“Why don’t we start with a brief re-introduction?” Dahlia asked. “We can use the sound bites elsewhere in the film. Or we might truncate your mayoral interview from last week and use this as your formal introduction.”
“All right.” Karen was aware of every line on her face. Every purse of her lips. The way her legs crossed, and how much skin was shown on the camera. The millions of people who might watch this documentary would look at her and think, “Damn, that’s the mayor? Who does she think she is?” Or they might think she looked awfully progressive for a woman in charge of a thousand people. “My name is Karen Marie Rath. I’m forty-four years old, which means I was one of the youngest mayors in this town’s history when I was first elected seven years ago.”
Dahlia did the quick math in her head. “Thirty-seven? How much political experience did you have before that?”
“Oh, let’s see. I moved to Paradise Valley a little over ten years ago. Was only here about a year when I decided to run for my first council position. Quickly moved up to mayor after the last one decided to not run for reelection. She actually suggested it. Shelley Jenkins. That was her name. Was mayor for two terms before retiring to Arizona with her wife.”
“Are you married, Mayor Rath?”
She should have anticipated this question so soon. Yet when she saw the calculating visage before her, she knew this wasn’t a mere formality. This woman isn’t flirting with me, either. Oh, but wasn’t she? Maybe Dahlia didn’t realize it, but every word dripping from her lips was laced in a dare. A dare to flirt back. A dare to challenge her. Dares upon dares that would choke the men in this room should they look up from their work for too long. Tom had hung around the door before the film crew shooed him out. He was probably in his office on the other side of the far wall, ear pressed against it and biting his nails from the sheer amount of sexual tension about to descend upon this room.
The fact that Dahlia probably didn’t notice it only made the moment more delicious.
“No. I’m divorced.” Karen had already rehearsed an answer like this. Not that it was her first time answering it. Whenever she was interviewed by state-wide or national media, they always asked about her marital status. It was salacious, wasn’t it? A lesbian mayor! That’s what they always called her, regardless of the vocabulary she submitted with her profile. Everyone wants to know who I would like to sleep with. Such was politics. “I was actually divorced before I moved here with my two children. The papers had been freshly filed when I packed up everything we could carry and drove up here.”
“Was your ex a…”
“My ex-husband was someone I met when I was young and foolish,” Karen interrupted. “The only reason we got married was because, well, you can probably guess. Our son was born about four months after we said ‘I do’. We had a daughter a few years after that. What do they call those children that come right before the end of a marriage? The band-aid baby? Not sure that’s what I was thinking when my daughter was born, but I can’t say I regret either one. They’re a pain in my side, of course, but that’s the mother in me honestly speaking. I love them more than anything else.” Or anyone else, for that matter. Even when Xander took apart her old Jeep and Christina ran off to hang out with friends Karen begged her to stay away from. For two seconds, anyway. “I think you’ll find that my story isn’t that uncommon around here.”
That made Dahlia’s eyes light up in ways that Karen should have found concerning. Instead, she admired the sweet flecks of green and brown that illuminated one stern woman’s entire face. “I’ve often heard the tale of the late-in-life-lesbian,” Dahlia said. “The woman who has repressed her sexuality for so long that she wakes up one day and realizes that everything she’s living is a lie.”
The corners of Karen’s mouth twitched. She almost made a quip about Betty Freidan and The Feminine Mystique. Instead, she thought to clarify one important fact. “It’s something many around here relate to, yes, especially if you ask our older residents who come from a different time. But I’ve been quite open with myself for a long, long time about who I am. I don’t identify as a lesbian, though, so that helps.”
Dahlia couldn’t look more bemused.
“I am openly bisexual. I had a girlfriend before I met my husband. Would’ve probably had more after him, should life not unexpectedly happen.” That was a reference to Xander, the little squirt who kept Karen attached to her ex for much longer than was natural. You do the right thing… get burned anyway. Ah, to be young, dumb, and twenty-one again. Although I was a little older than that… doesn’t rhyme, though. “My marriage taught me that I’m probably not compatible with men for more than a few months at a time. I moved here partially to start a new life, partially to take a chance with the local dating scene I had heard so much about.”
“Are you with someone now?”
“No, actually.” Karen hated to admit this part, but she had dedicated herself to the truth. A truth conveyed in a most professional manner. “I immediately jumped into local politics when I moved here. As soon as I was done settling in and making sure my kids had transitioned as well as they could, I was too busy to date.” She had been on a few dates, but as soon as she ran for mayor, Karen knew that some of her prospects had dried up in favor of taking on her new mantle. Few women wanted to date the mayor. Even if she didn’t have kids and a job that kept her busy to hell and back, she was the scapegoat for everything that went wrong. For every person who thought she was okay, there was one who wondered why nobody ever ran against her – not that they were about to do it themselves. “I don’t have any regrets, though. Being in this place has been enough reward. Seeing so many happy same-sex couples going about their lives while knowing I’m helping making those dreams come true… that’s the real reason I enjoy my job. I don’t think I’d be half as happy being the mayor of any other place.”
Dahlia continued to stare at Karen as if she searched for the hidden lies beneath the façade. You won’t find anything, Ms. Granger. I’m as open as a book right now. Her intentions were clear, although her heart might be a little guarded. After all, just because Karen was content to be single in Paradise Valley, didn’t mean she was immune to flights of fancy when in the presence of a woman who reminded her how gay she could really be.
“How did your kids adjust?” That got Wayne to look up from his perch behind the camera when Dahlia asked that, her lips thin and eyes narrower than Karen’s esophagus, which now contracted from the bile making its way up her throat. “Wasn’t it difficult for them to leave everything behind to start life in a small town? Let alone one that… subverts conventions?
Karen had prepared an answer to that as well, but that was before she heard the slight malice coating Dahlia’s words. Dare I take this personally? That would be foolish, wouldn’t it? Karen spent most of the energy on maintaining her demeanor. She couldn’t let Dahlia know she had gotten to her. Part of a politician’s training was knowing when to speak and when to conduct one’s self for the camera. Her mannerisms were as easily misconstrued as her words.
“Naturally, it was an adjustment. You have to understand, though,” Karen said, prepared to mention something she was not originally planning to include in this interview, “the deal I had in my divorce was that my ex-husband got the house while I got the kids. There was no having both.” Karen could still remember the gall of her ex when he laid that down on the arbitration table. Karen had been prepared to fight for custody until her dying breath, but she had not expected to be practically homeless in return. That’s when I knew who he really was. A man who would rather kick his kids out of their home than having them at all. “We had to move. I preferred to move far away, and my kids were still young enough that changing schools wouldn’t harm them too much. I had long heard about this town and decided I could make a decent living here working remotely for my previous company. I daresay my kids took to the small town life better than I did at first.” She placed an opportune chuckle there. “They were quick to mak
e friends, and the smaller class sizes at the elementary school meant they received more attention. It was how we found out my daughter has dyscalculia. It probably would’ve flown under the radar and never been properly addressed had we stayed behind in our old town.”
“It almost sounds too good to be true,” Dahlia said. “A fresh divorcee with two kids moving to small town Oregon, a place she had never lived before. Ten years later, she’s the respected mayor. You’re either tenacious, Mayor, or you’re extremely lucky.”
“I don’t see why it can’t be both.”
Dahlia asked for a break. She and Wayne stepped outside to discuss something, leaving Karen to relax her composure in front of the other young man.
“What’s your name?” she asked him.
He looked between the shadows, having a heated discussion behind the frosted glass, and the mayor. “Kurt, ma’am.”
“You like working for Dahlia, Kurt?”
He grinned. “She’s a rough taskmaster, but I was excited to get the opportunity to work on her crew for this film.”
“Is that so? She must be well-respected.”
“I knew the drama would make it entertaining enough.”
“I hear there’s been a good amount of drama behind my back.”
Kurt blushed. “Yeah… Dahlia is… uh…”
The door slammed open again. Wayne resumed his position behind the camera as if nothing were amiss. Dahlia, however, sat down with flushed cheeks and the sheen of sweat on her forehead.
“Sorry about that, Mayor.” She motioned for Wayne to resume filming. “We had a… never mind.”
“They had a disagreement,” Kurt mouthed behind Dahlia’s head.
So, Mommy and Daddy are fighting? This might play into Karen’s favor. “Would you mind if I asked you a personal question?” she asked.
“I suppose.”
“What is your true intention for this documentary, Ms. Granger? Seems to me you’re attempting to paint us in an unsavory light.”
Wayne jerked back from the camera. Dahlia, however, attempted to remain nonplussed. “I don’t know what would give you that unfortunate view,” she said. “My only intent is to portray this town as it is, and nothing more.”
Oh, there had to be more to it than that. Dahlia wouldn’t be so taken aback by that question if she didn’t have a little something to hide. It’s clear she has a motive for being here. I simply naively thought it was to portray this place as a town where some people’s dreams can come true. Humble dreams. Like “getting to live as one is,” and “not being bothered because of the sex of the person I sleep with.” A place where a kid could be raised by two moms and not feel like an outcast at school. Nobody had to worry about being turned away from services. Especially if that was the only service of its kind for thirty miles in any direction. When your wedding cake decorator was either gay herself or had a sister who was a lesbian, life was so much simpler.
So what was it about Dahlia that made her hold disdain for this place? Enough that she would go out of her way to bother the poor residents with inappropriate questions about their identities? It has to be something that makes her not realize she comes off as a homophobe. Karen was the first person to admit that “intent was not magical,” but she also had enough experience with people being people to know that a lot of homophobes didn’t realize they were acting that way. Normally, she assumed it was ignorance, especially in other places around Oregon that were not as diverse as Paradise Valley. (That said something, since Frankie was the first person to laugh in Karen’s face to hear that town called diverse.)
This was personal. It was ingrained into her from childhood. A traumatic life event? No, not something traumatic to the point it elicited rage like some of the poor people in town. A different kind of trauma. Abandonment. Death. Loss. Dahlia carried a hole within her that she blamed on lesbian women. Did she realize it, though?
Dare Karen bring it up?
“Your mother is a lesbian, isn’t she?” Karen didn’t give Dahlia enough time to respond. Not when those nostrils flared and Kurt dropped his pencil. I’m onto something here. Now, for the second part. “You keep asking me about my divorce and my children. You’ve been asking around about everyone’s previous relationships to men and if they have ‘children out there.’ Tell me, Ms. Granger, was your mother a late-in-life lesbian who left your family to strike out on her own and start a whole new life without you?”
The silence settling into Karen’s office wasn’t merely deafening. It was suffocating, like a hand around the throat. Yet whose hand was it? Her own? Dahlia’s? The unsettling realization that what they shared wasn’t born of mutual attraction, but mutual distrust?
So much for that.
“Out.” Dahlia snapped her fingers when she referred to her tiny crew. “Both of you. Out. Now. Stop filming.”
That was directed to Wayne, who wryly looked up from his camera and said, “You’re nuts if you think I was rolling at all. Saw this coming from a mile away.”
“Out!”
Karen allowed a modicum of surprise onto her face as Wayne and Kurt were kicked out of her office. Dahlia ensured the camera was no longer rolling before shutting the door behind the guys’ backs and turning to Karen, who regained her poise. Yet my heart is thumping like I’m about to get chewed out by my own mother.
“Who the hell told you that?” Dahlia’s demand was a swift whisper, slicing open the wounds she had allowed to scar over the long years of her adult life. Karen would have pitied her, if it hadn’t driven the filmmaker to make an ass out of herself in a town with a higher tolerance for dumbassery. “Was it Wayne? He’s been running his mouth when I’m not looking.”
Since she was no longer on camera, Karen dropped her shoulders and allowed her hair to fall before her face. Long enough to push it back again, anyway. She fisted her hair into a practical ponytail. Too bad she didn’t have any hair ties on hand. “Nobody’s told me, Ms. Granger. I’m smarter than you take me for. I was able to figure it out, based on your interactions about town. And with me, for that matter.”
Dahlia was beet red, her hands balling into fists. Would they fly? Probably not. Dahlia seemed like a woman who knew the power of self-restraint. That was why she refrained from flirting with Karen, although the mayor had left that possibility open more than once. What did she often tell herself? The only way you’re getting married again is if the right out-of-towner passes through. Their first day together had given Karen a bit of rueful hope. Did she think it would really happen? Of course not. Had she entertained the thought, though? Of course!
“I have no idea what game you’re playing,” Dahlia coolly said, “but I’m here to be a professional. I assumed you were, as well.”
“Ah, yes, professionalism! Exactly what I expected when you showed up in my town, hoping to cast us in a professional light! How foolish of me to assume such a thing. You’ve had nothing but ill-intentions since you got here.”
“Ill-intentions? Excuse me?” Dahlia scoffed. “I’m a documentarian, Ms. Rath. My only purpose is to get to the truth and illuminate it for the world to see. I’m in no business of following a particular bias, no matter what you or anyone else thinks. I would be remiss to not ask the uncomfortable questions nobody around here seems to want to answer.”
“Do you know why they don’t want to answer those questions?” Karen shot back. “Because they live enough of that shit every day. You want to ask Frankie about being one of the only black women in town? Of course she has opinions about it! God knows I get an earful every time I show up at the Chamber of Commerce! Except that has nothing to do with her sexuality. Nor does Anem Singer’s religion play into what other people think of her. Judge us all you want for being small town hicks, Ms. Granger. I’m sure you’re itching to pull back our progressive façade and show us as yet another small town built on the backs of colonialism. You might be right, considering the history of the area, but this town was built to be a haven for women who love other women.
That in itself is pretty radical. I’m sorry if your mother hurt you when she…”
“Do not bring my mother into this!” Was it too much to ask Dahlia to cool it on the piercing gazes that slapped a woman on the cheek – and in other places as well? It’s almost like she knows my exact type and can’t fail to deliver. Would that infuriate Dahlia more? Knowing that she was the mayor’s type? “My personal business is my own. What happened occurred decades ago. It is inconsequential.”
“Yet you can’t help but ask me about my children and my former marriage to a man. You’re asking the high schoolers if they feel pressured to be gay.”
“I never…”
Karen continued. “I allowed you to come here – no, I gave you my blessing -– because I thought you arrived in good faith. I saw your previous depictions of other communities and thought it would be a wonderful chance for the world to get to know our little town. How foolish of me. You’d think I would’ve learned a long time ago that these things don’t happen that way. I suppose I merely hoped they would, for once.”
“I don’t know how many times I can tell you, Ms. Rath.” Dahlia stood, prompting Karen to stand as well. “I have no ulterior motive. I don’t give a crap if your Podunk town is filled with backstabbing bigotry or is a paradisiacal haven for the world’s forgotten women. I’m here for the truth. I want to amplify the voices here that don’t ever get to be heard. Because every group of people has those quieter ones who are afraid to speak up.”
Karen was prepared to retaliate, but her words left her when she saw the earnest pain in the depths of Dahlia’s hazel eyes. While Karen had intended to prick, she never intended to bruise. But intent isn’t magical. I bruise her, anyway. A woman in a mayoral position had to choose her words carefully. Like the camera lens could be a tool of violence, a politician’s words carried the potential to inflict cataclysmic harm. Maybe to an entire nation. Maybe to one poor soul who happened to stand in the wrong place and at the wrong time.
July Skies Page 9
