“Hel-lo!” he said. “Sit down! Sit down! Have a beer on me!”
I could tell by Abby’s grin that she decided to play along, so I did too, just for the heck of it, and we pulled over chairs from the next table. If we worked this right, we might even get a whole meal out of it.
“Alice and Abby,” I said to the girl, to Christopher’s obvious relief. “We’re just visiting Abby’s aunt for the summer—helping out with her catering business.”
“I’m Gretchen,” said the blond girl. “Isn’t this place great? I’m crazy about the hummus.”
“Mmm, we’ll try it,” said Abby. “What else would you recommend, Chris, seeing as how it’s on you?”
I struggled to keep from laughing, but I knew we had him. We could just tell that this was a girl he wanted to impress.
“Uh . . . everything on the menu is great,” he said.
“Where did you guys meet up?” Gretchen asked.
Christopher immediately interrupted. “Actually, I’m flush tonight, so order whatever you want.”
“Thanks!” I said. And then to Gretchen, “Oh, we just run into each other now and then. We sell at the Saturday Market, so we see dozens of people.”
We talked about Oregon in general as we ate our dinner and were having a rather nice conversation when Chris told Gretchen that he was involved in fund-raising for a nonprofit organization. We began to wonder if the organization might possibly be him. We also noticed that he didn’t leave us alone with Gretchen for even a moment. When he wanted another pitcher of beer, he signaled someone to bring it to us.
But we wanted to make sure he didn’t pull a scam on Gretchen—somehow leaving her paying the bill.
So before we left, after thanking Chris for the dinner, I said, “Hey, weren’t you driving up to Seattle for a few days, Chris? How did that go?”
“Nah, something came up at the last minute and I had to put that off,” he said. And then, reaching for the bill, he added, “Nice to see you again. Gretchen and I are going to a movie. Be well.”
“You too,” Abby told him.
* * *
Muggy is muggy no matter where it is, I decided around the first of August, when I was baking, a sweatband around my forehead to keep sweat from dripping on the miniature quiches I was taking from the oven. Jayne said she couldn’t afford air-conditioning, and since it always got cool at night, that was something to look forward to. Which didn’t make any sense to me, unless she did all her baking at night.
“Do you ever wish you were on someone else’s payroll?” I asked her when we escaped to the porch between batches.
“Only when I think about getting sick,” she said, holding her iced-tea glass against her cheek to cool herself. “Would be nice to have health insurance. And of course there will be no cruises on the Nile or trips to Florence in my lifetime, and I don’t suppose I’ll ever be able to redo my kitchen . . . but I’m happy with what I’ve got, so why tie myself to a time clock?”
“But do you miss being around coworkers?”
“Never really had any, so what’s to miss? I’ll admit I love the Saturday Market just so I can hang out with other cooks. And I’ve got my now-and-then boyfriend. But . . . I’ve always been sort of a loner, and it suits me. What can I say?”
We took a couple days off to go to the ocean, and I loved it. The Oregon coast is so different from Delaware and Maryland. Few motels to be seen, no fences into the ocean anywhere. You don’t see many bathers, the water’s so cold. At some places there are seals, not swimmers, and huge boulders rise out of the water like humpbacked giants warning people away. Little inlets hold minute ocean treasures if you’re quick enough to catch them before they swim off. Once we’d had a taste of the coast, we had to brace ourselves to go back to Jayne’s hot kitchen.
Abby was a great roommate because, like me, she enjoyed her “alone time” each day, just to sit and read or wander by herself into town. Usually we strolled in together, but occasionally I explored on my own, and on one of those days, I discovered a Planned Parenthood clinic a few blocks away.
It’s something I’d been thinking about a lot. Along with thinking about Dave. I hadn’t considered seeing a doctor about birth control before because Patrick wasn’t in the picture. I hadn’t been “saving myself” for him exactly, it was just that, until recently, when I’d thought about sex with anyone, it was Patrick I was thinking about. But now . . . there was Dave.
I opened the door and stepped inside.
The nurse practitioner was a woman of about fifty—around Jayne’s age, I guess—welcoming and friendly, but also very matter-of-fact. MRS. EDWARDS, her nameplate read.
“I think I’d like some kind of protection in addition to condoms,” I said. “I just don’t like the idea of depending entirely on the guy.”
“Good thinking,” she said. “Do you want me to go over some of the choices with you before your exam?”
I swallowed. “Exam? Today?”
“Yes,” Mrs. Edwards said, pausing. “Are you having your period?”
“No,” I said. “I just thought . . . Well, it’s okay. Yes, I’d like to hear about the choices first.” Anything to delay it. I mean, a little conversation first would be good, along with a tranquilizer maybe, and a dark room so I wouldn’t have to look at her looking at me.
So she told me about the rhythm method, the least reliable, and who’s going to carry a thermometer along on a date, anyway? Condoms, of course, and she jokingly reminded me that they come in all colors and flavors. There was a weird thing they called a “female condom,” like a plastic bag I could stick in my vagina with the edges sticking out. Not! I told her. A diaphragm, flat and round, that I could insert over the cervix; an IUD, or intrauterine device; spermicidal jelly; birth control pills; a patch or injections . . .
How did sex get to be so complicated? I wondered. You don’t see guys going to Planned Parenthood before they become “sexually active,” as the doctors call it. Every woman you see making love in the movies is obviously on the pill or the patch or something, because you never see her fumbling around in her bag at the critical moment for the little compact with the diaphragm in it or the tube of spermicidal cream.
“I think I’d like to start on birth control pills,” I told Mrs. Edwards.
“We can do that, but you’ll need to get refills from your own doctor. The pill is ninety-nine percent effective, but you shouldn’t rely on it alone for at least a week after you first start.”
“No problem there,” I said.
“Good. Now, I’m going to step out and you need to take off everything from your waist down, and we’ll have a look. We want to protect the health of your partner, too.” Meaning that they don’t want him catching anything from me.
So there I was, five minutes later, lying on the exam table with a sheet over my midsection, my feet in the stirrups, sliding my bottom down to the end of the table, staring at the funny cartoon taped on the ceiling above me of a woman in a hospital gown with a look of terror on her face standing straight-legged right up in the stirrups and the doctor saying, “Please, Mrs. Jones, try to relax.”
My fingers clutched the edges of the table, and I closed my eyes, like if I couldn’t see Mrs. Edwards, she couldn’t see me.
“Okay. I’ll be gentle,” she said reassuringly.
I’d rather it was a man telling me that, actually—that he’d be gentle. I’d rather have been in a man’s arms. . . .
“Just part of being a woman,” Sylvia had once said of the necessary pelvic exams we go through in our lives.
It only took a minute or two, and then, just as gently, Mrs. Edwards withdrew the speculum and covered my knees and bottom with the sheet once again.
“Everything looks good,” she said. “You’ll want to use plenty of lubrication the first time. And if you decide not to go on the pill, I’d suggest you use both a condom and a full plunger of spermicidal cream. We’ll give you a pamphlet about the pill, and of course you’ll need to t
alk with your regular gynecologist soon after you get home.”
I sure could understand why impulsive couples just did it without all this mess. But forever worrying about an unplanned pregnancy was definitely not on my “want” list. I left with a little packet of pills, another of condoms, some pamphlets on birth control and safe sex, and a small sack with a tube of spermicidal cream and a plastic plunger.
“Have a good day?” Abby asked me when I got back—Abby, the girl who’s already had at least two intimate relationships. She was lying on the cot reading a bodice ripper showing a woman on the cover with her dress hiked up to her thighs and a bare-chested man with anything but safe sex on his mind.
“Yeah, I did.”
She studied the little package I dropped in my dresser drawer. “Shopping? Buy something cute?”
“Planned Parenthood.”
“Ah!” said Abby. “It’s about time.”
* * *
Jayne said we outdid ourselves with our milk chocolate cupcakes on market day. Each had peppermint frosting and a cream filling that oozed out of every bite. They sold out first thing. Abby and I sat behind the baked goods table, watching the panorama before us—the endless variety of people—while Jayne presided over the packaged casseroles: the Swedish meatballs, the spinach quiche, chicken and dumplings . . . all the things we’d sampled during the week.
Our attention was drawn to a young couple sauntering by. The girl was probably a sophomore in high school, the guy somewhat older. He was wearing a tank top over his muscular frame, showing off the tattoos on his arms and back. She was also in a tank top, braless, a long sarong-type skirt, and an embroidered headband low on her forehead.
They stopped to look at the handmade jewelry in the booth across from ours, and there was something about the girl that was so artificial, so awkward, it was almost embarrassing to watch. While the guy inspected the metal belt buckles, the girl seemed to find it impossible to let him be. She toyed with the hair at the nape of his neck, and when he brushed her hand away, she extended one hip and gyrated slowly against him. The more time he gave the two girls behind the display table, the more insistent the girl became, until finally she wrapped her arms around his neck and began running her lips along his cheek, drawing the furtive looks of passersby.
“I can’t stand it,” Abby said.
“She must be terribly insecure,” I mused.
Abby turned and stared at me. “Are you kidding? She probably thinks she’s God’s gift to men.”
“If she is, then I feel sorry for her, because she’s not enjoying herself one bit,” I said, watching the way the guy ignored her. Finally the couple moved on, the girl still draped around his body, publicly coaxing a kiss from him.
“You always excuse people, did you know that? Even when they’re awful?” Abby said. “Don’t you simply dislike some people? Other than Jared, I mean.”
I was genuinely surprised. I remembered how I had both envied and loathed Pamela in sixth grade; Penny, when she came between Patrick and me; and I never did care much for Dad’s assistant manager, Janice Sherman; or Mr. Hensley in seventh, with his horrible breath.
“Not true,” I said. “I can think of plenty of people I’ve disliked.”
“But, I mean . . . people like that girl, who put on a big show. I just wanted to go over and tell her how obnoxious she really was.”
“She knows that, Abby! And she’s miserable. Couldn’t you tell? If she felt good about herself, do you think she’d have to try so hard for her boyfriend’s attention? She was totally desperate.”
“Hmmm. Maybe you’re right. I’ll try to think of her as a comedy act,” said Abby.
By noon the banana date bread had sold out, and the only items left were a few casseroles of baked ziti.
Abby and Jayne wanted to look at some gauzy skirts at the other end of the market, so I kept watch over the table and took orders from people who wanted a particular item the following week.
And there they were again, the no-bra girl and her tattooed guy, back at the jewelry booth across from me. The two young women behind the counter were pretty and jewel-bedecked themselves, obviously eager to sell. They bantered and parried with the guy in the tank top, who had just slipped a heavy cross around his neck. It rested against his hairy chest wrong side up, and one of the saleswomen reached across the table and adjusted it for him. This gave him an excuse to grab her hand flirtatiously and ask about the ring she was wearing.
I couldn’t tell if the girl with him looked more annoyed or pleading. She slipped one hand through her boyfriend’s arm and gave it a gentle tug.
Stop, stop! I wanted to call. Laugh it off and stroll on. Instead, she tugged more aggressively, and this time he pushed her hand away, then turned his attention to the second young woman, fondling the copper necklace that nestled between her breasts. I saw his girlfriend’s cheeks flush, and for a moment I thought she was going to intervene. She recovered, however, and fanned herself with a brochure from her green bag, lifting her long hair up off the nape of her neck. She even playfully fanned her boyfriend. But then, when she still got no response—no recognition at all, in fact—she reached for the hem of her tank top and pulled it up over her head. Then she shook her hair out and faced her boyfriend, naked from the waist up.
My mouth dropped in astonishment, and this time the boyfriend noticed.
And he laughed.
Then the two women selling the jewelry laughed.
There was something so pathetic and sad in the girl’s complete vulnerability and the guy’s callousness that it brought tears to my eyes. She stood there helplessly, doused with embarrassment, and reminded me of Pamela, back when we were high school sophomores on our trip to New York, the way she had humiliated herself with Hugh. Of myself, the way my heart broke when Patrick and I broke up in ninth grade.
And right then I realized I needed a job where I was working with people. Baking was fun and creative, but I think I’d really miss counseling; I’d miss helping kids through some unbearable times.
When the girl finally walked away, holding her tank top against her chest this time, the guy made no move to follow. He whistled for her once, as you would call a dog. She stopped, turned around and looked at him, but when he laughed and whistled again for her to come back, she kept going, and I silently cheered her on.
* * *
Dad called to find out if he should meet me at the airport.
“You know,” I said, “I’ve been toying with the idea of not going back to school. Of maybe staying out here and trying my hand at the catering business full-time.”
“Alice . . . ,” Dad began.
“It’s really fun,” I said. “And I’m more creative in the kitchen than I thought. Jayne needs a baker, and the nights here in Eugene are great!”
“Alice,” Dad said. “Come home!”
I laughed. “Gotcha,” I said. “But catering has its moments.”
“Don’t do this to me,” Dad said, laughing now. “I’m too old.”
“No, you’re not, you’re just right,” I told him. “But to answer your question, you don’t need to come to the airport. Dave’s picking me up, and I’m going to his folks’ place for a few days before school starts. I’ll be home Tuesday.”
“Okay, sweetheart. See you whenever,” Dad said.
* * *
On our last day in Oregon, Jayne took us tubing on the Willamette River. It was almost enough to make me change my mind yet again and stay there.
We each had a giant inner tube, and we floated along, our arms and legs draped over the sides of the tube, the rubber—warmed by the sun—blissfully comforting, a counterpoint to the cold water lapping at us from below as our bottoms bounced along with the current.
Every so often, another tuber would drift into view and we’d wave. I tipped my head back and offered my throat to the sun, wiggling my toes in delight.
“I’m going to miss you girls,” Jayne said at one point as our tubes lazily bumped toget
her, and we floated as a clump for a few minutes.
“Women,” Abby corrected. “Once we reach the age of twenty, we’re women.”
“News to me,” said Jayne. “I still feel like a sixteen-year-old, as long as I don’t look in the mirror.”
“Stay that way, Aunt Jayne,” Abby said. “Forever sixteen, that’s you.”
We watched another group of tubers round a bend out in the middle, where the current was stronger. One of them had a cooler on his lap and was tossing cans of Budweiser to the others.
We waved. They waved. And suddenly I said, “Abby, do you see who I see?”
And there he was, Christopher, who recognized us and lifted his can of Bud in salute. The second thing we discovered is that they were all naked. We suspected it when we saw the bare breasts of the women, and we were sure of it when someone in their group upended one of the tubers and we saw his white bottom do a flip-flop in the water.
“Forever sixteen,” Jayne mused, smiling blissfully up at the sky.
6
THE FIRST TIME
What I didn’t tell Dad about going to Dave’s house was that his folks wouldn’t be there—they were in Boston for the week. And, not too surprisingly, Dad didn’t ask. Perhaps he just assumed, the way I’d said it, that they would be. Or perhaps he was showing respect for my privacy, now that I was twenty.
I wonder sometimes if he misses those crazy mealtime discussions we used to have that mortified Les, but who else was I to ask questions of if not Dad and Lester? Other girls had their mothers, while I had Aunt Sally, and Sally’s answers were about as helpful to a nine-year-old as a bra with a D cup.
The plane banked and turned in its approach to Reagan National, and I looked down on the familiar monuments—on the Potomac River, the Capitol—and thought how different it was from Eugene. Not better, just different. But it was home. When you live in the Washington area, everything sort of runs together—Maryland, Virginia, DC—and what happens in one place makes news in all three.