Stowe Away

by Blythe Rippon

  “Oh, baby. I hate seeing you hurting.”

  Sam smiled wanly. “Funny, I feel the same way about you.”

  “I know you do.” Eva tucked some of Sam’s long hair behind her ear and placed a gentle kiss on her forehead.

  When Sam’s breathing had normalized, Eva returned to her own stool and peered into her eyes. “Better?”

  Sam nodded a little and wiped her nose on her sleeve. “I did come out here to talk about you, not me. I want you to know that.” From the sheer momentum of her crying, one last sniffle escaped her.

  “Oh, Sam. I’ll always be your mother, and I’ll always hold you while you cry. And I think you’ve needed to cry about this for a long, long time.”

  How did mothers learn to be so perceptive about their children? How was Eva still this perceptive about her, given how little time they spent together these days?

  “Well, I don’t think either of us is up for cooking dinner since, you know, neither of us really knows how anyway. You want to go out? There’s a new restaurant downtown that I think you’d like.”

  Sam wrinkled her nose at the thought of leaving the house with her face a blotchy mess. It was a rare moment of vanity, but she seldom went out in Stowe without someone approaching her to ask what Yale was like. “A new restaurant? What kind?”

  “It’s called Stowe Away. How cute is that?”

  “Can we just order a pizza and watch something horribly saccharine and sentimental? I don’t have the energy for a public appearance.”

  “A calzone and Terms of Endearment it is,” Eva said, and with her arm wrapped around Sam’s shoulders, she guided her back into the house and toward the couch. With her head in her mother’s lap, Sam watched the push and pull of Shirley MacLaine’s relationship with her daughter and laughed when she invited Jack Nicholson upstairs to see her Renoir. Nothing felt resolved about Sam’s relationship with Natalie, but she allowed herself to be present in the moment with her mother and a good movie, and a few of the storm clouds lifted.

  Sam awoke to the smell of coffee and something sweet. Rubbing the bridge of her nose, she sat up, disoriented, and blinked until her eyes focused. The last thing she remembered was Eva stroking her hair during the Steel Magnolias part of their triple feature. She found her glasses resting, neatly folded, on top of the DVD case for Little Women, and she put them on before making her way into the kitchen. Her mother sat at the table reading the paper, surrounded by two cups of coffee, a plate with two slices of frittata, and napkins with two donuts.

  “Hungry?” Eva asked, folding the paper.

  Sam’s stomach rumbled, and she eased into a chair, grabbing the coffee first. “Evidently. You went out?”

  “I picked up some goodies from Stowe Away. It really is a delightful place—maybe we can go next time you’re home.” Eva slid a fork over to her, and as she savored the taste of delicious coffee and frittata, Eva updated her on some of the news from the paper as well as general gossip from around town. After conspiratorially whispering that she thought Dolores might be secretly dating someone, she finished her frittata and leaned back in her chair. “Sam, I’d like us to talk about some things before you hit the road.”

  Good things seldom followed an intro like that, and Sam wrapped two hands around the coffee to wait for the worst.

  “Relax, I don’t bite. But we need to talk about what’s next for you. I know you want to go to graduate school.”

  Sam nodded warily. “My advisor thinks I should go for an M.D./Ph.D. somewhere, so I can do research but still have clout in the medical community,” she said slowly, trying the words out for the first time.

  Eva seemed to expect this: “I’ve been researching programs. Stanford’s is cutting edge, you know, and the institution really pours resources into the sciences. Plus, I think you’d benefit from a different environment.”

  “Mom—” Sam said, but her mother held up a hand and silenced her.

  “Samantha, I’m fine. I’ve been stable for a while now. I’m taking my medicine, and I’m able to focus on my art, which in turn centers me; it’s a healthy cycle. I won’t have you staying nearby to take care of me. Trust me, that would only make me more depressed than I already am.”

  “But what if—”

  “Samantha, don’t even say it. I’m trying very hard, and it’s important for me that you believe in me. If you were to remain nearby out of concern for my well-being, it would feel as though you doubted me.”

  Sam wracked her brain to find an angle to argue, but came up empty. She gently took her mother’s hands into her own. “I believe in you, Mom. I really do.”

  “If you want to apply to programs nearby, simply because you like the programs, then by all means do so. At this point, I want you to cast a wide net and keep your options open. Once you’re accepted, we can sit down again and discuss logistics before you decide.”

  For the second time in as many days, Eva stunned Sam with her forthrightness, intuition, and support. Relief washed over her like a warm spring rain. She hadn’t realized until that moment just how anxious and frustrated she had felt about limiting her application process. There would be more discussions, she knew, but for now at least she could apply to Stanford and anywhere else, guilt-free.

  “This means a lot to me, Mom,” she said, squeezing her mother’s elegant fingers and hoping the gesture communicated how deeply she meant what she said.

  “It means a lot to me, too. You know, I’m very proud of you. You have a lot of gifts to give this world. And you don’t need to spend them all taking care of your old mom.”

  Feeling lighter than she had in months, Sam packed up her car that afternoon to return to Yale. As she was making trips to and from the house, she walked past the roses in the front yard that no one had particularly attended to since Jack left. Miraculously, some were still flowering, and Sam cut a handful of pink ones. Just before she left, while Eva was otherwise occupied, she put them in a vase on the kitchen table and wrote on a rectangle of cardstock she pilfered from her mother’s studio, Thank you for more than I could ever say. As she pulled away from the house, she rolled down the window to call out “I love you,” and Eva blew her a kiss.

  SENIOR YEAR:

  WINTER 2007

  Natalie sat on the floor of her room and groaned, leaning back against the side of her bed. “Thanks, Sam. Your hands are amazing.”

  Sitting on Natalie’s bed, her legs on either side of Natalie, Sam worked the muscles in Natalie’s shoulders. “My mom trained me well. She carries all her tension in her shoulders, like you.”

  They were quiet while she continued to work out the knots on Natalie’s left side. Sam was grateful Natalie and Claire had decided to live apart this year, with Natalie opting to live in a single. Whatever her relationship to Sam might or might not be, the obscene-sounding moans coming from Natalie would have been hard to explain to Claire. Besides, for the first time, she got a glimpse into Natalie’s individual decorating style: framed images of significant architectural structures, including the Golden Gate Bridge, the Great Wall of China, and the Millennium Bridge in London. She suspected the last was probably an homage to Harry Potter as much as appreciation for a brilliant piece of architecture. Sam couldn’t help notice that Natalie preferred open-air structures, rather than solid buildings.

  They hadn’t seen each other in over a week. Natalie began senior year vowing to buckle down and take her studies seriously, and true to her word, she spent as much time in the library as Sam spent in the lab. For the first time in their friendship, Sam wasn’t the only one declining invitations to hang out because of work.

  “Jesus, my head hurts.” Natalie sported the “hung over” look, engulfed by her favorite baggy jeans and a high school gym shirt that was two sizes too big and bore Romano in ironed-on letters on the back. Sam’s shirt read, Misuse of ‘literally’ makes me figuratively insane, and she wondered
, not for the first time, whether Natalie thought her shirts amusing or horribly unfashionable.

  “Did you have fun last night?” Sam asked. The night before, while most seniors had dressed up for the winter formal, she had stayed home to write poetry.

  “Yeah, too much. Claire was a great date, though—it’s been a while since I went to a dance with a friend. No pressure, you know? No awkwardness.” She sighed as Sam released another knot in her upper back. “I wish she had stayed longer. Maybe then I wouldn’t have had so many drinks.”

  “Do you miss having her as a roommate?” Sam made small talk to distract herself from the slope of Natalie’s back. She’d given Natalie massages before and usually managed to feel friendly about the contact; today, her mouth was dry and her skin flushed.

  “I like my space,” Natalie was saying, and Sam concentrated on the words and not the muscles in her shoulders. “And her constant studying made me feel guilty. She makes a better friend than roommate.”

  Sounds of students laughing as they headed to dinner drifted into the dorm room from its corner windows. The shades were drawn, blocking out the cold and the world that had been too bright for Natalie’s hangover. The low light from a lamp on the desk across the room played softly on Natalie’s neck, and she watched as a vein pulsated there, reminding herself to keep her hands moving. Exercising all the restraint and detachment she could, Sam moved her hands lower. “Why did you drink so much, do you think?”

  Natalie didn’t answer right away, and a Roisin Murphy song from Natalie’s playlist filled the silence.

  “Why do I ever drink so much? I’m in college. I’m young and carefree…Maybe you should drink more.”

  Maybe she should. “I drink. Just not as much as you.”

  “Yes, Sam, dear, you’re always so responsible.” After a pause, she continued slowly, as if trying to remember. “I think I kissed a couple of people last night.”

  “Only a couple? Must be slipping.”

  “At least I didn’t go home with anyone.”

  “Someone came home with you.” She hadn’t meant to tell Natalie, but the opening was there, and the words slipped out unbidden.

  Natalie turned around, clearly thinking she had misheard. “What?”

  “Harrison must have followed you home. I found him passed out in front of your door.”

  Natalie’s brows furrowed as she looked away.

  “You know he’s in love with you.” It was funny how many people Sam could have said that about: at any given time, half a dozen people had fallen prey to Natalie’s charms. Sam’s only comfort was that she alone remained a constant in Natalie’s life, and as far as she knew, Natalie gave parts of herself to Sam that she never showed to anyone else.

  “No.” Natalie’s voice went soft. “No, I didn’t know. Wow, how’d I miss that one? I’m usually pretty good about picking up on that sort of thing.”

  “I woke him up and helped him home.”

  “Thanks, Sam.” Natalie sighed. “I never would have hooked up with him if I had known. I thought it was just casual fun for both of us. God, I’m so insensitive. I need to get my shit together.”

  Sam sighed, too. She’d watched her friend break many hearts during three and a half years of college, mystified by why she continued to seek validation through casual sexual encounters. The parade of men and women who moved through Natalie’s caresses cost her something, whether or not she realized it now.

  “So you were here last night?” Natalie asked.

  Damn. Caught. “Yeah, well. Claire called and told me you were on your way to wasted. I didn’t want you to fall asleep on your back. You might have thrown up and choked.”

  “Oh. I didn’t even know that was a thing.”

  For someone who drank as much as Natalie, she knew surprisingly little about the dangers of alcohol. “I rolled you onto your side.”

  “You’re very sweet, Sam. You take good care of me.”

  Sam’s hands absently drifted lower down Natalie’s back, and she thought she felt Natalie’s breath catch. To Sam’s infinite confusion, this happened every now and then when she touched Natalie. As her fingers glided still lower, the vein in Natalie’s neck start pulsing faster.

  She had assumed that the occasional tingling she felt when they touched was wholly one-sided, but as heat rose up her own neck, Natalie’s cheeks flushed. Trying to distract herself from the taut body she could swear was responding to her touch, Sam said the most random think she could think of.

  “I’ve been thinking about returning to Tai Chi. I used to do it every day in high school. I was in good shape, and I felt centered.” She felt foolish and stopped talking.

  After years of hugs, snuggles, and quiet observation, she had memorized every curve, every muscle of Natalie’s body, watching with ever wider eyes as breasts filled out and muscles grew more toned from hours of dancing on tables at bars and athletic sex. Those muscles whose structure she had long ago committed to memory tightened and trembled slightly now, and Sam’s stomach clenched.

  As her hands moved outward, then up Natalie’s sides, something between them broke. Natalie whipped around and grabbed Sam’s face, pulling their mouths together, kissing her hard.

  Sam had always known kissing Natalie would destroy her somehow, but she was still shocked at how good her lips tasted. Natalie crawled up to the bed, pushing Sam onto her back and following her down without breaking contact, her heart pounding against Sam’s.

  After long, breathless moments of kissing, Sam fought for freedom. She needed to see Natalie’s eyes. As her hands came up to push her away, Natalie grunted and grabbed her wrists, forcing them over her head and pinning her, before finally meeting Sam’s gaze. A long moment passed as Sam’s own lust and need were mirrored deep in her best friend’s eyes. Shrouded in a blanket of desire, they dove for each other’s mouths. Tongues danced, and their moans vibrated together, and it was all so overwhelming that Sam might need to escape her own body if she were going to survive. She tried to raise her arms once more, but Natalie denied her again, playfully this time, as she moved her mouth across Sam’s jaw and down to her neck, kissing, nipping, and licking. Shifting slightly to press her thigh between Sam’s legs, Natalie bit her own lip as Sam arched and pressed back. Natalie sat up and whipped off her shirt, kneeling on the bed. Looking at Natalie’s curves, the tanned expanse of skin, the breathtaking shape of her best friend, Sam felt as if she were underwater, weight pressing against all of her limbs as she tried and failed to move them. Natalie released her own bra and slid it off before reaching down to remove Sam’s shirt. A sense of urgency flooded through her, and Sam threw off her shock and sat up, fiercely kissing between perfect breasts as Natalie unhooked and discarded Sam’s bra.

  As her fingers spread across Natalie’s stomach and moved slowly upward, Sam was torn between crying, screaming, and throwing her head back and growling. The tidal wave of emotions churning through her left her bereft of rational thought, and all she could do was worship the stunning body in front of her. She unbuttoned Natalie’s jeans and slid the zipper down, hardly daring to believe any of this was really happening. If it weren’t for the almost painful excitement washing through her, she would think it was all a dream.

  Natalie stayed Sam’s hand, pushing her back to the bed and resting on top of her. She devoured Sam’s neck, and as her fingers slipped under the waistband of Sam’s pants, their muscles quaked together. They warred for dominance, tearing off remaining clothing, rolling over and over each other, touching, stroking, grabbing, thrusting. When they finally stopped teasing each other, Natalie came first, hard and fast. Sam fought back her own release until after, and when Natalie sent her over the edge, she gave a strangled cry. Exhausted and panting, she was starting to lose consciousness when Natalie growled “more” in her ear and she was on fire again.

  They alternated between sleeping and having sex all
evening and into the night. They left the bed only to stumble over to either Natalie’s mini-fridge or pantry. It was three a.m. before they really talked.

  “God, you’re good in bed,” Natalie murmured, her body resting on top of Sam’s, her head propped up on her hand. “Why didn’t we do this a long time ago?”

  Sam laughed, the vibrations moving Natalie’s body up and down. “I didn’t think you wanted to.”

  “Well, we both know I’m not the smart one in this relationship.” She gazed down at Sam and, tracing her finger across Sam’s face, identified features as she encountered them. “Gorgeous green eyes, creamy skin, full lips, adorable nose—you’re beautiful.”

  “No, you are.”

  “Stop it. I’m the one looking at you. I see your face more than you do, and I say you’re beautiful.” Natalie kissed her cheekbones and jaw.

  Sam stilled her, placing a hand on either side of Natalie’s face and pulling her head away to peer into green eyes just a shade browner than her own. “I love you.”

  Natalie’s eyes, which had been wild with passion for hours, quieted and softened. “I know you do. I’ve known forever, you know.”

  Brushing blonde wisps of hair aside, Sam cocked her head and gave voice to what she’d been wondering since Natalie’s lips had first found hers. “What does this mean?”

  “Do I have to know right now?”