Lucy nods and says, both matter-of-factly and shakily, “I did, in my late teens and early twenties. I consider myself bisexual.”
“Oh yeah, you do, bitch,” Frank says. “Booyah!”
“Can you not talk over her?” Kirsten says.
Mariana, who Kirsten hopes is feigning naïveté for her viewers, says, “But if you’re married to a man, you’re not still bisexual, are you?”
“Well, my husband and I are monogamous, but I think even if your circumstances change, your core identity remains. Like, heaven forbid, if my husband passed away, I’d still be madly in love with him.”
Really? Kirsten thinks. Madly?
Mariana asks, “Do you worry about how your fans will react to this news?”
“I love my fans,” Lucy says, and turns and waves at the studio audience, which explodes in applause. Though, surely, an audience in Southern California is not representative of Lucy’s base.
Over the cheering, Mariana says, “This is just a hunch, but it seems like they love you, too.” More thunderous cheering ensues.
“Really,” Lucy says. “I gave this serious thought. I prayed on it, I talked to my preacher, I talked to my family. And obviously things are a lot better now for the LGBT community than they once were, but you still hear about teenagers taking their lives, or being made to feel like they’re less than. So I decided to let them know, Hey, you’re not alone.”
Kirsten thinks of Lucy at the camp-counselor orientation in 1994, and then she thinks, What if Lucy isn’t a greedy, phony hypocrite? What if she’s still herself, as surprised by the turns her life has taken as Kirsten sometimes is by hers? In Flanagan’s, it occurs to Kirsten that she might be witnessing a genuinely important cultural moment, which makes her wish that she were with someone other than Frank.
“I’m so verklempt,” he says. “I need a hug.” She assumes he’s being sarcastic, but when she glances at him, he’s teared up for real. He makes a sheepish expression and says, in a thick, wet voice, “I can’t believe your girlfriend is ruining my mascara.”
What choice does she have? In her arms, he smells like gin and some leathery cologne, and she’s still holding him when he lets loose with a huge, guttural sob.
“Oh, Frank,” Kirsten says.
* * *
—
After she leaves work, Kirsten doesn’t stop to buy Lucy’s book. When she arrives home, the boys greet her at the front door.
“Mama, how many tickles do you need to make an octopus laugh?” Jack says.
“I don’t know, how many?”
“I forgot my violin, but Mom brought it to me,” Ian says.
“I hope you thanked her,” Kirsten says.
“You need ten tickles,” Jack says.
In the kitchen, Casey is dumping mayonnaise into a large clear bowl, onto chunks of canned tuna.
“Melts?” Kirsten says by way of greeting, and Casey nods. As Kirsten washes her hands, Casey says, “Will you pull out the salad ingredients? There’s a yellow pepper.”
“I appreciate your getting Ian’s violin.”
“We need to be better organized in the morning,” Casey says. “I’m setting my alarm for fifteen minutes earlier tomorrow.”
“Okay.” After a pause, Kirsten says, “Did you hear that Lucy Headrick came out on The Mariana Show? Or whatever coming out is called if it’s retroactive.”
“Who’s Lucy Headrick again?”
Oh, to be Casey! Calm and methodical, with a do-gooder job. To be a person who isn’t frittering away her life having vengeful thoughts about people from her past! It happens that Casey is both a former farm girl, of the authentic kind—she grew up in Flandreau, South Dakota—and a gold-star lesbian. She and Kirsten met thirteen years ago, at the Christmas-caroling party of a mutual friend. Kirsten got very drunk and climbed onto Casey’s lap during “Good King Wenceslas,” and that night she stayed over at Casey’s apartment.
“Lucy Headrick is the Prairie Wife,” Kirsten says. “She just wrote a book.”
“Got it,” Casey says.
“She was actually very eloquent. And her fans are definitely the kind of people who are still bigots.”
“Good for her.”
“Are you pissed at me?”
“No,” Casey says. “But I’m trying to get dinner on the table.”
* * *
—
Kirsten puts the boys to bed, then lies down in the master bedroom and looks at her phone. It’s difficult to estimate what portion of the tweets Lucy has received this afternoon are ugly—they’re mixed in with “Yay for standing your truth Lucy!” and “I love you no matter what!!!” Maybe a third?
“why u like to eat pussy did u ever try a hard cock”
“You are A LESBIAN ADULTERER. You are DISGUSTING + BAD for AMERICA!!!!!”
“Romans 1:26 two women is ‘ against nature’ ”
Quickly, before she can talk herself out of it, Kirsten types, “I thought you were very brave today.” After hitting Tweet, she feels a surge of adrenaline and considers deleting the message, but for whose benefit? Her three bots? In any case, Lucy hasn’t tweeted since before noon, and Kirsten wonders if she’s gone on a Twitter hiatus.
In the summer, Kirsten and Casey usually watch TV together after the boys are asleep, but during the school year Casey works in the den—responding to parents’ emails, reading books about how educators can recognize multiple kinds of intelligence. Sometimes she keeps a baseball or a football game on mute, and the sports further deter Kirsten from joining her. Thus, almost every night, Kirsten stays upstairs, intending to fold laundry or call her mother while actually fucking around on her phone. At 9:45, she texts Casey, “Going to bed,” and Casey texts back, “Gnight hon,” followed by a sleeping-face emoji with “zzz” above the closed eyes. This is their nightly exchange, and every night, for about four seconds, Kirsten ponders Casey’s choice of the sleeping-face emoji versus something more affectionate, like the face blowing a kiss, or just a heart.
While brushing her teeth, Kirsten receives a text from Frank: “Bitch did u see this?” There’s a link to what she’s pretty sure is a Prairie Wife article, and she neither clicks on it nor replies.
She is still awake, in the dark, when Casey comes upstairs almost an hour later, uses the bathroom, and climbs into bed without turning on the light; Kirsten rarely speaks to Casey at this juncture and always assumes that Casey thinks she’s asleep. But tonight, while curled on her side with her back to Casey, Kirsten says, “Did you sign Ian’s permission slip for the field trip to the science museum?”
“Yeah, it was due last Friday.”
“Oh,” Kirsten says. “Imagine that.”
They’re both quiet as Casey settles under the blankets, then she says, “Did the prairie lady mention you on TV?”
“I probably would have told you if she had.”
“Good point.” Unexpectedly, Casey leans over and kisses Kirsten’s cheek. She says, “Well, no matter what, I owe her a debt of gratitude for initiating you.”
For some reason, Kirsten tears up. She swallows, so that she won’t sound as if she’s crying, and says, “Do you really feel that way, or are you joking?”
“Do you think you’d have dated women if she hadn’t hit on you behind the arts-and-crafts shed?”
“And your life is better because you ended up with me?”
Casey laughs. “Who else would I have ended up with?”
“Lots of people. Someone less flaky and petty.”
“I like your flakiness and pettiness.”
Kirsten starts crying harder, though still not as hard as Frank was crying at the bar. But enough that Casey becomes aware of it and scoots toward her, spooning her from behind.
“Baby,” Casey says. “Why are you sad?”
“This will s
ound self-centered,” Kirsten says. “But Lucy was really into me. I’m sure it was partly because I wasn’t that into her, and I wasn’t even playing hard to get. I just—” She pauses.
“What?” Casey says.
“I know we have a good life,” Kirsten says. “And the boys—they’re amazing. They amaze me every day. Did I tell you, when we were at the mall last weekend, Jack wanted to buy you this purse that was like a fake-diamond-encrusted jaguar head? Its eyes were emeralds.”
“Oh, man,” Casey says. “I can’t wait for my birthday.”
“It’s not that I’m jealous of Lucy Headrick because she’s a rich celebrity,” Kirsten says. “It seems awful to be famous now.” Her voice breaks as she adds, “I just wish that there was someone who was excited about me. Or that when someone was excited about me, I wish I hadn’t taken it for granted. I didn’t understand that that would be the only time.”
“Kirsten.” Casey uses her top hand to pet Kirsten’s hip.
“I don’t blame you for not finding me exciting,” Kirsten says. “Why would you?”
“We have full-time jobs and young kids,” Casey says. “This is what this stage is like.”
“But do you ever feel like you’ll spend every day slicing cucumbers for lunch boxes and going to work and driving to Little League on the weekend and then you’ll look up and twenty years will have passed?”
“God willing,” Casey says. She moves both her arms up so she’s cupping Kirsten’s breasts over her pajama top. “Do you want me to pretend to be Lucy at camp? Or Lucy now? Do you want me to make you a chocolate soufflé?”
“Soufflé is too French,” Kirsten says. “Lucy would make apple pie.”
They’re both quiet, and, weirdly, this is where the conversation ends, or maybe, given that it’s past eleven and Casey’s alarm is set for six-fifteen or possibly for six, it isn’t weird at all. They don’t have sex. They don’t reach any resolutions. But, for the first time in a while, Kirsten falls asleep with her wife’s arms around her.
In the middle of the night, because she can’t help herself, Kirsten checks to see if Lucy has responded to her tweet; so far, there’s nothing.
Volunteers Are Shining Stars
When I started out volunteering on Monday nights at New Day House, it was just me, Karen, and a rotating cast of eight or ten kids who, with their sticky marker-covered hands and mysteriously damp clothes, would greet us by lunging into our arms and leading us into the basement playroom. Karen was a tall, thin black woman in her early forties who had a loud laugh and worked as a lobbyist on Capitol Hill. She once told me that she was the oldest of five sisters raised on a farm in North Carolina, and I think this upbringing contributed to her laid-back attitude as a volunteer. Karen and I had basically the same philosophy toward the kids, which was We’ll try to entertain you, but we won’t give in to your every whim, and if you’re the type to sit by yourself, chewing on a plastic frog in the corner, we’ll let you hang out and chew as long as it doesn’t look like you’re about to cause yourself harm. For over ten months, before I did the thing I shouldn’t have done, Karen and the kids and I existed in a kind of raucous harmony. It was the beginning of June when the third volunteer showed up.
As I punched in the code that unlocked the front door, I could see a white woman on the bench in the entry hall, and I knew immediately that she was the new volunteer. Because of her professional clothes—black pants and a yellow silk blouse—she clearly wasn’t one of the mothers, and because she was just sitting there, she clearly wasn’t a shelter employee. Once inside, I saw that she had bad skin, which she’d covered in a pale concealer, making it uniform in tone but still bumpy, and shoulder-length wavy brown hair that was dry in that way that means you’re too old to wear it long. She was probably about Karen’s age.
When we made eye contact, she smiled in an eager, nervous, closed-lipped way, and I offered a closed-lipped smile in return. I sat on the other end of the bench, as far from her as possible. From the dining room, I could hear the clink and clatter of silverware and dishes, and a baby wailing. The families ate dinner at five-thirty, and we came at six, to give the mothers a break. That was the point of volunteers.
At five before six, Na’Shell and Tasaundra sprinted into the hall and hurled themselves onto my lap. Just behind them was Tasaundra’s younger brother, Dewey, who was two and walked in a staggering way. Behind him was another boy who had been there for the first time the week before, whose name I couldn’t remember—he looked about four and had tiny gold studs in both ears. He stood by the pay phone, watching us, and I waved and said, “Hey there.”
“I’m braiding your hair,” Tasaundra announced. She had already wedged herself behind me and was easing the elastic band out of my ponytail.
“Can I braid your hair, too?” Na’Shell said. “Miss Volunteer, I want to do your hair.” Both of them were five. Once Tasaundra had asked me, “Can you do this?” and jumped three times. I had jumped just as she had, at which point she’d grinned, pointed at me with her index finger, and said, “Your boobies is bouncin’.” Then she and Na’Shell had shrieked with laughter.
The woman on the other side of the bench said, “Oh!”
I turned.
“I heard them call you—you must be—I’m just starting—” She giggled a little.
“I’m Frances,” I said.
“Alaina.” She stuck out her hand, but I motioned with my chin down to my own right hand, which Na’Shell was gripping. The truth is that if my hand hadn’t been occupied, I still wouldn’t have wanted to shake Alaina’s. I had a thing then about touching certain people, about dirtiness, and I didn’t like Alaina’s hair and skin. Strangely, being groped by the kids didn’t bother me; there was a purity to their dirtiness because they were so young. But if, say, I was on a crowded elevator and a woman in a tank top was standing next to me and the top of her arm was pressed to the top of mine—if, especially, it was skin on skin instead of skin on clothes—I would feel so trapped and accosted that I’d want to cry.
“They sure like you, don’t they?” Alaina said, and she giggled again.
“Did you guys hear that?” I said. “You sure like me, right?”
Na’Shell squealed noncommittally. Alaina would figure out soon enough how generous the children were with their affection and also how quickly they’d turn on you, deciding you had let them down or hurt their feelings. None of it meant much. You tried to show them a good time for two hours once a week and not to become attached, because they left without warning. One Monday, a kid was there, and the next, he wasn’t—his mom had found a place for them to live, with her sister or her mother or her ex-boyfriend or as part of some new program where her own place was subsidized. The longest the families ever stayed at the shelter was six months, but most of them were gone far sooner.
Mikhail and Orlean walked through the doorway from the dining room. At nine and ten, they were the oldest; boys older than twelve weren’t allowed in the shelter because in the past, they’d gotten involved with some of the younger mothers. “Can we go downstairs now?” Mikhail asked. Mikhail’s two front teeth pointed in opposite directions, so that two-thirds of a triangle formed in the space where they weren’t. In idle moments, he had a habit of twisting his tongue sideways and poking it through the triangle.
I looked at my watch. “It’s not quite six.”
“But there’s two of yous.”
If we had been in the basement, I’d have said, Two of you. But I never corrected their grammar upstairs, where the mothers might overhear. I said to Alaina, “The rule is that two volunteers have to be present before we go downstairs. You’ve been through the training, right?”
“I’m ready to dive in headfirst.” She actually extended her arms in front of her head.
I walked to the threshold of the dining room, where the air smelled like steamed vegetables and fis
h. Scattered around the tables were a few mothers and a few babies—the babies didn’t go to the playroom—and about five more children I recognized. “We’re going downstairs,” I called. “So if you guys want to—”
“Miss Volunteer!” cried out Derek, and he stood as if to run toward me before his mother pulled him back by one strap of his overalls.
“Boy, you need to finish your dinner,” she snapped, and Derek burst into tears. Derek was my favorite: He was three years old and had beautiful long eyelashes and glittering alert eyes and pale brown skin—his mother was white, so I assumed his father was black—and when Derek laughed, his smile was enormous and his laughter was noisy and hoarse. He was the only one I had ever fantasized about taking home with me, setting up a cot for him and feeding him milk and animal crackers and buying him hardcover books with bright illustrations of mountaintop castles or sailboats on the ocean at night. Never mind that I had student loans to pay off and was living with a roommate and never mind that Derek already had a mother and that, in fact, she was one of the more intimidating figures at the shelter: She probably weighed three hundred pounds and often wore sweatpants through which you could see the cellulite on her buttocks and the backs of her thighs; she pulled her hair back in a ponytail that looked painfully tight; her teeth were yellow; her expression was unvaryingly sour. It seemed to me miraculous that she had been the one to give birth to Derek.
Seeing him cry, I wanted simultaneously to apologize to his mother and to pull him away from her and up into my arms, to feel his little calves clamped around my waist, his head pressed between my shoulder and jaw. But I merely ducked back into the entry hall.
Downstairs, I asked loudly, “Who wants to draw?”
Several of the kids shouted, “Me!”
“And who wants to play farm animals?” I asked.
Several of the same ones shouted, “Me!”
“I suppose I can be a cow,” Alaina said. “Moo!”
“It’s not acting like farm animals,” I said. “It’s playing with them.” I gestured toward the shelf where the bin of plastic figures was stored. “Either you could do the farm animals with them and I could do the drawing, or the other way around.”