by Kay Bigelow
“What about you, Gracie? What do you want?”
“Me?” she asked like no one had ever posed that question. “I think I want to be an empty-nester.” The thought amused her so much she had a giggling fit. She finally got control when the manager strolled by.
When Gracie handed Alex her change, she said, “Thanks, Alex. I haven’t laughed like that in years.”
“That’s too bad. See you next time.”
“You bet.”
Alex drove to Lauren’s house thinking about what it must be like to be Gracie Donovan. She wondered if she’d had dreams of being something other than a checker at the local grocery store and the mom to teenagers. There, but for the grace of God, go I. And by the grace of Lucia.
Alex knew she was extremely lucky to be doing something she truly loved. She was lucky to have Lucia in her life. And now she was lucky to have Lauren in her life. “Thank you, Universe, for these gifts,” she whispered.
****
Alex arrived twenty-eight minutes later carrying a large, plain, brown paper bag. Lauren was intrigued. Alex set the bag on the living room table and took Lauren into her arms. She kissed Lauren like she’d missed her.
“Wow!” Lauren said. “Miss me today?” she asked, even as she took a step from Alex and raked her eyes over Alex’s body from her smiling lips down her torso and below. When she got as far as Alex’s left thigh, her eyes snapped back to Alex’s.
Alex smiled. “I miss you whenever we’re not together.”
Lauren’s eyes fell to Alex’s left thigh again. “Oh, Alex, the things you do to me.”
Alex leaned into Lauren and whispered, “Just wait until after dinner and then you’ll know the things I will do to you.”
Lauren could see the desire in Alex’s eyes. She wondered if Alex would be willing to forego dinner. But, it seemed, Alex was going to make her wait and the intervening time would serve as foreplay, tortuous for Lauren and fun for Alex.
“What do you have in your bag?”
“Groceries, of course.”
Lauren didn’t know whether to be happy about the groceries or disappointed they weren’t heading straight up the stairs to her bedroom.
“Really? As in uncooked food?”
“Please don’t sound quite so surprised.”
Lauren laughed. “What can I do to help?”
“You can come keep me company.”
Lauren sat at the kitchen island and watched Alex dice onions, fry bacon, and sauté spinach. She was focused and didn’t speak, and Lauren was content to watch her work. Within minutes, Alex took a frittata from the oven that looked divine.
They sat in the nook to enjoy their meal. Alex watched Lauren take her first bite.
“This is delicious,” Lauren told her. “Is there no end to your talents?”
“There’s so much you don’t know about me,” Alex said.
“Is there? Tell me one more thing I don’t know about you that I should know.”
“There is one thing I need to tell you. I’ve been putting it off.”
“Now you’ve got me intrigued. Don’t keep me in the dark.”
Alex looked at Lauren with profound sadness in her eyes. If she tells me she’s dying, I’m going to hit her, I swear.
“When I first started painting, Natalia and I lived in Brooklyn. After she died, I remained in our apartment for a short while. A local art gallery agreed to include two of my pieces in one of their shows. My paintings received some good press. Shortly thereafter I moved in with April and, as I told you, then went to Boston for my MFA. While there, I was featured in a couple of more shows. After I got my degree and moved back in with April, I was one of several artists invited to show at a Manhattan gallery. After the show, I was approached by a very wealthy, well-known woman who said she wanted to be my patron.”
“You had a patron? How very Renaissance of you.”
“There’s more. She’s still my patron. She is taking me with her to London and Paris.”
“Okay,” Lauren said. I don’t think this is going anywhere I’m going to be happy with.
“We’ll be gone for three weeks at least, maybe an entire month.”
What does she expect me to say to that? There is nothing I can say. I hope she gets to the bottom line of this little tale.
“She pays me a monthly stipend so I can paint full-time. For her patronage, she has certain demands that must be met.”
Here it comes.
“We were lovers from the start. I couldn’t tell you about her because of that.”
Yep. There it is. The part she knew I wouldn’t like. I thought we’d talked about my need for monogamy—didn’t we? Maybe not. Still, even though we’ve never talked about specifically being exclusive, I assumed we were. My bad for assuming. Lauren was having a hard time breathing. She felt like she’d been hit with a baseball bat in the gut. She couldn’t think about anything other than Alex having another lover
“Please leave,” Lauren said.
“Lauren, please understand, I didn’t mean to hurt you.”
“Ah, but you did.”
“You must understand how important my painting is to me. I’m not known well enough to make a living off it. I’m sure I will be, but I’m not there yet.”
“Get out.”
“Lauren, I wasn’t lying when I told you I love you.”
“Alex, get out of my house now,” Lauren said, her voice cold as ice.
“Please, can we talk about this?”
“The time to ‘talk about this’ was before you told me you loved me. It was the time to talk about this before I fell in love with you. It was time to talk about this before we made love. It was time weeks ago, Alex. It is not the time on the eve of your departure for a month with your other lover.”
“Lauren, please.” Alex was pleading, tears on her cheeks.
“Get the fuck out of my house, Alex. Now.”
Lauren didn’t recognize the person she’d suddenly become, and she was certain Alex didn’t recognize her, either. Lauren had never been as furious as she was in that moment. Her blazing anger was surging through her body. She needed Alex to be gone. Now.
Alex finally got Lauren’s message as surely as Lauren had gotten her message. She stood up and walked slowly toward the front door, hesitating slightly before turning back to Lauren.
“Lauren, I love you with all my heart. I don’t love Lucia, but I need her money. Lauren, please can’t things stay as they were? Please.”
“No. Leave. Now,” Lauren said, emphasizing each word.
“But—”
“If you’re not out of this house in thirty seconds, I will call the cops,” Lauren said as she took her phone off the table.
Alex walked out of Lauren’s house and out of her life. She heard her SUV speed down the driveway.
Lauren burst into tears. When she stopped sobbing, she went upstairs and threw herself on the bed. Serena got on the bed and gently lay down next to her. Lauren threw her arm over the dog and cried some more. When she’d used half a box of Kleenex, she went into the bathroom.
What is the matter with you? It’s not like you were a couple. Hell, you were barely dating. She knew she and Alex hadn’t been together long, but there was such a deep connection between them Lauren could feel Alex’s presence. And now she could profoundly feel her absence. She didn’t know how to explain that, or even if there was an explanation, but she could feel it. It was almost as if there was an invisible…something binding them together. Great! Now I’m fantasizing about the tie that binds. Next, I’ll be seeing unicorns. Better unicorns than images of Alex naked—and with another woman.
The bathroom mirror told her she was not a pretty picture. Her hair stuck out at odd angles, her eyes were red and swollen, and she had pieces of Kleenex stuck to her nose and chin. Max came into the bathroom, jumped up on the counter, and purred louder than she’d ever heard him. She gathered him into her arms and burst into tears again. She hugged Max for so long he strug
gled to get down. His sympathy only extended so far, apparently.
She turned on the shower and was prepared to step into the stall with her clothes on because it seemed like too much of an effort to take them off. If I go into the shower with them on, I will just have to clean up the mess, and that is more of an effort than taking them off. Damn her! God damn her to hell. Why didn’t she tell me sooner? It wouldn’t hurt nearly as badly. I would have been disappointed, but this pain is too much to bear.
She did take her clothes off, but changed her mind about the shower. She washed her face, made a cold compress with one of the washcloths she kept in a cabinet beneath the sink, and held it on her eyes for a minute. Who am I expecting to see this evening that I need to worry about puffy eyes? The hell with it.
When she left the bathroom, Lauren headed out of the bedroom before remembering she was naked. She turned around and put on a pair of flannel pajamas and her winter slippers. She added her robe for good measure. She went to the kitchen to get a bottle of water, finding, to her dismay, that they hadn’t cleaned up their dinner mess. She took one of the brown paper bags Alex had brought the frittata ingredients in and dumped the unused ingredients as well as the leftovers into the bag. She was tempted to put Alex’s plate and fork into it as well, but stopped herself just in time. She checked the fridge for anything else that might remind her of Alex, and found nothing.
After dumping the paper bags into the trash bin at the side of the house, she went to the living room only to realize there was nothing of Alex anywhere in her house, just as there was nothing of her in Alex’s home. Alex had been very careful. Not that Lauren thought Alex believed what’s-her-name would ever be in Lauren’s home, but nevertheless she’d been careful.
Lauren fixed a hot chocolate and returned to the living room and sat down. She ruthlessly suppressed memories of Alex. She wasn’t entirely successful, but every time her mind wandered to Alex, she’d bring it back to the present. I need a distraction. Call Charlie. I bet she’d provide a robust distraction to what is ailing me. Oh, good, exchange one youngster for an even younger kid. No, I won’t do that. In fact, I don’t need that kind of distraction. I need something to occupy my mind right now.
Without giving it any thought, Lauren picked up the TV remote and turned the television on. When she got bored with one channel, she moved on to the next. Before she knew it, it was one-thirty in the morning and she’d been sitting in front of the damned TV for at least five hours, a first for her. She turned the television off and let Serena into the backyard.
When Serena returned, Lauren climbed the stairs to her bedroom. She didn’t bother turning on any lights since she was already dressed for bed. She stripped the bed and resisted the urge to throw the sheets out the window. She and Alex had made love on those sheets. Her scent would be all over them. She took them downstairs and put them in the washing machine and turned it on. After putting fresh sheets on the bed, she lay down. For a few minutes she didn’t do anything but lay there trying not to remember the last time she and Alex had made love. When she banished those thoughts, she sniffed the air, hoping to catch Alex’s scent, but it seemed she’d indeed banished the smell of Alex from the bedroom. The scent in her memory would not go away so easily.
When her thoughts turned to how she’d been with Alex, Lauren took her phone out of the pocket of her robe and dialed Lindsey’s number.
“Lauren? What’s the matter?” Lindsey asked before she could even say hello.
“Alex has a patron. They’re lovers. And they’re going to Europe together for a month.”
“The bitch. Did she tell you this?”
By this time, Lauren was crying again.
“Yes,” she sobbed.
“Poor baby. What can I do?”
“Nothing. I needed to tell someone.”
“I’m glad you called, girlfriend.”
“I’m sorry it’s so late.”
“Don’t worry about the time. I just walked in the door,” Lindsey said.
“Whose bedroom did you sneak out of tonight?”
“That’s not important. Are you heartbroken?”
“I am.”
“Would it help to say this, too, shall pass?”
“Ask me again when this, too, passes.”
“I will.”
They talked for half an hour. Lauren finally said goodnight because she knew the approaching weekend would be a busy time for Lindsey—they always were. Plus, Lindsey usually went to the markets on Thursdays in preparation for the weekend.
It didn’t take Lauren long to fall asleep, but her dreams were full of Alex. Alex in the park. Alex beneath her. Alex on top. Alex across the table from her at Mamacita’s, Alex at April’s house. Alex. Alex. Alex.
Chapter Eighteen
After Lauren ordered her out of her home, Alex drove around for a while. When she realized she didn’t know where she was, she pressed the GPS button on her steering wheel. Once it loaded, she pressed the Home button. The unit immediately began giving her directions. When she arrived home, she walked around her condo but couldn’t think of what to do.
The only thing she wanted to do was to be with Lauren. Why wouldn’t Lauren at least talk to her? What did you expect her to do? Sit down with you and talk about the woman who pays you money for sex? Really? Okay, maybe that had been a foolish expectation. But Alex had not been expecting to be kicked out of Lauren’s home without being able to explain things to her. What could I have added after I told her, “She pays me a monthly stipend so I can paint full-time. For her patronage and money, she has certain demands that must be met. We were lovers from the start”? Nothing. In three sentences, I told her everything she did not want to ever hear from me. I could have at least eased into an explanation of Lucia, but no, I had to blurt everything out in a damning three sentences.
I’ve lost Lauren. I knew that monogamy was probably important to her. I knew that and in thirty seconds, I’d told her I’d cheated on her. And now I’m shocked she kicked me out. Wait a second. I didn’t cheat on her. Lucia and I have not had sex since long before Lauren and I started seeing one another.
Alex knew she was nitpicking, but she was desperate. She wanted Lauren to see things from her perspective. Painting was her life. She was happiest when she was painting. She didn’t want to dabble in painting, she wanted to be an artist. She wanted it to be her profession in addition to being her passion. For the last five years, she’d worked hard to improve her skills. She needed to make a name for herself so she could support herself by selling her paintings. Lauren was astute enough to understand that. And she probably did understand that. What she probably couldn’t understand was Alex having accepted the patronage of a woman who was paying her for sex. Was that what Lucia was doing? Was that how she understood their relationship? Probably not. Lucia saw Alex’s talent and wanted to nurture it and allow it to grow and mature. Sex wasn’t the primary goal of Lucia’s patronage since they hadn’t made love in months. Maybe in the beginning it had been, but now? Not so much. Lucia could have easily dropped Alex when Lucia was no longer interested in having sex with her, but she hadn’t. She continued to be her agent and had gotten her her own show at a prestigious Manhattan gallery.
When did I begin thinking Lucia’s patronage was all about sex? They didn’t see even each other that often. They saw each other when, for whatever reason, Lucia needed an escort to a women-only event, like that fundraiser she hosted for the Human Rights Campaign. Mostly, they spoke on the phone whenever Lucia wanted to tell Alex about something, usually an art show or an opening at a major museum featuring an exhibition of an artist Lucia thought Alex would enjoy knowing better. Otherwise, they lived their separate lives.
Alex stopped pacing from her kitchen to her bedroom and finally sat down on her bed. How am I going to get Lauren back? Have I really lost her? Oh, my God, what if I have lost her? What if she never wants to see me again? What the fuck have I done? Could I have done anything differently? Lauren deserved t
o know the truth about Lucia so I couldn’t have done anything but tell her.
Alex burst into tears and threw herself back on the bed. She cried herself to sleep. When she woke, it was still dark outside, she was still dressed including her boots, and she was chilled. She couldn’t force herself to get up, remove her clothes, and take a shower, so she kicked her boots off and pulled the blanket she kept folded across the foot of her bed up and over her and tried not to think of Lauren.
****
On the following Friday morning, someone was pounding on Lauren’s front door at the crack of dawn. She was tempted to throw the covers over her head and ignore them. If it was Alex, she didn’t want to see her. If it was anybody else, she didn’t want to see them, either.
Whoever it was at the door was relentless. Lauren got out of bed in huff. She exchanged her pajamas for a pair of jeans and a long-sleeved T-shirt and charged down the stairs. She threw the front door open and demanded, “What?”
“Good morning to you, too,” Lindsey said.
Lauren stepped outside and gathered her best friend into her arms. As they were hugging, Serena slipped by and went into the yard. Lauren kept an eye on her so she wouldn’t wander away. Serena went on alert as if she saw something out by the road. Lauren looked and saw Alex sitting in her car across the street from the end of her driveway watching. Had she been there all night? Maybe. Lauren called Serena to her side.
When Serena finally realized Lindsey was on the porch, she ran to her.
“Hey, there Serena,” Lindsey said, getting down on one knee to snuggle the wiggling dog.
“How did you get here?” Lauren asked, not seeing a car in the driveway.
“I took the train to the station, and a taxi here.”
“Come inside,” Lauren said.
“Is that her across the street?” Lindsey asked.
“Yes. Are you hungry?”
“No, but I’d kill for a cup of coffee.”
“You got it.
