Significant Others (16 page)
Polly nodded slowly, taking it in. “That’s pretty swanky, isn’t it?”
“Well … parts of it.”
“Are you a Dowry Dyke?”
DeDe laughed. “Not if I don’t go to that workshop.”
Polly smiled at her. “Wanna go for a walk instead?”
Their hour-long odyssey took them through most of the subdivisions at Wimminwood, through the chemical-free and chemical-tolerant communities, through the zone for the loud-and-rowdy, the zone for the differently abled, the zone for sober support. “God,” said Polly when they reached the riverbank, “it’s a wonder they don’t issue us fuckin’ visas or something.”
“I suppose it makes things easier,” said DeDe, paying lip service to D’or’s argument. She wasn’t used to dealing with someone so unapologetically incorrect.
Polly’s brown eyes wandered to the end of the beach, where a woman was sunning in the nude. “You ever take your shirt off?” she asked.
“No,” said DeDe. “Not really. No.”
“Why not?”
DeDe shrugged. “My lover and I discussed it. We just don’t think it’s necessary. We don’t need to prove anything to anybody.”
Polly looked at her sideways, then skipped a flat stone on the water. “Chicken,” she said.
Having lost track of the time, DeDe left Polly in haste just before noon. She ran the last hundred yards to her appointed duty post, a large open-sided tent near the entrance to Wimminwood. It was crawling with efficient women in black T-shirts.
She approached the one she recognized, the cheerful black woman who had greeted them at the gate. “Excuse me, please.”
The woman swung around. “I know you. Uh … big Buick full of brats.”
DeDe laughed. “Don’t rub it in.”
“I’m Teejay, and you’re …?”
“DeDe.”
“Right. What can I do for you?”
“I’m looking for the security chief.”
Teejay looked around. “I think she’s gone out for … No, there she is … over there, next to the butt cans.”
“I’m sorry … the what?”
“Butt cans, precious. You know …” She made a cryptic motion, encircling her waist with her hands. “Her name is Rose. The one with the haircut.”
DeDe felt her face drain. Rose with the haircut. The hateful Rose. The monster who’d deported Edgar to the boys’ compound.
Unmistakably the chief, she was leaning against a tent post in loose green fatigue pants. Her breasts, which were bared today, had turned Spam-pink in the broiling sun.
DeDe approached warily, berating herself for not choosing Garbage Patrol, or even Health Care, for heaven’s sake. Rose looked at her and said: “We meet again.”
“Looks like it,” said DeDe.
“You the noon relief?”
“Uh-huh.”
“You’re not in uniform, then.” Rose reached into a box on the ground and produced one of the black T-shirts, handing it to DeDe. “I need you at the gate,” she said. “I usually handle it myself, but there’s been some trouble over in chem-free.”
DeDe nodded. “Will somebody show me … uh … what I’m supposed to …”
“Right. That’s my job.” Rose winked at her almost amiably, and DeDe felt a little surge of relief. If all the woman wanted was to be in charge, DeDe was more than willing to oblige.
Leading her out to the gate, Rose explained the intricacies of the job. “Mostly you answer questions. Stuff about the various zones, where they should park.
Don’t
let any cars onto the land unless they’ve got a pass.”
DeDe was still a little uneasy. “The zones. I don’t really know where …”
“Here’s a map,” said Rose, handing her a dog-eared pamphlet. “It’s all there.”
“Good.”
“Oh, yeah. You’ll probably have to deal with the Porto-Jane men.”
“I’m sorry … the what?”
“We call the toilets Porto-Janes,” said Rose.
Wouldn’t you just? thought DeDe. “Then … I let these guys come onto the land?”
“Yeah,” said Rose. “They’re the
only
men we allow onto the land. They clean out the Porto-Janes and leave. It takes about an hour total. They’ve got a truck and ID badges, so ask to see ‘em.”
“Gotcha,” said DeDe.
“There’s a walkie-talkie at the gate. You can always call for reinforcements if there’s anything you can’t handle on your own. It’s been quiet so far.”
“Thank God,” said DeDe.
“Don’t you mean Goddess?” said Rose.
The shift turned out to be far less threatening than DeDe had imagined. She spent most of her time chatting with friendly women in overloaded cars. When they groused about the parking regulations, they did it with good humor, and one or two of them had even sent wolf whistles in her direction.
Twenty minutes before the end of her shift, an enormous white limousine pulled up at the gate. The windows were the one-way kind, so she couldn’t see a soul until the front window hummed open.
A redheaded woman in a chauffeur’s cap leaned out and asked: “Which way to the stage?”
“Well,” said DeDe, “it’s down this road and to the right, but I’m afraid you can’t drive there.”
“Why not?”
“It’s the policy. No cars on the land. You can park in this lot, if you like. There’s a shuttle to the land every fifteen minutes.”
The chauffeur looked peeved. “We were told to go to the stage.”
“Well, if you’re a scheduled performer … I mean, if whoever …”
“Nothing is scheduled. My customer is a friend of the festival organizer.”
“Do you have a pass?” DeDe asked.
“No. We were told we wouldn’t need one.”
“Gosh, I’m really sorry. My instructions are to make sure that no one—”
“I’ll speak to her!” This was a voice from the back seat, raspy but resonant. It was followed by the whir of another shiny black Darth Vader window as it descended into the door. The face revealed was pale and without makeup, framed by a shock of black hair with a white skunk stripe down the middle.
DeDe felt her heart catch in her throat. It was Sabra Landauer, the legendary feminist poet-playwright, whose one-woman show,
Me Only More So,
had been the rage of the last two seasons on Broadway.
“Oh … Miss Landauer,” said DeDe. “Welcome to Wimminwood.”
“Thank you. Is there a problem here?”
“Well, a bit. If they’d told me you were performing …”
“I’m
not
performing. I’m visiting my friend Barbara Farrar, the
founder
of this festival.”
“Ah … well … of course.” Her resolve crumbled. When it came to catching hell from Rose or catching hell from Sabra Landauer, there was no contest. “So anyway, the stage is down this road, then off to the left. It’s the only big clearing. Anybody with a blue wristband can help you.”
“Thanks,” said the chauffeur.
“And Ms. Landauer,” DeDe added hastily, touching the limo to make it wait, “I have to tell you …
Medusa at the Prom
is my favorite book of poems
ever.”
Sabra Landauer made a pistol barrel out of her forefinger and fired it rakishly at DeDe. “Read my latest,” she said. “There’s something in it just for you.”
Before DeDe could respond, the dark window ascended. The limousine sped off down the road in the proverbial cloud of dust. Left standing in it, DeDe felt mildly disgusted with herself.
Why on earth had she said that? She had never even read
Medusa at the Prom.
Why had the mere sight of a famous woman made her lose it completely?
Muddled, she flagged on two other cars, only to be jolted back into reality by the sight of two rough-hewn men in a pickup truck. Remembering their mission, she stepped forward crisply and said: “Porto-Janes?”
“Yo,” said the driver, showing a snaggletooth smile. Poor guy, she thought. To have such a job!
She flagged him on, giving him a thumbs-up sign by way of moral support. The pickup moved on, slowly at first; then it scratched off amidst a barrage of maniacal laughter. Both men reached out the window to flip her the bird.
“Dumb-ass lezzie!” one of them shouted.
She stood there for a moment, paralyzed by shock, her head ringing with Rose’s admonition to ask for an ID badge. Stupid, stupid, stupid! Those weren’t the Porto-Jane people at all!
She lunged for her walkie-talkie, but couldn’t remember what people always said in the movies. All she could think of was “Roger,” and that, she felt certain, was patently sexist.
“Hello, Security,” she said at last, all but shouting into the walkie-talkie. “Security, this is DeDe…. Come in, please…. This is an emergency.”
No reply.
She checked the talk button to see if it was set correctly. Who knew? She tried again: “Emergency, emergency … This is DeDe at the gate. Men on the land! Men on the land!”
Still no answer. She shook the machine vehemently, then threw it into the ditch in a fit of pique.
Coming to rest in a blackberry patch, it startled her by talking back: “Security to gate, Security to gate … Come in
immediately….”
She climbed into the ditch and made her way gingerly through the treacherous tendrils, holding them at arm’s length like dirty diapers. As she reached for the walkie-talkie, a bramble sprang out of nowhere and pricked her hand. “Damn!” she muttered.
“DeDe, this is Security…. Come in.”
She fidgeted with the button again. “Men on the land, Rose! Men on the land!”
“Tell me!” Rose replied, just as the renegade pickup roared out of Wimminwood, occupants still cackling, spewing a cloud of reddish dust over everything.
Numb with terror, she stared at the departing marauders, then turned back to the walkie-talkie. “Is everybody O.K. down there?”
A damning silence followed. Finally, Rose said: “Wait there, DeDe.
Do you read me?
Wait there!”
The wait was almost half an hour, reducing DeDe to a nervous wreck. When Rose appeared at last, her jaw was rigid, her eyes chillingly devoid of emotion. A thin white icing of sunscreen now covered her breasts. “O.K.,” she said. “What happened?”
DeDe spoke evenly. “I thought they were the Porto-Jane men.”
“Did you ask to see their IDs?”
“No. I asked them if they were the Porto-Jane men, and they were driving a pickup like you said.”
“I didn’t say pickup. It’s a big truck, DeDe. It sucks up the shit.”
“Well, how was I supposed to know?”
The security chief shook her head slowly. “You are something else. You reeeally are.”
“O.K. I made a boo-boo. I apologize.”
“Made a boo-boo?”
“Fucked up, then.”
“Do you have any idea what those assholes just did?”
DeDe caught her breath.
Please God, don’t make it gross.
She shook her head warily.
“They drove past the Aura Cleansing Workshop, screaming ‘Fucking dykes’ at the top of their lungs—”
“I realize I—”
“Wait a minute. Shut up. On their way out, they knocked over a Porto-Jane.”
“God.”
“With somebody in it, DeDe.”
DeDe pressed her fingers to her lips as her stomach began to churn. “Was she … hurt?”
An excruciating pause followed. “She was severely traumatized,” Rose said at last. “We had to hose her down at the Womb.”
Racked with nausea, DeDe looked away from her accuser. “If I’d had any idea …”
“You didn’t follow instructions,” said Rose. “It’s as simple as that.”
DeDe nodded. “You’re right … you’re right.” She couldn’t help wondering, though, what would have happened if she’d refused entry to the marauders. Would they have obeyed her? Her children certainly never did.
“I’d think you’d want to prove yourself,” said Rose. “Considering your background.”
“My
background?”
said DeDe.
“You know what I mean.”
“No, I don’t. Please tell me.”
“I know about your father, O.K.?”
“You know
what?
My father is dead.”
“Your stepfather, then. Whatever. I’ve known all about his fascist Reagan connections.”
DeDe’s face burned. “So what does that make me, then?”
Rose shrugged. “You tell me.”
Hesitating a moment, she considered several retorts, then handed Rose the walkie-talkie. “It’s past two,” she said. “My shift is over.”
She walked back to her tent in a daze, tormented by an issue far more troublesome than a toppled Porto-Jane: How could Rose—or anyone else—have known about Booter, unless D’or had said something?
And why would D’or do that? Why?
B
DOOTER’S LAKESIDE TALK HAD BEEN A RESOUNDING
success. So far, at least a dozen Bohemians had pulled him aside to congratulate him, comparing him favorably to Chuck Percy and Bill Ruckelshaus, who had also addressed the multitudes that week. Sure, he had scrambled his notes once or twice, but no one seemed to notice, and the ovation afterwards had verged on thunderous.
He was walking now to burn off energy, filling his lungs with the pungent afternoon air. On the road above Green Mask, he passed a shirtless young man in his late twenties. His age and musculature suggested that he was an employee, so Booter felt duty bound to say something.
“Hot one, isn’t it?”
The young man made a sort of whinnying noise to indicate that it was.
“You work here?” Booter asked, doing his best to sound pleasant about it.
“Yessir.”
“Well, there’s a rule about shirts, you know.”
The young man looked at him blankly.
“You have to wear them,” said Booter.
“Oh.” He reached for his shirt, dangling from the back pocket of his khakis.
“It’s fine by me,” said Booter. “But … somebody else might give you trouble about it.”
The young man slipped on the shirt, buttoned it up.
“I’d say the same thing to a member,” Booter added, not wishing to seem a despot. “It’s just the rule.”
“Right.”
“It’s a hot one, though, isn’t it?”
“Yeah.”
Booter smiled at him and continued on his way back to the river road.
Order. Mutual respect. This was why the Grove was his favorite place on earth.
He found Jimmy Chappell in his tepee at Medicine Lodge. “There he is,” piped Jimmy. “The William Jennings Bryan of the SDI.”