As You Were (12 page)

Brittany stood there, staring at the puddle and trying to regulate her breathing. “Shit,” she said under her breath. The big woman who had borrowed the chair leaned back and said, “It’s okay, girl. Raven has that affect on me, too.” She smiled broadly, and turned back around.

The waitress returned with a fresh glass of wine. “On the house,” she smiled.

Brittany sat down, leaned back and sighed heavily.

Raven led the band through another nine songs, keeping the enthusiasm high. Brittany thought the whole display was like a feeding frenzy, but couldn’t help but be impressed by the way Tru commanded the stage and had the audience worshipping the floor she strutted on. At the big finish of the last song in the first set, Raven spoke over the drum roll. “Gonna take a short break, be back in 15. Thank you!” She put the microphone on the stand and left to applause, as the band slammed out the ending.

While the musicians headed for the bar for a drink and a mingle, a stage hand came out to retrieve the scattered collection of dollar bills Raven had not picked up. The emcee returned to center stage, and patted his feminine chest breathlessly. “Oh, my God! Call an ambulance! Let’s get some oxygen in this room!” A delighted titter traveled through the crowd. “Whew! Boy! Makes me wish I was a lesbian!” A clamor erupted from the women all at once. “Did we miss

Raven, or what?” The crowd collectively answered yes and applauded. “Raven has a few CD’s left up front. Better go buy one before they’re all gone.”

Backstage, Tru fastened the black polyester and spandex blouse, over the pushup bra, leaving the top two buttons open to reveal her cleavage. She allowed the shirt to fall loose over her black jeans. She began her breathing exercises. It was not a good idea to have a quickened pulse-rate before a slow song, it made vocalizing weak. She mopped the sweat from her face with a towel and freshened her makeup, fluffed her hair, still doing her exercises: in through the nose to the count of seven, then out through the mouth counting backward to one. It was good to be back on stage, but her nerves felt raw.

A middle-aged man in jeans and a Hawaiian shirt burst into the room. “Better than ever, Raven!” he spewed. “When can you do another show?”

“I’ve only done one set, Nathan...” she grinned. “Macy will be back from Seattle on Tuesday. Give her a call.”

“Seattle? Isn’t that a new gig?”

Raven smiled wanly. “Yeah. That place is a great connection. The music scene is hopping out there, again.”

“Let’s hope. All I know is, after you come off that stage, everyone is thirsty! You sound great tonight, Sweetie. Keep it up.”

“Thanks, Nathan. Listen, could you tell the light guy to give me an amber light on the softer tunes next set?”

“No problem. Anything else?”

“Water?”

“I’ll have it sent right in. Relax. You’ve got another ten minutes.”

“Thanks, Nathan.” She leaned over and pecked his cheek.

Nathan hooted and stepped out of the dressing room. A woman in her early thirties, decked out in a tiger-striped leotard and gold, sequined hose, whizzed past her. “Great songs, Raven. All yours?”

“Yep.”

The woman positioned herself at the bottom of the steps leading onto the stage, waiting for her introduction. “I’d kill to have your voice. If I had it, you can bet I wouldn’t have to go out there and shake my ass, instead.”

Tru laughed. “If I had your ass, Connie, I wouldn’t have to sing.”

“Things have a way of evening out, then.” The woman winked at her and moved up the stairs as the emcee began her introduction and her music burst from the speakers. She took a calming breath, and then bounded on-stage.

Dropping in a chair, Tru picked up the teal green Ovation Adamas, checked the tuning, and played through the first few chords of the next song. The bartender came in with a bottle of artesian water, and left a five on the counter for her. “This is the only place where the bartender tips the customer,” Tru grinned.

“Honey, you’re not a customer. You’re the main attraction. And what a hot little pistol you are!” He mimicked her, singing with comical gyrations. ‘I got it bad, lover...”

“I don’t do a thing for you, Jason. I’m the wrong sex.”

He giggled, “Darlin’, you could talk me into jumpin’ that fence in a New York second!”

“Maybe, but unless you had a sex-change, I still wouldn’t be interested.”

He stabbed an imaginary dagger into his chest several times, and feigned a wound. “Slay me! Slay me!” he rasped, then waved at her and was gone.

She chuckled, shaking her head and taking a deep breath. She stacked the one hundred twenty-one dollars and placed the twenty on the top, wondering who gave it to her. It was one of
the little mysteries in her life she had learned to live with; like whether Brit would ever love her again.

While the dancer sat on laps and worked the crowd, she took her guitar back out to the darkened stage and placed it on the stand.

Helki burst up the steps and threw her arms around Tru. “Girl! You are rockin’!”

“You are too, Helki. I am so glad you’re part of this. I feel like I can depend on you and that is such a great feeling.”

“Honey, I love your music!”

The two of them made their way back down the wing steps into the dressing room.

“So how are things at home?” Helki touched Tru’s arm.

“A little tense. Although in all fairness, I can’t imagine what it must be like to forget everything about your life...
or that you’re even gay.”

“You just need to kiss her one good time,” she laughed. “It’ll come flooding back to her.”

“I’m afraid she’d claw my eyes out.”

Helki checked her hair in the mirror and found it acceptable. “That bad?”

“Pretty much. Although we did have a moment yesterday...
I thought she was going to kiss me...”

“You’re a chick magnet, Tru. It’s only a matter of time.”

“Yeah. We’ll see.”

At the table in the corner, Brittany puffed the eCig and watched the woman who gyrated through the tables in a leopard costume to the tune of Melissa Etheridge’s ‘Your Little Secret.’
Tru is better
, she decided.

“Hey, girlfrien’, how’s the show, huh?”

That girl again. “Great. Tr—Raven is the best.” She wiped the same water ring off the table for the third time.

“You should know, right? So...
you guys work it all out?”

Brittany had no idea what “it” was, any more than she had a clue about what this one was up to, but she didn’t trust her as far as she could throw her. “I don’t think Raven would want me to discuss our personal lives without her here.”

The girl lifted both hands, one still clutching a beer bottle, as if she were under arrest. “Hey. That’s cool. Sorry. Can I buy you a drink?”

“Thanks, but I’m good.” She pointed to the full glass of wine.

When someone shouted, “Hey, Jan!” she shrugged and moved away.

Jan.
One of the e-mails in her box.

Brittany flipped her golden hair off her shoulders with both hands and pulled out her cartridge, putting a few drops of vanilla on the core, refastening it and enjoying a large draw of flavored vapor.

Amid the tables, the dancer made a theatrical display of ripping the leotard away from its Velcro fastenings to expose a G-string and a lacy black camisole. The reception to this action was, as usual, raucous and wolfish, and the dancer finished her performance by crawling on tables and mauling the women; she ran off stage to the sound of delighted applause. Brittany clapped with everyone else. The dancer had left the stage with a G-string full of money and the taste of many meaningless kisses on her lips. She was strangely pleased that Tru had not kissed them with as much fervor as had the dancer. Tru had kissed cheeks only.

The emcee returned and joked with the audience for a few minutes, making eyes at the blond young man in the front, then finally came down the steps to sit in his lap, making a few references toward his suspected virility. Once back on stage, the emcee introduced Raven again.

After opening with a slower song, she delivered five more songs of rock and pop and blues, with a crowd that got drunker by the minute, then left the stage to prepare for her last song of the
set. Her bandmates followed her, and they all shared some bottled water and discussion about the set. The last song would be a solo, with Raven and her guitar.

A few minutes later, the crowd began banging and clapping and shouting “Encore!” Tru stepped out to a warm reception and sat on the bar stool with her guitar. “I felt a need to sing this one tonight. It’s on one of the CD’s out front, if you don’t mind me saying so...” A female voice from the back stated loudly that she didn’t mind at all, and Tru smiled into the darkness and said, “Your check’s in the mail, Sweetheart.” The crowd laughed, and Tru settled on the stool and began to play.

The audience hushed; something Brittany felt was uncommon with this group, as Helki played a soft acoustic bass beside Tru. Brittany recognized the song as
The Ice Maiden,
the first one she had heard on the CD; the one she had played on the stereo that day when she found out how professional Tru’s alternate identity was.

...I had a passion deep and wide, I ached when she looked in my eyes, she captured me, a mystery, a lover’s spell. And the ice maiden is melting... melting at last...

Again, Brittany felt invaded. She sensed the song was about her. She watched women line up and drop tips on the stage at Tru’s feet, and understood that in this special, underground world, a dollar bill was like a rose...

On the last chorus, Brittany could almost feel the yielding energy of adoration flowing toward the singer who shared her heart with them...
with strangers.

Raven held the last note, let the guitar ring and fade, and stood, holding the neck of the guitar and discreetly knuckling a tear away, basking in the warm applause.

Able to look up again, Tru saw the young woman coming down the aisle toward the stage. A parade of emotion swept through her, and she failed to focus on any of them.
Had she been here the whole time?
Her heart caught in her throat as she watched Brittany stop at the steps and hold out the ten dollar bill. Tru searched Brit’s eyes for a sign...
did she remember? Was her memory coming back?
But Brittany seemed too uncomfortable. Tru looked down at the ten, clenched her lips together to will away the tears that threatened to come spilling out. They stared at each other a moment, each holding one end of the bill. Then Brittany winked.

Tru felt a tiny wound begin to heal, as the audience erupted in fresh applause.

13

RAVEN LEFT THE STAGE, ACCOMPANIED BY HELKI, who draped an arm around her, amid a new smattering of applause and cheers. She leaned her guitar against the block wall in a corner where someone had written, Dykes on Bikes!

Helki kissed her cheek. “You’re a star!” she said, and dashed up the steps and across the stage toward the bar.

Tru plopped in a chair and put her eCig in her mouth, drawing on it deeply. It was great to know that she no longer had to worry about the things a tobacco cigarette would do to a performer’s voice. Amid apple-flavored vapor, she thought about Brit.
She had followed me...She had followed me because—
Tru pressed the tears from her eyes and inhaled deeply on the eCig, exhaling the smoke in a deliberate stream. It was a step in the right direction, that was all. Just a step—

The stagehand dumped a handful of cash on the counter for the second time that night and smiled. “Easy money.”

She swatted him on the behind and got up to stack the new tips. Another sixty-seven dollars was added to the take. Tru lifted her hand and looked at the crumpled ten she had there, smiling to herself.
Seventy-seven...

Gathering her accoutrements, she placed the guitar in its case, and the money in her pocket.
Gay women can be so generous,
she thought, adding,
Especially when they are drunk
. Nathan would give her the gig pay on the way out, along with the proceeds from the sale of her CD’s, since Macy wasn’t able to be there to play manager. Not bad for one night of doing what you love and loving what you do, she thought. And in time for the electricity and horse-feed bills.

She folded up a wad of bills as the dressing room door came open. It was Helki again.

“Tru, have you seen my gig bag?”

Tru nodded at her bassist. “Yeah, girl, I put it behind the drum set. I didn’t want it to get stolen.”

“Cool. The guys have to leave soon.”

“Oh, didn’t you ride with them?”

“Yeah, but I think I got another ride...”

A petite blond came up behind Helki and slipped her arms around her waist.

Tru nodded knowingly. “Are you going to party?”

“Not here,” she said, wiggling her eyebrows.

The blond said, “A
www... let’s

stay for a few minutes. One drink...” she coaxed.

“Okay. Maybe for a one drink.” She called to Tru over her shoulder. “We’ll save you a seat in the back.”

Tru nodded as they shuffled out. No sooner had the door closed, than it opened again. Turning, Tru saw the object of her desire, the woman who seemed a poor clone of her former self.

“I’m impressed,” Brittany said.

Tru tried to smile. “Some things, thankfully, never change.”

Brittany went over to the bar which served as a dressing table and hoisted herself up to it, dangling her legs. “Was I your biggest fan?”

Tru sniffed. “True blue. Why did you tip me?”

“It seemed the thing to do, I mean everyone was staring at me like I was supposed to.”

“Is that really why you did it?”

“Not entirely, but that’s how we’ll call it.”

Tru didn’t want to push her on that one; they were too close to actual civility again. “You know what?” Tru liberated the ten from her jeans.

“What?”

“You always tip me ten dollars.”

Brittany leaned back on her hands. “Ain’t that a hoot.”

“I thought for a minute you—”

“Got my memory back? Sorry. This place doesn’t seem familiar to me at all. Totally foreign.” Brittany watched Tru refilling her eCig cartridge. “I don’t know why I followed you. Curiosity.”

“You know what that did to the cat,” Tru warned, replacing the refilled cartridge and taking a drag, her emotions once more in check for fear of making a scene.

“I’ll take my chances.”

Tru pretended not to think too much of that statement, and bent toward the mirror behind Brittany. Then she felt Brit’s hand cover hers there on the counter. A shock wave charged through her and she took a deep breath, closing her eyes.

“I can see why I loved you. You’re a catch. Everyone out there knows it.”

Tru opened her eyes, but closed them again, afraid to move for fear that Brit would take her hand away. “None of this came back to you, tonight?”

Brittany removed her hand. “No flashes of memory. Only flashes of...feelings.”

Tru opened her eyes and looked at Brit’s profile; her petal-soft complexion. “What kind of feelings?”

The door burst open then. The dancer began to change clothes, chatting with both of them about the wildness of the crowd, the exhilaration of performance. She pressed a soft towel carefully to the perspiration on her face, and repaired the damage to her hair, while she took frequent sips from a scotch and soda, and then reapplied her makeup.

Finally, she slipped out to dance the night away with the crowd on one of two dance-floors. Tru had been creating clouds of apple vapor in anticipation of the opportunity to get an answer to her question, afraid the spell—the one that had Brittany being kind, and touching her—would be broken. When the door closed behind the dancer, Tru went over and turned the lock.

Brittany straightened. “What are you doing that for?”

“So we won’t be interrupted.”

“And what are you afraid will get interrupted?” She folded her arms across her chest, the mask once more in place on her features.

Tru analyzed the firm line of her jaw, the subtle lift of her chin, and accepted the futility of her efforts. “Oh, I fully intended to throw you down and have my way with you, but I can see you’re not in the mood.”

Brittany liberated a mint from a tin in her purse and took out her own eCig. “Don’t be stupid. That’s not what I meant.”

“Right.”

Still seated on the counter, she offered the open tin. “Want a mint? They’re curiously strong.”

Tru smirked. “No thanks.”

“Do you want me to go?” She released puffs of vanilla, tried to blow smoke rings.

Tru cocked her head, and thought she saw a slight smile on her face. She moved closer, putting her hands on Brit’s knees. “Are you toying with me?”

Brittany greeted Tru’s eyes with an even expression. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” She lifted the eCig her lips and took a short puff, blowing it in Tru’s face.

Tru blinked, but it didn’t sting like real smoke. It was an impotent insult. It even smelled good. “What is that? Vanilla subterfuge?”

“Smoke signals.” Brittany swung her legs back and forth on either side of Tru’s hips. “Maybe you can get Helki to interpret them for you.”

“That was suspiciously close to a racial slur.”

“Don’t tell her I said it, then.” Then she smiled. Tru’s hand drifted toward Brit’s face, and Brittany caught her arm at the wrist. “Don’t get any bright ideas.”

Tru took her hand away and stepped back. “If you want to go, then go.”

“Why? So you can find a hot date for the night? I mean, I’m sure there are plenty of women who would jump at the chance to—”

“Stop.” Tru tossed her head back, blew out a lungful of vapor and rapped on the counter with her knuckles. “Are you going to sit there and be a bitch, or can we talk?”

Brittany began to swing her legs again, looking down at her loafers, and the floor beyond. “What do you want to talk about?”

“I want you to answer my question.” Tru found a chair and sat down in front of her.

“The one about whether I’m going to be a bitch?”

Tru rolled her eyes. “Brit—”

“Well, which question are you talking about?” she asked innocently.

“Forget it. You used to play this little game in the Army. Forget it. I won’t play this time.” Tru got up and took out her hairbrush.

“Now who’s being a bitch?” she countered.

Tru turned toward her, a retort on her lips, but stopped by Brittany’s sly smile. “You really have no intention of discussing this, do you?”

Brittany touched one finger to the tip of her nose and pointed to Tru with the other hand. “Suffice it to say, whatever I felt, you got ten dollars out of it.”

“And the hell scared out of me,” Tru laughed.

“So what’s the system, now? Do you stay and party?”

“Used to. Guess we should go home, though.” Tru tossed the brush toward her bag.

“I don’t want to ruin your night.”

“Do you want to go home?”

Brittany pursed her lips. “Do you?”

“You’re being evasive again...” Tru warned.

She smiled. “I’ll stay if you like, but you’ll have to protect me from all these wild women who talked about tearing your clothes off while you were on stage.”

“What?”

“I think it was that heaving cleavage in the last set. If you could have heard the things I heard—”

“What did they say?” Tru moved closer.

Brittany slid off the counter. “Never mind. It would go to your little lesbian head.”

Tru locked the dressing room on the way out with the key the club provided, and together they went back to the bar by the dance floor. Passersby complimented Tru as they inched their way through the crowd. At one point, Brittany yelped and whirled around, fire in her eyes, after someone pinched her ass and then escaped, unidentified. Tru came back, grabbed her hand and steered her toward the back bar.

The bartender greeted them warmly. “Hey, Raven. Caught some of your songs. You’re a smash all over again. What’ll it be?”

“Thanks, Benny. Two Chardonnays, pretty please.” Tru dug out several bills, but the bartender refused them. “You know how much business you pulled in?” He poured the wine. “Nathan says you and your sweetheart drink free tonight.”

“Thanks, Benny.” She took a sip of hers. “Mmmm. The good stuff,” she said to Benny. He winked at her. Tru put five dollars in his tip jar, handed Brit her wine. “C’mon, Sweetheart,” she chided.

Brittany made a smart face and trailed her to a table.

“What if someone we know asks you questions? How will you handle it?”

“Tell them I have laryngitis, and you talk to them.”

“Right. That should work,” Tru sneered.

“I’ll fake it. But you’ll have to tell me their names.”

Tru held her pen-style cig in her mouth as she inched around the table. “This should be good,” she muttered.

“What?” Brittany asked over the beat of retro-disco.

“I said the music is good.”

“The music is loud,” Brittany frowned back at her.

Prophetically, a butch girl, already beyond the legal limit of alcohol consumption, grabbed Tru’s hand between both of hers. “Oh Raven! My God! You are so hot!” She turned to Brittany. “And you! I don’t know which one of you is the luckiest!”

Brittany pointed to her own throat and shook her head.

The girl looked at Tru.

“Oh,” Tru offered. “Sorry. She has laryngitis.”

She slapped Tru on the shoulder. “Of course she does!! All that screaming in the bed!”–and she laughed uproariously.

An older girl, caught her at the elbow and apologized, while leading her into the flow of the crowd.

Brittany rolled her eyes. “Okay, so the laryngitis thing is a no-go.”

Tru laughed.

They sat at the table across from Helki and her newest conquest. Helki noticed Brit’s discomfort and got up, bent down and said, “Come on. Dance with me.” She pulled her up and before Brit could protest, had her guided onto the dance floor, to the melody of Sarah McLachlan’s
Angel.
Helki patted her stiff back. “Just relax,” she coached. Brittany managed to let go of her awkwardness at dancing with a woman; then as they circled slowly, her eyes snagged on the hovering fans around Tru at the table.

Helki noticed. “Does that bother you?”

Brit met her eyes. “Why would it bother me?”

“You don’t remember anything about how you loved her?”

Brittany seemed stunned by Helki’s directness. “I...
I don’t know. I may never know. I mean, she could have any one of those girls...”

“Yeah. But she wants you. And none of that is going to touch her heart like you did.”

Brittany glanced back at Tru, as they swayed in a slow circle. “It’s got to be tempting. All that admiration.”

“Tru would never cheat on you. She’s got it bad. Just like the song.”

Brit remembered the blues rock number that opened the show. “That song was—“

“Yeah, it was about you. She’s wild about you.”

“Well, she was wild about the other me. That me might be gone.”

Helki gave her a comforting rub on her back. “You’re still who you are at your core. Tru knows that. I mean, you’re not a different person. You’ve just temporarily forgotten part of yourself. I believe what you two had was strong enough to break through all that. If you just give it time.”

The song segued into a Madonna number, and they made their way back to the table. Girls moved away like Moses parting the Red Sea, to let Brittany take her seat by Tru.

The cute little blond climbed on Helki’s lap and was soon kissing her. Helki got up, holding the girl’s hand. “Okay, we’re outta here, Tru.”

“Aw, what’s the rush?”

Helki leaned back and pointed at the girl, with comic ferocity.

Tru laughed. “Ah. Okay. I’ll call you tomorrow.”

“Not too early,” she winked, and put an arm around the girl and headed for the exit.

“Did she just meet that girl?” Brit asked.

“Yeah.”

“And she’s going to hop in bed with her tonight?”

Tru laughed. “Probably repeatedly.”

Brittany made a face.

“What?” Tru said. “Have you become a prude?”

Brittany thought about it. “Was I a prude before?”

“No.”

Her consideration of this new information was interrupted by the female couple approaching them. Brittany pinched Tru’s leg under the table. “They’re waving at us! They’re coming over here! Who are they?”

Tru focused on the smiling twosome. “Oh, shit.”

“Who?” Brittany was getting antsy.

“Jan and Liz.”

“Hi, you guys,” the brunette smiled at Tru.

Brittany jumped right in. “Hi, Jan—” Tru punched her under the table. “Liz!” she corrected.

“Well, you’ve got reason to be all smiles, Tru. You sounded great tonight!” Liz cooed.

“Thanks, Liz.”

“Can we join you?”

Tru stifled a laugh as they seated themselves across from Brittany and her terrified smile. She leaned over to Brit’s ear to whisper, “Jan has the hots for you—”

Brittany frogged Tru under the table and she flinched, grunting at the pain. “How’s life?” she managed to ask.

“Good,” Liz smiled at Tru.

“Getting better all the time,” Jan leered at Brittany.

Brittany remembered Jan’s earlier visit to her table for an uninvited chat. “You’re a busy little bee, tonight, aren’t you?” Brittany put in, swirling the wine in her glass.

Jan cocked her head. “Being sociable. Did you guys get everything worked out?”

“Is it important that you know?” Brittany shot back.

The couple frowned over at her.

“Well,” Liz said. “I guess we know who didn’t get any last night—”

Brittany’s temper flared, but she kept her voice even. “Some of us don’t need it every night to feel good about ourselves.”

Jan cocked her arm back onto the chair and looked pointedly at Brittany. “That’s too bad...”

Tru leaned over to Brit again and said, “Chill out, Brit.”

“Well!” Jan stretched nonchalantly. “I’m up for a dance. Brittany?” Jan stood, waiting, while Brittany remained frozen in her chair, unable to assimilate the parade of emotions she felt.

Tru spoke up. “Hey, Jan! Trying to move in on my girl?” Tru put an arm around Brit and slammed her stiff body close.

“Now, I saw Helki dancing with Brittany a few minutes ago.”

“Helki gets special privileges.” Tru offered.

Jan pursed her lips, and bobbed her eyebrows. “Mmm. Kinky.”

Before Brittany could launch out of the chair, Tru said, “Here,” and tossed a five on the table. “You guys go get yourselves some beer. I’ll dance with my girl.”