Chapter 12
Something Claire doesn’t ever expect when she knocks on Jackie’s door is for her to already have a visitor.
Jackie is a solitary person, Claire has learned, whether by accident or design.
She seems to have almost no visitors besides Claire.
When Claire knocks on the door one very normal Tuesday and it comes with a very loud, very male laugh booming over the fence from Jackie’s backyard, it seems so out of the ordinary that Claire wonders if she’s imagined it until she sees a second, much smaller car next to Jackie’s in the driveway.
A small white Volvo. It’s older than Jackie’s Mustang, but in decent condition.
“Claire?” Jackie’s voice shouts. Claire can only just hear the words. “If that’s you, we’re around back!”
Claire is long past being nervous about visiting Jackie, but the introduction of someone new—a man, no less—has her stomach in knots.
But she wants to see her friend. In the end, she has no choice but to make her way around the side of the house to the fence gate, beyond which is a yard Claire hasn’t yet stepped foot in.
It’s a nice space, to be sure. It’s well landscaped and decorated.
The gardens are empty, but the lawn is well taken care of.
The tasteful patio furniture matches the shimmering pool.
Looking at the water is enough to make Claire blush these days, with the memory of that night at the window. Today is no different.
It doesn’t help that Jackie is sitting in one of the lounge chairs in a pristine white bathing suit, with a drink in her hand.
It stops Claire in her tracks. Jackie is wearing a floor-length flowing sarong over her bottom half, but it’s still the least amount of clothes Claire has ever seen her in.
The suit is somewhere between a one-piece and a bikini, with cut-outs along the sides to show off the waist. It seems to glow in the bright summer sunshine, perfectly complimenting her dark olive skin.
It takes a mammoth effort for Claire to pull her eyes away from the shapely curve of Jackie’s hips to pay attention to the person sitting beside her.
The man to Jackie’s left is darker-skinned even than Jackie—in fact, Claire is sure that he’s Black.
He’s well-groomed, with tight dark curls and eyes such a lovely shade of hazel that they almost look golden.
He’s wearing tiny red swimming trunks, and his shaved chest shines with baby oil.
They’re laughing together about something.
Claire is overcome by the bewildering and sudden urge to turn around and go home. Jackie is so joyful in his presence. So easy. Who is she to interrupt?
Jackie spots her before she can bolt.
“Claire! Come here—I’d like you to meet Theo,” Jackie says, waving Claire over. “One of my oldest friends.”
Theo offers his hand. When Claire takes it, he pulls it to his mouth to give her knuckles a dramatic kiss. His full lips are soft and completely whiskerless.
“Charmed,” Theo says, with a wink. His voice is deep and rich. “Care to join us for an aperitif?”
“I’m not much for French food,” Claire says.
Theo laughs as he lets go of Claire’s hand. His head tips back, as if he’s never heard something so funny in his life. “It’s a drink. I told you there was no culture here, Jacks.” His accent is different from Jackie’s—slightly southern, maybe?
“I know it’s a drink,” Claire says. Her frustration must be obvious, because Jackie speaks up right away.
“She was making a joke, you ditz,” Jackie says, smacking Theo on the arm.
Theo sips at his drink. Based on the jug sitting between them on the side table, it looks like a dark red sangria, and they’ve almost finished it. “Oh. Well, you can’t blame me for assuming. Look at this place. It’s where blandness goes to die.”
“Be nice,” Jackie says. She moves the sangria jug away when he goes to refill, raising a pointed eyebrow. “She’s a friend.”
“I am being nice!”
“Be nicer,” Jackie says.
Theo rolls his eyes. “When you invited me down to your slice of suburban hell, you didn’t stipulate that I needed to charm the locals.”
“Don’t listen to him. I really would love for you to join us, Claire,” Jackie says firmly.
Claire sits gingerly on a lounge.
Like Jackie, Theo is unlike anyone else Claire has ever met.
He’s fascinating to listen to. He commands a conversation easily.
Claire can see him easily tripping up someone like Pete, but at the same time there’s something about him that’s so different.
Claire’s interest is swiftly joined by a sort of irritation at the way Jackie seems so in-tune with him.
She tops up his drink without asking, and laughs at all his jokes and stories.
He has a kind of sharp wit that Claire can’t help but envy.
Theo has no wedding ring, so it’s doubtful that he’s the married man Jackie has talked about.
But he’s charming. He’s suave, and clever, and extremely handsome.
He’s affectionate with Jackie, touching her on the arm or even the thigh as he gesticulates with his hands, and Jackie doesn’t seem bothered at all. She seems to expect it.
They have an easy intimacy that makes something hot twist in Claire’s belly.
Perhaps it’s that he takes Jackie’s attention so easily? Claire is sure she’d feel this way with anyone else Jackie decided to spend her time with, man or woman. Maybe it’s just bitter jealousy, no different than Martha’s hatred of Jackie. Maybe Claire is just being petty for no reason at all.
It can’t be because of Theo’s race, can it?
She’s never thought of herself as one of those people who gets in a tizzy over inter-race relations, even if Pete has always voiced a vague disapproval.
If Jackie wants to see a Black man, that’s her business.
It’s perfectly legal nowadays. She can see anyone she likes. She can marry him, even.
Claire swallows past a sudden bout of anxiety.
“And then he made a move. Right in front of his wife,” Theo is saying, and it’s enough to bring Claire back to the present. “So I told him, if you want to kiss me, have a cigarette first. His breath smelled like cheap booze, and I had no interest in experiencing it through his mouth.”
Claire’s brain skips like a scratched record.
“He?” Claire blurts.
Theo raises a brow. He looks back and forth between Claire and Jackie, who suddenly looks pale and pinched.
“I believe that’s what I said, Suzy Homemaker,” Theo says, draining the last of the sangria.
“You kiss men?” Claire says. She feels like the slowest horse at the race, but his nonchalance is so absurd that it doesn’t feel real. This isn’t the sort of thing one says openly. Theo might as well have publicly announced his intention to commit grand larceny.
“Exclusively.” Theo winks again. His confidence is as shocking as the admission itself.
Jackie’s foot is twitching. She’s looking at Claire as if she’s expecting her to explode at any moment, and Claire schools her features to conceal the somersaults her brain is doing.
Theo kisses men. Assumedly, Theo has sexual relations with men. He’s one of those. One of the types of people Pete complains about over the morning paper—the sex-freaks. The degenerates. Claire is confused and a little unsettled by it all, but it’s mixed with a great deal of unexpected relief.
Theo and Jackie aren’t together, romantically or otherwise.
Theo laughs, presumably at the expression on Claire’s face. He pats Claire’s hand as if she’s a precocious toddler. “Oh, look at how shocked she is. Jackie, I thought that you—”
“Theodore!” Jackie snaps harshly. Claire jumps at the volume of it—she’s never seen Jackie look so grave. So angry. “Don’t.”
A few beats of silence pass. Claire can feel the awkwardness in the air like a mist—Jackie’s jaw is clenched, and her knuckles are white around her glass. Claire wonders if she and Theo are about to have a fight, and if perhaps she should leave.
Theo’s face falls. He puts his hands up, looking suddenly quite sober. “Shit. I’m so sorry, Jacks. That was—fuck. No more wine for me.”
“What?” Claire asks, looking between them. Some sort of secret has passed through the space she’s sitting in, and she feels slow for not catching it. “What is it?”
Jackie shakes her head with a smile that looks forced. “It’s nothing, Claire. Don’t worry about it.”
“Just a misunderstanding,” Theo says. His blasé tone from earlier is gone.
It doesn’t feel like nothing, but the subject changes so quickly that Claire can barely keep up.
The awkwardness never quite eases, though, with Theo clearly trying extra hard to carry the conversation and make up for his mysterious blunder, and Claire excuses herself less than an hour after she arrived.
Usually, she’d stay until at least two o’clock.
The first thing Claire does when she gets home is dart up the stairs to peer over the fence into Jackie’s yard.
Jackie and Theo are huddled close together now, in a conversation that looks intense and intimate.
Theo is holding Jackie’s hands between his much bigger ones.
Jackie’s shoulders are hunched. Her head falls forward onto Theo’s shoulder, and he puts an arm around her.
Claire isn’t sure she’s ever seen a man and woman, especially of different races, so close unless they’re going steady.
Jackie looks upset about something. The thing that Theo almost revealed, maybe? Claire is too far away to read their lips, but she shouldn’t be spying in the first place, no matter how badly she wants to know.
Reluctantly, Claire lets the curtains fall back across the window.
~ ~ ~
Theo stays at Jackie’s house for two days, from what Claire can tell. She sees them sitting at the pool a few more times through her bedroom window, but she isn’t brave enough to visit Jackie again until Theo’s car no longer sits in the driveway.