Looking for Julie

by Jackie Calhoun

Caught off guard, Sam shrugged. “Like it is with Carmen, I suppose.”

  “Carmen doesn’t do sex. She’s a good Catholic girl.”

  Sam wondered what to say and ended up with, “Maybe you should be seeing Julie.”

  “Maybe you should show me what it’s like. Hmm?” Nita took her hand and pulled her onto the bed.

  “I can’t,” she said and then realized that she could and she wanted to. She’d always had a thing for Nita. She kissed her, something she’d longed to do for years, and Nita put her arms around Sam and pulled her down.

  Sam didn’t waste time taking off clothes. In the back of her mind she knew Karen could return anytime. She pushed Nita’s shirt up and buried her face in Nita’s breasts. The nipples were dark. She smelled like soap. Nita gasped when Sam slipped a hand in her sweatpants. She came quickly and quietly, quiet enough for Sam to hear the door open and know that Karen was back.

  She pulled her hand free and turned over in time to see Karen turn her back. “Don’t go, Karen.” She jumped up and rushed into the kitchen where Karen was shutting her laptop and into the bedroom where Karen grabbed her things and shoved them into her backpack. “I didn’t mean to. It just sort of happened.”

  Karen raised her chin, and Sam got a look at the pain that screwed up her face and turned her gray blue eyes stormy. “Please, Karen. It was a mistake.”

  Karen shoved past her toward the door, dropping her key to the apartment on the floor. In a minute she was gone.

  “Was it a mistake?” Nita said, coming to the door of her bedroom. “I don’t think so.” She leaned against the frame, her dark hair tousled, and crossed her arms. She looked incredibly sexy.

  On Tuesday Edie called Claire to say she couldn’t make it on Wednesday. “We’re leaving for the Birkie.” Which was a half lie. They were leaving on Thursday, but she was feeling a little frantic about how the book was going and felt she needed those two days to work.

  A long pause ensued, while Edie waited. She was hooked on this woman. It didn’t seem to matter that Claire was rude and had no interest in Edie’s life. It was all about sex, which must have been why Edie couldn’t let her go. Even now, with Claire on the phone, she longed to lay her down on the bed.

  “Are you going with Pam?”

  “No, I didn’t know she was going,” she said.

  “Well she is, with Donna Hesselmeier.”

  This was one of the most informational conversations she’d had with Claire. “Maybe I’ll see them there.”

  “You won’t see me. I may have to start working Wednesday afternoons.”

  “Then I should call next Tuesday and make sure you’re going to be home Wednesday.” She held her breath, thinking maybe it was over.

  “If you want. I have to go now. Janine is on her way.”

  She failed to understand the relationship between Janine and Claire. They should be lovers, and she felt a pang thinking about them together. She called Pam whom she knew she had neglected.

  “Hey, I thought I was never going to hear from you again.”

  “I’m sorry, Pam. I’m trying to finish a book.”

  “I’m trying to finish one of your books too. I’ve been reading them.”

  Edie had to ask, “And?”

  “Oh, I love them. A romance is a romance, you know.” Meaning, Edie supposed, that it didn’t matter if the hero was a hero instead of another heroine.

  “Claire said you’re skiing the Birkie.”

  “I’m doing the Kortelopet with a friend. I think I’m not ready for the Birkie. I should have called and asked if you wanted to go with us.”

  “I am going, actually, with Jennifer Gottschalk. She came to our table at Jacobi’s.”

  “You’ll be well matched,” Pam said. She sounded happy. “I think you met Donna. She’s going with me. Are you coming to Madison tomorrow?”

  So she knew. “No, I need the day to write.”

  “Well, I guess I’ll stay out of Claire’s way then.”

  “Why?”

  “When you don’t come, she’s not fit to be around.”

  “Really?” she said with a grin, “I had no idea.”

  “Well, that’s how Claire treats the most important people in her life. She doesn’t want to let you know how much you mean to her. I don’t know why.”

  “She doesn’t even seem to like me,” she blurted.

  “Well, right now you are one of those important people. I think you outrank Janine. Janine is her default person. The one she falls back on when she loses someone.”

  “No kidding.” She was amazed and delighted and disbelieving.

  “Trust me. Do you want to meet somewhere?”

  “I’m riding with Jennifer and her brother, so I’m not in charge. If we see each other among the thousands of people, I’ll buy you a drink after the race.”

  “Sounds like a plan. Good luck.”

  “You too.”

  She went back to the book but had trouble picking up the thread. She had changed Al’s name to Tony and given him a distinguished look with threads of white in his dark hair. He had rescued Elizabeth from loneliness when Mary Ann had moved away. He encouraged her to create an exciting life of her own. She opened a store next to his auto shop where she sold trendy clothes from California. One night someone broke into both the auto shop and the clothes store. Tony went back to his place of work for something he forgot and was shot. Elizabeth found him on the cold floor of the office. He was rushed to the hospital where emergency surgery was performed. Mary Ann hurried to Elizabeth’s side to offer support.

  “I don’t think I could have faced this alone,” Elizabeth said.

  “Well, you don’t have to. I’ll stay the night.”

  “Where are Janie and Riley?”

  “I called the babysitter.” Mary Ann smiled.

  Elizabeth studied her face. “I’ve missed you terribly.”

  “And I you.” Mary Ann took her hand. “That must have been a terrible thing to see.”

  “The floor was covered with blood. I thought he was dead.”

  When the surgeon talked to Elizabeth, he gave a guarded prognosis. She was allowed to go into Tony’s room. Tubes crossed his body, feeding him fluids and morphine and oxygen and carrying away urine. She held his limp hand and spoke to him in a soft voice, telling him he’d be all right, until the ICU nurse told her he needed to rest and so did she.

  At home, she asked Mary Ann to keep Tony’s side of the bed warm. When Mary Ann comforted her with an embrace, she said, “I’m not sure I’m up to losing Tony and you.”

  “You don’t have to be. I’ve been offered the principal position at Harrison.” It was the middle school where they had taught together. “I’m moving back here.”

  Edie had over two hundred fifty pages. She couldn’t afford to kill off Tony and introduce another hero. The best she could do was let Tony recover and keep Mary Ann as a best friend.

  She looked out the window. The snow on the Green Trail was soft and sticky. Water dripped from the gutters. Now that she had a vision of how the book would end she could go to Madison on Wednesday. She quickly put that thought out of her head. What she didn’t need was Claire messing with her emotionally before the race. Instead, she worked the next day, adding another twenty pages.

  On Thursday she arrived at Jennifer’s house a little after four, the agreed upon time. The garage door rose as she got out of her car.

  Chip walked to her open window. “I’ll back my car out and you can put yours in.”

  Jennifer carried her ski equipment to Chip’s car. Her backpack was slung across her shoulder, her jacket open. Chip put the skis and poles in the Thule roof rack on top of the Subaru.

  At first they chatted excitedly. The Birkie was one of the most thrilling events in Edie’s life. Darkness fell swiftly, leaving a smudge of yellow along the horizon. Edie was riding in the back. The radio was on low, and they fell into a comfortable silence.

  Around six they stopped at Phillips, mo
re than halfway to Cable, and picked up subs, which they ate in the car. Edie was paying little attention to where they were, but when Chip turned off State Highway 77 onto a local road, she knew they must be near the rented cabin on Lake Tomahawk.

  The smell of wood smoke greeted them. The A-frame log building was dwarfed by the larger lake homes around it. Mike and Tom, Chip’s skiing friends, had turned on the cabin’s heat and lit a fire in the fireplace.

  “You ladies can have the bedroom,” Chip said.

  Edie tossed her backpack on the double bed and switched on a small lamp. The walls and ceiling were cedar as were those in the rest of the cabin. There was a dresser and another lamp on the other side of the bed.

  The sleeping loft had been built over the bedroom, the bathroom and small kitchen. The great room stood alone with large windows that faced the lake. Snowmobiles sped across the snow-covered ice, their bobbing lights leading the way.

  The five of them sat around the fire for a while, exchanging stories about past Birkies. Edie was the first to say “I’ll see you tomorrow.” She took her backpack to the bathroom where she removed her contacts, brushed her teeth and washed her face with her hands. Back in the bedroom, she stripped down to long underwear and slid between very cold sheets.

  Shortly after, Jennifer joined her, also getting into bed in her long underwear. “Yipes!” she said. “I thought you’d have it all warmed up.”

  Edie marked her place in The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo. “I tried,” she said. “I always have to read before I can sleep.” She put the book down on the table and folded her reading glasses on top of it.

  In the night they rolled against each other. Edie’s eyes opened as she felt the warmth of Jennifer’s body, but she couldn’t stay awake long enough to move. She slept soundly and awoke in the morning pressed up against Jennifer.

  Jennifer turned her face toward Edie. “You’re better than an electric blanket.”

  “Thanks. So are you.”

  Tom had turned up the heat and the main room was a whole lot warmer than the bedroom. After hurriedly dressing and taking turns in the bathroom, she went into the kitchen. She had brought granola for breakfast.

  “I felt I was sleeping near a couple of chainsaws,” Tom said as they ate.

  “I think that was coming from the bedroom,” Chip teased.

  “You’re a hoot,” Jennifer shot back.

  They crammed into Chip’s car and joined a stream of vehicles heading toward Telemark Lodge. Many of the license plates were from out of state, but most were those of Wisconsin, Minnesota and Michigan.

  Flags of the participants’ countries hung outside the lodge. Huge ice sculptures adorned the entrance. The sculpture of the historic rescue in 1206 of Norway’s Prince Haakon stood in the doorway. The baby was in enemy territory when two Birkebeiner soldiers skied him to safety during a snowstorm. King Haakon later united Norway.

  They walked past dozens of vendors into the huge room where registration tables were set up. The perimeter was littered with large plastic gear bags, each marked with the participant’s bib number. In the bags were promos and the timing chip that skiers wore around the left ankle. The white bags were for Birkie participants, the yellow for those doing the Kortelopet. Jennifer’s and Edie’s bags were with the third skate wave. Chip was in the second skate wave. She thought Tom and Mike were in the same one.

  After getting their bags, they went to the Expo and studied the waxes on offer. The right wax was everything when it came to speed. Familiar faces filled the hall and they stopped to talk to others.

  After piling into the Subaru again, they drove toward Hayward joining a stream of traffic going both ways. Massive ice sculptures of skiers and Birkie scenes marked the towns of Cable and Seeley on the drive south. Main Street was covered with packed snow. Dogs in harnesses pulled skiers back and forth in Hayward, demonstrating the sport called skijoring. After their display, elite ski sprinters raced each other down Main.

  Edie wanted to browse her favorite ski shops—Outdoor Ventures and New Moon—both packed with pre-race shoppers. New Moon’s wax counter was a must see. There, wax experts answered questions, and as every skier knew, waxing was the biggest concern. After eating lunch at a crowded coffee shop, they bought fresh bread at a bakery and made a stop at the grocery store. They stopped to admire the Birkie flame and to take each other’s picture sitting in an ice chair with American Birkebeiner carved in the high back.

  Edie was thrilled to be with Jennifer and Chip and even Tom and Mike. Like herself, they were Birkie regulars and interested in the same stuff she was. Back at the cabin, they waxed their skis, consulting each other on which waxes to use. She helped fix supper—spaghetti and garlic bread and a salad. Carbs were a must before a race. Conversation concerned the weather and the condition of the snow—slightly soft due to warming temperatures—and past Birkies.

  After cleaning up, they sat around the fire. The talk was about the race, about what time they should leave in the morning. Edie and Jennifer laid everything out for the next day—socks, boots, Under Armour, ski jacket, bib, hat, sunglasses, gloves, Gatorade and water, timing chip, backpack with change of clothes, white bag to hold everything not needed during the race. When she and Jennifer climbed in bed, Jennifer told her how much she enjoyed having her with them.

  “I was the only woman before you joined us.”

  “Hey, I feel lucky to be here,” she said.

  They talked for a few minutes more before turning their backs on each other. For a few moments Edie lay awake, worrying. Then she closed off her mind and slept.

  She awoke at six. Jennifer was already dressed. She consulted her about clothes—long underwear or just the ski tights, a vest or a jacket.

  “I’ve just got the tights on. I get hot when I start moving,” Jennifer said.

  She decided to wear her ski tights with Under Armour. She pulled a wick-away top over an undershirt. She would wear a Windbreaker. It was better to be cold at the beginning of the race than hot once she began to ski.

  They all ate a breakfast of oatmeal and piled into Chip’s car, putting their skis in the carrier on top, and headed to the nearest field that was used as a parking lot.

  School buses were dropping off skiers behind Telemark Lodge. Chip unloaded skis and poles, and she and Jennifer took theirs and made their way through masses of brightly colored skiers to the giant tent ringed by dozens of Porta Potties. Lively rock music filled the air. Big heaters roared in an attempt to beat back the cold.

  Edie was hyped. Who wouldn’t be? The announcer’s stand was on the airstrip behind the lodge. Flags from every participant’s country lined the strip. Slightly away from the starting area were box trucks with signs, one for each of the ten waves. She and Jennifer threw their white bags with everything they needed after the race into their designated truck. Some of the skiers were dressed in silly costumes. They too would race the distance.

  The elite waves were ready to go and she and Jennifer joined the dozens of people lining the starting area. The national anthem filled the crisp air and the governor gave a brief speech welcoming the racers and wishing them a speedy and safe race. The very first skiers to go were the re-enactors, dressed in authentic furs and birch leggings, striding out on wooden skis. The husband and wife and their baby symbolized the Norwegians carrying Prince Haakon to safety. They would ski the entire classic race of fifty-four kilometers.

  The elite skiers lined up along the starting flags. After the countdown, the starting gun fired and up went the flags. The skiers sped away, disappearing into a distant line of trees in minutes. Those in the next wave, who were kept behind a plastic line with little flags, moved into starting position.

  Edie had eaten the banana and drunk the Gatorade and water she had brought with her. She and Jennifer had stood in line at the Porta Potties. They cheered the second wave as it left and moved into place. The wind bit through Edie’s scant clothing. Ten minutes seemed like forever. The skate skiers no longe
r used the same trail as the classic skiers. They skied fifty kilometers, but skate skiing required enormous energy. Not only did they skate down the hills, they skated up them.

  Edie was ready. She had positioned herself in the center front next to Jennifer. The anxiety in the pit of her stomach disappeared as the wait ended. The announcer’s encouragement and the cheers of the crowd barely registered. The countdown began and when she heard the gun, she skated out with the others. Pushing with her poles, gathering speed with every thrust of her strong thighs, she disappeared into the trees. On the other side were the dreaded power line hills. She had managed to avoid colliding with anyone among the hundreds in her wave. The bane of ski racers was the skier who went down in front of them.

  Now she skated up, up, up the wide, clear area with the giant power lines, only to fly down the backside and climb again. Her heart rocketed into the anaerobic zone. The spectators, shouting encouragement, the skiers around her and the sheer excitement of the race pumped her into a steady, sustaining pace. Drummers lined the route, keeping a beat as she and the others climbed. Jennifer forged ahead, urging her on. She climbed the killer hill. Amazingly, no one in front of her fell on the steep curve at the bottom.

  Most of the trail ran through the lovely northern hardwood forest with rolling hill after rolling hill. Edie’s heart settled into a steady one hundred sixty beats per minute. She was cruising. She bantered with the other skiers, shouting encouragement to those she passed.

  After about nine kilometers the first food stop appeared. The many volunteers held out Gatorade, bananas and orange slices. She grabbed a cup of Gatorade, downed it and tossed it aside as she kept up her pace. She knew how important it was to take some kind of nourishment at each of the food stations. It was true she felt new power after a few minutes. Her muscles needed replenishment.

  Halfway through the race she came to the infamous Bitch Hill, where crazily dressed “bitches,” both men and women, accosted the skiers as they climbed the seemingly endless hill, yelling for them to “keep moving.” Edie avoided getting pinned with an “I got pinned by a Bitch” pin.