Waiting Read online

  "Transgender."

  "Transgender." The word was a lumpy, alien object on Caris's tongue. She wanted to peel it off and hide it in one of the curtain folds. Orangutan. That word was better.

  "Transgender," Lena said. Continuing their word tennis.

  Transgender, transgender, transgender. "Really?"

  Lena smiled tremulously. "Yes. Really."

  Caris wondered what she should be feeling. Outrage? Betrayal? Because right now all she could think about were orangutans. Their reddish hair, shiny eyes. Their scampering. "I like your curtains. Where did you get them?"

  Lena twisted her head to study her curtains. She kept her hand in Caris's, and her touch returned to being reassuring. Don't let go, Lena. Please.

  "Target," Lena decided. "On sale."

  "They're really nice. I love the color."

  "Caris."

  "And the word orangutan."

  "What?"

  "Orangutan. Like a monkey. I don't think they're monkeys, though."

  "They're not."

  Dale a man? Transgender? Caris reran Dale's scowls, the heated, pointed: "I am a woman. Not a man," whenever some hapless, helpful store clerk addressed her as "sir." A five-minute rant invariably followed. Reverse projecting her fears? Dale's insistence on penetrating Caris with the dildos. Refusing to let Caris penetrate her.

  "Do orangutans eat pizza?" Caris asked.

  "No idea."

  "Can you spell orangutan?"

  "O-r-a-n-g-u-t-a-n."

  Pain. Exquisite pain in her breasts.

  "Six months? You've known six months?"

  Lena gave a helpless, despairing sigh. "If I could do it again, I'd tell you right after she told me. I wrote you a letter. Want to read it now?"

  Caris should have pumped milk about five minutes ago, in the bathroom. She'd thought she could wait. But no. She'd been relatively lucky so far. Hadn't experienced severe engorgement. Elephant, weighty breasts, sore nipples, yeah, but not the swollen, rock-hard breasts many women experienced.

  Oh, God. The pain caused her to bend over for a couple of seconds. She felt like she might pass out. "I have to pump. My breasts are killing me. I won't be long." Caris got to her feet and grabbed her baby bag. She closed the bathroom door behind her but did not lock it. She took her shirt off. Under it, she wore a low-cut top. She sat on the toilet. She clamped her jaw shut and mashed her teeth together. Shit. The pain infiltrated every part of her.

  She pulled the left side of her shirt down first. The cup of her bra was detachable, and she attached the pump. It was manual, and Caris squeezed. She would be maybe five minutes. Because she wanted to stop breastfeeding, she just needed to relieve the pressure. Draining her breasts dry would simply signal them to produce more milk.

  A tentative knock at the door. "You okay?"

  "Fine. Moo."

  "Did you say 'Moo?' "

  "Yes. Moo. Get it? I'm expressing milk."

  "Anything I can do?"

  "I'm fine. I'm a cow, okay? But relatively fine."

  "I don't think you're fine."

  "You think I'm slitting my wrists or something? That I keep a butcher knife in my baby bag? I'm a milk cow, not a meat cow. I'm fine, Lena. This is normal."

  "Can I come in?"

  "No."

  "Why?"

  "Because. My nipples will scar you. They were nice and sweet before the baby. Now they're…" Caris looked down. Backforthbackforth motion. "They're gigantic darting minnows."

  "I won't look," Lena said. "Or you could cover yourself with a towel."

  Fine, fine. Caris switched breasts and draped her first shirt over her chest. "Come in if you must."

  Lena edged in, clasping a tote bag. "Your virgin eyes are protected," Caris said.

  Lena smiled uncertainly and perched herself on the edge of the tub. "I didn't want you to be alone."

  "Yes, well."

  "Do, uh…" Lena watched the slowly rising level of milk in the collection bottle with a mixture of fascination and dismay. "Interesting contraption." Meaning a scary-as-shit contraption.

  "Like I said. Moo."

  "Moo. Yeah."

  Lena leaned in, and her knee brushed Caris's. "I guess you're okay. Should I leave you alone?"

  "Do you want to be alone?"

  "I—no. Do you?"

  "No."

  Lena kept her touch where it was, and Caris was glad for the contact. Glad for the distraction. Caris suddenly ached, not only her breasts, but all of her, for someone to lay with in bed and laugh with and cuddle with. Kiss, too. Laugh and kiss. Not sex. She was nowhere near ready for sex.

  "I like your pictures," Caris said.

  Lena smiled.

  "Sometimes I imagine myself in a field, grazing the grass," Caris said. "I used to be like the women in these pictures."

  Another smile. Slight. "For what it's worth, cows are cute. They have their own charm. You know what? I'll put a cow picture up tomorrow."

  Something in Lena's grin drew Caris in. "What's their charm?"

  "I love their eyes. Have you ever looked into a cow's eyes?"

  "Somehow I neglected to do that."

  "When I was in middle school, we took a trip to a farm. The cows there were for making cheese. They were a brown-orange kind—the cows, not the cheese. I petted the cows. They made me feel calm. Peaceful. Their eyes were soothing, like they were saying everything would be all right. And their ears were so cute. Stuck out. Anyway." Lena chuckled self-consciously, and redness colored her cheeks. "I'll put up a cow picture tomorrow."

  She's lovely. "You're saying my ears stick out," Caris teased.

  Lena's blush deepened.

  Caris retuned to the pictures. One pair of women was French kissing. When will I kiss again like that? "I went to a shrink yesterday. Dr. Mark Lukaas. He's gay. You know him?"

  "No. Not crazy about shrinks."

  "Me either. And definitely not him. He's Dr. Frowny Face. It's like someone forgot to take a dildo out of his ass."

  Lena laughed. "Oh, boy."

  "Your mom worried about you."

  Lena rolled her eyes.

  "She loved you. She really did. She had a hard time showing it. She wanted you to settle down, be happy and—"

  "Did she tell you about Nakeem and Aron?"

  "Who?"

  Lena rotated her cast and pointed to two names: Aron M. Nakeem J. "Did my mother tell you about them?"

  "No. Who are they?"

  "Never mind. Doesn't matter. Look, Mom left me a note. The wreck was on purpose. Here. Let me show you."

  Chapter 6

  Lena watched and waited as Caris read. Caris's eyes moved quickly, scanning the lines. Then she stopped, her gaze turning incredulous. Unseeing. She'd stopped squeezing long ago. At last, she detached the collection bottle. She handed the note back to Lena, but in a way that signaled she was not quite registering Lena's presence.

  Caris removed the shirt—deep purple—that had been covering her breasts, and the shirt fell into her lap. Lena could not help but look. Caris's bra had no cups, and her nipples were big. No way around it. And erect, very erect. Lena's breasts had been worse. She never breastfed Nakeem or Aron, they had gone to Malik and Joanna right away, but stopping production of breast milk had taken a few weeks.

  Lena forced her eyes up.

  "Still think cows are cute?" Caris asked.

  "Nothing wrong with them." And there wasn't. The nipples possessed their own strange beauty, and Caris's breasts were full, round. Lovely. Lena felt stirrings of arousal between her legs. Oh, hell.

  Caris sighed. "Damn. Look at that. My left breast is bigger. When I thought they couldn't get any worse."

  Lena refused herself a second gaping. "They looked the same size to me. Your bra is cool."

  Caris laughed, but in a weary way. "Gonna be a long time before a woman finds them fit to be touched again."

  "You have nothing to worry about," Lena said. "You're beautiful. You really are. If that's the worst of
it, then—please. You're fine. Totally fine."

  Caris only laughed again. More wearily.

  Lena wanted to make her feel better. She knew exactly how Caris was feeling. "I'd touch them."

  "Why?"

  "Um...because. Breasts are breasts. Beauty comes in many, uh, they weren't that bad, uh, they, of course I didn't see what they were like before you got pregnant, so—" Stop. You're making it worse.

  Caris offered a smile. "Well, thank you, Lena." She put her bra cups back on and pulled her shirt up.

  Lena had never told anyone about Nakeem and Aron. She was not even sure her grandparents knew. Maybe her mother had told them, maybe not, but the secret of the children, of Aron's smiley face and their names on her cast, was sour. Always had been. "Look, Caris, your breasts will get better. Mine did."

  There. She had said it. Something close enough, anyway. And she felt better right away. She had nothing to be ashamed of. Teenagers made stupid mistakes. Nothing to be ashamed of at all.

  "Yours got better? What do you mean?"

  Lena indicated the names with her finger. Aron M. Nakeem J. "Like I said. My breasts got better."

  Caris's eyes were wide. Wider than at the hospital, when Lena told her about the accident, and wider than just now with the transgender news. "You had a baby?"

  "Two. Twins. Boy and girl. You're right that I didn't have class two weeks ago. I'm sorry I lied to you. I didn't mean to hurt you. I went to his baseball game. He hit a single. He should've been out at first, but he ran like hell."

  Caris studied the names on the cast for a long, long time. Long enough for Lena's tongue to thicken and her heart to harden.

  Long enough for her to realize what an idiot she was.

  Lena reached into her tote bag and jammed a letter into Caris's hands. "This explains the transgender stuff. Thanks for coming over."

  "Lena—"

  "Go, Caris. Please."

  "You have children, you have—oh, wow. How old? I thought you didn't want kids."

  "I don't have children."

  "Of course you had to go to the game. Yes, of course. He's your son."

  Your son. Your son.

  "I told you," Lena said. "I don't have children. I'm not their mother."

  "Then who are you?"

  "I don't know. I'm Lena. Lena who sees them a few times a year. Officially, anyway. Unofficially I go to games and events sometimes and hide and—" Shit, shit. Why was she running her mouth like this? Caris was not the person to talk to. Lena got up. She went into the kitchen and began emptying the dishwasher.

  Caris came in a moment later. "Lena," Caris said, and her voice was soft and delicate like the first time they had met, and Lena had no choice but to look up into Caris's eyes. She saw yearning there, or at least she thought she did. It was quite possible she was simply projecting her own desires. "You should go, Caris."

  "Can I hug you goodbye?"

  A hug? Her breasts pressing into Caris's, their heartbeats mingling, their—nope. Lena shook her head.

  "Do you have pictures of them? How old are they? Does your mom know about them?"

  "Of course she does. I don't know if Grandma and Granddad do." Up went a plate into the cabinet. A pot went in the drawer under the oven.

  "Lena—"

  "Later. I'll tell you more later. You should go home and read the letter explaining the transgender stuff."

  Caris retrieved a fistful of spoons and forks, and Lena indicated which drawer they should go into. They worked until the dishwasher was empty, and then Caris said: "Who is their father?"

  Lena sighed, fatigue snaking into her pores. "Joanna is their mother. Malik is their father. Deonte is...he's the only guy I've had sex with."

  "Where did you meet him?"

  "At a party. We were both fifteen years old and stupid and bored and drunk."

  Caris reached for Lena.

  Aw, hell. "Let me go."

  "Lena, let me help you. Please? I want to hear about the kids."

  "No."

  Caris slid an arm, then another, around Lena's waist. She rested one hand in the small of Lena's back. Caris's breath was hot. Wonderfully alive. Their breasts pressed into each other. No use for Lena to protest further. They stayed entwined for a few minutes, and Lena was in agony. Torture. Caris with her felt good. Right.

  Caris drew back a bit, her arms still around Lena, and smiled her lopsided smile. "I don't know about you, but I feel better."

  Lena moved without thinking. She brushed her mouth against Caris's, only then becoming conscious of what she was doing, her every nerve meltingly aware of where Caris's warm body touched hers. Half of her said to pull back, but the other half pressed on.

  Caris responded with a shiver and a soft moan. Lena let her lips graze Caris's for a long second, and then she flicked her tongue against Caris's mouth, tracing its soft fullness.

  They were together, their bodies, very together, so tight they meshed as one. They kissed deeply, leisurely, in sync, no sloppiness, though there was plenty of tongue. Tangling, exploratory, playful. It was a passion Lena had not experienced before. A serious, solemn passion that reached down through her, through her heart, stomach, lungs, to her toes. A passion that acknowledged that they were kissing to get their minds off other matters, Dale for Caris, and for Lena, Nakeem and Aron, but they were kissing, they were feeling, they were alive. They kissed with a passion that acknowledged they could never be together and that this might well be their first and last kiss. Intimate. Sweet. Tender. Lena had never imagined Caris would be like this. This good. This perfect. Many things clicked inside Lena, not at the same time, but a little after another, the click click click of dominoes.

  This was what it was supposed to be like.

  This. This. She and Caris kissed, Lena was not sure for how long, maybe five minutes, maybe ten, maybe fifteen. Then it was over. Caris drew aside, close enough for her breath to be hot on Lena's cheek, but far enough for finality. "Oh, Lena," Caris said. She sounded like she might cry. "I don't know what came over—I better go."

  Lena felt like crying herself. We made a mistake. A huge mistake. The kiss had been the best of Lena's life. They could not just let it go. But of course they would.

  *****

  Caris spent the next few days on her laptop. She did not use the TV because George and Shirley would see. She watched DVDs of her and Dale: their wedding, vacations, and so on. Searching for clues that Dale was transgender. Finding nothing.

  Sometimes anger burned inside her, like a low fire. Other times, she was exhausted and numb. On their wedding video, they cut the cake and smeared each other's faces. Dale had nothing but long kisses and romantic words for her. At three minutes and ten seconds into the video, Dale playfully grabbed Caris's ass. Caris, wedding dress and all, chased Dale around the reception hall and tackled her.

  The present-day Caris felt like smashing a vase. How could Dale think that mistreating her for six months was preferable to telling her that Dale was transgender? Was it preferable for Dale to kill herself?

  When Caris got sick of watching videos, she Google imaged "cows." Lena was right. Cows had deep, soulful eyes. Caris found a picture of two brown-orange cows, maybe the kind Lena had petted at the cheese farm or whatever kind of farm it was. Looking into their eyes helped Caris re-orient herself. Helped subside her anger toward Dale.

  Caris tried her best not to think about Lena. About that kiss. That connection, that whatever, was what she and Dale had been missing, but Caris refused to let herself dwell on the realization. She had been caught up in emotion. She did not have that type of connection with Lena. No way, no how.

  However, the fact was that Caris still felt her fingers entwined with Lena's. Still felt Lena's warmth, Lena's awed eyes on her breasts, Lena's pained voice when she talked about the children. A curious swooping pull had begun between Caris's legs during their kiss and had not gone away yet. It lingered, barely there sometimes, more there other times. Caris was tempted to laugh. Bare
ly two weeks after having a baby, she should not be feeling any stirrings of desire.

  But sure enough, that's what this was. For Lena. Caris rationalized away her reaction. No big deal. After months of coolness at Dale's hands, Caris was desperate for warmth. All this was. A physical reaction toward a woman who was doing her a favor by pretending to find her attractive. By pretending that cows were cute.

  Lena was not attracted to her. Nope. Lena had avoided her four years because Caris was her age and a possible gold digger—not because she was attracted to Caris, to her mother's wife. Right?

  Best to think about Dale. Dale was a more-immediate problem. Never mind that every time Caris closed her eyes, she replayed Lena's arms around her, Lena's cast pressing into her side. Her own arms around Lena. Their kiss. The sensation was so intense Caris felt like she and Lena parted a mere five minutes ago.

  Caris had always prided herself on being open-minded. What if Dale had told her about the transgender thing? Caris played out such a conversation in her mind.

  Caris, I feel like a man in a woman's body. I'm not happy. I'm transgender.

  *stunned silence*

  Here is a book you might like to read. Some information I printed off the Internet. Here's a support group. I love you, Caris, no matter what, and you're the most important person in my life.

  Caris stopped at that point. The truth was, she had no idea how she would have reacted, but she did know that back then, she had loved Dale and would have done anything in her power to make sure Dale was happy and to love Dale to the best of her ability. Dale should have told her. She really should have. She should have given Caris a chance. That was what marriage was about. Trust. Faith. Poor Dale. Caris tried to imagine Dale's suffering, but her own anger got in the way.

  She cancelled her next appointment with Dr. Lukaas. She needed time to digest the information before she could tell anyone. She kept slipping DVDs into her laptop and kept looking at pictures of cows. Her brain told her to let it go, she and Dale were done, but she still demanded answers. Concrete answers, not disturbing emotions.