[Repugnant Abomination]

Third draft. Let me know what you think.

Privilege

Tamara and Amber sat on the lumpy green sofa, entangled in each others arms like seaweed. Amber’s skin was darker than Tamara’s, but her body was like a blank sheet of paper. She had no tattoo’s or piercing’s, not even on her ears. She told people it was because she didn’t like pain. Even her eyes were just plain brown, not like Tamara’s, which had speckles of grey. Tamara had 3 tattoos and 8 piercing’s – 6 on her ears, 1 in her nose, and 1 in her tongue. The pitter-patter of rain sounded overhead, and blue, biting wind tossed debris against the living room window. 3 p.m. and Amber still hadn’t eaten.
“I’m doing it. Cross your fingers,” Tamara said, pulling away from Amber and picking up the phone from the coffee table with rings on its worn surface. She dialed.
“Well?” Amber said.
“Shhh, it’s ringing. Hi! I’m calling about the apartment advertised in the paper, the one on Circle St. Is it still available? ”
“Oh yes, yes of course,” the man said, his voice becoming pleasant.
“Great, when can we come and look at it?”
“I have some time right now.”
“Perfect! We can be there in 20 minutes,” she said.
Amber smiled and squeezed Tamara’s arm and said, “I can’t believe this is really happening. We’ll finally have a place of our own. Not that I could ever forget what’s his name,” she rolled her eyes.
“Oh come on, give Pat a break, he’s a decent guy.”

They arrived early and stood out front, pressed together for warmth. Tamara held a black umbrella to shelter them. Amber leaned up to kiss Tamara, but she turned her face and said, “not right now.”
“We should really move to California, you know. It hardly rains.”
Tamara nudged Amber, “stop whining.”
A group of birds picked at indistinguishable road kill; nature’s garbage men, cleaning up what nobody else wanted. The birds scattered as a white 67 Volkswagen sped by and parked. A portly man in his mid 50’s stepped out of the vehicle, his comb-over and fake gold watch as visually offensive as his beat up car. He walked passed them, going to unlock the door.
“Excuse me?” Tamara said.
“Yes?” The man said, fidgeting with the lock.
“We’re here to see the apartment.” Tamara said, putting her arm around Amber, who was staring at the ground.
The man stopped what he was doing and looked at them. Amber felt his eyes, baleful, running over her. It wasn’t the first time someone had looked at her – at them – like that. He adjusted his poke-a-dot tie and smiled beguiling at them.
“There you are. I tried calling you after we spoke, but you must have already left. I forgot I have an appointment in 15 minutes. I’m sorry for the inconvenience, but I’ll need to reschedule.
“Oh, ok. Well, do you need our number again?” Tamara asked, feeling Ambers body stiffen.
“No, it’s still in my cell. I’ll call to reschedule later today,” he said, hurrying by them towards his car, “and sorry again.”
Tamara followed him, asking questions about the neighborhood as they walked, but Amber didn’t move. Her brown eyes remained downcast, like she was trying to read the sidewalk. As he sped away Amber felt the distance between her and Tamara grow, like the landlord has thrust a gulf between them that could not be reconciled.

Amber sat on the couch, knees pulled to her chest, eyes staring out the window. To her left was Pat, eating a slice of pizza and watching a basketball game on TV. To her right was Tamara, sitting on the recliner with a half empty bottle of Bacardi in her lap, which she would drink from every few minutes. She knew Pat was oblivious, but obviously Tamara was able to handle what happened. She smoothed her hand over her shirt, sucking in her stomach as it passed over. Occasionally she glanced at Tamara, who she knew was avoiding her. Finally she stood up and walked to the kitchen, opening and closing cupboards loudly, looking for something that wasn’t there.
“Are you sure you don’t want a slice of pizza, Amber?” Pat asked over his shoulder. She didn’t respond. Instead she grabbed a diet coke from the fridge and crossed the living room to Tamara’s bedroom, giving her one last arduous look before disappearing into the other room and shutting the door.
“You can be a real ass sometimes, Pat,” Tamara said, taking another drink. Alcohol was a social lubricant for most, but for Tamara it was an alibi.
“I just offered her some food,” he said.
“You know how she is,” Tamara said.
“No, I don’t. I never know what’s going on around here. Why is everyone so pissed off? It’s the weekend; we should be having fun.”
Tamara stood, wobbly, and said, “She’s just upset about something that happened earlier. I’ll be back later.”
Amber heard the door slam and frowned. The walls around her were white, but covered in posters and pictures: Bob Marley, Malcolm X, Sylvia Plath, The Beatles, a Disney Princess collage, photos of Tamara and Amber together, and pictures Amber had taken for the photography class she dropped out of. A bed just large enough to accommodate two bodies pressed against the far wall. There was a desk set up in the corner with a laptop. Amber sat at the desk and turned the laptop on. She went to google images and typed in “cupcakes”. Her stomach knotted as she clicked through the pictures, imagining how the multicolored frosting would taste on her tongue. She pretended to smell them and feel their texture against her fingertips. It was in this way she tried to calm her cravings. It never worked. She traced her fingernail along the surface of the oak desk, unconsciously sucking in her stomach. She wondered where Tamara went, and thought about the apartment that would never be theirs, and about the man from earlier too, how he had added to the gulf between them, uncovering a painful truth that they had tried to bury. It always started like this. First the vague feeling of anxiety, brought on by stress that gradually increased into physical symptoms: sweaty palms, stomach pain, increased heart rate, and shortness of breath. It always ended the same way too.

Rain poured oppressively down on Tamara’s hooded head as she walked the streets of downtown Seattle. The night life was in full bloom. Faces she had never seen before were everywhere, yet they were always the same. The under 21 crowd, the drunk college kids, the 30 but I’m still cool guys, the 50 year old couples coming back from dinner and ice cream, and the sordid 40 year old men looking to pick up on any girls who had just a little too much to drink. She didn’t fit in with any of them, she thought. She was the gay black girl who studied medieval Russian literature, who intimidated guys her age and was called a dyke by girls who felt threatened by her. She once heard a rumor that one of the frats on campus nicknamed her the “the midnight dyke,” but she didn’t know if it was true or not. Two blocks from the strip club she was beginning to feel the effects of the alcohol. In her stomach and small intestines, blood vessels carried it to the blood stream to be metabolized by the liver. The central nervous system was slowing and motor skills, reaction time, and intelligent thought were diminishing; Blissful inebriation.
Rob Zombie and cigarettes and sweat and hollers and flashing lights assaulted her senses, she never felt more at home. She didn’t tell Amber about these visits, she wouldn’t approve. Tamara considered her disregard for Amber’s feelings an act of mercy; all lovers kept secrets in order not to hurt the other. As she pushed her way to the bar an Asian girl dancing on stage caught her attention. She gyrated her hips to the beat, pressing erotically against the pole on stage and twirling around it. With a twist of her hips she ripped her skirt off, and Tamara cheered with everyone else.
“What’ll it be, sugar pie?” The bartender said.
“Vodka Red Bull,” she said, still watching the girl on stage. She had nicer breasts than Amber’s. “Do you take cards?”
“Cash only,” he said, setting her drink in front of her.
She slid him a 20 and then pushed off the bar, gravitating towards the stage. Hues of gold and green flickered and flashed from the ceiling, illuminating swirling smoke from cigars and cigarettes, creating a haze. It was a fog Tamara appreciated. It fed her need for an altered reality, a few precious hours when she wasn’t who she was. The energy in the room was electrifying. She felt like part of the collective mass, all forming together to make the club what it is, a haven for self-indulgence. As the Asian girl finished gathering the bills thrown onstage a man standing next to Tamara yelled over the noise, “How’s it going?”, and smiled at her. She laughed and cheered louder as the girl on stage bowed and scurried off. The man next to her clapped and then turned his attention back on Tamara.
“Buy you a drink?”
Tamara thought of Amber moping around her and Pat’s apartment, the faithful girlfriend who couldn’t give her what she wanted, and made her feel guilty about it. She thought how her decisions were always compromised by her relationship, always leaving her unsatisfied. About the summer she wanted to buy a motorcycle and travel across the country so she could feel what it was like to be free, a creation of God, between sky and ocean, and how Amber didn’t approve.
“Vodka tonic,” she said.
The pair sat down at a table near the back of the room.
“What’s your name?”
“Tamara.”
“I’m Jack. You come here often?”
“When I need to unwind,” she said.
He slapped his hand on the table and said, “That’s so cool! I wish more girls were like you.”
Tamara grinned. All her problems were drowning in alcohol and compliments. She noticed a table across the room of men watching her, and she leaned forward, saying, “friends of yours?”
Jack glanced at the table and laughed. “Yeah, they’re probably dying of jealousy right now. I’m the only one out of us who’s managed to get a beautiful girl to talk with him.”
Tamara smiled and finished her drink, gripping the edge of the table for support.
“I’m drunk!”
Jack laughed and nodded, “I know.”
She didn’t know who was playing over the speakers, but the music was like an aphrodisiac. She closed her eyes, sucking on her bottom lip and rocking her shoulders and hips to the hypnotic beat, feeling it stir dormant memories and feelings.
“You know what would be sexy? If you got on stage and danced like that for everyone.”
Tamara opened her eyes and saw nothing but truth on Jacks face. Without pause she stood and sashayed to the stage. Jack ran to the table his friends were at, giddy.
“She’s doing it! I convinced the midnight dyke to dance! Get out your cameras boys, this is gonna be good.”

Growing up a middle class white boy in Iowa hadn’t prepared Pat for city life, or “diversity”, as his mother put it. She had a large vocabulary full of language to disguise her closet racism, and was a quick study on how to use it in the most politically correct yet backhanded ways, “She’s pretty for a black girl,” she once said of Naomi Campbell. Pat never saw what the big deal was though. He was friends with everybody. For his senior prom he asked Anita, the Mexican girl in the wheelchair everyone was nice to but kept at a distance, to be his date. His mother thought he did it to spite her, but he was just taking his convictions and applying it to his actions. He danced with her all night, not out of pity or guilt, but because she was beautiful and intelligent and didn’t even know it. To this day it was still the best date he’s ever been on. He thought about Anita a lot lately, and how she, and most people, needed outside confirmation of positive qualities, and how they rarely get them. Sighing, he cast Anita from his thoughts and rolled out of bed, going to the kitchen for a glass of water. As he walked back to his room he heard a strange sound coming from the bathroom.
Amber shoved two fingers down her throat, self-inducing the gag reflex and vomiting into the toilet. She hugged it, crying into the seat. Pat pressed his ear to the door and then tapped it on.
“Amber? Are you ok?” Pat asked.
“Go away.”
Pat twisted the knob, and to his surprise the door opened. What he saw made his heart ache in a way it never had, like he was feeling it for the first time.
“Amber…”
She couldn’t act angry or indignant anymore. She just cried, unabashed. Pat knelt down beside her and she threw her arms around him, burying her face into his shoulder.
“What’s wrong, Amber?”
She looked up at him, the edges of her lips caked with vomit.
“Please don’t tell anyone, Pat,” she said.
He grabbed a hand towel from the sink, wet it, and then knelt again, wiping gently at her mouth.
“Not a soul,” he said, still cleaning her off.
“You must think I’m pathetic,” she said.
“I’ll never think that, Amber. Come on, let’s get you into bed,” he said, helping her up and leading her to Tamara’s room. Amber lay down and closed her eyes. Pat drifted around the room, looking around like he hadn’t been in it in months.
“I never understood why you two hung up that Disney Princess poster. It doesn’t fit in.”
“It’s just a reminder, that’s all.”
“A reminder for what?” he asked.
“What do all the Princesses have in common, Pat?”
He studied it closer, looking for anything that stood out. Maybe the artists forgot to color in Aurora’s hair, or draw Bell’s hands, or didn’t give Cinderella her slippers. Then he realized what it was. He faced Amber, feeling completely inadequate and overwhelmed.

Tamara stumbled home, struggling to hold her torn shirt together over her chest. Her back was covered in scratches, but it was nothing compared to the shame and degradation she felt.

The next morning Pat was woken up by the phone ringing in the living room. He yawned and rubbed his eyes, stumbling out of bed. He stretched in his doorway. The door next to his opened, and Tamara and Amber came out in their robes, Amber leaning her head sleepily against Tamara’s shoulder.
“Morning,” Pat said, as the message machine did its thing.
“Hi, you’ve reached Pat and Tamara’s apartment; we’re not home right now, so leave a message.”
“Hi, this is John Waterman calling about the apartment on Circle St. Sorry I didn’t get back to you yesterday, but the apartment rented. Sorry for the trouble.”
There was a long, oppressive silence in the room as the three of them stood there, each contemplating what they had heard.
“Come on, let’s go back to bed,” Tamara finally said, and her and Amber disappeared back into her room.
Pat stood there. He thought about his mother and Nicole, and about Tamara and Ron Waterman and Amber, and all his buddies back in Iowa, and the friends he had made in Seattle and the Disney Princesses. He thought about all of them.