Chapter 3

Over the next few weeks I read the other three books, Women In The Shadows, Journey To A Woman and Beebo Brinker. Michelle seemed to retreat from me while I was swimming in this brave new world but sometimes I’d surface to ask her a question about one of the characters or comment on a particular scene.

When I finally finished the Bannon books our private little world was rocked by two events. The first was the announcement that President Kennedy and the First Lady would visit Texas as part of his reelection bid and the second was the arrival of Michelle’s parents. I’d heard enough about them, Michelle was quite open about them but hearing about them and meeting them was quite an experience.

Her father on the surface was much as she described. Jack Gates was conservatively dressed and polite, in many ways he reminded me of my own father. He treated his wife, Danielle with respect but I sensed a tension between mother and daughter, something whirling beneath the surface that could not be articulated and yet it was there all the same. Danielle was fashionably dressed in a skirt suit made popular by Jackie Kennedy although by mid afternoon she’d discarded the jacket to reveal the white blouse and fanned herself frequently, complaining of the Texas heat. It’s a common topic in Texas when the conversation dries up. About that time I decided to water the flowers in the garden, leaving Michelle alone with her parents.

Not long afterwards however, I overheard part of a conversation when her mother shouted.

“God has a special place in hell for your kind, I curse the day I brought you into this world.”

I froze, unwilling to go on and heard Jack respond with a sharp, “Danielle, enough of that.”

“And you, you are just the coward. How can you look on her without disappointment.”

“She’s my daughter, goddammit, yours too.”

A loud crash startled me, the sound of breaking china and then I heard Michelle yelling.

“I’ve had enough of you, I can’t help what I am. If you can’t accept me then it is on your head not mine, my conscience is clean.”

“You don’t have a conscience,” her mother yelled back, “otherwise you wouldn’t be living in sin with that woman!”

A door slammed and I hurried around to the back door to find Michelle lighting a cigarette on the back porch. Our eyes met and I froze in fear, she looked so angry that I thought she’d start yelling at me but then she realized I must have heard something because she sighed and leaned on the railing as she apologized.

“I’m sorry, she is difficult.”

Jack stepped outside a few moments later and he winced when he saw me. Father and daughter looked at each other and he squeezed her shoulder and murmured something in her ear.

She blushed and then nodded.

“You’re right of course,” she went back inside and he adjusted his tie as I joined him on the dilapidated couch.

“We are not living in any kind of sin,” I finally spoke up.

In answer he looked at me and something akin to a smile nudged his lips.

“It wouldn’t matter if you were.”

“I’m an old man,” he smiled, “I know I don’t look that old but believe me I’m sixty five years old and I’ve seen enough of the world to know that the world is not so neat. I was a naïve young man when our unit was sent to France. What I saw there changed me as it changed those of us who survived. It was a man made hell of monstrous proportions and we never even saw the worst of the fighting but it taught me the futility of pandering to lofty ideals when all about men are bayoneting each other for a piece of boggy French soil.”

He fumbled for a cigarette as he continued.

“Oh they speak of it as a grand crusade to stop the marauding Hun but try telling that to young men forced to go over the top and run into the murderous onslaught of German machine gun nests. I came out of that war determined to ensure the peace would continue and joined the diplomatic corps,” he lit a cigarette.

“I’ve traveled the world since then, the Middle East, Africa, Singapore and even a brief stint in Soviet Russia when Stalin signed the treaty with Hitler. I’ve seen a lot of the world and met many different people. Travel is good for you, it broadens your horizons,” he flicked ash onto the porch and shifted position.

“And it’s one of the reasons I always insisted on taking my family with me whenever I was posted to a new consulate. Michelle’s outlook on life is very much a result of her upbringing, but her marriage to Henry was not my idea. I thought him a self centered little man, more at home with his fancy Cadillac and an Ivy League education,” the back door creaked and he glanced up as Michelle stepped outside again.

“Henry is like a lot of his kind, he thinks women should be put under a glass and admired. Not a hair out of place and wearing clothes that flatter their figure. Occasionally they lift the glass and let her breathe. I have lived long enough to know that such a condition is an unfortunate consequence of our desire to control the world around us. It is only when we smash the glass that we find freedom,” he put his hand inside his jacket pocket and removed two tickets.

“Kennedy is one man who speaks of peace with the Soviets and many criticize him for wanting to smash the glass but I can easily admire a man like Kennedy,” he held the tickets out to Michelle and smiled.

“He is speaking at the Doris Miller Auditorium on the twenty second. These are for you and a partner but perhaps you might like to take your friend, Ellen unless,” he looked at me, “or maybe you would rather she went with someone else.”

“Thank you, sir, I would like to go.” I exhaled slowly.

“Happiness is doing what makes you happy,” he stared at his daughter, “be happy and try not to worry about your mother. She’ll come around eventually but if she doesn’t your happiness is more important to you than anything.”

It was a generous gesture and one that moved Michelle because she wiped at her eyes and thanked him. Jack merely nodded and smiled mysteriously as he inquired about eating establishments in town and that night he and his wife went out for dinner with Michelle. I was invited but declined and had a night in. When she returned I had just finished another book and she perched on the couch as she regarded me with a serious look.

“You do not have to come,” she began, “but it will be a good opportunity, we would be mingling with some very important people, the governor will be there too.”

“And you would not go as a man?”

“Heavens no,” she smiled, “that is the beauty of being a lesbian. I can be a woman who loves women but I am not a replacement for a man, I am a woman who loves women. If you try to come out of the closet you are reviled and persecuted but in the confines of the closet you can find happiness. My father always says if you can’t smell them you can’t tell them, I do not openly state my sexuality because it would hurt my father’s reputation and he has always been the man I most admire. For many years I looked for my father in other men but found only a pale reflection.”

“This does not mean we will sleep together?”

“Would you sleep with a man who took you out?”

“I have never slept with a man,” I responded.

“So we will go to this dinner and then go home,” she looked past me, “you do not mind that?”

“No, I don’t,” I inclined my head, “we are two women out for the night. This does not mean what you might think.”

“I wasn’t thinking that at all,” she replied.

However I was thinking that and I admit the Bannon novels had awakened some desire within me, a feeling that all was not right with the world. I was beginning to question my crush on George. He was interested, or so I thought but he was also interested in other women as well. Had I waited too long or was my desire for him simply a way of marking time? Either way I suspected I would know enough by the 22nd to come to my own decision and as the day drew nearer I began flirting with the possibility of sex outside of marriage.

Would it really be sex if it was with a woman? Would I be dishonoring a husband in the future if I’d been with a woman instead of a man? Logic told me otherwise but still I found myself wondering about the intricacies of such an encounter. We would never marry or even out ourselves, this would be our secret but it would change our living arrangements and I was not sure I could maintain the facade for a long period of time.

Nevertheless, a date was a date and that required a dress. Normally we both shopped together, ever since she’d taken the room Michelle had been my stylist. I trusted her opinion more than any other woman’s because she was a seasoned world traveler and infinitely more sophisticated. The day we went dress shopping must have looked completely innocent to a casual observer but for me at least it felt surreal. I was going shopping for a dress with my date and vice versa. Hence, I had to help her choose a dress that was flattering to her figure. I remember the moment of hesitation when she twirled in front of me and asked my opinion.

“You look, nice, beautiful even.”

“Why thank you ma’am,” she curtsied.

That last week I had my hair done and brought a picture of Jackie Kennedy simply because Michelle admired her so much, which wasn’t an unusual thing by any means, many women wanted to look like her even if they didn’t vote Democrat. My new hairdo finally attracted the eye of George Steele, and all I could think of was Laura in Odd Girl Out when he ambushed me in the parking lot and asked if I’d like to go to a dance that Saturday night.

I thought about it and said I’d think about it but I’d let him know on Friday. I thought it was the only excuse I could make without making it look as if I was rejecting him.

November 22nd, a day that will live long in my memory and I am not alone there. It was the day Kennedy was cut down by an assassin’s bullet in Dealey Plaza, Dallas. A faculty head came into the library and I remember staring at him and wondering what was wrong. Richard Johnson never cried, Michelle once jokingly told him if he cried he’d rust.

“The President’s been shot in Dallas,” he told me.

I laughed at first out of shock and then dropped the pile of books on the floor. I stood looking at the books thinking I should pick them up and then looked at Richard and realized the impact of what he’d just said. He was wiping his eyes and my hand flew to my throat. The image of my dress hanging in the closet at home popped into my mind and then left just as quickly.

“They think it’s in the head,” he bent down and started picking up the books, “we have to assemble in the cafeteria now.”

I found Michelle in the cafeteria and she put her arm around me as the principal held up his hands for silence and solemnly announced that Walter Cronkite had just informed the nation that the President had died. There was a stunned silence as we turned to the silvery circle representing our most tangible link to the outside world. Walter Cronkite was visibly upset and that upset me almost as much. It began to sink in then as the principal informed us that classes were suspended for the day but some of the teachers would remain behind to supervise children until they could be collected from school. Michelle was one of those who volunteered to stay behind. I went home and was still glued to the television when she came home.