Three Women (9 page)

Byrne said, "I was just about to make some breakfast."

"Oh, let me make it" Paula said, leaping up and dashing after Byrne to the kitchen area. It was not the old fashioned sort of kitchen, but an alcove off the living room. A circular booth of black leather substituted for a regular dining table.

They both reached for the refrigerator door at the same time. It was then that Paula noticed the red streaks swollen on Byrne's arm. She was about to exclaim over them, but the look in Byrne's eyes stilled her. It wasn't a challenging glance or expression that dared Paula to pry. Rather there was something that beseeched Paula to leave her in peace. The bantering laughter had vanished.

Paula struggled with her concern. Her natural desire to exclaim over the ugly bruises fought against her intelligence which cautioned silence. Instead of questioning Byrne, she reached for the bacon. While she lay strips of meat into the frying pan, her gaze firmly held to the task, Byrne broke eggs and stirred them. Paula thought, if she respects me, she’ll give me some explanation. But at the same time, she wasn't sure if she yet deserved this right to Byrne's respect

Paula concentrated on breakfast, glad for the excuse of eating not to make meaningless conversation.

By the time they wandered into the living room with their coffee cups, Paula had recovered from her awkwardness. Immediately she went to the easel. Her sketch pads were nowhere to be seen. She remembered that Byrne had put them away the night before... after she left.

Byrne said, "Oh, I stashed them back in the closet I didn't suppose we would be having another lesson again, quite so soon." Her voice was dry, but it held a hint of gladness.

"If it bores you..." Paula began.

"Quite the contrary. I enjoy you and your enthusiasm. It's good for me, you know. You help me forget things for a while.'' She turned for the bedroom. Paula stayed her with a hand on the bruised arm.

"Don't bother," she said. "I’ll get them." She was glad for the excuse to go back into that bedroom. It held the clues that she must discover. If only she could be smart enough to piece them together.

Byrne let her go. Paula went eagerly, but still with some distaste. The bedroom was like a dead thing from which she must not avert her eyes. Courage and hope to Paula's aid because she knew that Byrne was giving her the chance to discover whatever she could.

Standing at the doorway, Paula stared about this room of hidden tortures. The sheets, tangled with blankets, lay in a heap. One pillow dangled halfway the floor. The other seemed dashed against the headboard, its striped ticking hanging out like ripped guts. Violence was everywhere. The cigarette case gaped open its side. A comb had landed on the windowsill. Beneath it on the floor lay one curtain that had been torn from its rod.

Steadily Paula observed these signs of rage. One question, more demanding than all the others: Did Greta do this? It must be Greta. Surely Byrne would lot inflict those marks upon herself. She righted the cigarette box and searched the angelic face of evil. She recalled the degraded, puffy creature who had passed beneath the street lights. Certainly Greta was capable anything. It occurred to Paula that this woman was not in her right mind. Oh, my poor Byrne, she thought, why do you feel responsible for this creature? For she knew Byrne was strong enough to free herself, if only she wanted to do so.

Miserably, Paula went to the closet. She put her cheek against Byrne's jacket and clung to it, begging knowledge and understanding. The intimate smell of Byrne's clothes flamed her agony into tears. Goodness, warmth, love was Byrne. Not insane fury that shredded life's meaning into tatters. But she swallowed her tears and reached up for the sketch pads neatly stacked on the shelf. As she pulled them down, a shower of loose drawings fluttered and scattered about her shoulders. Carefully, she retrieved them. As she sorted the portraits, their serenity and blending colors made her calmer. For each was signed with the initials B.E.

When she had put them back, she left the room and went businesslike to the easel. Byrne lay on the couch, her coffee cup resting on the buckle of her trousers.

"No comment?" Byrne said, her eyes narrowing alertly as Paula flipped open to a clean page.

"No comment." Paula's voice was steady. She wet her lips and quickly began to draw. She would show Byrne how well she could take all this. Paula's importance, after all, was making Byrne forget. Her business would be to make her forget, not for a while, but forever. She concentrated on the reclining figure to draw its magnificent lines and shadows.

When she had been sketching for a while and Byrne seemed relaxed, Paula said casually, 'It would be nice if you'd tell me your last name. You know, just for the record." She kept her eyes looking at the picture so Byrne could not tell if Paula were leading up to anything.

"You're a funny girl," Byrne said, and Paula knew she had made the right move. "And the reason I like you is not because you're talented. God knows, talented people are a dime a dozen. But you have courage and faith in something that seems to promise nothing but unhappiness. I admire you for it."

Paula thought, I have faith in you, Byrne. But she kept her silence. Better to let Byrne talk, if she would. Paula continued drawing.

"Yes, I like you very much." Byrne's voice was low and flowed gently. Paula sensed that the door to Byrne was beginning to open. "You're emotional, yet you know how to control it. People much older than yourself rarely learn that. You're wise with nature's wisdom."

Paula caught a quick glance of the daylight quietly playing among the strands of red gold in Byrne's hair. Speak, my darling, speak. Share the secrets with me that are tearing you.

As though she heard her thoughts, Byrne continued. "If you were anyone else, Paula, I would send you away. In fact I don't even know, now, whether I shouldn't. Perhaps I don't because I am selfish. You offer..."

A jiggling of the doorknob halted Byrne's words. They both turned to it. The knob rattled, waited a few moments, rattled harder.

"Damn it to hell!" Byrne's voice rasped.

Fists pounded on the other side.

Paula said nothing. She stood still. She watched Byrne.

Knuckles drummed insistently, demanding attention.

Byrne flung herself off the couch. She strode to the door. Paula held her breath as Byrne opened it.

Head tilted like a puppy's, Greta looked up at Byrne.

"I think I want to go to the movies." Her voice floated like the wind high above the trees. "Is it all right if I go to the movies, dear? You won't be angry?" Aimlessly, her fingers moved in the air. Dainty fingers with jagged skin stained brown from iodine.

"Of course I won't be angry."

Paula listened with astonishment to the soothing tone that Byrne used. She seemed to be speaking to a baby.

"You go to the movies and have a good time. Have you enough money?"

"I have a dollar left from what you gave me. It only costs sixty-five cents."

Instinctively Byrne's hand went to her pocket.

"No, don't give me any more. I might lose it." The face puckered its lips. Byrne leaned over and kissed them. Greta made a happy childlike sound. Then she turned and strolled away.

Byrne closed the door and leaned heavily against it. She took one cigarette from her pocket and lit it slowly. Paula saw anger working itself outward, growing stiffly into the lips, flaming bright in the slanting eyes. "So that's it," Byrne said. She clutched one hand around the matchbook. Knuckles bulged whitely. Her anger didn't stab at Paula, it curled around herself and choked her blood into red spots on her cheeks. "That's Greta, my dear. Or what's left of her." She came across the room and stood very close to Paula. She stared full into the girl's face but did not focus on her. It unnerved Paula to be looked at so hard and yet not seen. "You were jealous of competition. A healthy young thing like you was jealous of that."

Paula struggled to make some sound, to make Byrne feel her presence. "Yes, I was jealous," she hit back. "And I'm still jealous of the past I can't fight. It's not fair for something like Greta to be my competition." She jabbed her pencil at the paper and ripped a dark line furiously down the page. "How can I fight a nightmare? Why must you live with it? Drag everything that's good in you down into a senseless misery?"

"Why, indeed?" Byrne echoed. 'It's so simple for you to make up rules on how to live and be happy. I should chuck Greta into a sanitarium and forget she ever existed. Forget those years we innocently lived together. Wouldn't it be convenient for you if I could say it wasn't my fault, my cowardice that sent Greta away."

"Whatever you did," Paula urged softly, "was not cowardly."

Byrne snorted and turned over a new page of Paula's book. "Let's drop it," she said. "I haven't the stomach."

But Paula flung the pencil aside and pulled Byrne down with her to the couch. "I don't care what you did. You aren't responsible for Greta's mind." She put her arms around Byrne's waist and pressed her cheek to her chest "But you are responsible for mine because you're torturing me. I act like a big shot but I don't know what I'm doing, really. Last night if you had let me, I wouldn't even have known..." her voice trailed away.

"You're smarter than you realize," Byrne muttered. She put her lips to the girl's hair and Paula felt the warm breath on her scalp.

"If I were smart, I would have you," she answered, "all to myself with nothing to stop us from being happy." The closeness of Byrne weakened her. She craved the lips and the flesh of her body. Good sense disappeared and she buried her mouth in the woman's neck.

"If you stay with me, you will never know any happiness." Byrne's tone was bitter with self-hatred.

"I love you. You can't stop me from loving you." She clung to Byrne and moved her head down to the opening of her shirt.

"No, I can't stop you," Byrne whispered, her voice vibrant with growing passion. "But I can destroy you.”

Paula laughed into the warm flesh. "I'm not Greta," she murmured, so you can't. "I'm Paula."

"Yes. Paula," she said curiously, as though aware for the first time of this new person in her arms.

But Paula was not content to remain like this, contact only half complete on the couch. She wanted Byrne to take her into the bedroom. Yet how could they go in there? The remains, the echoes of Greta would mock them.

If only we could leave this place, Paula thought. Go far, far away where no past could interfere. If only for a weekend she could have Byrne all to herself.

"Paula," Byrne said. "I want you to do something for me."

"Anything. You know that."

"Then listen carefully and don't question what I say." She held the girl tightly and Paula felt the buckle pressing against her own stomach. "I want you to go. There is nothing here, with me, that can be any good for you. Even if you don't believe me now, in time you will see the truth of it."

She hugged Byrne with all her strength. A frightened sick feeling swam through her. Leave Byrne! When at last she had found the one thing in life worth fighting for?

"Don't struggle against me, Paula. Just do as I say. Trust it blindly, for my sake, no matter how much it hurts."

Wordlessly Paula shook her head. She couldn't speak. Her throat tightened with desperation. Give Byrne up? Nothing short of death could make her do that. Not even Byrne herself. She had to show Byrne that Greta couldn't stop her. She realized that if Byrne did not care for her, she wouldn't be asking this. She would enjoy their moments, indifferent to what finally happened. As long as Byrne cared, Paula would not leave her.

Somehow, Paula freed herself from Byrne's arms. She stood up, swaying from her own confusion. There must be something she could do to prove to Byrne how wrong it was for her to ask this.

Byrne, mistaking Paula's action, said, "That's a smart girl. Cut yourself off clean and sharp. The wound will heal quicker that way."

Paula hardly heard her. Engrossed in her confused thoughts, she stumbled through a jungle of words, trying to find the right ones.

"I'm not leaving you, Byrne." Unable to look at the woman, she lifted her gaze to the beautiful portrait. "Don't ask me to do something I'll regret for the rest of my life." Her voice was hardly more than a whisper. "Long ago, you listened to reason. You were sensible and did what was supposed to be the right thing. But it was all wrong for you. It would be just as wrong for me to leave you now."

Byrne said nothing. Paula didn't know how she was taking it. She couldn't face Byrne, knowing that her words must be cutting into her. "You don't save me by asking me to go," Paula continued. 'If you care for me the smallest bit, you’ll let me stay with you. Maybe I'm a bigger coward than you realize. I haven't the will to go out into that lonely world again since I've found you. If you've learned anything from leaving Greta, you must know how I can't bear to sacrifice this wonderful thing you've given me." She sighed wearily.

"If you don't go," Byrne answered, "I won't be responsible for you." The words were precise, yet underlying them was a hint of gratefulness. For the first time since she had met Byrne, Paula was convinced that she was in some way needed. A strange peace floated around her. And she was ready for whatever destiny might have in store.

She turned and gazed at Byrne from a distance. Their glances met and each was touched by the other's smile. Byrne got up and went to the window. She pulled down the shade. A semi-darkness covered the room. Paula stood where she was until Byrne approached her. She let the woman draw her into the circle of her embrace. The full, sincere kiss told Paula she had won. And slowly, with the sure instincts of love, Byrne drew Paula to the couch and taught her the way of fulfillment.

Afterward, Paula saw and heard a change come over Byrne. The crust of challenge that coated Byrne's words broke and fell away. What had been the cold beauty of her form seemed tinged with a golden warmth. And Paula, soothed by the experience of completion, floated gently into sleep, secure within this new intimacy.