by Nicole Conn
She finally got close to utter fatigue, her legs shaking as she slowly removed herself from the pool. She felt like jelly as she flopped into her deck chair, her breathing heavy and labored as she let the water dry in the sun. Finally, finally, she felt a bit of relaxation ooze through her limbs. She was just shutting her eyes when the doorbell rang.
God, if Margaret was trying any more of her maneuvers, Peyton was going to seriously lose her temper. She was already close to doing so as she opened the door and she was ready to let her have it. But it wasn’t Margaret. It was Elena.
Peyton stood with her mouth in mid-motion. She could not have been more surprised to see Elena, standing there, looking utterly enchanting in her jeans and soft deep blue cashmere sweater, the jewel tone enhancing her already exotic features. Elena’s hair was loosely pinned, allowing the lush wavy thickness to fall about her shoulders. Peyton realized she was staring.
Elena glanced over Peyton, looking very sleek in her bikini, noticing the lean muscular build of her body, how finely toned Peyton’s body was, how strong and athletic. They both stood, frozen.
“I...I stopped by earlier but you weren’t here.”
“Oh...okay.”
“I’m sorry, I just couldn’t wait—I wanted you to see your photos.” Elena removed a couple of them from the special packaging she was carrying. Peyton, still trying to catch her breath, looked a bit queasy. Elena blustered along, proudly presenting her favorite headshot, bursting with a sort of parental pride, but at the same time feeling a bit shy.
“You look amazing, Peyton...” Elena glanced at her and then down at the pictures.
“Yeah...they’re—wow...”
Elena now felt a bit foolish and uncomfortable. “I…I should have called first.”
“No...it’s fine. You just didn’t need to come all the way over...here.”
Elena considered this, shook her head. “Yeah, well I guess this isn’t a good time—”
“No. NO! I...I...actually—” Peyton’s eyes darted about as she tried to figure out what to do. Feeling like a caged animal, but knowing that if she didn’t do this, and do it now, she’d have to live with the gnawing anxiety even longer. “This…this is as good a time as any. Uh...do you think you could give me a sec?”
Elena nodded uncertainly. Peyton grimaced, put up a hand, and then as she was about to dash back in, quickly turned to Elena. “Just come in…I’ll be out in a sec.”
Peyton raced around her bedroom, frantic, trying to get dressed, attempting to quell her panic, lamenting under her breath, “It’n gth, “s okay, it’s okay, it’s okay…”
She tried on one shirt, another. Scrambling, picked up a third shirt, silk, and accidentally tore it in her haste. “Shit!”
She ran into her closet, grabbed the nearest shirt she could find, stopped to catch her breath. Her pants! Where were her jeans?
“It’s okay, it’s okay, it’s okay!” But nothing was working. She stared in the mirror, saw how pale she looked. “Oh my God!... Oh for chrissakes, just tell her...”
When Peyton reappeared in the living room, awkward and self-conscious, she noticed that Elena looked about as uncomfortable as she felt. She motioned her to sit.
They both did so, stiff and formal. Peyton turned to face Elena, but that made her even more nervous, so she turned away, not looking at her.
“So look,” Peyton began, clearing her throat. “Elena...”
“I really should have called first.” Elena shook her head, feeling terribly off-kilter.
Peyton took a deep breath. “I...I have to talk to you about something.”
“Sure. Are you okay?”
“Uhmm...actually no. I mean nothing seriously is wrong, it’s just that...well...,” Peyton stood up and changed tack. “Would you like some Breakfast Eng…I mean English Breakfast? Because I have some in the kit—”
“For God’s sake, Peyton. What’s going on?”
Peyton let out a deep breath, scratched her forearm, started, then stopped, then started again, not quite certain how to deliver the information she needed to give. “Christ...this is ridiculous...first of all…you’re straight. Second of all, you’re straight—AND married—and, oh my God, I so didn’t want this to happen—” Peyton furtively glanced at Elena to see how she was taking it, but she simply sat on the chaise, silent, inscrutable.
Peyton sat back down, and as if summing up her case. “Because well…you know I’m a lesbian.”
“Uhmm...yes.” Elena responded, a bit offended.
“So...well, that’s it.”
“That’s what?”
“What I just said.”
“Which is...” Elena’s amazing brown eyes pierced through Peyton until she could no longer even look at her.
“That...that I’m—” Then under her breath, “Oh for God’s sake…” Then aloud, “I...I like you, Elena.”
“I like you too,” Elena blurted.
“No,” Peyton was now frustrated. “More than I should.”
A long silence followed. Elena didn’t move. She was starting to get it.
“So...we don’t have to—you know—talk about it any further…I’m fine with that...let’s just take some space, not spend so much time—”
“No! NO!...no oh GOD!”
Peyton and Elena were both equally surprised at her outburst.
“No...I don’t want for us not to spend time together. ” Elena’s voice was laced with pain.
“But you heard what I just said—“
“Yes, but I just found you...” Elena looked about, startled at herself, scared. “We need to be in each others’ lives,” she continued as if it were self-evident, followed by yet another burst of incredulity. “Oh God, no! No!”
They sat, neither moving.
“Peyton—look...” Elena began to bargain. “I just feel like you are my absolute best friend...I just know we can get around this. I don’t want to not be with you. And you can have,” she said with all the affirmation in her she could summon, “all of me…”
Peyton glanced up at her and stared, nonplussed. Elena looked as confused as she did, momentarily trying to regain her bearings, as they both grappled with the discussion, what it meant for each of them.
“I mean...all of it—all of me except for that. All of me…”
“Just so you understand.” Peyton put out her hands as if trying to explain to a child. “For a lesbian that is a big deal.”
Elena laughed, realizing how ridiculous she sounded.
Peyton tried to diffuse the tension. “Well, at least in the beginning.”
“Let’s have some wine.” Elena put her hand back on Peyton’s forearm, this time leaving it there. “We’ll make a plan. Just please…please don’t take you away from me.”
For the first time, Elena looked small and scared, and Peyton found that she could not deny her. She nodded, reassuring.
“I’ll get the wine.”
*
“Yes, these are God’s children but they have lost their way.” Barry’s voice held the same rich tone, luxuriant andighuxurian lulling, that it always had. Part of his charm and success with his congregants was his ability to make his listeners want to believe everything that came out of his mouth. Not the content necessarily, but the convincing and inviting manner in which it was conveyed. “And we do not reward a deviant course by allowing it the sacred sacrament and gift of marriage.”
Elena sat in her usual pew, Nash next to her and Tori next to him, all dressed in their church wear, sitting as they all had sat for years, Elena listening as she had listened countless Sundays, half in and out, spending most of her time checking off and making new lists of the tasks and prioritizing them in the ways which were necessary to run their lives. But now, now Barry was talking about an issue, yes, which she had scarcely paid attention to before, but now held meaning because it pertained to Peyton. Elena could not square the fact that she had not only at times fully disagreed with the merits of Barry’s service, but for
years she had been complicit in his words by sitting in the same pew, week after week, never saying a word. Doing nothing. Just being there as the words were allowed to float out into the world and do whatever harm they might.
She couldn’t take it anymore. Her eyes met Barry’s. She saw in them a certain resolve, a steely kind of patronizing she had never before seen. She wasn’t sure how much of it was performance and how much of it was reality. Either one scared her.
“They think if they twist enough arms in the political arena they will win this prize.” His eyes did not leave hers. “But marriage is the most precious right we hold.”
Elena’s jaw tightened. It was not something that ever had occurred to her to do, or that she had the right to do. But she got up and walked out of the service.
Barry’s voice rose. “It must not be tarnished.”
To Elena’s astonishment, some of congregation followed her exit. Among them, Nash and Tori.
Behind her, Barry thundered, “It WILL NOT be tarnished!”
“Amen,” came the response from those remaining in the church.
*
Elena had been waiting for hours, knowing that at some point Barry would have finished up the last of his paperwork and parish visits and would come through the front door. And would do what he was doing now. Slam the door and walk right up to where Elena sat at her computer.
“What the hell is going on with you?” His face was red, angry. “Do you know what it looks like when my family walks out of a sermon?”
Elena glanced at both Tori and Nash, who both peeked up from their books in the living room.
“Barry—don’t.”
“You know there’s a certain amount of this stufr="of thisf I just have to do. We’ve talked about this before.”
“Yes, Barry, I’m very familiar with the ‘greater good’ speech.”
“And these compromises used to be fine for you—until now. What the—”
Nash closed his book, shook his head. “You really amaze me, Dad. I know you don’t even believe that crap. You’ve had gay friends. Back in your grand ‘theah-tah’ days.”
Barry glanced at his son then back to Elena.
“Look, Nash, I just think it’s important for people to understand that they cannot be rewarded for bad behavior.”
“‘Bad behavior?’” Nash jumped up from the couch and approached his father. “Get real, Dad. Selling your soul is bad behavior. Loving someone isn’t.”
Fuming, Nash shook his head in unveiled disgust and stormed from the room.
“Yeah and ya know, Poppa Bear, the whole abomination thing—my gosh, the Bible also says it’s—” Tori dropped her air quotes again, “an abomination to eat rabbit or shrimp. Heck, it says that if you work on the Sabbath—which you do all the time, Poppa Bear, you should be put to death. Talk about your uber-literalism—”
“Tori, that’s enough!”
“Well...” Tori shrugged. “The reality is, the gays are here to stay. I don’t know anyone who doesn’t know or have a gay friend, brother, uncle, sister. It’s only a matter of time before this whole marriage discussion is so yesterday’s french fries!”
Elena got up and, trying to end the conversation by means of distraction, began to tidy.
“Look, Tori, you and Nash are going to have to trust my judgment on this and keep your opinions to yourself. I need to keep this church running, and that’s all there is to it.”
Elena saw Barry’s body tense, then he too stormed from the room. Elena was about to go after him, but Tori stopped her with a gesture, and began to assist with the clean up.
“Let me help.” Tori began to bus some meal remnants. “You know Nash needs,” she glanced at her watch, “roughly another nine and a half minutes before he cools down and Poppa Bear probably another half hour, so it’s sort of pointless to try and reason with them now.”
They both entered the kitchen and cleaned side by side in silence for several minutes until Elena began to wipe the dishes and put them away. Tori stopped her mid-stride, gently extracted the dish towel.
“Did you know between the Utah Mormons, who funded Prop 8, and the Church of Latter-day Saints here in California, those propagandist crazies raised over thirty-eight million dollars—altogether the money raised ftopney raior and against was three times more than for any other kind of—” Again Tori used air quotes, “—social issue brought to ballot. But Momma Bear, the Latter-day Saints is the home of Millie’s best friend and everyone knows Millie’s the money at Poppa Bear’s church. I guess we should cut him some slack—cuz he’s pretty screwed if he doesn’t toe the line.”
Elena listened intently. She hated injustice, but while she was vaguely aware that injustice happened on a global scale, daily, she knew she had for years been paying very little attention. At this point she was so tired she did not want to delve any deeper into what all of this might mean, or continue this conversation. She tried misdirection.
“Tori, does it ever hurt to carry all that information in that head of yours?”
“Like a horse to water, gotta drink...gotta think.”
“Well, you will never bore anyone, that’s for sure.”
“It might not just be pandering, though, Momma Bear. It might be that he’s afraid the gays are going to destroy the fabric of his own marriage.”
As Tori handed Elena a plate, her sweet eyes pegged Elena’s with the unspoken question.
*
The next afternoon Elena was supposed to have a meeting with Millie, but she told Elena, “We have a serious, and I mean serious to the toenails, crisis with one of the board members, she’s electing to reduce the altar shrubs! We voted on that if you recall, and I’m not putting my hard-earned money into reducing all that beautiful altar work I had done, Elena. No sirree. So, I’m sorry to do this to you at the last minute, but I knew you’d understand. I just can’t make our fundraising meeting—but we can reschedule to Tuesday evening, we’ll squeeze it in, like everything else we do. The Good Lord give us strength Elena—how else do we manage?” Millie asked but then answered herself, “By choosing, us, Elena. We were blessed, Elena, do you understand that? Chosen by the Divine Power to do his bidding. I know you’re just married to the man, but your support of Barry’s work is just as critical—maybe not as important, certainly—but without it Barry wouldn’t have the hours he needs to do his good works. And God blessed me with the resources to get on out there and fund the good fight. Okay, glory be, sister.” Millie laughed good naturedly at her hipster talk. “We’ll sing God’s praises another day!”
Elena couldn’t get off the phone fast enough. But one thing kept rankling her long after the conversation had ended. The concept of being chosen. Chosen by anyone. Chosen for what? And wasn’t that akin to being trapped? And what was her purpose here if she had been chosen?
She would never be able to sever her connection to a spiritual life, a belief in the divine, but she certainly would like to exorcise the entire cultish dogma of the church to which she now found herself enslaved. She had begun to feel a purpose, lately. A new purpose. Working with Peyton, extolling the virtues of women who had made grand strides in their lives—either thd n—eithrough their wonderful role-modeling of what women could do when they put their mind to it—the Amelia Earharts, the Madame Curies, the breakthrough women like Martina Navra—whatever that tennis star’s name was—she had broken barriers and then even more by her brave stance on coming out.
The excitement Elena felt around the Women’s Glory Project injected through her like a jolt suddenly, and she knew what she felt might be akin to what Tyler felt about his pathway in life. Working on this book and being a part of something bigger, outside of herself, even exploring the softer, less “sexy” stories of mothers who adopted multiple disabled children, of teachers who gave up Harvard professorships to teach in the inner city, of female Navy Seals serving their country—all of it gave Elena the first sense of purpose she had had since she became a mother to her young baby Na
sh, when taking care of his needs made her feel useful. But after…after Sarah, it was still so difficult to think of her without falling apart. Elena knew it was from that point forward that she had felt so little purpose in life. As if by losing her own daughter she was nothing more than a failure. She had felt the only job left to her in life was to support Barry so he could function at maximum capacity, and to make sure Nash got his needs met too, however small or insignificant any of it was—whether it was picking up Barry’s dry cleaning or getting Nash to soccer practice on time, she had made sure she did every meaningless errand with as much attention and focus she could put onto it. To make up for it…for Sarah. Sure these things were important to running her family smoothly—and to the happiness of those she loved but what did any of that have to do with the grander scheme of things, any contribution beyond that? The Women’s Glory Project and working with Peyton made her feel special. Important. Fueled by the fire this realization ignited in her, Elena grabbed her camera and decided not to waste a moment afforded by this cancellation of Millie’s. She was going to turn around what would have been most certainly a waste of time and go out and shoot. Shoot anything and everything.
Elena wandered through the park. She shot frame after frame, and each time it felt so good to feel that spark of passion she had always had for her work. This was what she had studied, all those years ago, yes, along with the acting, which had just been an inhibited young girl’s pipedream. Even then she did not like to be in front of a camera. She was much happier behind it as she had discovered when they’d needed someone to take the still photography for one of the school plays.
Everyone had commented on how spectacular her work had been, the old black-and-white grainy prints somehow capturing the real essence of the performers. And just like back then, she felt a natural kinship to the frame, the concept of still storytelling. It energized her.
As she continued walking through the park, she wondered what Peyton would think of these shots, then shook her head. Don’t be silly, she’s not going to be interested in these nature shots—what do they have to do with The Glory Project? Yet, Elena knew Peyton would look at each one and comment on it, and she could see her as she did so, how the sinewy muscles in her forearm would move as she held them in her hands and at the same time how gentle and strong those hands were. She had allowed herself to come to terms with the fact that she found Peyton attractive. Actually, she found in her a handsomeness born of the most basic qualities; the sweet vulnerability that came out of Peyton even when she tried to mask it with a g he it witruff nonchalance. And that face…unlike any other face she had studied. When she photographed, she did study every aspect of a person’s composition. With Peyton’s face she hadn’t so much studied as memorized how the slight curl line formed along the side of her lip and coiled so sweetly when she smiled, the way her eyes looked hazel one moment, turning a spirited brilliant green when Peyton got excited, how the shape of Peyton’s strong square jawline met a perfect dimpled chin, the exact triumphant arch of her upper lip, those lips…she had beautiful soft…