“Hi.”
Danielle turned and saw Emily standing next to her.
“Hi yourself,” Danielle replied. With a gesture she invited Emily to have a seat next to her.
“Thank you again for arranging for my crew and me to be here,” Emily said. “I think these scenes will certainly enhance the film once it’s done.”
“I really didn’t do much,” Danielle admitted. “My mother and Nita are not the type of women who run away from people carrying movie cameras. Champagne?”
From an open bottle of Cristal that had been left to chill in a silver bucket within reach Danielle poured her companion a drink. She picked up a glass of ice water for herself.
“Cheers,” she said, clinking Emily’s glass with her own. As she did this she let her eyes steal down to that spot on the younger woman’s neck just below her right earlobe. Experience had taught Danielle that women loved to be kissed on that spot.
Emily said, “I’m hoping that when we return to London I can get some of your time?”
“For?”
“To talk about women, of course. Naturally, you’re one of the people I’d like to interview most considering your unique...arrangement with a lesbian and a straight man. I’d also like time with Katie as well.”
“Would you like us both together?” Danielle asked.
Emily held Danielle’s eyes for a few moments.
“No,” she said, “just you to begin with.”
Despite herself, Danielle felt something stir inside her. She crossed her legs.
“Well, anything I can do to help, just ask,” Danielle said and then took a sip of her water. “Will this be an on camera interview?”
Again Emily looked at her for few moments before replying.
“Eventually I’ll need to film our discussion but—”
“But?”
“But at the start it could just be us two. Talking.”
“And where would we be talking?”
The two women’s eyes were locked together.
Emily finally said, “Could be someplace public or someplace private. I’ll let you decide.”
***
“What’s up, babe?” Max asked when he and Katie reached Danielle a few minutes later, after Emily had gone. They took seats on either side of her.
“First off, please make sure I don’t have anything else to drink tonight. I’m beginning to think weird things,” Danielle said with a smile.
“And apparently I’m beginning to see things,” her husband said. “Did I actually catch sight of you in pleasant conversation with Emily? I thought you hated her.”
“I don’t hate her,” Danielle rebuked, hoping she wasn’t blushing too strongly. “She seems sweet, in fact. But forget about her.” She nodded her head in the direction of Arlene and Nita, now slow dancing. “What do you think about Mom and Nita?” she asked.
“That they’re both loony birds,” Max stated. “Spending time with them is like spending time with Laurel and Hardy.”
“I meant,” Danielle began, “what do you guys think about this marriage thing? Do you think it’ll last?”
“They seem very happy,” Katie said. “They’re both attentive and affectionate to one another; they both seem to enjoy working together planning weddings and, according to your mom, the sex is very, very good.”
Danielle made a face and playfully elbowed her wife in the ribs for putting her mother and sex in the same sentence.
Max said, “Who knows if it’ll last, sweetie. Who can tell with these things? My buddy Mikey back in the Bronx thought that Katie was the death knell for you and me. He gave us six months.”
“Michael thought that?” Danielle asked with surprise.
“Sure; all my friends did; they were all convinced that you were a closet lesbian who was trying to let me down easy.”
“If only that were true,” Katie said. “Then I wouldn’t have to deal with you every day, Max.”
He threw a wadded up napkin at her.
Danielle watched the newly married couple continuing to dance. Privately she gave them a year, no more. Their romance had been too whirlwind, too perfect. No bumps, no bruises, no scars. It had been, it seemed, just one long date with a wedding now at the end.
She wondered how many other gay couples, both men and women, had fallen into the same trap heterosexual couples had been falling into since, well, forever. The trap of getting married just because they can get married; never asking themselves if it is the right choice; indeed, not even taking the time to discover if it is the right choice. She asked herself: How long before the gay divorce rate starts matching the straight divorce rate?
But immediately upon thinking this Danielle suddenly felt guilty—and hypocritical. Sure, she had been friends with Max for a few years before their relationship turned romantic but just a few weeks after first having sex with him she had uprooted herself from Arizona to follow him to New York City. As for Katie? After Max had given Danielle permission to enjoy her bisexuality she immediately started dating Katie, whom she had met only six months earlier and fallen instantly in lust with. Danielle hadn’t played the field with other women; hadn’t sampled what else was out there; it had been just Katie. Less than a year later all three of them were living together.
So, Danielle asked herself now, who was she to question the viability and strength of the love existing between her mother and Nita just because they had gotten to this point in Amsterdam relatively quickly?
She smiled.
“I think they’ll last a long time,” she said and then gave first Max and then Katie a kiss.
Two for One-Relatively Speaking (The Two for One series) Page 34