The Burning Light of Two Stars by Laura Davis

Author:Laura Davis
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Girl Friday Books
Published: 2021-09-15T00:00:00+00:00

Here’s one. It happened in New Jersey, when Mom was still living in my childhood home. I was visiting from far away. I imagine myself in my early twenties. Maybe it was after I left the ashram at twenty-one, when I had no idea what the rest of my life might be. Perhaps it was after I came out to her, when I was on my high horse, spouting feminist philosophy, and she was certain I’d live out my life as a lonely lesbian in a seedy bar.

The night before, Mom and I had agreed to call a truce on whatever conflagration was consuming us, and to walk to the beach the next morning. After breakfast, we put on our windbreakers, laced up our sneakers, and headed out the front door toward the Atlantic.

The moment we stepped out onto the crooked sidewalk, the sky opened, as if God had decided that very day to start the flood. Sunny one moment; a downpour, the next. I gasped. She gasped. We were drenched in seconds, rain soaking our clothes, dripping from our noses, saturating our skin. Our socks and shoes, soggy white cotton in rubber soles. Mom yelled out, “It’s raining cats and dogs.” I nodded but could barely hear her. The rain was too loud.

We looked at each other, each expecting the other to run back into the shelter of the house. Mom shouted through the rain, “Let’s go anyway.” I gaped at her. Did my mother really want to get drenched with me in the rain? As she looked at me expectantly, a huge adventurous grin spread across her face. I’d never seen that look before. Her hair was stringy and wet, her cheeks painted with rivulets of rain, her dare unmistakable. I wanted to know this woman.

“Yes,” I shouted, grinning back. She put her arm in mine, and it felt like it belonged there, and, together, we turned away from the known world and the walls of my childhood home and ran out onto the soggy streets, our glasses streaked so much, we couldn’t see. Laughing, delighted, we strode out into the deluge.

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