by Robbi McCoy
Harper had never thought of Mary as “funny.” She was wary of this idea and it must have showed.
“Aunt Harper,” Sarah said, sounding mature, “there is nothing to worry about. I’m only interested in boys, believe me, and there are no boys at Mary’s house. Couldn’t be safer.”
She had a point. It was mainly boys that had gotten her into trouble with her parents. And despite their attempts to rein her in, she was nearly an adult. She deserved some responsibility and some trust.
“I’ll give you the number of my friend Roxie. I’ll let her know you’re here and ask her to check on you. You can call her any time if you get worried or need something. And I’ll have my cell phone,” she said. “Although I suspect the reception is sporadic up and down the coast.”
“So you’re going?” Sarah looked liked she was going to jump up and down with glee.
“I guess I am.” Harper felt an involuntary grin spreading across her face.
Chapter 24
LAST SUMMER
Eliot stopped by to pick up a few of his belongings from the shed, things he had stored there for their summer camping trips. He was on his way to some other woman’s house now. He had replaced Harper, quite easily, apparently. This new woman was someone he knew in Washington, someone he had even dated during non-summer months. She had become his year-round companion now. She might marry him and give him kids. Perhaps they will be blissfully happy together, Harper thought. He should be thanking me for releasing him.
Eliot piled his things on the lawn outside of the shed, his too-long hair covered by a Seattle Seahawks baseball cap.
“Why don’t you take both sleeping bags,” Harper suggested. “Since they match. You can zip them together. Less useful apart.”
“Okay, thanks,” he said. “That’s helpful.” Harper went inside the house while he transferred his things to his car. She made him a glass of lemonade. When he came in, he gratefully swallowed two big gulps and then sprawled out in a kitchen chair, his long legs taking up nearly half the kitchen. He seemed perfectly at home here. And why not? He had been sitting there just like that for ages.
“You seeing anyone?” he asked.
“No, not really.”
He eyed her silently as he drank the lemonade. “It was that girl, wasn’t it?” he said, finally. “That girl, Chelsea. It’s been nagging at me all year. Last summer I could tell something was up, even before I came down. I just couldn’t figure out what it was, what had happened to you. It ate at me for months. And I kept remembering that girl because of the way you talked about her last spring like she was on your mind all the time. You were seeing her, right? I mean, romantically. That’s why you didn’t want me around.”
“Sort of,” Harper said evasively.
“Why didn’t you tell me? We’ve always been able to talk about things.”
“This was different.”
“Because it was a girl?” he asked. His voice was calm, understanding.
“I guess so.”
He observed her coolly.“It doesn’t really surprise me, Harper. I’ve seen your heart reach out to women so many times. I always figured that someday one of them would reach back and that would be the end of us. I sort of always knew I wasn’t what you wanted.”
“That wasn’t really why, Eliot,” she said. “It wasn’t because of Chelsea. We needed to be over anyway. For both our sakes. Whatever this thing was between us for all these years, it wasn’t a relationship. It was going nowhere.”
“Going nowhere?” He looked surprised. “Because that’s the way you wanted it. You know I would have done things differently if you’d have let me. I tried to persuade you to make a life together. But you wanted to be a ‘free spirit.’” He said the last sentence mockingly. “Let’s not talk about that now. That happy little domestic scene wouldn’t have worked with us and you know it. For a lot of reasons.”
He stood up and put his empty glass on the counter. “Well, yeah, the girl, for instance.” His voice was sarcastic. “By the way, what happened with her?”
“Gone,” Harper said, simply.
Chelsea had been gone for almost a year, at least gone from Harper’s arms. But she hadn’t left her heart. And the heat of the summer sun brought her sharply to mind, so sharply that Harper could almost feel her skin. She could smell her hair in the heat waves coming off mown grass.
The day after Eliot picked up his camping gear, Harper dialed Chelsea’s cell phone and got voice mail. She left a message that probably sounded more desperate than she intended. “I’d like to see you. Please call. I’ll understand if you’d rather not, but I just want to talk, that’s all.”
She knew that Chelsea would call, out of pity or guilt or both. Chelsea was sorry for what she’d done, sorry for pushing her way into Harper’s heart and then abruptly leaving. She had said so many times as she was leaving, and Harper had no doubt she was sincere.
Chelsea called the following day. She was wary. Understandably. Harper proposed a picnic, just to talk. No hidden agenda. She suggested Tuesday evening for the free concert in the park. Chelsea agreed. Their phone conversation was brief and guarded.
As Harper packed picnic supplies Tuesday afternoon, her mood was light. When the phone rang, she jumped, alarmed, fearing that Chelsea had changed her mind. It was just a telemarketer. Hanging up the phone, Harper saw, through the screen door, Chelsea’s black Honda pull up at the curb. Her pulse quickened. Chelsea’s hair, golden light in the sunshine, surrounded her face like a halo. She strode up to the door, one bare knee showing through a sizeable rip in the fabric of her jeans. Harper noted her familiar shy smile with a pang of affection.
She pushed the screen door open, and Chelsea stepped inside, smiling. She hugged Harper close, warmly, but not sexually, and Harper closed her eyes, letting her body feel for just a second the sensations that were like a siren song to her blood and skin. Then Chelsea released her and stepped back.
“Thanks for coming,” Harper said. “Everything’s ready. Do you want to walk?”
Chelsea nodded. She was silent. Perhaps nervous. They walked the four blocks to the park, carrying a small ice chest and a tote bag.
“It’s good to see you,” Harper said, searching Chelsea’s face for some clue to her feelings.
“You too.”
They found a spot on the grass some distance from the musicians and most of the other picnickers and spread out a blanket. Harper had put chardonnay in a Gatorade bottle, which she poured into paper cups.
“Liquor’s not allowed in the park,” she explained.
Chelsea took the cup and swallowed a mouthful of wine as if it were medicine. She seemed distracted, watching the other people, avoiding eye contact. Harper hoped she would relax.
The nearly white hairs on Chelsea’s forearms glittered when a ray of sunlight hit them. Harper was reminded of a singular day the previous summer in a secluded cove they had found by chance, having walked quite a distance from a public beach. After plunging into the surf for a while, they had reclined on their towels on hot sand. Harper had removed Chelsea’s bikini top, revealing her gorgeous breasts to the sun. She had traced a finger along the tan line up over the curve of one breast, down into the groove between them, and then over the other, brushing off a few grains of quartz. Chelsea’s skin always sparkled in the sun. The fine, blond hairs that covered her caught the light like crystals. Chelsea lay on her back, her eyes closed under her sunglasses, her lips curled into an effortless smile. Her sand-dusted hair was splayed out on the blanket. Looking now at Chelsea’s arms in the dappled light under tree branches, Harper recalled this scene in vivid detail, recalled bending her head down to lick the shimmering layer of sunshine from Chelsea’s skin.
Delicious memories like these assailed her senses, retelling themselves intensely with sounds and tastes and smells. That day had been one scene in a tale full of promise in which each detail was brimming with meaning and magic. It had been a day full of awe, a day of honest joy like almost e
very day she had spent with Chelsea last summer.
“How’ve you been?” Harper asked.
Chelsea turned her attention to Harper. “Good.”
“You’ve got a tan already.”
“Swimming.”
Chelsea continued to hold herself at a distance. They ate pasta salad and chunks of watermelon in almost total silence as Harper tried to think of a way to draw her out. She yearned to recapture some of the emotional closeness they had had, even if the physical were now denied.
“Are you writing poetry?” Harper asked.
“Not so much right now. Maybe you didn’t know, but I finished my master’s degree in January. I’m going full time into teaching. Starting next month, I’ve got a fourth-grade class.”
“No, I didn’t realize that. I didn’t know you were serious about that. I thought the teaching was just something you wanted to have to fall back on, if you needed it someday.”
Chelsea picked at the grass absentmindedly. “Originally that’s what I planned, but I’ve been feeling lately like I need to do something more useful. The poetry, it’s an indulgence. It’s not a profession. I hoped it could be at one time, but it isn’t going to be. I can always write poetry, of course, as an avocation. I mean, I can’t just be Mary’s protégé all my life, now, can I? The time comes when you’re no longer the student. You have to become the teacher. In this case, literally.”
Harper glanced at the band playing some distance away and then back to Chelsea. “How do you know when the time comes to be the teacher? I mean, there’s always plenty more to learn.” “Well, sure. I don’t know. I suppose you just want to be pretty sure you know more than the students do.” Chelsea laughed, a light, pleasant laugh like the tinkle of a glass wind chime.“There’s always going to be more to learn. In that sense, you’ll be a student all your life. You can be both.”
That’s true, Harper thought. You could be both. She hadn’t really thought of it that way before. You still have much to learn, Grasshopper, she heard in her head.
“I think you’ll make a wonderful teacher,” Harper said. “I’d never be able to do that. The math alone would send me fleeing out the door.”
Chelsea smiled. “I guess teaching isn’t for everyone. At least not elementary school. Mary, for instance, thinks it would be absolute torture. She doesn’t understand why I’m willingly doing this. Children make her nervous. She thinks they should be put on another planet and segregated from society until they’re eighteen and have achieved a certain level of civility. It’s sort of funny. She has strong maternal instincts, but they don’t kick in for anybody who hasn’t grown to adult size.”
“How is Mary, by the way?” Harper asked.
“She’s well. Working on an exhibition. Opening next month in Santa Rosa.”
“Does she know you’re here, with me?”
Chelsea shook her head. “She’s very touchy on the subject. I thought it’d be better not to mention it. No point getting her worked up over nothing.”
Harper, nodding, thought to herself, Is this nothing, then?
“You’re happy?” she asked.
Chelsea said, simply, “Yes.” She held her cup out for a refill. She wasn’t going to elaborate, which meant that she was being loyal to Mary, loyal to the privacy of their relationship.
A plaintive saxophone solo drifted through the still evening air. Harper was disappointed. She had hoped, more than she had admitted before this moment, that Chelsea and Mary were having trouble, that maybe they weren’t even together anymore. If there were any problems, though, they weren’t something Chelsea wanted to share. Harper had to respect that. She let the subject drop.
“How about you?” Chelsea asked. “What schemes have you been hatching?”
Harper thought over the past year. “Well, I’m still working on that video series, you know, the female artists. Got four of them now.”
“Good. Really worthwhile project. The one you did of Mary, it’s just beautiful. The music, especially. Well, that’s where you excel, of course. Do you remember that day, Harper?” Chelsea asked, smiling freely for the first time. “You played the baby grand for us.”
Harper nodded. “I remember. I played Appassionata.”
“That’s such a beautiful piece. Every time I hear it now, of course, I think of you.” Chelsea averted her gaze and let her last word trail off almost inaudibly, as if she’d said something she regretted. “So, who are the others, then?”
“There’s Catherine Gardiner, thanks to Mary.”
“Sure. I knew about that one.”
“And Wilona Freeman.”
“The photographer?”
“Right. I’ve known her for years and finally got around to including her this last winter. And Sophie Janssen, the sculptor. One of her larger pieces is in Oak Park. It’s a big metal...”
“Pear! Yes, I’ve seen it. Very sensuous. How do you know her?”
“We met at the dedication ceremony, actually. The symphony performed for that. She’s very approachable. Totally down-to-earth and no-nonsense. You’d never guess she was an artist just talking to her.”
“Artists aren’t all whack jobs, Harper,” Chelsea pointed out.
“No, I know that. But they do tend to be a little different, usually.”
Chelsea looked amused. “Must have been a challenge for you, then, to make her seem interesting.”
“No, not really. She’s a fascinating woman, despite the sanity.”
“So you have a painter, sculptor, photographer and poet, but no musician?”
“No, no musician.”
“That seems odd to me. I would have expected you to feature a musician right off the bat.”
“I just didn’t think of it.”
“Sometimes I think you don’t value your own art as much as you do other people’s. You take it for granted or something, but to the rest of us, musical talent is mysterious and impressive. Maybe one of those soloists they bring in for the symphony would be an interesting subject. Like that oboe player from last season.”
“Yes, you’re right. I’ll keep my eye out, then, for a musician.” Harper put a cover on the pasta salad. “Do you want any more of this watermelon?”
Chelsea shook her head. Harper longed to know her thoughts. There was so much that wasn’t being said between them.
“Have you been dating?” Chelsea asked.
“Some. A little.”
“Women?”
“Oh, yes! After you, what else?” Harper laughed. “I’ll always be grateful to you for that.”
“Even after how it ended up?”
“Absolutely. It seems like I’ve been looking for something all of my life, and now I know what it was I was searching for, what my personal truth is, you know?”
“You finally figured out that you’re gay, you mean? You make it sound so mystical.”
Harper shrugged, recognizing the gentle criticism that had always been a part of their relationship. It was one of the things she appreciated about Chelsea, her insistence on looking at things a little more starkly than Harper was inclined to do.
“So how is it going, then? With these women, I mean?” Chelsea’s blue eyes looked searchingly into hers. What does she want to hear? Harper wondered. This wall between us is simply maddening. What would she say if I told her right now that I’m still madly in love with her and I would do almost anything to be lying in bed beside her one more time?
“Nothing’s come of it,” Harper said. “Nothing serious. I went to a women’s festival a couple of months ago. That was an experience.”
“Yes?” Chelsea asked, expectantly.
“I met a woman there, a Turkish tanbur player who called herself Astral. She was fascinating.”
“What’s a tanbur?”
“Sort of a lute. A stringed instrument with a long neck.”
“I can see why she caught your eye, then.”
Harper nodded, then said, “We spent the night together.”
Chel
sea arched her eyebrows. “How was that?”
“Fun. Enlightening.”
“Good,” Chelsea said with no evidence of jealousy. “Have you seen her since?”
Harper shook her head. “It was a one-time thing.”
Chelsea nodded. “You know, I’ve never done that.”
“Slept with a Turkish tanbur player?”
Smiling, Chelsea said, “Had a one-night stand. I sort of envy you that. I tend to fall in love with anybody I sleep with. Irrevocably. Head over heels.”
Including me? Harper thought. Were you head over heels in love with me? Are you still in love with me?
“I guess it’s time to get back,” Chelsea said.
They stood in unison and collected their things. They walked slowly, silently. Harper wanted to delay their arrival at her house, dreading the moment when Chelsea would leave.
“So what now?” Chelsea asked. “You’ve set Eliot free. Not going there again, I guess?”
“No. Eliot has moved on already. I suppose I will eventually find someone. A woman, I mean. You, Chelsea, have shown me the way!” At this pronouncement, Harper made a sweeping gesture across the sky with her arm.
“Oh, come on, Harper, don’t make a spiritual quest out of this too. All I did was pry the lesbian out of you. Simple as that.”
Harper liked the way Chelsea jostled her, the familiarity it alluded to. Too soon, they stood on the sidewalk in front of her house. Is there any way I can make her stay? Harper wondered. Am I totally powerless over her?
“Want to come in?” she asked, trying to sound casual.
“I don’t think so. It’s been good seeing you again, but I should get home.”
Realizing that Chelsea was about to say goodbye, Harper felt panic rising to her throat.
“We can’t do this, though,” Chelsea continued. “We can’t see one another again. I know that neither one of us wants to be just friends. It’s obvious to me that nothing has changed. We both still...”
