The frocked girls went to the cage, and Annie tripped the latch with her nose. Jane poked her head into the rabbit cage. No one noticed, not even the owner of the rabbit. Jane picked the bunny up by the scruff of its neck and the creature benignly agreed as if Jane were a fireman carrying it to safety. Then the bunny did the queerest thing—it climbed on top of Jane’s back and balanced herself—it would later be revealed that it was a she-bunny. Jane looked at Annie as if to confer, and they began to move toward the door.
Gitana looked into the camera lens and screamed, “We’ve got to stop this!” Her face loomed large in the camera lens. “Don’t they realize this is a church?”
“You said that before. I don’t think they care,” Bud said. “That’s the beauty of animals, they have a certain amorality when it comes to the instinctual.”
The camera lurched, and it became apparent that Bud had been yanked off the pew and forceably moved down the aisle against the crowd as the pets and their people were resuming their seats.
“We’ve got to save the bunny,” Gitana said.
They rushed outside the church, but Annie, Jane and the bunny were nowhere in sight.
“Oh my, God, they’ve gone and done it. They’re murderers,” Gitana said, wringing her hands.
“There is no evidence of that,” Bud said. She panned the church garden.
“There they are,” Bud said, pointing to the corner of the garden dedicated to Saint Francis of Assissi. Annie and Jane lay on the grass, their frocks spread out, intently watching the rabbit eat grass. It looked benignly pastoral.
Gitana went to lunge, Bud put up a restraining arm. “Don’t startle them.”
“But the rabbit is still alive,” Gitana said.
“And if you go at them like that it might not continue to be,” Bud said.
Gitana considered this.
There was such a thing as a “considering face,” Chase thought as the camera captured it. She glanced around at her companions. Everyone was rapt, waiting to see how the drama would play out, to see whether what they thought would happen happened or if the miraculous would occur.
Chase realized she was a doubter when she whispered to Bud, “Is this going to get gory?” The dogs chased rabbits, but they’d never caught one so Chase didn’t know for certain what they would do if they ever did.
“You’ll have to wait and see,” Bud replied.
Chase went to chew a cuticle. Bud slapped her hand.
Jane sniffed the bunny. They touched noses, and Jane licked the bunny’s face. Annie did the same and then the three of them sat in companionable silence.
“What the hell?” Chase said.
Donna shushed her. The auditorium was silent. Everyone held their breath.
The whole thing was downright bizarre, Chase thought. She waited for the ugly denouement that seemed certain, but then it didn’t happen. The rabbit hopped over and sat between the dogs and all three ate grass. Gitana, Bud and the camera stopped. The film no longer joggled. Everything in time stopped—a window where a still frame replaced the whirl of activity. Jane must have heard Gitana and Bud. She turned her head slowly and observed. She licked her lips and appeared to study them. Then, instead of mauling the rabbit, she licked it as if to say to the humans, “Do you see? I know you assumed the worst and it didn’t happen—there is love here, not hate.”
The man whose rabbit it was stood next to Gitana and Bud watching the dogs and the rabbit. “Well, I’ll be goddamned,” he said. He noticed his slip. “Pardon me.”
Gitana smiled at him.
“And when the lion lays down with the lamb,” he said.
“Yes,” she said.
That was the end of the film. The auditorium erupted in applause.
Chase hugged Bud while the rest of them clapped. “That was fucking great,” Chase said.
“Wait until you see the next one.”
Donna stared down at the crowd. “Wow. Do you think they got it?”
“Got what?” Chase said, sitting down with relief that the dogs didn’t eat the rabbit.
“That the lesbian nation needs to get out of faction-land and just be together as a community—not all this us-them dichotomy,” Donna said.
“That’s deep,” Chase said, “but I wouldn’t count on a miraculous solution to Lacey’s problem of overseeing a war zone of hegemonies.”
Bud nodded.
“Do you think all the time that Annie and Jane chased rabbits that they were just curious and wanted to know a rabbit?” Addison said. “Maybe there is such a thing as Wind in the Willows.”
“I don’t know,” Chase said.
The audience sat back down, and Bud started the next film. “This one is going to warm them up for Dr. Robicheck.”
“What is it about?” Chase said.
Donna looked away. “I am only doing this for the sake of community, and I hope you will all understand that I did my best in a disasterous situation.”
“What?” Chase said.
“Just watch,” Bud said.
The film began with red flashing lights—Bud had worn her Contour HD 1080P helmet camera and set her Panasonic Digital camera in the back window of Donna’s car. In this way she’d been able to catch most of the angles and all of the sound when she combined both videos during the editing process.
“Officer, what exactly have we done?” Gitana asked.
“I was going the speed limit, my tags are current, the taillights are operable and I didn’t have an obstructed windshield,” Donna blurted.
“Ma’am, I need your license and registration. Hand them over slowly and keep your hands in plain sight. Do you understand?” He pulled his trousers up about his hips and wiggled from side to side.
Bud whispered to Gitana, “Chase would have had a heyday with that gesture except that she’s incarcerated as a political prisoner and at this rate the rest of the family might end up in the pokey.”
“No talking,” the officer said, glaring at Gitana and then Bud. He seemed to notice the helmet but went back to studying Donna’s paperwork, which had become crumpled and sweaty from Donna holding it too tightly. “I’m going to run this,” he said, backing away slowly. “No one move.” He eyed them warily. He went to the cruiser door and ran Donna’s information on his computer.
“I have a clean record,” Donna blathered.
“I need you to open the trunk,” he said as he checked out the rest of the car.
“Can I get down from here? It’s getting really hot,” Bud said. She’d used the Contour 1080 to show her hand on the roof and the heat rising from it so the viewers would get a sense of her location as well as her predicament.
The police officer squinted at her as if assessing the threat. “Do it slowly and keep your hands where I can see them, and what is that thing on your head?”
“It’s a bike helmet.”
“She’s fucking six and not overly large for her age. What do you think she is, a miniature Bugsy Malone?” Gitana said.
“Ma’am,” the police officer said in a warning tone.
Bud made the slashing-her-throat motion at her mother, who ignored her. The TM900 caught this gesture on video.
“No, really, what have we done?” Gitana said, her face getting red. “Surely, we are entitled to know.”
“Officer, pay her no mind. She is going through the change of life and you know what that can do to a person,” Donna said.
“Change of life? What the hell does that mean?” he said as he looked under the car.
Bud felt the need to be helpful. She looked under the car with him. He stared at her. “What are you doing?”
“I don’t know,” Bud responded. “What are you doing?”
“Looking under the car.”
“So am I. What are we looking for?”
“That’s for me to know and you to find out,” he said.
“This is not the school playground,” Gitana yelled. “What are we being charged with?”
“You’re
going to get charged with…” he appeared to be thinking.
“Being rude,” Donna suggested. “I mean you haven’t arrested her so it can’t be resisting arrest.”
“And there is the change of life thing,” Bud added.
“The change thing. What exactly is that?” he inquired.
Bud supplied the info. “It’s when a woman stops having her period…”
He put up his hand. “Stop right there.”
“And her ovaries stop producing as much estrogen,” Bud continued undaunted.
“Hot flashes ensue and then it is advisable to start some sort of hormone therapy in order to correct that and help with the erratic mood swings, some of which you may have noticed.” She pointed at Gitana.
“Cease and desist or you will all being going downtown—I mean it.”
“But I really feel that natural hormone therapy using—” Gitana clamped her hand over Donna’s mouth.
“Yes, sir. Now what do you need us to do?” Gitana said, coming back to her senses.
“Open the trunk. Your car fits the description called in by the border patrol—we are looking for illegal aliens. Now, I need your vehicle keys.” He held out his enormous hairy-knuckled hand.
Donna shook her head.
“Give him the keys. We don’t have illegal aliens in the trunk,” Gitana said.
Bud was standing close to the police officer capturing everything on tape. He looked down at her. “Is that a camera?” he asked.
“Yes, sir. I am making a documentary,” Bud replied.
“You’re filming me?”
“If it’s all right with you. If I use this footage, I would send you a release form.”
He smoothed back his hair and pulled up his pants again. “I don’t see a problem with it. Now, open the trunk.”
“I can’t. I won’t!” Donna said, getting angry.
“It’s just as I suspected,” he said, playing to the camera. He moved toward the trunk. He turned to Bud, “Are you getting this?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Open the trunk, or I will be forced to blow the lock.”
“No! It’s my trunk and what is in my trunk stays in my trunk.”
The standoff began. Bud panned from one stern, resolute face to another.
“Donna, for fuck’s sake open the trunk,” Gitana said.
“Not in front of the child,” the officer said.
“You weren’t concerned with her before when she was frying on top of the car,” Gitana said curtly.
“I didn’t know she was a filmmaker then,” he replied. “Now, open the trunk, or I will be forced to compromise the lock.” He pulled out his revolver to illustrate the point.
“What if there are people in the trunk? You’ll kill someone,” Gitana said.
“Are there?” he said.
“No. But if there were,” Gitana said. She glanced over at Donna. “There aren’t, are there?”
Donna eyed the gun. She must have realized the gravity of the situation because without another word she handed the keys over.
The police officer eyed her warily and went to the trunk. “I’m coming in. Put your hands where I can see them,” he said to the trunk.
Donna covered her face with her hands.
Gitana and Bud stared at her. “Do you know what’s in the trunk?” Gitana asked.
“No, but it must be something bad or Donna wouldn’t be freaking like this,” Bud replied.
“It’s bad,” Donna said through splayed fingers.
“What is it?” Gitana said, alarmed.
“You’ll see.”
“Ma’am, can you explain this?” His face was beet red.
Donna walked over, her head bowed. Gitana and Bud followed her and they all peered in the trunk. It looked like a mobile sex toy shop. There were boxes of dildos in every conceivable color of the rainbow according to the cover photos on the top of each box. There were black leather harnesses and boxes of lubricant in a variety of flavors along with vibrators, butt plugs and clitoral-stimulating devices that resembled a human forefinger.
“Donna?” Gitana said.
“It’s for a demonstration class at the Institute,” Donna blurted.
“Are those rubber penises?” the police officer asked, his face getting redder.
“They are commonly referred to as dildos, and they have a long history dating back to Roman times,” Bud said.
They all stared at her.
“It’s all on Wikipedia,” Bud explained.
“Do you have a license for these?” he asked, picking up a box and staring at the photo on the top of the box. He opened it slowly and peered inside. He shut the lid quickly. “What on earth is that thing?”
“It’s a Muffin Mucker,” Donna said, seeming to regain some of her confidence.
Bud reached up to the camera and hit the zoom feature. Gitana saw Bud do it and put her hand over the lens. “That’s censorship,” Bud said. It wouldn’t matter. The Panasonic digital camera was filming away from the back of the car through the crack between the trunk and the rear of the car. It added an interesting perspective.
“No, it’s parental control.” She took the box from the now shell-shocked police officer. “It appears to vibrate as well, you know…” she glanced down at Bud, who now had the camera off her head and was cleaning the smudged lens. “And it has this added attachment for…”
The police officer held up his hand. “That’s enough.”
“What does she need a license for? It’s not like she’s going to drive a penis,” Bud said.
“A business license to sell those…things,” he sputtered, pointing at the trunk with distaste.
“But I’m not selling them. They’re for a class on ‘Sex Toys for the Novice.’ Believe it or not there are a lot of women out there who know nothing about sexual aids,” Donna said, her composure now intact. “I have the invoice that proves I purchased them at full price, and I am not selling them. I am simply delivering them to the Institute. I am the CFO, which more or less makes me a purchasing agent of sorts, especially for purchases of this sort.”
He held up his hand again. “That is enough, more than enough information.” He shut the trunk and handed over Donna’s license and registration. “You may go.”
“Thank you, Officer,” Donna said pleasantly as if he’d only given her directions to a museum or tourist attraction.
Once in the car, Donna said, “Well, that didn’t go as badly as I thought.”
Bud had edited out the part where Donna had banged her head on the steering wheel and swore them all to silence. She had restarted the video after everyone had calmed down a bit, but that was a director’s prerogative.
Gitana leaned back on the headrest and said, “Great mother of God, that had to be the most embarrassing moment of my entire life.”
“I think you handled it pretty well. I mean you did explain the Muffin Mucker rather succinctly,” Donna said. She started the car. She glanced in the rearview mirror and put on her turn indicator.
“You’re a very good driver,” Bud said. She patted Gitana’s shoulder. “Those things are just a natural part of people’s sexual lives.”
“How do you know about people’s sexual lives?” Gitana said, turning around to look at her daughter. “Oh, never mind. I keep forgetting you know everything.”
“Except what a penis looks like in 3-D.”
“Well, you got an eyeful of facsimiles today,” Gitana said.
“Yup.”
“See this whole thing was rather educational, after all,” Donna said, setting the cruise control for sixty-five. Then she changed her mind. “I think I’ll set it for seventy-two.”
“I was going to suggest that,” Bud said.
Bud did a “That’s all folks” imitation using a dildo instead of a carrot and the screen ran the credits.
Bud turned to smile at Chase.
The angry lesbians were laughing so hard the auditorium echoed with it. Donna, sitting in the
screening room, had her face in her hands. “It was awful, so awful.”
“I thought it was hilarious,” Isabel said, rubbing Donna’s back.
Chase sat with her mouth open. “No one ever mentioned any of this to me. In fact, it’s news to me.”
Addison appeared to be musing. “It was definitely enlightening. That Muffin Mucker could put a dent in teen pregnancy.”
“You are sworn to silence on this,” Chase said. “Your mom might not be too mad, but Stella would hang me upside down by my toes and make me eat oatmeal.”
“Oatmeal?” Addison said.
“Ever tried to eat something that thick and viscous while hanging upside down?” Chase said.
“Uh, no,” Addison said.
“I’ve seen it done and stuff comes out your nose. Regatta Vasquez ate an oatmeal cookie while hanging from the monkey bars, and it wasn’t pretty,” Chase said.
They all stared at her. “What?” Chase said.
“Let’s go see what’s happening in the war zone, shall we?” Donna said.
When they got to the stage, Dr. Robicheck and Lacey were speaking to some women who were smiling. Lacey gave them a thumbs-up motion. Chase took this to be a good sign. She lost Bud and Addison in the crowd of admirers. She watched as Bud’s head of curls moved along with people. She tried to be okay with this—Addison was with her. It wasn’t like someone would abduct her…
Chase suddenly imagined a group of paramilitary lesbians taking hold of Bud and holding her for ransom so they could gain control of the Institute. She took a few deep breaths and tried to feel normal, which, as usual, didn’t work. She never had mastered normal. Instead, she contemplated getting a GPS bracelet for Bud so she could be located anywhere. Oh, God, now she was really getting off track.
Lacey and Donna broke her train of paranoid thoughts. “We’ve got them to agree to meet with Dr. Robicheck in the library right now. Donna and I are going with,” Lacey said, beaming with enthusiasm.
Chase touched Donna’s arm before she followed Lacey. “How long do you think the effects of laughter last?”
Donna shrugged. “Not long enough.”
Chapter Sixteen—Double Jeopardy
“Chase, don’t you think you might be overextending yourself?” Gitana asked, looking around the writing studio.
In the Unlikely Event... Page 20