Starfish Read online

  Starfish

  By Anne Eton

  Copyright 2013 Beginnings Press

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. All characters in this fictional story are 18 or older.

  This ebook is also available in paperback.

  Copyright 2013 Beginnings Press

  ISBN-13 (mobi): 978-1-62602-031-3

  Jill’s waiting by the fountain. Just like she said she would be.

  She sees me and smiles. Her hand touches her short blonde hair and I wonder if, under all that armor of cool, she’s just as nervous as I am.

  I say hi, try to crack a joke. She says something about my outfit. How she didn’t think I owned clothes like this.

  Looking down, I consider my midriff-baring red blouse, black jeans, black studded belt and Cruella heels. It’s all stuff I picked up in thrift stores over the years. I always shop thrift. Usually I purchase my regular conservative clothes. But the sexy blouse was a quarter, jeans were a buck, I think the shoes came as a two-pairs-for-one buy but I’m not sure. I can’t resist a good deal. I told myself at the time that I was assembling a Halloween costume. I would go to a party as Jill.

  Only that never happened, along with so many other things. Throwing the clothes on today had been a last-second decision. I had wondered if Jill would get the joke.

  She certainly looks amused. Dressed same as ever. Tight white shirt exposing her flat tummy, black hip huggers, black sneakers. But there’s a light in her eyes. She smiles at me, and I forget what I was going to say.

  She walks, I follow. I wonder if our local hangout will be jammed with parents and their kids, celebrating today’s graduation. We trot over the quad, where custodians are setting up the folding chairs in precise, orderly rows. Power tools hum as bored burly guys assemble a stage, panel by panel.

  The bar is indeed packed but Jill, as usual, finds a way. Soon the two of us have improbably found stools at the bar. I order a vodka martini, something I’ve only had once before. Beer is my go-to, whenever I’m not with Brad, anyway—he disapproves of drinking and who can blame him, I should, too—but right now there’s no time to lose. Jill and I only have a few hours. I need some liquid courage, fast, if I’m going to go through with this.

  The martini arrives. I try not to gulp it. Jill sips a Blue Moon, her usual. We discuss moving-out stuff: rental trucks, boxes, dollies. I keep glancing at the clock on the wall. Relax, Jill says. It’s going to be okay. I tell her I know, but deep down I don’t know.

  My phone rings. Brad. I answer it and shout over the bar noise that I can’t talk right now. He asks me where I am, and I tell him, but I add that I’m with my parents. He says okay, and that he will see me at graduation. We hang up.

  If I had told him I was with Jill, maybe he would have invited himself to join us. Fifty-fifty, I think. Lately he has acted, not hostile exactly, but cold whenever Jill has been around. It’s as if he senses a competitor, another suitor. Or maybe he’s just plain jealous. He knows nothing about The Offer, though, so I guess he just has good intuition.

  Way back, when Jill originally asked me to say nothing to Brad about The Offer, I had rolled my eyes. Brad and I at the time had been dating for less than a week. Not telling him about The Offer had seemed like a waste of a good joke.

  Jill and I had laughed about The Offer ever since freshman year. It annoyed me that Brad could not share in the mirth. But Jill had made me promise.

  Now I’m glad she did. Brad knows nothing about Jill’s sexuality and things are so, so much easier that way. His intolerance in that regard is one of the few things I don’t love about him, and it would break my heart if he came between Jill and me. Jill’s friendship has been the one constant of my up-and-down college journey. I feel close to her in a way that I fear Brad will never understand. But he doesn’t need to understand, and that’s okay.

  I order a second martini and down the hatch it goes. Jill cracks that she doesn’t want to have to carry me. I kid that she might have to. It’s like old times, us teasing and laughing. I try not to think about leaving tomorrow…

  I’m not thinking about it. And I can tell Jill’s refusing to think about it either. She small talks: her new job, the studio apartment in Manhattan that she has rented sight unseen, the possibility that she may buy a bike and brave New York’s city streets. Working on Wall Street is boring enough, she says. A hair-raising commute twice a day may keep life interesting.

  I’m feeling the alcohol now. Good. A light, easy buzz lifts my brain. Everything seems funny—the jostling crowd around us, the posters on the wall, Jill’s starfish earrings. I’ve never seen her wear them before.

  I bought them for her during sophomore year, when she and Deborah and Bonnie and Elizabeth and the rest of us were in Fort Lauderdale on spring break. The earrings were in a costume jewelry bin inside a tourist trap gift shop. My gift was a joke, of course. I had earlier begun telling Jill that she was a starfish, and I was a clam. She kept applying relentless pressure, trying to get me. No matter how many times I had told her to forget about The Offer, she had never given up. The starfish earrings had made her laugh, like she laughed about everything.

  I suddenly remember something. If I wear them, will you accept The Offer? Jill had asked then.

  The shiny stainless-steel earrings look pretty under the bar’s track lights. I reach and touch a glittering starfish, sliding my finger over Jill’s ear. Jill gets a funny look on her face. It’s an expression I’ve never seen before, and for a moment I almost run out, run away, leave her with the check and everything else, all the memories, the friendship, us. Because I’m terrified of the possibility that in the next few hours the us will stop, and in its place there will just be a me and her. That might happen, anyway, since she is going to the Big Apple and I’m going to be teaching English in Botswana with Brad. Out of sight, out of mind.

  Alcohol-brave, I go ahead and ask her: is this going to change our friendship?

  She smiles. She takes my hand. That will never, ever change, she says. I nod. I believe her.

  My hammering heart slows and my face transforms into a sunny smile.

  Our drinks are empty. You ready? she asks, touching my knee. It’s a light touch, just her fingertips, a playful touch like so many she has given me over the years, but this time it shoots electricity up my legs.

  I pay for my drinks, she pays for her beer. We slide off our barstools, jostled by the hovering frat boy seniors desperate for a seat and one last get-wasted-hurrah before graduation in a few hours. Jill leads me out into the sunshine.

  She turns back toward campus. What? Oh, yeah. The conference center. As I walk behind her, stumbling in my heels, my alcohol-fogged brain struggles to remember the conversation we had had less than an hour ago.

  I had called asking where she was going to sit. What do you mean, she had said. After a short chat about potential shaded areas on the quad and saving ourselves from the traditional graduation-day sunburn, the words left my mouth. Out of nowhere.

  I wish I taken you up on The Offer.

  (A timely pause as she weighs if I’m kidding. She decides not, thus:)

  It’s not too late.

  (I laugh. She speaks again.)

  It’s not too late.

  (Her tone deflates my giggling. Calm. Sure of herself. Very Jill. She keeps talking.)

  Why don’t we go to the conference center. We don’t have time for a hotel. My roommate’s here, and I’m guessing your roommate is there, too. Right?

  Right.

  So let’s do it.

  (An eternity passes. Finally,
I reply:)

  I need a drink first.

  Meet me at the fountain. We’ll hit the tavern and then we’ll go. Okay?

  Okay.

  See you in five.

  Okay, I had said. I look at the tree limbs swaying above us in the breeze as we pass through the heart of the place I have spent the last four years of my life.

  Okay, I had said. Just okay. No aw Jill. No yeah in your dreams. No evasions or brush-offs or snappy comebacks. Not today. Not on this, the last day we will see each other for a long time.

  Inside the conference center, a few older men in suits wander around. They seem befuddled. Probably visiting professors, wondering what all the commotion is about on the quad and forgetting it’s graduation day.

  Jill approaches the reception desk. I halfway hope they have no rooms, and am halfway terrified they don’t.

  They do—someone canceled their reservation. Jill pulls out a credit card.

  I can pay half, I say.

  She gives me her trademark grin. Points to me, says: Peace Corps salary. Points to herself: Wall Street salary.

  I laugh. She pays. If the receptionist wonders why two college girls are renting a six-hundred-dollar-a-night room at the campus conference center on graduation day, she doesn’t show it. She’s probably seen more interesting stuff than this.

  We rise up the elevator in silence. I touch Jill’s hand; her fingers caress mine. The doors open and she walks out into the hall. My hand releases, and she doesn’t hold on; I hurry out after her before the doors close again.

  Room 662. I feel an incredible wave of relief that we are not in 666, an indicator that I would be going to hell for sure. Then I remember: no hotel has room 666, or room 13 for that matter. So if I am looking for a sign that my betrayal of Brad is going to send me to eternal damnation, I’m not going to find it in such a soap-opera overwritten way.

  Jill walks past the bed, pulls the curtains closed. She glances back over her shoulder.

  I’m still on the threshold.

  We stare at each other.

  Finally, I walk in and close the door.

  For a moment, I wonder if all Jill really wanted to do was watch HBO. The TV remote’s in her hand. Stations flip endlessly before she finds what she wants: smooth jazz. A screen saver glides around the television screen and soft saxophone music fills the room.

  You romantic you, I say. Only it doesn’t come out right. My voice is high and catches on the last word. I wonder if Jill will feel sorry for me and call the whole thing off. That’s all right, Ellie, we don’t have to do this. Why don’t we just lie on the bed, order some champagne, and relax? I see us laughing on the bed, fluted glasses in hand, reliving all the funny stories of the past four years.

  Jill sees my nervousness all right, but her reaction isn’t exactly what I was expecting. She begins popping the buttons on my blouse, one by one. Her eyes are on her work and you would think from her calm expression she was just helping a friend disrobe in a cabana at the beach.

  It hits me how determined, how ruthless, she is. The straight-A student. Ceaseless letters and phone calls to investment banks, asking for an internship. No wasted time. Guess that applies in this area of her life, too. Jill has always known exactly what she wanted, which I suppose is partly why she’s always fascinated me. I came to college with a vague idea of doing some sort of philanthropy work. Beyond that, I didn’t know. I guess I still don’t.

  My shirt’s off. Jill reaches for the belt. I don’t want to be undressed like a child so I beat her to it, opening the buckle carefully, watching the sharp spikes in the leather. The damn belt stabbed me once when I was rearranging my closet and I don’t want it to happen again. Stepping out of my heels, I unzip my jeans before stepping out of them also. After a split-second I scoot my panties off and beat her to that, too, because somehow I want to own the responsibility.

  But it doesn’t matter, because I freeze up anyway. So Jill takes the lead. Turning my shoulders gently, she faces me away from her. My head bows. I’m embarrassed, scared, pick an adjective. I’ve never felt so unsexy in my life.

  But Jill’s hands communicate with my body, rubbing my hunched shoulders. It’s okay, the hands tell me. It’s okay.

  Gradually, I feel some tension drain off. Now I just feel foolish. Jill’s soft lips kiss the back of my neck, as if to say: giving up so soon? You hippies always were quitters. Ha ha, kidding. Kiss, kiss…

  Her hands brush my hair over my shoulders and my curls settle on my chest. I feel my bra unhooked, the first time another person has ever done that. Looking down, I watch the cups pull away from my dark locks as Jill slides the straps down my shoulders. It’s a huge effort for me not to cover myself with my arms.

  Her hands leave my shoulders. I hear her undressing. I just wait—head bowed, facing away, thinking about freshman year.

  Our very first day together, Jill and I had agreed that some smart-ass must have assigned us together as roommates. Why else would a crunchy liberal do-gooder be paired with someone who actually declared in her admission essay that she wanted to be a millionaire by 23? We had laughed about it, then gone to our very first meal in the cafeteria.

  I feel her hands again. Gentle pressure. She’s turning me. I comply, passive. Facing her, I can’t yet look her in the eye. I stare down, goggle-eyed at the naked gym-toned body that I have seen a million times before. Freshman year, anyway, the last time we roomed together. But it looks like not much has changed. Why would it have?

  This is the interval when I expect the speech. Don’t worry Ellie. We can take this slow. It’ll be beautiful, you’ll see.

  Nope.

  She takes my hand, tugs. I look up. She’s smiling. Walking backward, she leads me into the bathroom.

  I can’t quite process her joke, something about room-servicing a camera for Girls Gone Wild. My mind is not registering the words. I just stand on the cold tile. Jill pivots and bends into the tub to turn on the water.

  I consider, in an abstract way, her butt. It’s round and firm with a perfect little V indentation at the top where the cheeks meet. Why can’t I have that butt? I know what Jill would say: you can, if you work for it. But my college gym membership was wasted on me. I think I went once, to stare at the treadmills. Perhaps consequently, my own butt has been growing over these past four years. This month I finally bit the bullet and bought new underwear and jeans, since who knows how many thrift stores there may be in rural Africa. Has Brad made comments about The Incredible Expanding Ass? Probably, but I tune him out. I tune out a lot of what he says.

  Hot water sprays from the showerhead. A warm steamy mist settles over my skin. Jill lifts the bathmat from the edge of the tub. Watching her lay it on the tiles with a perfect flip of her wrists, you would think she does this every day. Her boobs wobble with the movement, a saucy shake.

  I try not to wonder if this is Jill’s standard seduction technique: lead a nervous first-timer into the shower for some loosening up, then repair to the bed. How many times have I seen her hook up with some girl at a house party, some girl who more often than not had had no idea that she might on some occasion try going gay for a day. Or a night. I would watch Jill lead them upstairs, downstairs, or out through the exit. I asked her once what her secret was; she said that the straightforward approach always worked best. I like you, you like me, homosexuality.

  The humming exhaust fan overhead can’t keep up with the steam. It’s filling the bathroom and beading on my skin, running down in drops. Jill smiles at me through the fog and embraces, snuggling in close. Here we go. I close my eyes. We’re standing next to the tub. I worry about falling on the tub if I pass out. I’m feeling pretty lightheaded. As Jill begins kissing my neck softly, so softly, my brain keeps thinking about the best decision to make in the short second or two before I faint. Fall toward the towel bar and try to grab it on the way down. At least maybe I’ll slow my body when it hits the tile…

  Jill’s kisses advance toward my Adam’s apple. I tilt my
chin high. Opening my eyes, I look up at that stupid ventilation fan embedded inside the light fixture. You would think for this kind of money a hotel would splurge on something that could actually suck steam out of a bathroom. Oh my goodness. I gasp, hard.

  Jill stands up again after having given my pubic hair a lick. What the hell? It’s hard to hold my thoughts together. But Jill just snuggles in again, kissing and nibbling the other side of my neck. Her hand cups my breast, as soft a touch as I have ever felt in my life.

  I put my hands on her. They settle on her hips, like we are dancing.

  I say ow and flinch as something sharp jabs my clavicle. Jill notices and touches her ear. The starfish earrings are duly removed and placed on the sink counter.

  I smile as she returns for the embrace, opening my arms to her this time. We kiss. Just a light brushing of lips that connect so slightly it almost doesn’t happen at all. Tingles explode over my skin.

  We stand by the side of the tub forever as Jill’s light kisses wander over my neck and shoulders. Her hands begin to caress the Incredible Expanding Ass. I catch myself, chastising my brain for thinking that way: you’re pretty, everybody says so, and neither you nor your butt are fat. If Brad wants to comment every time you eat a bite of cheese or chocolate, you can just start making remarks about his disappearing hairline.

  Jill kisses up the tip of my chin to my cheek, a slow dreamy diagonal line bypassing my mouth. I turn my head and push my lips onto hers. They open. Our tongues touch, a tentative hello.

  She pulls away gently and I have to let go. Checking the water temperature, she bends over again, adjusting the faucet. My fingertips slide a big goofy happy line up and down her back, matching my big goofy happy smile.

  She enters the tub. I take her hand and also step daintily over the edge, feeling the warm water wash away the steam and sweat on my body. Our faces close, she grins in response to the big goofy happy smile. Kisses my cheek. Then she moves close again, kissing my neck once more. I don’t think I could ever get tired of this.

  We’re not snuggling, not that close. It’s like she’s teasing me, daring me to crush my body into hers. The tip of her tongue slides down my neck aaaallllllllllll the way to my breast. Her lips cover the peak. I never knew a touch so soft could make me so crazy. As her fingers touch my pubic hair, I wonder what took her so long. I lift a foot carefully. My thighs part, and her fingertips move slow and light over the thatch that I have never bothered trimming.