Fiction by Ed Robson

Ed Robson grew up in Baton Rouge and earned his BS at LSU before moving to NC for grad school at UNC-CH. He spent 30 years practicing psychology in Winston-Salem, retired, moved to Conway, AR for his MFA at UCA, had a heart attack, got his groove back paragliding over Lago Atitlán, and now keeps writing like his life is on the line. He lives in North Carolina, where he spends his days restoring neglected houses with his wife and his evenings at open mics and other writing-centered events. His poetry and other writings have appeared in many journals. His first poetry collection, Carping Every Diem, is available from bramble press (brambleonline.com).

Another Life

Semi-regulars at Boudreaux's All-Night Grill and All-Day Oyster Bar took it for granted that the couple in the high-backed booth next to the kitchen were, in fact, a couple. It wasn't just because they sat together four to six days out of seven, sometimes from lunch till well past supper, now and then from suppertime through breakfast. It was more than the economy of their communication, which might in noisy times be managed by a glance, a canted eyebrow, and a twitching at the corner of the mouth, but in quiet times took on a murmured musicality whose nasal tones betrayed their Creole heritage as surely as their dark eyes, olive skin, and easy laughter.  

What it was, was that they just looked right together. He was six feet tall and muscular, with gentle eyes, expressive lips, and dark-brown curls that radiated like the aura of a saint. She was five feet eight, lithe and graceful, and her blue-black hair was plaited in a single braid that coiled three times around her head exactly. As a pair, they lent a certain presence to the room, and they so often sat together without speaking for an hour or more, a casual observer might have gotten the impression they were married.

Braze and Gayle were not a couple, and committed denizens of Boudreaux's knew they never would be. They were friends, a friendship that had grown up like wisteria across that table in the past six years. This was where they sorted out the flotsam of their lives, savoring the ironies that no one else could properly appreciate. Like falling in love at first sight, at the same moment, with the same woman.  

Sarah wasn't beautiful, exactly, though something in the ample curves that graced her barely-five-foot frame just begged for holding. Her mouth was wider than her narrow face had room for, and her jaw was square and mannish. Her hair was hopeless, not quite orange, not quite brown, prematurely graying and forever tangled. No doubt a stylist could have dealt with all of that, but the one time she'd gone for a consultation, she took offense at just how many chemicals would be involved in "fixing" her and went straight back to the uninspired but friendly barber who had cropped her locks since she first moved to Baton Rouge at 21, thirteen years before.

And yet, although her eyes were small, her forehead tall and trapezoidal, and her cheekbones much too sharp, her nose made up for everything. Slender at the bridge, generous about the nostrils, graceful in its whole conception, it drew no attention to itself but modestly coordinated all the rest. Braze and Gayle both noticed it immediately, only afterwards discovering the hilarity that lurked behind her eyes and the tenacious courage of her smile.

"Oh my god." Gayle said it first. "I'm smitten. Help me, Braze. Tell me she's gay."

"Uh-uh. You tell me she straight and single, and I may forgive the way you looking at my future bride."

To their delight, the downtown lunch rush served a plausible excuse for Gayle to offer her a place with them, which courtesy she promptly paid by breaking both their hearts.

"Thank you so much, both of you,” she said as she set down her oyster po-boy, fries, and tea. “My husband said he'd get here early and snag us a table, but he just texted me to say he can't get free today, so I thought I'd have to foist my company on someone who preferred to dine alone."

"Thass a shame," said Braze, "but we be glad a someone new to look at. Not that Gayle is one bit hard on my eyes, but even perfect faces, when you see em all the time, you know . . ."

"Flattery is wasted breath," said Gayle. "He keeps hoping I’ll stop being lesbian for long enough to let him jump my bones."

"Not even once," said Braze. "After all the years we been best friends, she still be telling me, ‘dream on.’"

"Don't believe it, chère," said Gayle. "The truth is, Braze is way too much the gentleman to ask. I'm Gayle Prejean, by the way, and my deceptively inhibited best friend is Braze Pegram."

"And I’m already shocked and awed. My name is Sarah Anderman, and I’ve got the strangest feeling we are going to spend a lot of time together."

Which both of them would certainly have welcomed, but a married woman's time flows differently, plus Sarah worked on weekdays, so apart from Sunday suppers and the times her husband went away on business overnight, they didn't often get to be a threesome.

That was, simply put, a damned shame, for the quality of those times was exalted. Sarah's mind was quick and quirky, and her heart was huge. Her capacity for intimacy—her aptitude for sharing on the deepest level, whether of the intellect or of the jagged shards of raw emotion—challenged both of them to reassess their own standards of candor. When that meant confessing all the longings she provoked in them, she gave each one of them a long and very tight hug and a whispered vow: "Another life."

But two years later came a day that called for everything that Braze and Gayle had ever learned of honesty, for all the ironies they'd ever known or heard of or imagined had come crashing down like meteors around them. Jason, Sarah’s husband, who had always claimed to loathe the thought of progeny, had just left Sarah for a woman who already had three children and was carrying another, this one his. 

And Braze was dying.

"It won’t be real soon. Dr. Kumar, he say I got maybe two good year afore ma brainstem fail. Thass a mercy, too—when the reaper come, he likely gone be quick about it. Maybe even painless."

"Yeah, for you." Gayle pushed away her gumbo, still untasted, not trying to hold back the anger or the tears. "You can just check out and leave us all behind."

"Hey, I sorry."

"Yeah, I know, you sorry bastard. And I'm sorry for you, and I'll say how much as soon as I get over feeling sorry for myself. Don't hold your breath, though. That may take a while."

Several quiet minutes later, Gayle asked, "Does Sarah know?"

Braze shook his head. "Too much on her plate aready. I tell her soon."

"You hold that back from her, you may die sooner and more painfully than what your doctor said."

Braze winced and grunted. "Yeah, I guess she need to know."

"God damn it, Braze, she'll want to know.”

"Okay, okay." He sighed. "Okay, I call her up tonight. But look, I got a favor that I got to ax you, cause it just too big to ax somebody else. Well, I wouldn’t wanna ax nobody else, sep Sarah, and I can’t be axin her, not now."

"Who says I feel like doing you a favor?"

"Ain’t nothing that you got to do right now. And if you never feel like doin it, then don’t, thass all. Me, I won’t be knowin either way."

Gayle just looked at him.

"You wanna hear it?"

"No."

"Okay. You want another beer?"

"Yes."

Gayle had pulled herself together by the time Braze slid back into the booth with a bottle in each hand. “Okay,” she said. “So what’s the favor?”

"Have my baby."

"Shit. I should have stuck with no."

"Listen, Gayle, you know how long I be wantin chirrens. Last night when I be lyin down, all my mind can think is how my name be gone so soon. I don’t know why, but that afflict me morn my own dyin."

Gayle took a long pull on her beer. "This rare disease, this cancer that you've got, you're sure it's not genetic?"

"Dr. K, he think it be some chemical I be expose to in Iraq. My sperm, they fine. And they be on deposit at the hospital."

"Oh, crap. Then you're serious, not just trying to get me into bed."

"Naw. I know that ain’t gone happen. This be more important."

"Look, I'll think about it. That's all I'm promising, okay?"

"Thanks, Gayle. Ya know I love ya, right?"

“And I must love you, too, cause you’re still breathing.”

~~~~~

On Sarah’s patio the next night, abetted by a bottle of Glenfiddich Jason hadn't had a chance to pack before his baggage and his ass both landed in the yard, the women did their howling at the moon.

"Sometimes I wish there were a god for me to stop believing in," said Gayle, "someone up there I could shake a finger at."

"Which would help precisely how?" said Sarah.

"Which would help precisely not one bit," said Gayle. 

"Then shut up and drink until you think of something positive to say."

A minute passed. "I'm positive I like your husband's Scotch."

"Duly noted. Shall I text him with your sentiments?"

"You do that. And I'm positive it sucks for Braze to die before he gets his chance to be with you."

Sarah swallowed carefully and put her glass down on the edge of the coffee table, where it took the course prescribed by gravity and shattered on the bricks. Ignoring it, she stared at Gayle. "He's still carrying that torch? He didn’t tell me that last night."

"Would you expect him to?"

Sarah pursed her lips. "Not right away, I guess."

"And maybe never, since he can’t offer you a future anymore."

"Well, fuck." Sarah stood up, walked unsteadily into the kitchen, came back with another glass, sat down, and poured herself more whisky.

Gayle drank.

Sarah drank.

Gayle poured.

Sarah spoke into her glass, "So you think I should seduce him now instead of waiting."

"I don't think what I think matters."

"It doesn’t. But I think you’re right."

Gayle grimaced. "More right than you know."

"Oh? There's more he didn't tell me?"

"Like a secret file of love poems? Like not getting past a second date with anyone in two years? Like a perfect job he didn't take in Memphis just because he couldn't bear to give up hope you might someday get single?”  

"Oh, Gayle. Oh, shit, I'm gonna cry. And I hate love poems."

~~~~~

Braze’s eyes lit up when Sarah opened the door. “Oh, chère, mon Dieu! Just look at you!”

“You like?” She spun around to show him how the blue-green raw silk dress clung to her curves.

“Do I like? You look like springtime. You must a went someplace special.”

“Au contraire.” She closed the door. “Dressed up for special company. Come give me a hug.”

Braze gave her a friendly squeeze, then relaxed his arms, but Sarah held him close another dozen heartbeats before leading him into the kitchen, where a small, round table was set for two.

“Oh me, oh my! I smellin somethin that smell plenty good yeah.”

“Just a pot roast with some vegetables. Only recipe I know that Boudreaux’s can’t make better.”

“Mmm-mmm. I do love me some pot roast. Oh, lemme put this here beer in you icebox.”

“Open us a couple first, okay?”

Braze opened two bottles and handed one to Sarah, who handed him a little gift bag in return.

“Un cadeau? Merci beaucoup.” But his brows contracted when he looked inside. “A toothbrush? Well, thass, uh . . .”

“Exactly what you needed. Come on; I’ll show you where to put it.”

She took his hand and led him to the half-bath by her bedroom, flipping on the light. “See? Your toothbrush can stay here with mine.”

Disbelief competed unsuccessfully with pleasure on Braze’s face as Sarah stepped up close and slipped her arms around his neck. Looking down into her eyes, he asked, “How you know this what you want, eh? Are you sure you heart be ready? Don’t you need some time to get pass all the hurtin?”

“It takes a good man, Braze,” she said, “to ask that kind of questions. But the one good thing about the way that bastard left—he burned his bridges. And as for all the other stuff you do at times like this, I took half a week to cry about my marriage, which is probably at least two days beyond what it deserved. Then I got good and drunk on Scotch, which let me spend one more day in profound regret for all my sins.   

“So now I’m over that and ready to begin the life I want. And the love I feel for you, it’s not some new thing I discovered after Jason left. It’s as sure to me as anything I know.”

Braze opened his mouth, but what he meant to say was lost as gentle fingertips upon his cheeks guided his lips down to Sarah’s, and her arms drew him fiercely tight against her.

Several minutes later, without loosening her hold on him, she drew back far enough to see his eyes. “Will you promise me one thing?” she asked.

“What one thing?” he said.

“That you won’t be dying any time tonight.”

Braze raised his eyebrows. “Well, ya know we all of us be dyin all the time. But don’t you worry, I ain’t plannin to stop livin any time before tomorrow.”

“Well, if you’re sure, then we can go ahead and eat. Dying takes a lot of strength. And so does living, when we do it right.”

~~~~~

“Well, hey there, Sarah. How you doing?”    

It was three months later. Sarah set down her Abita next to Gayle’s three empty bottles on the table where their friendship had begun. “Why did you want me to sleep with Braze?” she asked.

“Just like that?” said Gayle. “No very-well-I-thank-you-how-are-you?”

“Very well is not how well I’m feeling at the moment.”

“What’s the problem? I thought y’all were doing great.”

“We were,” said Sarah, “till we realized that we were losing you.”

“But you haven’t lost me.” Gayle held out her hands. “Here I am. And wasn’t I at your place just three days ago?”

“More like a week, and only for an hour. Braze calls, you don’t pick up. I text you, you don’t text me back. You hardly even come here anymore. What the fuck is going on?”

“Nothing’s going on. I’ve just been busy.” Gayle drained her beer and started to get up.

“Sit down, Gayle.”

“I need another beer.”

“You never needed alcohol to tell the truth before.”

“You think I’m lying?”

“Look at me and tell me that you’re not.”

Gayle tried to meet her gaze but failed. Talking to her empty beer instead, she said, “I just don’t feel right hanging out with y’all. You know how it is. Two’s a couple; three’s a crowd.”

“Which goes straight back to what I asked before. If you were going to feel that way, why were you so keen on getting us hooked up?”

“I thought that would make him happy.”

“You thought sex with me would make him happier than hanging out with you?”

“You were what he wanted most in life.”

“Would you make that trade, Gayle? Give up your best friend to get a lover?”

“No.” Her voice was barely audible.

“What if you were dying?”

Gayle shook her head and sniffled.  

Sarah pulled a wad of napkins out of the dispenser and handed half of them to Gayle. Leaning close and looking into her eyes, she said, “You gave us to each other. That was beautiful, an awesome gift. But both of us would give it up right now to have you back again.”

For a minute, tears and mucus held the floor.

Finally, leaning on her elbows, head between her hands and eyes behind a napkin, Gayle said, “God, I miss you both. A hundred times a day I think of something I just have to share with you or him. At first it made me glad to know that he was getting the affection he deserved, and that you were being loved by such a good man. And hanging out at your place—that was great, but I could see y’all didn’t need a chaperone.”

“You thought we didn’t want you there?”

“Not that, but seeing y’all so much in love, kissing and carrying on, it felt like looking through a window at somebody else’s party.”

Sarah shook her head. “So you leave because we’re having too much fun?”

“What am I supposed to do, stay and party with the two of you?”

“Gayle, there is no party. All there is, is us, celebrating every single day that we’re together and alive. We talk and laugh and carry on, and yeah, we flirt and kiss a lot. After fifteen years in Baton Rouge, I’m finally getting what it means to be a coonass, which is never doing anything half-way. But without you, it can’t happen, cause Braze and I, we aren’t a couple; we’re just two parts of a three-part thing. We’re incomplete. We can do without sex, if we have to. But we can’t be us without you. It just doesn’t work.”

Gayle began, “I think all three of us, . . .” but then she started laughing when she hadn’t finished crying, and her intoxicated airways soon were so confused, she ended up in alternating sneezing fits and hiccups. After two more tries, she finally got it out: “. . . are fucking crazy.”

“You know it, sister,” Sarah said. “We’re the cutting edge of crazy. We three put the funk back in dysfunctional. So what’s it gonna take to get you back into the loony bin with us where you belong?”

“I don’t know,” said Gayle. “I’d feel really bad if y’all stopped having sex on my account, so don’t do that. Just be yourselves. You know I love you both. I guess it doesn’t matter if y’all kiss and carry on.”

“Okay,” said Sarah. “But watch out. Kisses start to fly around, a few might land on you.”

“What if I don’t feel like being kissed?”

“Then just say no. But better say it quick.” Sarah leaned across the table and kissed her on the lips, emphatically.

“Whoa!” said Gayle. “I thought . . .”

“Yeah, I’m straight,” said Sarah. “But I’ve always loved you, so why can’t I kiss you?”

“Well, I sure won’t complain. But won’t Braze get jealous if we kiss in front of him?”

“So kiss him, too, and let him feel some love. Don’t worry, he won’t think you’re trying to seduce him. He’s the gentleman, remember?”

“But what if . . .”

“What if what? What if we get drunk and all end up in bed together? Gayle, the only way that’s gonna happen is if you decide to let it happen. And if you do, well, lucky me—I’ll get to sleep between you.”

~~~~~

Dr. Kumar was half right. The end was quick and painless. Nine months after being diagnosed, lying blissfully beside a woman he adored, Braze Pegram simply ceased to be alive.

They spread his ashes in two places he had loved: Bayou Lafourche, where he'd grown up fishing and trapping with his cousins, and the Philmont Ranch in New Mexico, where he'd hiked and camped in Boy Scouts.  

It was in the lodge near Philmont that Sarah was finally ready to accept Gayle’s comfort. Making love at first felt awkward, but the memory of Braze in some strange way became more peaceful as the wall came down. “I wonder,” Sarah said, as they lay together afterwards. “Could this be what he wanted all along for both of us?”

Gayle said, "I don’t think he wanted anything for us but happiness, but he sure was a dreamer, just like you. Anybody else would say a three-way love could never last, but he believed this thing we had was going to keep us all alive forever."

"I believed it, too," said Sarah. "I think maybe I still do. I only wish . . ."

Then the tears returned. Sarah sobbed and wailed into Gayle's chest until her voice was hoarse, and still she keened in grief beyond consoling. When she could speak again, she said, "I knew we never should have waited."

"Waited for what, Sarah?"

"For a baby. I never wanted one till he did. But he didn’t want to try till my divorce was final." She blew her nose. “Why are you looking at me that way? Is anything about this situation funny?"

Gayle smiled and drew her close again. "He would think it was hilarious. I’ll just say I have a wonderful surprise for you."

~~~~~

Gayle and Sarah spoke their vows in the rotunda of the Old State Capitol in Baton Rouge. Ring bearers were Clement Braze Pegram and Selena Gayle Pegram, both three years old. The reception was from nine to close at Boudreaux's All-Night Grill and All-Day Oyster Bar.