Love After Hours

by Radclyffe

  “Funny,” Gina murmured. “You never look nervous.”

  “I’m good at hiding it.”

  “Are you nervous now?” Gina’s question was so quiet Carrie wondered if she even meant to speak out loud.

  “No,” Carrie said. “You never make me nervous—a lot of other things, but not that.”

  “Good.” Gina rubbed the back of her neck. “I might be a little.”

  “You don’t have to be,” Carrie whispered. “You’re safe with me.”

  Gina’s smile was rueful. “Maybe I don’t want to be safe.”

  “Let me know when you decide.”

  Gina nodded. “I’ll be right back.”

  Gina disappeared inside and Carrie swung the rocker gently with one foot, taking in Gina’s home. The house fit somewhere between the size of hers and the big sprawling farmhouse Harper and Presley lived in. Gina’s was two neat stories, white clapboard with gingerbread trim around the eaves and porch roof, a slate roof, and a full porch front and back. The barn, off to her right and a hundred feet away, was bigger than the house, as often seemed to be the case, and looked well kept up and freshly painted. She didn’t see any sign of animals, and the fenced pastures looked to be planted in corn and hay. The cornfields swept almost to the horizon on three sides of the barn, meeting the slowly billowing blue-black clouds amassing where land and sky joined. The scent of ozone and summer heat tickled her nose. Her skin moistened in the humid twilight.

  The screen door creaked and Gina appeared with two glasses of wine. She held one out to Carrie and sat down beside her.

  “I can so use this,” Carrie said. She hadn’t expected the invitation and was content to let Gina take the lead. The quiet was soothing—not even the crickets were chirping—and watching the storm slowly churn closer while safe and protected under the wide expanse of the porch roof was oddly peaceful.

  “Margie and Blake,” Gina said, “you know them pretty well?”

  “Mmm,” Carrie said, sipping the wine, surprised by the question. “Margie is Harper and Flann’s youngest sister. And Blake is Abby’s son. Abby and Presley are best friends from college.”

  “Tight group.” Gina sprawled beside her, one arm stretched out along the back, her fingers almost touching Carrie’s shoulder. Her leg was an inch away from Carrie’s knee. The tension radiating from her rivaled the explosive promise of the thunderclouds drawing nearer.

  “Pretty much family all the way around,” Carrie said.

  “And you too. You were living with Harper and Presley for a while, right?”

  “Yes. Presley and I shared the house when we first moved here.” Carrie laughed. “God, there are no secrets in this place.”

  “Not true,” Gina said. “They’re just buried deep.”

  “Are you speaking from experience?” Carrie asked carefully.

  “Joe told me about Blake’s surgery,” Gina said as if Carrie hadn’t spoken. “I wouldn’t know if he hadn’t said anything.”

  “Blake’s transitioning is not a secret,” Carrie said, “but hopefully it won’t be news after a while, either.”

  “He seems to be pretty cool about it.”

  “He’s a remarkable kid, and so are his mom and Flann. And Margie and his other friends are totally unfazed by it.”

  Gina let out a long breath. “Not everyone is, though. Like the asshole in the parking lot.”

  Carrie snorted. “He’s all bruised ego. I think he’s still smarting because we beat his team with a woman pitching. He’s got to find some excuse for his own failure, I guess.”

  “Yeah, well, prejudice always does.” Gina gave her a long look. “Don’t underestimate him.”

  “I won’t.” Carrie brushed the top of Gina’s hand with her fingers. “Promise.”

  A streak of lightning shot across the sky, a quicksilver flash followed a few seconds later by the distant roll of thunder.

  “How far away do you think that is?” Carrie kicked off her shoes and socks and curled a foot underneath her other leg, settling back in the glider.

  “If you count seconds, you can estimate the distance. I’d say that’s about a mile.” Gina turned her glass in her hands, staring at it as if some elusive answers resided in the swirling wine. “Margie and Blake—they made me wish I’d had their guts.” Gina’s voice trembled. Whatever path she was traveling, the journey was a painful one.

  “Did your parents have a problem with you coming out?”

  Gina was silent for so long, Carrie wasn’t certain she was going to answer.

  “Not in so many words,” Gina finally said, her voice flat and empty. “Of course, I didn’t say anything to anyone, either, for a long time.”

  “It’s not easy,” Carrie said. “I was lucky. My parents are radicals—I think I mentioned that. Kind of latter-day hippies. I grew up with all kinds of people around the house and never really worried about what my parents might think. It took me a while to admit to myself I wanted to be with girls, but once I did, I saw the light.” Carrie laughed, remembering the exultation accompanying that particular epiphany. The thunder rolled closer, and she started mentally counting the seconds every time she heard it. The twilight shimmered, a false dark as if she were viewing the world through a veil. Her life had been like that, before she’d come to understand her dreams and desires. “Anyhow, by that point, it was kind of an over and done thing.”

  Gina nodded, her expression distant. “I always knew. I wanted to be like Joe from the time I could think about being like anyone, even though both my sisters were just as tough and just as good at pretty much everything as he was. But they had a girlie side I never had.”

  “Hey,” Carrie said teasingly. “I’m very girlie, in case you hadn’t noticed, and I’m very much a lesbian.”

  Gina cut her a look. “Oh, believe me, I’ve noticed. I’m pretty much a slave to your girliness.”

  Carrie caught her breath, torn between laughing and moaning. The heat in Gina’s voice struck as potently as a lightning flash. “Good.”

  Gina leaned imperceptibly closer, her fingertips just touching Carrie’s shoulder. Heat lightning coursed along Carrie’s skin. Her heart raced and a deep ache kindled in her depths. Carrie sipped her wine to take her mind off the urge to crawl into Gina’s lap.

  “You’re beautiful, if I haven’t said that out loud,” Gina said. “I think it every time I see you.”

  “I like the way you look at me,” Carrie murmured. “Like I’m all you see.”

  “You are.” Gina traced small circles on Carrie’s shoulder, the light touch so erotic Carrie shivered.

  “It’s going to rain soon,” Carrie murmured, as the seconds between the lightning and the thunder disappeared.

  “I know. Do you want to go inside?”

  Carrie shook her head and emptied her glass.

  “No, I want to sit here with you and listen to the rain.”

  Gina slid closer, her arm curling around Carrie’s shoulder.

  “I can’t think of anything but you. I lie awake at night wanting you.”

  “But there’s something, isn’t there.” Carrie gave up and leaned into Gina’s arms, resting one hand on Gina’s taut stomach. “Why did you bring me here tonight?”

  “For this.” Gina cupped Carrie’s face, lifted her chin, and kissed, hard and hungry, a fierce, desperate kiss that burned through Carrie like lightning crashing. Thunder rolled. The storm would be above them in seconds, and she needed to decide if she was going to stand out in the downpour and let the storm rage around her, or run for shelter. She pressed her hand to Gina’s shoulder, gently pushed her away, and Gina drew back instantly.

  “If you keep that up,” Carrie said, “you’re going to have to take me to bed.”

  Gina’s fingers tightened on Carrie’s jaw. “Would you mind?”

  Carrie laughed, hearing the unsteadiness in her voice. “Oh no. I’ve been thinking about it, imagining it, quite a lot since the last time I saw you.”

  “The last t
ime you said you weren’t ready.”

  “Oh, I’m ready,” Carrie said. “But I’m not sure you are.”

  “The rain is coming.” Gina cradled Carrie against her chest and rested her cheek on the top of Carrie’s head. Sheets of water, an advancing army of wild power, tore up the earth. Wind whipped branches from the pines and dashed them across the yard. Thunder boomed, shaking the ground beneath the porch. And always the lightning, feral and unchained. Gina’s mouth was close to Carrie’s ear, her breath warm in the cool air, her words cloistered on a roll of thunder. A secret passed in the heart of the storm.

  “I never told anyone about Emmy,” Gina murmured. “I kissed her the first time when we were twelve.”

  Moving as slowly as she could, Carrie rested her hand lightly on Gina’s thigh. The rigid muscles quivered beneath her fingers.

  “Her parents were strict with her. They must’ve known how popular she was going to be, how all the boys were going to want her. They never suspected it was me who touched her first. That she let me.”

  Gina’s voice was low, heavy and dreamlike.

  “I worshiped her, would’ve done anything she wanted. I couldn’t believe it was me she wanted, and no one else.” Lightning struck in front of the barn, silvering the yard for an instant. A cymbal clash of thunder broke a heartbeat later. Icy slivers of rain blew across the porch, and Carrie shivered.

  Gina’s arms tightened around her, and Carrie held very still.

  “Her parents wouldn’t let her date until she was fifteen, and then every boy in school was calling her. She wasn’t like some of the other popular girls. Everyone liked her, even the girls who wanted to be her. She was junior prom queen, and we all knew she’d be the senior queen too. Her boyfriend was prom king.” Gina’s voice shook. “But I was the only one who touched her. In that barn right out there the first time. My grandmother was alive then, and she kept cows. We’d come here after school to help clean the barn, and after we’d lie in the hay and she’d let me put my hands on her.”

  The night turned from gray to black. A light came on over the barn, a shimmering haze, barely visible through the storm. Carrie’s world had become the circle of Gina’s arms and the beat of Gina’s heart beneath her cheek. She pressed to her, as much for solace as to comfort.

  “Joe figured it out. He could always tell when I was hiding something. He kept my secret, because Emmy wanted us to be a secret. I was her secret love, and her secret shame.”

  Carrie stroked Gina’s hair and slipped her other hand under Gina’s shirt. Her abdomen was tense and cold. So cold. Nothing she could do would take away that old wound. All she could do was let the pain pour down around her like the rain.

  “I didn’t go to any of the parties on senior weekend because Emmy would be there with Kevin. I hated to see her with him, as if she was his trophy, his prize. But she called me the night of the last party when Kevin got too drunk to drive her home. She called me and I went to get her, and I was angry. Angry that he hadn’t taken care of her, and angry that I’d let her go with him. She was crying, and I kissed her. I shouldn’t have, but she was mine and I wanted her.” Gina shuddered. “We’d always been so careful, but I couldn’t think, didn’t think, didn’t care. All that mattered was that she was mine. And a couple of Kevin’s friends saw us.”

  Carrie held her breath, fighting the nausea building inside her. God, how she wished there was something she could say or do that would make a difference. The past could not be changed, but it could be forgiven. She slid her arm around Gina’s waist, held her as tightly as Gina held her.

  “Emmy was nearly hysterical when they called us names, laughing and threatening to tell Kevin. To tell everyone. She got behind the wheel of my truck, and I just barely managed to get in the other side before she tore out onto the road. I couldn’t calm her down, couldn’t stop her crying, and she just kept going faster and faster. I couldn’t stop her and the truck rolled and I didn’t know until morning when I woke up in the hospital that she was gone.”

  “I’m so, so sorry,” Carrie murmured, squeezing her eyes tight, determined not to cry.

  “They never said anything about us, those boys. Maybe they were too drunk to remember, maybe they knew why Emmy had driven off the way she had. That they pushed her until she broke.”

  “And you never said anything, either, did you,” Carrie guessed.

  Gina shook her head. “How could I? Emmy died for that secret, and I kept it for her.”

  “But Joe knows.”

  “Not about that night. If I’d told him, he would’ve gone after them. He would’ve killed them, I think, right then.”

  “And your family?”

  “They knew how close we were, but they didn’t want to know all of it. Later, long enough after they could ignore the past, I told them there wouldn’t be a husband.” Gina laughed harshly. “I still think they hold out hope. It’s not so much they’re against being gay, they just want a traditional life for me. For them.”

  Gina sighed and some of the tension ebbed, as if the words had breached a dam she’d tended for years. The thunder was an echo now, and the lightning had spent itself in its fury. The rain had lost its furor too, subsiding into a gentle dance on the tin roof above them. Carrie stroked Gina’s cheek, brushing away the tears that might’ve been only the rain on her face. She kissed her, slowly, as gently as she knew how, brushing her mouth over Gina’s until Gina’s hands came into her hair and Gina clung to her, desperately vulnerable.

  “It’s not your fault,” Carrie whispered.

  “If only I hadn’t kissed her—”

  “No,” Carrie murmured, stroking Gina’s face. “It wasn’t the kiss, Gina. None of your kisses. It was an accident.”

  “It should’ve been me driving. It should have been me who died.”

  “Neither of you should have,” Carrie whispered. “There was no sin, there was no price to pay. You loved each other. There was nothing wrong in that.”

  “If I’d been stronger, braver—”

  Carrie gripped her shoulders. “Gina, you were teenagers, and you did the best you could. You were there for her—you came when she called you. Loving her was not wrong. She wasn’t wrong to be afraid. There is no guilt in being afraid. You were both innocent, and what happened that night was an accident.”

  “I’m sorry,” Gina said with a weary sigh. “I’m sorry to put this on you. You don’t need to hear my troubles.”

  Carrie shook her gently. “Don’t you say that. How can I know you if you don’t share your pain? And since I’m pretty far on the road to falling in love with you, it matters even more.”

  “You might be making a mistake,” Gina said before she kissed her, her mouth urgent and hot.

  “That’s not for you to decide,” Carrie said when she caught her breath.

  “The storm’s passing,” Gina said.

  “No.” Carrie pulled Gina to her feet. “It’s just starting. Take me inside.”

  Chapter Twenty-three

  Gina held the screen door for Carrie and reached inside to flick on the kitchen lights. The light from the amber fluted wall sconces bathed the room in muted gold reminiscent of sunset on a hazy August afternoon. Her chest was curiously light, as if her heart had shed a mantle of stone she hadn’t realized she’d been carrying. Carrie’s comfort, more than she deserved after telling her about Emmy, had soothed an ache so deep inside she no longer noticed it. She wasn’t sure she could shed the guilt as easily as she had shed her secrets, and she doubted she’d ever believe that Emmy would forgive her. She’d replayed the night so many times, what she should have done, how the anger she had no right to feel had betrayed Emmy’s trust. Emmy had not been at fault. Her fear was real and Gina’s rage had come from impotence—impotence and helplessness and jealousy.

  Carrie hadn’t blamed her, and Carrie was here with her now. Gina stopped in the middle of the kitchen, and Carrie paused, waiting the way she had waited when Gina had made her confession.

&
nbsp; “I wanted…needed to tell you about Emmy,” Gina said. “You deserved to know before we took things between us any further.” She smiled wryly. “And we were headed there fast. I’m glad you know, but I can’t promise you there won’t be ghosts sometimes.”

  “I don’t want promises, about that or anything else, except…” Carrie reached for Gina’s hand.

  “Except?” Gina gripped Carrie’s hand, probably too hard. Carrie’s fingers were cool and steady, a lifeline Gina had never expected.

  “I need you to trust me enough to let me see you. I’m not afraid of your shadows.”

  “All right. I’ll try.”

  “And I want you to leave a light on in the bedroom tonight,” Carrie said.

  “All right.”

  “Aren’t you going to ask me why?” Carrie’s voice teased, but her gaze probed.

  Gina cupped Carrie’s cheek and kissed her. “I hope it’s because you want me to see you, because I want to see you so much I can hardly breathe.”

  Carrie covered Gina’s hand where it rested on her cheek. “When you put it that way, I most certainly do want your eyes…and everything else…on me.” She threaded her arms around Gina’s neck and pressed against her body. “Most of all, though, I want you to see me, and only me.”

  Gina caught her breath. She was such an idiot sometimes. “When I’ve touched you, I’ve only ever seen you, only ever tasted you, only ever hungered for you. And when I lie down at night, and my body is on fire, you’re the one I think of.”

  “Then you’d better do something about it, right now,” Carrie said, an urgent edge to her voice.

  Gina kept her arm around Carrie’s waist and pulled her through the downstairs to the front staircase, up to the second floor and into her bedroom. The room had been her grandparents’ a long time ago, running the entire width of the back of the house, with ceiling-high windows on three sides that let the breeze blow through even on the hottest nights. Gina’d left them open and the recent storm had scrubbed the air clean. She pulled the chain on the brass lamp with its cream-colored silk lampshade and little gold tassels rimming the border. The soft light was enough to see by, but not too bright to shatter the cocoon of quiet stillness surrounding them as they approached the bed.