A Palette for Love

by Charlotte Greene

  “I won’t let it taint me, Aunt Kate. I promise.” I gave her a hug. I couldn’t admit why I was interested in moving there. It had never appealed to me before. Even when I went to school Uptown, I’d simply gone and come home, hanging out in neighborhood joints back in the Bywater and the Marigny. Still, I was tempted to move there now to be closer to Amelia, who had a house in the area. I didn’t mention this to Aunt Kate, however, knowing how she would respond.

  “Did you eat?” she asked.

  “I ate the last baguette and most of the rest of the cheese.”

  “Good girl,” she said, patting my leg. “What are your plans for the rest of the day?”

  “I’ll probably go upstairs and paint for a while.” I paused and couldn’t help but blush. “Amelia’s picking me up later and…I’m staying with her tonight.”

  “I see.” Her brow was furrowed, and I couldn’t tell if it was with disapproval or not. At the very least, she was worried about my relationship with Amelia—that I knew, but I still didn’t have a very good read on what she thought of the whole lesbian thing.

  Not wanting to get into it with her, I excused myself to go paint, realizing as I climbed up to my artist’s garret that I’d been longing to be alone with my new painting for days now. Within a few minutes I was lost in it, my worries slipping away to nothing as I worked.

  *

  The car arrived for me at seven. Not knowing how to dress for a casual evening with Amelia, I wore a combination of casual and work clothing—my nicest, darkest jeans and a sleeveless black blouse. She’d put so much emphasis on clothing the entire time I’d known her, I was actually a little intimidated by the thought of letting her down in some way with my appearance. I decided that, after this experiment, I would judge my choices based on the kind of things she wore when we were alone and not working. As the car approached her house, a chill of excitement swept through me. Not only would we be finally alone together, but I would also see inside her house for the first time. I’d only seen the outside, twice, when we’d stopped by there quickly for work.

  Most of the Winterses’ mansions were on Camp Street, including Amelia’s. While there had been some change of hands over the years since the Winterses first moved to the area in the early nineteenth century, the primary house, now owned by Amelia’s parents, had always remained in the family. Wealth among the descendants of the original Winters family had gone up and down over time, with mansions sold in down times and then bought again. Currently, as Amelia had explained, besides her parents and herself, two of her brothers and one uncle owned houses nearby.

  Amelia’s was a lovely shade of lavender, with a dark, tall, gated fence around the outside of the lawn, and a large front porch on the first and second floors. The hurricane shutters were a darker purple, as was some of the house trim. The car pulled through the gate and dropped me off before leaving again, and I nervously approached the front door. While I’d been in a few Garden District houses on tours over the years, this was by far the grandest I’d ever approached. I couldn’t imagine what her parents’ place would be like tomorrow.

  Amelia opened the door before I had a chance to knock or ring the bell, and we stood there for a long time just staring at each other. She looked worn and tired and was still wearing her work clothes, but for all that, she was, as usual, stunning. She took two large steps and pulled me into an embrace, squeezing hard.

  “God, I missed you,” she said quietly.

  Tears sprang to my eyes at this, and I blinked them away quickly. “Me too.”

  “I had a supper prepared for us.” She indicated inside the house. “I also sent everyone home so we have the place to ourselves.”

  Of course she has servants, I realized, somehow still startled by the idea. The gulf between our stations in life constantly surprised me.

  Her house was a marvel of design and taste, as expected. The furniture was a careful selection of art-deco and mid-century-modern design. The paintings were also in this style, primarily, each room seeming more like a museum showpiece than a place where someone actually lived. The dining room was stunning, with two places at the head and next to it lit by the warm light of a dim chandelier and two candles.

  “Please sit,” Amelia said, pulling out the chair at the head. “I’ll go get the food.”

  I sat down, setting the napkin in my lap, and looked around the room with barely contained wonder. This room had apparently remained truest to its original time period, as the wallpaper was clearly original or re-created Victorian silk in dark-purple paisley. The table and chairs were high-backed Victorians as well, and the china and glasses were made of the heavy glass of that era.

  Amelia wheeled in a small cart laden with dishes. She set one of these in front of me and dramatically pulled off the silver cover, revealing a masterpiece of cookery. She set one at her place and sat down next to me. We ate in silence for a while, and a strange, awkward tension seemed to prevail. I realized about halfway through my first dish that my hands were shaking, and I put my silverware down so I could regain control of myself.

  “Is it not good?” Amelia asked.

  “It’s wonderful.”

  “It doesn’t look like you think that.” She looked concerned. “Don’t worry—you won’t insult me. My cook did everything.”

  “It’s not the food.”

  “What’s the matter?”

  I gestured at the room, at the table. “I just feel…out of place. I’m sorry. I’m not used to all of this. Cooks. Servants. Big fancy houses. I feel like I stepped into an alternative universe.”

  “So it bothers you? My money?”

  “I wouldn’t say that,” though it did, “just that…I don’t know what I have to offer you that you don’t already have. I’m just a lower-middle-class girl from the Bywater. I have nothing.”

  She took my hand. “You have everything I don’t have, Chloé. Most of what I have was given to me. I’ve made a lot of my own money, but I couldn’t have made any of it without help from my parents. Everything you have you earned. That’s admirable.” She kissed my hand. “And you’re incredibly intelligent and adorable, too.”

  I blushed. Her eyes became serious again, and she suddenly stood up, helping me to my feet.

  “What?” I was confused.

  She pulled me into her arms and kissed me, hard. I kissed back, sliding my hands around her back, drawing her toward me. The heat between my legs was instant, scorching, and I was wet immediately. Amelia shoved me back onto the table and then swept the dishes off, most of them shattering on the floor. I yelped in surprise and then she was on top of me, climbing onto the table and covering my face and body with her mouth and hands. I wrapped my legs around her and arched up and in to her body, my need mounting with every kiss. Her lips were now on my neck, sending delicious shivers all over my body. Her lips were hot on me, igniting my desires further while her hands shucked off my shirt and unhooked my bra. That task accomplished, she yanked my shirt and then my bra off, tossing them off across the room before setting her mouth on my breasts. I sighed in relief, arching into her mouth, my nipples hard with desire. She bit down, and I moaned with pain and pleasure.

  Taking this as permission to continue, she nibbled her way down my stomach, sometimes biting down harder, sometimes just sucking. My desire was beginning to feel almost painful, as the pulsing rhythm between my legs grew more insistent. I took one of her hands and put it there. She rubbed my sex briefly, but the material on my jeans was too thick. She stopped for a moment and yanked off my shoes, throwing them aside, then wrenched down my jeans. Consumed with the fire of my passion, I could hardly help her because I was so weak from desire. I watched in tense readiness as she ripped off my panties. She climbed back on top of me, sliding between my legs, and I rose to meet her again. I wrapped my legs around her back, and she began kissing, sucking, and biting my breasts and stomach again.

  “Oh yes,” I moaned as she pushed her knee against the throbbing between my legs. I moaned
again and arched my back. She kissed me, her tongue pushing down into my mouth. I kissed back just as hard and could feel her body react to my aggressive kissing.

  “You like it rough, don’t you?” she asked, her voice hoarse, catching on each syllable. She was breathing hard, like I was, and all I could do was nod. Her mouth clamped onto mine again, and her tongue probed deeper as I felt her hand cup my sex for a moment before her palm rubbed against me.

  Suddenly, her entire hand entered me, slamming in hard. I gasped for a second in surprise, then gritted my teeth and moved into the momentary pain, a pain that quickly subsided into heavenly relief as her fingers found the rhythm of my body. She sank in harder and farther than ever before, and suddenly it seemed as if I might explode with pleasure. The pain was there, but distant, adding a strange, burning heat underneath the pleasure, which made everything even better, more intense. Feeling my body stiffen in response to some place deep inside, she kept her fingers there, massaging the exact spot to make me come. I couldn’t hold back any longer, and as I screamed in delight, she once again bit down on my breast, the simultaneous pain and pleasure overwhelming. I collapsed back into the table, shaking and quivering with the remains of the orgasm, unable to hold myself upright any longer.

  We lay there on the table for a while, her head on my chest. I was stroking her hair, and her eyes were closed. Her expression was peaceful, calm. As my heart rate began to slow back to normal, I continued to watch her, tenderness welling up inside me as I looked at her. She held a piece of my hair in her left hand, twirling it through her fingers absent-mindedly. Her hair had come loose, and it cascaded down onto her shoulders in lazy dark waves.

  A new passion began to build up in me, a crazy kind of desperate longing, and I sat up, propelling her back onto the table. She looked startled, and I used her surprise to my advantage, kissing her and climbing on top. She let me kiss her lips and neck, but when I started to explore underneath her shirt, her body stiffened. I decided to push through it, and let my hands climb up under her shirt to her breasts. For a moment it seemed as if she might accept my explorations, but then she was elbowing and shoving at me, seemingly desperate to get away.

  “No!” she said, sitting up and bringing me upright with her.

  I was panting, still sitting on top of her, and I must have appeared completely dumbfounded. Our faces were only a couple of inches apart.

  “What is it?” I asked, hurt. “Why won’t you let me touch you?”

  She couldn’t meet my eyes, and her expression was dark, almost angry. I swung my legs free and slid up and off the table. I stood, naked, watching her just sit there, her arms crossed over her chest. She said nothing.

  “Jesus Christ, Amelia! Say something!” I yelled.

  “There’s nothing to say.” She met my eyes, her voice carefully casual.

  “What do you mean there’s nothing to say? Why can’t I touch you? Why won’t you let me? Are you afraid I won’t be any good at it?”

  Her expression changed to pained for a second, then the pain was gone, and that careful casualness was back almost before I’d seen the other look in her eyes. “It’s nothing like that,” she said, sliding over to the edge of the table. She slid off and stood next to me, taking my hands. “It has nothing to do with you.”

  I laughed, bitterly. “What the hell does that mean? Of course it has something to do with me. We’ve slept together I don’t know how many times now, and you won’t let me touch you. What am I supposed to think? It has everything to do with me.”

  She sighed and shook her head. She pulled me closer, trying to kiss me. I wrenched myself free and started picking up my clothes, pulling each piece on as fast as I could, so angry I barely knew what I was doing.

  “Please don’t be this way,” she said, still standing there, just watching me dress.

  “There isn’t any other way to be, Amelia.” My voice was shaking with rage. “You’re trying to make it seem like it’s not a big deal, but it is. Don’t you understand?”

  I pulled on my shirt and then looked over at her. Her face was still a mask of cool calm, which only infuriated me more. “Goddamn it, say something!”

  “What do you want me to say?” she asked, hands out in defeat.

  “I want a goddamn explanation.” I almost stomped my foot.

  “There’s nothing to explain. I have limits, that’s all,” she said, her voice almost a whisper.

  I jumped on this the moment it was out of her mouth. “What kind of limits? Why?”

  She sighed, breaking eye contact with me. “It’s not worth discussing.”

  I stood there for a long time, just staring at her. She was doing her best to look anywhere but at me, which only fueled my anger. Picking up my purse, I started making my way out of the room. Amelia, startled, was shaken out of her attitude and ran after me.

  “Where are you going?” she said, grabbing my arm.

  I yanked it free. “Anywhere but here with you,” I spat, and ran out of the house.

  Chapter Eighteen

  I barely slept. In fact, I hardly even tried to sleep, knowing I would just lie there tossing and turning all night. After rushing out of Amelia’s house, I managed to flag down a cab on St. Charles and got home fairly quickly. Luckily, Aunt Kate was out when I got home, and I didn’t reveal myself when I heard her come in a couple of hours later. The last thing I needed was to talk to her right now, let alone show her my defeat.

  While I knew logically that I’d made the right decision to leave last night, that didn’t help me feel any better. Further, I realized I could probably have handled the whole situation better. Storming out of there last night had been immature. Nevertheless, I hadn’t seen many other options at the time. If she was unwilling to talk about things, I had nothing left to say. I didn’t want to play games with her, and I didn’t want to fight about it, but we had to discuss the elephant in the room before I would consider moving forward or, I was starting to realize, before I could consider staying in a relationship with her.

  At three in the morning, after painting angrily for several hours, I’d actually picked up the phone to call Meghan. In the past, any time something major happened with a boyfriend of hers or mine, we would call the other with the implied knowledge that, night or day, the other was available. I’d stopped myself that night for a few reasons, namely that Zach was likely at her place, or she at his, and because I didn’t even know where to begin to explain the problem. I didn’t understand it myself. If I couldn’t get anything out of Amelia, I would never understand it. Further, saying something about it would, I knew, make it real. I wasn’t sure if I was ready to face all the implications of what that reality might mean.

  Next, I debated calling Lana, but something about doing that it seemed like a betrayal, in this case both of Amelia and of Meghan. Meghan was supposed to be my go-to friend for all things, and Lana was supposed to be my academic friend. If I called Lana, I’d be replacing Meghan, perhaps permanently, as my counselor. It was a silly way to think, and I knew that, but that didn’t make it any easier to make the call. Further, I wasn’t sure I wanted to talk about Amelia’s problem with Lana. It seemed far too private and something like a personal failure on my part. While Lana and I were pretty close as friends, and getting closer lately, I couldn’t picture talking to her about my sex life, at least not yet.

  Around dawn I crept downstairs to make myself some coffee. The gray light coming in through the living room windows was hardly bright enough to help me navigate around the furniture, but I moved as slowly as possible, terrified of waking Aunt Kate. If she heard me, she would know something was wrong since I was home, and she’d want to talk about it. If I wasn’t ready to discuss it with Meghan, I certainly wasn’t ready to talk to Aunt Kate about it. She had made it clear that while she wouldn’t necessarily protest my relationship with Amelia, she didn’t, and possibly wouldn’t, approve of it either. My current emotional state would simply add more wood to that fire.

 
I put some milk on the stove to heat and poured some of the coffee concentrate in a mug. Though I’d barely eaten anything last night, my stomach was so knotted up with anxiety I didn’t even think of making myself any food. An idea occurred to me as I waited by the stove, and I rooted around in the cabinets until I found a small red tin behind the sugar canister. Inside, I found a desiccated pack of cigarettes. I’d quit smoking in my early twenties and had never been a heavy smoker even then, but when I quit, I hid some packs around the house for emergencies. This one had to be nearly five years old, and I knew the cigarette would taste god-awful, but I slipped one out anyway before searching for some matches.

  I took my café au lait outside to the backyard, sat down on the little stairs by the door, and lit my first cigarette in years. I coughed and sputtered with the first few drags, the stale smoke tasting like burning hell, but I managed to push through and keep smoking. The morning was chillier than anything I’d felt since being back in Louisiana, and in my light pajamas, I shuddered. Winter was coming to New Orleans.

  When I came back inside, Aunt Kate was sitting at the kitchen table with her own coffee. She sat in the chair facing the door, obviously waiting for me. I stood in the doorway for a moment and then sighed, realizing there was no way out of this. I sat down in the chair nearest to her and she took my hand.

  “It must be bad if you’re smoking again,” she said quietly.

  “I only had one,” I said, rather stupidly.

  She rolled her eyes. “Even one is too many, dear.” She was quiet for a long while, just looking into my face, apparently trying to read my expression. “I heard you last night when I got home, and I heard you working and shuffling around all night and this morning. I understand that you didn’t want to wake me up and didn’t want to talk to me, and I guess I know that you don’t want to talk now.”