Primitive Scent (Lesbian Stories)

Primitive Scent

The music calmed her and later she fell asleep with the radio next to her pillow, the risqué music trickling gently into her ear. She felt a touch of shame but the music was comforting nonetheless. 

In the night she dreamt of the fish in Old Man Stevenson's pond. She was floating in a tractor tire, her legs draped over the edge so that only her feet were in the water, and her posterior, through the center of the tire. She was enjoying the coolness of the pond water, watching a wasp-shaped cloud in the otherwise pure blue sky. But with the first nibble on her toe she remembered the carp, flesh-white and as long as her shinbone. She tried to lift herself out of the water, the tire bobbling as if it may tip over altogether. She saw the fish's sucking mouths and their black eyes, glassy and vacuous. The cloud moved before the sun, plunging Rebecca into a night-like darkness on the pond, thousands of fish swarming upon her. . . . She awoke tangled in twisted bed sheets. The radio, with its dead batteries, had fallen to the floor.  

At nine o'clock Rebecca was sitting on her front porch drinking a glass of juice. It was cool in the shade of the porch but it promised to be a beastly hot day, the first of the summer. Her illness had returned and she could barely swallow the sips of juice. 

Perfectly on time, she saw Frankie coming up her street--a bulky cotton bag on her shoulder. She stopped at Rebecca's front steps. 

What's all that? said Rebecca, nodding toward the bag. 

Flashlights, bug spray, apples in case we get hungry. 

Rebecca had planned to bring nothing, perhaps because she did not believe they would really go to the cave. Yet she knew Frankie would not change her mind-for one thing, she was determined to prove Rebecca wrong . . . to prove the whole village wrong. 

The screendoor opened, startling Rebecca, and her father stepped onto the porch. Good morning, ladies--what are you up to so early this morning? Pastor Philips was in beige pants and a maroon sports shirt, looking strange to Frankie not in his ministerial black. Perspiration glistened on his bald head. 

Thought we might go for a hike, said Frankie. 

A hike? I didn't know you'd turned my daughter into a nature lover--job well done, Miss Francine, and he winked at Frankie. Well, I'm off to the church--Mrs. Overton claims one of the organ pedals is getting mushy, and we can't have music with mushy notes in God's house. Have a good hike, ladies. Then Pastor Phillips went down the steps and turned to his pickup truck in the driveway. In a moment he was pulling away, with a honk and a last wave. 

Are you ready? asked Frankie. 

Rebecca knew it was futile to protest. She could simply refuse to go with Frankie but something prevented her from doing that too. It might have been pride--not wanting to forfeit the village's integrity, or simply not wanting to be wrong. As she left the comfort of her porch and began walking with Frankie toward Hollis Woods, the outskirts of which intersected with the boundaries of the village, Rebecca felt curious more than anything. She wanted to know if the legend was true. There was fear also but it did not seem precisely the fear of encountering the devil himself--though that would have made sense to her--rather it was fear complexly bound with shame, with guilt. . . . 

Walking along in the rising heat and humidity, not speaking, Rebecca could not sort out all that she was feeling, nor even begin to articulate it if she tried. Meanwhile images from her dream about the white carp kept returning to her; and as unsettling as they were, she preferred them to dwelling on the task before her. 

She glanced secretly at Frankie, who was a few inches taller, and her expression was as placid and as featureless as the cloudless blue sky above them. 

Rebecca had to lead the way once they reached the woods, which were noisy with insect sounds and birdsong. There was no purpose in delay so she took the winding paths that led directly to the off-limits trail. A wooden barricade was erected, white paint peeling from its posts and cross boards, and a sign with faded letters that warned NO ADMITTANCE. From what they could see the trail was overgrown but recognizable among the trees and leafy forest growth. 

Frankie rearranged the bag on her shoulder and climbed over the barricade, which was only waist high and more ornamental than functional. Rebecca followed in a few seconds. It occurred to her that given what lay at the other end of the trail, the barricade might have been more substantial. Until this moment however it had always been substantial enough. 

Penetrating deeper into the woods the air became cooler and heavier, the insect sounds more distinct and stranger, as if new to Rebecca's ears. In fact the woods felt altogether alien, though she had been in them to walk or picnic or play a hundred times. This part of the forest was utterly different. A strangeness came over Rebecca but it was more than the woods feeling foreign--she herself seemed changed. 

The trail wound back and forth, then without warning they were standing in front of the mouth of the cave. It seemed carved into a lushly overgrown hill, and the small black entrance was situated in a way that suggested one would be walking steeply downward upon entering. 

Well, said Frankie, shall we, as she fished the flashlights from her bag. She gave Rebecca one with a red plastic casing while she took a larger metal flashlight. The girls switched them on and cautiously entered the cave, Frankie leading and having to duck a little. She looked totally at ease but perhaps her heart was racing as much as Rebecca's for she reached back and took her friend's hand. 

Immediately a mineral scent reached Rebecca, and a welcome coolness. Except for their scuffing shoes the cave was perfectly quiet. Shining their lights along the walls and ceiling and floor, they could see the cave was simply an empty space--there were no bats or dark-dwelling insects. Its emptiness was a relief to Rebecca. The cave was so small their lights reached its farthest corners. 

You see, said Frankie in a whisper, there's nothing here. Yet she still held Rebecca's hand. 

Rebecca continued to shine her light along the cave walls, the fear slowly leaving her. What's that? Her light had illuminated an odd feature of the far wall. They approached it while using their flashlights to expose the form in the rock more fully. It was the shape of some creature fossilized in the wall but mostly exposed to view. It had a horselike head except with sharp teeth in its jaw. Its spine and ribs appeared in the girls' moving lights, as did its strangely short arms, stranger still in contrast to its large legs bones. In life it must have been a fearsome thing. 

It's a dinosaur of some sort, said Frankie--there's your Lucifer. 

The girls continued looking at the prehistoric animal, seeing it one small piece at a time. Neither girl was inclined to release their clasping hands. In a way that did not require words they knew this would be their secret. They alone would smell the cave's primitive scent.

"Primitive Scent" originally appeared in the Tulane Review, fall 2011.