THE LINE WOUND through the lobby of the college health center and down a long hallway before circling back and disappearing around a corner. Lily groaned in frustration. This will take forever, she thought. She checked her cell phone. It was just after eleven. Her next class wasn’t until one, so she’d probably be okay.
“Please take your coats off and read the materials you were given,” a short woman called out.
Lily glanced at the sheet of paper she’d been handed when she signed in. This year the shot covered H1N1 and seasonal flu. There was the usual blah, blah, blah. Who should get the vaccine and why. Risks. Life-threatening allergic reactions. Lily shoved the paper into her backpack. She had no allergies, so this would be a no brainer. She wished she’d brought something to read.
Kids in front of her joked with each other or texted. She thought about checking her phone, if only to look like she had a social life, but she knew the only messages would be from her mother. “Are you okay, honey?” “You’ll make friends, dear, don’t worry.” Her mom thought she understood the stress Lily was under, moving from rural Maine to a suburb of Boston. Small high school to big college, only child to roommate. She’d even given Lily a special “sex” talk. That was grueling. How to talk about “it” without ever mentioning what “it” was. Not that “it” mattered to Lily. Any sex she would be interested in didn’t involve boys and a risk of getting pregnant. But mom didn’t know that, so she’d gone along. “Yes, Mom, I’ll use condoms.” She’d practically had to fight her mother off of forcing her onto the pill.
The line crept forward. A series of small posters dotted the wall to her left. They all played on the same theme—End relationship violence. No means no. It’s never too late to say no. Prevent sexual assault. Lily’s eyes widened. Was this such a huge problem that they were the only messages the health center put out? Not drug abuse? Or eating disorders? Not drinking—except what led to sexual assault? We’re here for you. Tell someone. Kind of creepy, she thought.
When she turned to look at the posters behind her, she spotted her roommate, Snake, farther back in line. She spun forward and pretended she hadn’t seen her, though she was hard to miss. Purple-streaked spiked hair, leather jacket. Lily couldn’t see her roommate’s hands, but knew her short nails were painted black. Her jeans would be ripped, her wallet stuck in her back pocket and tethered by a chain. Doc Martens on her feet. The quintessential punk urban butch. Or boi. She had trouble telling the difference. If there was one. Lily sighed.
She had been able to fill out the roommate preference form online, so her mother didn’t know that she’d requested a lesbian. Her parents hadn’t really grasped that this was a gender-neutral college, with a dorm set aside for trans kids. Lily didn’t think her parents knew such kids existed, but she was hoping they’d find out so that when she came out as plain old vanilla lesbian, they wouldn’t be so shocked. Maybe relieved even.
Snake’s first care package from her mom had included dental dams. Lily had stared at them in wonder as Snake tossed them on the bed beside her and dug deeper into the box for a bag of chocolate chip cookies.
“Are you out to your parents?” Lily had asked quietly, trying to sound confident.
“Yeah, sure. They’re cool. Even said I could take a girl to my prom. I just didn’t want to go, you know? All that prancing and preening.” Snake shuddered. “Want a cookie?”
There wasn’t anything in particular to dislike about Snake, except maybe her name. She was frustratingly well adjusted, from New York City, with understanding parents who were both teachers. Lily hadn’t been sure how to answer Snake’s question, What do your parents do? Right now, her mom worked as a waitress, but until Lily went to school, she’d run a daycare. Her dad moved from job to job, depending on the season and economy. Winters he worked as a logger, summers mostly in construction. Weekends he took on handyman jobs or fixed cars. Her parents never had the time to send care packages.
Lily was a little jealous because Snake was an art major and that helped her fit in. Lily majored in chemistry. The lab wasn’t known for its gay scene. She never knew what to talk to her roommate about and hoped by next year she might make one new friend she could room with.
The line had rounded a corner and begun descending stairs. “How come no one’s coming back out this way?” a tall boy with greasy hair commented. That led to laughter and jokes about them all lined up to face their doom. “Pigs to slaughter,” someone else called out.
The metal stairs angled downward. Lily couldn’t see ahead more than a few people, the lower level was dark. The other kids grew quiet. She was tempted to turn around and make her way back up and out, away from this uneasy feeling that crept over her, but that meant passing Snake, and she didn’t feel like having to explain her anxiety. She’d never felt so alone surrounded by so many people. She took a deep breath and turned a corner. The hallway brightened. A couple of doctors stood to the side, chatting and smiling. Lily relaxed. Imagination can be a dangerous thing, she thought.
The next series of posters caught her eye. Lily did a double take. Was that Snake? A face alarmingly like her roommate’s glared from the photo, brown eyes boring into Lily. Lesbians get AIDS, too, you know, the caption read. Lily flushed and glanced around quickly to see if anyone noticed her staring at the poster. The boy behind her was texting madly, the girl in front chatting to her friend. The line crept forward to another poster of a naked woman, her legs spread, head thrown back, a grimace on her face. Ecstasy or pain? Lily wasn’t sure. She couldn’t tell if the person going down on her was male or female, but with purple-streaked, short-cropped hair and a leather jacket, that could be Snake, too, she thought miserably. Sex kills, read the caption on this one. Lily looked around, alarmed. What kind of messages was this place giving out?
Her only sexual experience so far had been some kissing and groping with Amanda, her field hockey teammate in high school. She’d thought about going to a meeting at the LGBT center, but lab work consumed her afternoons. For all she knew, Snake was the only other lesbian on campus, though probably not, since she spent any number of nights away from their room, only coming in at dawn and flopping onto her bed fully clothed and sleeping till noon. It was hard to complain about a roommate who was rarely in the room.
A fluorescent bulb overhead buzzed and flickered. It sent a strobe-like effect onto more posters, each more ominous than the last. Get the shot. Homosexuality can be cured.
Lily felt sick to her stomach. Someone laughed toward the front of the line, which had turned another corner. The laugh turned into a cry. She glanced back. Snake hadn’t rounded the last corner yet. She wished she knew just one other person here.
“Roll up your sleeve. Keep moving.” Lily looked toward the voice. A grim-faced woman with a clipboard motioned the single line to split. Lily could see into a large room where four tables were set up as stations with kids moving toward a nurse at each. Quickly, a nurse wiped a spot on their arm and stabbed in a needle. “Next,” the woman said.
Lily pushed up her sleeve and stepped over to the nurse. She looked away as the needle poked her.
“Next.”
It was over. All that time wasted for a two-second shot. Relief flooded her as she pulled her sleeve back down and followed the kids who had just been inoculated through a doorway. A woman at a table handed her a paper to sign. Another motioned to a door for her to leave through. Not the way she came in. She pushed through. A dimly lit hallway led to another door. The noise and chatter of the flu shot queue faded. She made her way down the hall then paused and looked back. No one else came through the door. Had she gone the wrong way? There had been only the one door. She pushed through the second door and stepped into blackness. Before she could go back, the door slammed shut behind her. She groped but found no handle to open it. How could she have made a wrong turn? There had been no other way to go.
Lily leaned against the door. A hot wind made it hard to breathe. As her eyes adjusted, forms began to take shape. Women. In pairs. Naked. The air filled with moans and grunts, and everywhere women were coupled, grinding into each other.
From the shadows, a woman approached, also naked, with long, dark hair and large breasts. Lily’s gaze drifted down to a leather harness and large, blood-red dildo. She sucked in a hot breath.
“So glad you came out,” the woman said in a sultry voice. Her skin was coated with a sheen of sweat or oil, Lily couldn’t tell which. She gripped Lily’s arm where the shot had been given, causing her to flinch in pain.
Twisting away from the naked woman, Lily saw her parents, watching as though through a window, shaking their heads. “Oh, Lily,” her mother mouthed.
“Time for your orientation,” the woman said. Lily struggled to get away but felt her hands bound behind her and other hands pulling on her clothing, ripping cloth, popping buttons. She tried to scream, but nothing happened.
“Relax,” the woman said. “All first years go through this. We won’t hurt you.” She laughed, low and husky. “Much.”
Another woman approached, dressed only in leather chaps and holding a whip. “Lights!”
Lily blinked in pain as klieg lights came on. When she could look, she saw her own nakedness and also bleachers filled with students on either side. The other women were gone, leaving the one holding her and the other with the whip. They were outside, she recognized the parking lot next to the health center and the lawn behind the president’s residence. The crowd cheered. She struggled to get free, but she was pushed forward onto a bed.
The students began stamping their feet and chanting, “Vir-gin! Vir-gin! Vir-gin!”
Lily closed her eyes and screamed into the mattress.
A BRIGHT LIGHT stabbed her eyes. “Lily?” The voice sounded far away. Mom? She tried to respond, but nothing happened. The sound of her name grew louder, more insistent. “Lily.” The voice sounded familiar. Not Mom. She peeked through heavy eyelids and made out a blurred face, then two. The light shifted. She squinted.
“Whah?” she managed to mutter. The blurred face sharpened into brown curls, glasses, a white coat, a woman’s features. Something cold pressed against her forehead. She reached to touch the source.
“Don’t move.”
Lily took a deep breath. Air reached into her lungs, cool, not scalding. She was on her back and could move her hands. She wasn’t bound or naked. The other face resolved into Snake’s familiar features. She was smiling hesitantly, her brows knit in concern.
Lily tried to rise. The woman in the white coat laid a hand gently on her shoulder. “Lie still, you’ll be fine.”
She looked from Snake to the woman, her badge coming into focus. Jean Mitchell, M.D.
“You gave us a bit of a scare. Lily, is it?”
She nodded.
“Good thing your friend was here.” The doctor nodded toward Snake, who broke into a relieved grin.
“What happened?”
“You fainted. It’s not uncommon. When did you last eat?”
Lily thought back to the start of what was becoming a very long day. “Um, well, I had a cup of coffee before my first class this morning.”
“I thought as much.” The doctor leaned back. “We’ll get you something from the vending machine, but then I want you to go straight to the dining center for a real meal. Then you can come back and get your shot.” She stood. “Don’t move.”
Lily watched her leave. No shot? She felt her arm, but it didn’t hurt.
Snake pulled her chair closer. “Hey,” she said.
Lily looked at her. Snake seemed real enough. “I fainted?”
“So it seems.” Snake fidgeted. “When the line split, I wound up right behind you. You took one look at the needle and keeled over. I caught you, though. I didn’t want you to hit your head.”
Lily put her hands to her face. “God, how embarrassing.”
Snake touched her arm tenderly. “No, don’t worry. I’m just glad you’re okay.” She cleared her throat.
“Did anyone take pictures?”
“I don’t think so.”
“I’ll probably end up on Facebook or YouTube. Shit.”
Snake stiffened, her leather jacket creaking. “They’ll have to deal with me if you do.”
Before Lily could respond, a nurse entered with a bag of chips and a bottle of orange juice. “Doctor’s orders—once you’ve had these, I’ll come back and check you out.”
Lily sat up, took the food, and thanked her. She swung her legs over the side of the bed. Snake remained in the chair. “You don’t have to wait for me, Snake, you can go.”
“Sandy.”
“Hmmm?” Lily asked as she put a handful of chips in her mouth.
“My name’s Sandy. I don’t really care for Snake. And I don’t mind waiting. Unless . . .”
Lily ate more chips. This attentive Snake, er Sandy, was a little hard to get used to. Maybe this was the dream and what happened before was real. Oh, god, Lily thought, what the hell was that all about?
“I know we haven’t exactly been close,” Sandy said. Lily stared into her brilliant blue eyes. Not brown at all. How had she never noticed them before? “I don’t blame you for pretending you didn’t see me in line . . .”
“I didn’t,” Lily protested feebly.
“Yeah, you did,” Sandy said, clearly hurt. “I have feelings, you know.”
“I’m sorry.”
Lily held out the bag of chips in offering. Sandy started to reach for one then stopped. “No, you need them.” She smiled shyly.
Lily sighed. “We’ve been roommates for, what, three months? I don’t know the first thing about you.”
Sandy shrugged. “We’re not that different.”
“Oh please. You’re out to your parents. I’m not. Your mom gave you dental dams, mine gave me condoms. I’ve had something only approximating sex, you get it regularly.” Sandy blushed bright red. “Need I go on?”
“You think I have sex?”
“You’re never in at night.”
Sandy tilted her head and knit her brow as though just comprehending what her roommate thought of her. “I’ve been working on a photography project, and the only time I can get the darkroom is at night.”
Lily stared at her then looked away. “Shit. I am such an ass.”
“It’s okay. I could have told you, but you seemed, so, well . . .”
Lily wanted to cry. “Stuck up. Go ahead. Say it.”
“I was going to say busy. Stressed. Not stuck up. That hadn’t occurred to me. Shy maybe, if anything.”
An image flashed of Sandy catching her as she fainted. As Sandy, instead of Snake, her features softened and Lily saw for the first time that she didn’t have any piercings. Not even earrings. Her skin was smooth and zit-free, except for a small comma-shaped scar on her left cheek. When she smiled, as she was now, it creased into a dimple. How could she have lived with this sweet thing for three months and not ever seen her?
They sat quietly together, Lily munching potato chips, swinging her feet, and Sandy watching her.
When she finished the chips and crumpled the bag, Sandy reached for it and their fingers brushed. A shiver swept through Lily as she watched Sandy toss the bag into the trash can behind her. A simple gesture of manners that crumpled Lily’s old notion of her roommate.
“Why are you here? . . . Sandy.” That name would take practice to get used to, but it suited her, Lily decided.
In the few seconds it took Sandy to respond, Lily watched her breathe, how her shoulders moved slightly, her color deepening.
“You’re right,” Sandy began. She leaned forward, her elbows on her knees. Lily couldn’t see her eyes. “We don’t know each other very well. So I decided that maybe you might be kind of scared, because, you know, I would be, if I were in your situation. So I hoped it might help to see a familiar face—however strange.” She chuckled, but Lily could tell it wasn’t from bravado.
“Oh.” Lily leaned forward and ran her fingers through Sandy’s short, stiff hair. Sandy shifted and for a moment Lily’s palm cupped her cheek.
“How’re we doing here?” The nurse breezed in.
Lily pulled her hand away but kept her gaze locked on Sandy. “Much better, I think,” she said.
The nurse gave her a quick once over—temperature, blood pressure, pulse (did she just raise an eyebrow?), listened to her heart. “I think you’ll live,” she said with a wink. “You’re free to go. Don’t come back without a full belly.”
Lily thanked her. Sandy scampered out of her chair, grabbed Lily’s backpack, and held the door. She led the way through a short hallway, not nearly as dark as Lily’s weird dream. But when Sandy pushed through another door, bright light blinded Lily, like the lights in her dream. She panicked and pulled back. “I can’t—”
Sandy stopped. “What? You okay?”
Lily blinked in the strong light. Sunlight. She could see the president’s lawn, just like in her dream. They were in the parking lot, but there were cars, not bleachers full of cheering, leering students. No bed, no naked women. Just Sandy, her eyes the color of the sky. She took a deep breath and nodded. “Yeah, I’m fine.”
Sandy held out her hand and Lily took it. Together, they headed down the hill to the dining center. Lily inhaled deeply the chill winter air. “So, tell me about your photo project.”