The Only Lesbian in Town

I'm often asked if I moved to Brisbane because of small town homophobia. A lot of people remember the nineties and the devastating suicide rates amongst gay and lesbian teenagers in country towns, and assume that if you're not in a metropolitan city, life as a queer person is shit.

Thankfully, I was spared the fate of cruel parents and largely spared the troubles of a small-minded town. When I came out, aged eighteen, announcing to my family that I preferred women, my mother muttered 'half your luck'. My father laughed at her response and thumped me on the back, telling me he didn't blame me, and he wished me more success with the ladies than he'd had. My brothers wanted to know if this meant there was now more competition for the handful of available, single women in the district.

Maybe it was because of their easy acceptance, or maybe it was because they ran the only hotel in town and shunning me might mean being refused a drink - not a risk worth taking, for a lot of locals - but I didn't have too bad a time of life in the years afterward. The biggest problem was the I became 'the lesbian', and when you're 'the' lesbian, your love life isn't exactly destined to bloom, is it?

So, at the age of twenty-one, I made the move. Packed my bags, found a flat to rent, and moved to Brisbane. I already had a job lined up, as a delivery driver, and I assumed that I'd find a good woman, settle down, and maybe have a few kids.

That didn't happen. I met some women, and had some relationships, but nothing ever really worked out. I kept driving, moving my way up from a van to a semi rigid to a prime mover. Women truck drivers are about as thin on the ground as lesbians in country towns, but I was used to sticking out, and at any rate, most of the men were good to me, and those that weren't were quickly put in their place by the others.

Now, ten years after first making the move, I'm starting to feel tired. Sometimes it's as if the city is closing in on me. There are people everywhere, and it's always noisy, so my brain never feels it can switch off. The light pollution makes it impossible to stargaze, and I miss my family.

My parents are starting to drop hints about retiring. They want me to take over running the hotel and it's attached bottleshop.

Running a country pub isn't everyone's cup of tea, and I'm just not sure it's mine. For starters, you need to work long hours. Secondly, you need to have a diverse range of skills; everything from listening to emotional drunks to balancing the books to marketing your business. Thirdly, you need to be able to accept that your biggest clients are the people with the biggest problems with alcohol.

I have profound memories of Wesley Simpson getting falling down drunk and pissing himself, and of Kyle O'Sullivan going through the drive-through bottleshop every Saturday morning, right after he'd been paid, to buy enough rum to get him through the week. Wesley's inebriation was more embarrassing to behold, but Kyle's issues hurt me in a whole different way.

Kyle had three kids to three different women before he was out of his teens, and he lived and worked on his parent's farm. In the backseat of his dusty old ute his three boys would sit, lined up, all dark eyed like their father, jostling and arguing with each other as their father put in his order. To keep them quiet, Kyle would buy them each a can of Fanta and a packet of chips.

I often wondered what happened when they got back home. Sometimes, not knowing the truth makes a situation seem more sinister. Left to fill in the gaps, your mind begins to wander. That's what it was like for me, in my teens, watching Kyle come through each Saturday morning. My mind would race, as I was left to ponder what fate lay in store for Kyle and his kids.

It wasn't until a few years ago, when Kyle's kids grew up, and the youngest one began to visit the pub on occasion, that my mind was set at ease. Neal told me his father had indeed battled with the booze, but he'd been a functional drunk. Neither his, nor his brothers', childhoods had been too badly scarred.

But while that might have made me feel better, it hasn't entirely helped clear my doubts. A 'good' drunk is still a drunk, and do I really want to be the one who helps people facilitate their addictions? The end result is that I feel a bit stuck. Do I stay in Brisbane, where I'm unhappy but have a job I don't dislike? Or do I move back home, to a place I love, but will be obliged to take on a position I know I'd despise?

Questions, questions, questions.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

A couple of years ago one of the regulars at my parent's pub was diagnosed with cancer. Like me, Cyril Granstone was a truckie, and when he realised the bell was tolling for him, he offered to sell me his prime mover. The price he was asking was so low I was sure there was a catch.

'No catch,' he told me, staring at my boobs. He was a dirty old lech, but a fun one, and I wasn't even slightly offended by his wandering gaze. 'When I die the bloody vultures will pick over my estate, and I'd rather help out a good woman if I can before they steal what they think they're entitled to.'

The vultures he was referring to were his siblings. Cyril was a lifelong bachelor, an Vietnam Vet and a wealthy man. He told me his insurers had paid him out now that he was terminal, which had added to the pile he'd accumulated. He didn't need, or want, top dollar for his truck.

His offer was so generous I felt obliged to say 'no', but he rolled his eyes at me and told me to make him happy and say 'yes'. He was glad there were more women drivers these days. He liked watching us climb in and out of the cabs.

In the end, I relented. I got a loan, bought his truck, and started making serious money.

On Sunday afternoon I take my truck to collect a load of Lucerne hay from Alan Miles. Alan is, hands down, one of my favourite people to work for. He's organised, he's efficient, and he's always polite. If he's been staring at my bum and legs as I get in and out of the truck, he's been exceptionally good at hiding it.

Alan is singing as he loads the hay, his clear strong voice belting out the lyrics to Mental as Anything's 'Live it up', but he's working at a casual pace. Both of us are taking this as an opportunity to take a break and indulge in some chit chat.

'I'd love for a woman to come up to my place,' I complain, unbuttoning my long-sleeved workshirt and slipping it off. Underneath I'm wearing a tight, white singlet, and with it a pair of comfy blue jeans and a battered pair of work boots. I have a reasonable figure; not skinny, not fat, and relatively busty. 'I should've been born a man, Al.'

He laughs at that. 'Maybe you just need to sing them a love song, Sunny.'

'I can't sing like you, and besides, what counts as a love song these days? You listened to the radio recently? Christ, I must be getting old, because it all sounds like shit.'

He sings 'Hey there you with the sad face, come sit on my face, I'll eat you out' to the tune of 'Live it Up', and I burst into laughter.

'No good?' he guesses.

I laugh harder as I try to do battle with my hair. It's long, it's thick, it's dark and it's curly. On hot days like today I'm forever pulling it up into a pony tail, then releasing it when I start to get annoyed from the feeling of driving with my hair pulled back.

'Maybe not what women are wanting to hear,' I reply diplomatically. I let my hair fall freely around my shoulders. 'Besides, I need to find a woman first.'

'There's a new lesbian working at Oakey hospital,' he tells me helpfully. 'She'd be about your age. Maybe a bit younger.'

'Cute?'

'I suppose so. There's no meat on her bones, though. She looks like she needs a good feed.'

Alan likes chubby girls, so the new lesbian might be anorexic, or she might be a normal weight.

'You should go and introduce yourself,' he adds. 'I've heard she's single.'

'What, I'm supposed to go into the hospital on some pretence, ask for the cute new lesbian and say 'hi, I'm a dyke, too, want to date?''

'Not like that,' he grumbles good-naturedly. 'I mean at your parent's hotel. She goes there sometimes for dinner.'

'I see.' I pick up my hair and start plaiting it, in a last ditch attempt to keep it out of my face and off my neck. 'I'll keep that in mind.'

I head off to make my delivery, trying not to think too much about the new lesbian. On one hand, I want to get excited. There's another young, lesbian out here? And she's cute? And she goes to my parent's hotel for dinner? On the other, getting excited about someone you've never met is more than a little nutty, even if you're a lesbian and accustomed to being the only one of your kind in a fifty kilometre radius.

As I make the trek back to Brisbane, I call my parents to see if they make mention of the new dyke. They don't, but they suggest I come up next time weekend, if I'm free, to help out in the bar. The weather has been excellent and a lot of motorcycle and car clubs have been travelling out their way and stopping at the hotel for lunch and beers on the weekends. An extra set of hands would come in handy.

I find myself at the bar next Saturday, pulling beers and mixing drinks. By mid-afternoon all of the tourists have come and gone and it's just me and four of the regulars at the bar. Mum is working the bottleshop and Dad is in the kitchen helping the staff clean up after lunch.

'You heard about Kara?' Luke Wilms asks me, leaning over the old, wooden counter.

I'm guessing that Kara is the lesbian, but to be polite, I say 'no', and ask him who she was. His craggy face contorts into a smile and he conspiratorially tells me she's the new nurse at Oakey hospital. Twenty-seven years old, light brown hair, glasses, and small boobs -- maybe a large a cup or a small b cup. Friendly. Lesbian.

'What makes you so sure she's a lesbian?' I inquire.

'I asked her.' He takes a sip of his shandy. 'She said to save people gossiping, she'd just come out and let it be known that yes, she prefers women. I told her about you. Told her to come down sometime, because you might be about, and from what I've heard, she's done that. I was wondering if you two had managed to meet up.'

'What'd you tell her about me, Luke?'

'I told her you had a great set on you, and were a truckie, but weren't too butch. Told her you were single.'

I've never quite understood why so many people seem to consider me 'butch', particularly out here, when most of the straight women will wear jeans on a night out. If you take yourself into Toowoomba, the nearest town, there's an enormous Rivers store, as well as Hannah's, which sells the quintessential RM Williams. Depending on your budget, you can take your pick of the two, but the end result still looks much the same.

Adam Eastwood, all of twenty and skinny as a rake, gazes over at me. He's one of those poor, dumb idiots that just can't grasp simple facts, but he never means ill. He's just stupid. Once you understand and accept that, the crap that comes out of his mouth becomes less aggravating.

'Are you the man in the relationship, Sunny?' Adam inquires.

'I'm sorry?' I ask.

'You know. Are you the man?' he prods gormlessly.

Luke puts down his shandy and stares at him incredulously. The other two men in the bar, men whose names presently elude me, are also quiet. They've sussed out that a juicy little exchange is occurring and are keen for the verbal sparring to start.

'Adam,' Luke snorts. 'There is no man in the relationship. She's a dyke. It's just two girls.'

'Yeah, but how do you have sex?' Adam prods, his eyes narrowing in disbelief as he asks me his question.

Luke answers on my behalf. 'Someone blow this man's mind and tell him about eating pussy. Maybe if he can figure out how to do it right, he'll be able to find a girlfriend.'

'No, proper sex,' Adam retorts, glancing at Luke, then me, then back to Luke. 'Like, when you use the strap on. Is Sunny the one that wears it?'

My cheeks flush with embarrassment, and I'm debating whether I should tell him a few home truths about my sex life, or just keep him guessing, when Luke again steps in to save me.

'Adam,' Luke says slowly. 'Proper sex is when the woman has an orgasm.'

'But...'

'...Adam,' Luke interrupts, his voice sharp. 'Take your curiosity to a porn site, like a normal man. She doesn't owe you the details.'

I mouth Luke a silent 'thank-you', and promise not to charge him for a single extra drink that afternoon. Adam gets disgruntled and tells us he's going.

'Gonna figure out how two girls fuck, are you?' One of the patron's jeers.

Adam flips him the bird and slinks out of the bar, and back to his family's farm. He probably can't afford to keep drinking, anyway. There are all sorts of farms around here, with varying degrees of profitability. Kyle, the drunk with three kids and an alcohol problem, was the child of wealthy farmers, earning enough to keep his children's mothers happy and to keep himself in grog.

Adam's family is dirt poor, and there's nothing on the horizon that's likely to change that. His clothes are clean but well worn, and I guarantee you that the tags on them won't be displaying designer names.

We watch him leave.

'I did hear something about Kara,' I admit to Luke. 'Alan told me. I went by last week to pick up some Lucerne.'

'Did Al tell you about his new girlfriend?'

I glance up in surprise. 'No. There's a new girl?'

Luke nods. 'Some girl he met on the internet. She's from Brisbane. He won't say anything to anybody about it, but we've all seen her around. Exactly how he likes them, too; plump and pretty.'

My heart sinks. Brisbane? He met someone from Brisbane, presumably on some online dating site? No wonder he's been keeping it quiet. She lives two hours away from him. He must surely know that whatever he's got going on with this woman is unlikely to work out. She'll want to live near her friends and family, rather than move to an unfamiliar, quiet town, and that's problematic because Alan is stuck here, wedded to the land.

'How long's this been going on?' I ask.

'A few weeks, that we know of. I thought he might've said something to you. You two have always been good mates.'

Alan would never talk to me about his romantic endeavours. He'd always been someone who plays his cards close to his chest when it comes to love. That's why when I was twenty-four and trying to figure out if maybe I was bisexual, I asked him to sleep with me. I knew he'd never tell a soul, and he didn't. And he didn't do a bad job of it, at least by my lesbian standards, even if screwing him did do away with any doubts I had about my sexuality.

'Nope,' I reply. 'I hope she lets him down gently when she gets sick of travelling out here.'

'Me too. He likes this one, really likes her. You can tell by the way he looks at her.'

For the rest of the afternoon, I forget about Kara. Instead, I worry about Alan. One thing's for sure, though; love is a tricky business out here.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I stay at my parent's house on Saturday night. I could theoretically stay at the hotel, but I'd rather not.

The hotel has two single rooms, four doubles and a family room. None have private bathrooms, instead sharing two large, modern rooms that are situated at either end of the upper story. You'd probably be unsurprised to learn I saw my first hard cock in one of the bathrooms, on the same day and at the same time I first learned about male masturbation.

I must've been ten or eleven at the time, and had just barged into the bathroom at six am on a Tuesday morning, busting for a pee. My father was taking his usual half hour sabbatical in our sole bathroom, and the cleaners were scrubbing out the barroom ladies room. To this day I'm not sure who was more shocked; the poor sales rep who was taking care of business before heading off, or me.

While initially the most horrifying of experiences, as I hit puberty and my tits reached a D cup, both the hotel rooms and the bar became places to avoid. Even as an adult, I'm wary of drunk men. Ninety-five percent are fine. Five percent are not. It's that five percent that bothers me and because my parents have never been ones to stop people from continuing to imbibe well after they probably should have cut them off, it's not uncommon to have someone take a room to 'sleep it off' after a heavy night on the sauce.

After the kitchen has finished serving dinner, and the other lesbian has made no signs of an appearance, I leave running the joint to my parents and their staff. I lie in my old, single bed in my old bedroom, and stare at the ceiling. If I take over the hotel, I'll also be obliged to live here. The house is large, old, requires a lot of maintenance. It's totally unsuitable for a single person. Another negative to consider.

I'm tired but horny, and I slip a hand down the waistband of my shorts, into my panties, and find my slit. I part my labia, feeling my clit harden and swell in anticipation, and with my free hand I reach up my shirt. I toy with my breasts, nipples stiffening, as a warm heat spreads between my legs.

My fingers dip into my channel, lubricating them, and I spread the wetness over my clit. My movements are still slow and casual as my body is teased towards full arousal. My heart thumps, and I shut my eyes. My hand moves from between my legs and joins the other in caressing my breasts, squeezing them, rolling the nipples around in my fingers, trying to imagine a woman playing with them.

I kick my clothes off and lay on top of the covers, naked and horny. My skin is so sensitive that the feel of the rough cotton bedding is both excruciating and sensual, and I turn onto my belly and rub myself against it, my nipples aching.

My hands return to their previous positions; one groping my breasts, the other crushed between the bed and my cunt. I continue to taunt my body, rubbing, stroking, tugging. I bury a groan in my pillow, as my fingers begin to frantically work my clit. My orgasm is building, so dangerously close I almost forget to stop myself, but somehow, I manage to pull my hands away just in time.

I roll onto my back, breathing in deeply, trying to focus on the stillness of the night, and the warm, humid air. My bedroom looks out onto a farmer's property, and I throw open the curtains and stare at the fields. They're deserted of human life. Nobody can see me.

I stand in front of the window, showing this fertile field my nude form. Large heavy breasts with erect nipples. A smooth, flat stomach. Rounded hips. Dark, wild, hair that must make me look like a madwoman. I feel so alive, so sexual, so ready to surrender myself.

'Here,' I whisper, as if in challenge to the world, as I spread my labia and stroke my hard little button. 'Watch.'

My fingers work frantically, up, down, clockwise, counter-clockwise. Ever faster, then slow, slow, slow, then faster again. I'm doubled over in exquisite agony, ready for the final piece of the puzzle to fall into place. Ready to cum.

This time, when I know I'm close, I don't hold back. I let out a small, desperate cry, as I crush my fingers against my cunt, kneading it through a climax that leaves me weak-kneed and shaking. Then I stumble over to my bed, crawl under the covers, and fall asleep, naked.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

On Wednesday Alan and I are chatting on Facebook when I mention I'll be spending my Friday night making a trip to Dalby. Oh, the excitement, I tell you. Dalby.

He's excited. He asks if maybe I can cut him a favour, if I don't mind. The girl he's been seeing doesn't drive, and a bus ticket to Toowoomba is setting her back twenty-five bucks a pop. Would I mind taking her out to Oakey? He'll drive in and pick her up from there.

Now, trucking is a solitary career for the most part. It's just you, and the road, and the open highway channel. Mostly I like it, but sometimes it gets a bit too lonely, so I'm more than happy to take the girl out to Oakey. Not only will it give me some company, but it'll give me a chance to check her out.