Stray Figures - 2. Chartreuse Mango

“Refill on the water?” The bartender leaned in with the question as he ran a cloth along the bar, keeping its stainless steel surface sparkling even as pre-show patrons crowded against it.

“No. Thanks.” Cara declined. Nice of him to offer up the service amidst the demands from paying customers. Her glass of tap water had been free, but she’d be sure to leave a tip on the counter. With a small smile in his direction she forced her attention back to her friends and their ongoing discussion about their jobs as newly minted attorneys. She had been the lone member of the group not to attend law school. Instead she’d pursued post graduate work in aesthetics, an area of study that had prepared her for nothing.

“I’m just saying that with Duncan, Macy & Yeats announcing their plan to award midyear bonuses, it’s likely that the other top tier law firms will match. They don’t want to look cheap next to the competition. Here’s hoping we see something extra in our paychecks soon. “ Rebecca flicked a flaxen strand of hair over her shoulder and raised her cocktail glass. Her long-time girlfriend Eileen and the other couple in the group – David and Gretchen - raised their own drinks and tapped in a toast.

Cara held on to her water glass. She was propped on a barstool at the periphery of the group and leaning forward to join in the toast would have been awkward. It wasn’t that she begrudged her friends the bonuses, but the reality was she had no expectation of receiving any such thing this summer. Or at any other time. Not-for-profit companies did not recognize the contributions of their employees with monetary windfalls equivalent to the price of a small car.

“Sweetheart, I keep telling you not to get your hopes up. Olivia and Daughters is a top notch firm but we’re really not in the same league as Duncan, Macy. I’m not sure the partners at our firm are going to match the competition.” Eileen squeezed Rebecca close and planted a kiss near her ear. Cara watched Becca pull away.

“I think you’re wrong, Eileen. I think that O&D will be paying out bonuses to us. They want to be seen as playing on the same field as the big boys.”

“But the whole point of going to work for Olivia and Daughters was to avoid playing on the same field as the big boys. Or any boys. That’s why Janie Olivia started up her firm back in the ‘70s. The big boys wouldn’t elevate her to partner so she had to strike out on her own.” Eileen’s voice was infused with a sort of implacability that still managed to be warm and soothing. It was the sort of voice that would make her a great litigator.

Rebecca responded by setting her jaw. “I’m just saying that if attorneys at O&D are doing the same work as Duncan, Macy, we should be paid the going rate.”

Eileen and Rebecca were clearly heading into one of their frequent bickering discussions. David jumped into the conversation to point out that the firm did hire men, himself, as an example. Gretchen gulped at her wine, muttering about the number of hours they were expected to work, and Cara allowed her attention to drift further away from the conversation of her friends.

A well-heeled crowd filled the theater’s small bar, posing and posturing for their own benefit. The jazz ensemble playing was a local one and essentially unremarkable, but the venue was new. Currently, it was the place to be seen if you considered yourself a patron of the arts in their town.

Cara dipped her fingers into the glass and fished out an ice cube. The action was uncouth, but she perversely wanted to set herself apart from the stuffy sophistication pressing in on her. Jazz was supposed to be music for the working class. It was an everyman sort of music, gritty and wailing and joyous. What could the emotion of the music possibly have to say to these men with $200 haircuts and these women with $500 handbags?

She bit back a gurgle of laughter, abruptly swallowing the cube of ice cooling her mouth. Now there’s a girl who looks like she’s ready for a night of rollicking, earthy jazz.

Her attention was caught by a woman who had just gained entrance bar area. She was the antithesis of the immaculately groomed perfection of the other patrons. Not that she was disheveled exactly. Her appearance would be better described as offbeat, atonal. Cara’s laugh had been one of delight, not derision. The woman’s long, thick hair bordered on messy. Her pale skin was made more so by the application of a wet lipstick with overtones of orange. A long silk scarf hung unevenly around the collar of a black vest, one end trailing dangerously close to the ground.

The woman glanced about the room, quickly determined there was no seating and propped herself against a dimly lit wall. She beckoned the circulating hostess with a friendly gesture and bent her head to place her order. From all appearances, she was alone. Cara felt an impulse to skip over to the woman and introduce herself, to start talking as if they were old friends or as if they were six years old, that age when a fast friendship could be formed with no more than an exchange of names.

Instead she tried to catch the woman’s eye, hoping to see mutual interest, an exchange of sexual heat, but the woman’s gaze never settled on any one person. A group of people moved between them, blocking Cara’s view, and when she next looked over at the wall, the woman was gone.

She turned her attention back to her friends and realized that they were looking at her expectantly. “Sorry, did I miss something?”

“David was just asking if you got that grant for your organization. The one you were talking about last time we got together.” Gretchen prompted her. She then leaned against David, nuzzling the side of his neck just as if they were some sappy straight couple in love.

"Yeah, thanks for asking. It came through a couple weeks ago. The grant writing is a bit of a nightmare, but worth it when a major foundation takes an interest in our work. This one…”

Oh, look. I think they’re starting to seat for the show.” Rebecca’s observation drowned out the remainder of Cara’s sentence, and their little group joined the general exodus from the bar and into the lobby of the concert hall. The woman with the bright lipstick was no where in sight. Cara sighed and slid her hands into the pockets of her leather jacket, shuffling along with the others.

She jumped when David and Gretchen fell in on either side of her, both throwing their arms over her shoulders to give her a hug. David bent his head so that she could hear him in the rising din of the crowd. “Glad you got the grant. You’ll have to finish your story after the show.”

Cara relaxed and smiled, nodding at him and giving Gretchen a returning squeeze. Her friends did care about her. She felt guilty for her uncharitable thoughts about David and Gretchen earlier. They had kept their relationship a secret for a long time. Both of them had always identified as bisexual but it had still been a surprise when they’d gotten together with one another after so many years of being “just friends.” Until they’d started dating, Cara had only known Gretchen to date women and David to hook up with men.

The group passed their tickets under the scanner and began climbing the steps to the balcony. Cara, Rebecca, Eileen, Gretchen and David. They’d known one another since college where they’d all met at the campus LGBTIQ group. These women, and David, had been her core, her family, her comrades, for her entire adult life. They’d been there when she’d come out to her parents, helped her choose a major, consoled her on her first break up with a girlfriend. And on her second one. They’d marched for the rights of women, the rights of animals and the rights of political prisoners. They’d gotten drunk together at pride festivals.

When post-graduate studies drastically reduced the amount of time they had for partying, Cara had suggested these quarterly cultural outings. For the last three years, they’d sampled a variety of theater, the ballet, and symphony and opera performances. They attended art gallery showcases and traveling exhibits at museums. There was always something going on and usually the arts offered at least one special rate performance that didn’t impinge a great deal on a student budget.

Seated in the first row of the balcony, all of them looked with interest around the new concert hall. They each exclaimed over little features they spotted. The architects had retained much of the art deco design of the previous structure, and it was now a theater in the round with a few rows of seating behind the stage. Tile mosaics adorned the supporting pillars and outer walls. Cara made note to take a closer look at them after the show.

“Too bad these cheap seats are so high up.” Becca squinted as if she were looking into the sun trying to see the stage. Cara didn’t think the seats were bad, especially for a musical performance. The early reviews had reported the acoustics to be good from every seat in the house.

Her companions started flipping through their programs and Cara was about to do the same when she spotted the girl from the bar, the wild-haired woman with the bright lipstick and interesting face. She was down below, handing her ticket to one of the ushers. The man gestured up to the balcony and Cara watched the woman begin her ascent of the stairs. She was alone so either she was meeting someone up here or someone would be joining her.

Able to stare without appearing rude, she analyzed what she found appealing about this woman. Her hair flowed unrestrained over her shoulders and Cara guessed that this was her concession to “dressing up”. Something about the woman suggested that the hair was probably more often clipped back at the neck. On closer inspection, her clothes were rather sedate. Of high quality and all black, except for the scarf which Cara saw had been retied around her neck.

The make-up was jarring. That’s the only way Cara could describe it. But it was unintentionally jarring, in the way that make-up can be jarring on teen-age girls who haven’t discovered the right shades for their skin tone or mastered how to apply eyeliner in a way that’s subtle rather than garish. There was an endearing quality about this woman’s attempt at dressing up for the night.

The woman was nearly at the balcony level, her lipstick lighting the way. Cara imagined herself kissing it off, revealing the natural pink that it surely covered. Her skin was pale, but as the woman drew closer, Cara saw the paleness was natural and not the result of foundation. The skin was smooth and perfectly free of blemishes.

“I think she’s alone.” Once again, Cara was startled out of her own thoughts by David. She felt her face heat.

“I shouldn’t be staring, I know." She shot a guilty glance at David. "But, she’s so interesting. Though I doubt she’s here on her own.”

“I bet she is. Watch.”

The woman was studying her ticket and checking the row numbers. With satisfaction, Cara watched her turn into the same row as Cara. Only an aisle and a handful of seats lay between them. With just a slight shift to the right, she could see the woman’s face. She watched as the woman looked around the concert hall taking apparent pleasure in what she saw.

As David had predicted, the woman had taken a single empty seat. She issued polite greetings to the occupants on either side of her but exhibited no familiarity towards them. She appeared to be attending the performance alone.

“How did you know?” Cara swiveled to face David, astonished at his perception.

He shrugged. “I didn’t. But I could see your interest and I was hoping it would turn out that way for your sake.”

Cara swallowed a sudden lump in her throat. “You’re sweet, David. Gretchen is lucky to be with you. I don’t know that I’ve ever told you that I’m happy for the two of you.”

“Thanks, C.” David gave her hand a squeeze.

“So you figured out that she was flying solo tonight. Any insight to whether she’s gay?”

David shook his head. “You’ll have to find that out on your own.”

The lights dimmed, signaling the start of the performance. Cara directed her attention to the stage and soon found herself pulled into the music. This group was better than usual, perhaps responding to the high expectations of the crowd or lifted by the grandeur of their surroundings. They played a brassy blues style of jazz, then punctuated it with stomping, swinging beats. It fit Cara’s mood and she looked over at the girl from time to time, trying to gauge her reaction to the music, silently sharing her own enjoyment of the experience. She determined to find a way to introduce herself to the woman.

The performance had no intermission so Cara was forced to wait until the end of the show to engineer an encounter. However, it seemed after placing the two of them so close, fate ultimately ruled against her. In the congestion of filing out of the auditorium, she lost sight of the girl with the wild hair and bright lipstick.

“Good choice tonight, Cara.” Eileen skipped down a couple steps so that she was descending evenly with her. Rebecca was just behind them, walking with David and Gretchen. The rest of her friends voiced their agreement.

“Definitely worthwhile.”

“I’m looking forward to seeing some more shows here.”

Cara smiled round at them. “Thanks, guys. I’m glad we can still get together like this even though we’re out of school and have real world obligations. We’ll have to give some thought to what to we want to attend next.”

Again, there was a general murmur of assent though Rebecca felt compelled to add a further thought as they entered the main lobby. “Now that we’ve all got steady paychecks, we should splurge and start buying tickets on the main floor.”

Cara chose not to respond to the comment. Truthfully, she was a long way from being able to afford the more expensive tickets. She noticed that none of the others followed up on the remark. Gretchen and David were silent, as if they hadn’t heard or were pretending not to have. Eileen had pulled out her work blackberry and was reviewing messages.

Were they avoiding the topic Becca had raised out of sensitivity to Cara? Was she holding back her friends from more expensive pleasures? Or were these the paranoid thoughts of an insecure woman who didn’t yet know what she wanted out of life?

Despite the pleasurable performance tonight, Cara was suddenly, inexplicably weary. When the others suggested capping the night off in a wine bar a couple blocks away, she declined.

“It’s been a long week, guys. I’m going to head home.” She zipped her jacket and turned her collar up against what she knew would be a brisk spring night.

“We’ll walk with you to the subway stop. This isn’t the best part of town.”

“No need. There will be plenty of people from the show headed my way. I’ll be fine on my own.”

With a few more reassurances to her friends, she struck out on her own for the subway. Part of her wanted to analyze why she’d spent the night bouncing from melancholia to hopefulness, weariness to exuberance while another part of her wanted to avoid thinking altogether. She hummed tunelessly, paying attention to the other pedestrians who were indeed, she was glad to see, mostly people who had been at the performance.

Truly tired by the time her train arrived at the platform, she was disappointed to see there were no seats available. But fate, as it turns out, had not completely abandoned her after all. When the train lurched forward, she spotted the dark haired girl just a few steps away, hanging on to the bar overhead, scarf once again trailing near the ground. Cara scooted a little closer.

“What did you think of the performance?” The girl looked up in surprise. Cara waved her program and nodded at the one peeking out from the girl’s pocket. “I saw you earlier tonight. We were seated in the same row. The new venue is stunning and the musicians really lived up to it tonight.”

“Yes. It was a good performance. I enjoyed it.” Apparently deciding Cara posed no threat, the girl offered her a small smile. Her eyes were a brownish green and just as clear as her pale skin. Up close, Cara could tell she was older than she’d originally thought, maybe closer to the age of 30. “This was the first time I’ve been at the venue.”

“First time for most everyone, I’d venture to say. It just reopened after a 3 year renovation.” Cara searched for something in the woman’s body language that indicated she might be gay, scanned her for a necklace, earrings, anything with a rainbow motif or some other indication of her sexual orientation.

“Oh, I hadn’t realized it was so new. I haven’t lived here very long.” The woman held out her hand. “I’m Lindsay.”

The hand was warm and dry. Her clasp was firm with just the right amount of pressure. Cara slid a little deeper into her desire to know this woman better. She returned the handshake, reluctant to let go. “I’m Cara.”

“Did you really notice me earlier?”

“Yes.” Might as well be honest, Cara thought. “At first in the bar. I was there with friends but got distracted by the crowd. I like to people watch. Then I noticed you again when you were seated near me at the show. I like your lipstick, by the way, it’s an unusual shade.”

The train lurched again, pulling away from one of the stops, and Cara gestured to a couple of now empty seats. The line about the lipstick had been a partial truth. She did like it for its quirkiness, but the color was truly awful. Still, whatever she’d said had caused a bigger smile to break out on Lindsay’s face. She was glad she’d offered up the compliment.

“Make-up is a new thing for me. I have a new job as a professional lobbyist here at the state capital. Before I moved up here, my girlfriend warned me I’d have to figure out how to wear make-up, dress professionally, and generally get my act together.”

Hope flared and died in the span of a second. Lindsay was gay. And she was attached. “I see. So you’re doing the long distance relationship thing?”

“Oh. No.” Lindsay shrugged. “I keep forgetting when I talk about her to clarify. She’s an ex. We broke up a while ago, before I even took the job here. We were together a long time though. I’m just at the point where I’d even consider dating again.”

“I use to have a girlfriend too.” Cara blushed as she realized how awkward that sounded. “I mean, I haven’t dated seriously in a while.”

Lindsay looked like she might want to say something, but she stood instead. “We’re coming up on my stop.”

“Oh. Our conversation was just getting going.”

“So tell me when we can finish it.”

Cara thought fast. Her stop was the one after this which meant they basically lived at opposite ends of the same neighborhood. “Pink Elephant Café. It’s on Roosevelt Drive. Can you make it tomorrow morning? For brunch?”

“I’d like that, Cara.” Lindsay pulled out a card and wrote something on the back. “This is my business card. I’ve written my lipstick shade on the back since you liked it so much. Send me a text tomorrow morning with the time we should meet.”

Cara waved good-bye and looked down at the card. “Chartreuse Mango” was written boldly across the back. A bubble of laughter welled up. A lipstick in that shade was so wrong and yet so right. She flipped the card over. Lindsay DeGraw. Lindsay Degraw of the Chartreuse Mango lipstick. She tucked the card into her wallet wondering if it might turn into one of those small items that she’d never want to throw away. Tonight was starting to seem important, full of feelings and scenes she’d want to remember when she was old.

Her phone buzzed as she stepped off the train at her stop. She scrolled through the text as she rode the long escalator to street level. It was from Rebecca.

Everyone’s telling me I was sort of a jerk tonight. I’m sorry, Cara!!! I hate that I might have hurt your feelings and I’d hate even more if you weren’t with us having adventures. We talked about what the next one should be. How about Shakespeare in the Park? That’s always fun and it’s free.

Cara smiled. Rebecca was a good sort. A good friend. But the truth was, they were all changing. It wasn’t ever going to be like it was when they had met back in college. Still, she sent a quick text back to Rebecca.

Sounds fun, Becky. It’s all good between us.

Then she followed it up with another text, this one to the number on the card she’d just tucked away.

I know we just met, but I have an urgent question. How do you feel about Shakespeare?

In just a few moments her phone buzzed.

“Can one desire too much of a good thing”?

Cara curled her hand over her phone and smiled.