[Close Calls cover]

"Close Calls, " Part Two

By Wickie Stamps

A Story from Close Calls: New Lesbian Fiction

I pulled into any empty spot in front of the shelter, grabbed my bag and, after securing the club onto my steering wheel, rang the door to the Safe Space, Jamaica Plain's battered women's shelter. A senior resident opened the door.

After checking in with the other staff, I grabbed my cup, walked into the kitchen and poured myself a cup of coffee. I stepped out onto the back porch for a quick cigarette. My thoughts went back to my conversation with Christy.

The only time I'd come close to a similar conversation was with an boyfriend fifteen years before. We were sitting in a bar near Fenway Park, matching each other drink for drink. Sitting in a high-backed wooden booth, we took turns threatening to either kill ourselves or each other. We played our little game in an off-handed manner. It was a disturbingly casual chat, like friends lazily discussing what they were going to do on their next vacations. I remember how turned on I was by the madness of it all. Now I wondered if I was merely attracted to my boyfriend and that, because I was drunk, tolerated his insane threats.

Then he reached across the table and hit me. And all desire went out the window. Perhaps I wasn't attracted to abusers after all. I sure wasn't after he hit me.

As a child I'd had similar bouts of psychological warfare with my younger brother Phonso who was easy prey.

"Where's mama?" he'd ask as he sat on the floor playing with his toy truck. I'd be sitting cross-legged in our Daddy's green overstuffed chair. Most likely I'd be reading a book, something I did a lot as a child.

"She's dead," I'd say without looking up. More likely than not she'd probably be out at the local bar drinking and flirting with some man.

"No sir," he'd say casually and continue playing with his truck. Phonso was used to my games.

"No, I'm serious, she's dead," I'd continue. "Remember when the phone rang earlier?" I'd ask, still looking at my book.

"Yesss," he'd say slowly. I could tell by the tone of his voice that he was on the verge of taking the bait.

"That was the police saying they found her body in the alley behind the bar." I'd peek over my glasses and assess the progress I was making at wearing him down.

"Liar," he'd say as he rolled his fire engine back and forth over the brown shag carpet. But, I could tell by the furrow in his brow that the fantasy of mama lying dead in some alley was creeping into his mind.

"She's dead I tell ya," I'd continue. "Dead as a doornail. So dead that even the maggots are finished with her." I knew this would get to him. He was always such a sissy.

I could see the image of our mother as a maggot-ridden carcass slowly working its way into his tiny mind. By now he'd slowed down rolling his truck, his shoulders had drooped and his face grown long. A few more lines and he'd be down for the count.

"Yeah, apparently she'd been in the alley with some guy and he strangled her, raped her and gouged out her eyes. Then he threw her in the dumpster with the rats." I was aware that the details of my story were pretty shoddy but hey, the kid had no brains and any gray matter he did have was very easily overridden by his fragile temperament.

Usually by this point I'd see the first tear drip down his cheek. He'd take the back of his long-sleeved shirt and wipe it away. Slowly he'd get up, wrap his arms around his firetruck and walk out of the room. "I hate you," he'd mumble in-between his whimpering.

"Good riddance," I'd yell after him and go back to my book. I didn't bother following him as I knew he'd just climb into his hamper, pull the dirty clothes over his head and cry himself to sleep.

I'd go back to my book. It was one of my grandfather's old medical books, filled with drawings of skeletons with the flesh hanging off of the bones. All of the layers of flesh had numbers identifying the muscles. My favorite one was of a skeleton perched on a gravestone.

"Where's your brother?" Mama would ask when she'd arrive home.

"In the closet," I would say without looking up. Mama would sigh, put down her purse on the piano and walk down the hall. I'd hear her open the door to his room and call out his name. Then I'd hear her open the closet door. After a few minutes she'd walk out, carrying him. He'd be lying against her shoulder, sucking his thumb.

"You were teasing him again weren't you?" she'd accuse sweeping back his damp hair from his face. I'd keep reading my book. Mama would walk past me and with her free hand, grab my book right out of my hands and snap it shut.

"Hey," I'd protest and, crossing my arms over my chest, sink deeper into my chair.

"You're on punishment young lady," she'd say, tossing the book on Daddy's desk. Right before they'd disappear around the corner into the kitchen I'd make a face and stick my tongue out at him. The brat would just tuck himself in closer to Mama and suck faster on his thumb. I swear he'd have a smirk on his face. "What's the matter sugar, hmm?" I'd hear Mama say.

"How did your visit go?" Carla, who was the director of Safe Space, had walked out onto the porch to join me for a cigarette break. She must have been standing behind me for a few minutes. She already had a cigarette out and was leaning over lighting it. She took a deep drag, clicked her Zippo shut and slipped it into her jacket pocket.

I turned towards the back yard and stared at the children playing on the jungle gym. It always felt good to see children who had come from violence free to play and laugh. I paused and just watched the children. I really didn't want to discuss Christy with Carla. I felt like I'd just get a lecture about what assholes abusers were. I also felt my relationship with Christy, including my attraction to her, was my business.

"Do you ever lie?" I asked distractedly as I continued to watch Natika and Nicole playing on the jungle gym. Their younger brother Sam was standing under the tree nearby, clapping his small hands, excitedly watching his older sisters horse around. Sam, who was being seen by play therapists at Children's Hospital, had opened up so much since he came to our shelter. I smiled as I watched him beaming at his sisters.

"You mean like the time I had an affair and never mentioned it?" she asked.

I snapped out of my reverie and turned to look at my lover over my sunglasses. I was always struck by the rich blackness of her skin. "Yeah, right." I said. Carla and I had been lovers for over six years. We'd met when we were both members of the Alliance Against Women's Oppression, a left-wing women's group. Despite the shitty sex life we presently had, Carla wasn't the cheating type. "No, I mean lie for no apparent reason," I said and turned back to watch Natika trying to coax her younger brother onto the jungle gym. She wasn't having any luck.

"People don't lie without a reason. Women, especially." Carla had joined me at the railing and yelled to Natika to leave her brother alone. "Why?" she glanced over at me. I wondered if she knew I was considering having sex with someone.

I hesitated, more to get my head clear than to measure my words. One thing I knew about Carla, nothing a human being did, including myself, ever surprised her. I also knew that Carla held a hard line when it came to abusers, male or female. She felt they seldom changed. While a member of a Black revolutionary nationalist organization, Carla's husband, also a member of the same group, had gone crazy and taken her and her daughter Naomi hostage. He held them at gun point in their apartment until the Chicago police had tear gassed the place. All of Carla's comrades had known that her husband had been beating her. All or them, arguing for the sake of the revolution and the responsibility of Black women to stand by their men, had told Carla to stay with him.

"I'm working with an abuser," I blurted out. "But it's a woman."

Carla turned and looked at me hard. At that moment Natika threw a toy hammer at Sam. He freaked. Carla headed into the yard towards Natika. "Tika I told you to stop messing with your brother," she said as she picked her way around the sandbox and past the swings.

"So you think her being a woman makes her less of an abuser? What's she in for?" Carla said as she reached the kids.

"Murder," I said following after her. At that moment Sam was hunkered down, rocking himself. Natika had climbed off the jungle gym and was trying to drag her baby brother by his hair towards the bars.

Carla stopped dead in her tracks. Slowly she turned, put her hand on her wide hips and looked me dead in the eyes. "Excuse me?" she said.

I rolled my eyes and stubbed out my cigarette. "Well, she's a woman."

"So?"

"She has a right to help."

"So does a Klan member, right?" Carla was obviously pissed off. Carla usually got pissed at me when she was frightened for me.

"Miss Natika I told you to leave that child alone!" Carla hollered and turned back towards the two fussing kids

"I told her I killed my lover," I added. I was beginning to feel increasingly foolish.

Carla didn't even bother to turn around. "Women lie because they're trapped or they think lying will calm down their abuser." As she talked Carla shoved her leather cap back on her head and tried to pry herself in-between the kids. I wished that Carla looked more butch than she did. I felt guilty for thinking it.

"Remember that post card you bought at the Institute of Contemporary Art?" she asked as she broke up the pair.

I searched my mind. "I'm clueless," I said. I had no memory of ever having bought a postcard when I was there.

"Your right about being clueless," Carla said as she stood up straight and arched her back. "But think about it. It was really important to you when you bought it."

The conversation ended. Carla never asked me to stop seeing Christy. In fact she never brought the subject up again. Personally, after her comment about my being clueless, I was more than thrilled that she dropped the whole damned subject.

It would be another week before I'd see Christy again.

I went through the usual entrance routine. Name, ID, waiting for the confirmation either on the list or by the guard calling the center, emptying my pockets and dumping my belongings in the locker, occasionally a pat search, but usually not. Then buzz in through door one, wait; then buzz in through door two. Unless I was going out into the court yard or into the cottages, something I rarely did, these were the last locked doors I'd pass through.

Christy was sitting in the Learning Center when I walked through the door. Her profile was to me. Her right arm was over the back of the chair. With the sleeve rolled up I could see parts of her tattoo on her forearm. Smoke curled up from the cigarette she held between her fingers. I watched her as she stared out the window. She ran her fingers slowly through her long hair and pushed it back over her shoulders.

Christy turned her head, and saw that it was me. "Hey," she said and went back to gazing out the window at the asphalt loading area.

"Hey yourself," I said as casually as I could and walked over to the chair across from her and sat down. Like the last time, I found myself studying her well-chiseled body.

"Like what you see?" she suddenly asked and turned to look directly at me. I was caught off guard.

"Maybe, maybe not," I said and smiled nervously. Already the conversation was out of control.

"I think maybe," she said quickly and turning towards me, leaned forward and stubbed out her cigarette in the ashtray. "I think maybe," she said again. She looked over at me, stood up abruptly and walked over to the window. She looked out again, keeping her back to me.

"So what's up with you?" Christy asked suddenly.

"Oh, not much," I said, trying to cover my feelings with a smile.

"Kill anybody today?" she asked. She looked up at me while she lit her cigarette. Today there wasn't a smirk across her face. I swear I saw a wave of hatred sweep across her face.

"No, not that I remember," I said facetiously. My fear had resurfaced. "But the day's still young."

"I don't remember killing my lover," Christy said. "But they say it was early evening." She crossed one leg over the other and leaned back in her chair.

"But do you remember why you killed her?"

"Sure, she pissed me off," Christy said easily and stared at me. "Of course that's not what I told the attorneys or the cops." Today Christy seemed to have no problem chatting about the murder.

"What did you tell the police?" I was relieved that the conversation had moved away from me.

"Oh, I did the girl thing and cried a lot, said I was out of control, the drugs and booze you know. And they bought it," she said as she took another deep drag then leaned her head back and made smoke rings. After she'd blown several perfect rings, each through the other, she took another drag, exhaled slowly and looked directly at me. "I enjoyed it you know," she said. And smiled. Then her smile faded and she became serious. It was the first time she looked tired and haggard. "Do you want to know why I really killed her?"

I paused, unsure if I really did want to know. But this moment in my time with Christy felt different, more intimate. I noticed I was holding my breath. I exhaled. And realized that this is why I had wanted to work with Christy. I wanted to know why a woman would kill a woman. "Why Christy, why did you kill your lover?"

She looked me dead in the eye. "Because she was a woman, because she loved me, because I wanted to fucking die and she got in the way. I hated her for fucking loving me. I hated her for showing me that someone on the face of this filthy fucking earth really was capable and willing to love me. She destroyed my world. And offered me a reason to stop killing myself. I, quite simply couldn't take the pain of being loved. It was harder than all the hatred I've had to face in my life."

I was shocked and completely unprepared for this confession. I sat motionless in my chair. Tears ran down my face. "Christy, you know I can't keep working with you. I am too attracted to you. I'm sorry."

"I know," she said and flipped her hair back over her shoulder. She stubbed out her cigarette. "Me too. I'm attracted to you. It's ok. All I really wanted anyway was to tell someone what I just told you." She put her hands to her face and rubbed her eyes. "I miss her you know," she said as she straightened up and pulled herself back together again. "Anyway, I'll get a few privileges out of these sessions," she said flippantly. We both smiled. "Will you visit me?" she asked. Her voice sounded young and there was an eagerness in her look.

"You know, I don't know. I'm confused," I confessed. "I have a lover, we are having problems." I hesitated. "I need to think about it. If I decide not to it's not because I don't like you. It's just that I have a lover."

"Fair enough," she said and stood up.

I could feel her eyes on me as the door to the Learning Center whooshed shut behind me.

As the guards unlocked the doors my eyes were already peeking through the plate glass windows, looking for a phone. I saw one over in the waiting area. After I got my belongings back from the guards I quickly searched my pockets for change and, finding some, dialed the number of the shelter. I recognized Carla's voice.

"Hey," I said. "It's me."

"Hey you," she said. "Did you terminate with that client?" she asked.

"Yes, yes I did." I could hear Natika in the background who, I assumed, was tormenting her younger brother.

"Are you all right?" Carla asked. I knew she could detect the sadness in my voice.

"Yes, yes I am." I felt completely drained.

"Oh by the way, you were right," I said in-between Carla's scolding of Natika.

"About what?"

"About fear and lying." I didn't mention that part of my need to lie was based on my fear of sexually intimacy with Christy.

"We've both been there."

"Yes, you're right" I said over Sam's screaming. I could feel the tears welling up in my throat.

"Close call, huh?" Carla said.

"Yeah," I said and wiped my eyes with the back of my sleeve.

"Well, just get in that car of yours and head on back here. I'll cook you dinner," she said in-between scolding Natika and Sam. "The specialty tonight is Natika under glass." We both burst out laughing.

"See you back at the ranch," I said and hung up the phone. I dug around in my bag for my car keys. That's when I came across the post card. I flipped it over and saw that the photographer was Barbara Kruger. Black, white and red it had a image of a man holding his finger to his mouth. The words "your" and "silence" were in red. The other three words were in black. "Your comfort is my silence," it read. Then I realized you could also read the red words first. "Your silence is my comfort," I read. I smiled and shoved it back into my bag. As I walked out to the car I made a mental note to talk to Carla about digging around in my belongings.

Go back to part one of "Close Calls"

Back to Close Calls: New Lesbian Fiction

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