While I’d been working for only a week, I was grateful the next morning that it was the weekend. Shame washed through me at the thought of what I’d done last night, but I pushed it away. While I’d been raised to understand that touching yourself is natural and sometimes necessary, that didn’t necessarily explain the reasons behind why I’d touched myself. In truth, I knew that if I was willing to think about it further, I’d been incredibly turned on—primarily because I’d been with Amelia. That morning in the shower, the water rushing down on me as I stood there, doing little, I tried to reconcile this truth with what I knew of myself, but I still struggled with it.
While I’d always found the female body attractive, before now it had always been in an abstract, artistic way. I preferred painting female models, for example, but most artists would say the same thing. Something about naked men, perhaps because of the extreme unfamiliarity with the male nude in our culture, made painting them less appealing and almost always embarrassing. Unquestionably, Amelia was beautiful. Anyone would be attracted to her, I told myself. Shaking myself out of my reverie, I finally managed to wash and then climbed out of the shower, pulling on my grubby painting clothes.
Aunt Kate and her boyfriend Jim were sharing breakfast in the kitchen, and both seemed a little sheepish when they saw me, drawing apart. I greeted them and grabbed the coffee pot.
“So how was the dinner?” Aunt Kate asked.
“Very strange,” I said, sipping the coffee. Aunt Kate prepared it in the New Orleans style, with chicory and from a concentrate, and the chicory had a bitter, biting tang that I loved.
“How so?”
I blushed at the memory of dancing with Amelia and then quickly recovered. “I don’t know, just all those rich people throwing their money around. It’s weird, you know? All those clothes, all that decadence—I’ve never really been around it before.”
“Can I fix you something to eat?”
“No thanks. Coffee’s fine.”
Aunt Kate sighed. “You really need to eat more, girly. You’re wasting away.”
I glanced down at myself and shrugged. While it was true I’d lost weight over the last few months, I couldn’t understand what all the fuss was about. “I guess.”
“Why don’t you sit down and talk to Jim while I make you some eggs.”
Knowing it would make her happy if I agreed, I sat down. While I waited, Jim and I shared a short, awkward exchange. He was a nice-enough man but, as Aunt Kate was clearly the talker in the relationship, not exactly a conversationalist. He owned his own construction company and was the company’s general contract manager. I managed to get him to open up about a restoration project he and his team were working on in the Quarter, and I found myself warming up to him as we chatted. Aunt Kate cooked me Creole eggs, which, once I started eating, made me realize how hungry I’d been. As Jim and I ate and talked, I glanced over at Aunt Kate to see her smiling at us, obviously happy that we were getting along.
“Thank you so much for breakfast,” I said after a while. “I guess I was hungrier than I knew.”
She looked satisfied. “I thought so. What are you up to today? I take it from your outfit that you’re going to waste this beautiful day up in your studio?”
“It’s not a waste, Aunt Kate. The light will be perfect for painting.”
She laughed and I excused myself, climbing up to the studio.
*
I spent most of the rest of the weekend painting, happy to have free time and, for the first time in ages, able to use my time painting guilt-free. It’d been a long time since I’d been able to devote myself to painting for long, uninterrupted hours, and now that I was working again, I didn’t have to watch every brushstroke or tube of paint. While I’d initially returned to working on my newest painting, at some point on Saturday afternoon, the memory of my first visit to the warehouse and the sensation I’d had as I looked at the beautiful mural hidden in the back inspired me. Knowing that the feeling was trying to tell me something, move me in some way, I put my half-finished landscape aside and started a new painting.
It absorbed me so wholly, I barely slept or ate all weekend. I was even tempted to cancel dinner with Meghan on Sunday night, but given the tension between us lately, I knew it wouldn’t be a good idea. I wanted my best friend back. What’s more, I’d started to feel a little guilty about how I’d behaved toward her. She and Aunt Kate were sort of right. Something was happening with Amelia, but I didn’t know what it meant.
Meghan lived in a funky shotgun house about three blocks from my aunt’s. Every inch of it held one of her many “treasures,” the quantity of which bordered on hoarding. She had knickknacks and tchotchkes lying on every surface, in every corner of her house. While there were apparently themes to her junk, I could never detect them. She also made collages from the various bric-a-brac she found in the Bywater, which were occasionally interesting if, to my taste, cluttered. She’d lived here so long, it was hard to picture her moving out, but that was apparently the plan since Zach’s place was bigger.
Meghan wanted us to have a girls’ night, so Zach had made himself scarce. She opened the door in her sports bra, and I laughed at the sight of her.
“The damn air-conditioning’s out,” she explained as I came in. The room was sweltering and smelled distinctly like B.O. I made a face and she laughed. “I’m sorry. I can put deodorant on till the pigs come home, but there’s not a lot I can do about it when it’s this hot out.”
“Maybe we should go out.” I wrinkled my nose with distaste, waving my hand in front of my face dramatically
She sighed. “I guess so. I didn’t want to spend any money, but I can’t really have guests over when it’s like this. I was thinking about going over to Zach’s after dinner. It’s so friggin’ hot here, I can’t sleep.”
“Do you want to postpone?” I asked, trying to sound casual.
Her brow furrowed and she frowned, deeply. “No. Do you?”
“No.” I shrugged. “Just an idea.”
Meghan wasn’t buying it. “Why are you avoiding me lately? We used to see each other or at least call each other every day. You’ve been back almost two weeks now, and I’ve seen and heard from you exactly four times.”
I sighed, feeling angry again. “All we’ve been doing lately is arguing, Meghan. I don’t know what to say. It’s not exactly pleasant to be around someone who’s constantly questioning your motives and getting pissed off.”
“I’m not!” Meghan said angrily, and then we both laughed. The laughter helped the tension and we hugged each other, relieved to be returning to normal. “I’m sorry, Chloé. I didn’t mean to be such a bitch. You know I’m only worried about you, right? But you’re a big girl. You can do whatever you want.”
Suddenly, Meghan grabbed my arm and pulled me over to the couch. “I guess this is probably the worst time to show you this, but I’m going to do it anyway.”
She’d spread the newspaper on the coffee table by the couch, and when I saw the page she’d left open, my knees gave way and I sat down, heavily. There was a half-page photo of me and Amelia dancing at the dinner last Friday night. We were staring into one another’s eyes, and Amelia’s hand was incredibly close to my ass as she pulled me into a twirl. I looked both happy and excited, and, though the shot was in black-and-white, it was clear my cheeks were flushed. The caption beneath the photograph said, “Miss Winters Bags Another Blonde.”
“Crap,” I said quietly.
Meghan nodded. “You’re damn right, crap.”
“Do you think Aunt Kate saw this?” I asked weakly.
“What exactly is there to see here?” Meghan countered, her eyes mischievous. “You’re dancing with a beautiful woman. You look thrilled, and she looks like she wants to eat you for lunch.”
I stared at the photo again, examining Amelia’s face. It was true. Even if one were being incredibly forgiving, Amelia’s expression seemed hungry, predatory.
“It’s probably just the lighting,” I said lamely.
Meghan rolled her eyes. “You have got to be kidding me.”
I was silent for a long time. To give myself some time to respond, I read the rest of the society column. Besides a report on several of the other attendees, the columnist reflected on Amelia Winters’s new “dish,” who, luckily, wasn’t named. While the tone of the column was light and snide, the insinuation was still very clear.
“Look,” I said, trying to keep my voice steady, “we danced for less than five minutes. That’s all.”
Meghan raised an eyebrow. “You’re sure?”
I blushed darkly and looked away, remembering what had happened when I finally made it home. Meghan and I sat in silence for a long time until I was finally ready to meet her eyes again.
She looked amused. “You’re blushing like a spring flower, girly. Something you want to tell me?”
I shook my head quickly, surprised to find my eyes fill with tears. “No. I mean, I don’t know.”
“What does that mean? And why are you crying?” She scooted closer to me and pulled me toward her, one arm over my shoulders.
“I don’t know what’s going on,” I said, wiping at my face, furious and scared at the same time.
“Do you have feelings for her?” Meghan asked after a long time.
“No. I mean, sort of. I think she’s attractive…”
Meghan pulled back from me, staring. “Attractive?”
“Don’t you? I mean, she’s objectively gorgeous. Even you said so.”
Meghan shrugged. “She’s very pretty, if you like that flat, androgynous type. I’m more a curvy-girl fan myself.” She laughed at my surprised expression. “I mean come on—Christina Hendricks is the sexiest woman alive.”
After a long pause and carefully weighing her words, she asked, “Are you thinking about doing something about this attraction?”
I shook my head quickly. “No. I couldn’t. She’s my boss, for one. And I’m not, I mean, I’ve never even thought about that with a woman…I wouldn’t know what I was…No.”
Meghan raised her eyebrows but wisely didn’t reply. My protest sounded weak even to me. We were quiet for a long time again before she said, “She was the person in your sex dream the other night, right?”
I laughed and pushed at her playfully. “Fuck you,” I said, wiping away my remaining tears.
Meghan stood up, stretching. “I’m going to say one more thing about this, Chloé, and then I promise I won’t say anything else about her unless you bring her up.”
“Fine.” I was trying not to get angry again.
“I don’t care if you sleep with men, women, or two or three of both. The only thing I’m worried about is you. This woman is a predator, Chloé. She has a reputation. I don’t want you to get hurt. That’s all. Would you think about it before you decide to do anything? Please?”
I nodded. “I will.”
“Now how about I get a shirt on and we get the hell out of this place? I could use a drink.”
I wrinkled my nose again. “Take a shower first, would you? You smell like shit.”