Weekend (3 page)

“Does it want to take back women's right to vote, too?”

Joe laughed.

Elliot had said, “Even if I had a kid, it would be by adoption. Bringing a baby into this overpopulated world is repulsive. This conversation is really over before it starts, Josephine.”

“Oh, god,” said Joe. “I can't even talk to you. Why does it even matter
why
I want a baby, whether it's just some urge to spill my genes on the earth? When it comes down to it, how many people have justification? They just want babies. It's okay. It's not immoral. There's a lesbian baby boom out there, or haven't you heard?”

“Really? You want me to agree to have a kid because the Joneses are?” No sign of Ell's dimples. V-crease in her forehead.

“How about because it would be good for us?”

Elliot took Joe's hand in her stronger one, crushed it some. Elliot worked out with weights; it was one of the things Joe loved about Elliot—her passion for lifting, her bulk, her muscles.

“I just have a hankering.”

“A notion?” Ell scowled. Joe was forever “getting a notion” and changing around all the furnishings and paintings in a room. “It'll go away when you hit menopause, and meantime, we'll still have our life.”

“Just come to one appointment with me,” said Joe. “Just one.”
Just one just one just one.
“'Kay?”

And Elliot relented.

How does it happen that you go like that, from happily childless to miserably childless in a year? How does it happen that you go like that, from desperately against to desperate to get pregnant in a few months? How had Elliot gone from “no” to enthusiastically “yes?”

How can we help you today, why did you come to our clinic?
Once they heard that, the future seemed a foregone conclusion.

Joe wondered if Ell, all these years later, would change anything, if she regretted anything. Did she regret going to that first naïve appointment with the fertility specialist? Maybe, of the two of them, Joe was the more regretful, the one who spent the most time thinking about how life used to be when it was just the two of them, before the spectre of a baby turned into egg harvesting and agonists and antagonists and false hopes and false positives and sad, sad nights sitting on the toilet shedding fetal cells, weeping. She would have, thought Joe, she would have given it all up in order to avoid all the pain and struggle and hope and dashing of hope, all the money, all the estrangement from Elliot.

Even now, looking down at Scout—the navy eyes of birth, pooched lips, mushed nose—and feeling her heart pump love, she was not completely convinced the baby had been worth it if the price was her marriage.

Elliot called from the kitchen, “I was going to work on the dock today, but it got away from me.”

Joe said, “Scout's umbilicus is starting to smell.”

Elliot turned and said, “What? What?” And Joe said, “The
midwife said it would start to rot and it is, it's rotting. Come smell.”

And Elliot crossed the room, obediently bending over the baby and rearing back. “Jesus.” She ran to the bathroom and slammed the door.

“None of this is exactly as billed,” called Joe. Scout started to wail.

“You can say that again,” she heard disembodied through the door. When Ell came out, she daubed at her mouth. “I'm definitely getting the flu.”

“Keep your distance, then,” said Joe.

“Let me just confirm: it is not as billed,” said Elliot, backhanding her face.

“I know, eh? Gross.” Joe squeezed her right breast, examined her nipple. “My milk still isn't coming in.”

Elliot heaved a sigh. “Your milk will come in. You know it will. It just does. Day three, day four.” She took the baby and jiggled her across the room, crooning nonsense. Baby-soothing motions had come on them like salsa dancing, side to side, up and down, side to side, a baby jive.

“You just said you thought you might be getting sick,” Joe said quietly. Being spoken to sharply made her cry. She didn't mean to cry, but …

Elliot didn't even hear her. “Shhh,” she was saying in time to the baby's wails. “Shhhhhh, baby-o, shh. Please be quiet, baby-o. Can't you just be quiet now, sweetheart?”

This was how it was now and would be forever—the baby
an implacable force between them—a bond and a wedge. All that was joyous and funny and lazy and loving about them was buried under an avalanche of diapers and sleepers and zinc cream.

What was the distress signal of queers who used to fuck but now only watched a newborn suck, suck, suck?
You suck
seemed both accurate and unfair, but at least it made Joe smile.

“'Kay, I'm gonna go pick Logan and her girlfriend up,” said Elliot. She hummed “In the Mood” to the baby while she changed her diaper. “I asked them to dinner. I can boil up some pasta, and I'll pick up salad stuff.”

Joe felt a jealous twinge that she and Scout couldn't go in the boat too, not for a couple more days, anyway, until her wounds settled down. Joe was just—stuck. The little woman. The housewife. The bottom line. “We don't have a life jacket for Scout.” She herself could use a life jacket, one she could wear twenty-four hours a day.

“Maybe seeing Logan will lighten you up a bit.”

Lighten me up a bit? And then she thought, I wonder if I'm in love with Logan.

And then she thought, Fuck. And then she thought, Fuck Logan and the boat she was about to ride in on. “When are you picking them up?” She heard her own voice, high, thin, complaining—the voice of the shrew she didn't want to be. “I don't want to see anybody. I just want to be alone with you.” But she meant alone alone with Elliot, not alone in the same house barely acknowledging each other. She meant foot and back rubs.
She meant doing things together, telling jokes, cutting up, not this moving exhausted through a series of joyless chores every day. Laundry, sweeping, vacuuming, dusting, breakfast, lunch, dinner. Boat over to get groceries, gas, supplies. Elliot either fawning and jealous or gone, gone more than she was home.

       
AJAX

Ajax surely hadn't realized that Elliot, the famous Elliot who once had dumped Logan, would be the first person they saw. For that matter, Ajax hadn't known anything about a cottage on an island. (
Logan owned part of an island? What the fuck?)
In fact, she'd only vaguely understood that Logan had a “shack in the woods,” as they called it. That Elliot summered there had completely escaped her. Now here she was, the-ex-that-mattered, the only partner Logan had ever lived with, in the oh-so-butchy flesh. Every time Logan had spoken about her, it was with a stupid grin. In the dusk light of reunion, they both glowed before clearing their throats and pretending nonchalance.
To hell with being grown up
; Ajax decided she hated Elliot on principle.

While Elliot loaded the luggage, Ajax looked around the marina. Speedboats. Sailboats—sloops and yawls. Houseboats. Yachts. Logan's red powerboat. A mess of yellow life jackets up under the boat prow. Osprey nest on a telephone pole. Ajax could hear a woodpecker.

“Ellman,” said Logan to Elliot.

“Bud. Glad you could make it up.” Sloppy grin on Elliot's strong face.

“How's the new kid?”

“You know, a baby. Screams, wizzes, shits.” Half smile, higher on the left, dimples, a shrug; unable to hide her pleasure
in the kid's arrival. “I have a daughter. Who knew I could turn baby crazy?”

“Congratulations! That's just wonderful.” A pause. “Why's it called Lake Boiling Foot?” Ajax asked, pointing at a sign

“Water's so hot you can't barely get refreshed. You'll see.”

“So you're Logan's—” Low voice.

Toby crouched and peed.

“Friend,” said Elliot. “Best friend. For a long time. Since we started architecture school together.”

Toby shook the dock; it took both Logan and Elliot to tug-convince the scared dog to step into the boat, whereupon he collapsed in a heap with his paws over his ears.

Elliot said, “Sweet gelcoat, man,” and Logan said, “Mike says two-year warranty.” Logan started the engine, which emitted blue spirals of smoke before putting then shooting away from the pier. Boi talk about boat repairs as they bounced across the lake. Wind poured around the visor, relief from the heat. Forests clambered up on every shore, cottages bigger than most city mansions.

Logan lifted their chin at the bags of groceries stored under the bow, a question.

“Missus says you're expected at dinner later. Picked up some staples for your fridge yesterday.”

“Thanks,” Logan said. They looked out over the lake, motioned for Ajax to take the wheel. That made Ajax pay attention—she knew boats from her childhood. She canted across to take over, edged the throttle wide.

“How was the birth, man? Everybody good?”

“Intense. We're calling her Scout.”

Ajax hollered to be heard. “I love Scout! I love the name Scout!”

Even though it stole her breath, she loved the wind, the jolts of the boat as it slammed into water.

“Joe was a brave sonofabitch.”

Ajax craned around. “We can't come over for dinner if—is it Joe? If Joe just gave birth.”

“Haven't seen this one, though,” Elliot punched Logan's upper arm, “in forever. Come, be social. Joe's happy to have you.”

Ajax tried to send Logan a message, tried to meet their eyes:
No; it's not okay
. Outside of the boat's roar, the lake was placid and still. A loon called. Elliot took the wheel. The ride lasted twenty minutes. Elliot steered the boat closer to the dock where it squeaked against rubber tires. Logan reached to pull the stern to the dock, let Ajax clamber out. Sea legs.

Elliot jumped onto the dock; Logan passed up luggage and groceries. Elliot grabbed bags, said she'd see them at eight, and vanished.

Ajax cleat-hitched the boat—a knowledge-perk from having grown up on an island—then stood and stretched. She could see one house from the dock, a veritable palace—she could actually see two houses, if you counted a jutting shake wall. What had she been expecting? From what Logan had said, a shed. “It's beautiful here, Logan. Thank you for bringing me.”

“I designed it, built it.”

“You
built
it?” She didn't say what she wanted to say: You call this a
cottage?

“After Elliot. After Elliot and I smashed up.” They lifted suitcases. “That horrible time when you need a project, a big project so you don't mourn so loudly you lose all your friends.”

“You built a cottage here, on the same property as your ex?”

“Hers was ours. She had to buy me out, and the deal was half the island. I built the second one right when I would have been happy to see her kicked off the island. Hostile, I admit it.” Logan laughed and kissed Ajax's nose. “But you know what? It's worked for us for a lot of years by now. Can you just wait for me down here while I take this stuff up?”

Ajax picked up some of the lighter grocery bags but Logan reached for them. “You sit yourself down and put your feet in. Tell me if the water's cold. I need a report.”

They looked at each other; a challenge. “I like to do as much as I can,” Ajax finally said firmly but quietly.

“Just indulge me. No carrying. I know your challenges. May I quote:
Carrying anything uphill
. So not on my watch, McIntyre. This weekend is all about being taken care of, for
me
to pamper
you
. Let me just put our stuff away and get ready a little to welcome you.”

Ajax swished her feet while Logan made several trips. It was warm, almost hot—like Elliot had said, Lake Boiling Foot, liquid sluggish air—not like BC waters at all, more like the
Bahamas. Water slapped the pylons. Fuck being ill; being ill sucked. Finally Logan was back and kissing her neck.

A pathway was partly delineated by in-ground solar lights. The house loomed, half log, half river-stone mansion. Logan set down the last bags. “I'm carrying you over the threshold, McIntyre.”

“Logan, you built a
log
cottage?”

Logan grinned. “Logs from the property, as it happens. With a bit of help. Well, okay, substantial help.”

“Wow,” said Ajax. Logs stained dark brown. Accents of red and white. A wide porch. A clothesline. Chaise longues. A lengthy outside table. A fire pit. A meadow of poppies. They startled a deer, which had been investigating geraniums on the porch; it clattered away. Flashes in the dusk, like phosphorescence in BC waters, discombobulating, winking, until she realized what they must be.

“Fireflies!” she cried. She hadn't seen fireflies since she was little, in Ontario visiting her gramma. They didn't see them in Vancouver.

She hugged Logan tight.

“Everything's gone blue,” said Ajax with wonder. “Wow.”

“A van Gogh painting just for you,” said Logan.

“
Starry Night
with fireflies.” Blue tree trunks, indigo light, yellow bugs like a hundred spinning planets. She wasn't crazy. She spun in the half-dark. Couldn't she go out like this, at least, in love with Logan, addled with fireflies and a northern sultry night?

Logan leaned on the porch railing and said, “You realize this was how I fell for you, right?”

Ajax had her arms out as if she'd be able to grab the dusk and keep it in a jar. Stunning beautiful useless happiness.

“The way you're open to everything. The way you notice. The way you haven't lost your childlike glee.” Logan carried in the bags and reappeared. “Come on. I'm starving. Jump up. I want to get dinner on.”

Ajax swatted them, laughing as Logan tried to lift her. She probably had fifty pounds on them. “Don't be a freaking idiot.”

Ajax pecked them all over their neck, but then she was in Logan's arms like a solid sack of potatoes while Logan—they couldn't fool Ajax—staggered over the threshold.

“I want to shower you in gifts for all your life,” said Logan.

The cottage was lit with dozens of fat cream candles.

“Wow,” Ajax said again. “Wow, Logan. Just wow.”