June 1953
Of all the ways for it to end, it had to be a letter. Delphine shudders. A letter she hadn't even realized was sent. How could she have been so blind to Raymond? Has she simply ignored him too long? Surely he too understood that neither of them were willingly fulfilling their parents' wishes.
Still, when Raymond comes home one day with their mother in tow, she cannot contain her shock. She attempts normality, begins brewing coffee but knows that everything is about to break.
"Maman…" Delphine pleads with her mother, obviously not content to be so far from home. Sitting in her living room staring down her children.
"I told you. Delphine isn't well." Raymond tells their mother, in plain English. "She should return to Montréal with you. Immediately."
"Neither is Raymond." Delphine responds. "I have a job, I cannot leave. I am due to return in September. I have a life here. A job.."
"Delphine you were supposed to keep your brother out of… trouble. Not be corrupted by him!" Their mother struggles with her words, looking at her two most disappointing children.
"Delphine is in trouble too." Raymond insists, using the same euphemism.
"You're not pregnant!" Her maman exclaims in a panic. "Delphine!"
"Non. I am not… I have never been." Delphine tells the truth. "That's not even possible." It's not a lie, Delphine knows. Laying with Cosima cannot bring any consequence. That is, except for this.
Raymond throws his hands in the air. "Elle a une petite amie. Like I said in the letter! She's even in her bed at night!"
"I have a dear friend." Delphine responds trying to keep her head level."Cosima." Maybe, maybe there was some way to salvage the situation.
"But, in your bed…" Her maman looks between her children.
"Raymond has lovers." Delphine blurts out. "He sneaks them into the apartment at night when he thinks I'm asleep...if he even comes home. I work, I clean, I spend time with my friend. I love her! I have done nothing wrong!"
"Delphine, you are coming home with me." Her mother tells her. "You are to pack your things, and we will get on the train tomorrow. This… this is the end of this. Papa and I will take you to see the priest. We will find a solution."
"What about me?" Raymond speaks finally.
"You stay. Complete your schooling. We will deal with you in time." Maman tells them both sternly. "Both of you need to grow up."
"Can I… can I say goodbye to Cosima?" Delphine cannot stop her tears. Even if she were to leave, where would she go? To the Newmans to live as their border until they too discover the truth?
"Maybe a letter, once we are home." Her mother answers evenly. "No more. No less. More than she deserves."
"I love Cosima. I won't lie. I am already ruined. Let me stay." Delphine begs, but her mother remains silent. Staring her down across the room.
Home wasn't where she belonged anymore, Delphine had felt it at Christmas but it was so much stronger this time.
"I won't lie." Delphine sets her jaw and begs to return to Toronto, to her beloved Cosima. Instead she finds herself in a series of meetings with her parents and the parish priest.
She tells the truth. No doubt it makes them uncomfortable. But if she wants any chance at freedom, being ruined may be her only chance.
Though Delphine had been expecting to be thrown out, to be cut loose so all she'd have to do is board the train and run directly into Cosima's arms once she arrived. Never to leave again.
Instead maman and papa listen, and the priest speaks after looking her over.
The solution, the priest told her parents, was for Delphine to marry, as quickly as possible. That this was all a side effect of her remaining unmarried too long, having spent too much time in school, and that marriage and a husband would soon set her right.
Delphine is not certain she can believe that, believe them… but what choice does she have? So when her uncle introduces her to Thomas Rousseau, she smiles at him, shakes his hand. He is employed in the banking industry, a French father, an English-Irish mother. Two languages and a career taking off. A better match than her parents could have possibly anticipated.
And when he shows interest in her, despite being almost a decade her senior, she smiles and agrees. Maman is pleased, so pleased Delphine begins to worry then. Papa too, is pleased and Thomas is removed enough from their circle he has no idea. Not that Delphine was engaged before, not of Louis's lies, not that Delphine was away in Toronto. Thomas looks at her and sees what he wants to see. The courtship is so short, he's already decided what he wants, so why delay?
Delphine pretends to be what they want. No one needs to know that she cries at night. No one needs to know that she dreams only of Cosima. If her little sisters witness her sobbing, they say nothing. Understanding only that Delphine has done something bad . That Delphine was never to be left alone.
It is the way it must be. Her family will not allow her to return to Toronto, return to her beloved Cosima. She must right herself. Must try.
September 1953
Delphine is gone. Cosima cannot quite accept it. Her first response is to board a train to Montreal, to find Delphine and bring her home, quickly, before something worse happens. Instead, she works in the shoe store and tries to squirrel away money. Money she and Delphine will need to try to achieve the independence they need to be happy. They have to be together, Cosima knows and so she works harder, wishing she had a mailing address but it is Delphine who knows where she is. It is Delphine that must reach out so she can return.
"Where is Delphine?" Cosima demands, knocking frantically on the apartment door once more. Raymond had so far refused to answer beyond once. Delphine's been gone all summer and though a miserable fall is setting in she was increasingly concerned. The school year was due to start and Delphine was still missing.
"Go away Cosima." Raymond opens the door lazily, a cigarette dangling from one hand.
"Where is Delphine?"
"She went home." Raymond responds as before. "She got sick of you and your stupid games and she's gone home."
"Delphine wouldn't leave me." Cosima sets her chin, staring down Raymond. "She loves me." She's not going to deny that. Neither of them would. And why should she. Especially to Raymond of all people.
Raymond scoffs at her, throwing her a small smirk before backing into the apartment. It smells, Cosima realizes, and not just of cigarettes but like rot and something foul she once thought she smelled emanating from Raymond's room.
"Here. See how much my sister loves you." Raymond produces a small piece of thick white paper.
Cosima stares blankly at it a moment. Not quite comprehending what lay before her.
"It's...it's a wedding invitation." She sobs aloud as she realizes it. Her Delphine, due to marry some Thomas Rousseau in a few more weeks.
"Go. Go home." Raymond rips the invitation from her fingers. "Go home and know you are nothing. That you'll die wasting away in your own sin. Like me." He pauses to take a long drink of amber liquid directly from the bottle.
"Where is Delphine?" Cosima demands again. "I need an address." Someway to reach Delphine before it's too late.
"Delphine isn't like us." Raymond repeats. "Go home." He closes the door with a slam.
She sobs all the way home, unable to help herself. How? How had this happened? How could this man have stolen away Delphine without her realizing? How could Delphine do this?
Five weeks, Cosima sobs thinking as she boards the streetcar, needing to get home. There were only five weeks before Delphine would marry. And she didn't know what she could possibly do.
October 1953
Her wedding night isn't what she wants. Delphine had known that going in, surely it shouldn't be a surprise to her how she longs for Cosima. She'd known that through the long wedding mass, through the entire engagement that she was a fraud. Worst of all, no one seemed to care. Certainly not Thomas. Not her relieved parents.
Even as her new husband removes her slip, her stockings, her corslet. She supposes she really shouldn't be surprised at his ease removing female undergarments, of course men got to play by different rules. He kisses her, as if to encourage passion but all she can think of is her craving for Cosima, the softness of her skin, her smell. Instead her husband pulls her legs to wrap them around himself. Even the angular hips, the rougher skin feels wrong to her, completely alien. She finds herself not really wanting to look at him, they're fully nude and she makes no effort to look down between them. Feeling him is disturbing enough.
He misreads her distress, speaking to her softly, reassuring her. Her sadness, her concern is taken for nerves, and she lets him do so. To him, she's nothing but a scared virgin bride on her wedding night. He cannot tell, she realizes with some relief, he has no idea she's made love before. Not that this feels anything like that.
It's uncomfortable, if anything, verging on painful, Delphine thinks to herself. She's no longer making eye contact with him, but he doesn't seem to care. This is what she was supposed to do, she's a wife now, but as he moves in her, she weeps. Not for the discomfort, but for this sham. This, this is supposed to be healthy, to prove she isn't ill, to please her family. Instead all she feels is grief. The numbness that had set in when she left Toronto, when she'd agreed to this engagement melts away, leaving a raw ache of sorrow.
"What's wrong now?" Lillian asks impatiently. "Why are you moping?"
Cosima sits glumly on the couch, unable to stop the feeling that her chest has been hollowed out. "Delphine got married today."
"Cheer up Cosima, you are being ridiculous." Her mother tells her. "Just because you weren't invited to a wedding in Montreal… write your friend a letter. Someday you'll mail each other pictures of your babies. I had a penfriend for years! Girl I knew from school. You've played with her daughter!"
"You don't understand." Cosima mutters, unwilling to clarify further. She cannot make her mother understand. Make anyone understand. No one could, not without sending her for some sort of treatment. That, that might be even worse. If this could be cured.
"Grow up! Like Delphine did!" Her mother snaps. "Find your own young man and stop whining."
She thunders up the stairs to collapse in her room. The tears fall hard and fast. Cosima closes her eyes, it's too easy to picture Delphine here, Delphine in her bed, Delphine who swore she'd love her always.
Delphine had betrayed her for what? Out of desperation? Fear?
Was Delphine ever honest when she said she'd love her forever? Was Delphine scared? Miserable?
It wasn't a lack of love. It couldn't be. Unless Delphine wasn't what she seems.
As night sets in she can't stop thinking about Delphine. That somewhere in Montreal, Delphine is giving herself to someone else, if she hasn't already. Someone else kissing and touching Delphine. Someone else loving her.
Cosima throws her lamp into the wall, letting the glass smash and shatter on the floor. Vaguely hears her parents yelling, their thundering footsteps.
But she cannot find a solution, there is no way forward or back from this.