The prostitute joined her. "Doesn't feel too cold now, does it? That's odd." She smelled of watermelon, a summery smell in stark contrast to the bleak fall. She must have sprayed the watermelon on in the bathroom. Or perhaps it was gum.

  The prostitute craned her neck. "The moon's beautiful."

  You're beautiful, too. Frances wondered her companion's name. She had almost asked a few times but did not bother in the end. Prostitutes gave fake names. These names meant nothing.

  The prostitute liked her, though. Was attracted to her. The slight tilt of her head earlier, her pink cheeks, her unnaturally shiny eyes, her nervousness, gave her away.

  Or maybe it was a sort of repulsion/attraction. Like gawking at a wreck because you had to see it.

  Was it possible the prostitute was sexually fluid? Bisexual? Gay? Whatever the prostitute was, Frances was pleased. A little horrified, too. Mostly pleased. Maybe there was hope for her yet. Maybe the gay community would not crucify her after she came out. Maybe she would be able to find someone and settle down.

  Or maybe the prostitute was that good at her job, able to fake a subtle attraction. Maybe she never attempted suicide, and the bracelets were a way to shroud herself in mystery, to raise the specter of possibility.

  So many wonderings.

  Isn't the moon lovely tonight, Marissa? Frances hoped that Marissa looked at the moon. From Mexico. From Russia. From Australia. Or maybe Marissa was right out there, in Frances's range, right in the D.C area. They had stood on the tenth-floor deck of their old apartment countless times, Marissa soft and precious in her arms, and gazed up at the moon. Frances saw no limit for her daughter.

  Frances shifted her gaze down. Funny how a railing was the sole barrier between her and death. A leap from her penthouse twenty floors up would doubtless kill her. Would a third-floor leap? Probably.

  "What are you thinking?" the prostitute asked, and Frances met her eyes. The agency picture had not done the prostitute justice. For example, gold flecked her eyes, creating a kalediscope with the browns and greens. Frances had to fight not to stare, to not lose herself.

  "Whether I ought to just jump. Why I shouldn't, if the world wouldn't be better off without me."

  "Marissa's why you don't jump."

  "Mm-hmm." The prostitute was exactly right. If Marissa came back one day, she would need her mother.

  The prostitute slipped one of her hands into Frances's. Frances stiffened but let the touch remain. Baby steps.

  "Why are you strong enough to come out now?"

  "My nephew," Frances whispered. "He died two weeks ago. He was twelve years old. He had my eyes. No one else does. Did."

  The prostitute leaned into Frances, her breasts brushing Frances's own. Frances enjoyed the searching intensity, the warm urgency in her gaze, the shifting browns and greens. "I'm sorry. Wait. Aren't your brother's kids fifteen and seventeen?"

  Frances chuckled. The prostitute had done her homework. Frances had one sibling, an older brother named Nicholas. He was a six-term congressman representing West Virginia's second congressional district. "My nephew's name was Nathaniel. My brother had an affair with his best friend's wife thirteen years ago."

  "Ah."

  "A ninety-one-year-old man named Benjamin Robinson killed my nephew. Mr. Robinson had no business driving, and when he saw Nathaniel, he accidentally pressed the gas instead of the brakes. He swiped Nathaniel on his bike at three-thirty after school. In front of school."

  The prostitute's closeness was distracting. Very. So was the watermelon smell. Frances liked having a woman with her like this. This prostitute was nothing like the other one.

  "Tell me about your nephew."

  Nathaniel had probably smelled of watermelon, too. Marissa might have, but Frances had not been around enough to find out. Frances wanted to tell the prostitute not to wear that watermelon spray again, or if it was gum, not to chew it again. But that would be silly. Wimpy. It was a smell, a smell! One she was arbitrarily associating with a dead child.

  Frances knew she would never be the same again--whatever same was--after seeing the boy frozen in death, the child with her blond hair and dimpled chin. The boy who looked more like her than her own daughter did. Marissa was entirely her father.

  Frances knew she would never be the same again because after they got back to the motel after bribing the funeral home guys, her brother, a bear-giant of a man, wept on and off in her arms for nearly an hour.

  All these thoughts. Memories. Regrets. Was this what getting old was like? She certainly felt old. Not old in the sense that her body was achy, tired and cranky, although it got that way sometimes. But old in the sense that she had regrets, lots of them, and was not sure she had the courage to follow through on her plans to address them. She had taken an important step, but there was still room to backtrack. Oh yes, there was.

  Regret filled the white spaces on the pages of her memoir. She sensed the same regret in Nicholas when he told her about Nathaniel.

  "Nicholas didn't want the baby. He was ready to run for the House. The potential scandal was the worst thing in the world to him, so he was glad when the Callaghans wanted him out of their lives. Better to lose his best friend and Alice and the child than his political future."

  The prostitute tightened her grip.

  "Nicholas's mistake gnawed at him tiny bit by tiny bit, until everything was gnawed away, leaving only regret. He shouldn't have asked me to come to the funeral home with him. Only…" Frances sighed. "He didn't ask. I volunteered. I drove him to Hartford, Connecticut. Because he's my big brother, he looked after me when we were kids, and that's what a good sister would do, right? It was my idea to bribe the funeral home to let us in after hours to view the body."

  "What was that like?"

  Frances shivered. "Nathaniel was me, inside. Dead. My brother could become president. Could save the world. But his son, his son he never knew, would still be dead. It didn't have to be too late for me. My heart beat. I had a chance and a child out there. Nicholas sacrificed his son for his selfish ambitions, and that's what I had been doing with my own child, too. That's the instant I decided I had to come out. That's when I told God, 'Fuck you. Screw you. Screw the suffering you've caused, the morality, the bullshit.' "

  The prostitute said nothing, but her face spoke for her. Conveying that she understood, that she was quite willing to do more than hold Frances's hand. The combination of a vulnerable woman and Benjamin Franklins, Frances supposed.

  "I'm a monster," Frances said, and was glad that the prostitute did not contradict her. Frances had become a monster bit by bit, like her tormentors at camp. So slight, she had not registered it happening. Until it was too late, until her husband came out as gay and was desperate enough to kidnap their daughter. And what had Frances done then? She kept going. She stepped her hate up, accelerated. Like the confused old man trying to flee Nathaniel's death scene.

  She had joined the ex-gay movement with the best of intentions. She did not want people to have to endure what she had at camp. No physical or mental torture was necessary. Best to treat gays with compassion and respect. Why would they convert otherwise?

  Wolf in a blue-eyed lamb’s clothing.

  Some people looked at her gratefully, others neutrally, but more and more, people looked at her, hate leaping from their eyes.

  No hate leaped from the prostitute. She had secrets, too. Came with the job. She was lovely, no denying it. If Frances collected beautiful women instead of hourglasses, this new woman would go in the trophy case.

  Frances replayed the surprise from earlier in the prostitute's eyes. And the skepticism. Frances Dourne was coming out. Yes, ma'am. About damn time.

  Chapter 4

  Elena got home about three a.m. She and Frances had chatted until two o' clock, and then Frances left her the tip. Not the largest Elena had received by any means, but still substantial. One thousand dollars. One freaking thousand dollars, for four hours of…of whatever that had been. The tip, plus her take-away pay, meant Elena had netted close to two thousand dollars for four hours of card playing, talking and listening.

  Elena wanted to give the money back. Wanted to tell Frances neither one of them had any business carrying that much cash around, that both of them could, and should, do better.

  The usual "welcome home" awaited Elena. The living room was dark. Her mother, Brenda, turned on the lamp next to the couch and breathed an: "Elena, dear?" As if anyone else would be slithering into the condo in the wee hours of the morning.

  "It's a prowler, Ma. Come to ravish you."

  Her mother laugh-wheezed.

  "Get that checked, please."

  "Psssh." Brenda waved the comment off.

  Their dialogue was familiar, but Brenda added something new. "Isaiah's father came by for dinner."

  Elena's ears stang. Her mother rarely referred to Kevin by his name. Nearly always "Isaiah's father."

  "Of course he did," Elena said bitingly. "Free food, right?"

  "You're too hard on him."

  Elena set down her briefcase. Her heart was thick and unsteady. She did not need this. Not now. Not from her mother.

  "He's a good man, Isaiah's father is. He made mistakes."

  "Ya think?"

  "He wants to help you."

  "That's his problem."

  "Help me up."

  Elena crossed her arms and linked hands with her mother. She felt the rough creases, the calluses on Brenda's palms. Brenda's back and knees were shot after years of hard, manual labor. "You shouldn't wait up for me, Ma. Use your bedroom for a change."

  Brenda's sleeping gown was limp against her body. She had used to be Elena's height. Now she was an inch or so shorter. Prenaturally old at sixty. "That's my job. Doesn't matter if you're thirteen or thirty-two. You'll always be my baby."

  Elena helped her mother down the hall. "How was the party?" Brenda asked.

  "Great. The costumes were amazing. People stayed and stayed. Couldn't get enough of the food. The clean-up was awful."

  Brenda yawned. "I can imagine."

  "Go back to sleep, Ma."

  "Elena."

  "Yeah?"

  A flicker of pain crossed Brenda's expression. "Kevin took the urn. I'm sorry, dear."

  *****

  The office door was open a crack. Elena turned on the hallway light and peeked in. She pictured Isaiah's bedroom at their old place, an apartment. The room had contained a bed with an Atlanta Braves comforter and the usual odds and assortments of a ten-year-old boy's bedroom: a basketball, a baseball and glove, model cars and trucks, books, video game cases, clothes scattered about. Messes. Elena had bought this condo six months ago. Isaiah had never set foot in it. Now, as her eyes adjusted to the dimness, Elena saw the office desk she purchased during a sale last year at Felicianna's store. The desk was a handsome red walnut, a restored antique circa 1900. On the desk was a three-inch wood globe, probably her favorite piece from Felicianna's. The globe was from about 1890, and the oceans were dark olive instead of blue.

  Party planners needed home offices, didn't they?

  Elena replayed Isaiah's wide grin and beaming eyes after Kevin came back into his life. Isaiah even wanted to live with his father. She wanted to throttle both of them, although she understood Isaiah's pain. His yearning for his father.

  Sons and their fathers. A boy drooling over a man who abandoned him only to show up in his life when he was ten. A boy discarding the woman who gave birth to him, sacrificed herself, rocked him to sleep, saw him through sicknesses and dried his tears.

  Elena closed the door. She did not have the heart to search out the empty spot in the corner of the desk where the urn belonged. Isaiah's urn looked like a metallic toy truck. It had four wheels and a secure top. He would have loved it.

  Part of Elena was furious at Kevin. The other half of her--the dark, quiet half--hoped he would do something with the thing. Sprinkle the sand somewhere appropriate, stow the urn in the back of a closet or use it to store coins or pins or soda can tabs for the Ronald McDonald house.

  He had no right, though. Who the hell did he think he was?

  Elena met Kevin Norwood in high school. He was a player, both on and off the football field. He pursued Elena for the better part of their senior year, and after graduation, she finally gave in.

  Just to see. To make sure she was gay.

  He wore a condom, but their son arrived nine months later. Kevin cradled the baby, kissed his son, posed for a picture, and then walked out.

  Elena trudged to her bedroom and stepped out of her clothes. Logic said she should be more forgiving of Kevin. He was a different man now. Worked hard in his construction job. If she had let Isaiah live with his father, maybe the boy would be alive today. The police said Isaiah's drowning was not her fault, but the pit where her soul dwelled whispered otherwise. Elena knew many facts about drownings now, facts fed to her by her mother, Kevin, Felicianna, and Oliver, her former therapist.

  Drownings rarely happen the way they're portrayed on TV. There are rarely frantic splashings, rarely screams for help. Often, the person drowning is surrounded by people who have no clue of trouble. In one case, a boy drowned while a man side-stroked beside him. What happens is that a drowning victim looks like he is playing in the water. Victims beat their arms at their sides, trying to find an anchor on the water. They crane for oxygen, going vertical in the water, bobbling up and down. They are not trying to yell for help. They are gasping for oxygen. They are gasping to live, to avoid suffocation.

  In as little as twenty seconds, years of life could be over.

  Isaiah had been a good swimmer, small but strong and sturdy. Elena had not seen him go down. Neither had the lifeguard or the adults and children swimming near him.

  Maybe the drowning was her fault. Maybe not. What mattered was, her son died while she read a mystery novel on the beach.

  If she was going to be charitable and forgiving toward Frances Dourne, she could be, should be, toward Kevin Norwood. And toward herself. Accidents happened. Kevin had told her many times that Isaiah's death was not her fault. He held her in the hospital when the doctors came out and said Isaiah was breathing with the aid of machines but was brain dead. Kevin stayed with her and watched Days of Our Lives with her for the next five days while they debated what to do with the machines and their son. Kevin had given her the hourglass necklace.

  Kevin should not have taken the damn urn.

  Chapter 5

  Frances was awake before the alarm beeped at six a.m. Her Monday outfit, a gray, dependable suit one size too large, awaited. The transformation from the night before was amazing. Not like some silly Clark Kent/Superman thing. No, Frances could almost pass for two separate people. Almost. She dressed, inserted her contact lenses, and swept her hair into its usual bun. She pulled into the parking spot reserved for her. Big important queen bee. Big important pretender.

  She had a photo session for Gay Is a Choice's new brochure. A brochure that would never reach its audience. The marketing department had no inkling of her plans. No one other than the prostitute did. While the photographer snapped away, Frances sat for the photos, shook hands with staffers and clients, and typed on her computer. Frances Marie Dourne in her natural habitat. At eleven o' clock, the photographer proclaimed himself satisfied.

  At twelve, she had a business lunch with the contractor for the new teen center in San Francisco. Then a reporter from Fox News came for a quick interview. His name was Stone Jordan. He was trim and tall like a basketball player. He had wavy brown hair and piercing brown eyes. Brown/brown could be a rather boring combination, but not on him. Stone was kind of man she used to plead to God every night to send to her. The kind of man she deluded herself into thinking she had fallen in love with.

  He looked eerily like her husband.

  She glanced at the finger where her wedding ring had rested. She had tossed it off twelve years ago but some days felt its weight.

  "Mr. Jordan." She greeted him with an enthusiastic smile.

  He grinned back. They shook hands. "Ms. Dourne. So we meet. Call me Stone."

  She batted her eyelashes. "Call me Frances."

  "You should be on TV," he said. "Not stuck in an office building."

  She "accidentally" caressed his arm. "Let's get this show on the road, Stone."

  At two o' clock, the camera people and the lighting people arrived to begin production on a new promotional video. Frances had her section of the script memorized. She was to sit as part of a circle of anxious people.

  "Hello, I'm Frances Dourne," she was going to say, smiling and leaning into the circle. Signaling her warmth, her accessibility. "So many people are here to help you. Me and my organization. Your new friends. Years ago, I was where you are now. Lost. Shunned. It doesn't have to be that way for you, not anymore. Being gay is a choice. I put in the hard work, and now I'm happy. I'm straight. You can be too. Are you ready?"

  The anxious faces would turn grinning. The circle would explode into roars of: "Yes!"

  "Then let's get to work!" Frances would reply.

  *****

  Thanks to Amanda, the booking agent, Elena knew her newest client's name--Darren Joseph Kendall. Like Frances, he picked her out from photos, Amanda said.

  Elena was meeting him for the first time, less than twelve hours after she met Frances. Elena had grabbed what sleep she could that morning. Was Frances able to function on just a few hours' sleep?

  Elena waited for Darren at the Four Seasons. When Darren arrived, Elena was sprawled, in a black nightie, on one of the two queen-sized beds. Her hair tumbled every which way.