Chapter Text
You heard the rumors from Inez
You can't believe a word she says
Most times, but this time it was true
The worst thing that I ever did
Was what I did to you
But if I just showed up at your party
Would you have me?
Would you want me?
Would you tell me to go fuck myself
Or lead me to the garden?
- Betty
“You can do this.” Greta’s voice shook as she whispered the four words to herself again and again, standing at the end of a long driveway, frozen in fear. She’d put on her best dress and rode her bike across town to make a grand gesture, not to stare at the dancing shadows behind the house’s drawn curtains. It was early September and just chilly enough for goosebumps to have dappled her exposed arms as she debated entering through the front or side door. School had started just a few weeks prior, and Greta was already counting down the days until graduation.
“She wants to see you. She has to want to see you.” Greta threw her bicycle to the ground, not bothering with the kickstand, and pushed past her fear to close the distance between her stuttering heart and the birthday party she hadn’t technically been invited to. “She would have said something if she didn’t want to see me, right?”
Greta circled the house, easily finding the side door in the dark. She’d grown up in this house as much as her own, and stretched onto her tiptoes to pull down the spare key from the top of the doorframe. The click of the mechanisms as the door unlocked sounded like gunfire in the quiet of the yard, even with the faraway sounds of music blanketing the lower level of the house. Greta let herself into the mudroom, eyes immediately locking on Dana’s favorite emerald green sweater hanging above a stack of school textbooks.
Moving further into the house, Greta shouldered past her classmates while looking for a familiar mess of dark waves, murmuring out greetings when her name was called. She caught a few sidelong glances from some of the other senior girls, but ignored them in favor of searching for Dana. Greta was nearly six foot, abandoned her formal dates to dance with Jo de Luca, and had tried out for the boy’s baseball team three years running – she was more than accustomed to their stares. After a few minutes of searching, she finally found Dana in the kitchen, laughing at something Arthur Hill had said, one hand on his bicep and the other clutching a cup of her mother’s famous punch recipe.
“Arthur, could I steal Dana away for a moment?” Her voice was strong and sure, not betraying any of the nerves tickling at her insides. Though the sentence ended in an uptick, it was evident that Greta wasn’t asking a question. Arthur’s face screwed up in indignation, but still Dana turned, carefully placing her drink onto the counter before mumbling to Arthur that she’d be back soon.
Greta walked with purpose through the living room, heading for the French doors at the back of the house, with Dana following closely behind – so closely that their fingers brushed more than once, neither pulling away. The noise of the party was muted as the two girls stepped into the backyard, under the cover of the late evening twilight. In the furthest corner of the Thomas’ garden was a gazebo, sheltered by oak trees and well acquainted with fervent teenaged desire. Dana caught Greta’s fingers as they approached the structure, squeezing gently to reassure her. The garden bore witness to the evolution of their friendship, embracing each change of seasons between them. The flowers had buoyed their fingers as they crafted crowns of daisies; the grass had received their laughter; the tree bark had kept their quietest secrets and the limbs had cradled their softest moments.
When Greta turned to face her best friend, she opened her mouth to begin the speech she’d practiced ad nauseum on her bike ride across town, but was cut off by Dana’s lips covering her own. Greta’s hands wove themselves into Dana’s hair, and as their bodies pressed together, she melted. The anxiety she’d harbored, buzzing in her chest and numbing her arms, dissolved. This was soft summer rain and the static of the radio in between songs and the warmth that hits your cheeks when you come in from a snow storm. It was the crack of the wooden bat against a baseball and the scent that lingers at used bookstores. It was heaven and hell and not caring which you ended up in.
Greta pulled back, breathless. “Happy birthday.”
Dana grinned, her eyelashes fanning over the apples of her cheeks. “Thank you. You’re sweet.” Greta’s fingernails gently scratched at Dana’s scalp, tugging her closer under the soft light of the moon, trying desperately to make up for the two weeks they hadn’t spoken.
“Where have you been?” Greta whispered. Her fearlessness was floundering, and she could feel the fear of the answer settling heavy against her chest. “Why didn’t you invite me tonight?”
Dana sighed, opened her mouth to speak, and promptly closed it. She nodded to herself a few times, staring down at her oxfords before shrugging and looking back up. “Ms. Hill saw us, Pegs, behind school. She found my mother at church the next Sunday.” Greta’s eyes filled and she pulled back, shaking her head slowly.
She’d known for years that she loved her best friend, in a way that was decidedly not platonic. Not like she loved Jo. Not like she’d ever loved anyone else. She would trace words on Dana’s back during sleepovers – “I love you” written carefully with her pointer finger. Greta woke up morning after morning with Dana’s arm clutching her waist, her breath gentle against Greta’s neck. They’d held hands, like so many other girls did, but Greta knew that other girls didn’t feel hollow when their friends let go. When she finally gathered the courage to kiss Dana for the first time, she knew it was a risk, but it was a risk she would have taken a thousand times over.
“No. No, Dana, we were so careful.” Swiping angrily at the tears on her cheeks, she wrapped one arm around her stomach and took another step backward. “We always checked.”
“We weren’t careful enough.” Dana closed the space between them, reaching out but not touching Greta’s waist. “My mother said I couldn’t see you anymore. I was trying to protect you, from your mother finding out. I know what she would do, Pegs.”
Greta’s vision swam, the roar of ocean waves building in her eardrums. She could feel the fear creeping up her spine, the beginning of more hot tears forming along the waterline of her eyes, the panic flickering within her rib cage. She knew it wasn’t safe. She knew that they could never be careful enough, but it was worth it. Dana would always be worth it. She’d seen the newspaper articles, listing out the queers who’d been arrested – sodomy, indecency, obscenity. She’d watched as the members of her church excommunicated “suspected inverts.” She’d heard about the police raids in other cities, disbanding congregations of “deviants.”
She also knew that when she imagined a wedding, she’d never pictured a husband. Unless she lied and hid and pretended for the rest of her life, she would never be safe. The world wasn’t welcoming to girls who loved smooth thighs and soft lips; it wasn’t kind to confident, loud, “too much” women who wanted to play men’s sports; it wasn’t gentle with those who dared to step outside of the bounds of normalcy society had created.
“I don’t want to lose you.” It took all of her strength to whisper those words out loud, barely able to see Dana’s dark eyes through her own tears. “I don’t know what I would do without you.”
One hand landed at Greta’s waist, the other settling on her collarbone as Dana closed the space between them. Greta could taste the salt of her tears on Dana’s mouth, but she didn’t let it deter her. It had been two weeks since they’d last spoken, and the ache in her chest had expanded with each day. Greta grasped at Dana’s skirt, pulling their bodies flush against one another as she leaned back against one of the wooden columns of the gazebo. Her hands were a flurry of motion, not lingering at any one place for long, as she tried to rememorize the body she knew so well.
“Dana!”
No.
Dana pulled away immediately, straightening the front of her dress before turning around to meet the full force of her mother’s fury.
No.
“Mom, I –”
This can’t be how it ends.
“I told you to stay away from that girl. She’s not normal.”
Greta watched, frozen, as Lillian stormed across the garden, backlit by the glow of the moon. The same moon that had kissed the crown of Greta’s head as she pedaled here, hoping for an explanation. She felt numb. Her ears filled with buzzing that drowned out Lillian’s words, and her gaze could focus on nothing but the faces of her classmates crowded around the house’s windows.
“You’re giving us no choice,” Lillian hissed, wrapping her long, slender fingers around one of Dana’s wrists. “I told you we’d have to send you away.”
No.
Greta’s knees went weak and crumpled beneath her. She helplessly reached out as Dana’s mother pulled her away, back toward the house’s bright lights and the Thomas’ illusion of a perfect family. She sat there, useless, watching Dana fight against the vice grip her mother had on her arm, until she successfully twisted out of Lillian’s hold. She ran back toward the gazebo, to Greta, her face blotchy and streaked with tears. Her hands shook as she pulled off the ring she’d been given for her 13th birthday – the silver one she’d always worn on her fourth finger. Greta slid it onto the same finger on her right hand, holding tight as she watched Dana be pulled away again.
“Dana, I love you,” she called, her voice shaking and her throat hoarse.
“I love you too, chickadee.”