Chapter 13
"Who could that be?" Rhoda gasped, body suddenly plunged into high alert. She wiggled away from Mary, searching, reaching for her nightgown.
Mary was in equal parts panic, running fingers through her hair, grasping for her own nightgown.
Rhoda frantically searched everywhere for her underwear.
"Mary, Mary dear, are you in there?"
Phyllis. Ugh, that infernal, horrible woman with her terrible timing.
"One moment, Phyllis." Mary called.
Rhoda groaned, "we could have pretended to be out."
"She can see my light, what was I supposed to do?" Mary was wrapping her robe about herself and Rhoda still couldn't find her undergarments.
"Mare, I can't find my panties." Rhoda hissed.
"Forget it, forget it." Mary shooed at her to fix the bed as she moved to the doorway.
"Really. What is taking so long? It's not as if you have miles of apartment to get through." Phyllis was already admonishing through the door.
Mary rolled her eyes as Rhoda pulled the messy sheets into some semblance of order, plopping down atop the chair just as Mary opened the door.
"I just dropped in to see how you were doing. Well, what's..." Phyllis looked Mary over, trailed her eyes up and down her flushed frame, taking great notice of her tousled hair. "I had no idea I was...interrupting your, ah, well, really Mary." Phyllis - for nearly the first time ever - was at a loss for words.
Rhoda should feel mortified that Phyllis thought what she thought, but in that moment she was impressed at this lack of commentary.
"Oh no, you're not interrupting. I was just about to shower." Mary pointed awkwardly towards the bathroom. Rhoda rolled her eyes, rubbing at her forehead. So convincing, Mare. Real convincing. "Rhoda's here."
Phyllis' eyes traveled from Mary to Rhoda, to the bed, to the plaid panties that had come to rest on the stairs by the door, then back to Mary again. "Oh, no."
"What?" Mary was trying her hardest to play her innocent routine, all big eyed and bushy-tailed but Phyllis would not be duped.
"Oh, Mary. Mary, Mary. I have no words." She placed her hand over her chest and Rhoda actually thought she might be mute, until - "except I do. I mean really, Mary. I see what this is. And don't think that I'm saying this for the reasons that you think I'm going to say this - my brother is gay, after all - but I mean really, Mary. Rhoda? Rhoda, of all people. Rhoda. I really expected more from you. I worried that this might happen. Yes, I've seen how close you two have grown, how you don't go out much anymore, always staying in, having your "girl's nights". Alone. I was quite worried. I just knew Rhoda would be a bad influence on you."
Rhoda felt small. How could Phyllis blame her for everything? As if there was even blame to assign. She sure as hell didn't feel ashamed about what they had done that evening.
"You know what, Phyllis." Mary's unwavering, strong voice broke Rhoda out of her potential, internal downward spiral. Rhoda's head shot up, taking in the powerful, tall pose Mary had assumed. "If you haven't noticed, Rhoda is a lovely human being who has always been there for me and whom loves and supports me. Rhoda is really quite wonderful. And Phyllis, I love her. And I'm not ashamed of it. I really love her."
Phyllis placed a hand over her heart, as if she might faint right there in the doorway. "Mary, you can't be serious."
Rhoda felt her heart racing. Sitting on her hands because she wasn't sure if she wanted to clobber Phyllis or wrap her arms about Mary and kiss her senseless. She was delirious, elated. Mary was standing up for her.
"I don't mind this sort of...lifestyle but think of my little Bess. What will I tell her? That Aunt Mary has taken up with Aunt Rhoda. How could she possibly understand it?"
"Well she doesn't have to because we're moving out." Mary spoke resolutely.
"Mare," Rhoda gasped.
"Mary, don't be ridiculous." Phyllis was trying to reason with her again as the door slammed shut in her face.
They both heard the other woman pleading on the other side of the door as Mary turned to face Rhoda, cheeks flushed with the thrill of standing up to Phyllis, of giving that insufferable woman a piece of her mind.
Mary stepped forward, bending down to retrieve Rhoda's errant panties from the ground.
"Uh, Mare..." Rhoda felt her pulse quickening, pulsing there in her veins.
"Now, Rhoda." Mary kept moving forward, clasping Rhoda's soiled underwear as if it were just any ordinary garment. "Rhoda, don't be cross with me." Mary kneeled down before her, hands moving to rest on Rhoda's knees.
"Mad, no, kid. I'm not mad. I'm just - uh - shocked. You're always coming out of left field with things. Always to everyone else but me. But, you...you wanna live with me?"
Mary grasped her hand then, lifting it to her lips to kiss it. "Yes, Rhoda. Yes, I do. And I'm sorry I keep doing that. I don't know what comes over me. I was just so mad at my parents for suggesting I stay with Peter and mad when Phyllis kept blaming you. You haven't done anything wrong. I've done it all wrong." Mary hung her head then.
"No, hey, kid. You're getting really good at standing up for yourself. I just...I want to be in on it. You know, before the whole rest of the world knows what you're thinking." Rhoda clasped at Mary's hand, running her fingers through Mary's hair. Because that was now allowed. Touching, caressing, kissing, God she loved this woman.
"I'm sorry, Rhoda. I didn't mean - I just thought with the new baby and now that I'm making a little more at work I thought it made sense if we..."
Rhoda kissed her then, kissed her as if she might have proposed to her. " Of course I'll move in with you. Of course, kid." She could think of no other thing she would rather like than to live with Mary Richards. To share a home as she so oft imagined them doing.
"Good. Good," Mary was grinning. "I - uh," she scratched briefly at her forehead. "I feel kind of strange about all of this, this moving in and we can't even be properly married."
Married! Mary had used the term, the word, applying it to the two of them as if it might be a thing they could do. "Yeah." Rhoda laughed a little, the concept hitting her a mile a minute. There would never be a wedding, not a real one, one that her mother had envisioned for her anyway. There would be no white gown, no groom in a tux waiting for her at the end of a long, horrible aisle. Thank God, thank God, there is a God!
"Why are you laughing?" Mary asked, hands running over Rhoda's smooth thighs.
"I feel relieved. Really, I do. I mean all these years I've been chasing after this ridiculous dream of being married, of finding this perfect man, and it's you, kid. I've found you and a wedding just seems ridiculous now. I can't imagine it. I don't know what my mother would think – I don't care what my mother thinks right now -, but I've never been happier Mare." Rhoda cupped Mary's cheeks, pulling her close, mouth pressed to mouth. The kiss morphed from innocent and chaste into something more, her body still humming from moments before, alive with want and desire.
"Who says that we can't be married?" Mary pressed her lips to Rhoda's neck.
"Well, the law, the Bible, the state, the – " Mary silenced Rhoda with a searing kiss which made Rhoda hum. "Oh, Mare." Rhoda sighed, "kid, you really drive me wild you know. Here we are having a serious conversation and you're –"
Mary's fingers found Rhoda's warm center, as if before had not been enough, as if it could never be enough. Her fingers slid over Rhoda's slickness, silencing her. "I've never felt like this with anyone before." Mary whispered, pulling Rhoda to her. "I want to marry you."
"Yeah?" Rhoda yelped, arms wrapping about Mary to hold her closer.
"I wish things were different." Mary was stroking her as if she would do anything for Rhoda, as if she were her sex slave, ready to care for Rhoda in any way, as if trying to make up for something.
"What are you talking about?" Rhoda matched Mary's motions, breathless, but sensing that Mary was worried about something.
"Rhoda," Mary kissed at her cheek. "Are you really okay with all of this? I mean, with me and with the baby."
Rhoda's head rolled back, body arching into Mary. How could she ask her these questions at a time like this? How ridiculous. She was opening herself up – something she did not do easily – allowing Mary in, deep. She loved her, had loved her before the baby fiasco, before everything else. When they got in arguments it felt deeper, worse than any other arguments she'd ever had before with anyone else and she seemed only to care when it pertained to Mary. Really care. She knew that she never wanted to spend another day without Mary, with or without this child she loved her. The child changed nothing – only added an extension of Mary into the world and Rhoda could imagine she'd love the kid just as much as she loved the woman now before her, bringing her to the edge for the second time that evening.
"Oh!" Rhoda called out, clasping at Mary tightly, her body stilled against Mary's hand. She shook, felt her body relax back against the chair, panting, floating, content. She pulled Mary towards her, Mary rolling in her embrace to rest her head in Rhoda's lap. They sat like that, breathing deeply, serenely together.
"Mare, I've never loved anyone more. I didn't think this was possible. I thought it happened in books maybe, but not…not in real life." Rhoda trailed her fingers through Mary's hair.
"Let's get married then." Mary pulled back, practically jumping to her feet. The woman made pregnancy look easy.
"What are you talking about?" Rhoda could not move so quickly, not fully returned to her body.
Mary was rummaging through a drawer in her dresser. "I mean, Rhoda, that I want to marry you. And since we can't have a proper wedding I want us to exchange something else. Ah!" Mary held up the item she was searching for.
"What is this?" Rhoda sat up in the chair, pushing her nightgown back down.
Mary resumed her place on the floor before Rhoda. "Will you marry me, Rhoda Morgenstern?"
Rhoda's hands went to her mouth, the prick of tears threatened the corners of her eyes. "Mare, oh God…Mary."
"This was my grandmother's engagement ring." Mary held the knotted golden band with square diamond set in the middle.
Rhoda felt the tears trailing freely down her cheeks. "Mary."
"Say yes, Rhoda." Mary prompted.
"Oh, but wait!" Rhoda found her footing then. She pushed herself up, knowing just what she needed. There had been something she'd seen, it had caught her eye, stuck out to her at Hempel's. She had no idea why she'd gravitated towards the simple pearl necklaces with little pendant in the middle, a small little diamond surrounded by gold. She'd seen it and bought it, not with herself in mind, but now she realized whom she'd purchased it for.
"Where are you going?" Mary called after her, but Rhoda was racing to her apartment, rummaging through her dresser for the box. It was there on top, still wrapped in tissue.
Racing back to the apartment Rhoda moved to kneel down beside Mary. The two were on the floor facing one another and Mary's eyes went wide at the box in Rhoda's hand.
"Yes, kid, of course I'll marry you. But you have to marry me, too. Mary Richards, will you marry me?" Rhoda opened the box and showed Mary the necklace. The perfect necklace that was Mary Richards. She had bought it for her without even knowing.
Mary was crying then, the two of them on the floor crying and exchanging gifts and as Mary slid the ring onto Rhoda's pointer finger – the only finger it fit and seemingly appropriate because theirs would never be a marriage like others – and Rhoda clasped the necklace about Mary's neck, they realized they were married. Perhaps not legally, not by law, but in their hearts. They knew.
They fell into one another, lips smeared with tears, arms wrapped tightly about one another as if they should never part again.
Thank you so much for reading along! I appreciate all the kind comments you have left on this story. There is much more to come...about 26 chapters total, so do not fear! Comments are always lovely and I hope you continue to enjoy!
I am also planning a post Mary & Rhoda, the 2000 movie, fiction to follow this.