Part 12 (1/2)
She knocked on the adjoining door Mich.e.l.le style, not waiting for an answer. Carla followed her upstairs. Mich.e.l.le and Janka were both reading at the table. Tammyfaye was sitting in Janka's lap and glared at them resentfully when they entered.
”Tell them what you told me in the car,” Alison demanded, too excited for amenities like greetings.
”Hi, I'm Carla,” Carla said coyly. She wanted to make sure that her moment in the limelight lasted as long as possible.
”Tell them,” Alison urged impatiently.
”Well, Alison showed me the picture... ” began Carla.
”Carla is the woman who was attacked last night,” Alison interrupted.
”Alison showed me the picture,” Carla repeated in a louder voice, determined to hold onto the reins, ”and I knew I had seen that woman somewhere...”
”Melanie Donahue,” inserted Alison.
”...and I even got the idea I had talked to her, or had at least listened to her talk. So I thought and thought about it, but I couldn't remember where I'd been. Then my mom called and she was all upset because she had read about the attack in the paper and she was saying,” here Carla's voice became high pitched and almost sing-song, ”'Oh, no, I told you what would happen if you hung out with those people, Reverend Malcolm was right, no good can come from this, it's a sin against G.o.d and this was his way of warning you that you still have time to repent. Satan must have blinded my eyes for me to ever think that I could accept this',” Carla took a deep breath, ”'you've got to go back to The Group and we'll help you fight this!' So, of course I said, 'No. I don't want you to call me if you're going to say this kind of c.r.a.p, and if you have anybody from that place call me I'm going to get another restraining order.' She said, 'Oh, this is killing your father, and won't you reconsider and I'm praying for you,' and right in the middle of the whole mess I got this flashback!” Janka and Mich.e.l.le were sitting side by side, watching Carla as intensely as if they were attending a Broadway first. The girl had missed her calling as an actress. ”I remembered that was where I had met her! At the support group.” She sat back, beaming.
The two women looked at each other. Mich.e.l.le said tentatively, ”All, did we miss something? Like, what the h.e.l.l are you talking about?”
”The Crusaders,” Alison prompted impatiently. ”Remember our undercover operation? Remember what they told Janka about 'support groups' and how they would come to her house if they needed to? Well, Carla was in one of those groups! And so was Melanie Donahue!”
There was a moment of silence while everyone digested this information.
”So what are you doing working in a d.y.k.e bar, then?” Mich.e.l.le asked bluntly. ”Change your mind?”
”Hey,” Carla defended herself, ”I wasn't at those meetings because I wanted to be. Hardly anybody was. I was only seventeen. I was still in high school, and I had this kind of unspoken deal with my mom and dad that if I went over to the storefront once a week and listened to other people talk about how bad it was to be queer they wouldn't have me thrown in the loony bin again. Okay?”
”And Melanie was in this group?” Janka asked. Carla nodded.
”So you're how old now?”
”Just turned twenty-one,” Carla said proudly. Alison's insides twisted in embarra.s.sment.
”Which makes this about four years ago. But didn't you say,” she pointed at Mich.e.l.le, ”that Melanie had met this Krista and gotten together with her some time ago? Longer than that?”
”At least six years ago,” Mich.e.l.le confirmed. ”Maybe more like eight.”
”Well, then what was she doing there? Did she break up with Krista and try to go straight and then give it up and go back to her?” Janka looked confused.
”No, no!” Alison was excited again. ”Listen to this.”
”Her girlfriend was with her,” said Carla. ”If I remember right the story went like this. I mean, I might not have all the details, because I've suppressed a lot of this, but I think it was like this. Melanie and Krista had been together for a couple of years. Krista had always been uptight about being a d.y.k.e. Melanie was her first lover. I don't know if she was raised in some kind of church that was against it, or she was born again, or what the deal was, but she had been kind of pacifying herself for a long time saying that she wasn't really a lesbian, and their love was pure....”
”Which meant she put out as little as possible,” said Alison. Carla, who had been saving that for a climax, gave her a dirty look. ”Sorry.”
”Anyway, they bought a house and they started a business together, and Krista had a baby. Now, I don't remember this part really well, but the little girl got sick or was in an accident or something like that and Krista got all freaked out and promised G.o.d that if he just saved her she would never flick another woman again.” Actually, Alison had been somewhat amazed and a little suspicious of how Carla had gone from total blankness to such a complete memory. However, when she had questioned her in the car the young woman had told her it was something that had happened to her before, and had to do with the abusive way her parents had reacted to her lesbianism. She had deliberately blanked out large parts of her adolescence, but could recall incidents in great detail when reminded of them.
”So the baby lived, and Krista kept her promise. Now, apparently Melanie wasn't really jacked about this.
”I guess not,” Mich.e.l.le said.
”...but Krista got her to come to the group with her a couple of times to hear about pure love and all that.”
”And she bought it?” Mich.e.l.le asked incredulously. ”Boy, not the Melanie I knew.”
”She didn't,” Carla told her eagerly. ”See, right about then I graduated from high school and moved out of my folks' house, and of course the first thing I did was stop going to that awful place. Really, what I wanted to do was go back one more time to tell them I was too a d.y.k.e and I loved it. But I was afraid to. I didn't even let my mom know where I was for a whole year. But I ran into Melanie in the women's bookstore one day. At first I was totally freaked out-I thought somehow that they were on my tail, right? But we talked a little and she told me that she wasn't involved with the Crusaders anymore; she just hadn't been able to stomach it. But she was still with Krista. See, she really loved her, and she had decided it was worth it to stay with her even though they couldn't commit any 'h.o.m.os.e.xual acts' anymore. Isn't that gross? Like the only time you're queer is when you're f.u.c.king, and paint-mg the house or going to the store isn't a h.o.m.os.e.xual act, too. But she had decided to go along with it, because she loved Krista and they had this business and the house and the whole bit. Also, she just adored the little girl and I guess Krista had basically said, 'Play it my way or you don't see her anymore.'”
There was a long silence.
”That's sad,” said Janka finally. ”That is the most pitiful story I have heard in a long time.”
”No kidding.” Mich.e.l.le sat as if she had been sh.e.l.l-shocked.
Alison had been so excited about the connection she had hardly thought of the story as involving human characters. Now, like her two friends, she felt sad, and also a great rush of anger at the society that forced girls like Carla to black out whole years of their young lives in order to forget the suffering they had undergone because they were lesbians.
The feeling, however, was quickly overridden by her excitement. At last she felt as if the case were going somewhere, and not just in awkward fits and starts the way her theory had against Dominique. Thinking of Dominique reminded her of the hysterical message on her answering machine. She had deliberately gone to see Carla first, shelving Beth until morning. Perhaps it was heartless, but she simply was not up to anything trying-not Dominique's rudeness or Beth's anguish. She was, after all, not these people's therapist. She would call them in the morning. She would have to about the blood in the sink, although it was probably something totally innocent. This new theory about the Crusaders' being involved seemed to render Dominique incapable of murder.
Janka and Mich.e.l.le were sipping their raspberry tea and did not seem to catch the implication.
”Don't you see?” Alison asked impatiently. ”This is the connection that we've been looking for. The murders couldn't have been just random. The killer went to too much trouble for that. Melanie was a big, tough looking woman-only a fool would have chosen her if any d.y.k.e would do. Tamara and Carla were both attacked in a crowded parking lot-again, why put yourself in a vulnerable position like that if it doesn't matter which d.y.k.e you get?”
”Why put yourself to that kind of trouble at all if you can just hang around their homes?” asked Mich.e.l.le. Alison felt crabby for a moment, as if Mich.e.l.le were poking holes in her theory out of perversity. But she had to look at every angle. It had to be airtight before she dared present it to Jones and Jorgensen.
”I don't know why,” she said slowly.
”Maybe some kind of s.e.xual thrill?” suggested Janka. ”You know, being in danger and all that? Or maybe the feeling that G.o.d is on your side and will let you walk right into the den of the wicked to do his work?”
”Hmm. Carla,” Mich.e.l.le said suddenly, ”you said that you were afraid to go back to the group, that you kept your whereabouts hidden. Do you think that anyone involved with them could be a killer?”
”They scare me,” Carla said simply. ”It was so...” she shuddered, ”...awful being there. So...just horrible. The praying and the shouting. They told us over and over that we were evil, that we were possessed by the devil. They'd get in like these crazy frenzies and I'd just think 'Okay, okay, I'll say whatever you want. Just shut up and leave me alone!'”
”But did they ever do anything physical, Carla? Try to remember,” Alison urged.
Carla was silent for a moment, and suddenly Alison wanted to apologize for making her look back into the dark time that she had hidden from herself, wanted to tell her that no more recollection was necessary, but she couldn't. Another woman's life might depend on her memory.
”They made people come in,” she said finally, slowly. ”I know that. Like I told you my mom and dad did, like blackmail. But sometimes somebody would fight. And their parents or whoever would just drag them in while they were kicking and screaming. Ugh, it was so gross. We were supposed to stand around and pray for them, but inside I was wis.h.i.+ng that I had enough nerve to fight. And I think they did some of that reprogramming stuff. Because a couple of times these people came in to testify, like these guys that used to be drag queens and they were married now and living in Littleton. They talked about being restrained, like it was something that was done for their own good, you know, so they could finally see the light of G.o.d and cast out the demons. This one time I had this big fight with my mom and I told her that I was going to leave home and go live with this friend. And she told me that no matter where I went the Crusaders would find me and bring me back. I was so scared I couldn't even sleep at night. I read this story in a magazine about this woman whose parents had hired her kidnappers because she was a d.y.k.e. So these people that were supposed to reprogram her-one of the things they did was rape her. Like that was going to change her mind. There were these guys in the group...I could imagine them doing that and thinking it was for G.o.d. I didn't even think about leaving again. Not until I had saved up to buy a plane ticket for someplace far away.”
The story was too pitiful for comment. The kindest thing to do seemed to be to treat it just as information being given, rather than anything personal.
”Anything else?”
”Well, sometimes some of the supporters were violent. That's what they called your folks or whoever was making you come in-supporters. Like, Brother Malcolm never said that you should kill queers or anything,” she gave a shudder, and Alison could see that she was remembering only because she was forcing herself to remember, ”but sometimes someone would come in all beat up. Like there was this guy who did that to his son all the time. And n.o.body thought that was wrong or told him to stop. They thought it was the kid who was being an a.s.shole to make his dad act that way. And my mom said that his dad must love him a lot if he was willing to do that instead of letting him burn in h.e.l.l.”
The three of them said nothing. Mich.e.l.le gave Alison a quick look, no more than a glance, but it was enough to tell her that, for at least a moment, she resented her bringing this girl to their apartment, that she resented her interrupting the cozy life they had built in the gay ghetto with reminders that somewhere, and not even in other countries or continents, lesbians were being beaten and raped for daring to name what they were.
”Do you know Sharon Aldrich?” asked Mich.e.l.le suddenly.
Carla nodded. ”Real big singer, shouter. 'I used to be a d.y.k.e but now I'm saved and if the Lord can do that for me he can do that for you.'”