by Sarah Dreher
"Oh, shit," Gwen said under her breath.
“I know I'm not perfect," Mrs. Burton went on, "but God knows I've tried to treat her well, to the best of my ability, limited though that may be. I certainly can't imagine what I've done to cause her to want to play such a cruel, cruel joke on me."
"It's not a joke," Gwen said.
Mrs. Burton folded her hands in her lap. "In my day," she said to Aunt Hermione, "ladies didn't speak of such things."
"Maybe not," Aunt Hermione said, "but they did them."
Mrs. Burton's back stiffened. The skin on her neck took on a stretched appearance. She opened the photograph album and began turning pages rapidly and at random. "Look at this," she said to no one in particular. "Look what a beautiful child she was. Everyone said she was a beautiful child."
"Lovely," Aunt Hermione said. "Though what that has to do with anything is beyond me.”
''Would you ever think, to look at that sweet child's face..."
Aunt Hermione picked up her crocheting. "Eleanor, don't be an ass.”
"Grandmother..." Gwen began. She seemed to have forgotten she was holding Stoner's hand. Her skin felt cold and waxy, as if all the life in her had shrunk to a small, hard lump somewhere deep inside.
"I admit she hasn't been treated well by men.” Mrs. Burton went on earnestly. "My goodness, who has? First her father, then that dreadful Bryan Oxnard creature she insisted on marrying. But that's no reason to give up on them completely."
"Sounds like a good reason to me," said Aunt Hermione, and consulted her pattern.
"It doesn't have anything to do with men," Gwen said. "I love Stoner." Her voice was clear and strong. Her hand trembled.
Mrs. Burton looked in their general direction. "You're indebted to her, of course. We both are. But this silly infatuation will pass."
"Grandmother. "
"Your granddaughter's a lesbian," Aunt Hermione said placidly. "Might as well get used to it."
Mrs. Burton snorted. ''We would never," she said, her voice rising a little, "have one of... of those people in my family."
''Why not?" Aunt Hermione squinted at her crocheting. "You already have child abusers."
"And given a choice, I would prefer child abusers."
Aunt Hermione sighed. "Eleanor, don't make a bigger fool of yourself than you already have."
''Well,'' said Mrs. Burton, getting to her feet a little unsteadily, "I won't have this in my house."
"Fine," Gwen said. "I can be packed in half an hour."
Stoner looked at her. Gwen's face was gray, her eyes burning. She's going to crack, she thought, and slipped a steadying arm around her shoulders.
''Will you kindly," said Mrs. Burton in a voice shaky with indignation, "take your filthy hands off her?"
Startled, Stoner unconsciously took a step back. "What?"
''What you do in your own home is your business. I don't want to know about it. But as long as you're in this house..."
"Wait a minute," Gwen said. "I pay half the rent."
Mrs. Burton turned on her. "That doesn't give you the right to bring your trash in here."
"Damn it,” Gwen snapped. "Stoner saved my life. If it hadn't been for her, Bryan would have killed me."
The older woman's face was hard as stone. "I wish he had."
"Honest to God," Aunt Hermione said in the shocked silence. "I've heard enough silliness in the last five minutes to last me a lifetime."
Mrs. Burton turned on her. ''We don't need your opinion, Hermione. You and your house full of perverts."
"House full of perverts?" Aunt Hermione raised an eyebrow. "Stoner, are you up to something you haven't told me about?"
She forced herself to shake her head.
"Too bad," Aunt Hermione said, and returned to her crocheting. "Might have been profitable."
"I suppose," Mrs. Burton said to Aunt Hermione, "you like thinking about your niece putting her hands all over other women."
"I have other things to think about, Eleanor, and so should you. If you can't control your imagination ... "
Mrs. Burton turned on Gwen. "Promise me you won't see her again, and we'll forget all about this."
"I intend to see her again," Gwen said, her voice deadly, "and I won't forget any of this."
We're doing this all wrong, Stoner thought. We should sit down and discuss it calmly. Everyone gets five minutes to speak, to tell how they feel, no name calling, stick to the subject, no threats, and if we can't make progress we call for a cooling-off period. Not the easiest thing in the world, but not a mess. This is a mess.
"Look," she said, "maybe if we all… I mean, let's look at it… well, what does everyone want from this?"
"I'll tell you what I want," Mrs. Burton shrieked. "I want you out of my granddaughter's life."
"That's the last thing you'll get," Gwen said coldly. ''Where I go, Stoner goes."
"It seems to me, Eleanor," Aunt Hermione put in, "you have the most to lose here."
It seemed to slow Mrs. Burton's momentum. She sat back and plucked at her sleeves. She looked old, and tired.
"You must understand," she said at last. "The way I was brought up... we would never... " She looked up at Gwen helplessly.
"The way I was brought up," Aunt Hermione cut in, "we would never treat another person cruelly. You should thank your lucky stars Gwen's fallen for Stoner. At least she has better taste in women than she does in men."
Mrs. Burton turned on her. "I've given her a decent life. The least she can do is be a decent person."
"She is a decent person," Aunt Hermione said. "Head and shoulders above what Stoner used to bring home."
"Aunt Hermione..."
"It's all right, dear. Like all of us, you're evolving."
''Well,'' Mrs. Burton said, "you can evolve yourself right out of this house." She turned to Gwen. "As for you, I'd rather see you dead."
"Gwen," Stoner said softly, "would you like me to leave now?"
Gwen shook her head. “Grandmother, I want to explain-"
"Explain?" Mrs. Burton gave a harsh laugh. "Explain this... this sickness?"
It's always the same, Stoner thought wearily as she went to the window and leaned against the sill. Recriminations, anger, blame, guilt, rejection - all because we love the wrong people. Love the wrong people. In a world where school lunches are traded for nuclear warheads, and the air gives you emphysema, and the water gives you cancer. Where the FDA sets the "maximum allowable rat feces" per can of tuna. Where rapists walk the streets, free on probation, and you can drop a few coins in a slot and watch a movie of a Real Life woman being Real Life beaten to Real Life death for kicks and profit. Where we finally got a woman nominated for vice president, the most innocuous office in the country, and all the woman-haters came screeching out from under their rocks to tap dance on her coffin, and some of the woman-haters were women, and what does that say about how we're taught to see ourselves? It should have been the signal to start the Revolution, but we'd forgotten about the Revolution, and now we have Yuppie Dykes in designer clothes getting their M.B.A.s from Closet University, and before we know it, it'll be 1950 again and all we'll have left will be The Well of Loneliness and The Children's Hour, and we'll wake up some morning believing the best thing to do if you're a lesbian is kill yourself.
''What are we doing? "She heard herself say into the stretched rubber-band silence. ''We should be out in the streets screaming our heads off."
Everyone looked at her.
"Stoner's been on a rampage since the '84 election," Aunt Hermione explained. "She thinks it would have turned out differently if only she'd done something, but she hasn't figured out what the something is."
"I only mean," Stoner said, "there are more vital things to be upset about."
Mrs. Burton sniffed. "Of course you'd say that."
"Grandmother," Gwen said softly.
Mrs. Burton turned her head away.
Aunt Hermione met Stoner's eyes, and shrugged. "Go figure."
Gwen stood in front of her grandmother, fists clenched, her face about to crumble. "Please," she said, "I love her, and I love you. Please try to..."
Mrs. Burton's eyes were burning coals. "Love? You call this love? This disgusting... revolting... obsession?"
Stoner felt something break. "God damn it," she barked. "That's enough!"
Mrs. Burton turned her back. "I'm not interested in anything you have to say."
"I don't give a damn!" The words exploded from her. "You're an ignorant, self-righteous woman. Do you have any idea what it means to be a lesbian?"
"I do not," said Mrs. Burton. "And I don't want to."
Stoner strode across the room. ''We do the dirty work in this world. We set up Crisis Centers to protect you upright, uptight 'normal' women from battering husbands. We fight for your Medicare and Social Security. We push your wheelchairs and wipe up your urine when you're too old and feeble to do it yourself. We do all the work you're too 'lady-like' to touch. And for that we're called names, and fired from the jobs nobody wants. When we go in public restrooms, we see hate written on the walls by people who are too ignorant to spell but claim the right to judge us. When we pick up a newspaper, we see letters from Bible-quoting cretins telling us our gay brothers are dying-of AIDS because God despises what we are. But we go on living, Mrs. Burton, because we earn the right. We live in a world of hate, and still we manage to love. You live in a world of love, but you hate. I don't understand that. I don't understand it at all."
Mrs. Burton glared at her. "How dare you talk to me like this?"
"I love Gwen. I'd give my life for her. If she left me for one of those 'nice young men' you think so highly of, I'd still love her. If he was cruel to her, I'd take her in and comfort her, and try to keep her safe. If she went back to him, I'd go on loving her. And I'd never, ever say the things you've said to her tonight. If this is your idea of love, I don't want any part of it."
She forced herself to break away and went to the window. The street was gray and empty. Old newspapers lay limp in the gutter. The air above the city was an oily yellow. She felt sick.
The silence was heavy behind her. She tried to imagine what they were thinking, but couldn't.
I hope Gwen understands. I hope I haven't ruined it for her.
She felt a hand against the side of her face.
"Hey," Gwen said.
"I'm sorry, Gwen. I couldn't help..."
"It's fine. I love you."
''Well,'' said Aunt Hermione as she gathered up her yarn, "I think we've about covered it. It's been an entertaining and enlightening evening, but I have an early reading with a Virgo, and you know how they are. Coming, Stoner?"
"I won't leave Gwen," she said.
Mrs. Burton's face was white with fury.
Stoner held her ground.
"I'm going with you,"Gwen said. "I don't feel welcome here."
"If you leave this house tonight," Mrs. Burton snapped, "don't come back."
Gwen turned to her. "I'm thirty-one years old, Grandmother. I’d like you to understand what Stoner means to me, but I don't intend to beg."
Eleanor Burton was stiff with righteous indignation. "You'll regret this, Gwyneth."
"I probably will. But if I stay, I'll regret that, too. So I might as well go where I'm wanted. I'm sorry it has to be like this, but I will love whom I love, and I don't intend to feel guilty for it."
''Well, don't expect me to..."
"I don't expect anything," Gwen said. ''When I find a place, I'll let you know where I am. If you need to get in touch with me, you can do it through Marylou at the travel agency."
"I wouldn't hold my breath if I were you," said Mrs. Burton.
Gwen left the apartment without speaking.
"Eleanor, Eleanor," Aunt Hermione clucked as she slung her tote bag over her arm, "you have some serious thinking to do." She jiggled Mrs. Burton's wrist affectionately. "I know you're a Leo, but try not to be a jackass."
The door slammed behind them.
"The trouble with bigots," Aunt Hermione muttered as they went down the stairs, "is they're so unoriginal. I wonder if Freud had anything to say on the subject."
Stoner couldn't answer.
"I've always suspected," Aunt Hermione went on, "that you were wise to slip away from your family in the dead of night instead of going through this. Tonight has convinced me I'm right."
The ground felt littered with broken things. Broken trust, broken love, broken...
Gwen was huddled at the bottom of the stairs, arms around her knees. A white line rimmed her lips. Her mahogany eyes were gray. Her hair had a powdery dullness.
She looked, Stoner thought irrelevantly, as if she'd been bleached. She knelt beside her. "Are you okay?"
Gwen looked up. "Oh, God, Stoner. What am I going to do?"
TWO
At last count, eight-hundred and fifty-nine travelers had stepped off Trans-Continental Airlines at Sky Harbor International Airport, Phoenix, Arizona, at high noon in Mid-August without sunglasses. No one has ever done it twice.
The desert sun, at high noon in Mid-August, rains down a torrent of silver needles. The sky burns white. The mountains that ring the city - Maricopas, White Tanks, Superstitions - flatten into dusty, two-dimensional mounds. Desert plants turn pale. Crawling, slithering, running creatures surrender to the heat and hide. The air shimmers on the horizon and flows in sluggish currents along the airport tarmac. Tires go soft. The odor of melting tar lies heavy along the ground. Light explodes in tinsel stars from moving glass and chrome. Phoenicians huddle indoors around their air conditioners and wait for the time of long shadows.
Sky Harbor International Airport, Phoenix, Arizona, at high noon in mid-August is a white-hot Hell.
Stoner winced. The muscles around her eyes were tight. Her pupils ached. She fumbled and stumbled her way to a seat in the waiting area and sat down. Dark shapes moved around her in a steady stream. I've gone blind, she thought. Blinded by the Light, Hallelujah.
Well, even if she couldn't see, Stell could see her. But nobody came forward out of the shadows. Stoner chewed her lip nervously.
Maybe she doesn't want us here.
Maybe we got the wrong day.
Or the wrong airport.
What if she doesn't show up?
What if we were supposed to meet her outside?
No, she said inside. Inside, in the TCA lounge. I'm sure she said that.
Maybe TCA has two lounges.
Nonsense, airlines don't have two lounges.
Airlines have dozens of lounges.
Did I give her the right flight number?
Come on, if she misses me, she'll have me paged.
Maybe I should have her paged.
She started to get up.
But I'd have to find a phone to have her paged, and she might show up and think she'd made a mistake and leave.
She sat back down.
I should have made the arrangements myself. I shouldn't have left it up to Marylou. I hate other people to make my travel arrangements. I mean, how do you know they haven't screwed up? If I screw up, at least I have some general idea where the screw-up lies. I screw up dates and times. I don't screw up transportation and destinations. So, if I'd made my own reservations and Stell didn't show up, I'd know I got the wrong date or the wrong time, but I’m in the right place. Which is more than I know now.
Marylou says travel agents who make their own reservations are like psychotherapists who treat family members and close friends. Or lawyers who represent themselves in malpractice suits. Marylou says...
Marylou never travels. Marylou hates to travel.
Marylou probably knows something I don't know but am bound to learn the hard way.
"I'll be darned," said a familiar voice. "You looked worried last time I saw you, and you still look worried."
She squinted into the glare. "Stell?"
"It ain't Dale Evans." A tall, thin shadow planted itself in front of her, hand
s on hips, and laughed. "I'll just bet you thought you could get away without sunglasses."
"Yeah," Stoner said with an awkward grin. "I did."
'Well, are you going to let me hug you? Or are you going to sit there and break my heart?"
To her great embarrassment, she felt tears spring to her eyes. "Oh, God, I've missed you,"she said, and threw her arms around the older woman.
"Missed you, too, kid." Stell squeezed her tight. "Thought you'd never get here."
Stoner rested on her shoulder. "You still smell like fresh bread."
“Well, I should. I'm still baking it." She held Stoner at arm's length and looked her up and down. "You're about the same. Where's your lady love?"
"Picking up the suitcases. She'll meet us outside."
Stell reached for Stoner's carry-on. "Might as well take our time. What you gain in travel time, you lose waiting for your doggone luggage." She led the way to the entrance. "Hope you didn't have your heart set on Timberline. It's been a topsy-turvy summer."
"I don't mind. I've never been to the desert before."
"I'll have to admit," Stell said as she strode ahead, "there have been moments the last month when I'd give my good right arm for a breath of Wyoming air. But family's family, and you gotta do what you gotta do." She stood back to let Stoner pass through the door first. 'Watch yourself, kiddo. That sun's a killer."
A blast of searing air knocked her back on her heels. “Good God!"
"Hot enough to blister paint," Stell said. "Stick close until I find the pick-up. If you get lost in the parking lot, you can go critical in ten minutes."
Heat from the pavement burned through the soles of her boots. She squinted against the sun and gasped for breath. "This is unbelievable!"
"It does get better." Stell picked her way between and around parked cars. “We have the altitude on our side in Spirit Wells. You might bake your brain by day, but you can count on freezing your tail off at night."
"Spirit Wells? I thought the trading post was in Beale."
"Beale's the nearest Post Office. Spirit Wells was a settlement of some kind about a hundred years ago. Or that might be a rumor. Anyway, I haven't seen any towns, Spirits, or wells." She stopped beside a light tan, rust-pocked, dust-coated Chevy LUV that had seen better days, but not in a long time.
