by JD Glass
“I don’t understand.”
Fran closed her eyes a moment, then opened them. She showed me the other side of her hand.
“Oh…” I gasped softly, understanding what I saw, what it meant. It was as if she had dipped only the front of her fingers in a red so brilliant it seemed almost unreal, while the center of her palm gleamed wetly, a darker color, from where it had pooled. Blood. My blood.
Fran closed her hand and pulled it away from me. “Nina…” she began and stopped, staring at me with golden eyes gone dark. “Nina…why…I mean, just—oh!” She pulled me into her arms and began to truly weep, tucking her head into my shoulder.
I wrapped myself around her as her shoulders heaved, rocking her, hopefully calming her.
“Shh…shh…” I murmured, planting kisses into her hair. I took her hand, the one she had curled to her chest, and laced my fingers through it. I made her open it up and pressed my palm against hers. It seemed appropriate—this, my hand, had been the one inside of her. Essence to essence. It seemed right ABC to bring them together.
“Fran,” I sighed. I kissed our joined hands, kissed her knuckles, her fingertips. I spread her fingers open and exposed her still-damp palm. I touched my fingertips to it and on impulse, painted a dot on my chest with it. I did the same to her.
Finally, she spoke. “Why, Nina, why did you—”
She shrugged helplessly when I put my fingers to her lips.
“Don’t you see?” I asked, smiling at her gently. I could feel that smile widen as I remembered the sound that I’d heard, the sound of soft kisses. I knew what it was—it was the sound of us, the sound of making love, and despite the cool morning air, the realization warmed me throughout.
Fran shook her head, not yet knowing what I saw or heard.
The warmth of my heart grew through me, filling me, overflowing until it floated above my skin, and I had to share that feeling, that knowledge, with her. I shifted so that her back leaned against my chest, and I still rocked her lightly as I told her what it meant.
“No matter what happens,” I whispered, “this is yours.” I kissed her head, then moved her hair so I could kiss her neck and shoulder. “If I died tomorrow…”
She shivered violently at those words, then twisted around to kiss me fiercely. “Don’t say that! You’re not allowed to say that,” she pleaded as she bowled me over with her strength and her fear and her love.
Her kiss was fueled by adrenaline, and I let her surge against me, reassure herself again that I was solid as her lips crushed mine.
“Whatever happens, Fran,” I explained softly as we broke apart and she gazed at me, “this…” and I took her hand and closed her fingers over her palm, “this will always be yours.” I rolled her gently over to prove it.
I woke up on an unfamiliar world, a different, softer world—one that held the unbelievable sight of Francesca Kitt DiTomassa wrapped protectively around me, her golden mane spread across my throat, her hand cupping my breast and its thumb occasionally tracing its curve, and a splendidly shaped leg draped over mine. I lay there, absorbing the experience, then lifted my head to look out the window. It was still gray out, and from what I could see, the world outside had become soft and white.
∗ ∗ ∗ ∗
Chemistry
Love and laughter—
it’s what we’re all ABC after
Skin to skin—it’s all chemistry
“Chemistry”—Life Underwater
∗ ∗ ∗ ∗
You would think that being involved with Fran would force me to think about Samantha, and it did, sometimes: the realness of her was an occasional haze on my skin, and I rounded corners and expected to see her or looked up and expected to catch her eyes. Those times I was haunted at work, at home, even when I was with Fran.
On a few occasions we’d be in the middle of making out and I’d think “she and Samantha did this,” or we’d make love and I’d think of the two of them together, which kinda flipped me out. I didn’t know who I was more jealous of, and the thought of them together made me so fuckin’ hot I twitched. I didn’t think it made me a bad person. I chalked it up to being young, dumb, and full of, um, hormones, honestly.
After those first few days, when we were snowed in together, she must have thought about some of the same things, because the very next time I’d gone to her apartment, she’d changed the cover on the futon, rearranged her bedroom, and managed to mention that she’d bought a new mattress. I took the hint and broke it in with her. Yes, it was quite comfortable.
Life consisted of work, rehearsals, and Fran, who was amazingly supportive of my music. She’d never really heard it. I mean, I took my guitar over and played a bit, practicing lines over and over, writing lyrics and rehearsing melodies, but she’d never heard the band.
Something in me had changed—and not just the fact that my pseudo-virginity was now a myth. I got a brand-new pair of buzzers and retrimmed my hair, dyed it black, and with Stephie’s help placed a bloodred inch-wide stripe down the back center. Oh, the smell of Manic Panic hair dye in the morning—crayons and Play-Doh—who could ask for anything more?
Strangely, though, my pants felt different. Nothing sat right over my hips or thighs; everything just twisted and made me uncomfortable, and I abandoned anything but button flies and army pants. I also started to wear underwear because I was just too damn sensitive, but I wore only thongs. Besides, Fran liked them.
Things had changed a bit at work, too. Jen stopped calling me “kid” as much, and while women still came on to me with alarming frequency, I didn’t need her help quite as much. In fact, I’d been semi-promoted. I now backed Jen up at the door and occasionally filled in for her, while Dee Dee was showing me how the books worked. In fact, I’d been coming in some afternoons when we were closed so I could review the bar order and receive deliveries with Dee Dee.
“A head for business, that’s what you’ve got, Nina,” she’d tell me when I asked her questions. All that math with Attila the Nun hadn’t been in vain.
The night was quiet. I’d had a rehearsal earlier with the band, and Jerkster had decided to come hang out for ABC while, which was fine by me.
Jen had called to say she was coming in late so I was “doing the door” until she arrived, but since only three people were in the bar, Dee Dee sat with me, reviewing the bar order and asking my opinions and reasons about why we should order what.
The bar phone rang and Dee Dee answered it.
“For you,” she told me after asking whoever it was to hold on a moment. She handed me the receiver. “It’s Fran.”
“’Lo, Kitt,” I said, with the lowest, sexiest tone I could muster. It was funny; no one used her nickname anymore but me, and it was very special between us. I could tell she enjoyed hearing it—her smile would brighten and her eyes would sparkle more.
“Hey, baby,” she answered. I could hear the smile in her voice. “You working tonight? Rehearsing?”
Honestly, no matter what my confusions were, I loved her with everything I had, and make no mistake, that’s never gone away.
“It’s gonna be quiet tonight,” I told her.
“Well, I’m free,” she said, “and…I’d love to see you.” She drew the last few words out with a little roll that made me smile at the image it conjured in my head. I wanted to see her, too.
“I’d love that too, but I have to go back to the Rock at some point. I have a rehearsal tomorrow.”
“Lucky for us both then that I’m free until the day after. Stay over tonight, and I’ll go back with you tomorrow.”
“You’re gonna come by here, then?” I asked, pleasantly surprised.
She had hung out there while I was working, but not very often. She did have classes to attend. I also suspected that the attention I got on some of the more crowded nights bothered her. So even though we’d never formally defined what we were or called each other “girlfriend” or anything like that (and I really hate the term “lover”—it sound
s so, so, just, I don’t know—I just don’t like it as an overall blanket term) I made sure she knew whose bed I was going to be in—hers, without a doubt.
“Yeah, absolutely. I, uh…” and she hesitated, something she rarely did. “I really want to see you.”
“And I’d like to be with you,” I returned. “I miss you.” I meant it. I hadn’t seen her in a few days, and although we’d spoken during that time, it wasn’t the same thing at all.
“Yeah?” she asked, her voice softer, uncertain.
“Absolutely,” I affirmed.
“Great!” she answered cheerfully. “I’ll see you in a little while. Ciao!”
“Ciao, Francesca,” I said, and clicked off. I returned my attention to the bar, only to find Dee Dee smiling at me.
“What?” I asked, grinning. I couldn’t help that.
“Sie hat dich gern.” Dee Dee smiled at me.
I gave her a puzzled look, not understanding what she’d said. I hadn’t gotten really past the basic greetings yet—but I was trying.
“She really likes you,” she translated, her eyes sparkling.
“Well,” I glanced down at the books before us on the bar because Dee Dee’s regard made me feel a little shy, “I certainly hope so.”
“Love is a very strange thing, Nina,” Dee Dee said solemnly, “and it makes us strange even to ourselves.” She paused, then grabbed a few glasses from under the bar. She poured cream into one, juice into another, vodka into the third, and plain old soda into the last one.
“Which ones would you absolutely not mix together?” she asked expectantly.
“Cream and juice.”
“And why is that?” she prompted.
“It’ll curdle the cream, of course,” I explained, puzzled. I knew she knew this; she was a chemistry major.
Dee Dee promptly mixed some of the juice with some of the cream in a separate glass. “And you are right, of course,” she said as we watched it transform into cheese. She held up the glass to show me the results, then deftly flicked it away under the sink. “But,” and she held up her index finger to make her point, “watch this.” She strained some vodka through ice and carefully mixed it with the cream and the juice. Even though I was watching, I can’t tell you exactly how she did it—but a few good shakes later, she poured a thick and creamy mixture that looked exactly like a pale orange shake.
“Try it,” she urged, so I did. Jerkster came bopping over from the corner where he’d been sitting, and I offered him a sip, too. It was very nice, actually—smooth and cool, velvety and light, with a summery orange taste. It tasted just like a…
ABC
“A Creamsicle!” Jerkster announced, and I agreed. That’s exactly what it tasted like, a grown-up Creamsicle with just the lightest of kicks.
“How did you do that?” I asked Dee Dee, smiling. “That was some trick!”
“Ah, nothing,” she said, waving away the compliment. “You like?” she asked Jerkster, raising her eyebrows at him.
He peeped over the straw he joyfully sucked on. “Uh-huh,” he said from around the plastic. The cup started to make that burbling sound as he got to the bottom, and he bopped happily off back to the jukebox.
Dee Dee observed him for a few more moments, then returned her attention to me. “It’s…it’s a lot like love, Nina,” she said, pointing to the two empty glasses. “In the first example, we have two items—mutually exclusive, so different, and when they mix? One tries to become the other or the other tries to absorb the first to such a degree that they create something useless—and both are ruined. But, in our second example?” She paused and smiled. “There’s something else—a catalyst that shares elements of both, yet it is separate, different. When it is used in the proper way, all these pieces give up a part of themselves, yet here they are, uniquely themselves, and together, something uniquely different—each a contributing element.”
I got it, I really did. “It’s a bit like being in a band.” I nodded. “Everyone does their thing, but together…” We both looked over to the jukebox where Jerkster was dancing, badly. “You know what I mean.” I grinned at her.
“I know what you mean,” Dee Dee smiled back, “but do you know what I mean?”
I reflected. I thought I did, but maybe I’d missed something. I scratched my chin. “You know, Dee Dee, I’m not sure,” I admitted, paying her the serious attention her tone deserved.
Dee Dee pinched my cheek. “You should never, ever, give anything to the point you are lost. Your life will become dreck, useless, and you,” she pinched me again, “have too much to offer to waste it.”
Her regard was so genuine it embarrassed me, and because I’d freshly cut my hair I knew she could see my ears burn as I dropped my eyes to the bar.
“So,” I said as she let go, “does that mean I should be more like vodka than cheese?” I gave her my biggest grin and jumped away from the towel that flew at me.
“Wisenheimer!” She laughed. “Nothing cheesy about you!”
“You missed!” I laughed back.
She fixed me with her bright green ABC eyes. “I miss on purpose,” she grinned, “or you’ll spend another hour on your hair.”
I clutched my chest like I’d been mortally wounded. “Oh! You’re killing me!” I mock-complained, then straightened up and put my hands on my hips. “Hey, I like my hair!” I told her, half joking but serious.
Dee Dee smiled at me again. “I like your hair, too,” she nodded in agreement, “but it’s your face that makes you money.”
“And all this time, I thought it was my sparkling wit and conversational skills,” I countered.
“Ja, there’s that too,” Dee Dee said as she wiped the bar, “but you must know by now how stunning you are, no?”
“Uh, no?” I answered as I walked back to the bar. I sat on a stool and pulled the books she’d left on the counter back to me. “People always say it, but it’s, like, just bullshit, you know?” I started to review the numbers. “It’s just what people say because they want to fu—um, have sex,” I corrected myself, “right?”
“There’s always that,” Dee Dee said, and straightened from her task, “but someone’s done you a great disservice.” She waved her rag at me.
“What do you mean?” I asked, confused. I mean, yeah, sure, people said I was cute or whatever all the time, while the ones that said I was beautiful were the ones actively trying to get me into bed.
To tell the truth, sometimes it seemed like everyone was always trying to touch me; I was starting to find ways of walking around them without any contact—I couldn’t bear it anymore. I was even occasionally uncomfortable with Fran and just didn’t want to be held. But I figured people did that because they were, you know, rude, grabby, and horny—there was nothing real behind it except their physical need.
And as far as those who said I was cute (and I could swear the breath of cold air that whispered beside me for a moment was the touch of Trace’s gray eyes), went, well, I’d never heard cute equated with stunning before—unless it was a cartoon and someone was dropping a brick on someone’s head—now that’s stunning. I said as much to Dee Dee, well, except for the part about touch avoidance, and she frowned at me.
“No, Nina, you’re wrong, quite wrong,” she told me, her voice husky and low with her soberness. “People don’t do that to everyone—they do it to you because they want to be near someone with your kind of—ah!” she grumped, obviously frustrated, groping for the right word. “Light, Nina. They want to be near your light.”
Now I was really confused—what the hell did that mean? “What?”
Dee Dee poured herself a soda and mixed some cranberry and orange juice for me. “Here,” she said, sliding the glass to me, ABC Page 155“listen.”
“Thanks. Salud!” I smiled as I lifted it and took a sip.
“Prost!” Dee Dee returned. She put the glass down with a bit of force. “Let me see your eyes,” she asked abruptly.
I looked straight into hers, le
tting her search for whatever it was she wanted. I loved Dee Dee’s eyes—the startlingly amber-to-green combination that tonight shone a mellow grass color. Finally she nodded.
“Your heart is always in your eyes, Nina, and that’s what they want, the part they want to touch,” she told me, “the part you never share.”
I had no idea what she meant—she’d lost me somewhere between heart and touch.
“Even I feel that, but I don’t want to fuck you.” She grinned and pinched my chin this time.
“Okay,” I said slowly, “I’ll keep that in mind.” Yeah. Now I was really confused.
Dee Dee shook her head and chuckled as I got out of my seat.
“I’m going to go check the lines,” I told her, meaning the vast cylinders in the basement that hooked up to the tap lines in the bar. “We’re getting something weird from the soda gun.”
“Okay, go check,” she agreed, outright laughing now. “Too much for you, huh?”
I grinned back as I felt a slow burn rise up my neck. “Something like that,” I agreed good-naturedly, still not knowing what I was really agreeing to. She’d given me a lot to think about, but no matter what anyone said about my heart, I knew Dee Dee had a good one. I was glad she was my friend.
A kink in the soda line was forcing it to send out a less-than-ideal mixture of syrup and carbonated water. I spent a good ten minutes wrestling with the valve seal so I could unhook it, straighten it out, then hook it up again. It was a good thing I knew my way around a wrench, I thought as I wiped my hands on a nearby rag.
I locked the storm gates behind me and walked back into the bar proper. Fran had arrived, which made me smile, but what I saw through the windows erased that.
One of our regulars, Yvonne, had probably had a little too much to drink. She wouldn’t be the first, or the last, to do that, but I’d be damned and double damned if she thought she could cause a problem in the place I worked—especially not with Fran.
I didn’t know what it was about, and ABC I didn’t care. Yvonne’s arms were flailing, and she spoke vehemently to Fran, who had taken a step back and squared herself off in a defensive position.