by Lily Craig
"Dirty like how?"
It was clear that Madelyn's interest had gone from the purity of a celebrity crush to a more transgressive curiosity. Georgie had felt the same thing when she saw the cover of that first Playboy. It had been like having a dream where Kate was kissing her, only Georgie was still awake, and everything tingled.
"The girls were naked. And some of them were touching themselves or doing things to look sexy. It was weird."
Georgie screwed up her nose partly in show—though she'd told Madelyn about her sexuality she wasn't sure she was ready to share how the Playboys had made her feel. What if that was where the line had been drawn, and once they crossed it Madelyn would abandon her?
Madelyn surprised Georgie, though, and spoke with bright eyes. "Are they still there?"
"What?"
"The magazines. Downstairs?"
Discomfort washed over Georgie, her scalp crawling with a chill of anxiety. But excitement rose up, too, to combat the feeling. She was torn between lies and truth.
"Yeah, I hid them back in the drawer after I saw. Sometimes I go look when no one's around."
That was as much as she wanted to confess. Other, more shameful thoughts of what she did after she looked weren't for sharing. Madelyn might have been understanding so far, but Georgie was loath to push her luck to the edge. Sweaty, exciting experiences were still just for Georgie and her imagination to enjoy.
"Can we go see them now?" said Madelyn, her forehead creased with an earnest expression that made Georgie long to do whatever Madelyn wanted. Her hair was parted exactly at the center of her head and it emphasized the way Madelyn had of raising her eyebrows when she asked a meaningful question.
Georgie knew she shouldn't. All of her previous trips to the study had been when her father was working late and her mother and sisters were driving to ballet lessons or picking up groceries. A few had been when the family was outside enjoying the patio later at night or shoveling snow, but never had Georgie opened that drawer with other members of the family still in the house.
Georgie wasn't sure what Madelyn wanted out of the venture, nor was she certain that she could trust that their friendship would remain unchanged, even though she so desperately wanted it to. And yet, here was a chance to grow closer. To reveal a hidden part of her life, maybe to be seen as more valid.
And yet.
While Madelyn's question hung in the air, Georgie bit her lip and thought. Snapshots of the fleshy images she'd seen already brewed in the back of her mind, heating her thoughts to a dangerous place. Even if it was a terrible idea, Georgie wanted to see a Playboy right now.
She wanted to open those glossy pages and see a woman, naked, breasts exposed invitingly so that Georgie’s heart hammered and her body rushed with longing.
A glimpse of parts she still wouldn’t say out loud yet.
Feverish tension building between her legs, demanding her attention.
Even if Madelyn saw the magazine and ran from the house screaming, Georgie now thought she could handle it.
In part because she wasn't thinking rationally at all anymore.
"Yeah, if we’re quiet, we can go right now," whispered Georgie. She held a finger before her lips and hunched her shoulders, padding along the carpet in her bedroom to the door. Madelyn followed her, breathing through her mouth so audibly Georgie would have normally cancelled the mission.
But Georgie saw this point in time as a narrow window of opportunity. Her mother was baking seasonal cookies and her sisters were in the basement watching a movie. Georgie's father never came home this early. And besides, it wasn't every day that your best friend heard that you were a lesbian and then wanted to see naked women with you.
Georgie almost couldn't believe her luck.
She willed her mother to keep baking, her sisters to sit passively absorbing their movie. Madelyn walked softly behind her, and with each step Georgie's skin tingled a little more. They were downstairs within a minute, and Georgie held up a hand to indicate a pause near the landing.
She heard the stand mixer working in the kitchen and motioned for Madelyn to follow her while she rounded the corner to the hall. A few more steps, and then they were in the study. Georgie flicked on the overhead light and breathed deeply for the first time in what seemed like forever. Madelyn was smiling next to her, her hands visibly shaking from the adrenaline.
"They're just in here," whispered Georgie. She'd crossed the thick hunter green rug to the desk, which was immaculately clean as always, and opened the bottom right-hand drawer. A stack of innocuous papers in firm-branded folders were inside, which she took out and put on the desk.
Beneath the papers, she found the false bottom of the drawer easily. Once you knew it was there, the seam was obvious. Georgie's slim fingers hooked around the board quickly and she lifted it while Madelyn watched, eyes huge and rapt.
"I can't believe we're doing this," Madelyn said with a nervous giggle.
Georgie smiled in a way she hoped appeared reassuring, and she picked up a shiny copy of Playboy. It was one she hadn't seen before, so she knew that her father replenished the supply occasionally.
Excitement built a ramp in her stomach and began to race upwards.
Madelyn stepped closer to look over Georgie's shoulder while she leafed through the pages. Madelyn gasped when they reached the centerfold.
"Wow," whispered Madelyn. "I hope I get big boobs someday, too."
Georgie just smiled, not wanting to say that she was less keen on growing her own breasts to that size so much as finding someone with similar proportions she could touch. Madelyn's reaction felt so different from hers.
"Do you think—" Madelyn began to speak, but her voice cut short when the door opened in front of them and Georgie's mother's face poked in.
"Girls? What are you doing in here?"
One of Georgie's most poignant regrets in the years that followed was that she hadn't positioned the stack of accounting papers as a barrier to someone who entered the office after them. As it played out in her mind, she and Madelyn could have hidden the dirty magazine behind that paper wall so that her mother never knew what was going on.
In real life, of course, things went much differently. Caroline’s eyes dropped from the two girls' faces to the sleekly gorgeous woman on the cover of the magazine, and it was less than a second after asking her question that she gasped and yelled for them to get out of there.
8
Present Day
"You knew you were a lesbian so early on, Georgie. I'd been jealous of your certainty for a long time. Recently, though, I've wondered if you sometimes choose to see things more black and white because you like being definite. Or pretending to be, if you have to."
Georgie made a face and stared Madelyn down. "What does that mean?"
They were still across from one another on the couches, still locked in a difficult conversation. The snow fell faster now, determined to blanket the countryside in so much of itself that the landscape would be unrecognizable.
"Do you really, completely and totally think we have zero chance of being together? If you knew that, deep down in your bones, and had absolutely no doubts about it... it would be easier for me to accept your saying no. But I can’t buy it, at least not yet. Isn’t there some small part of you that sees a chance for us?”
Madelyn spoke with more confidence than she had. It was excruciating to see the anger and disdain on Georgie's intelligent features. Even as the light dimmed outside, bringing the dark December evening ever closer, Madelyn couldn't fight the spark inside her. Whether it was hope or something less admirable, she couldn't tell.
All she knew was that she wanted Georgie to be in her life, more than she'd wanted anything else in this world.
"Since when is a chance worth throwing away everything?" Georgie said, having deliberated silently for a minute after Madelyn spoke.
"So there is one? A chance?"
A heavy sigh rushed out of Georgie. In the rapidly darkening
afternoon light, she looked younger. Without the experience of seeing one another regularly, Madelyn found she'd been picturing a version of Georgie where she'd aged and matured much differently. Georgie still carried herself with a sort of impish swagger, but the curve of her cheeks reminded Madelyn of when Georgie was just a kid.
Sometimes Madelyn felt she was still a child, too. Lost in the murky depths of trying to grow up and figure herself out. How it was possible to reach 25 and still assume you were 16 when people asked your age, she didn't know. Maybe you never felt grown up. Maybe it was all a lie that everyone pretended was real, so they didn't feel as scared by the world.
"The hell am I supposed to say to that, Mads? The issue isn’t whether there’s some microscopic chance. It seems like you’ve got a whole other version of me playing out like a movie in your head."
"Translation, I should move on?"
Georgie rolled her eyes in frustration. "That's a perfect example of what I mean. You're so good at taking what I say as this horrible, cruel thing. I never said it with that... tone. You're the one making me sound mean."
Madelyn struggled to reconcile her rushing feelings with the retreat Georgie was making. Georgie's elbows were on her knees, and she'd run her hands through her hair angrily while talking. It left a shaggy trail of cowlicks behind and tenderness leapt into Madelyn's chest, unbidden.
Georgie had that way about her of making Madelyn care. Especially when she wanted to do anything but get entangled in another person's emotions.
"Sorry if my feelings are inconvenient to you, Georgie," Madelyn said. She regretted the childishness of her statement seconds later. "I shouldn't have said that. What I meant was, I hoped you'd feel differently. That maybe there was a spark."
This time, it was Georgie's turn to falter. She drew her legs up underneath her and looked as if she were about to speak a few times before she actually got words out.
"I've started dating. In Edmonton."
"Oh."
Panic and dread made a terrible combination, seeping into every fiber of Madelyn's body until it was immobilized. It would be just her luck to realize she loved Georgie right after Georgie moved to Edmonton, only to lose her to another woman with better timing.
Did she have a girlfriend?
Madelyn didn't have the courage to ask.
"How's it going?" she said, instead.
The casual shrug with which Georgie responded would have been enough to plunge Madelyn into depression if she hadn't already taken down all the walls surrounding her heart for this conversation. No barriers remained, so instead the way Georgie seemed to want things to stay irreverent merely stung Madelyn. Like wasps on a hot summer night.
"Anyone special?" Madelyn asked, and then she realized she'd bitten her lip. The coppery tang of blood mixed with her regrets and it became too much, all at once. "Actually, don't answer that."
Georgie faltered, her eyes searching Madelyn's face for insight.
"Are you ok?" said Georgie, but at the same time, Madelyn stood abruptly.
"I should go to bed," she said.
Georgie laughed until she realized Madelyn was serious. "But it's 3:00."
Madelyn waved her hand vaguely and started walking to the stairs. "A nap, then. I need to sleep. Right now."
Her body had almost shut down. Too much input, too much feeling, had worn her down to bone-dry exhaustion. She had sudden sympathy for her computer's restless whirring after a long evening of homework, when its fan couldn't keep up with the processor despite desperately trying to cool the machine.
"All right," Georgie said. She watched Madelyn step up the staircase one tread at a time with wary concern. If she had more questions, she didn't ask them then.
Madelyn was grateful when she put her head on the pillow and sleep followed quickly; she'd been afraid of the afternoon's conversation playing over and over in her head. Sometimes she got stuck on a moment like that and couldn't help but relive it, trying to find a way to make it go how she'd wanted. Today, though, her body collapsed readily.
Sleep was a welcome oblivion.
The lightest rap on the door woke Madelyn. Her open mouth had drooled a small puddle next to the pillow, and she grunted in confusion when the noise came again.
"Madelyn?"
The voice belonged to someone familiar. Madelyn's sleep-addled brain struggled to place it.
"What time is it?" she asked, noticing the pitch-black surroundings. She was at the cabin in the mountains.
With Georgie.
Remembering the conversation they'd had earlier, Madelyn wished she could return to sleep. But Georgie had opened the door a crack and poked her head in.
"Hey. Sorry to wake you. There's food downstairs if you want a meal. But... I should let you know the power's out."
The whirring of Madelyn's mind sped up tenfold and she bolted upright.
"What?"
"It's kept on snowing outside. Must have knocked a power line down somewhere. The stove's gas, so I could make some pasta, but the lights are out, and the baseboard heaters don't work anymore."
"Shit."
Silence allowed Madelyn to listen for the storm. Wind howled outside, casting flakes against the window in chaotic smatterings. It sounded rough out there. Luckily, the weather eclipsed her hurt feelings, because Madelyn was also hungry.
"There any pasta left?" she said, not quite ready to meet Georgie's eye. Thankfully, it was dark enough that she thought Georgie might not notice.
"Tons."
With a stretch, Madelyn stood up and followed Georgie down to the kitchen. Where she'd expected darkness, there was a fire crackling in the hearth. Though it was more dimly lit than the cabin would have been with electricity, the flickering brightened the space considerably.
"Good job on that fire, G."
"Thanks," said Georgie. She stared into the fire when they reached the bottom of the stairs, causing shadows to cast about her face in dancing motions. Madelyn could have gazed at Georgie's implacable expression for ages, but her stomach had other plans. While they stood there for a moment, a growl escaped her belly.
Madelyn laughed. "Sorry, I guess my strategy of bailing from a difficult conversation mid-day has angered my stomach."
Georgie didn't respond, just smiled weakly. Madelyn wished she knew what Georgie was thinking. But she didn't press her. She suspected her nap had also angered Georgie. It had been insensitive.
"And it's probably infuriated the electricity gods, too, by the look of it," Madelyn said. Even if Georgie was mad at her, Georgie was too kind a person not to offer a meal to Madelyn. And now, survival had to transcend their own personal drama. Being stranded in the woods with no power was dangerous.
A steaming bowl of fusilli later, Madelyn dabbed red sauce from her mouth with a napkin and went to the couches to join Georgie. Though the fire wasn’t as high as when she came downstairs, white-hot coals shimmered at the bottom of the hearth, emitting more warmth than the licking flames had earlier.
Madelyn sat on the couch across from Georgie and watched as a log capsized, tumbling into the coals with a fizz of sparks.
"You made a great fire," she said to Georgie. With her belly full of pasta and a nap under her belt, the heart-wrenching talk of the afternoon felt miles away. They still had time to work through things. No matter what they wanted to do, the weather had them stuck.
Georgie stared into the fire, her face unreadable. She was curled up beneath a throw blanket and the only thing moving about her was a foot that poked out from the side of the throw, tapping restlessly. She may not have heard Madelyn's comment.
"It's nothing serious," said Georgie. Though she didn't turn to face Madelyn, the words sounded heavy with emotion.
"Oh, I don't know. Might not seem like it now, but if we have no heat, I'm definitely glad you know how to start and tend a fire. My post-apocalyptic knowledge is more like 'Ask Georgie for help' and 'Die if zombies find me'."
Madelyn found herself smiling just from
being near Georgie. She knew she sounded silly—that was often the case when she spent time with her best friend. Georgie was so withdrawn sometimes, so serious. It made Madelyn feel like a glass of champagne that couldn't stop bubbling.
"No. I mean that no one I've been on a date with is serious. Or that no dates have been serious. Whatever, you get the point."
Pop. Fizz. The champagne shouldn't have been celebrating as much as it was, but Madelyn wasn't so altruistic as to wish her love interest off the market. She wanted Georgie to be happy, yes, but ideally that happiness could be found with her.
"I do," she said. "Thanks for telling me. Can I ask—"
But Madelyn wasn't able to finish her question because Georgie stood up abruptly. The glimpse of vulnerability she'd allowed Madelyn apparently couldn't be sustained. "Fire's not enough to keep this place warm all night. The pipes might freeze up, so we should run the taps just in case."
"Ok. Good idea." Madelyn followed Georgie to the main floor bathroom, where she cranked the tub to the slowest trickle possible while Georgie let the sink tap flow. In this proximity, it was hard not to notice the lean muscles that made up the lines of Georgie's body, the collarbone that ran across her shirt opening. Madelyn's nerves tingled while her eyes betrayed her.
"I like your shirt," she said, hoping a compliment would explain why she'd been staring. Georgie shrugged and grinned bashfully, holding out the sides of the button-up.
"This old thing? I've had it for years."
"I know. It looks good on you," Madelyn said. She walked out of the bathroom to fill the kitchen sink, hoping she'd finish blushing before Georgie saw her face.
Why couldn't she just keep things under wraps for a better time?
It wasn't like a snowstorm was the right moment to shower a friend in compliments. It had hardly been opportune for her to confess her feelings, either. Madelyn was just plain bad at the whole thing. She deserved the frustrations Georgie had been expressing, and then some.
They continued the task upstairs in each of the bathrooms and then settled back in near the fire. The wind outside provided a constant background noise, blasting the large glass panes in the front of the cabin with periodic gusts of snow.
