Olivia

by Donna Sturgeon

  He was having a heart attack.

  “Shit!” Olivia ran to the phone in panic.

  Her hands were shaking so bad she had to try three times to get 911 on the line. Once she did, she couldn’t talk coherently because of her hysterical tears. By this point Eugene was unfrozen and lying on the floor and he looked dead. The soldering iron was under him and she could smell his flesh burning, but she was terrified to move him, afraid that if he wasn’t dead, the simple act of rolling him over would kill him for sure.

  The paramedics burst into the trailer, took one look at Eugene, and loaded him into the ambulance. Olivia fought for her right to ride with Eugene, refusing to let go of the ambulance doors until they finally threw her in the back of the bus with him and took off toward the hospital with lights flashing and siren screaming.

  The paramedics warned her several times to back up and stay out of the way because they couldn’t work on Eugene with her screaming and carrying on like she was from the sight of Eugene—her father—her daddy—who looked so small, so frail, and so very, very dead. After the fifth unheeded warning, they sedated her. They only gave her enough to calm her, but she rode the rest of the way completely numb, trying to remember how to breathe.

  The hospital was a scary place and the doctors pushed her out of their way as they frantically worked on Eugene. He had tubes and wires and hoses coming out of everywhere and machines were beeping and buzzing and screaming out alarms. The room smelled of disinfectant and sickness and death and a nurse’s overpowering vanilla and sandalwood perfume. Everyone talked at her at once and another nurse wouldn’t leave her alone, waving a clipboard, demanding insurance or Medicare information.

  They wheeled Eugene up to surgery and left Olivia standing all alone in the suddenly empty room that was too quiet, too bright, too still, and too big for one person. She needed someone to help fill the void. She called the one person who had the power make her feel safe. When he showed up less than five minutes later and scooped her into his arms, she cried.

  “It’s ok,” George whispered in her ear. “Shh, don’t cry. I’m here, Baby Girl.”

  Olivia couldn’t stop crying as she clung to him for dear life. He rubbed her back and stroked her hair and whispered in her ear, and yet she still cried. She cried for Eugene and for herself and for everything they’d had together and everything they never could. When George led her into the private family waiting room, she tripped alongside him and continued to cry. When they sat, he held her tight to his side and she rested her head on his shoulder and curled up against him and continued to cry and sniff until her head hurt so bad she couldn’t keep her eyes open anymore.

  “Thank you,” she whispered into his shirt and he held her tighter yet.

  “I’ll do anything for you, Baby Girl, you know that,” he said.

  She kept her eyes closed and listened to his heart and breathed his scent of cologne mixed with Tide and Snuggle and Kitty’s air, and slid her arms around his waist and tried to shrink away from the world and disappear to a place where there was no pain and no death and no worries. George rested his head on hers and she told him she loved him and he whispered it back. When she kissed him, he returned her kisses and added some of his own, and then stroked her cheek with his thumb and kissed her closed eyes and repeated his words of love for her. And through it all, they waited.

  Late into the night, when the surgeon finally came looking for them, George roused Olivia from her sleep. She lifted her head from his lap and rubbed at her eyes as the doctor sat on the coffee table across from her and explained hearts and valves and diets and smoking and complications and rehabilitation and then left, leaving Olivia scared and confused and unsure if Eugene was dead or alive.

  When George took her hand, she clutched onto his arm and followed him into a room where a skinny, frail, sleeping man lay hooked to machines that breathed for him.

  “He’s alive,” Olivia whispered in disbelief.

  “Yes,” George said.

  Olivia let go of George and pulled a chair up next to Eugene’s bed. She took his hand in hers and rested her head in her other hand and cried a fresh round of tears, this time of fear and happiness and confusion and joy and exhaustion. George stood behind her and placed his hand on her shoulder and they stayed by Eugene’s side until the Intensive Care nurses dragged her away with the promise she could return in the morning.

  “Come home with me tonight. You shouldn’t be alone,” George said, and Olivia agreed.

  He drove her to his apartment building and led her upstairs and sat her in the living room while he made her a quick dinner of spaghetti and garlic bread and salad. They ate side-by-side in silence. Olivia wasn’t hungry but she ate enough for George to be satisfied, and then he took her hand and led her into his bedroom and shut the door behind them. And then he kissed her.

  “Make love to me, Georgie,” Olivia asked, needing to feel something real that wasn’t scary or painful or terrifying, craving the comfort of love and affection and tenderness.

  “I can’t do that, Baby Girl,” he said, his face pained with something she didn’t understand and didn’t have the strength to figure out.

  They did not make love, but George slowly undressed her and kissed her and caressed her body in a way that made her feel loved and beautiful and safe. He undressed himself and lay down alongside her, skin-to-skin between the sheets, and they discovered and explored each other and spoke without words. Olivia experienced an orgasm the likes of which she had never had before and knew she never would again.

  When she opened her eyes, and saw the tears in George’s, she wiped them away and asked him why he was crying.

  “Because you’re so beautiful, Liv,” he whispered.

  “No, I’m not.”

  “Yes. You are.”

  He kissed her again, slow and sensual, as if it would be their last, and then curled up behind her and they slept nestled like spoons, a perfect fit for each other in body and soul, and slept until morning.

  George cooked for her again, this time a breakfast of bacon and eggs and toast and coffee, and they ate in another comfortable silence. George drove her back to the hospital and stayed with her for the entire day while she watched over Eugene and held his hand. She wanted to stroke her father’s cheek and kiss his forehead and hug him with her cheek on his chest so she could listen to his healing heart, but she knew he wouldn’t like it if he were awake, so she didn’t do it to him while he was asleep.

  Instead, she made do with getting to know his right hand, all of its lines and wrinkles and the shape of his knuckles, the calluses on his palm from using a screwdriver and its orangey-tint from fifty years of eating Cheez Doodles. His slight nicotine odor made her crave a cigarette, and once she got started smoking she ran outside every half-hour for nothing more than to clear her mind.

  Flowers started to appear in the reception area for Eugene. Due to his condition, they couldn’t go into his room, so they decorated the nurse’s station and the waiting room and the restrooms and the hallway. Everyone in Valley View, in South, in Northside, every business, every single household in Juliette, it seemed, sent flowers to Eugene. Even the mayor himself sent a beautifully massive Peace Lily, which Olivia associated with funerals, so she made the nurses take it away. She didn’t open any of the cards because they were for Eugene, not her, but she looked at the flowers and the balloons and teddy bears and fruit baskets and felt a little bit better.

  Her cell phone rang constantly and she put it on vibrate and eventually shut it off completely. Mitch seemed to be the only person in Juliette who didn’t know about Eugene. He sent her some angry texts telling her to answer her goddamn, fucking phone, but she didn’t. George saw one of the texts before she shut off the phone, but he didn’t say anything. He placed his hand on the back of her neck and kissed her forehead and sighed as though he was carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders.

  Eugene did not wake up all day. George took Olivia home with him again that
night, and he made her chicken enchiladas and rice and an ice cream sundae, and she ate better this time. After dinner, she volunteered to do the dishes, and while she was standing elbow-deep at the sink he came up behind her and slid his hands around her waist, and she leaned back into him.

  His hands slipped under her shirt and his lips found her neck, and she felt her body relax from his touch and she started to cry again. He lifted her into his arms and carried her into the bedroom, and again, when she asked, he said he could not make love to her, but he made her feel beautiful, and then they slept with her head on his chest and their legs twisted together and made love to each other in their dreams.

  Eugene was awake when Olivia and George came in the next morning. His eyes were terrified and he was unable to speak because of the tube in his throat. The nurses couldn’t get him to calm down and threatened to sedate him again, but Olivia stopped them.

  She stood at the foot of his bed so he could see her, and kept one hand on his leg and her eyes on his shoulder. She told him about random events of her life for five minutes at a time while he slept and woke and slept again. She had to pee an hour after she got there, but she held it so she wouldn’t have to leave Eugene’s side. She never went out to smoke and she ate the banana George brought her for lunch one-handed, while holding Eugene’s leg, and standing at the foot of his bed.

  George made pork chops and sweet potatoes for dinner, and as soon as she finished eating he took her plate from her and set it on the coffee table. He laid her down on the sofa and lifted her shirt and kissed her stomach. He worked his way around her body as he slowly removed her clothes and kissed every inch her skin.

  Olivia didn’t bother to ask him to make love to her, knowing that he wouldn’t and knowing that he couldn’t possibly make love to her any more than he already was. What George was doing to her was so much more than making love to her. He was truly loving her, and she truly loved him in return. The next morning, while George was in the shower, she texted Mitch and broke off their engagement. And then she stripped off her clothes and joined George under the steaming spray.

  The tube came out right after lunch, and Eugene managed a few hoarse words asking about Chester. Olivia mentally slapped herself for forgetting about Eugene’s beloved dog, but George assured Eugene that Chester was fine and wouldn’t be running off anytime soon. He was staying with Izzie in her houseful of chaos and had made great friends with a stuffed panda bear named Hercules. Eugene ate some ice chips and sat up in his bed and dangled his feet for a few minutes then fell into an exhausted sleep. Olivia sat by his side and watched some television and George watched Olivia.

  When they went home that night, George started supper, and Olivia leaned against the counter and watched George. He was a beautiful man with dark hair that caught the light, eyes that twinkled when he smiled, lips that tasted like sweet peppermint, and arms that could lift her high and make her feel secure. She loved him, she trusted him, she admired and adored him, she had faith in him and she would do anything in the world for him, as he would for her. And that is why she asked him, “Are you gay?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then why are you with Yvette?”

  George slid the meatloaf he was making into the oven. “It’s not easy to explain.”

  “Could you try? For me?”

  He took his time setting the timer, wiping the counters, stacking the dishes, avoiding her eyes, but finally he turned to her and said, “Ok.”

  He took her by the hand and led her to the living room and sat her down beside him. He didn’t start talking for a long time. While he put his thoughts together, he held onto her hand and ran his thumb in a circle around her palm, unknowingly creating an intense heat deep inside her. It made her want to forget about their talk and simply kiss him until she created that same heat deep inside him—a heat so intense he couldn’t say no and finally crossed that final barrier and pushed inside her. But she needed to hear what he had to say, so when he started to talk, she listened.

  “I’ve known I was gay since I was a kid… or maybe I should say I’ve always known that I was different, that I wasn’t like the other boys on my block. I can’t explain it, really. I just knew. When I was fourteen, I kissed a boy for the very first time, and it was like… like my world suddenly made sense. I finally knew what the difference was.”

  He closed his eyes briefly, trying to hide the pain in his heart, but she felt it all the same.

  “It was a joke thing, one of those stupid dares that kids do, and the other boy was definitely not gay. I had to pretend that I hated it as much as he did, but… I loved it, Liv. I had kissed a dozen different girls before him and dozens more after, and none of them made me feel the way that he did…” George paused and looked at her. “Until you.”

  “Me?” she asked in surprise.

  George didn’t answer her. Instead, he switched direction.

  “I was good at sports. Really good. I played basketball and baseball and football, and I was really, really good at it. And, of course, being good at sports makes you popular with the girls, so I had them hanging all over me all through high school, and I didn’t know what to do about it.”

  He stopped again and rubbed his hands across his face.

  “I don’t know how to explain this to you so you’ll understand it. You don’t have any brothers or sisters or ever kissed a girl—”

  “I’ve kissed a girl,” Olivia said.

  “You have?” George asked in surprise.

  “Sure.” Olivia nodded. “Izzie and I used to practice on each other all the time when we were kids. And I’ve kissed my wife.”

  “Your…what?” George looked at her long and hard, trying to figure her out, and then started to laugh. “Did you just say your wife?”

  “Yeah. Melanie and I got married awhile back because the minister wouldn’t let her marry a coat rack.”

  George laughed harder and then grabbed hold of her, kissing her hard and fast on the lips. With a bit of a growl in his voice, he said, “God, I love you, Baby Girl,” and then he kissed her again.

  Olivia had to fight the urge to continue kissing him. As his laughter died, he scooted them down on the sofa and stretched his long, muscular legs onto the coffee table. Her head found his heart as she settled around him, and she listened to him talk with his words vibrating in his chest.

  “Well, all right then, kissing a girl for me is like kissing a girl for you. It’s ok and it’s not going to kill you, but it’s not what you want and it’s not what you need. It doesn’t leave you satisfied or wanting more. It feels…”

  “Wrong?” Olivia suggested.

  “That, yeah, definitely, but it’s more that it’s… empty. You know?” he asked, and Olivia nodded. His fingers played through her hair, and she snuggled in deeper. “Junior year, I met this girl named Lisa. She was nice and sweet and very religious, and wouldn’t go past first base. She was the answer to my prayers. I asked her out and we started dating, and suddenly I had a girlfriend that everyone liked and respected, so the other girls kind of left me alone. I wasn’t getting pressured into having sex anymore. Hell, we hardly even kissed.”

  “You were pressured into sex?” Olivia asked. She thought only boys did that to girls.

  “I had a lot of sex in high school. More than I care to remember. You can’t exactly say ‘no’ without drawing the wrong kind of attention to yourself when you’re at a party and girls are hanging all over you, practically undressing you, and your buddies are cheering you on.”

  “Yeah, I guess not.”

  George breathed deep, in and then out. “So, anyway, we dated through high school and split ways in college and I kind of kept to myself for awhile, until I met Nick.”

  Olivia shot upright and blurted out, “What about that girl Mia?”

  As soon as she said it, she cringed. Shit. George hadn’t mentioned Mia yet. She knew the name from Izzie’s investigation.

  “I met Nick in an American History class in college
,” George continued, ignoring her outburst. He pulled her back down and settled her against his chest, holding her there, as though it was easier for him to talk without her looking at him. “From the moment I saw him, I was attracted to him. I didn’t know whether he was gay or not, but for the first time in my life, I wanted to find out. He was a popular guy with a lot of friends and I kind of watched him for awhile trying to figure out if he had a girlfriend or not, or if he had a boyfriend or not. And trying to figure out what I was going to do about it if he did have a boyfriend. It’s not like I was secure enough in myself to ask him out. Other than that one kiss when I was fourteen, I had absolutely no experience being a gay man, and I was scared.”

  “Was he gay?” Olivia asked.

  “Yes.”

  “How did you find out?”

  “We were at the same bar one night. He was with his friends and I was with mine, and as the night wore on, the two groups kind of merged into one big group. Somehow Nick and I got separated from the rest of them. We got to talking and it just came out in conversation. I can’t tell you word for word what he said or what I said. We talked a lot that night. At the end of the night, long after I went back to my apartment, he called me and said he thought he picked up a vibe and not to get upset if he was wrong, but would I like to go to dinner with him.”

  Olivia’s heart stopped beating as she asked, “What did you say?”

  “God, I was nervous,” George said with a hint of a laugh that reflected those jittery nerves he was talking about. “I think I stammered something about studying for a final and hung up the phone quick. I laid awake all night long with this nervous feeling in my stomach. I might’ve even puked, Liv… I didn’t know what to do.”

  “Why?”

  “It’s one thing to know who you are, but it’s entirely another thing to act on it for the first time. He knew who he was, and he had been living as himself for long enough to be confident in his own skin, but I hadn’t yet. In the end, I told him no.”