Until that point, the sounds of the party going on around us had been muted but still distinct. But the minute Ruby said what she said, the minute I heard the word lesbian, my blood started beating so fast that my pulse was all I could hear. I was not paying attention to what was flying out of Ruby’s mouth. I could only catch certain words, like girl and dyke and twisted.
The skin on my chest felt hot. My ears burned.
I did my best to calm myself. And when I did, when I focused on Ruby’s words, I finally heard the other piece of what she was trying to tell me.
“You should probably get a better handle on your husband, by the way. He’s in Ari’s bedroom getting a blow job from some harpy from MGM.”
When she said it, I did not think, Oh, my God. My husband is cheating on me. I thought, I have to find Celia.
EVELYN GETS UP OFF THE sofa and picks up the phone, asking Grace to order us dinner from the Mediterranean place on the corner.
“Monique? What would you like? Beef or chicken?”
“Chicken, I guess.” I watch her, waiting for her to sit back down and resume her story. But when she does sit, she merely looks at me. She neither acknowledges what she has just told me nor admits what I’ve been suspecting for some time now. I have no choice but to be direct. “Did you know?”
“Did I know what?”
“That Celia St. James was gay?”
“I’m telling you the story as it unfolded.”
“Well, yes,” I say. “But . . .”
“But what?” Evelyn is calm, perfectly composed. And I can’t tell if it’s because she knows what I suspect and she’s finally ready to tell the truth or because I’m dead wrong and so she has no idea what I’m thinking.
I’m not sure I want to ask the question before I know the answer.
Evelyn’s lips are together in a straight line. Her eyes are focused directly on me. But I notice, as she’s waiting for me to speak, that her chest is rising and falling at a rapid pace. She’s nervous. She’s not as confident as she’s letting on. She’s an actress, after all. I should know well enough by now that what you see isn’t always what you get with Evelyn.
So I ask her the question in a way that lets her tell me as much, or as little, as she’s ready to say. “Who was the love of your life?”
Evelyn looks me in the eye, and I know she needs one more tiny push.
“It’s OK, Evelyn. Really.”
It’s a big deal. But it is OK. Things are different now from how they were then. Although still not entirely safe, either, I have to admit.
But still.
She can say it.
She can say it to me.
She can admit it, freely. Now. Here.
“Evelyn, who was your great love? You can tell me.”
Evelyn looks out the window, breathes in deeply, and then says, “Celia St. James.”
The room is quiet as Evelyn lets herself hear her own words. And then she smiles, a bright, wide, deeply sincere smile. She starts laughing to herself and then refocuses on me. “I feel like I spent my entire life loving her.”
“So this book, your biography . . . you’re ready to come out as a gay woman?”
Evelyn closes her eyes for a moment, and at first I think she is processing the weight of what I’ve said, but once she opens her eyes again, I realize she is trying to process my stupidity.
“Haven’t you been listening to a single thing I’ve told you? I loved Celia, but I also, before her, loved Don. In fact, I’m positive that if Don hadn’t turned out to be a spectacular asshole, I probably never would have been capable of falling in love with someone else at all. I’m bisexual. Don’t ignore half of me so you can fit me into a box, Monique. Don’t do that.”
This stings. Hard. I know how it feels for people to assume things about you, to prescribe a label for you based on how you appear to them. I have spent my life trying to explain to people that while I look black, I am biracial. I have spent my life knowing the importance of allowing people to tell you who they are instead of reducing them to labels.