Jane’s spoon was poised in front of her mouth and stayed there as this revelation swirled about her. As if she heard a swarm of bees, she turned to look, finding nothing, of course. Nothing but a reeling sensation. She moved to the table to sit, fearing the bees would sting her or at least make her faint.
“You saw it?” she rasped.
“Yeah. Really something, seeing people doing it.”
“Did…did you…” Jane’s throat closed so badly she got up for water, drank an entire glass, then resumed her seat while Jennalee remained standing, back against the counter. “Did you keep watching?” Jane finally managed.
“Yep. You could tell when he came.”
“Oh, God,” wailed Jane, sounding almost like Anita Southerland.
“Mom, what’s wrong? You asked me.”
“I know,” said Jane, breathing labored. “I just didn’t think…”
Only then did it occur to Jennalee that she’d said too much. Only then did she realize her mother wasn’t concerned with Southerlands fucking as much as she did her own daughter possibly doing it or at least knowing too much about how to do it.
“How could you tell?” Jane asked, voice trembling.
“I don’t know,” said Jennalee, fabricating as fast as she could. “I mean, he threw his head back and got all frantic so I figured he was, you know, coming. I mean, I guess that’s what it was and they stopped right after that. He let her down, tucked his thing away, zipped up.”
“Oh, God,” said Jane.
“Mom, come on, don’t get all upset over me knowing about sex. They taught a class about it in school, all the mechanics, you know, erections, sperm, birth control. I’m educated on the subject, courtesy the San Francisco Unified School District.”
Jane turned to her yogurt so Jennalee did, too. They’d both finished when Jane spoke again. “I accept the educational aspect, which is good, I do want you to know about these things. What I don’t want is you watching people doing it. That is disgusting and I will speak to Mr. Southerland about it.”
“No! Oh, Mother, you can’t do that. I’ll die if you tell him I saw. I will, I’ll die. Drop over at your feet. Expire. Totally die.”
“Okay, okay, calm down. I won’t tell him you saw. I’ll just say he was seen and that such activity is unacceptable on the grounds.”
“I bet there’s more of it going on than just Vaughn. These people seem to like their liquor and you know what goes with that.”
“Please don’t talk like that, Lee,” begged Jane. “I’ve had enough for one night. I’m now going to bed, where I doubt I’ll sleep a wink. Good night.” She kissed her daughter on the forehead and left the kitchen.
Jennalee didn’t feel tired or sleepy. Just the opposite, she was up now, not just out of bed but up with renewed energy. Exile was finally hopping. She wondered about Vaughn enduring police interrogation. Would he confess to fucking at the end of Building Three? Would the police call on Lorene? She’d have to stand up for him, say she wanted it, but didn’t she have a husband? They’ll be back tomorrow, Jennalee decided. It wasn’t over. And Anita, probably in the loony bin by now or at least the alcoholic ward where she could dry out. Poor woman. He drove her to drink, that was plain. What a mess marriage could be. As she ventured back to her room, she found herself grateful her parents were devoted, even if boring.
Instead of attempting sleep, she checked her phone to find more texts from Jimmy what’s-his-name and one from Lana in San Francisco. She went on about some new guy and Jennalee deleted her. Enough chat. Jennalee went over to YouTube to watch some antics, checked out Twitter, then started Googling Sutherlands when what she really wanted to do, and had held off doing because it seemed so common, was to Google Harley Laidlaw. She excused herself the indulgence based on the fact that he’d deserted her yesterday. She needed to know what made him tick.
Laidlaw led to the pawn shop, to Lizann, some ancient entry about a concert she gave, and then there was Harley, several entries about the “promising violinist showing great poise and talent despite outward appearances.” Jennalee chuckled and told Bascomb Bunny, “And I know him. We’ve kissed and he got a hard-on.” She fixed her eyes on Harley, who stood with violin in one hand, bow in the other, both at his sides. He looked directly back at her, not smiling, and she noted the earring was the eighth note. He wasn’t wearing anything too familiar. Noting the date was four years earlier, she saw the emerging punk, the beginnings of the wild hair but no beard stubble. He wore jeans and a garish red print shirt, over which she recognized the white pinstripe vest. She liked that. Maybe it was some kind of companion, like Bascomb whom she now hugged.
It was nearly three before Jennalee put down her phone and turned out her light. “I’ll never get to sleep,” she told Bascomb, who offered no comment. She immediately slept.
* * * *
Next morning she lay in bed waiting for Harley’s violin practice to drift down from the bluff, but all was silent. She and Bascomb Bunny curled together for half an hour, but the only sound was her mother who came knocking at her door. “Get up, Lee, if you want any breakfast.”
“Okay,” Jennalee called. When Jane had gone, the girl listened once more for the violin. Nothing.
* * * *
“Don’t wolf down you food,” Jane scolded as Jennalee shoveled scrambled eggs into her mouth.
‘I’m not wolfing,” Jennalee replied, “and is that even a verb?”
Jane chuckled. “Nice to know some of the school’s efforts have paid off.”
Once fed, Jennalee hopped up but before she could flee, she heard a familiar refrain. “Stick around and help out.”
“Sure,” Jennalee said from the hall where she raced along. In minutes she was dressed in cutoff denim shorts and a pink tank top. She added pink sandals, pulled her hair into a ponytail, and once outside, congratulated herself on her choice of attire because it was already hot. Sutherlands were in the pool, though not as many as before. Hangovers, Jennalee decided. How many were laid out zonked in bed? She considered them as she hurried along the winding path toward the bluff.
As she climbed, she knew her efforts were not futile. If Harley wasn’t already up there, he soon would be. He wouldn’t fail to practice.
He was sitting under the oak tree, violin case unopened beside him. Creeping closer, Jennalee saw him leaned back against the fat tree trunk, eyes closed. She stopped, not wanting to intrude, knowing she would.
“It’s okay,” Harley said without opening his eyes.
“How’d you know it’s me?”
“I heard leaves crackle under foot and who else comes up here?”
“You working up to practicing?” she asked, immediately adding, “Do you visualize before? Mr. Mendel taught me that, like a painter who thinks about what he’s going to do, not how the painting will look but how it will feel to hold the brush and lay on the paint. That way, only with music, thinking of hands striking the keys and music flowing. Not so much the result as the promise. He also said it gets you into the music, or it into you.”
“He’s right,” said Harley. “I like Mr. Mendel. Wish I could have known him.”
“So are you visualizing?” Jennalee asked.
After a few moments, he said, “I guess I am in a way, but not so’s I want to play.”
“Is it the fucked-up business?”
“Sorry I took off like that,” he said. “Kinda rude and that’s not me.”
“That’s okay. I have times like that. Too many.”
When silence fell between them, Jennalee managed several minutes before the quiet drove her to speak. “So did you hear the commotion last night? The sirens?”
“Hard to miss.”
“Know what happened?”
“Generally, yes,” he said. “Specifically, no.”
“Anita Southerland called the police saying an assault was in progress, but when the cops and an ambulance came, it turned out she meant her husband, Vaughn, screwing this other woman, Lorene. An
ita was drunk, Vaughn showed up, got royally pissed, Anita was hauled off by ambulance, and Vaughn went in a cop car.”
“Sutherland with an O,” Harley said. “He’s the worst of the lot.”
“That’s not all,” Jennalee added. “Earlier, when I passed Building Six down at the end, I saw them doing it. He had Lorene up against the wall, skirt up, and he was going at her. I couldn’t believe he was doing it right there on hotel grounds and I watched until they were done.”
“Lorene,” said Harley. “She’s a Sutherland with a U so it’s cross breeding on Vaughn’s part which makes it even worse. Marian will shit when she finds out and Haskel, his father, will love it. And you know they’ll find out because they all blab everything.”
“Who’s Lorene married to?”
“Arthur. He pops up now and then, nice enough guy, kinda low key, made a bundle in venture capital.”
“So why would Lorene screw around on him?” Jennalee asked.
“Why does anybody? My guess is he’s some kind of tyrant at home, or maybe he’s kinky in bed. Maybe he wears her panties and has her whip him. He’s a Sutherland. That’s enough.”
“But to choose Vaughn? I mean, he does seem to be Arthur’s opposite, but still. He can’t be that much better, from what I’ve seen.”
“Probably a big dick.”
This thrust Jennalee back to the scene of the crime. Vaughn had seemed to have things well under control, no slipping out or anything, so maybe that was it. Or maybe he was just better in some way that got to Lorene. Jennalee could relate to that. Howard Li was so much more than the Malvern boys.
“So do you think it was a one-time thing?” she asked once she’d chased off thoughts of Vaughn Southerland’s penis. “Or is it some regular thing and they’ve been doing it in secret for months?”
“No idea. I stopped following the Sutherlands several years ago, right after my dad beat the shit out of Richard Sutherland for hitting on my mom.”
“Richard? I don’t know that one.”
“Just as well. The Sutherlands have two genetic traits: one, they produce only male offspring, and two, they’re all drunks, Richard the king of them all.”
“But your mom doesn’t drink, does she?”
“Nope. Freak of nature, like being a girl in that family. Most women who marry into the realm take up drinking because they’re married to Sutherland men.”
“Jeez, what a family,” Jennalee said.
“Dad has asked Mom a million times to skip the reunion, but she has this hope it’ll be different. She was so quiet this morning, like she’d done something wrong. Embarrassment on the family’s behalf. Dad doesn’t press when shit happens. He’s good that way.”
Jennalee had a flicker of curiosity about Garth, who Harley never mentioned without prompting, but she held off asking his whereabouts, starting to fidget as a result. “So,” she said, letting it hang there between them for a few seconds. “Are you going to tell me why you’re fucked up?”
He stood, got out his violin and bow, and began playing the summer movement of Vivaldi’s Four Seasons. Jennalee loved this concerto and hoped those below appreciated such an appropriate start to the day, so energetic, so vigorous, and in Harley’s hands, so pure. When the movement ended, Harley didn’t go into the next. Instead he just stood, like in that Google picture, violin and bow at his sides, and she got that his telling about Carroll was only possible this way.
“I was thirteen the first time Carroll Fraser kissed me,” he began. “I’d just played that exact movement, him along with me, and once we finished, he threw an arm around me like he had a hundred times, like I think Little League coaches do their ballplayers. This time, though, he leaned in and kissed me on the mouth.”
“How old was he?” Jennalee asked, unable not to.
“Thirty-two.”
“Wow. What did you do?”
“Responded for sure, my dick hard in about two seconds. I kissed him back, but I had no experience and was probably awkward. The thing is, I already had a major crush on him so this sort of set me off, you know how it is. I was in love, instantly in love.”
“So it was just the kiss?”
“Just the kiss. Then next lesson there was no kiss, which totally screwed with my head and I wondered what I’d done wrong. I made it through the lesson, but cried after I left because I thought he didn’t love me anymore. I spent the next week in agony, trying to figure how I could fix it. Then came my lesson and he kissed me again, which made no sense, but I didn’t care. He loved me again.”
He stopped, put away violin and bow, shut the case, then walked to the bluff’s edge. Jennalee gave it a few minutes, then followed.
“I don’t know why I’m spilling it all like this,” Harley said. “I’ve never told anybody and I just met you, only, I don’t know. Christ, I don’t know.”
“So you’re gay,” Jennalee said.
“Do you have to label me?”
Jennalee went silent when she had a million things to say. He’d knocked her off kilter and she had no idea how to get back on kilter.
“Sorry,” Harley said. “I don’t mean to be rude, but I’m tired of all the labels and categories people insist on. And you don’t seem to get to choose for yourself, which makes it worse and okay, look at me, running my mouth. Sorry.”
“No, it’s okay, I get your point. I never saw it that way.”
She tried to let things settle, but they bubbled back up. “Okay, you had sex with a man a bunch of times, so what does that make you?”
“Me,” he said, somewhat sadly. “Just me.”
She leaned over and kissed his cheek. “I really like you, Harley. You’re the first person I can’t figure out.”
“That makes two of us.”
She kissed his lips and he welcomed her like he had before. His tongue found hers to set up a dance and then he pulled her into his arms. When his hand went up under her tank top to squeeze a breast, she felt giddy as much for the kissing and fondling as for the fact that Harley, who had fucked a man, wanted her.
When he eased off the breast and kissed her again, she knew he was into it, so she took off her top and pulled him down into the grass on top of her. “You won’t run away again,” she said.
He told her no. “Not ever.”
His erection prodded her leg, more evidence his music teacher was a mistake, an experiment gone wrong, and when Harley’s kisses grew wet and urgent, she knew she had him. What she didn’t do was treat him like the Malvern boys or even Garth or Howard. Harley was beautiful now, a man of music who desired her, cared for her as he had no other. He was grinding against her when she reached down to his zipper which refused to give. This is where the boy usually assisted, since most couldn’t wait to get it out, and Harley’s did arrive, but not to assist.
He took her hand in his and held her still. She said, “Don’t run away,” and he said, “I won’t.”
“Okay, then.”
They sat up and she said, “It’s okay, only…”
“Only what?”
“Uh, maybe explain?”
“I’m not sure I can.”
“Explain?”
“Explain.”
He pulled up his knees and rested his chin on them, arms curled around his shins. “You’re probably the best girl I’ve ever met,” he said after some minutes. “Cute, talented, total rebel, caring, funny, and for some reason you like me, which is a major surprise. The thing is, I’m kinda falling for you, which is a good thing in some ways, lots of ways, but also not and please don’t take that wrong. We are now at the fucked-up part. Literally.”
She had to bite back a “Maybe you’re bi” comment because she was about to label him again. Jeez, she thought. If labels were so common, what was she? Ah, yes, the San Francisco slut.
“I like you no matter what,” she told him. “Fucked up, fucked, even fucking. Doesn’t matter. We share music and more. Good friends.”
“You’re sweet,” he said, “and als
o raunchy, which I’ve never seen much before.” He kissed her, a long and delicious kiss. “Thanks,” he said after.
He practiced then and Jennalee lay on the dry grass, floating on his sound. When he began the Elgar, she turned onto her side to watch him move, his eyes closed. Music rescued him in ways she never could.
“Won’t you be missed?” he asked her when he was done and put away his instrument.
She sighed. “I guess. Yeah, probably. There’s a brunch and they’ll want me to do something.”
As they walked down from the bluff, Jennalee asked if he could tell her what happened to end the relationship with Carroll Fraser.
“Not now,” Harley said. “I’ll tell you, but not now.”
Chapter 15
They held hands descending the bluff and Jennalee felt like she had in fourth grade, back before boys started wanting something. She felt fresh, new, and innocent, all because of Harley. She glanced over at him. He was definitely not fucked up.
They were nearly to ground level when a motorcycle’s revving engine cut into the mood. Harley let go of Jennalee, who was immediately filled with such dread, she thought it might come bubbling up out the top of her like some volcano. Sure enough, when they reached the winding path, there sat Garth on the Kawasaki. He gunned the engine to further announce himself.
“Where you guys been?” he asked.
When Harley said nothing, Jennalee jumped in. “Harley was practicing on the bluff and I went up to listen.”
Garth looked up. “Sounds like a good spot. Remote, you know? Where you headed now?”
“Brunch,” she said.
He gunned the engine again, then kicked the bike into gear. As he slowly rolled away, he called back, “Harley! She’s a great lay. Maybe she can teach you how.” Then he roared away.
Mortified, Jennalee tried to run, but Harley grabbed her hand and held her back. “No running away, remember? Not me. Not you.”
“I want to die,” she cried.
“He’s an asshole,” Harley declared. “I never listen to anything he says.”
At this Jennalee burst into tears, so he led her from the path over toward Building Seven, which appeared deserted. He never let go of her hand, and when she was finally reduced to a wet sniffle, he again produced a handkerchief. Like some knight, she thought, or at least a gentleman. She mopped up, took some deep breaths, and told him, “You’re the first guy I’ve ever seen with a handkerchief. You’re like some knight.”
Sutherland Page 13
