Sapphic Voices Romance

Another One

by Mary Dawn
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Copyright © by Mary Dawn, April 2010

“Want another one?” I ask, offering a slice of orange to my new friend.

She tilts her head to the side slightly as if to question me, lifts her eyebrows, declines. I haven’t yet figured out what that particular look means. It is usually followed by a smile and a shake of her head as if she’s clearing her thoughts or can’t believe I’ve said or done the incredibly stupid thing I have done or said. It makes me think she is wise beyond her years to know I’m full of shit all the time.

I put the orange in my mouth. It is good, plump, juicy – all the things you love about fruit in the middle of February, just glad to have it no matter where it came from or who had to suffer, happy to be reminded of the sun you’ve missed warming your back. My new friend and this orange make me feel pleasantly alive.

I call her my friend because to call her anything else would be a lie. She is not my girlfriend, lover, wife, or other. She is a low buzz between my ears obscuring the background noise that is usually in my head. When her questioning eyes rest on me – my insides vibrate and I can’t think right. I can’t even peel an orange gracefully. You can’t even call what we do conversation.

Our short evenings start when I tell my lover, my girlfriend, my wife – that I’m going for my walk and I’ll be back soon. I lock the door to our home. I walk quickly to the park occupied with the thought that she is waiting for me, hoping I have not missed her by chance. Any light left in the sky drains away, and I am briefly in the shadowed park before the playground lights blink on. I walk toward the lights, my thumb testing the porous skin of the fruit in my pocket.

Sometimes the orange cannot be shared and I carry it back home for next time. Other nights I leave it for her in an empty swing to let her know I was there. More often it is ours, peeled with cold, shaky fingers, eaten by grown women perched on swings waiting for someone to stop them.

“How long are we going to do this?” She says tonight, digging the tips of her expensive tennis shoes into the gravel, regarding me somberly through waves of dark hair drifting with the wind across her face.

My stomach clenches at the fruit settling in my stomach, “That was the last orange.”

She nods her head as if I have answered the question to her full satisfaction. “I thought so.” She sighs.

“How did you know?” I ask, curious at how she comes by her knowing all manner of things related to me.

“I saw you get out of your car.” She points her chin towards the park entrance. “I suppose you won’t be going straight home tonight?” She challenges me with an emphatic eyebrow. “Maybe you’ve decided to switch produce.” She smiles at her own joke.

“Figs maybe?" I suggest, looking at my distant car that is not supposed to be out on a walk tonight. Figs would be appropriate, anything round, juicy, or messy - definitely messy. I don't resist her hand fitting itself around mine, leading me away from our limbo. I want to go. I want to return after she is finished with me, when we are finished with each other, to find my life still whole, unbroken. I am Eve, charmed and eager, a willing victim of my own appetites.

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Click here for a list of all of Mary Dawn's Stories at Sapphic Voices Authoresses.

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