Chapter 1
Alba and I were considered best friends. We often went out together to our favorite club, The Honey Lounge, a strictly lesbian club as the name may indicate, at least to us lesbians. We weren't a couple, but we did share a small house; we were strictly platonic. That said, she suggested a pact that if one of us hooked up with another girl, we'd either go to the other girl's place, or if we both got lucky, we'd have a previously arranged signal to let the other know if the house would be used. The only problem, for me at least, was that I just didn't hook up. I wasn't really in the game. That never happened, though Alba did occasionally wind up at a femme's house.
Alba was a catch for just about anyone, and she did hook up at regular intervals, at least enough to satisfy her, and per our arrangement, she always wound up at the lucky girl's place. She chided me some, but wasn't intrusive. She was cool with how I seemed to be. True, we had what I guess might be called a strange arrangement but it was working. Alba was a rare person, and a friend such as I l hadn't had in the past. It went back to how we met, and even before that, what I considered the odd life Alba had early on. Not long after we met she told me a little about some early experiences.
"I was just past my twelfth birthday. At the time, we were Catholic, though my father hadn't gone to church in a long time. I don't even remember him going with us, only my mother and two brothers. Why my father didn't go, I wasn't sure, but Mom made sure the rest of us went, had us go to confession the previous day, and took communion on Sunday. You know about communion, right?"
"Uh-huh. Is it different for Catholics, do you think? " I asked, not knowing the first thing about Catholicism.
"Yes, but that's not important. What I want to tell you is about Father Delaney. He wasn't an old guy as many were, and he was sort of handsome, and very friendly. All the kids liked to hang around him, and he seemed to encourage it. Anyway, we had this playground sort of behind the church, and inside, there was a gym with a basketball court, and one outside too for when the gym was closed.
"I'd not shown any interest in boys, I wonder why," she said with an innocent sideways grin. "Father Delaney" she went on, "must have noticed it and asked me about it. I told him I didn't know why, I just wasn't interested. He turned on his huge, all encompassing smile, and told me that I could be his girl then until I had a boyfriend, and he gave me a friendly sideways hug on the shoulder.
"Not thinking anything about it, I smiled, actually pretty pleased with myself at his having shown me this bit of what I thought was special attention. Boy, I was soon enough to find out just how special his attention was meant to be, at least in part. Whenever he'd see me he'd always asked: 'How's my girl today?'. That gave me a warm feeling. It's nice to think someone thinks well of you, sort of special like you know. Anyway, keep in mind that I was only twelve, okay."
I nodded and waited for her to go on. She did.
"A few months later, he saw me and called me. He was at the door to where they lived, and not thinking anything of it, I went and he invited me in. He asked how I was, then gave me a lopsided grin and asked if I had a boy friend yet. Naturally I told him no for, as you know, boys just didn't do anything for me, not then, and not ever.
"Still feeling at ease with him, I smiled shyly, and he told me that I was still his girl then, and gave me a small hug and kissed my forehead. Innocent enough, huh?" she looked at me with a sardonic look and a rolling of her eyes.
I grinned too, but pretty much thought I knew some of what was to follow. I was mostly right.
"Well that was it, but I didn't know it yet. 'Yeah, you're my girl, Alba, and a very pretty one at that.' Wow! That nearly made my day, but then he kissed me on the mouth, and I mean kissed me, pressing me against the wall. I was in shock, not to mention completely confused. I had no idea what was going on, or why, or what I was supposed to think. My mind was a jumble, I tell you.
"It got worse. I was trying instinctively to turn away from him, but he didn't let me until one of his hands went for my breast that had already popped out real good, and just as quickly it went to try to undo my jeans. That's when I really must have panicked. He had to back away a little though he kept kissing me, but he was so busy trying to get his way with me that he gave me some space, lucky me.
"My head down, and desperate as could be, I must have looked at his feet cause the next think I knew I'd lifted my foot and smashed it down on his instep. I must have got him good cause he howled loudly and danced away on one foot. Being turned loose, and scared like hell, as fast as I could, I ran out of there and didn't stop running until I was home."
"God, Alba, what did you do then?" I dumbly asked.
"Do? Nothing, I guess. I went to my bedroom and was scared shitless. I mean, I was really shook up, and my mind was flying with all kinds of insane thoughts that didn't make any sense, and I stayed that way. Mom asked me what was wrong when I couldn't eat, but I just told her I wasn't feeling well, and asked to be excused. My mind didn't give me any rest."
"At school, I didn't have any luck, and the teacher wouldn't let me off the hook. She was a real sweetheart, and when she felt something had to be wrong, she pulled it out of me. To make a long story short, she had my parents in and told them what I'd said. Dad went berserk! Before he called the cops, he'd gone and punched out Father Delaney. He was so mad that if Father Albert hadn't stopped him, he might have killed him. Needless to say, Father Delaney was quickly transferred out. They said he needed special hospital care, but as everyone knows now, they just moved him to someplace else and hushed it all up. Ain't that a bitch?" she ended it.
I could tell that she had gotten lost in the old feelings as she told it to me, and I wondered what I could do, should do, to help her out of it. It was a dumb thing to say, but it worked.
"No, it ain't a bitch," I said with a small smile. "Some bitches are kind of sweet, ain't they?" I said, my smile turning into a grin and I hoped for the best. It was okay.
"Yeah, Polly, some are, aren't they? Shame on me for mixing them up with that bastard."
"All of those bastards," I said emphatically, and making a face to back it up.
"Uh-huh, all of 'em. Pricks!"
She'd gotten past it, and the old Alba that I knew was back from the captivity of her bad memories.
* * * *
Thereafter Alba found out that we had a similar connection, that being how our religious life affected us. I hadn't had the awful one time experience that Alba had that was so traumatic. No, mine was more of an ongoing thing, most likely as so many others probably had too. It was religion being hammered into me, and me not aware of it; the rights and wrongs, the dos and don'ts, the hellfire and brimstone stuff.
Before I knew it, it was in me like a time bomb waiting for me to fuck up enough, to defy it in the most probable way possible before it set me off into a world of darkness. It almost got me, but not quite.
Too long after I realized that I was the poster girl for neurotics anonymous, and a trip to the depths of La-la-land, it was in me like a gene gone wild; mutated and finally ready to shatter my life just like a growing cancer. I had my own brand of bastards, and they weren't stealthy either, but I didn't know it until it was almost too late. Well, maybe they were stealthy then. Yeah, they had to be.
Unlike Alba's father, mine, as well as my mother, were big Jesus freaks. When the preacher blasted homosexuality, and left off to give the congregation their opportunity to punctuate his condemnation of them, my father's voice was at the forefront of those letting out with the 'Amens' along with just about all other males, the women nodding their heads in righteous indignation. I almost didn't have a chance, but it was some years before I honestly knew it. Back then I was just about brainwashed, resolving in my mind that I would forever be on guard against any such abominations, and avoid them like the plague.
