No Tears for Katherine

It took Pauline ages to scrub off the grime from the ’74 Cadillac she was restoring. But it was worth it, for she’d finally gotten the engine to start. If the neighbors hadn’t all heard her whoop of triumph down to both ends of the block, they’d surely heard the engine chugging, for she hadn’t bought a new muffler yet.

In any event, she mused as she finally emerged from the shower and put on her favorite red top and white pants, that made two things Florence would be overjoyed with when she got home. Besides the candlelit dinner Pauline had planned to mark the 40^th anniversary of their freedom, but they were a giant step closer to “that big old rusty boat”, as Florence called Pauline’s latest project, being out of the garage.

It was a real challenge for Florence, Pauline knew that. Over 25 years they’d been out in Santa Clara, not just the first lesbians on the block but probably the first Democrats, and the neighborhood had caught up with them in just about every way they could ask. But Florence had never warmed up to her wife’s love of fixing up old cars. “I’m glad it brings you joy, Pauline,” she often said, “But couldn’t you learn to love a nice compact model for once?”

“Boring!” Pauline always replied. “Little cars have no style. Besides, it was a great American land-yacht that got us out here, remember?”

“You romantic you,” was a typical sardonic reply.

But Pauline was sure the memories of their escape in the redoubtable ’74 Buick her sister-in-law had furtively supplied for them were as precious to Florence as they were to her. She was sure enough that she’d gone to the trouble to find a photo online of an identical one at a car show and have their cake decorated with it.

With the cake stashed on the bottom shelf of the refrigerator where Florence would never notice it, Pauline got to work on dinner. Once the roast beef and potatoes in the oven, she got to work on chopping the carrots and peppers for the salad, and once again her mind wandered to that long ago Valentine’s Day. It seemed so silly now to think how they snuck out in the middle of the night – couldn’t they have just told their mothers they were going to a movie and pick up the car at Pete and Amanda’s house?

No, she recalled as she was mixing the vinaigrette, they couldn’t have done that. Father would have demanded to know what movie they were going to see, for one thing, and probably would have insisted on driving them there and maybe even chaperoning them through the movie. And she hadn’t known Pete was on her and Florence’s side at the time, so of course they never would have suggested keeping the car at his house.

If only they had known Pete was in their corner, she mused now as she tossed the salad…but then, she wouldn’t have wanted to involve him. Heaven only knew what Father might have done to him! No, as absurd as it all seemed now, there was a reason why they’d snuck out the back door at two in the morning. After all these years, Pauline really didn’t know why she was still trying to think of an alternative when, after all, her strategy had worked perfectly.

She had the dining room decked out with their favorite tablecloth and the good china in plenty of time, and even timed the bake-at-home rolls just right. When she heard Florence’s car in the driveway, she rushed into the dining room and turned off the light and lit the candles. Then there was just enough time to tear off her apron and toss it in the kitchen before Florence came in.

She was carrying a stack of papers. Paperwork for the girls’ basketball team, no doubt. As she shut the door, she looked up in surprise to see Pauline framed by the candlelight. “Pauline? What’s up?”

“Happy anniversary, Florence.”

“Anniversary? That’s in July, isn’t it?” They had married within weeks of legalization, a decade before, after years of already referring to one another as their wives.

“Not that anniversary,” Florence corrected. “Valentine’s Day, Florence? Home?”

“Oh, right!” Florence hurried off her coat and hugged Pauline tightly. “Speaking of home, have you heard? From Pete?”

“I haven’t checked my e-mail,” Pauline said, pulling out Florence’s dining room chair for her, which she dutifully took. “I was working on the Caddy and then making dinner. Oh, and I got the Caddy to start!”

“Thank the goddesses,” Florence said.

“I knew you’d say that!” Pauline patted Florence’s shoulder playfully as she poured her a glass of red wine. Then she poured one for herself and returned to the kitchen to get the salad. “So what did my brother have to say?” she asked when she returned with the bowl.

“He – I’ll tell you later, all right?” Florence said. “Let’s enjoy dinner first.”

“I like the way you think.” Pauline returned to the kitchen and got the roast and potatoes out of the oven.

“Oh, that smells wonderful!” Florence said as Pauline set the casserole dish in the middle of the table. “Thank you, darling.”

“It’s worth celebrating, isn’t it?” Pauline asked as she carved the meat. “Forty years of freedom!”

“I guess,” Florence said.

“You guess?”

“I’m sorry, Pauline. You know I’m not as romantic about that whole thing as you are. I mean, it’s great we made our escape and were able to make everything work out here. Sometimes I’m still amazed at our luck.”

“Luck!” Pauline finally took her seat and the meal was on. “Don’t you remember our first apartment? I was afraid to go outside after dark!”

“All too well,” Florence said. “But that’s just what I mean, the place was a wreck when we got there, practically just a week ahead of the gentrification, and you convinced those Chinese guys to get together and buy the building when we could still get it for practically nothing!”

“That wasn’t luck,” Pauline said. “We all could’ve lost everything if the neighborhood hadn’t flipped.”

“And instead, all of San Francisco flipped,” Florence said. “That’s luck.”

“I guess. But I mean, Florence, you remember…”

They were silent for a moment. There was no need for either woman to say just what they remembered. Their living room was lined from floor to ceiling with pictures of friends they’d lost in the epidemic. Two young men had died in Pauline’s arms.

“You’re right,” Florence finally conceded. “No one who was in San Francisco back then has any business talking about luck.”

“But it is pretty incredible, isn’t it?” Pauline said, sipping her wine. “We come here with nothing but an old car and an accounting course and a teaching certificate, we literally can’t go home, we end up living in a dump for five or six years, and now look!” Their house bore a remarkable resemblance to the side-by-side houses they’d grown up in back in North Carolina. Pauline still harbored a twinge of regret for not sneaking a peak in her father’s forbidden study on the night they’d run off; now she had her own study upstairs and made a point of never shutting the door.

“Being desperate can make a gal pretty resourceful,” Florence said. “But I do hope you understand if I’m not as romantic as you are about that night. All I could think of until we got here was, our dads could be right on our tail, and even if they weren’t, how were we gonna make ends meet when we were both fresh out of college?” She paused and took a long drink of wine. “And yeah, here I am dean of a snooty private school and you made us a fortune in real estate, but it all could’ve ended so differently…” She stopped and grabbed up her napkin from her lap and held it to her face.

“Oh, Florence,” Pauline said. “Listen, if I ever thought this would hit you the wrong way…”

“No, dear, it’s wonderful!” Florence said. “Thank you! It’s very thoughtful. No, that’s not the problem. It’s what I heard from Pete. What we heard, I mean. I’m sure he e-mailed you too.”

“Is it Amanda?” Pauline felt her heart sink. She and Florence owed everything to her brother’s wife, who’d bought the Buick and passed the keys to Pauline on the night they’d run off.

“She’s fine,” Florence said. “Oh, their youngest, Tricia, she wants to move here to work. He said he’d pay us for a few months’ rent.”

“No need,” Pauline said.

“I agree, we owe them that much,” Florence said. “No, look, it’s…” She paused for another swig of wine. “It’s Katherine.”

“My sister?” Pauline had five brothers and sisters, but Pete was the only one they’d had any contact with since the night they’d run off.

“She died this week, Pauline. Breast cancer.”

Pauline didn’t cry. She hadn’t cried over any of the other news, good and bad, that Pete and Amanda had passed on over the years from both of their families. Proms, weddings, over two dozen nieces and nephews who were never to know their aunts existed, both fathers and Florence’s mother passing without even a word of regret on their deathbeds about running their daughters off – Pauline hadn’t cried a tear over any of it. The joy was never hers to share, after all, not unless she and Florence had pretended to be what they never could be, and that meant the sorrow wasn’t her problem.

“I’m sorry to hear that,” was all she could manage now.

“Are you really, dear?” Florence asked.

“She was just as pious and full of hate as our parents were,” Pauline recalled. “Not her fault, but she was.”

“Don’t you ever wonder if any of them saw the light, like Pete did?”

“Pete would’ve told us. And he and Amanda would’ve put her in touch with us.”

“Hadn’t thought of that,” Florence said. “Pete didn’t say anything about what became of her or what she did with her life. Just that she’s gone.”

“There’s a reason for that.” Pauline turned her attention back to her dinner.

“Good point.” Florence followed her wife’s lead, and they finished in silence.

The news still had Pauline feeling a touch melancholy as she cleared the table, for she couldn’t help but remember happy afternoons babysitting Katherine, helping her with homework, even giving her advice on boys, which had proven to be good cover with Mother and Father. She almost laughed as she wondered if that advice had ever done Katherine any good. She did wonder about the husband she remembered Pete mentioning years before, and how many kids she left behind.

And would their minds be poisoned like their mother’s was?

“This feels a little inappropriate now,” Pauline confessed as she brought the cake in from the kitchen. “You’ll just have to take my word for it that I didn’t know about Katherine.” She opened the box to reveal a heart-shaped cake with a 1974 Buick emblazoned on it. “You can do anything with food coloring these days.”

Florence laughed. “Oh, that’s adorable!” She stood up and hugged Pauline. “Look, I really do think you’ve got the right idea, celebrating our escape. But you know I’ve never been as romantic as you have.”

“Not about this anyway,” Pauline admitted as she cut two slices.

Florence helpfully spent dessert gossiping about the girls on the basketball team and their chances when the season started in March. Pauline welcomed the distraction as they enjoyed the cake, but she couldn’t help but think of her mother, who no doubt chose to believe she’d outlived two of her daughters.

Florence could tell, as always. “All right, darling,” she said as she polished off her cake. “I need a long shower after that practice, and you need company.” She stood up. “I’ll clean up, I insist, and I’ll see you in the shower in maybe twenty minutes?”

“I sure could use that,” Pauline said, and she got up. “Thank you for cleaning up.”

“No tears, right?”

“Of course not.” And there weren’t any, as Pauline made her escape up to their bedroom.

There were no tears as she shut the bedroom door behind her and turned the light on, either. But rather than undress for the shower, she went to the lingerie chest in the corner and opened the top drawer. The top three drawers were her domain, the lower three were Florence’s, and after forty years they still had secrets.

Secrets like the 8 x 10 photo that Pauline had squirreled away in her suitcase on that fateful Valentine’s Day. She didn’t think Florence had ever seen it, and she hadn’t looked at it herself since Pete’s e-mail reporting Father had died six years ago. But she looked long and hard at it now. Mother and Father on their wedding day in 1953, Father looking as possessive as he was proud, Mother in a white dress in a time and place where that meant everything, beaming at her new husband and undoubtedly imagining a happy-ever-after life before her.

Three thousand miles away, she was now an eighty-five year old woman burying her daughter. Pauline wished she could cry for her.

But her eyes were dry as she put the picture back in the drawer.