Music From Another World: One of the most empowering books for women, bestselling author Robin Talley’s gripping new 2020 novel

by Robin Talley

  Here goes. This will be the first time I’ve ever actually told anyone.

  Oh, God, oh, God, oh, God…

  You obviously already figured this out, but…I’m gay.

  I’m sorry. My handwriting is probably harder to read than usual. I’m just so freaked out, knowing you know.

  I trust you. I do. I wanted to tell you months ago. And when I read your letter…

  I think of you as a good friend, too, Sharon. Maybe my best friend.

  Who am I kidding—you’re definitely my best friend. I’m sorry, that’s probably strange since we’ve never met, but I’ve never had a friend who really knew me before.

  I always thought I’d never tell anyone. I’d go to bed praying that the next morning I’d miraculously wake up straight, and this was all a bad dream.

  All along I knew better, though. I’ve liked girls ever since I was a kid. It started with…

  God, this is embarrassing, but…it started with Cher.

  I never missed an episode of her show. I’d sew exact replicas of whatever she’d worn that week for my Barbies. I was too old to be playing with Barbies by then, but my parents didn’t notice, thank God.

  I don’t remember exactly when I figured out that my fixation wasn’t on Cher’s clothes—it was the fact that Cher was in those clothes. She had this one outfit where you could see her belly button, and I remember so clearly when my mom gasped and switched off the TV. I had to stop myself from lunging to turn it back on.

  Your brother’s so lucky. He gets to live in San Francisco, and he has you.

  I could never tell my sisters. They’d go straight to my parents, for one thing, but also, they’d hate me if they knew.

  I think my aunt might suspect already, though.

  I’ve never really told you about her, but ever since Anita Bryant started her campaign, my aunt and uncle have been running a group to support her. Now they’re leading the Orange County branch of the campaign to pass Proposition 6. You’ve heard about that, right? The initiative to ban gay teachers? Last week my sister and I stood out in front of the grocery store and got a hundred pledges to vote yes in an hour.

  I hate having to lie to everyone in the middle of all this. I started a whole diary to get through it. That’s what my letters to Harvey are. I always thought writing to an imaginary Harvey Milk was the closest I’d come to telling anyone, but…well, here I am now. Telling you.

  Write back, please. As soon as you can. I’m nervous putting this in the mail, but also…I just enjoy getting letters from you. Especially now.

  Yours truly, Tammy

  Monday, November 28, 1977

  Dear Tammy,

  I just got your letter, and tonight I’m going to walk down to the post office so I can put this back in the mail to you. That way you’ll get it faster than if I leave it in the mailbox out front. I wish I could send it faster. Having to wait for the mail is terrible sometimes.

  But you don’t need to be nervous. I meant what I said before—you can trust me.

  How about we both try writing to each other, the way we write in our diaries? I did that a few times during the summer, but I guess you never really could. Now that I know, though, if you wanted to write to me the same way you’ve been writing your letters to Harvey Milk, I’d want to read them.

  I’ll start. Here’s what I would’ve written in my diary about today.

  I went to the women’s bookstore on Valencia Street after school. It was my first time, and I was nervous. I’d changed out of my school uniform and put on some lipstick and a leather jacket I’d just bought at a secondhand store. As soon as I stepped off the bus and walked inside, though, I could tell no one there cared how I looked.

  “Hi,” I said, as I stepped toward the girl at the cash register. “I’m, um, I’m looking for—”

  “LOOK OUT!” a voice shrieked behind me.

  I whipped around and barely managed to jump back before the dolly laden with a six-foot-high stack of boxes could careen straight into me.

  “SHIT, I’M SO SORRY!” the same voice yelled as the girl behind the cash register leaped out to grab the top box before it crashed to the floor. The box below it was tottering, too, and I instinctively jumped forward and wrapped my arms around it. It was heavy, and I staggered backward, but I managed to hang on.

  “I told you not to stack them so high!” the girl who’d come out from behind the register admonished. “Christ, Becky!”

  “I know, I know, I know!” Becky ran out from behind the dolly and up to me. She was about my height, with pale skin, red hair, and freckles across her nose. “Are you all right? I’m so sorry!”

  “She’s fine.” The other girl set down her box next to the cash register with a grunt, then took the box out of my hands and set it next to hers. When they were both secure, she wiped her hands off on her jeans and held one out to me to shake. She was tall and dark-skinned, with short curly hair and big hoop earrings, and she grinned at me before she rolled her eyes at Becky. “I’m Lisa. Tell Becky you’re fine. You’re fine, right?”

  “I’m fine.” I smiled back and shook Lisa’s hand. Her denim jacket had at least a dozen buttons pinned on. I read SAVE THE WHALES, TRUST IN GOD—SHE WILL PROVIDE, and ABOLISH APARTHEID before I realized I was being rude and lifted my eyes back to her face. “I’m Sharon.”

  “Rad to meet you. Sorry my roommate almost killed you. Want a beer? It’s the least we can do.”

  I thought she was joking until I noticed the six-pack behind the cash register. “No, thanks. I only came in to see if Evelyn was around.”

  Lisa didn’t miss a beat. “Evie!” she shouted, without turning her head. “A woman’s here to see you!”

  “You sure you’re okay?” Becky grabbed my elbow and looked me up and down as if checking for wounds. “I’m so sorry. The right wheel’s quirky on that thing.”

  “The wheel is fine.” Lisa waved a dismissive hand. “Becky’s just trying to get out of loading-dock duty next time, but it’s not gonna work.”

  “Sharon! You came!” Evelyn was striding toward us from a door behind the cash register. “That’s great. Did you already introduce yourselves?”

  “Yeah,” Lisa said. “Becky nearly killed her, but Sharon saved your box of Camera Obscuras.”

  “I try to be useful,” I said, hoping it sounded funny. I guess I succeeded, because Evelyn laughed. She was wearing a T-shirt and jeans, and she looked different, more relaxed, than she had when I’d seen her at the club. Her knee collar was nowhere in sight.

  The bookstore was smaller than I’d expected, and except for a single narrow aisle and a nook to one side that held a paper-strewn table and a few chairs, every inch of space was crammed with bookshelves. A couple of girls with long, loose hair were studying the shelves to my right, and low voices murmured behind the door Evelyn had emerged from.

  I doubted Becky was much older than me, and the others might’ve been in their early twenties. None of them looked like real adults. They were all a lot younger than my teachers.

  Becky finished lifting the boxes off the dolly and steered it toward the room at the back. Evelyn stepped forward, still beaming. “I’ll show you around. You want a drink?”

  “Already offered.” Lisa hopped up onto the counter next to the register and ripped open a box. “She said no. Whoa—did someone mean to order an entire box of Adrienne Rich?”

  “We can send them back if they don’t sell, but they will.” Evelyn nodded confidently.

  “Okay, well, I’m ordering a box of Audre Lorde on Monday, then.” Lisa reached for the next box.

  “Your timing is great, Sharon.” Evelyn waved for me to follow her toward the table and chairs. “We’ve got a volunteer meeting starting in a few minutes. Want to help us fold some flyers on Prop 6?”

  “Heck, yes.”

  I blushed as soon as I�
��d said it, highly conscious of how young I must’ve sounded, and Evelyn laughed. It was another friendly laugh, though. Everything about this place was friendly.

  “I should start setting up.” Evelyn reached for a jar of pens on the counter. “Could you help me bring things out from the back?”

  “Sure.”

  I followed her into what turned out to be a tiny storeroom full of boxes and supplies. Two other girls were somehow crammed into the back, going through an inventory list, when Evelyn and I squeezed inside. At first I could barely breathe in the tight space, but soon I was carting boxes of envelopes and Xeroxed flyers and rolls of stamps out to the table. More girls had arrived, and they were gathering around it. There weren’t enough chairs, so some wound up sitting on the floor, tucking their sneakered feet under them on the industrial gray carpet and sipping from bottles of beer and soda. The store had looked minuscule at first, but now that so many people were inside, it felt bigger.

  Evelyn introduced me to the others as we passed out the supplies, making a big point to tell them all that I was going to help the store “connect with more young women.” The way she kept saying it reminded me of how Peter loves to tell people I’m his “kid” sister, but the girls at the store were cool about it.

  Lisa came out from behind the cash register and waved for me to sit beside her on the floor next to a stack of letters. I sat, grabbing a few and copying her movements as she neatly folded each page into thirds.

  “Are you and Becky roommates?” I asked Lisa. Everyone else seemed to be talking in low murmurs while we worked, except Evelyn. She was still bustling around getting things organized.

  “Yeah. Evie lives with us, too. And three other women, but they had to work today. We’ve all got other jobs, since we’re not making any money from the store yet.”

  “You mean you don’t get paid to work here?”

  “Nope. We own it, as a collective. Someday we hope to turn a profit so we can put it toward some of our causes, but for now we’re just trying to keep up with the rent and the light bill.”

  “Oh, wow. That’s so cool. I thought you were all in college.”

  “We are.” Lisa laughed. “That’s why we need the extra jobs. Got to pay those tuition bills. And eat, too.”

  “Wow. Do you go to SF State?”

  “Evie does, for grad school. Becky and I are at SFAI. Susanna over there goes to SFCM.” She pointed to a Chinese girl on the other side of the table with long, black hair and a T-shirt that read THE FUTURE IS FEMALE.

  By the way, Tammy, have you heard of SFCM and SFAI? They’re the San Francisco Conservatory of Music and the San Francisco Art Institute.

  I was surprised that there were so many feminist artists. Then I realized I shouldn’t make assumptions.

  “So are you all…um, feminists?” I asked, then immediately blushed. I sounded ridiculous.

  Lisa laughed. “Well, it’s a feminist bookstore, so I sure as Hell hope so. And to answer your next question, no, we’re not all lesbians. But some of us are.”

  She winked. I laughed, because I could tell she wanted me to laugh, but now I was wondering exactly how many lesbians were in that store.

  Another Black girl Evelyn had introduced me to, Alex, squatted down next to Lisa. “Hey, is it cool if I bring a date to your poetry reading next week?”

  “Depends.” Lisa grinned. “Who’ve you got in mind?”

  “Well, since you asked…” Alex dropped down to sit on the floor, and soon the two of them were off and running, talking about friends of theirs. I relaxed, since I knew I wouldn’t be called on for this conversation. Besides, I definitely wasn’t cool enough to get invited to a poetry reading, with or without a date.

  I couldn’t believe how many girls had come to this volunteer meeting. No—not girls. Women. That’s what people here seemed to say. Most of them were in jeans and T-shirts with boots or loafers, and most were wearing their hair short and loose in no particular style. No one seemed preoccupied with how they looked, or with what anyone else thought of them.

  I was starting to think I might actually fit in there someday. Maybe I even already did.

  When I climbed up to grab another roll of stamps off the table, Becky and Evelyn were sitting at the far end, talking about how depressing it was that Senator Briggs had gotten enough signatures in Orange County to put Prop 6 on the ballot. Which made me think of you, of course.

  “It shows how crucial it is that we beat them at the ballot box,” Evelyn said. “Sharon, get your friends to come here after school. We’ll need all the help we can get.”

  “With more mailings?”

  “Yeah, it’s not exactly glamorous work.” Evelyn swept out her hand over the pile of stamps and envelopes on the table. Behind her was a bookshelf with a Lesbian Poetry sign across the top. I wondered what makes poetry lesbian. “We’ll need to start prepping for Gay Freedom Day before long, too. All the campaigns against Prop 6 are about marching.”

  “You think women are going to turn out for that?” Alex tilted her head skeptically from her seat on the floor. “Last time it was all gay white men as far as the eye could see.”

  “Yeah, but more of us have been coming every year,” Lisa said. “The first year I was in the city I was the only woman in sight, but it’s gotten a lot better.”

  Evelyn nodded fervently. “Harvey’s going out of his way to invite the lesbian groups.”

  “Sure, because we need a man to invite us.” Alex didn’t look any less skeptical.

  Evelyn turned my way with another vigorous nod, as if she was anxious for me to believe her. I nodded back, as though I had conversations about Gay Freedom Day and invitations from Harvey Milk all the time.

  “It’s the media who always forgets lesbians exist.” Lisa chuckled. “If enough of us show up, they can’t ignore us.”

  Did that mean Lisa was a lesbian? I could barely keep up.

  “Anyway, we’ve got bigger actions planned, too,” Evelyn added. “When the election gets closer, we’ll start going door to door. It’ll be the first statewide vote on gay rights, so donors should pony up to help.”

  “They’d better.” Becky licked a stamp with a flourish. “Or we’re shit out of luck.”

  Everyone laughed except me. I was still puzzling out the first part of the conversation, and wondering how many of them read lesbian poetry.

  “Hey.” Lisa waved at me. “You okay, Sharon? You upset Becky said ‘shit’?”

  I blushed. Did I come off like that much of a goody-goody? “Nah, it’s cool. I don’t give a shit about ‘shit.’”

  That brought up a big laugh from the group, and I relaxed a little more. They didn’t need to know that was the first time I’d said the word “shit” out loud.

  I’m not sure if I’ve ever been around people I liked as much as I was starting to like these girls women. I didn’t have to pretend to be someone I wasn’t here. They didn’t know I was just some naive Irish-Catholic kid from Dan White’s district, but maybe they wouldn’t care if they did.

  There was no tension. No expectations. They were treating me as if I was already one of them.

  I want to go back to that store, Tammy. I want to do more folding and stapling. Maybe I can even knock on some doors.

  That would mean more lying to Mom, though. Besides, could I seriously talk to strangers about Prop 6? What if someone slammed the door in my face? And what if I knocked on a door that turned out to belong to someone from our church—could that be dangerous for my brother?

  All I know for sure is, I loved being in that place. When Evelyn finally told us we could stop for the day, the paper cuts on my knuckles barely even stung.

  I only wish you could’ve come there with me. You would’ve loved every second.

  Yours truly, Sharon

  Wednesday, November 30, 1977

  Dear Sha
ron,

  Wow. I want to go to that bookstore with you. I want to go so much.

  Reading about it made me think of what you said in your other letter, about how accidents define everything. Reading about the women at that store, all I could think was how much I wish I’d been accidentally born in San Francisco. Your city’s a completely different world.

  Do you remember what we said back in the summer, about not going back and rereading our letters, or crossing things out? I want to start doing that again. After this horrible pep rally my aunt made me put on at school, I started reading over all my letters to you really carefully to make sure I didn’t give anything away, and I don’t want to do that anymore. I want to be straight-up honest.

  Like about Carolyn. There’s no one else I can talk to about her. We kissed again yesterday, for the first time since that night on the golf course. It happened in the girls’ locker room before math class, but it was really quick and we both ran away afterward and I don’t know what it means, and…

  Actually, maybe I should tell you about Thanksgiving instead. That’s simpler.

  My dad’s parents came out from Ohio for the weekend. That’s a big deal, because they hate flying, and they hate California even more. I’ve only seen them a handful of times since I was born, and I’m not entirely sure they can tell me and my sisters apart, but they’re obsessed with my little brother and my baby nephew.

  My aunt and uncle came over to our house for Thanksgiving dinner with my little cousin Eddie, the way they do every year (my aunt hates to cook). That made things awkward. My mom’s family and my dad’s family have never been close, and my grandparents clearly resented Aunt Mandy and Uncle Russell being at the dinner. When my grandparents started drinking—they only drink on holidays, so they tend to get drunk fast—things got worse.

  “I thought you’d have more children by now, Amanda,” Grandpa said before Dad had even carved the turkey. “How old are you?”

  My aunt tried to cough politely. “Now, now, we never discuss a woman’s age, do we?”