The Collectors (8 page)

The yearning was intensified by having no idea when I’d see her again. Jeanne seemed to want me. She couldn’t get enough of me over the past seven days. But she doled out information on a strictly need-to-know basis, and I had but a low-level security clearance. If an invasion were planned by Jeanne, I’d know about it when the bombs began to fall, and not a moment before.

Jeanne’s body language told me a fair amount though. I had no experience in being a submissive, but I did have experience with lovers. You can tell when someone is being truly intimate, whether they’re drowning you in kisses or tanning your behind. There was something there with Jeanne. But to give her interest in me some scale, I had to know if she was the same way with others, particularly Adele. But questions about Adele were strictly verboten.

Several days after my last visit to Jeanne’s, I ran into Adele on campus. I’d been trying to steer clear of the studio buildings and other areas where art students could be found. Ever since Adele tried to get me to disappear from Jeanne’s life, I sought to avoid a confrontation. I didn’t know where she’d been over the past week, but I could only guess she knew I’d been visiting Jeanne. Mrs. Kirchberger probably told her. As I was leaving campus after my afternoon class, I saw Adele running toward me, looking like she’d tackle me if I tried any evasive maneuvers. She stopped in front of me and grabbed my arm, pulling me off the sidewalk toward a nearby bench.

“I thought we agreed you wouldn’t see Jeanne anymore,” she said. She was pissed off.

“We did not agree.” I was a little pissed off too.

Adele looked incredulous. I shook her hand off my arm and stepped back, taking note of the wild look in her eye.

“Adele, I don’t want to fight with you about a woman. Can we talk about this calmly?”

“This woman, as you call her, is the person I live with. My significant other, as you might say. I can’t believe you’ve just swooped in and tried to steal her from me.”

I sat on the bench and tried to count to ten. It was one of the very small handful of things my mother taught me to do. Restraint of pen and tongue she’d say. I’d had very little restraint of tongue over the past week. In fact, my tongue was very sore. But I was tempted to get into it with Adele, which probably wasn’t a good idea. Part of me understood her desire to protect what she thought she had, but most of me just disliked her for it. She was complicating things.

“Here’s what I don’t get,” I said. She remained standing, glaring down at me. “You’re acting right now like you and Jeanne are the everyday sort of girlfriends who obey the rules of monogamy and expect everyone else to respect you as a couple. Yet you were the one who served me up on a platter to Jeanne. It doesn’t appear that either of you are monogamous. I was there when Pat fucked you silly, remember?”

“That was for Jeanne. It wasn’t my choice.”

“But you clearly enjoyed it. You’re being hypocritical.”

Adele slashed her arm through the air in frustration. “You don’t understand anything.”

“Tell me, then. What am I not getting? I’m not suggesting you stop seeing Jeanne. Why would you suggest I do?”

“Because you’re the first woman I’ve seen her with who is taking her further away from me. The other ones didn’t matter. I told you that.”

Like before, this news sent a thrill through me. If Adele meant this to motivate me to take some kind of high road and exit the scene, she was just shooting herself in the foot. Every hint that Jeanne cared for me made me more determined to be with her in any way I could.

I stood and looked Adele in the eye with as much compassion as I could muster. “I don’t know what to do in this situation, Adele, I really don’t. I’m not going to lie to you. I intend to spend time with Jeanne if it’s what she wishes. I think it’s unfair to blame your relationship problems on me. Surely if Jeanne is feeling more distant than before it’s something between the two of you. Something for you to try to work out together.”

“Yeah, I’ll make an appointment for couples counseling ASAP.”

I could tell this was a joke, but laughing didn’t seem appropriate.

“There’s a lot you don’t know,” Adele said, “so I’m trying to cut you some slack. In our world there are different ways of having relationships. A dominant may have sex with many women, but most dominants eventually take one woman as her Primary. That’s primary with a capital P. It’s a formal relationship, sealed with ritual and ceremony.”

“It sounds like S&M Freemasons. I’ve never heard of such a thing.”

“Of course you haven’t. We’re a private organization. Hasn’t Jeanne told you about it?”

“Not a word.”

“Maybe you’re not as close to her as you think. She’s the head of the Society.”

That stung. Why hadn’t Jeanne said anything?

“Are you Jeanne’s Primary?” I asked. I felt like I’d been dropped into a science fiction novel, where everything was just familiar enough to be understandable but different enough to know you were in another world.

“Not yet. But when she asked me to move into the garden apartment I knew she was planning it.”

“Knew? Or hoped?”

Adele’s eyes flared. “You are a selfish, horrible bitch. I’m warning you to stay out of our life.” Adele was getting right in my face.

“You’re warning me?” I slapped away the finger she was holding up at me.

“I’m warning you. And there’s a world of trouble for you if you don’t get the fuck away.”

She strode away and I could feel adrenaline rush through me, a delayed reaction to the confrontation. I wished I could talk to someone. Someone who knew about the Primaries, who knew Jeanne, knew what was normal and what wasn’t, if normal even existed. I didn’t have a guidebook. Maybe I was pissing off more people than just Adele. Maybe I was in for some real trouble.

And maybe I didn’t care, as long as I could still see Jeanne.

*

It was another five days before Jeanne called me. There was a Friday night opening at a gallery exhibiting the paintings of an artist Jeanne admired and she wanted me with her. I was to be ready at six the following evening.

I agreed, because it did not occur to me not to. I wondered what would happen if Jeanne wanted me to do something I could not or would not do. Surely, she would find my limits. Or perhaps I would find hers first.

She picked me up in her Saab and we headed to the gallery district. Given how many times both of us had been in these galleries, it was surprising we had not met before. When we walked in, the gallery was already filled with the sorts of people who come to these things—the crowd from the offices downtown, moving from one gallery to the next, filling up on the free wine and cheese these First Friday openings always had; the older and very rich patrons of the arts who sit on boards, prop up galleries, and keep an eye out for new talent; the artists, half of whom were contemptuous of the work on display, the other half simply jealous; and the friends and family of the exhibiting artist. Looking about at all of them made me think about how there are social rules and regulations within all sorts of groups of people. Why wouldn’t there be in the BDSM world also? My only problem was not knowing what they were. It galled me that Adele had important experience and knowledge that I didn’t have.

Jeanne steered us to the wine and then began telling me about the artist, a woman named Danielle Prine. We stood in front of a canvas—a huge 5’x4’ super realist rendering of a woman next to a house. The house was tiny and the woman was huge, as in
Gulliver’s Travels
huge. She had a pained expression on her face as she looked down at the house. A tiny man seemed to be holding the door open for her and tapping his watch, as if he were annoyed with her for being late.

“She likes to tell a story with her paintings, and I always enjoy that,” Jeanne said. “But what’s even more amusing is listening to people looking at her work and coming up with sometimes ludicrous interpretations of what she intended.”

“Such as?”

“This piece was in Danni’s thesis show and I heard someone say she thought the artist was married to a man with a very small penis.”

“Ah.”

“Naturally, everything consequently looks small to her.”

“The artist, Danni? Is she married?”

“No, that’s the funny part. She’s old school lesbian feminist, even though she’s only thirty or so. She was a classmate of Adele’s last year. I think they were friends. I’m not sure.”

I sipped my wine and stole a look at Jeanne as we moved along one wall of the gallery. I wondered if I should tell her about the warning from Adele, but something told me not to. My mother’s advice, I suppose. Don’t say anything if you think it’s possible it will make things worse. In this case, I just didn’t know.

I linked my arm through hers and I could feel her squeezing me closer. I tried a different approach.

“If she’s old school lesbian feminist, and I don’t want to stereotype here, she probably didn’t respond to Adele’s overture to bring her home to you.”

“I don’t think Adele even tried.”

“Does she have a labrys tattooed on her neck or something? Why would Adele approach me and not Danni?”

Jeanne looked amused. “You sound defensive, Laura. What are you worried about?”

“I don’t know exactly. I’m just wondering if I have some look that says, ‘spank me.’”

“Listen, you have to get over the idea being submissive puts you in some kind of down position. It doesn’t. And if you think only certain people like what you like, you’re wrong. All kinds do. I’ve tied up plenty of feminists. Hell, I’m a feminist. Aren’t you?”

I wanted more of exactly this kind of conversation, but it was cut short, as usual. A tall woman in leggings, a purple tunic, and beat-up Frye boots walked up to us and gave Jeanne a kiss on the cheek.

“Danni, this is my date, Laura. Laura, this is the artist, Danni Prine.”

Danni shook my hand vigorously and then told Jeanne she was a lucky woman. I liked that. I liked Jeanne calling me her date. Danni looped her arms through ours and pulled us off to a corner.

“I need a five-minute break from talking about my paintings,” she said. “My jaw aches from having to smile so much.”

“You and your high-class problems,” Jeanne said.

“Yes, thanks to you.” Danni looked at Jeanne with affection and turned to me. “Did you know Jeanne made all of this possible?”

“What are you talking about?” I asked. Jeanne looked down at her shoes, obviously uncomfortable.

“She introduced herself at my MFA show and provided me the means to work for a year to prepare this show. She paved the way for me to get into this gallery. She’s my patron, my Medici.”

Jeanne took the opportunity to walk away and start talking to a man she knew nearby, which made Danni laugh. I was dumbstruck.

“She hates hearing people say nice things about her,” Danni said. “But she’s an unusual and generous person. She’s been a patron to quite a few artists who she found promising and needed some help.”

“It’s wonderful,” I said. And I meant it. “It’s impossible for most artists to support themselves in the States. Jeanne tells me you were in graduate school with a friend of mine, Adele.”

“Yeah, I haven’t seen Adele for quite a while, but she’s another one who gets some help from Jeanne. And she needed it bad. I think when Jeanne came across her she was getting evicted from her apartment and thrown out of school for nonpayment.”

“Is that right?”

“Adele told me Jeanne paid for the rest of her grad school tuition and gave her a place to live. She’s amazing.”

Danni got dragged away by the gallery owner and I went to find Jeanne, who’d drifted away. I saw her in the farthest corner from me, with Adele, which shouldn’t have been a surprise. Why wouldn’t she be here? I had a bad feeling. The generosity Jeanne showed Adele could only mean she would give Adele whatever she wanted. And Adele wanted me gone.

I stood frozen where I was, streams of people walking around me like I was a post. It looked like Adele was raising her voice. I couldn’t imagine yelling at Jeanne was a good tactic to use, so I rooted for Adele to completely lose it. I hoped she’d make a big, awkward scene in the gallery and thoroughly disgust Jeanne. But before Adele had a chance to ratchet up the histrionics, Jeanne walked away. I saw her scanning the room, looking for me, so I waved my hand and walked toward her. She scooped me up and we were out the door in a flash.

“What’s wrong? Are you okay?”

Jeanne looked annoyed, but I didn’t think with me. She was striding toward the parking garage a block from the gallery. I was a little annoyed to get the silent treatment.

“Listen, I know you don’t want me to ask about Adele, but it’s kind of hard not to when I see you guys have an argument in a public place.”

“That wasn’t an argument. It was Adele spouting nonsense and me walking away.”

“What kind of nonsense. Was it about me?”

I skipped a few steps to try to catch up with her and saw a scowl on her face. I was pretty sure that one was for me. She remained silent while the car was brought around for us, but once we were on our way she took my hand.

“I know I’ve not talked to you about much of anything other than art.”