We were back on the shell road that led to Dinkin's Bay. It was nearly dark and a high wind sailed scudding clouds across a plum-colored sky. In a very small voice, she said, "I guess so… hell, I don't know. Are you surprised? I mean, that it's that way between Bets and me."
Apparently, it was easier for her to pretend that I didn't know-as if that were the only reason she had never discussed it before.
"I knew that you two were close," I said.
"You think any less of me now that I've told you? It seems so… weird."
"Offended, you mean? Outraged? Not likely."
"If it bothers you, I'd understand."
Nope, it didn't bother me. The biological truth is that homosexual behavior is almost certainly genetically mandated.
I said, "Why? Does it seem weird to you?"
She shrugged. "At first it did… then it didn't seem weird at all. Like the most natural thing in the world. I'd tried it with men"-she paused to look at me-"but it never seemed to work out."
I already knew that because Dewey and I had once tried. It was sweet and tender but utterly without passion. Rather than feeling closer to her, I'd finished feeling as if we'd been distanced and, worse, as if our friendship had been jeopardized.
"So you caught Bets screwing around. You're not the first couple to have to weather an affair. Maybe she was lonesome. Maybe she was drunk. Maybe she just had to get it out of her system. But one thing we both know is that Bets is a good person and has a hell of a lot of character. So, when we get back to the house, you call her on the phone and start sorting it out. Madrid? It's about midnight there, I think."
Dewey said, "No. Nope, we're done. What happened hurts like hell; catching them like that, but we were done before I ever flew to Spain. Before Bets left, we spent the whole time fighting."
"About wanting to see other people?"
She hemmed and hawed and avoided the subject. Dewey is one of the private ones. Talking too much about herself makes her uncomfortable. She needed a break; no more pushing.
It was later, when we were back at my stilthouse that she told me, no, what she and Bets had been fighting about was me.
3
We had showered and changed. Because Dewey said she wasn't in a party mood, we decided not to go to the marina. How long had it been since I'd missed a Friday night with the fishing guides? I made a light dinner: grilled snapper with mango chutney and salad. We did the dishes exchanging the kind of polite conversation that is really silence. Finally, as I was putting the last dish away, she said, "Are you still in the mood to listen? There're a couple of things I left out."
I told her, "No kidding," then listened to her tell me that, for some reason, it would be a lot easier to talk about if she didn't have to look at me. I suggested we sit out on the deck, lights off, and look at the winter sky. Dewey said no, what she wouldn't mind doing was maybe lie on the bed, her face in a pillow, with only the reading light on. Then she added, "And you might as well rub my back while I'm down there," giving it a tone of indifference- why not do two jobs at once? "I pulled a latissimus the other day when I was lifting. My whole back feels out of whack."
I thought: Why does she want to try this again? Then I thought: Because she's trying to rebound from Bets.
But I did what she said. She was trying to orchestrate so carefully that it seemed needlessly cruel not to go along with it. Sometimes I try hard to believe my own lies…
So I switched the reading light on, switched the other lights off. Heard her fiddling with the stereo and then heard Marianne Faithfull come on, soft, haunting, ephemeral- one of Tomlinson's albums from his flower child days. Then came around the clothes locker into shadows to see Dewey lying there in nothing but her heavy bra and bikini panties. Anticipating me, she was up on one elbow, face looking soft and serious. Before I could speak, she said, "Just shut the hell up and let me get this out of my system. All I want you to do is work on my back."
I said, "Your call."
She buried her face in the pillow and said, "Don't say a word."
"If that's what you want."
" 'Cause what I need to do is, I'm going to pretend like you're not here…"
Sitting on the bed, hip-to-hip; Dewey sprawled belly-down, talking softly about this and that, nothing serious, until she said: "I guess this thing with Bets's been on my mind. So, yeah, maybe I need to talk with somebody about it. Lucky you, huh?"
Long silence.
Then: "What'd you ask me-am I in love with Bets? I answered you, but I didn't answer you. Bets told me for nearly a year-'I love you, Dewey'-before I could even make myself say the words."
I waited through another long pause. Heard, "So… I finally said them and… Christ, it was like freedom. Like I could finally admit, yeah, this is what I am. All the time I spent worrying-hey, why'm I the only one who doesn't fit in? God… and the guilt. Gone, just like that. 'I love you, Bets.' Said those words and it was the greatest feeling. Like letting go. You know?"
No, I didn't know. But I didn't say it. Kept working on her back, using my thumbs to knead the lean muscle cordage beneath soft skin. I wanted to tell her something Tomlinson had once said: Guilt is the curse of those who care. It wasn't often, but the man's unrestrained spiritualism sometimes made sense even to me. But this was her time to talk… and it was sounding more and more like a catharsis…
"So I moved in with Bets. It wasn't just because I wanted a roommate, like I told you. All I wanted to do was be with her. Be with Bets. Man-we laughed so much together. Something else, first time in my life, I enjoyed… sex. First time anyone ever touched me that I wasn't tense or worried or felt like I had to fake it. You know Bets- those long fingers of hers?-but they're soft, too. The way she uses them. And kissing-"
I felt Dewey's body shudder beneath me.
Could feel my own pulse as I listened to her say, "The kissing was so nice. You know that feeling? You're kissing someone so lost in it all, like you're breathing for each other. Then we'd giggle like little girls." She said, "Whatever happens, I've got Bets to thank for that," as she pushed herself up on an elbow, fished around beneath her
… heard the sound of contracting elastic… and she slipped her bra off. Got a brief look at the pendulous weight of her left breast as she turned to toss the bra on the floor. "You mind? This thing's choking me plus it's getting in your way."
I cleared my throat; looked at her clothes in a pile by my feet. Stood and folded them neatly over my telescope, more to put some distance between us than anything. My body was reacting to her story in a way that I could not control. I needed a break.
Heard Dewey say, "Get back here, Ford." Heard her say, "Hey-while you're up? You got any oil? Body lotion, I mean?"
I did. Knew I shouldn't get it… but I found it in the medicine locker anyway. Then, when I was settled, pouring oil on her back, she said, "Now… where were we?"
I kept telling myself that I was listening with the careful ear of an objective observer… but, more likely, I was forcing an interest to keep my mind off what my hands were doing; off what my hands wanted to do. This was a Dewey that I'd never met and didn't know: the secret Dewey giving me a tour of her secret world.
"They're mostly nice people," she said, "just like anybody else. Not kinky or weird; not perverts. Just women living their lives. Our friends were mostly jocks-it's what we call each other. 'She's a dike.' Or 'she's a jock.' There's a difference, understand. Doesn't mean she has to play sports-it's a look-but she probably plays sports.
"I was always what they considered a jock, but then that started to change. It's what I'm telling you about; the trouble between Bets and me. See, the third type's a 'lipstick': a girl who's pretty and feminine. A lipstick is gay, but she can probably go both ways and enjoy it." She hesitated a moment before she said, "I ever strike you as feminine?"