F" TION

BERIT FORTIER

TEQUIlASUNRISE

I Janet?" Before I can be forced to answer,her eyes light on some other face acrossthe room, and she promptly excuses her-self with promises galore to return and re-

am sitting on Monica's floor, eat- sume the conversation.ing shrimp which have little pieces of "Don't go away from this spot," areshell on them that I find every other bite usually the last words she utters to me allor so. There must be a hundred people evening.'here, none of whom I know nor care to Of course I do. I fmd some comerknow intimately. I see them every time where I can observe human frailty at itsMonica throws a party, which is every finest. Janet used to call it my laboratorynight that Monica decides she needs to pose. Once adopted, she said, I look atreestablish herself as the hub of lesbian everyone and everything as if under a Jnightlife on the Upper West Side. I think microscope. But that's not the case at all. anet didn't just leave me. She left theI like Monica's parties more than I like Inreality, I hope to learn by watching and country. One warm day in November,Monica. Her parties at least allow me to listening. Most of the women here have the kind of day when you awaken in theremain somewhat anonymous and dis- slept or had some other form of intimate morning and you know something isconnected, neither of which requires interaction with each other. I found qut a desperately wrong. A warm front hadmuch in the way of effort or attention. long time ago that it's far easier to ask a bounded in, wreaking havoc on my

Monica, on the other hand, requires dyke whom they haven't slept with than sinuses, a condition I inherited from myboth. She greets me as ifwe're the closest whom they have slept with at one of father along with a trust fund which setof close, gal pals I think is her clique's Monica's parties. The answer is always me up for life.word for it, asks me exactly three ever- shorter that way. Yet, when all of these Holding my head, which feels likeincreasingly piercing questions with the women see each other, they hug and kiss someone has been using the matter be-third question always being, "So what each other, and laugh and talk with ease hind my eyes for dart practice, I stumblereally hal'pened between you and as ifnothing traumatic, no lesbian drama into the kitchen to get a cup of coffee.

TEQUILA SUNRISE ISSUE 175 / 35

had ever come between them. It doesn'tmatter, either, if the adulterer is standingwith the couple of eternity.

So I watch and listen, hoping to dis-cover their secret for swallowing theirfeelings (some not so old) of anger andjealousy and most of all, scarred pride. Iam determined to fmd some nugget ofknowledge which will help me recovermy own sense of self pride, nonexistentsince Janet left me.

There I am, favorite mug in hand, whenit dawns on me that there is no coffeemade. This is unusual. Every morningthere is coffee, more precisely Cafe Bus-telo, simmering softly away in the ThreeFor One coffee maker. But this particularmorning the Three For One is not onlynot on, it's nowhere to be seen. Maybe itis the sinus headache or maybe it is theheat. Maybe it is a combination of thetwo, but it's as if I still cannot grasp whathas happened while I was sleeping. Istand in the middle of the kitchen,temples throbbing, T-shirt slightly dampfrom the unusually warm temperature,my hair matted down on one side andstanding up on the other, trying toremember when I saw the Three ForOne last. My brain is foggy. I can't thinkstraight.I start to look through the cupboards,

which are arranged in alphabetical orderby the item that they contain, anotherhousehold task analyzed by Janet.Around the third cupboard which housesdry goods, a term I have never heard saidby anyone but Janet and general storeclerks in old westerns, I am jolted by anodd little thought that Janet has taken theThree For One to be fixed somewhere fursome reason. Having squatted through-out my search of cabinets one and two,baking goods and canned goods respec-tively, I stand up groaning asmy muscles,which don't even know they're awakeyet, stretch to a more humane position.She must have left a note somewhere, Ireason, and start to scan the chairs,tabletops, even the refrigerator for one.True to an old habit of hers, she has left

me a note inside the refrigerator taped toa can of Diet Pepsi. I walk over to thekitchen table while I tear the envelopeopen. A ring fulls out on to the floor, thering I gave Janet on our first anniversary.Another odd little thought jolts me butthis one has nothing to do with coffee.I'm starting to shiver even though theapartment is baking. I slump into a chair.My heart is beating way too fast. My tem-ples are pounding. I uncrease the whitepaper and read that my life will suck thebig one for the next year, that I can expectto cry every day and lose ten pounds thatI can't afford to lose, and that I will re-move the word trust from my vocabularyfor many years to come.That's not what the note says, of

course, that's what I read into it. The let-

I uncrease the white paper and read that my life willsuck the big one for the next year, that I can expect tocry every day and lose ten pounds that I can't afford tolose and that I will remove the word trust from myvocabulary for many years to come.

ter actually says, "As you know, it hasn'tbeen good between us fur some time." AsI know? I thought I was going to get a cupof coffee this morning, that's how muchI know. There are quite a few wordsabout this not coming as a surprise (towhom?), "it's" been coming for a longtime (how long?), and other similarphrases that I can't quite understand yet.All this time, the ring, the one I hadmade special by a jeweler friend of ours(ours-better not say that word anymore)and which is really two rings encirclingeach other, is still on the floor, glisteningin the broad ray of sunshine which hassplit the kitchen in two. I feel like Gollumin the Lord of the Rings, horrified as Iwatch the ring take on a life of its own.I stare at it. It seems to throb, to grow

bigger. I kick at it with such a force thatit skates across the floor and disappearsunder the refrigerator. Well, that's takencare of. I put the letter very neatly backinto the envelope, wad it into one ball,open the kitchen window, and throw itout as hard as I can. Out of sight, out ofmind.For the next two hours I empty every

cabinet, every shelf, in search of theThree For One. Yes, she told me via herlove letter that she had taken it with herto France (what, don't they have coffeemakers in Europe?), but I must makecertain that she is telling the truth.Maybe Janet has had a breakdown and-and-and ... I can't finish the sentencebecause all the cupboards from A to Z areemptied, and there isn't a joe-maker to befound, and I am sitting crosslegged, myT-shirt getting damper from the tears thatI am crying, the cans and boxes of foodstill arranged by alphabetical orderaround me.

Iam brought back to Monica's living

room by the entrance, really the grandentrance, of a beautiful black womanwho floats through the crowd as if she ishooked to the ceiling by invisible wires.As I strain to catch a better look at herthrough the crowd, I realize my neck issore from my pulling the ring on its chainback and forth around my neck.Of course, I retrieved the ring a few

days after I had disposed of it under therefrigerator. Using a broom, the broomJanet always used every hour on the hourto keep the kitchen floor spotless, Iscraped the ring out and put it around myneck on a chain I found in the back of adrawer. Then I packed my bags and left,leaving my own note to Janet on the toi-let. Nice touch, I thought at the time.I stop tugging at my chain, or my ball

and chain, as I sometimes fondly refer toit, and look at the black Venus. She issmiling at me, a big smile, a smile whichpulls me toward her and away from mypast.

Iam having trouble staying out ofVenus's blue eyes, which run up anddown my body as if they own me. I'mstarting to want her to own me, some-thing I haven't wanted in a long, longtime. I'm drinking my sixth tequila sun-rise. It's starting to taste like day oldTeem, but I keep sipping on it anyway.I have finally realized what it is I want-

ed to know. All these parties have finallypaid off. I hold the key to everything now.All this time I thought there was some-thing deep inside these people that al-lowed them to carry on conversationswith someone that they found in bedwith their lover. But it wasn't deep at all.Six tequila sunrises is all it takes. I feellike I could talk to each and every one ofthem now. I can't believe I never even no-ticed that all these people must drink te-quila sunrises. How stupid of me. Pull

36 / CHRISIDPHER STREET BERIT FORTIER

yourself together. Venus is talking to youagain.She's tells me that she's a sex-line oper-

ator at 1-900-SLAYS-ME. I tell her thatI can't believe that she doesn't get offlistening to the phone calls she's paid tolisten to every night. I'm talking to herabout sex and S&M as if they're words orconcepts that easily roll of my tongue. Ican't tell if she's buying it or not. I feelsmooth, though. Now she's saying that ifI was on the other end it would be adifferent story."Hah, bah." I laugh.God, that sounded loud. Her blueness

bores into me some more. I ask her if shewants another drink. She accuses me ofchanging the subject."Me?" I ask, looking down into the

backwash of my drink that I hold some-what askew in my hand.She asks me if I'd like to call her num-

ber and hands me a business card that'sall done up in black except for the brightred lettering spelling her name, Com-manda, and the telephone number. I saysometime maybe I will. Smooth. I askher if I call if she'll pick up the phone orare there hundreds of operators. I stuttera little. Not much so maybe she didn'tnotice. I ask her again if she wants adrink. She bores. I ask her if she thinksit's getting hot in here. I start to blabbersomething about not being very good atthis. She asks, at what?"At this."I'm starting to feel hotter. Then it all

starts to come out. Janet. Me. Even theThree For One part. The whole kit andcaboodle. I can't stop myself. I want tostop, but I can't. I tell her I think I'm theone who needs a drink. She laughs, takesmy hand, and starts to walk me out. I tryto stop and tell her that I have to tell Mon-ica that I'm leaving but she just says,"Monica's a big girl," and she steers medown the hall to the front door."I'll make you a deal," I say to her. I'm

slurring my words but I go on. "If youwant me to go home with you, you haveto promise me you won't answer the tele-phone. You know, if a customer calls orsomething."She says something about being hard

to get, laughs, and we're almost out thedoor when we run smack into my ex,Janet, who's looking like she can't decideif this is really me or a pod out of TheBody Snatchers. 0

WHATREALLYKILLEDGILDA

RADNER?Frontline Reports On The

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This is the one book that challenges everythingwe've been told about the epidemic.

While Americans have been told by scien tists, the government, and the media that "AIDS" isthe most serious health problem in America, a much larger epidemic has been spreadingacross the country: the epidemic called Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, also known as ChronicMono, Yuppie Flu, or Chronic Immune Dysfunction Syndrome (c/DS).

Since 1988, Neenyah Ostrom has been reporting on this medical catastrophe for the NewYork Native-a paper many people consider to be the intelligentsia's paper of record on the"AIDS" epidemic.

What Ostrom has uncovered will disturb every Amreican who is concerned about theirpersonal health and the health of their friends and family.

Michael Denneny, the editor of And the Band Played On, told Publishers Weekly thatNeenyah Ostrom "has done an extraordinarily consistent job of following virtually everycurlicue of the trail of this potentially devestating disease.... I definitely think her findingsshould be paid attention to and further explored. "

Trade Paperback, 400 pages, S14.94.ISBN 0-9624142-1-2

That New Magazine, Inc., PO. Box 1475,Church Street Station, NY, NY 10008

TEQUILA SUNRISE

Please ship me __ copies of What Really Killed Gilda Radner?

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ISSUE 175 / 37