Little Disquietude (12 page)

"Aw," Ward said.

"Does he really spit on you?" Sophia
asked.

"Only when he sings."

Adam said, "And don't forget, it's a
musical."

The house lights went down. The orchestra
began to play. Leah wondered if she knew anyone in the pit. And
then, with Sophia's fingers stroking along hers, and Sophia
breathing softly to her right, she wondered if she'd follow any of
the opera at all.

* * *

The house lights came up. "Half time," Ward
announced. He bolted for the bathroom.

"Why's he rushing? He's a boy," Leah
said.

Sophia squeezed her hand.

The last hour had been a blur of affection
and German farce. Leah had settled against Sophia's hair until
she'd gotten a crick in her neck. In the shifting around, her hand
had traveled to Sophia's lap, and settled on Sophia's thigh. Sophia
had squeaked. No one had shushed them, but Sophia had blushed and
refused to look at Leah for the rest of the act.

Their eyes met in the light. Leah smiled. She
leaned in and Sophia leaned in to meet her. They pressed their
foreheads together, noses not quite touching. Sophia whispered,
"You're fun."

Leah had to bite her tongue to keep from
asking, "Is that all?" She instead asked, "What on earth happened
in the first act?"

Sophia blinked. "I have no idea."

"It's in the playbill," Adam said.

"Do you need more champagne?" Leah asked,
turning around, keeping her hand in Sophia's.

"I had more than enough. Do you want to get a
hotel room tonight?"

"Adam," Leah said. "Sophia's right here."

Sophia giggled. She leaned around Leah and
peered at Adam.

"The four of us," Adam said.

"Kinky," Sophia said.

Leah tugged on her fingers. "I'd rather go
home, if Sophia's up to driving. Be in my own bed."

Adam smirked.

Sophia leaned back in her chair.

"You can join me," Leah said, and Sophia
blushed and swatted her away. "Too much?" Leah asked.

Sophia shook her head.

Leah leaned closer and asked, "Not
enough?"

Sophia squeaked. She closed her eyes.

Adam smacked Leah.

"Sorry, sorry. Aren't you glad we drove
separately?"

"I know what I'm doing," he said.

Leah whispered to Sophia, "We could just go
make out in a pretty velvet stairwell or something for the second
act."

"Someone will ask us about the opera," Sophia
said.

"We can Google it."

The house lights flashed.

"Too late," Leah said, "If we made a run for
it, we'd be crushed by the wave of drunk people returning."

"It's just like NASCAR after all," Adam
said.

Ward vaulted into his chair and said, "
Die
Fledermaus
!"

Leah flashed him a gang sign.

"Oh, look, chemistry," Adam said.

"Fuck you," Ward and Leah said together.

The opera began.

"Sure you don't want to stay?" Adam asked as
they walked to the car. "It's a glittering city."

It was. The lights reflected off the
skyscrapers and created a gorgeous, if small, skyline. The bank
buildings rose out of the ground and beckoned. But Charlotte was
not old New York, and there wasn't enough cold in the warm reds and
pinks and faint blues. There was no water, black and murky, to
capture the light and reflect it, to make it all seem colder, more
distant. Looking out from the parking deck at downtown, Leah felt
she could be anywhere.

She had laughed so hard she was soundless.
Her face hurt from smiling. She hadn't breathed for long moments.
Sophia kept poking her and she'd laugh all over again. But now
streets below were just streets. The opera didn't change that. She
said to Adam, "I want to go home."

"We have to do that little musical first," he
said.

She saluted. He and Ward got into their car.
Leah watched them drive away silently, and then turned to Sophia.
"I want to go home with you."

"You'd rather go to the roach motel than your
place?"

"You have a more comfortable bed," Leah said.
She closed her eyes, imagined falling onto crisp, clean sheets, the
too-soft mattress, the puffy pillows, and Sophia's scent, drifting
over her. She inhaled and opened her eyes.

Sophia studied her with furrowed brow, a
slight pink tint to her cheeks.

"To sleep. All I can think about is sleep,"
Leah said. Her cheeks burned. She glanced at Sophia's car,
picturing the long drive ahead of them, wishing it was over.

Sophia's frown deepened.

"Shutting up now," Leah said.

"Bitch."

"Diva."

"One note actor."

"Which note?"

"I'll, uh, let you know when I actually see
you perform," Sophia said. Leah moved closer to her for each word,
and now could lean against her, with Sophia's back to the car.
Sophia licked her lips nervously, and hesitated.

Leah brushed her lips across Sophia's. Her
hand trembled as she clasped Sophia's fingers, balancing herself to
lean in for a second, deeper kiss. Her heart fluttered in her
chest.

Sophia moaned. Leah's knees weakened with the
sound. She leaned into Sophia, moving to kiss her ear, getting a
mouthful of carefully sprayed curls and an earring. Sophia giggled.
Leah blew into her ear, and said, "Or, we could just stay right
here." Sophia clutched her side.

"Hey, you girls looking for a little
action?"

The man's voice was too close and too loud.
Leah turned around. He was dressed in a tuxedo, and had three
friends with him, similarly dressed, similarly male, similarly
drunk. Leah's mouth hung open.

Sophia shook her arm. "Ignore them and get
into the car."

"What?"

The man said, "Come on. The opera! Wasn't
that amazing?"

Sophia squeezed her wrist.

"Don't talk to them. Just get in."

Sophia opened the back seat of the sedan,
which forced Leah to step closer to the men blocking the way around
the car. But she got in as directed and Sophia slammed the door on
her. Leah winced. She was still trying to catch up on what was
happening, thinking of dissuading Sophia from whatever threat she
saw--after all, they were at the opera--and she was highly
embarrassed. She pressed her cheek against the glass.

"Go home," Sophia said, pushing her body
between Leah's door and the men.

"We saw you kissing. You want action, same as
us. It's too early to go home. Look at those outfits," he slurred.
He tried to put his hand on Sophia's cheek. She slapped him away.
Leah yelped. She scrambled for her cell phone. The man lunged for
Sophia, who let him grab her, and then used the leverage to knee
him in the groin and then step on his foot.

He howled. Sophia ducked into the driver's
seat and locked the door. Leah looked out the back window. Sophia
started the car and eased it back. The men scattered, cursing. She
drove toward the ramp.

The whole thing had happened in three
seconds, and the men had only tried to touch Sophia once. Leah's
anticipation and fear were still churning inside her. She had seen
that kind of thing on television, but hadn't thought it applicable
in real life. Or necessary. But Sophia seemed to know what she was
doing, and Leah shuddered, wondering if it was from experience.

She thought she was going to be sick. She
closed her eyes and inhaled, and exhaled slowly, and then inhaled
again. The car was still moving. She opened her eyes as they turned
onto the street. She wasn't going to be sick.

"Should I call 911?" Leah asked.

Sophia shook her head.

"Should I call Adam?"

Sophia shook her head again. Leah leaned
forward and tapped her arm, around the driver's seat. Sophia let
out a cry and jerked away. Leah sat back.

Sophia cleared her throat, and said in a
small voice, "Sorry. Try that again." She glanced at the rear-view
mirror. Leah met her gaze and smiled. Sophia gave a tentative smile
back.

Leah scooted forward and gently rubbed
Sophia's arm. Sophia didn't flinch. Leah wrapped her arm around
Sophia's chest, awkwardly, and said, "I'm not wearing my
seatbelt."

Sophia laughed.

"Want to pull over?"

"We're about to hit the highway. We can stop
at the next rest stop," Sophia said. Her voice was stronger. Leah
lifted her fingers. She brushed Sophia's cheeks, and felt
wetness.

"You saved my life," Leah said.

"Oh, don't be dramatic. They were just drunk
guys."

"I have to be dramatic. It's in my Equity
contract."

"Is it? I don't have a card, remember?"

"Oh, right," Leah said. "Well, they say you
have to live life to the fullest, or your characters won't. And
since the characters are bigger than we'll ever be--"

"Right. I was just practicing."

On the highway at midnight, the road was
open, traffic scarce. Sophia drove with her left hand, and covered
Leah's hand with her right. She pulled it back and gently kissed
Leah's wrist. Leah closed her eyes.

Her emotions--fear, awe, worry, admiration,
and the inappropriateness of how good, how erotic Sophia's lips on
her hand felt, when those men had wanted the same thing, for the
same reason. She pulled back and curled into the back seat, where
she could breathe, slowly, in and out.

"Are you all right?" Sophia asked.

"Are you? They could have--You put yourself
between them and me. Who does that?"

"I don't know. It was instinct. It just made
sense. The whole thing was over in three seconds."

Leah smiled. She said, "It was...incredibly
flattering."

Sophia was quiet. Exit signs, green and
brightly lit, passed by them. The numbers had gone down while they
were traveling south, and now they went up again. 22... 23...
Sophia exhaled and said, "Those guys sat three rows behind us."

"What?"

"Center-left. They weren't random criminals.
They weren't even the drug dealers from our neighborhood in Durham.
They were rich, classy guys."

"Sophia..."

"Do you think this is the first time I've
done that? Or the tenth?"

Leah leaned over the seat and cupped Sophia's
neck, stroking gently.

"That's just the way guys are," Sophia
said.

"Not all guys," Leah said. Not because she
disagreed, but she stubbornly didn't want a world like that for
Sophia. She wanted something better, where people were nicer to her
friend.

"Adam's gay," Sophia reminded her.

"He still--" Leah fell quiet. She slid back
slightly, to tangle her fingers in Sophia's hair.

"What?" Sophia asked.

"You'll fit right in when you come to New
York," Leah said.

The car pulled into the rest stop at 12:45 in
the morning. Other cars were there. Men went in and out of the
bathroom. One family, seemingly not sleepy, piled out from an SVU
with Georgia plates. Sophia got out of the car. She surveyed. Leah
got out and stood next to her. A car drove past them and Leah
flinched.

"God," Leah said.

Sophia leaned into her.

"I'm so terrified. How are you not?"

"I am," Sophia said. "I always am."

Leah squinted.

Sophia kissed her cheek and said, "I'm a
great actress. I picture another reality for the emotion I want to
convey, and I bring it to life, in this reality."

"What are you picturing?"

Sophia reached up to rub her cheek, lowering
her eyelashes demurely.

"What?"

"You, laughing, at
Die
Fledermaus
."

Leah snorted.

Sophia asked, "What? It's the closest happy
memory I had, the most pungent."

"No wonder you can capture such ambition and
anguish," Leah said.

"I'm a sponge. And Lady Macbeth will cut a
bitch," Sophia said.

Leah slid her hand down Sophia's arm, and
captured her hand. "Walk me to the bathroom?"

Sophia pulled her toward the sidewalk.

Leah finished before Sophia, and washed
herself in the tiny sink, and then stepped outside, away from the
moths smashing themselves against the halogen lights. No one was
around outside except for an older custodian, who sat by the drink
machines and smoked.

In the streetlights she could see the
outlines of trucks and the forest beyond. North Carolina had so
many trees, and they weren't even in parks. The excess and the
summer breeze were peaceful, even in the middle of the night. She
breathed in, hoping to taste pine.

This world would be nicer if it weren't so
incredibly humid.

"Hey," Sophia said behind her.

Leah jumped.

"Sorry."

Leah turned around. Sophia stood,
half-smiling, with her arms folded. Her hair was limp against her
neck. She'd washed off her makeup, and she looked fresher, sweeter.
All of twenty-five. Leah stepped closer. Sophia tilted her chin.
Leah let her gaze rove down Sophia's body, and then met her eyes.
"Let's go back to the car."

"Okay."

Leah took the keys from Sophia, and unlocked
the car, and then opened the back seat. "Let talk. Just for a
minute?"

"You want me to get into the back seat with
you?" Sophia asked.

Leah nodded.

"Are we going to fog up the windows?" Sophia
asked.

"Please. In a car? At a rest stop?"

Sophia's face fell.

Leah climbed into the car and then offered
her hand through the open door. "Please," she said.

Sophia got in and closed the door. As soon as
the door clicked shut, Leah enveloped Sophia in a tight hug. She
whimpered slightly, involuntarily, into Sophia's hair. Sophia's
hand settled against her stomach.

"I've never had anyone defend me before,"
Leah murmured. "It was so. Well. Hot."

"Hot?"

"I can't explain how much it made me want to
thank you."