"She came into the shop when I was on the floor and the boss was in the back. I guess she made an assumption about a girl in a mechanic's getup…"
Betty's joking (weakly) but Kate stops her to say, "Do people? Make assumptions?"
"Sure," Betty says, still looking at the tabletop. "You learn to read people and sometimes you make different choices. My boss, he told me that he'd have me as a worker as long as I was good, but sometimes a guy won't listen to a woman about his car, wants to talk to a 'real mechanic.' I would've made a fuss about that once upon a time, but now we stay mostly under the radar. At the grocery store, the owner loves us but her nephew curses at us in Hebrew. We don't go in when he's working. When there's an option, we take it. I hope there's never a day with no option."
Kate is gaping slightly across the table when Betty looks up past her eyebrows. They make eye contact and Kate closes her mouth. Betty shrugs one shoulder and Kate nods, smiling slightly.
"It's worth it," Kate says, only the barest hint of a question mark on the end.
"That's right." Then Betty cocks her head, sitting up straighter in her chair, and says, "What about you? You must have done some dating in that small town of yours."
"Oh sure," Kate says, throwing her head back and laughing like a girl in a Coke commercial. The performance comes automatically, and when Kate remembers it's just Betty she looks down sheepishly. "The older ladies at the church are always setting me up with their grandsons, 'such nice boys for the most eligible bachelorette in town,'" and now the laugh is both clearly fake and vaguely hysterical.
"A couple of them have been good for a month or so of dinners and dances, but I guess I haven't found 'the one' yet." The last words stumble out of her mouth and she freezes, takes a breath, then rolls her eyes. "That's what I tell the ladies, anyway. They tell me I'm the sort of girl who takes her time, which I guess is better than picky." Or homosexual goes unsaid.
Leaning back in her chair, Betty has one hand on the table, finger tapping slowly as she watches Kate. She doesn't speak, and Kate feels judgments rolling off of her in waves – Kate's own judgments, she knows, cast off on Betty to confirm her worst fears. But Betty doesn't reply; she stands and begins to clear the table, saying, "Won't you give me a hand?" with a charming smile. She indicates the other apron as she begins to fill the sink, and Kate approaches it with trepidation.
As she slips the halter over her head, she can smell this stranger who lives in a two-apron household with Betty McRae, and it makes her feel at once more and less like herself. She's not sure which she'd prefer, to tell the truth.
For a moment as she joins Betty at the sink, accepting wet dishes from her gloved hand and drying them with a soft cloth, Kate loses herself in the easy domesticity of the scene. In the slanting rays of the sunset through the window over the sink, she sees herself as another Kate, one who kissed Betty back because Leon was the only one watching and he would understand. One who didn't run away at the end of the war, didn't start a whole new Betty-less life just to see if she could.
At the sink she is this steady Kate, in the steady rhythm of wash, dry, shelve, and she begins to hum. Betty looks up with a surprised smile and Kate ducks her head and carries on, smiling too.
The final dish is a creamer and Kate, caught up in the rhythm of movement, hesitates with her hand raised, unsure where to place the dish in the cupboard. Betty, having just removed her rubber gloves, places one hand on Kate's back as she reaches past her, taking the creamer and setting it on a shelf. She over-balances slightly and Kate, having half-turned at the touch, twists and catches Betty's waist before she can stumble. There was no thought in the movement and there's none in the next, when she closes the microscopic gap between them and kisses Betty.
It's all of an instant before Kate is turning and ducking her blazing red face down and away. Betty's hands have landed on the counter to either side so she can't actually get away, but she's practically scaling the counter in her efforts.
Betty steps back, releasing her, and Kate's hands go to her hair as she crosses the room. She turns back toward Betty and then walks into the living room. Trailing behind, Betty can hear her muttering something about a purse and her compact. Kate crouches by the couch and Betty leans in the doorway, wondering what to say.
"Off so soon?" Betty cringes and shakes her head as soon as the words leave her mouth. It's pitch dark now and Kate probably should have left an hour ago, besides which…
Kate drops her compact back into her clutch purse and snaps it closed. She runs her hand over the seat of the couch (Betty can feel the corner of that slip of paper poking her through her pants and wonders if Kate is looking for it) and then stands. She looks at the floor, knuckles white around the clasp of her purse, and opens her mouth—then crosses to the front door in two strides and fumbles with the lock.
"Kate, hang on."
Focused on the deadbolt Kate can bring herself to say, "I've forgotten all my manners but you'll have to forgive me, I really must go," and the lock opens and she's out the door and halfway to the gate by the time Betty catches the door hanging open.
"I'll phone Gladys," Betty calls out behind Kate, who puts up one hand in a half-hearted wave as she works the gate with the other. "We'll get drinks!" It sounds a lot more like a threat than Betty intended, but as Kate hurries off down the sidewalk with her face tilted toward the street, she shrugs and closes and locks the door.
Heading back toward the kitchen to finish cleaning up, Betty doesn't notice until she's hanging up her apron that the other hook is empty, which means Kate wore Lucy's apron out onto the street. She laughs, wrapping her hand around the empty hook and hanging her head. They'll get drinks and Kate will return the apron, probably neatly tucked away in some superfluous symbol of politesse. And Betty will find a way to convince her that they can be friends. This was just a false start.
Yawning, Betty walks to the bedroom, deliberating whether to stay up and tell Lucy all tonight, or let things lie and get an extra hour or two of sleep. She undresses in front of the mirror and wonders what it could possibly be about her that would make a girl like Kate hold on to the idea of loving her for ten… fifteen… who knows how many years. Though she knows her actual body has little to nothing to do with it, it's the only thing she can stare at, so she does, for just a moment. Slipping into her usual men's pyjamas and wrapping a scarf around her hair, she smiles in collusion with her reflection before turning away.
On the pad of paper by the bed she draws two stick figures kissing and scribbles curls on each round head. To the side she writes 'L + B', surrounds it with a heart, and draws the tree upon which it is carved. In the corner she writes 'xo B' and then goes to bed.
In the midst of sleep there's a soft kiss on the shoulder and arms that hold her like home; a whole-body sigh and deeper into dreamless peace.