Red Leaves

She and Conni had been best friends until Kristina started playing basketball. That’s what Kristina said when asked what had happened to their friendship. But it was a lie. It wasn’t basketball that had happened to their friendship.

Why is she laughing so loudly? thought Kristina as she sat there trancelike, not laughing at all. Jim, too, was stone-faced. Albert bantered with Frankie, flirted with Conni, and when he hoped Conni wasn’t looking, pushed his cake toward Kristina, who immediately pushed the plate back to him. Kristina lifted up her eyes and saw Conni watching Albert push his cake plate toward her. The laughter faded in Conni’s blue eyes. Kristina ignored the plate, didn’t even glance at it.

They had all chipped in and bought Albert a Pierre Cardin watch, because he was never on time, anywhere. Rather, Conni and Jim - the only ones with money - chipped in.

Kristina wished Jim would stop looking at her with that unhappy expression. What right does he have to be unhappy? She thought. He studies as much as I practice, he works at the Review as much as I work at Red Leaves. He is the one who never wants to sleep over because he has to be in bed by eleven.

Trying not to look at Jim, Kristina sat across from him at the table, an old university-issue Formica table with steel reinforced legs. She felt bad for him without even knowing why. Kristina fed Aristotle the rest of her cake, and the rest of Albert’s cake, too. They got up; other people were waiting to use the kitchen facilities. The party was over.

The Hinman lounge was a semicircular TV room and kitchenette, attached like a peninsula to the front of Hinman Hall. The kitchenette, or the ironically named Hinman Café, didn’t even have a refrigerator. It had an ice maker, where the students stored their drinks, an electric stove, a microwave, and dirty dishes in the sink. The chairs in the TV lounge were so old they must have come with John Holmes Hinman, Class of 1908.

Kristina and Jim sat in the low maroon chairs, while Conni and Albert sat together on the torn brown sofa, and watched the 32-inch Mitsubishi. Other residence halls had rear-projection screens. Not Hinman. Kristina remembered Mass Row fondly, where in their freshman year they had study lounges, separate kitchens, and a TV lounge with a 50-inch Sony in it.

Conni held Albert’s hand. She was always holding some part of Albert, Kristina thought uncharitably, and then caught herself and felt ashamed. She is his girlfriend. That’s what she’s supposed to do.

Frankie had gone back to Epsilon House. Aristotle lay on the floor. The four friends watched TV and didn’t talk, though Kristina could recall a time when they gabbed so much that other students often asked them to leave. They usually left, and went up to one of their rooms and played cards on the floor and argued politics and philosophy and God and death. Or they argued about movies that no one ever got to see, but argued about in principle anyway. Most of the arguments were in principle.

Only the history major Jim wanted facts in his arguments. Albert would try to explain that philosophy and religion majors were not that interested in facts, but Jim didn’t understand. Conni was a sociology major, and Kristina wasn’t convinced Conni knew the difference between fact and theory. When they first became roommates, Conni had once looked up innocently at Kristina and said, ‘Krissy, what’s socialism?’

A year earlier the four of them discussed the party conventions, then the presidential debates, and then the lurid revelations in Penthouse about a would-be president.

After the elections, the junior year was spent talking about health care and gays in the military. None of the issues really affected them: Conni and Jim were on their parents’ insurance, Kristina and Albert never went to the doctor. And as far as Kristina knew, no one was planning to join the military, not even Frankie, who had plenty of opinions on gays in the military, on any men in the military for that matter.

They were university students. Everything was fodder for a good fight, including harvesting practices in Iowa, where none of them had ever been. But nothing meant anything. Jim was passionately opinionated. Albert was the devil’s advocate. Kristina was moderate. And Conni had few opinions.

Once, Conni had meant something to Jim. When Jim found out that Conni wanted his roommate, Albert Maplethorpe, that had meant something, too. Jim had somehow worked it out. He seemed to have forgiven Albert, and he and Kristina had started going out. The four of them became very close. So close that in their freshman year, very late at night, having downed many beers, they played truth or dare. They didn’t do anything outrageous, but the conversation took a definite X-rated turn.

That was as far as it went, because Kristina wanted to keep them all friends, and they all managed to remain good friends. It would have been a shame to ruin their intimate, eager college friendship over the Albert and Conni thing, which was supposed to mean nothing.

Except Kristina knew that Constance Tobias didn’t think so. Albert meant everything to Conni. Earlier this year, a classmate had asked Conni, ‘Albert still your boyfriend?’ and Conni had replied, ‘Now and ever.’

After watching the news at eleven, they all got up. Kristina stretched. Conni lifted up her face to Albert, who obliged and kissed her. Kristina lowered her eyes.

‘Well,’ Conni said, grabbing Albert’s hand and thrusting her chest at him, ‘good night now. I have a seven-forty-five tomorrow.’

‘Kristina, will you walk the dog?’ Albert asked, looking straight at her.

She had been lost in thought and it took her a while to answer. ‘Yeah, sure, course I will.’ She tried to smile.

‘You don’t want me to walk him?’ Albert said patiently. ‘I don’t mind. I know you’re afraid to go out at night.’

Jim moved forward. ‘She’ll be fine, thanks.’

Kristina gave Jim a quizzical look. ‘I’ll be fine, thanks,’ she said.

‘They’ll be fine, Albert,’ said Conni, pulling on his arm. ‘Let’s go.’

After Albert and Conni left, Jim said gruffly, ‘Want me to walk him? I’ll have to get my coat.’

Shaking her head, she said, ‘It’s okay, Jimbo. I’ll walk him.’

‘You don’t have your coat either. Where did you leave your coat, anyway?’

‘Don’t know,’ Kristina said quickly, wondering when she could drive up to Fahrenbrae and get it. Tomorrow she had classes, basketball, and then Red Leaves at two. Well, I’ll have a long weekend to go get my coat. I’ll have plenty of time.

She should have let Albert or Jim walk the dog; she really didn’t want to walk him. It was late and she was tired. Aristotle was a fiend for the dark spooky woods behind Hinman and Feldberg. Kristina wasn’t.

‘So, you want me to walk the dog or not?’ Jim asked.

‘No, that’s okay. I’ll do it.’ She paused. She was so tired. ‘You want to stay over?’

‘Stay over?’ Jim repeated.

‘Yes,’ she said, trying to smile.

‘Krissy, I have a seven-forty-five tomorrow.’

‘I know. I do too.’

‘I’m really beat,’ he said. ‘Maybe tomorrow night?’

She looked at him, resigned. ‘Yeah, sure, Jimbo. Maybe tomorrow.’

He must have caught something sad in her tone, because he said, ‘Tomorrow is your birthday? Yes, yes, definitely tomorrow.’

She managed a smile. ‘Good.’ She kissed him. ‘You’re not mad at me anymore, are you, Jimbo?’

His mouth was tense when he said, ‘No, why? Should I be?’

‘No, you shouldn’t be,’ Kristina said without looking at him. ‘Well, good night.’

Kristina walked Aristotle quickly in the cold night. He was pulling the leash to the wooden steps in the woods. ‘No, Aristotle,’ Kristina said firmly, pulling him to the lighted common area in front of Hinman. ‘I’m not taking you there, you dog. You should know that by now.’ Aristotle obeyed reluctantly. After he sniffed around the ground for a bit, Kristina walked him to her bridge. It was poorly lit, but she walked the length of it and let Aristotle pull her a few feet into the darkness of the woods to do his business. Her heart already thumping, she waited for Aristotle to finish while she listened to the woodland’s muffled noises. When Kristina heard something crack nearby, she yanked on the dog’s leash. ‘Come on, Aristotle, let’s go!’ she breathed, and ran back.

After Kristina got back to her room she turned off the overhead light and looked out the window onto the courtyard and Feldberg Library.

It was nearly midnight.

She took off her brand-new black boots and remembered Spencer O’Malley.

A handsome young detective looking at me like I was the best cup of hot chocolate he’d ever had. A nice man with cold hands whose pupils dilated at the sight of me. But what can I do with dilated pupils now? I thought my mission was to right my life. What year was that my New Year’s resolution? Like, every year. I’ve been trying to do that since I was eleven. Every year that was the first of ten items stuck to my bulletin board with a blue tack. Ah well. That’s my mission again for 1994, but this time I really mean it.

Kristina took off her jeans and put on clean black underwear. She took off her sweatshirt and bra and put on the pink tank top she slept in. When she was younger, she had been proud of her sleek toned lines, of her fair color. She looked like her mother. As a teenager, her hair had always been short, and her mother hadn’t allowed her to go to school in anything but dresses. She had once been a proper young lady, but at Dartmouth she played basketball, where speed and stamina counted most. At Dartmouth she didn’t own a single dress.

Kristina went out in the hall to the bathroom to brush her teeth and wash her face.

When she returned, Albert was sitting on her bed in the dark. Locking the door behind her, Kristina came to sit next to him on the bed, relieved to see him. He wiped her still wet cheek with his fingers. In return, Kristina brushed the hair away from his face. His ponytail was unbound, and his hair hung loose past his shoulders.

‘I can’t stay long,’ he said. ‘I could barely get out as it was. Told her I had to get my condoms. She said she had some. I said I wanted the colored ones. Red, white, and blue. With the rocket’s red glare…’

‘You’re so patriotic’ She smiled, moving closer to him. He wiped her other cheek and forehead. She stared him straight in the face, her eyes inches away from his eyes, gently running her fingers through his hair. ‘I understand,’ she said softly. Their arms were touching.

‘I wanted to talk to you about something,’ he said.

‘Anything,’ Kristina said tenderly. ‘What is it?’ She was so happy he had come. Earlier she had thought it had to stop. She knew it had to stop. But when she was with him, alone, she didn’t want to stop anything.

‘Let’s go somewhere,’ he said.

‘When?’

‘Now. For Thanksgiving.’

She sat quietly by his side in the dark; silently she sat and looked out the window.

‘Go where?’ Kristina finally said.

‘To Canada!’ he breathed out. ‘We’ll rent a car and cross the river, to the other side, make a right, and just keep on driving. We’ll find some nice little cottage, somewhere nice. In Quebec. On the way back, we can stop in Montreal. What do you say?’

Albert looked back at her stare. ‘What? We got no money again?’ he said with a peculiar lilt to his voice.

‘No, we -’ She stopped. ‘We got a little. Howard gave me some for my birthday.’

‘How much is a little?’

She thought very quickly. ‘Ten thousand dollars.’

Albert watched her intently. She tried to keep her face impassive. ‘That’s enough to get to Canada,’ he finally said. ‘Or is that money all for you?’

Rubbing his arm, Kristina said, ‘Don’t be like that. It’s for us.’

‘It’s not for us,’ he said. ‘It’s for you.’

‘For us,’ she insisted.

‘For you,’ he repeated, with the same peculiar lilt to his voice. Then with his right hand he cupped the side of her face. ‘Rocky,’ he said gently. ‘Want to?’

‘Please,’ she whispered. ‘We can’t. I’m playing on Saturday.’

Albert sneered. ‘UPenn. I can beat them myself with my eyes closed and shooting into their net. Your third team can beat their first, with or without you.’

‘Albert, I can’t skip the game!’

Shrugging, he said, ‘Not like you haven’t done it before. It’s no big deal. The coach yells at you for two minutes and then you dazzle her at practice for a week and everything’s okay.’

‘Yeah, well, she told me last time I missed a game that she’d make me sit out, like, a month, if I did it again.’

‘Kristina,’ said Albert, smiling. ‘The coach knows she’d be cutting off her nose to spite her face. The only thing she’d do without you is lose, and lose big.’ Albert drew Kristina closer to him, squeezing her. ‘You’re too good.’

She squeezed him back.

Albert prodded on. ‘Come on, Rock. What do you say?’

She put her arm tighter around him and shook her head. ‘What, disappear for a few days? And then? We got to come back, you know. We have to come back and live here. There’s no escape.’

‘Who wants to escape? I just want us to go -’

She interrupted, ‘If we could drive to Alaska, you’d say go there. If we had more money, you’d say, let’s never come back to this place, let’s travel the world, and be free of this life, of Dartmouth, of Howard -’

‘We are free of Howard,’ Albert said sharply.

She continued, ‘- of Connecticut, of Luke and Laura, of Jim and Conni. You’d even forsake Aristotle, if it would mean…’

‘Mean what?’

‘Mean no one would know us. You’d forsake everything. Wouldn’t you?’

Albert placed his hand on her chest to feel her heart. ‘Wouldn’t you?’

Kristina tried to pull away from him. ‘Not everything. Not everything.’ She choked up. ‘Though God knows,’ I want to -’

‘Do you?’ he asked intensely. ‘Do you want to?’

‘To be free? More than anything,’ she said, equally intensely. Her brown eyes flashed at Albert. But he misunderstood her meaning.

‘Then let’s go!’ he whispered. ‘Edinburgh, Kristina! Remember Edinburgh?’

Remembering Edinburgh made her hands weak. Her fingers tensed and relaxed, and her heart squeezed tight with memories of Edinburgh. ‘Sure, I remember. But what then? I’d still have to come back and face Jim. And what about Conni? Remember how it was when we came back? It would be just like that, only worse.’

‘I’ll make something up.’ He smiled tenderly. ‘I’m good at that.’

‘No,’ she said. They were speaking in hushed tones, and her no was an octave higher.

Albert said, ‘It’s no big deal. I’ll do anything to get away for a few days.’

‘What’s the big hurry? We’ve just been to Fahrenbrae.’

He waved at her impatiently. ‘Fahrenbrae is too close to here. We can go far into Canada for a few long days. We’ll go sledding. Remember how much you like sledding?’

‘Sure, I remember,’ Kristina said, getting weaker, the fight sinking out of her. ‘God, we just can’t.’

‘Rock, stop,’ he said kindly, keeping his arm around her. Keeping her to him. ‘Stop fighting me.’

‘It’s just a holiday,’ she said.

He was not easily dissuaded, but he took his arm away.

‘This is no good,’ Kristina said with a miserable, hollow laugh.

‘I agree,’ he said. ‘What do you think we should do? Stop?’

‘Yes,’ she said immediately and laughed mirthlessly.

‘Oh, Kristina. Oh, Kristina! How many times a year do you think we can continue having this conversation?’

‘Until we stop.’

‘Well, gee,’ he said. ‘I don’t exactly remember you saying that this morning at Fahrenbrae.’

‘The hills were too beautiful,’ she replied quietly, with emotion in her voice. ‘You were too beautiful.’

He leaned into her face. ‘I’m not beautiful now?’ he asked softly.

She averted her eyes. ‘Too beautiful.’

They were silent. She imagined going to Canada with him.

‘Albert, I know you agree with me. We have to stop. We have to get sane. You go with Conni. I go with Jim -’ Kristina stopped. ‘Or not. But whatever. Go our separate ways.’

‘We’ve done this before. It didn’t work. I don’t know how to get sane.’ He paused. ‘Do you? I didn’t think so. We’re just crazed all the time.’

Her mouth was dry when she whispered, ‘Yeah, crazed.’

‘Crazed!’ he exclaimed. Grabbing her, he pulled her close to him on the bed. ‘Rocky, why are you doing this to me? Why do you do this to me all the time?’ he said hotly, feverishly kissing her open lips, his hands gripping her wrists so tight it hurt.

She shut her eyes and pulled his head into her face, closer, if that were possible, into her, his lips overwhelming hers, pushing them apart with their intensity, their violence.

She groaned, moaned under his arms. He pushed her down on the bed. ‘Kristina,’ he whispered. ‘What are we going to do?’

Her only response was a stifled, raspy moan. Albert pulled her up to lift her pink tank top and expose her breasts, and then pushed her back down on the bed again. She whispered. ‘We’re going to go a little crazy. And then we’re going to escape forever.’

‘Escape?’ he whispered into her mouth, grinding against her with the hardness in his jeans, hurting her, making her ache and moan with pain and desire. He was grinding as if he were trying to push himself whole inside her. ‘Escape? What are you talking about? There is no escape.’

‘Sweet hell,’ she whispered. ‘Almost like heaven.’ His big hand covered her mouth roughly. ‘I don’t want to be damned,’ she said through his closed fingers. She wanted to cry.

He bent down to her breast, putting her nipple between his teeth. She stroked his arms, his head, his hair, his face. ‘Kristina, Kristina,’ he whispered back. ‘We’re not damned. We’re in love.’

‘No,’ she moaned as his hands moved down to her thighs. ‘We’re damned.’

She arched her back to help him take off her panties.

He pulled himself back up to her face and kissed her lips. ‘Rocky, darling,’ he said. ‘Rocky, Kristina, Rocky…’

‘Oh, Albert,’ Kristina whispered. ‘Please… please… let’s stop.’

He pulled back for a moment, to look at her, his hands near her face and neck. ‘How can I stop?’ he whispered fiercely.

‘How can I when you make me so fucking weak, I can’t see straight…’

When he pulled off his jeans and she reached down to feel him, he was ready for her. She moaned softly into his neck, and he breathed hard, clutching her with his hands, propping himself up, one hand underneath her back, thrusting into her.

A knock on the door stopped them.

‘Kristina?’

It was Conni.

Kristina instantly fell silent and put her hand over Albert’s mouth, whose heavy belabored breath continued to be the only sound in the room.

The knock came again. ‘Kristina, I’m looking for Albert. You know where he is?’

Kristina held her breath, held Albert with her arms, and then let out, ‘Conni? No, I don’t see him. Listen, it’s real late.’

The doorknob turned.

‘Could you open the door, please?’ Conni said impatiently.

‘Conn, I’m so tired, I can’t see straight,’ said Kristina, as she stifled Albert’s moan. ‘I’m half asleep,’ Kristina finished, finding his mouth with her hand. ‘I’ll talk to you in the morning, okay?’

‘Could you just open the door for a second? I need to talk to you.’

‘Conni, tomorrow, okay?’

Conni banged loudly on the door. ‘No, it’s not okay, Kristina. No it’s not okay. Open the door.’

‘Conni, leave me alone, will you? I had a long day. I’ll talk to you tomorrow.’

Conni continued to bang on the door and carry on, but Albert and Kristina stopped listening. Albert turned Kristina over. Kristina put her face in the pillow to muffle her sounds. She felt Albert’s hand in the back of her head, pushing her face into the pillow, his body hard behind her.

But Conni’s banging and yelling did not subside.

Finally, Kristina heard someone out in the hall telling Conni to shut the hell up or they would call security. Conni wouldn’t stop. A few minutes later somebody came to the door and asked Conni to come away. She refused. The security man knocked on the door and asked Kristina to open it. By this time Albert and Kristina were spent. Albert’s hands were stroking her, caressing her. He blew on her perspired face to cool her.

Kristina told the security man she was trying to sleep, wasn’t well, and wasn’t dressed. Eventually he led Conni away.

Later when they were lying next to each other in the little bed, Kristina said quietly, ‘God, Albert, we can’t live like this.’

‘You’re right. Let’s go to Canada.’

‘What, forever?’

‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Let’s go to Canada forever.’

She pushed him lightly. ‘Boy, you’ll say anything right now, won’t you?’

He smiled. ‘Anything.’ He was lying sideways, propping himself up on his elbow. He blew on her face again and then kissed it.

Kristina wondered about Conni. What was Albert going to tell her?

‘Canada, huh? Albert,’ Kristina said, ‘why Canada? Seems far away.’

‘The farther the better,’ he said. ‘Tell me you don’t want to go.’

‘I didn’t say that,’ she said cautiously, thinking.

‘Let’s go,’ he beseeched her. ‘We’ve got the money - you said so yourself. There’s nothing stopping us.’

She wanted to ask Albert about his imminent engagement to Conni. How are you going to take me to Canada and get engaged to her at the same time? she wanted to ask.

Albert poked her gently. ‘Well?’

‘And when this money is gone, then what?’

‘Then nothing. Then we’ll get more money,’ he said.

‘From where?’

Albert pulled away from her and stared at the ceiling.

‘Howard and I are now officially divorced,’ Kristina said. ‘Grandma is dead.’

‘There must be some money tucked away somewhere,’ said Albert.

‘What are you talking about?’ Kristina said, a little shrilly. ‘There’s no money, I’m telling you.’

‘So? We’ll get jobs. We’ll have money.’

Smirking, Kristina said, ‘You’re gonna get a job, Albert?’

‘Sure, why not?’ He put his hands behind his head. ‘I’ll try anything once.’

Now Kristina lay on her side, propped up by her elbow, and stared into his face. She wanted to tell him about the money, but she was just waiting for the right time. When he was married to Conni, maybe. She smiled at her own little joke.

‘What’s so funny?’ he asked.

‘Nothing, nothing,’ she quickly said. This was not a good time.

‘Rocky? If I break up with Conni, will you break up with Jim?’

Oh, not this again. She wanted to say, break up with Conni? Is that before or after you get engaged? But she didn’t.

‘Albert, please,’ she said. ‘Please.’

He gritted his teeth. ‘I just don’t know about that Jim of yours.’

Getting defensive, Kristina said, ‘Why, because he’s a nice guy? Because he treats me well?’

‘Because having sex with you is against his religion.’ Albert said meanly. ‘Some relationship.’

‘Well, I didn’t know he didn’t like to have sex when I started going out with him, did I?’

Staring passionately at her, Albert said, ‘No, Rocky, not just not like to have sex. Not like to have sex with you.’

‘But it’s easier for you this way, isn’t it?’

‘Yes,’ Albert said instantly. ‘At first I couldn’t stand the thought of him touching you.’ He paused. ‘Of anybody touching you.’

‘Well, how do you think I feel about you and Conni?’ Kristina said. They fell silent. Kristina was thinking about Thanksgiving. To be with him. Not to be alone. Not to be with Jim or with Conni or with Howard, or alone, but with him, far away - in Canada.

‘We don’t have to go anywhere,’ Albert said. ‘The ten grand, the ten thousand goddamn dollars we have. We could save it.’