That look again. Something dark and shy and sad, but too quick to catch, darts across her eyes. I want to reach for her, to hold her to me until it comes to the surface and I can understand what it is she’s keeping in there.
“You don’t, you know.” I place a hand over hers, pressing her palm against my cheek. “I’d be happy if you stayed.”
She kisses me lightly, a soft brush of her lips over mine. “But I have five hungry women coming to my house in twenty-four hours. They’re very demanding. So I can’t.”
I sit up, reaching for my jeans. “I’ll walk you out.”
“No, stay naked.” She stands up and heads for the door, turning to smile at me before she leaves. “It’s your best look.”
22
Jane
I drive home in a daze. Fumbling with my keys in his driveway, tripping over gravel at the base of his deck. I almost run over one of his magnolia bushes as I head down his long, winding driveway.
It’s like being drunk, this post-coital haze. Sex should come with a warning label.
At least sex with him.
My god.
My mouth is dry as I turn onto the main road leading back to my house. I glance at the clock and see that’s it’s after four. Penelope and I went to his house at 9:30.
That’s a lot of sex.
Sure, there was some talking in-between.
But mostly sex.
I tilt my head to one side, noticing a stiffness in my neck and spy a small, purple mark appearing on my skin.
A hickey.
Like I’m sixteen.
I roll my shoulders as I turn onto my street and stretch my legs as I bring my car to park in my driveway. Tiny soreness spots crop up across my body. My inner thighs, stressed from their lack of exercise, make me wince slightly as I climb the stairs to my front door. My nipples are so sensitive they almost chafe against the soft lining of my bra. I close the door behind me and glance at my reflection in the glass. My lips are red and swollen, and my chin has the unmistakable hue of beard burn.
They’re going to know.
I drop my bag on the table and head for the shower.
It wouldn’t be the worst thing, I suppose, if they knew. It won’t take them long to figure it out, but I would like a bit of time to figure it out for myself before I have to answer questions.
Assuming I get the chance.
My friends are like bloodhounds, but I’ve got 24 hours to throw them off the scent.
The next evening, Christine and Jessica arrive first, arms weighed down with Caesar salad and feminist manifestos respectively.
“You finish the book I gave you?” Jessica asks as she enters, sliding a volume of Sylvia Plath towards me.
“The one you dropped off on Friday?”
“Yeah.”
“No. No, I haven’t finished the 400-page academic analysis of intersectional feminism in the last 48 hours. Sorry”
“Well,” she shrugs. “Here’s a classic, everyone loves The Bell Jar, and when you’re done with that, I’ve got bell hooks lined up.”
“You know,” I turn from the fridge, careful to keep my silk shawl casually draped across my neck, and double-checking my foundation in the reflection off the microwave, “I’m the professor, not you.”
Christine winks and unwraps the foil from her salad bowl.
“I know,” Jessica shrugs, accepting the beer I hand her. “But the ivory tower is isolating. You need to get out there,” she gestures with her bottle, “and join the resistance.”
“I educate,” I take a swig from my iced tea. “That’s my part.”
Jessica rolls her eyes and drinks her beer. “What about you, Christine? What is your part in the resistance?”
“Which resistance?” She smiles, gently fluffing the salad with two hand-carved wooden spoons. The handles look like turquoise inlay and, once again, I can’t help but wonder where she gets her money.
I glance at my friend, all curly hair and friendly eyes. Quiet and unassuming. Christine is the person who always lets others go in front of her in the grocery store, even if she only has two items and they have two carts. Christine pays for the car behind her when she goes through the tolls. Christine spends her days at the women’s shelter and her nights in the food pantry.
Christine would make an excellent drug mule. No one would suspect a thing.
I glance at her right hand. Another shiny bobble balancing on one finger. I stopped keeping track of her rotation of gems last year, when I began to feel self-conscious about my limited sterling silver collection.
I take a sip of iced tea.
Definite drug mule.
“All of them,” Jessica nods vigorously.
“Well,” Christine shakes a separate container of home-made dressing and pours it lightly over the greens. “I do my best.”
“Lest you forget, my little anarchist buddy,” I fix Jessica with a knowing glance, “Christine spends most of her time at the food pantry and the women’s shelter. She’s doing more than the rest of us.”
“Obviously. I work at the shelter, I see her all the time there,” Jessica huffs. “There’s no need to be defensive.”
“I’m not defensive,” Christine smiles and accepts the iced tea I offer her.
The door opens behind us and Penelope walks in, swinging a crocheted bag in one hand and balancing two stacked pies in another.
“Hey guys,” she grins at us, sliding the pies carefully onto the kitchen table. “I picked some blueberries yesterday afternoon and turned them into these. I hope they’re good.”
“I thought you always said berry picking is best in the early morning?” Christine asks.
“Oh, it is, but yesterday morning I was-” she pauses, briefly glances at me, then quickly back at Christine. “I was busy, so it had to wait until the afternoon. But they’re good.”
“Dory’s gonna kill you, stepping on her turf, bringing pie.” Jessica laughs. “You’re going to start a pie war.”
Penelope smiles over my shoulder at Kate, who’s just
