Queermance Anthology, Volume 1 (2 page)

She didn't want to push her luck, so once she had gathered these items safely in her pack, she
retreated outside the storage room. As she waited for Amana to finish, she pulled out her radio and
replaced the batteries. When Amana finally emerged from the room, Chase was fiddling with the tuner.

'Are you coming?' Amana asked her.

'One more second…' Chase muttered, pursing her lips as she concentrated on the crackling
sounds coming from the machine.

Music burst from the speakers and Chase let out a cry of triumph.

'Okay,' Chase said as she hoisted the radio onto her shoulder. 'We can go now.'

Chase smiled at the other woman. Amana shook her head and continued on.

Chase followed closely as they climbed to the next level. A song she liked came on the radio, and
she began to sing along, until she realised that she didn't know as many of the words as she had
thought and hummed along instead.

Amana frowned at Chase, who stopped humming immediately.

'Sorry,' Chase muttered. 'Note to self: no singing or humming.'

'It's not that,' Amana said. 'Aren't you afraid that people will hear the music?'

'Not really,' Chase replied with a shrug. 'Who's going to hear it; other scavengers? Besides,
I've got my blade.'

'Fat lot of good that does you.'

'Hey, usually I don't have to worry about guns. You're the first scavenger I've met that carries
one.'

They continued up one level and then the next. Amana stayed silent, but with Chase's radio
playing it didn't feel nearly as lonely.

As they walked, the building creaked and moaned beneath their feet. It grew cooler as well, and
soon Chase could feel the gentle kiss of a very welcome breeze on her face.

When they turned a corner, Chase discovered exactly why that was. A chunk of the building had
collapsed. Several floors had fallen on top of each other and now let fresh air from the outside
flow into the rest of the building.

The stairs were a mess. Chase picked her way carefully over the rubble, using a fallen cement
pillar that had once been part of the building's support structure as an alternate route to the next
floor. Amana climbed up after her.

As Chase set her feet down carefully on the surface of the next floor, the building let out
another loud moan in protest. Several ceiling tiles and chunks of flooring fell away.

'I'm not so sure this part of the building is safe,' Chase muttered. 'Maybe we should turn
back.'

'It'll be fine,' Amana assured her. 'Although if you want to turn back and leave the rest of the
building to me, I have no objections.'

Chase pursed her lips. She had contemplated doing what Amana suggested, but Amana's challenge
quickly steeled her resolve to stay.

She stormed ahead, nudged aside a few ceiling tiles with her foot and was about to get to work
when she felt the floor shudder beneath her feet.

She realised that she was standing only metres away from what had once been the side of the
building, and what was now a twenty storey plummet into the watery streets below. She might survive
such a fall, if she was lucky, landed in deep water and didn't hit anything on the way down, but she
definitely didn't want to risk it. This high up she was more likely to break her neck or back, and
if she did survive the fall, the odds of her being too injured to swim to safety were way too high
for her to be comfortable.

She shuffled back a little, and eyed off a desk a few metres away from the drop.

Meanwhile, something had caught Amana's eye and led her to pick through the most damaged corner
of the building. Chase wondered what it was when Amana let out a happy shout and emerged from a pile
of rubble holding something. It was small and pale and glinted in the light.

'What is it?' Chase asked. 'Is it jewellery?'

'Not quite,' Amana told her. The woman looked happier with her current find than she had all day.
'It's crystal. It's a bear, I think. It's not worth nearly as much as jewellery would be, but art as
beautiful as this should not be left behind, regardless of its value.'

Chase was about to agree with Amana when the whole floor let out another loud moan and lurched to
the side. There was a rumbling, and then a crackle, and then several pieces of the floor broke from
the side of the building and plummeted into the water below. The floor began to tilt and shake.

Chase moved to the nearest standing support pillar and grabbed onto it with all of her strength.
She glanced back at Amana in time to see the other woman lose her balance.

Chase let out a cry of distress as Amana slid towards the drop. Chase was sure that Amana was
going to fall, but before she reached the point of no return, the other woman managed to grab hold
of an exposed beam.

Amana would not be able to hold onto it for long though. The crystal bear had fallen from her
hand and fell off the ledge beside her, plunging to the distant water.

Amana's brown eyes met Chase's green ones, and for a second Chase cursed herself, knowing that
there was no way she could stand by and watch Amana fall.

She threw her pack and radio towards the more stable end of the floor, then dropped to the ground
and crawled as slowly as she could towards Amana.

The floor rumbled and Chase was sure that it would snap off from the rest of the building at any
second, taking both her and Amana with it. She was close to Amana now; so close that she could
almost reach out and touch her.

She extended her hand towards the other woman.

'What are you doing?!' Amana screamed at her.

'Come on!' Chase screamed back, knowing that her intent to save Amana was perfectly obvious.
'I'll pull you up!'

Amana glanced at Chase's outstretched hand, then at the drop behind her, and then finally back up
at Chase, before cursing loudly and reaching for Chase's hand.

She had almost made it when the building lurched again, throwing Amana back and almost making her
lose her grip. Chase squealed. Amana grit her teeth, forced herself back up and over the ledge, and
reached out for Chase's hand once more.

Chase's fingers brushed against the other woman's palm, and within seconds they both felt the
reassuring grip of their hands around each other's wrists. Chase took a deep breath, took hold of
the nearest piece of rubble that looked like it would support their combined weight, and pulled with
all of her might.

Amana scrambled back onto the floor, and the two of them half crawled and half ran, not stopping
until they were safely on the other side of the building, where the floor was stable and they could
relax.

The floor where they had been only seconds earlier broke from the rest of the building and
plunged to the waterways with a loud splash.

'Well, that was more exciting than I'm used to,' Chase commented.

Amana was staring at her.

'You saved my life,' Amana muttered.

Chase shrugged.

'Yeah,' she said. 'I guess maybe I did.'

They were both silent then, and Chase quickly turned her attention to recovering her discarded
backpack and radio. She picked up the radio and cursed as she realised it had stopped working again,
this time for good. It had broken when she had thrown it.

Beside her, Amana let out a much louder curse. Chase looked over to discover that she had also
been doing a stocktake of her equipment and supplies.

'What is it?' Chase asked.

'A lot of things fell from my pack,' Amana told her. 'Including most of my food and the medicine
we scavenged earlier, and I've lost my gun.'

'Well, we can always look for some more supplies tomorrow,' Chase suggested. 'I don't know about
you, but I was planning to stay here tonight anyway.'

Amana curled up, wrapping her arms around her legs and pulling them close to her body. She looked
surprisingly vulnerable without the weapon she had carried earlier, and Chase realised how small
Amana really was. It seemed strange. Amana didn't act small.

Chase smiled at Amana, trying to encourage her. She was happy when Amana smiled back, even if
Chase could tell that it was forced.

'Well, we're not going to go hungry at least,' Chase remarked as she rummaged in her pack. She
pulled out the cans of tuna Amana had let her scavenge earlier. 'I know. It's not very exciting, is
it? Luckily I also have this!'

Amana's eyes lit up as Chase pulled a whole block of chocolate from her bag. Chase was glad now
that she had made the trade. She and Amana definitely needed chocolate after what they had been
through.

It wasn't the worst meal Chase had ever eaten, but it far from glamorous. The cans of tuna needed
to be opened with Chase's machete, and the chocolate had melted a little.

The sun set as they ate, casting over the city a golden pink glow that bounced off the water and
the glass surfaces of the buildings. Chase and Amana agreed that it was a beautiful sight. Amana
finally seemed ready to be friendly with Chase as well, and as they picked at the last of the
chocolate, Chase found herself talking to the other woman as though she was an old friend.

'So, what's your story?' Chase asked.

'My story?'

'Come on, every scavenger has a story. How did you get started?'

Amana wrapped her arms a little tighter around her knees.

'You first,' she said to Chase. 'Why did you become a scavenger?'

'Well, I'm not very good at cooking,' Chase chuckled, 'Or at making things, and I'm not really
that smart, or good with animals. My Dad was a scavenger. He used to bring me out here all the time
when I was little, and he'd tell me stories as we explored the city together. He taught me
everything I know about scavenging. When he died I…'

It had been almost a year now, but that didn't stop Chase from choking up when it came time to
speak of her father. She could still see his ginger-bearded face, and his twinkling eyes. Everyone
always said she took after him.

'I didn't know what else to do,' Chase concluded.

They were both silent for a moment, and then Amana began to speak.

'I used to have a partner,' Amana told her. 'She was the one that got me into scavenging. We used
to sneak down here all the time and see what we could find. We'd spend days away from our families,
and away from civilisation.'

'What happened to her?' Chase asked.

'She got pregnant,' Amana said.

'Huh? Oh!' Chase exclaimed. 'When you said partner I thought you meant-'

'I did,' Amana interrupted. 'Whatever definition of partner you thought I meant, it was correct.
She was everything to me, at least for a while.'

'But she left you for a guy?' Chase asked. She looked Amana over again, feeling more than a
little shocked. 'Oh my god. She must have been crazy!'

Chase was afraid she had been insensitive, but Amana laughed, the sound echoing around their
encampment and making it feel much warmer than it had a few moments ago.

'Thanks,' Amana said, wiping a tear from the corner of her eye. 'You didn't need to flatter me
like that but I appreciate the thought.'

'I mean it, though,' Chase told her. 'You're really pretty.'

Amana shrugged and Chase would have sworn that her cheeks darkened in a blush.

'Thanks,' Amana muttered. 'You're… you're kind of cute too.'

Chase felt her eyes widen, and knew from the sudden warmth in her cheeks that she was blushing
much more obviously than the other woman. She shuffled closer to Amana, slowly at first, then more
quickly when she realised Amana didn't find the increased intimacy unwelcome, until there was only
an inch or two of space between them.

'So, um…' Amana muttered, 'You don't have anyone waiting for you back home?'

She moved as she spoke and her knee brushed against Chase's leg.

'No,' Chase replied, 'It's just me.'

'Good,' Amana said.

She leaned forward, and the next thing Chase knew, Amana was kissing her. She kissed her back.
Amana's lips were soft and tasted of the chocolate they had been eating.

Chase felt the other woman's fingers run through her hair, and didn't know whether to lean into
the touch or further into the kiss. She heard a small whimper and it was a few seconds before she
realised that the sound had come from her.

Amana pulled back from the kiss and chuckled softly. For a moment, Chase was worried, then
Amana's lips pressed against her own once more and there was no more room in her mind for worry.

Chase wasn't sure when or how it happened, but after what could have been mere minutes or entire
hours she found herself lying on the floor with Amana on top of her. The kissing that they had been
engrossed in was put on hold as several items of clothing were shed and put aside.

Chase ran her hands over Amana's skin, marvelling at how smooth it was. Her own skin was rough,
and covered in freckles and splotches. Amana was curvy in all the right ways too. If Amana was silk
then Chase knew she was no more than sandpaper.

At that moment Amana's lips latched onto Chase's neck, removing all thoughts and self-doubt from
her mind. Amana's hands drifted lower and as the two women lost themselves in each other's touches,
it was very easy for Chase to forget that she was anything but perfect.

****

The sun streamed through the window and onto Chase's features. She scrunched up her
eyes against it and tried to roll over, until she realised something, or rather someone, was pinning
her arm in place.

Memories of the previous day returned to her, and she slowly opened her eyes to see Amana's face.
She looked surprisingly sweet and peaceful in sleep. Chase reached over and tucked a strand of hair
behind the other woman's ear, as gently as she could, hoping that she wouldn't wake Amana.

Chase didn't know whether it was the touch that did it, but Amana's eyes opened. She blinked a
couple of times and then frowned, and Chase wondered if she regretted what they had done.

'Morning,' Amana muttered. Her eyes darted over Chase's body, reminding Chase that she was still
very naked.