Ginger

I barely looked up from my glass when the door opened, deep in thought, writing an article about the town council in my head. There was a tall, coated figure, riding in on a breeze that circled through the darkness of the bar, and I shivered with an icy feeling of change. I took another sip of my bourbon, its warmth to chase away the unwelcome draft. Out of the corner of my eye, the figure moved on wobbly heals. Is she drunk already? She headed towards the bar, and of all the empty seats, she chose the stool two down from me. I suppose I should be thankful she didn’t come one stool closer.

“Hey,” she said as she slid onto the stool, hanging her purse on the hook beneath the bar. “I love these hooks, saves from putting my purse on that nasty floor.”

Chitchat. I hated meaningless chitchat – I preferred silence. “Yes, they are handy,” I glanced at her, just a glimpse of her profile. I didn’t recognize her, but there was something familiar, something about her voice.

“What can I get for you?” The bartender, Jim, asked as he wiped away invisible spots on the bar.

“Your best Bourbon. Neat. And another of whatever she’s having.”

“Coming up.”

“Well, thank you. That’s not necessary.” I looked up again and she was staring at me, the whole situation making me a bit uncomfortable. Yet her eyes were soft and friendly, perhaps a bit longing, a bit sad, but welcoming, and the foreboding feeling eased a bit. Besides, if she annoyed me, I could always head home. No one there to bother me.

“It’s my pleasure. I’m celebrating and could use the company.” With that, she held her hand out. “I’m Ginger.”

I took her hand, large, strong, well-manicured nails.

“Nice to meet you, Ginger. I’m Kate. What are we celebrating?”

“A homecoming of sorts. I want to celebrate ahead of time in case it doesn’t go well.”

Oh heavens, the drama begins – there’s a story there no doubt. I’m not one to dig into other people’s business. I’m a good listener, an observer. I can learn more about someone simply by listening to the tone of their words, watching their mannerisms. Besides, I believe people tell you what they want you to know, truth or not, so I don’t ask. No Gladys Kravitz blood in me.

Jim put our drinks in front of us as Ginger pulled two twenties from her wallet and slid them across the bar. Jim quickly made the change and laid it in front of Ginger.

“No honey, that’s yours,” Ginger said, pushing the bills towards him. Jim picked them up quickly as if she might change her mind, gave her a slight nod of thanks, and wiped more of those invisible spots as he walked to the other end of the bar.

I took a sip of my drink, a bourbon like Ginger had ordered, smooth going down, much better quality than the house bourbon which was my first drink. I told Ginger just that.

“Only the best for today, honey. I need a little Dutch courage before I enter my sister’s house.”

I have to admit, I was becoming more curious as she revealed bits of her situation. The bourbon seemed to mellow my mood. I suppose it wouldn’t hurt to ask one question.

“So you have family here?” I shifted on my stool a bit to face her, taking in her long brown hair, her face bore more wrinkles than I first noticed. My guess, she was in her fifties or thereabouts. Pretty much my age, I would say.

“Yes, I’m from here. I haven’t been back except two, maybe three times in thirty-some-odd years. I came back for each of my parent’s funerals, but that’s about it.” She lifted her glass and drained the rest of its contents, tapping the bar to get Jim’s attention for another. She picked up the empty glass and rolled it between her hands, a nervous habit she perhaps had done many times, mulling over what to share, how much to divulge, weighing what lie ahead at her sister’s house.

Whatever her situation, I surmised it was complicated, with layers of pain, left covered all those years. There was no reason for her to tell me, a stranger, the complexities of the years that kept her away from this small town. I’m not sure I even wanted to hear it, which obviously was going to be heavier than the idle chitchat I usually had with Jim or the other regulars who frequented this bar. So I said nothing, but it didn’t matter. When the second bourbon came, she drank about half and began the saga.

“I grew up on School Street, just down from the Methodist church. My parents were very strict, believed in God, and did not spare the rod on the spoiled child. From my perspective, that was just an excuse to beat the shit out of us. They were drunks, every night sinking deeper into the bottle, but always managed to attend church every Sunday – you know, the types – hypocrites. They thought if everything looked okay on the outside, all was right with the world. What happened in the home, stayed in the home. Everyone knew of course, they just didn’t acknowledge it or do a damn thing about it. It wasn’t their problem to fix I suppose.”

Ginger finished off her drink. “I left home and this town behind the day I graduated high school. I had saved a small amount of money from after-school and summer jobs, and then sold my car. I had enough to buy a train ticket to San Francisco, with a few dollars to spare. I was free, or so I thought. It was rough – I was eighteen and had no idea what it cost to live in a big city, but I knew it had what I was looking for.” She paused to get Jim’s attention. Seems she was just getting started on her story, and her drinking.

“What year was that?” I asked, going through the filing cabinet in my brain, trying to remember what was going on in this small town at that time, and what was happening in California – the two of course were worlds apart, regardless of the year.

“I graduated in 1977, and I wanted to be a part of the city that was changing the country.”

I had the picture. I had followed the events in San Francisco, as everyone did, but here, not a favorable view. Lots of derogatory and inflammatory remarks always followed the news clips. Our small town consisted of mainly small-minded people, vehemently against anyone or anything that didn’t fit in line with our cookie-cutter lives, using religion to justify their beliefs. There were race wars still happening across the South, and now in San Francisco the homosexuals were colonizing, and poking the bear. Me? Well, I wanted to be a journalist, and I couldn’t get enough of news depicting strong individuals questioning our rigid society. Times were changing.

“Wait a minute! Did you go to school here? I don’t remember a Ginger in my graduating class. There were only fifty or so of us; everyone knew everyone.” By now I had completely turned towards her and was getting a better look. I can be a little slow on the uptake, but I saw it now. Ginger had an Adam’s apple. Ginger wasn’t always Ginger.

At that point she turned so I could see her whole face, get a good look at her, and she grinned. I recognized that sly grin.

“George? I’ll be damned. George Abernathy. Holy fuck!” I stumbled with words as it sunk in. “Well, George, it’s good to see you.” I took her hand in mine, tears welling up in my eyes. “I always wondered what happened to you. Hell, I thought you were dead.” I stood up and pulled her from the stool, giving her a hug wrapped in years of missing my friend.

“Kate, when I walked in and saw you, well, I was scared, but I just had to see.” She hugged me tighter, and I knew she was crying, too. “I wasn’t sure you would like Ginger.”

We released each other and sat back down on the stools. I still held one of her big hands in mine, rubbing it like a Jeannie in a bottle, rubbing for luck and wishes, to erase the years our lives had taken us so far from each other. Now, looking at her, I could see George just as clear as day. There was my best friend George.

“George, uh, Ginger – it doesn’t matter to me because I know who you are inside.” I guess our carryings-on had rattled Jim a bit, but he was right that we both might need a fresh drink. I picked up my glass, and holding it up said, “To my new friend Ginger.”

Ginger wiped the tears from her face with the back of that big hand, picked up her glass. “To my lovely friend Kate – the one person I believed would love me even if I were a giraffe.”

“George, shit, I mean Ginger, you know you were the best thing in my life. I thought you were gay and I thought I was too, but believed as long as we stuck together it wouldn’t matter. We both struggled so much with our identities, but I was always so comfortable around you, safe. I didn’t feel safe to be myself with anyone else. You had always talked about San Francisco but I really didn’t think you would go. When you left, it almost killed me. That Fall I went off to college and found a whole flock of lesbians, none openly out of course, couldn’t be at that time in the South. But we all knew, and clung together as we made our way through the world of hatred and rejection. When I graduated I found a little pocket of like-minded women, some gay, some not, but everyone was into freedom, love and understanding and trying to save our planet. I fit right in.” I started laughing, “Heavens when I say it like that it sounds like a Jim Jones sort of thing.”

Ginger smiled at me, the warmth in the smile I had always known. “Oh Kate I think we both felt we weren’t in the right place, or in my case, the right body. For the longest I thought I was gay, until I met some transgender women. Hey, did you not get the letters I sent you from San Francisco? I wrote to you almost every week telling you all the juicy details, begging you to come out there too.”

“I never got a single letter so I didn’t know where to write you.” I was thinking back to that time, realized my father probably had a hand in that. He never liked George, called him my fag friend, and there were all sorts of rumors about George living in sin out there. “I feel sure J.D. intercepted those letters and burned them. If he wasn’t already dead, I could kill him.”

“That bastard. I hate you didn’t know I cared and missed you, that I could never forget the support you gave me through high school. Geez. Surely wouldn’t want to go through those years again. Kids can be so mean.”

We both took a sip of our drinks, lost in thoughts of the past, saddened by the oppression.

“So, does Brenda know, or are you simply going to show up on your sister’s doorstep?”

Ginger took a sip of the bourbon. “She knows. I told her a few months ago. She actually took it better than I expected. She always knew I wasn’t a creature from this planet.” That grin, that sneaky little grin that liked the shock factor.

“Why now? What made you come back now?”

“Our parents’ estates are finally being settled. I gave up long ago thinking they would leave anything to me. I mean, besides being Ginger, which of course they never knew, I wasn’t around to take care of them when they got older and sick. They both went down quickly, but all that fell on Brenda’s shoulders. She deserves everything. She called me last week, said I was in the will and needed to come. They may have left me a hate letter, telling me what a disappointment I was.” She tried to play it off as a joke, but I could tell nothing about this was easy.

“Well, I for one am glad you made the trip. Seriously, you have made my day. Hell, you’ve made my month! How long are you staying?”

“Not sure. Depending on how it goes with Brenda, we’re meeting with the lawyer tomorrow morning.”

“Maybe we could have dinner tomorrow night? I really would like to hear about your life, and tell how what went wrong with mine for me to end up back in this one-dog town.”

“I would like that. Been too long my friend.” Ginger patted Kate’s leg.

“So tell me… I’m not up on all of this LBGTQ stuff. Are you into women? Not that I’m asking for me – asking for a friend.” I had a hard time keeping a straight face.

“No darlin’, I’m looking for MR Right. Going to leave the ladies to you.”

“I appreciate that. Now I just need to get out of this town to find one.” All those years, and it still was so easy to talk to him, I mean her. Little did I know that when that stranger sat down at the bar beside me, I would find my long-lost friend. Sounds sappy, but stranger things have happened. Now if we could just get the world to be open to the fact that we may be different than them, but we bleed the same color blood when wounded. For tonight, I’m not going to attempt to solve the world’s prejudice. I’ll just stay in my little circle and look forward to catching up with a friend tomorrow.

Ginger stood, retrieving her purse from the hook. She picked up my phone from the bar, “Give me your thumb.” I followed orders, unlocking my phone. She put her number in my phone and sent a text to herself so she would have my number.

She pulled me in for a bear hug, my face smooshed into her bosoms. “Are these real?” Perfect opportunity to learn more about how all that worked.

“Honey they are as real as you can get for fifteen thousand dollars.” We both were laughing so hard my head was bopping back and forth on her chest.”

“You should have let me know. I would have given you mine for free. It kills my back carrying these things around all day.” See, the banter between us was still there. “I would be twenty or thirty pounds lighter.”

“Girl, you did fill out quite nicely. But I’m sure your partner would appreciate you keeping them.”

“Okay enough. Good luck with Brenda. I’m here if you need support.” With his hands on my shoulders holding me out to get a good look at me, he said, “The years have been kind to you my friend.”

“Right back at you sister.”

With that, he was gone, and the bar seemed empty without his energy filling the place. George was always larger than life, and Ginger has thankfully inherited that.