Kristin Ashe: A Safe Place To Sleep Part 7

"What is it?"

"Women excite me. Then they quickly bore me. I have a high need for physical touch, for s.e.x."

"In that way we're not alike."

"We're not?" she asked teasingly.

"I'm practically as.e.xual. I've always envied people to whom touch came easily."

"And I've always envied people who weren't ruled by their s.e.xual fantasies."

"Then we should make great friends."

We both laughed.

"Tell me about Gallagher. I want to know more about this woman who was in your life," she requested, settling back into the booth.

"Well," I paused, trying to think about how I would begin, "we met four years ago playing on a softball team."

"Did you approach her or did she approach you a" I love to know how women got together."

"Neither really. We started out as friends. Both of us needed a friend then. My lover Lisa had just moved to Los Angeles, and Gallagher had recently moved here from Boston."

"Were you physically attracted to her?"

"Oh G.o.d, yes! She's a beautiful woman!"

"What did you like best about her?"

"Physically, you mean?"

She nodded.

"Her shoulders, I guess. She has these great broad shoulders."

"What about your relationship a" what was it like?"

"The first year was fantastic! I couldn't believe how happy I was. I kept expecting someone to come in and steal her away, but they never did. From practically our first date, Gallagher made it clear to me, and everyone else, that she was in love with me."

"Didn't that scare you, how much she cared about you?"

"It terrified me. It still does. None of my other relationships had prepared me for how much Gallagher loved me or for how loyal she was. She taught me a lot. About trust. And about pa.s.sion."

"So you were pa.s.sionate then?"

"Were we ever. I mean she's Italian, how could we not be? Our first year or so, we made love all the time. It was the happiest year of my life. I called it "The Year of Pa.s.sion.' "

"What happened?" I could see the concern on Destiny's face.

"The same thing that always happens, except this time, it was devastating for me, because I thought Gallagher was my life partner. Gradually I stopped being able to be close to her. We made love less and less and fought more and more."

"How sad."

"It was sad. Gallagher was in therapy trying to work through the effects her mother's physical abuse had on her. I was trying to sort out feelings about my family. Pretty soon, we were no longer in love, we were in therapy. It took over our lives."

"I know that feeling, like it's consuming your life."

"Exactly. How could two broken people keep all the pieces together? We couldn't. At first, our fights were funny, almost charming. Then, slowly, they became more desperate. One night, I found myself walking home in the rain because we'd had a fight and I refused to ride in the same car with her. I was fifteen miles from home, in a terrible neighborhood, at midnight. That's when I knew we'd gone too far. We were destroying each other."

"Was that why you ended the relationship?"

"Partially. Mostly, I ended it because too many things were broken. An alarm clock. A lamp. Our insides."

I fought back tears as I struggled to tell her the dark truth.

"One or both of us would go into these violent rages where we'd break things and push each other around. Finally, I couldn't take it anymore. I couldn't stand to be around the anger, in her or in me. We still brought out the good in each other, up until the day she left, but G.o.d, did we bring out the bad in each other, too."

"I've been in some pretty rough fights myself," she said, perhaps sensing my guilt.

"Not like ours you haven't. At least I hope you haven't."

"You'd be surprised." She reached out to calm my fingers which were drumming on the table. I recoiled inside, but I let her hand stay on mine.

"Thanks for saying that."

"I'm not just saying it to be kind, Kris. It's true."

"I always thought we were the only ones who took our anger that far."

"Not hardly."

Much to my relief, the waiter interrupted with our food, a vegetarian burrito for Destiny, chicken fajitas for me. After he left, I quickly changed the subject.

"Are you ready to hear a little about my time with your father and your grandma?"

"I guess so," Destiny answered, taking a deep breath.

"Okay. Stop me anytime it gets to be too much for you."

I started by summarizing my afternoon with her father. She interrupted me several times to ask questions.

"So they weren't able to have kids?"

"Right."

"But they never knew which of them was unable?"

"Right."

"Okay, go on."

And then later...

"So it really was my mother, more than my father, who wanted to adopt me, is that right?"

"It seems so."

"That's strange."

"Why?"

"My father always seemed to enjoy me more. All these years, I a.s.sumed it was his idea to adopt. By nature, my mother's not a very warm person, but especially with me, it seemed like she kept her distance. I always felt like I wasn't good enough for her. When I was in high school, it finally dawned on me that she wasn't good enough for me either. Maybe because she wasn't my real mother, mostly because she was the kind of mother she was. Now, I can ignore her every time she tells me I should do something different with my life, but it took me twenty years to get to the point where I didn't jump every time she said that."

"Funny, isn't it, how when we're kids, we think we failed our parents, but as adults, we realize they failed us," I interjected.

"That is funny. It's even worse when you're adopted, though, because you have the added paranoia of thinking they don't love you as much because you aren't their natural child. And every time they disappoint you, you fantasize about what your 'real' parents would have been like. I never quite got past feeling like a guest in the Greaves' home. My parents, especially my father, tried to make me welcome, but I never completely felt like I was. I spent a lot of my childhood escaping into fantasies. I've never told anyone this, but all of my friends, my true friends, were imaginary people. They were people I made up in my head, friends who never left me. It's ironic really," she laughed bitterly, "my only permanent relationships have been with people who don't even exist."

I think if she could have cried then, she would have. I must have been reading her mind.

"d.a.m.n it all!" She hit the table with her open hand. "I wish I could cry, but I can't. I never have been able to. Sometimes, so much emotion backs up in me I think I'll explode!"

"You cried when you were little. Maybe you'll learn to cry again."

"Did I really?"

"Yes, you did. Your grandmother told me you cried after your parents died."

"Huh. I wonder why I stopped."

"I don't know."

"I never cry. Sometimes I'll feel like it, like just now, but the tears won't come. They simply will not come out of me," she said angrily.

We were both quiet for a moment. Her voice broke the silence.

"Hey, Kris, if you could change just one thing about yourself, what would it be?"

"Seriously?"

"Yes, seriously, what would you change?"

I thought before I answered. "I'd touch more," I said, my voice cracking, much to my embarra.s.sment.

"I'd cry more," Destiny said and looked away. "That's what I was thinking about a minute ago."

There was more silence, as if we'd both said too much.

"But enough about me," she exclaimed, the false enthusiasm apparent. 'Tell me about my grandmother. What's she like?"

"She's quite spirited actually. I see where you get your drive. She's one tough lady."

I went on to tell her all about Marie Kenwood. I left out the details of their good-bye scene, because frankly, I thought it was more than Destiny could take. She laughed when I told her about my great detective work in figuring out I was sitting in her grandma's favorite spot. She had a million questions for me. I could barely answer one before she fired off another.

"Where does she live?"

"In a townhouse in southeast Denver, near Iliff and a""

"What's the townhouse look like?"

"It's brick, two-story a""

"No, no. Inside, what's it look like inside?"

"Basically like you'd expect an older woman's home to look like. Wingback chairs, coffee table full of ladies magazines a""

"What's she look like?"

"She's short but imposing. She's quite attractive, very dignified looking. Her nails are manicured a""

"Do I look like her?"

"Not really, Destiny." I saw the disappointment in her eyes. "She's over eighty years old. She has more wrinkles than you." I tried to cheer her up, but the disappointment remained. "Maybe you look like her a little."

She visibly brightened.

"What part of me?"

I said the first thing that came to my mind.

"Your eyes. They look like hers. Not much, but a little."

She smiled widely.

"We were close then, she and I?"

"Very close," I said without having to lie.

"I wish I could remember her," Destiny said with a faraway, dreamy look in her eyes.

"You don't remember anything about your grandma?"

"No, not at all. It's like she belongs to someone else."

"In a sense, she does. The little girl who knew your grandma doesn't exist right now, because you buried her with your parents."

"I guess I did," she said quietly. "My first conscious memory is of kindergarten, my first day of school. I was Destiny Greaves by then. Peter and Barbara Kenwood were gone. Destiny Kenwood was gone, too."

"You know, Destiny, there's no way to minimize how much tragedy there's been in your life, but there is a bright spot: You were loved. It's clear your parents loved each other and they loved you. Your grandma adored you, too. That's something, you know."