Tools of Ignorance: Lisa's Story

by Barbara L. Clanton

  “Honey—”

  “I don’t know, Mom,” Lisa interrupted. “I’m confused. I mean, I still love her.” Lisa tensed. She’d just said the word love and her in the same sentence.

  Her mother cleared her throat obviously uncomfortable by Lisa’s confession. “Hey, our exit is coming up. Do you want to drive the rest of the way to camp?”

  “Sure.” Lisa nodded. Normally she would have been excited to get more driving practice, but she couldn’t find the energy. The talk with her mother had worn her out. And on top of that, her broken hand had started to ache. Her mother flicked the turn signal on and eased into the exit lane.

  Lisa’s phone chimed announcing an incoming text. She looked at the display. It wasn’t Sam, because the number had a 516 area code. The number looked familiar, though, but she couldn’t quite put her finger on it.

  She clicked open the text. “r u on ur way, apl pckr? I miss u.”

  Lisa stared at the screen as her mind frantically tried to make sense of the message. The only person in the whole universe that called her apple picker was Tara. Lisa froze when her brain finally understood. Tara was at camp and waiting for her.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Trust

  LISA CHECKED BEHIND her to make sure she wasn’t being followed. She didn’t see any sign of Tara, so she left the path and headed into the woods toward the old shooting range. She still hadn’t made up her mind about going to William’s wedding, so she skipped lunch to find a quiet place, away from camp and away from Tara, where she could call him.

  She picked her way along the trail, and even though the summer day was warm, she shivered as the forest closed in around her. She kicked up the dry leaves and inhaled the woodsy smell, which took her right back to the summer before when Tara had first brought her out there.

  Lisa managed to steer clear of Tara during her first night at camp and most of that morning. The second night, though, Tara apparently didn’t like being avoided and pounded on Lisa’s dorm room door. Lisa kept her door locked tight and told her to take a hike. She thanked all the gods in the universe when Coach Greer flung open her door to find out what all the ruckus was about. Lisa couldn’t hear what lie Tara came up with, but as long as Tara went away, she didn’t care.

  Lisa breathed in the summer forest and wondered for a second if she had taken the wrong trail because she didn’t remember the old shooting range being this far away from the camp. The concrete structure finally came into view, so she relaxed. Memories flooded her mind before she could stop them. Tara standing close to her in the clearing. Tara touching her. Lisa closed her eyes and remembered feeling Tara’s lips on hers for the first time. She moaned out loud at the remembered softness and the urgency. No, she would not give in to the memory, and with effort opened her eyes. The Tara in her memory was a very different Tara than the one who had slammed into her during the championship game. No, that year-old memory could never be recreated.

  She took a deep breath and sat on a boulder near the edge of the clearing. Before pulling out her phone, she said, “William Dowell,” out loud to the forest. She smiled. If her mother had married her bio dad, Lisa’s name would have been Lisa Dowell.

  “And now, batting for the Clarksonville Cougars, number fifteen, Lisa Dowell, Dowell, Dowell,” Lisa echoed into the quiet forest.

  Wait, she thought, William lives in East Valley now.

  “Oh, geez.” She put a hand over her mouth. “I would have been an East Valley Panther. Ewww.” She laughed. “I would have been Christy’s catcher.”

  She tried not to, but couldn’t help picturing herself catching for the East Valley team. She’d be wearing red and black and squatting behind the plate when Marlee got up to bat. Jeri would try to steal second base, but Lisa would snag Christy’s pitch and rifle it down to throw her out.

  “Out,” the umpire would yell, and Jeri would slap the ground in frustration. The East Valley infield would hoop and holler, and then Sam would…

  The imaginary events came to a screeching halt. Sam would have been her teammate. Lisa blew out a sigh and pulled out her phone. She scrolled down her contacts for William’s phone number and hit the talk button. She desperately needed to change the subject in her mind.

  “Hello?” a male voiced said.

  “Hello? Is this William?” Lisa picked at the hem of her shorts.

  “Yes. Who’s calling?”

  “Oh, it’s your…it’s Lisa.” She wanted to say, “It’s your daughter, Lisa,” but that seemed like a betrayal to her real father.

  They exchanged pleasantries for a few moments and then Lisa asked, “William, will everybody stare at me if I go to your wedding?”

  “Well,” he paused as if trying to figure out how to answer her question, “I think they might, but only out of curiosity, not judgment.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “My closest friends and family know who you are, and so does Evelyn’s family. Everybody else will just have to try and figure it out.”

  Lisa wanted to laugh, but she wasn’t sure if she wanted to put herself through that scrutiny. “I’m not sure what I’ll say if people ask me who I am.”

  “Well, I think honesty is the best policy. Why don’t you say, ‘I’m William’s long lost daughter,’ and then let them try and figure it out.”

  Lisa laughed. “What do I say when they look at me cross-eyed and ask me to explain that.”

  “Oh, that one’s easy. Send them to me, and I’ll explain it to them.”

  “You will?”

  “Of course.” He cleared his throat. “Once I got a chance to meet you, I’ve kind of been coming clean with everybody about it. Not that you were a secret to be kept hidden or anything, but I’m finally doing the right thing. Shoot, I’ll be thirty-four next month, so it’s about time I grew up and took responsibility for something.”

  He laughed, so Lisa did, too.

  “And, Lisa?”

  “Yeah?”

  “You can bring your friend, Samantha Rose, to the wedding if you want.”

  “Okay. Thanks.”

  “I can’t wait for you to meet my baby sister, Fran.” He laughed into the phone, a bubbling carefree sound that made Lisa smile. “She and her wife, Margaret, have been married for three years now.”

  “Married?” Lisa wasn’t sure she’d heard him correctly. Did he know? Did William know about her and Sam?

  “Oh, yes. Fran and Margaret live in Boston and are legally married in Massachusetts.”

  “Oh.”

  “Lisa, it’s okay. The way you talked about Sam when I took you to lunch clued me in, so don’t be nervous about that, okay?”

  “Okay.” She swallowed hard in an attempt to disrupt the lump that had started forming. “I…thank you. Maybe I will come to your wedding after all.”

  “Hooray. Everyone is looking forward to meeting you, especially Fran and Margaret.”

  “They are?”

  “Oh, yes. I told them all about you. My sister knew about your existence all along. She and Margaret are so excited to have a niece. See? You have two aunts already built in.”

  Lisa smiled at the prospect of having two aunts, and two gay aunts at that. “I’m looking forward to meeting them, too, then. Thanks for, um—” She wasn’t sure how to thank someone for not freaking out over her being gay. She hadn’t exactly come out to many people in her sixteen years of life. “Thanks for being cool about me and Sam.”

  He laughed. “Hey, my sister told me about herself when she was fifteen. And, you know what?”

  “What?”

  “You might get that little trait from my side of the family.”

  Lisa hadn’t thought about it before. Maybe it was a genetic thing like hair and eye color. “Maybe you’re right.”

  “Just don’t tell your mother.” He laughed, and she chuckled with him.

  “Is Evelyn okay with me? You know, being one of her bridesmaids and all?”

  “Evelyn’s more than okay with it. The bri
desmaid thing was her idea.”

  “It was?”

  “Um hmm. Lisa, you’re gonna love her. She knows the score about you and Sam, too. Oh, and, you know what?”

  “What?”

  “You’re going to meet your grandparents.”

  Lisa inhaled sharply. She’d forgotten that she had another set of grandparents. “Are they—” The lump in her throat was back. “Are they okay with me, you know, popping up after sixteen years?”

  “Yes, of course,” he said softly. “They are very anxious to meet you. Like me, they thought about you all the time, especially on your birthday.”

  “They did?”

  “Yup, we always wished the best for you, but like I told you at lunch, back when I was eighteen, I wasn’t ready to be a dad. You and I were so lucky that your mother was ready to be a mom.”

  “Yeah.” Lisa laughed. “And now she says she wants to be a grandmother.”

  “What?” He laughed into the phone. “Wait a few years, okay? You have some living to do first. Do you want kids?”

  “Of course.”

  “Yes!” he said as if the Buffalo Bills had just scored a touchdown. “Listen, talk to my sister first. She and Margaret want to have kids, too and they’ve done a lot of research on the subject.”

  “Okay, I will. I can’t wait to meet my new aunts and grandparents. This is going to be a little surreal. Instant family.”

  “Exactly. And if you bring Sam to the wedding, you’ll have a support system built right in should the family get overwhelming.”

  “Thanks, William.”

  “No problem. Okay, listen, I’ve got to get back to work, but when you get back from camp—you’re at softball camp now, right?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Okay, when you get back from camp, give me a call, and we’ll get you fitted for a bridesmaid dress. Evelyn will be so excited. She didn’t give up hope and had the dress ordered for you anyway.”

  “She did?”

  “Um hmm. We’re very excited to have you in our lives, Lisa.”

  “Me, too.”

  “Okay, I’ve got to get going. You take care and call me whenever you want, okay?”

  “I will. I’ll talk to you next week.”

  After they hung up, Lisa closed her phone gently and grinned. Going to William’s wedding might actually be fun. She was excited to meet his sister Fran and her life partner Margaret. And Evelyn, too. Lisa hadn’t actually met William’s fiancée yet, they had only waved to each other during the parade. And William wanted her to bring Sam. She took a deep breath for strength. Yeah, it was time. Time to call Sam and apologize for overreacting.

  She stared at her phone for a moment. Asking Sam to go to the wedding with her would be like asking her on a date. Maybe it would be a way for them to start over.

  Lisa kicked at a rock in the dirt and remembered Sam saying time and time again that she wanted Lisa to come to her house to meet her parents. She’d even said she wanted Lisa to meet Helene, the family nanny. Yeah, Lisa acquiesced, I overreacted. There was only one way to make it right.

  Lisa slid her phone open and said, “Sam” into the mouthpiece. While the phone dialed the numbers, Lisa tapped her foot nervously on the dirt. She almost hoped Sam wouldn’t pick up, so she could leave a voice mail message like a coward.

  “Lisa?” Sam said in Lisa’s ear.

  “Hi!” Lisa said way too enthusiastically.

  “Are you at camp?”

  “Yeah. Are you at your summer house?” Lisa couldn’t help the tingles that bubbled up as she talked to Sam.

  “Yeah, we’re getting ready to go sailing.”

  “Oh,” Lisa sat up taller, “maybe I should let you go.”

  “No!” Sam blurted, and Lisa laughed.

  “Okay. I’ll stay.”

  “Okay.”

  The silence between them grew. Lisa spun around on the rock to face the shadowy forest as if talking to Sam would somehow seem less scary in comparison. She pulled her feet up on the rock and hugged her knees.

  “Uh,” Lisa stammered, “I just talked to William.”

  “Oh, you did? How is your old bio dad?”

  “He’s fine. I’m going to be in his wedding.”

  “Oh, you decided—”

  “I want you to come with me,” Lisa interrupted. Oh, that was freakin’ smooth.

  “You do?” Sam said. “When is it?”

  “The Saturday after I get back from camp. Not this Saturday coming up, but the Saturday after that.” Lisa knew she was babbling, but as she thought about possibly losing Sam, her heart couldn’t bear it. She squeezed her eyes shut and hugged her knees tighter.

  “I, uh, think maybe I could be available.” Lisa detected a hint of teasing in Sam’s voice.

  Lisa’s heart pounded. “You can? Are you sure?”

  “Yeah. I’ll just tell Coach Gellar I can’t play that day.”

  “Oh, that’s right. Summer ball started.”

  “Coach Gellar is over the moon about you and Marlee playing with us.”

  Lisa’s heart smiled. It sounded like Sam maybe wanted to play ball with her. She looked at her soft cast. “Yeah, well, I’m not doing a lot of playing these days with my broken hand.”

  “Oh, she knows it’ll be a few weeks more before you can actually play.”

  “At least.” Lisa grinned sitting there all alone on a rock in the secluded woods. Sam wanted to play on the summer team with her.

  “How is your hand, by the way?”

  “Good, I think. The swelling has finally gone down completely, and it feels like it’s healing.”

  “Oh, thank goodness.”

  Another awkward silence threatened, but Lisa stopped it by blurting, “Sam?”

  “Yeah?”

  Lisa felt her throat tighten again. “I miss you.” She held her breath.

  “Me, too. I miss you, too.”

  Lisa let out the breath. “I’m sorry. I should have trusted you.”

  “I’m sorry, too. I didn’t know how to tell you. I mean, well, you’ll see everything when you come out here. Well, not here at the summer house, although you can come here if you want, but I meant to East Valley. Where I live. Oh, God, I’m rambling.” Sam laughed, and Lisa laughed with her.

  “I don’t know why I overreacted at D’Amico’s that day,” Lisa said. “I was kind of blindsided, you know? When Susie laughed at me, I kind of got my feelings hurt.” She felt like a baby admitting that to Sam, but it was the truth.

  “I don’t think she meant to, but I’m sorry she hurt your feelings.”

  “That’s okay. I like you so much, Sam. I just don’t want to get run over again. Ever since Tara played me last summer, I’m a little shaky with trust. Once bitten, twice shy, you know?”

  “Yeah,” Sam said softly, “I get that. We can trust each other, can’t we?”

  “Yes.” Lisa swallowed hard. She debated telling her that Tara was at camp, but decided to hold off for a little while. “Geez, I can’t wait to see you again. Are we still, are we…”

  “Yeah. Of course we are.”

  A hand touched her shoulder, and she jumped. She whipped around to see Tara standing right behind her, her head haloed by the noon sun overhead.

  She held the phone to her chest. “You scared the crap out of me. What are you doing here?”

  Tara leaned down and gestured toward the phone. “Is that Blondie?”

  Lisa scowled. “Shut up.” She pulled the phone back up to her ear.

  “Who was that?” Sam demanded.

  Tara leaned down and said, “Hey Blondie” into Lisa’s phone.

  Sam bellowed, “That’s friggin’ Tara, isn’t it?”

  “Sam, I didn’t know she was coming to camp this summer. I swear.”

  Tara burst out laughing. Lisa stood up and stomped her way toward the path back to camp.

  “Oh, sure, Lisa,” Sam said. “You’ve got a lot of friggin’ nerve talking about honesty and trust, and there you are at
camp with that tramp.”

  “I’m not with her, Sam. She’s just…she’s just here,” Lisa said weakly.

  “Yeah, I’m sure she is. But, hey,” Sam ranted, her voice getting louder, “since we’re both being so completely honest and open now, remember my first girlfriend? Well, she wasn’t that chick from Northwood. My first girlfriend was…Wait for it…Susie. Yeah, Susie Torres. Okay? Now we’re both being completely honest!” Sam hung up, before Lisa could respond.

  “Sam?” Lisa said weakly into the phone, even though she knew Sam was gone. She growled and whirled around to face Tara who had followed her. “You!” She stabbed a finger in Tara’s direction. “Why did you have to do that?”

  “What?” Tara shrugged innocently and stepped in front of Lisa.

  Lisa took a step back. “You broke up with me, Tara. Why are you bothering me now?”

  Tara took a step closer. “Oh, c’mon, baby.” She reached out to touch Lisa’s cheek.

  Lisa swatted her hand away. “You stopped calling me this spring, even when I left messages for you. You didn’t return any of my emails, either.” She felt the white hot anger of rejection boiling in her gut. “So why, Tara, why are you so friggin’ interested in me now?”

  “Baby, c’mon. You live near Canada, don’t you? How was I supposed to know we’d ever see each other again?”

  Lisa controlled her anger, but with a lot of effort. What she really wanted to do was slap Tara across the face and storm back to the dorm. “Yeah, but you knew that last summer when we left camp. Why keep stringing me along?”

  “Oh, c’mon, baby. Why so angry? It’s just you and me now. We have a whole week to finish what we started. C’mon, let’s go back to my room. Talk it out.” Tara reached for Lisa’s hand.

  Lisa slapped Tara’s hand away and growled, “Tara, you’re sick. You know I’ve moved on. I love her.” She held up her phone.

  “Blondie?” Tara laughed.

  “Her name is Samantha!” Lisa roared. “And she’s nothing like you. She, at least, isn’t shallow and transparent like you are. You never really cared about me at all, did you?” She didn’t wait for Tara to answer. “No, you only cared about the conquest. We never did get all the way around those bases last summer, did we? And you can’t stand that, can you?”