Primitive Scent (Lesbian Stories)

Primitive Scent

It all caused Rebecca to feel a restless sort of anger of her own and she wanted to show Frankie that she possessed something that Frankie did not--and the knowledge of Lucifer's den burst forth: 

There's a cave in the woods where Lucifer lives--right over there, and she fanned her arm toward Hollis Woods, somewhere beyond the post office and Mr. Reynolds's barbershop. 

Frankie continued watching the wasp. Lucifer? The devil? She finally looked at Rebecca. Sweat had gathered on Frankie's upper lip. Right over there, in Haley Woods? 

Hollis Woods, yes. 

How can that be? 

The form of the question took Rebecca by surprise. How? She was prepared to argue Lucifer's existence in the cave, not how it was possible. 

Frankie did not bother waiting for a reply. Have you seen him? Lucifer? 

No--but he's there, we've known for a long, long time; people here have known forever. 

So we could go to this cave right now, this very minute, and see him? 

He's Lucifer--we don't want to go there--besides, the trail is off limits. 

Frankie began laughing--laughing out loud like boys laugh among themselves at a joke no one should tell, and Rebecca wanted to slap the laugh from Frankie's merry face, the dark hair falling in front of it. 

It's true, she said meekly. 

Frankie stopped laughing to ask, So you just accept that the devil's there, in the cave? Without having seen him yourself? 

Rebecca had nothing to say. 

Tomorrow I'll meet you at your house, let's say nine o'clock, and we'll go check out this cave of yours. 

Rebecca began to protest but Frankie bounded down the steps of the gazebo and headed in the direction of her house. For the first time since moving to the village she seemed happy. Rebecca watched the sunlight glint off Frankie's hair, her suntanned legs bouncing along the concrete walk. 

The black wasp ceased its futile sorties against the rafters of the ceiling and flew out of the gazebo to disappear on the hot summer air. 

That night Rebecca tried eating her mother's casserole but every bite made her ill so she excused herself to her room. While her family went about its nightly business--it was Thursday so her father was beginning to write his sermon in earnest--Rebecca tried to distract herself from thinking about Frankie and her determination to visit Lucifer's cave, but nothing worked and her nausea grew worse and worse. She wished that she had never mentioned the cave to Frankie, she wished that Frankie had never moved to the village. What was she doing here anyway? She and her father clearly did not fit in. Her father sold seed and he could do that living anywhere along his route--there were plenty of larger towns that would have suited him and Frankie. 

Rebecca reached over and pulled the waste basket closer to her bed; she was certain she was going to be sick. The radio was playing a familiar song but the song itself seemed to be making her nausea more acute. She picked up the radio from her desk to shut it off. Instead her fingers found the tuner knob and began working it toward the city station. When she thought she might be close she adjusted the volume so low that she could barely here the crackling static. Her heart raced and she glanced at her closed door--she wished that she had a lock on it, like her parents' door. 

There . . . the city-station music came from the radio's speaker, half music and still half static. She twisted the antenna . . . there, better. Rebecca listened with the radio against her ear. It was a love song, one that she had never heard.