Something True (15 page)

“The best part is that you picked Tate. Or she picked you. If we hadn't already tried it in high school and realized we were completely incompatible, I would fight you for her to the death!”

“What about not getting murdered?”

Vita laughed a big, hyena laugh.

“I like you. Don't worry. Tate is my best friend, nothing else. And she's a good person. She's solid. What you see is what you get, and you can depend on her. Plus she's got that jaw line. What I would do for that bone structure!” She paused, suddenly serious. “So why are you running off?”

“I have to leave Portland tomorrow. For good. Forever.”

“So? That's tomorrow.”

Laura glanced out of the window at the vacant lot below, with its overturned shopping cart, its broken-down picnic bench, and the snowfall of cottonwood tufts drifting in the sunlight. It seemed like the whole city sang that song. From the hookah smokers to the lazy traffic jams in which no one honked, it seemed like the whole city shrugged and said,
So? That's tomorrow.

T
ate had braced herself for the possibility that Laura would not be in the apartment when she got back. She was ready for disappointment. She was ready for the sudden amplification of sound—a lawnmower, an engine revving—that filled a room once a lover had left. She was not ready for the sight of Laura, wearing half a business suit, sitting across from Vita, in some fantastic morning-after outfit that seemed to include a hairpiece made out of a dead Afghan hound.

“You're talking about Enron,” Vita was saying, waving a bejeweled hand in the air. “You are talking beast of the apocalypse, resident evil.”

“I'm talking about business,” Laura replied with equal vigor. “This is the language of American business, and if you don't speak it, you can't compete.” She popped a raw sugar cube in her mouth.

“So if everyone jumps off a cliff with Satan, we should too?”

“Well…yes!”

They were so engrossed in their talk they did not notice Tate's arrival for a good ten seconds, which was still not enough time for Tate to process the sight.

“Vita!” she said when she found her voice.

They both looked up.

“I came to borrow some CDs,” Vita said, “and I met Laura.”

“I see that.”

Tate was going to say something practical about keys and privacy and boundaries. But Vita and Laura looked so oddly happy together, the sunlight streaming through the window, their coffee steaming, and neither of them wearing enough clothes to be seen in public. They looked…like friends.

“I see you found the coffee,” Tate mumbled.

“There's more in the pot.” Vita nodded briskly, as though Tate had just arrived late to a scheduled meeting. “Laura has been outlining her plan to sell your soul to the devil, and while I don't generally approve, I think she may be right. This is your only option.”

“What?”

Tate was trying not to stare at Laura's breasts as they swelled beneath the filmy camisole.

“Your plan?” Tate pulled up a chair.

“To save Out Coffee,” Vita added.

“I thought we were a lost cause.”

“It's going to be a tough sell,” Laura began. “The board is all about the bottom line, and we don't have a lot of time to get that up.”

The explanation that followed reminded Tate of an economics class she had dozed through in college. Apparently Vita and Laura had already been over the lesson during the two hours Tate was at Out Coffee. Vita had not dozed off. She kept clarifying, but the clarifications only distracted Tate from the difficult task of appearing deeply interested while not actually looking at Laura. She couldn't look because Laura was so beautiful in her camisole, with her disheveled hair, so sexy with her talk about “corporate underpinnings” and “fiduciary duties.”

Tate tried to listen. She gathered, at least, that Laura's plan was a blend of fund-raising and accounting fraud. Out Coffee would report its projected earnings as real earnings. They would base the projected earnings not on past history, but on a supreme optimist's version of what a coffee shop
might
make in Portland if God loved them more than He loved Jesus and starving children. Then they would raise prices, switch to nonorganic, non–fair trade products, and buy from a corporate wholesaler. This would ensure the shop looked profitable to Laura's business partners. At the same time, they would raise the four months' rent required to continue their lease, provided it was approved by some group of tycoons Laura referred to only as “the board.”

“That's $8,000,” Tate said, when Laura finished. “Maggie can't raise that kind of money.”

“It's sixteen, actually. The Clark-Vester Group will double the rent.”

“We don't have $16,000.”

“You've got two kidneys,” Vita said helpfully.

“Maggie's already mortgaged her whole life.”

“It's not that much money.” Laura reached out as though she was going to touch Tate's hand, then glanced at Vita and withdrew. “I know it sounds like a lot, but it's not really. You'll find a way. There is a window open. I got the board to reconsider your eviction, but you have to revise your books, and you have to have the cash in hand.”

Tate's mind was still reeling as she sat down at the table in the back room at Out Coffee. Laura sat beside her. Maggie and Lill sat on the other side. And Krystal, who was supposed to be working the counter, leaned in the doorway. Tate wished she was still in bed with Laura. Barring that, she wished she had an hour in her garden to think about everything that had happened in the last few days—from Laura's arrival at her house the night before, to Laura's insistence that they had only a week to secure Out Coffee's future, and that they had to talk about it immediately because Laura was leaving Portland the next day.

As it was, Tate found herself saying, “You remember Laura Enfield,” as if everyone's attention was not fixed on Laura.

“Of course I do,” Maggie said.

She looked angry, her mouth set in a down-turned fissure. The words
KEEP YOUR LAWS OFF MY BODY
draped across her T-shirt.

“Laura has a plan that could get us a lease in the new building,” Tate said.

“It's not a new building,” Maggie grumbled. “It's the same building. We're just getting kicked out.”

“The Clark-Vester Group plans to do extensive remodeling. It's going to be a beautiful space,” Laura said. “State-of-the-art, LEED certified. I'd like to see you in that building.”

“Will you be doing gray-water reclamation from the roof?” Lill asked, stirring a piece of lemongrass in her green tea.

“Laura wants to help us,” Tate said. “She thinks we can stay, but it's going to take a lot of work.”

“Why?” Maggie asked. “Why help us? A week ago you wanted to close us down.”

Tate offered a vague explanation about Clark-Vester supporting emerging businesses; she had no idea if it was true. Lill said Maggie had to be open to the “possibilities of the universe.” Laura said that small-business leases could offer Clark-Vester a significant tax break, especially given Portland's small-business incentive packages. Maggie crossed her arms and replied with a stubborn string of “but whys.” The conversation circled around and around like the fan above their heads.

Finally, Krystal sighed from her post in the doorway.

“Duh!” she said.

Tate shot her a look.

Krystal bugged her eyes out at Tate.

“I'm sorry,” she said. “You guys are so dense. She has a crush on Tate.”

“Krystal!” Tate hissed.

“I doubt that very much,” Maggie said.

“Sexuality can be very fluid,” Lill said, tasting her lemongrass.

“You guys are so out of it.” Krystal leaned her head against the doorframe. A customer rang the bell at the front counter, and she sighed again. “I don't get why it's such a big deal. I'll just go make more coffee while you sit around and talk about everything except the stuff that matters.”

“Tate and Ms. Enfield have nothing in common,” Maggie said to Krystal's retreating back. “That is a ridiculous fantasy.”

Tate opened her mouth to protest—although what exactly she planned on saying she did not know. Then she glanced at Laura, whose posture had gone even more upright than usual. Her face was pale, her hands tightly laced together.
She's scared
, Tate thought.

“Just listen,” Tate said.

Laura outlined her plan: the creative bookkeeping, the cheap supplies, the $16,000.

“It all sounds like a bunch of lies to me,” Maggie said, when Laura finished. “We lie to ourselves. We lie to our customers. We lie to the bookkeeper.”

“No, technically, your bookkeeper lies for you,” Laura said.

Maggie snorted. “We lie, and we lie, and we lie. Then we buy cheap junk from Walmart, and we lie to the customers who trust us and what we stand for. And who's to say you don't come around a month later and tell the IRS to check our books? Wouldn't that be convenient? You get your $16,000 and then, oops, we're all in jail for tax fraud.”

“This has nothing to do with taxes. You'll report earnings and expenditures to the IRS just like you always do. This is just a different way of interpreting the numbers you share with the board.”

Exasperation entered Laura's voice, concealed behind the smooth flow of words, and Tate glimpsed the woman Laura was in the rest of her life. Formidable. Unyielding. It made her gentleness, her fear, more poignant. Tate felt her breath go shallow and her heart sink in her chest. Laura was leaving tomorrow.

“If we need to lie to corporate America to keep Out Coffee open, why not?” Tate said.

“You're not doing anything illegal,” Laura added.

Lill placed her palms together as if in prayer. She took a deep breath.

“I feel…at peace with this.”

“Good?” Laura looked at Tate.

“I mean, I know an accountant who can rework our books,” Lill added. “I did Reiki on her.”

Laura shrugged. “Get me her number, and we'll talk about what you need to do. Two years' worth of records should be enough. This isn't a big line item for the board.”

Maggie slapped both hands on the table. “We're not doing this. I don't trust her. If we're going to save Out Coffee, we're going to do it the right way. We'll have a rally. We'll do a zine. We'll get people involved. This is
their
coffee shop,
their
community,
our
community. We'll sign a petition. I don't think Clark-Vester is going to look at two thousand signatures and tell us we're not viable.”

“You're not being practical,” Lill said.

“If you think you can run this shop, then come back and run it,” Maggie said.

“As I recall, I'm the only one who ever did run it,” Lill snapped back. “At least until you indentured Tatum.”

“Then why did you leave?” Maggie demanded.

“Because you closed me out.”

“Because you left me!” Maggie folded her arms more tightly across her chest.

“I embraced my heterosexuality,” Lill said. “You, of all people, should understand that. I was given a gift of insight into my sexual orientation. I was a kid when we got together. I didn't know. I thought I was a woman-oriented woman, and I am, spiritually, but not physically. And now you're supposed to be my best friend, and you still hate me because I'm straight.”

“You left me when I needed you. That has nothing to do with sexual orientation. And you.” She pointed at Laura. “You need to think about the women who worked and sacrificed to break the glass ceiling and get you where you are today.” Maggie glanced back and forth between them as though they were two sides of the same unfortunate coin.

Laura said nothing.

Lill pleaded, “I didn't leave you because I didn't love you. I left because it's not who I am. It's not
you
, it's
me
. It's my life. That's what you always taught me. It's my body, and it's my life.”

Maggie slumped in her chair and rested her chin in her rugged hands.

“I lost you, Lill, and now I'm losing Out in Portland,” she said.

Laura turned to Tate. “I should go.”

“No,” Tate said quietly. To Lill and Maggie, she added, “Please stop. Please listen.”

They both looked up.

“I trust Laura. Now, trust me. We can save Out Coffee. Laura's not asking us to break any laws, just to bend them a little. You chained yourself to the building. You know: We can't start a revolution if we follow all the fine print. Think about Stonewall. What if those drag queens had said, ‘No, we're going to play by the rules'?”

“We're not revolting,” Maggie said sorrowfully. “We're just trying to run a coffee shop.”

“Out Coffee is more than a coffee shop, and you know it.” Tate leaned forward. “This is our revolution. It's an economic revolution. It's not about race or gender or orientation. It's about money—who has it and how they keep it and what that does to the people who can't get into the system. Big business closes doors for people. They say what we can buy, when we can opt out, who gets health insurance, what chemicals go in our food. They tell us what we have to say to every customer who walks in the door and how many seconds we have to say it. We have to create an alternative.”

Tate glanced at Laura expecting to see her rolling her eyes or at least wearing the strained expression of someone who was trying not to roll her eyes. But her face was solemn.

“I live my whole life in a hotel,” Laura said. “And every room, in every city, is exactly the same. Out Coffee is different. Those hotel rooms aren't ever home. But there is a little bit of home here. For everyone.”

Tate held her breath, waiting for Laura to continue, but she said nothing more. Her words hung in the air, and everyone looked at Maggie.

Finally Maggie sighed. “Go back to your hotel,” she said quietly. “You can't be part of them and help us. You can't live in a hotel and build a community.”

“But…” Laura said.

“Just go.” The anger had drained out of Maggie's voice. “You won't ever understand.”

Tate walked Laura out. On the sidewalk outside Out Coffee, they stood awkwardly like teenagers after a first kiss.

“I'm sorry,” Laura said.

“It's her decision. You tried.”

“What are you going to do now?”

Tate stared down the street to the distant point where the Portland skyline appeared between buildings. She didn't know.

“Maybe go down to the port and load trucks. The longshoremen are striking. I could probably pick up a couple weeks as a scab. I hate it, but the strike is over some territory squabble between the longshoremen and the electricians' union. It's not a real labor issue. Then…” She stuck her hands in her pockets and exhaled into the clear, blue sky. “Who knows? I've been at Out Coffee my whole life.”