Two Women

Rachel slept until four. When she finally roused herself, I made coffee and we partook of that great ritual of New Year’s Day:

“Please tell me what I did last night.”

After an afternoon of goofing off in the East Village, Marcus and his kids headed home. Lucy retrieved our kids, and Rachel and I were left to our own devices. We had the rest of the weekend together, to celebrate the New Year and her imminent seventeenth birthday.

In planning the weekend, I wanted to find a fun party for New Year’s Eve—preferably artsy, funky and not too crowded—where Rachel could meet cool folks, have a glass of wine, and feel grown up.

But where to find such a cool scene? I am not cool myself, but I have cool friends. High on that list is Samantha. I asked her to find a good party for us, and she came up with a list. We selected a private party at a restaurant in Williamsburg, where Samantha knows the chef.

In describing Samantha to Rachel, I said that if I were going to have an affair during my marriage, it would have been Samantha. Laconic and cerebral, she’s got a magnetism that draws you closer, to hear what she will say next, to ascertain the nuances of her wry wit.

For years, I lived vicariously through her great array of friends and lovers. Several of her friends became my friends, but not her lovers. I was married, of course, and anyway, she tended to regard her lovers as disposable amusements.

When I first met Samantha, she had passed through a lesbian phase; her new favorite pastime was meeting straight boys online who liked to get fucked with a strap on. “Are there many boys like that?” I asked, incredulous.

Rachel and I met Samantha at her loft. She poured us wine as we looked at the new series of paintings she was finishing. She has long worked with sexually charged images of Amazonian women, rendered with highly realist skill. In the new work, the surface depth is flattened so that one is more aware of the abstract interactions of her muted colors.

“Awesome,” Rachel said.

Samantha has seen my other children grow up, but this is the first time she has met Rachel. She has heard me talk about my daughter’s upbringing in a large family in a rural area, my frustration that her mother home schools from fundamentalist text books (Rachel was recently required to write an essay reconciling the truth of creationism with the theory of evolution), and my pride in her independent mind.

“You too look just alike,” Samantha observed. It’s true: if I were young and pretty, I would be Rachel.

I’ve brought a fresh loaf and some Brie. We talk and drink, making short work of the food. Time to hit the party.