by Lee Lynch
In a soft, deliberate voice, refusing her annoyance, Berry answered. “Who, Jaudon? Her family owns the house.”
“Jaudon is a her?” said the same woman.
She was trying to think of a scathing response when Allison cleared her throat and said, “Jaudon is one adorable strutting rooster.” Berry wondered if she should worry about Allison. Free love was the rage these days and she could imagine some of these women diving in without a moment’s hesitation. “Let’s get back to what we were doing.”
Berry, with gentle earnestness, examined first herself, then Cullie, using a chart in the book. No one found any threatening lumps. The students pledged to buy and carry the book to their classes to show their teachers and other students its wealth of information. They picked up their equipment, their paper towels slick with jelly, finished cleaning themselves, and gathered the stained exam table paper. At the door, they reached across shoulders and around waists in a group hug. Donna carried out the garbage bag of medical waste.
Cullie gave Allison and Berry extra hugs. “When do I get to spend time with you and the mysterious butch in the doorway?”
“Oh, I don’t know.” Berry was confused. Butch? Did Jaudon have to carry that label around with her on top of all the rest? She swore she liked gay men at the bar better than Berry’s friends. “Anyway, Allison met Jaudon.”
“She’s cute as a bug, but I make her nervous,” Allison said, with an open smile.
Again the uneasy feeling tackled Berry. Keep your mitts off my Jaudon. She declined to rassle her meanness this time.
Cullie told Allison, “You don’t make me one bit nervous, teach.”
“Bless you for saying so. I thought I scared away every last one of you rural butches.”
“It’s true y’all talk awful dad burn fancy. Do you do everything so fancy? How about some lessons in how we do things here in the country, teach?”
They looked at each other with face-stretching smiles.
“Why don’t you come visit with me tonight, Cullie?”
Here we go, Berry thought, annoyed and nervous. Allison was supposed to be in hiding, not dragging people to Vicker land and attracting attention. “You two get on out the door before some frog gets a mind to jump inside,” Berry replied with an attempt to sound hospitable.
Cullie said, “Smooch!”
The nearest frogs went silent as Cullie and Allison stepped along the wooden floor of the side porch. Berry went to give the all-clear to Gran and put the sheets in the wash. She saw a light under Jaudon’s door. She must have come in the back door.
Should she knock? Jaudon didn’t drink when she went out with Rigo, but she and Jaudon were changing so fast, she wouldn’t be surprised if that changed too. She wished they were changing together. Every day another barrier grew up between them and she didn’t know how to break through. She raised her hand to knock, hesitated, realized she was too faint-hearted to face Jaudon. How to make sense of the living room scene for her? She walked on by Jaudon’s door.
*
“You going to tell me what went on in there?” Jaudon sat on the edge of Berry’s bed after a wakeful night, wearing her pajamas and a put out expression.
She was put out. Berry ought to have told her there was going to be a…whatever went on last night. This morning, she awoke to the sound of a big pickup truck starting outside. One of those girls from yesterday afternoon was driving. Cullie? Did she stay the night with Allison?
Berry massaged Jaudon’s chest where the pajama top opened in a V. She explained, watching the incredulous expression on Jaudon’s face.
“I have leftover speculums. It might not be a bad idea for us to get familiar with our bodies. We might be able to spot trouble down the line.”
“Aw, heck, Berry. You want to do that to me?”
“If you’re willing. Practice on me, angel?”
After some arm twisting and a lot of instruction, Jaudon held a mirror for Berry. After that, she looked herself.
“How do I tell if what I’m seeing isn’t what it’s supposed to be?”
“That’s why you’re looking, so you’ll have a baseline for comparison.”
Jaudon gave a noisy sigh. “Okay, go ahead and do it to me. Better to know than die, I guess.”
Berry expected Jaudon to agree, but gave her one more surprise. “First, your breast exam.”
“What?”
“It’s another place we can head off trouble.”
“Jiminy,” Jaudon said as she took off her pajamas.
“No one but my Jaudon can combine self-exams with a Walt Disney character.”
“You have to admit, this is downright Goofy.”
“Hush up, and do what I’m doing. You’re probing for lumps or anything new or strange.”
“Mine are too small to grow extra bumps.” Jaudon was proud to be small. “I never asked for these things anyway.”
“They’re so soft,” said Berry and caressed them.
Jaudon swept Berry’s hand aside. “Quit fooling around. Or is this part of it?”
“With you, angel, yes. Okay, on your back and position your legs the way mine were.”
“I guess this won’t be the first time.”
“Hush. I’m greasing this up good so it shouldn’t hurt you, okay?”
A peacock shrieked outside and Jaudon recoiled. “Get it over with.”
“No need to rush. You have the mirror?”
Berry pushed the speculum.
Jaudon yelped. “I can’t, Berry. Take it out!”
“I’m so sorry, so sorry,” Berry repeated and repeated as she slowly, slowly withdrew the tiny bit of speculum she’d eased in. “I honestly could not have been gentler, Jaudon.”
“Oh, sweet Jehoshaphat. I must be all tore up.” Jaudon’s tears dripped onto the bed.
“My poor angel, you are so tiny inside. No wonder you don’t care for me going in there much.”
“See, I can’t be a regular woman if I wanted to. Men, babies, forget it.”
“Can you imagine what it’s like for women who don’t know how they’re built until they marry men?”
“Did any of the other girls have trouble last night?”
“Nothing was mentioned. There’s no shame to it. We’re every one of us built different.”
“Some of us more different than others.” Jaudon was shameful that yet another characteristic made her peculiar. If Berry was seeing how real girls looked, she might change her mind. “How come I don’t get as wettish down below as you?”
She cuddled Jaudon’s head against her breasts. “Wettish? I flood you out and you think you’re strange? I don’t know how to convince you, Jaudon, we’re all different.”
Jaudon had her lips pressed together hard. Berry was wiping gel off herself with tissues.
“If you were different? I’d adore you more. There’s not a soul on earth better than you, and I get to keep every special bit of you forever.”
She looked up at Berry. “You mean it?”
“’Course I do.” She kissed Jaudon and stroked her hair. As their love matured they continued to share long exciting kisses while listening to their big band music, but this wasn’t the time of day for music.
Jaudon continued to be shook up, but she bet Berry was in the mood for more today.
They continued kissing as Jaudon guided Berry onto her back.
“Jaudon, you’re going down under the sheets again?”
“Down under? You have Australia in mind, don’t you?”
“You are Goofy.”
Jaudon walked her fingers along Berry’s stomach. “Almost there.”
Berry was slick with that Vaseliney stuff. She was always smooth and silky wet, but this was nicer.
She loved Berry with every inch of herself. On impulse, she moved downward and kissed the part Berry called the outside labia. Berry gasped and let her legs fall open. Jaudon kissed the inside, the inner lips. She always imagined Berry pink and pretty there and was taking her time
admiring her. She wanted to worship the hidden glory of Berry and used her tongue and lips to do so. The other tidbit, she forgot the name, was tiny on Berry; when she kissed it, Berry acted as if she lit her on fire. Jaudon had never heard those kinds of sounds from Berry in all this time. She stuck her tongue inside to taste her.
Berry lifted herself up to press against Jaudon’s tongue. These were not things you learned in nursing classes, but she’d read about oral lovemaking. She wanted it to go on forever, this melding of Jaudon with the new sense of herself. She was connected to, and part of, everything. She wanted Jaudon to experience this. The release was indescribable. About now the house could fall apart around them for all she cared.
Jaudon reached an arm up to muffle the noises coming from someplace way inside Berry. She wanted to give Berry more, but Berry made her stop and got her head between Jaudon’s thighs. She concentrated on her building tremor. Yeah, it was good—Berry loving her enough to give back like this was the best. She wasn’t one to make sounds herself, but this sensation, she had to let off steam somehow. She pulled the pillow over her face and tried not to remember afterward what sounds she made.
Berry scrambled up into her arms. They held on until Berry’s alarm went off. Jaudon was going to miss half a class as it was.
“Go bang on Allison’s door to see if Cullie will give you a ride,” Berry said after they kissed, their mouths tasting of each other.
“That’s her filthy tank of a pickup?”
Berry nodded as she slid off her bed. “Probably.”
“She woke me starting the truck. She’s long gone, whoever she is.”
“Cullie’s one of the feminists helping with Allison.” Berry hesitated, remembering Cullie got as wet as she did during the self-exam. There was no narrowness inside Cullie. It was interesting, how different from each other two tomboy types could be. Not an observation she’d share with Jaudon. “I guess Cullie spent the night with Allison.”
“Helping?” Jaudon suggested. “The way I help you?”
“Get out of here.” She gave Jaudon a playful push. “I’ll be ready to go in ten minutes.”
“That’ll be the day.” Berry’s nightgown made a surprise landing around Jaudon’s neck. “Nice throw,” she called.
Predawn frolicking was an excellent idea. She never wanted to take Jaudon for granted or be guilty of neglecting the light of her life. The recent strain between them eased.
Chapter Nineteen
Berry and Jaudon weren’t home much. The nurses were finishing their clinicals, required humanities, med-surg, and medical ethics classes. Jaudon studied at home, on the job, during classes to get her credentials sooner rather than later.
Gran, who’d come back stronger than ever once she wasn’t under Eddie’s thumb, kept an eye on the property, visitors, mail, slick salesmen, lost varmints, and the revenuers—as she called the tax assessor and his cohort functionaries. Since Allison’s arrival, she took on guard duty in case the law came asking about a young woman fugitive.
Gran loved Allison, and described her as a fine young lady. Allison teased her about taking in a radical lesbian feminist activist, but Gran visited the trailer each day to chew the fat and give Allison advice about how to live her life.
“The Culpepper gal is over yonder quite a bit,” Gran told Jaudon and Berry one Sunday evening. Berry looked at Jaudon and knew she was thinking the same thing: Allison chose Cullie over Lari.
Unsullied white clouds took the shape of vapor trails. Palm fronds leaned motionless against the last graying blue in the sky. With each infrequent breeze came a leisurely rustling sound.
“And her white Westie. Cute as a bug’s ear, the three of them.” They were on the porch, citronella candle burning steady in the hushed night air. Gran was on the rocker they’d managed to save from Stinky Lane. It had belonged to Gran’s mother. Jaudon and Berry shared the porch swing. “Cullie takes Allison out places.”
Jaudon slammed a fist into her palm. “They don’t have the good sense God gave a goose, do they?” She turned to Berry. “Your friend is supposed to stay put. What do we know about Cullie? Or Allison? Do we know Allison’s last name?”
Gran was resolute. “Don’t know it, don’t want to know it. The less said, the less I have to tell the law.”
“Her name is Allison Millar,” said Berry. “She’s like us—she craves her Cullie time. Cullie’s nothing but a regular person.”
“What concerns me,” said Gran, “is them leading the law back here. And I’m going to talk to both of them about it. I’m very partial to Cullie, she’s funny as a gator on ice skates, but I suspect the dog is leaving puddles in the trailer.”
Jaudon pushed off the swing and stomped down the wooden steps. “It’ll smell to high heaven after a while. Allison’s overstayed her welcome, as far as I’m concerned.” She wrenched a weed from the ground.
Berry didn’t plan to sound as sharp as she did. “I never wanted Allison here in the first place.” She tried to practice the habit of consulting the Great Spirit. A few deep breaths did the trick, but half the time she forgot. “I’d like to give sanctuary to everyone who wants to patch up the world, but yes, Jaudon, I agree her time is at an end here on Pineapple Trail. It’s for Allison’s sake too—she knows she needs to keep moving. I’ll talk to the group tomorrow about finding the next place.”
“Allison won’t fight moving,” said Gran, “but I’ll miss her. She tells me she’s apprehensive out there. She believes someone’s watching her.”
Jaudon said, “Bless her little pea pickin’ toes. If the law was chasing me, Gran, I’d think I was being watched too.”
“Oh, Jaudon, Allison’s a good woman. She’s given up a lot to do what she thinks is right.”
“For your information, Berr, Cullie’s truck wasn’t out there this morning. It was Lari’s sporty foreign number. Again.”
Berry smiled as if she was swallowing a secret. “Lari might be delivering groceries, might not. Allison doesn’t believe in monogamy.”
Gran wrinkled up her forehead. “Monogamy. Like the Mormons do?”
“The opposite. Monogamy is sticking with one person till the end of your days. Allison wants variety.”
Gran nodded. “I’ll tell her to quit while she’s ahead and not make my mistake. You can see her and Cullie enjoy each other’s company. That Larissa Hand, she has an untrustworthy manner about her.”
Jaudon cringed at Berry’s comment about Allison and variety. When Jaudon met Cullie they hit it off like long lost pals. She even took Cullie up to the tree house. Cullie, of course, climbed the ladder with her dog under one arm. Zefer had whined on the ground as she watched them climb without her. Jaudon was none too pleased to hear Allison might be misbehaving on Cullie. “You’re saying Allison sleeps around.”
“I don’t know what she does, angel, only what she tells me she believes.”
“I hope her morals aren’t contagious.”
“Not in this household they aren’t,” Berry said.
“You girls are smarter than I was. Eddie turned into a real Dill pickle as soon as I told him to move in. But your grandpa died of the flu a month before your mother was born. Life was very hard on my own. I needed a man.”
Not that man, you didn’t, Berry thought with some viciousness. She didn’t dare look at Jaudon, who must be thinking the same thing. If Ma and Pa stayed, Gran might never have needed to take up with someone like him. Eddie’s my fault too, she thought. It’s a wonder I don’t drive Gran away along with Ma and Pa.
“Now I have no idea what I did need a man for.”
Berry got up and hugged Gran. “We’ll always take care of you.”
Gran patted her shoulder. “I know, pet, and I’m ever grateful. Life gets topsy-turvy at times and makes someone think. One day your life is all ahead of you and the next you’re nearing the end. As soon as I feel up to it, I plan to make hay while the sun shines, but don’t you worry, I won’t shame your momma and get you tossed out of you
r house and home by drinking and gambling and carrying on, though I wouldn’t rule out a bingo game on occasion.”
Berry laughed, but Jaudon was on a different channel altogether. “Is Allison one of those fools who want to let Vietnam go Communist?”
“No. She wants to get Americans home safe.”
“Well, we can’t stand by and let the Commies take over.” It burned Jaudon up how Allison, with every freedom in the world, didn’t appreciate what Bat was doing over there. If she was a man, and didn’t have Berry, she’d go kill as many Commies as possible.
Berry was taken aback by Jaudon’s anger. She suspected it wasn’t all about Vietnam, but more about her own war with the world over being different.
“She’s not a Communist, Jaudon. Allison talks a lot about protecting democracy.”
“Why is she hiding then? America stands for fair trials.”
Gran spoke up. “The girl prefers to be on the lam than locked up for a crime she didn’t commit. Wouldn’t you, Jaudon?”
“I’m not about to poke my nose into government business. Sterilize away. This whole planet is getting too crowded.”
Berry looked at her grandmother, whose eyebrows were raised high.
Gran said, “Jaudon, Jaudon. You’re so angry.”
“No, I’m not. Miss Feminist is more trouble than a houseful of hornets. And this unfaithful business. How do I know she’s not going to go after you, Berry?”
Gran tsked. “Jaudon, don’t look trouble in the mouth.”
“She might talk you into believing we shouldn’t be together.”
“I have a mind of my own, Jaudon. Not Allison, not anybody’s going to come between us.”
The distance between Berry and Jaudon yawned wider. They watched an armadillo amble across the front yard.
“You’re in quite a sulk, Jaudon,” said Gran.
Am I being dim-witted, thought Jaudon. Stubborn? Don’t I have a claim to be uneasy? Why were they looking at her like she was too dense to live? She scraped back her chair. “Hey. I’m getting ready to run a chain of stores and to make some money at it. I don’t have time to live with my head on Allison’s cloud.”