After Wife's Death - Becoming Her - Chapter 2

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I pulled out a set of Trish’s exercise clothes and went to burn some energy on the treadmill. 

These clothes, and the forced exercise of the treadmill, had been one of her favorite distractions when something was bothering her. 

She’d lose herself in the challenge until her mind let go of whatever stress was troubling her. It’s one of the reasons she always stayed so lean, which I’m sure was another reason she liked it. 

The outfit was a bright blue and white and green leotard in a slashing abstract pattern that just screamed with the energy that had always bubbled out of her. 

Plus shiny blue tights flashed with highlights on her rippling legs. 

I cranked the treadmill up to the sort of pace she had liked, and soon found that my month of idleness had taken a serious toll on my own fitness. I was sweating and out of breath by the time the program was really getting started, but I determined to keep at it.

I guess I learned a bit about how the need to focus can make the world recede. Trish had learned that over the time she had committed to the exercise, but my own realization came about more abruptly. Unheard over the whirring of the treadmill, Bud Weisman and his wife Katy had let themselves into my house. 

They had a key, but more than that they had the code to the garage door opener so they just walked in through the garage like they owned the place. That was their long-earned privilege with us, more family than friends.

I guess we had been lucky, Trish and I when we played our little games, not to have them come in on us in some other awkward moment, but they were usually careful either to call first or to come during the afternoon. Come to think of it, this was the afternoon. Only . . .

"Wow, Tim," Bud said with a snicker. "Great legs!"

Katy slapped his arm, hard enough to make the point that she was serious, but that didn’t stop me from blushing madly and jumping off the treadmill en route to my bedroom.

"Tim," Katy called, "wait. It’s okay. Please, don’t run away."

I was already in my bedroom when she called, but before I got my door shut, she was standing in the doorway. "Really, Tim," she repeated, "it’s okay."

I heard Bud shut down the treadmill and turned to see Katy standing there with a look of hurt in her eyes, a look that said she was hurt because I was hurt. 

Go figure, they intrude on me and I’m hurting her! But it was true. I guess there’s some sort of obligation on my part to trust them if I let them come in unannounced.

Bud came walking up to stand beside her, doing an admirable job of keeping his eyes on my face and not on my outfit. They were a strangely well-matched couple. In some ways, they were the opposites that had attracted each other.

Bud was the dignified lawyer, usually wearing a neat, three-piece suit. Even when he relaxed, he was likely to be wearing khakis instead of blue jeans, and leather loafers instead of sneakers. Katy, on the other hand, was the stereotypical farm girl. 

She could look spectacular when she dressed up, with long dark-red hair and bright blue eyes. 

Whenever I saw her I was also rather, um, inescapably reminded that she had never had reason to complain about her own figure, neither in the places she wanted fat, nor the places she didn’t. But her choice of clothes was almost always jeans, usually tight enough I couldn’t believe they were comfortable. 

With her western-style boots and hair in a habitual ponytail, she looked like she had parked her horse, not a car, outside. 

Yet the two of them gave each other what they needed. She left her hair long for the simple reason that Bud liked it that way, a symbol to both of them of her total commitment to him. 

And he provided her the sense of stability that kept her red-haired intensity under control, along with a wry sense of humor that never failed to make her laugh. I had actually introduced them to each other. Bud had been my roommate, and Katy had roomed with Trish.

"Tell me about it," she said quietly.

"I just, well, I don’t know. I guess I felt closer to Trish if I wore her clothes when I worked out. It all started when I was out of clean clothes and had to leave right away to go get my hair cut, so I just wore a pair of her underwear, and well, after I got back from grocery shopping today, wearing her clothes to exercise in just felt, um, oh, I don’t know . . ."

"You’ve been wearing her underwear?" Bud asked.

"Shut up, Bud," Katy snapped. "It’s just clothes."

"Well, yeah, but . . " he said.

"Shut UP! Bud," she ordered, sending him a look that made even me quail.

Katy took my arm and guided me back out into the family room. Patting my shoulder, she had me sit on the couch while she sat at the other end. But she looked at her husband instead of me.

"Dammit, Bud, think about it! Tim has been more dead than alive for a month. He finds a way to start mending the hole in his heart and you told me yourself how much better he sounded when he called last night. 

That’s the reason we came to visit today, for God’s sake! So what if his way is to be a bit closer to Trish? If it works, then I’m all for it!"

"But, I mean, it’s a bit, uh, . . . " Bud said, running down at another glower from Katy.

I interrupted their argument, "Um, well, you’re right, Bud, it is, uh, strange. I guess. I, uh, we never told you guys, but sometimes Trish and I would play little games, and I had worn her clothes a couple of times before. Anyway, I wouldn’t have thought to do it if I hadn’t been out of underwear, and, well, you know."

"You’d worn her clothes before?" Bud repeated.

I blushed, and ducked my head, nodding a little.

"That’s interesting," he said noncommittally, the lawyer tone now in his voice.

"Yes, it is," Katy said firmly. This time, the look she gave Bud had something more than simple anger in it. There was a message there that registered even through my embarrassment.

"Doggone it, Bud, you’ve known Tim just about forever. He hasn’t grown horns and a tail just because he’s wearing some comfortable and stylish exercise wear. If it weren’t for a lot of foolish prejudices, I think this sort of thing would be popular with men. It’s certainly comfortable, isn’t it?" she said, turning to me with her final question.

"Uh, yeah, well, sure, I guess so."

"I may have to get some for Bud," she said with a grin. "I think he’d look just darling in a nice, tight thong leotard and shiny tights."

Now it was his turn to blush and mine to grin. A memory popped up of a time when I had told Trish that seeing her all sweaty, in such body-conscious clothes, made me hot. 

She had stretched, slowly and sleekly, making her legs look about a foot longer than usual. I used that memory to adjust my position on the couch, remembering the look in her eyes.

"Dear Lord!" Bud said, looking at me. "This is spooky!"

"Huh? What?" I said.

"For just a second there, you looked, I mean, you reminded me so much of Trish, somehow, that I couldn’t believe it."

"Hardly," I said.

"Actually, Tim, you did move very sensually, for a moment. But I think it was the expression on your face. That sort of grin, sort of smirk, sort of pout thing was something I have seen Trish do a hundred times."

"Really?" I said softly. "I guess you’re right."

"So this really helps you?" Bud asked. "To pull up memories of Trish and act them out?"

"Well, yeah, I guess so," I said. "I know that when I can imagine Trish is still with me, I feel better. A lot better."

"She’s not, you know," Bud said softly. "Still with you, I mean."

"Really?" Katy interrupted. "If he can keep the memories sharp and close to his heart, then isn’t she still with him, in a way?"

"Oh, that’s not what I mean and you know it," Bud said dismissively.

But Katy wouldn’t be denied, "No, I’m serious. Tim needs to find a way to work through the bad memories. They’re recent, but they’re not the most important things to remember about Trish. If his way of finding the right balance is to play-act through better memories from their time together, that might be a really good approach."

"Just what did you do?" Bud asked.

Before I could answer, Katy said, "Bud, you go find a way to amuse yourself for a while. I’m going to talk about this with Tim alone."

"Hey, I’m his friend and I’m dealing with it," Bud protested.

"No, you’re not. Certainly not if you think ‘it’ is something that needs to be dealt with. I think it’s a great approach, not a thing that needs to be ‘dealt with.’ So just go home for a while, or go visit a hardware store. I’ll let you know when I need a ride home or make some other arrangements."

It was funny. In all the time I’d known them I’d always thought of Katy as sort of meek and submissive. Oh, she’d laughed and teased and sometimes argued, and her temper did justice to the red in her hair, but I’d never seen her just order Bud to do anything. And I’d for sure never seen him just do it. But he stood up and walked back to the garage door.

"Tim," she said, once Bud was out of the way, "can you do something for me?"

I looked at her, wondering what she wanted.

"Can you pretend to be Trish for a while, or, um, did you say that the two of you played dress up games sometimes? Can you show me what you did?"

I blushed again, and ducked my head, embarrassed beyond words.

Katy slid closer to me on the couch and pulled me into her arms. "Really, Tim, I think this is a very creative approach to a very terrible problem. I, um, well, I was thinking that if we have a good, uh, ‘girl talk’ I might really be able to understand. Can you do that for me?"

"I don’t know," I said. "This is all so weird, and kinda sick."

"Sick? Why would you say that?" Katy asked.

"Well, I mean, look at me. I’m dressed in girl’s clothes. And you’re asking me to pretend to be my dead wife."

"Well, actually I’m asking you to hold her memory so close to your heart that you can remember every gesture she would make, remember the way she talked, and the way she smiled, and everything about her. What’s so bad about that?"

"Um, nothing, I guess."

"And to show me that you remember, and so that I can remember too, why not demonstrate what she would do instead of just talking about it?"

"Um, I don’t know," I said softly.

"Well, in that case, it can hardly be ‘sick’ if we can’t even give a reason for it to be wrong at all."

Something about her words was wrong. I mean, I knew this was strange, but I couldn’t quite figure out how to argue with her. Maybe I didn’t want to argue with her. I could see that a part of what I wanted was self-justification, but she sure made it easy.

Something in my posture, or in the relaxation she could feel as she held me, must have told Katy of my decision even before I recognized it in my own mind because she said, "So, show me what you used to do."

I sat there for a long while, but my mind and my eyes kept returning to the VCR and the tape Trish and I had made one time. The last time we had played the girlfriends game, Trish had set up the camcorder. We had sipped our tea and then Trish had given me a "girl" lesson, with demonstrations on how to walk and things like keeping my legs together if I was wearing a skirt. Before the grinding gears in my mind made a conscious decision, Katy picked up on my thoughts.

"You have a tape, don’t you?" she said.

I nodded, trying to remain uncommitted.

"Well get it out!" she ordered, though her tone was more teasing than authoritative. Before I could do it myself, or tell her no, she was standing up and looking through the tapes on the shelf by the VCR.

I sure couldn’t let her just start checking them all out. Some of our tapes were from games other than "Girlfriends". So I got up myself and got the right tape.

Trish had always played that game with taste and elegance, making me into the kind of lady that might actually have interested her. 

If she were interested in ladies. The outfit I wore on the tape was a skirt and sweater set in a dark red that she had told me worked as well with my neutral sort of brown hair and eyes as it did with her own darker hues. 

It didn’t, of course. She was just spectacular no matter what she wore, but she had convinced me that with her help I had achieved at least an average sort of attractiveness. In a static image only, of course.

"Wow, you look really good," Katy said, then sat up a little, trying to hear the tape. "What was that? What did she call you?"

"Oh, uh, Tammy," I stammered.

"Ooh! That’s so perfect!" Katy said, smiling appreciatively.

On the tape, we drank our tea. The Tammy in the image slouched, yet seemed stiffer than Trish. Or, maybe heavier was the right word. That Tammy seemed to need the chair for support, not only of her bottom but of her shoulders and arms. 

Trish, on the other hand, perched lightly and with exquisite balance on the seat, yet was able to move her arms and toss her head and swing her shoulders as she reached for the teapot as though none of her limbs weighed more than the dainty sugar cubes she dropped so precisely into her cup. 

Copying Trish on the tape, I had found I had to hold my head up and my shoulders back in order to keep that balance. 

My waist got more of a workout than I had expected as I rocked from one hip to the other to counter the motion of my arms.

"I never realized this was such hard work," I told her on the tape.

"It’s not work, darling, it’s just being alive!" Trish replied, bright enthusiasm shining from her eyes.

The image flickered and went to a scene where Trish was trying to teach me to move like a woman, or at least to move demurely. The skirt she had given me was narrow enough and short enough that if I just sat down, it rode up a long, long way.

 And if I didn’t keep my knees glued together, well, it was pretty obvious. I felt my knees draw tight again as I watched the Tammy on the screen blush at Trish’s gentle laughter. 

Watching the two women in the video, or at least the two people wearing skirts, I saw that even when that Tammy didn’t flash anything, she still moved with a graceless stiffness that made the contrast with Trish seem ludicrous. 

I watched again the motions Trish was making, seeming to stand casually while watching me, that is, the Tammy on the tape walk by. 

Even in standing Trish was always moving softly, a touch at her hair, a slow caress of her skirt to smooth a nonexistent wrinkle, something to keep her so vibrantly alive. When she moved to catch up with Tammy, her hips and shoulders and tilting head played a symphony of complex harmonies, always seeming to slip through some invisible path of least resistance rather than forcing a straight line.

Thankfully, the tape stopped about the time she caught up with me. What followed was not something that I wanted anyone else to see, for all that I remembered it even more vividly than the scenes I had just witnessed.

"Do it again," Katy said breathlessly, wide-eyed.

"What, run the tape?" I asked.

"No, I mean get dressed like that," she said. I want to see it in person."

"No way," I said. "Look, this has gone far enough. This is stupid."

"No it’s not," Katy insisted. "Look, I’ll help."

"I’m all sweaty, and I stink," I reminded her. "I’m not about to ruin some of Trish’s clothes by putting them on when I’m like this."

Katy deflated with a hiss like a settling tire. "You’re probably right. Besides, I’m probably not the right person to help you. I’ve never been into all the feminine frills very much. I’ve learned to do some things that work on me, for Bud, but I’m not sure I know how to get you looking as good as the girl in that tape."

Her enthusiasm re-inflated as quickly as it had gone down. "You need expert help, and I know just the expert."

"Who?" I asked. This was getting out of control, fast.

"Trish and I both used the same hairdresser, a girl named Lonna Roberts. She’s really good at this sort of thing, and I know she and Trish were friends and I’m sure . . ."

I interrupted her with a laugh, the first real humor I’d felt since forever. She stopped in mid sentence and looked quizzically at me.

"I know Lonna. She cuts my hair, too," I said to explain. I had been all set to refuse, but of all the people in the world, I had already more or less spilled this secret to Lonna when I asked her to cut my hair differently. Still, this was pretty weird. It was one thing for a man and woman to play fun little games in private. It was just a game, and very temporary. And above all, private. Bringing in half the population of our town was a different thing entirely.

I shook my head and said, "No, this has gone far enough. I can deal with the loss of Trish without pretending to be her."

"Like you’ve dealt with it for the last month?" Katy said quietly.

I looked sharply at her, hurt by the all-too-accurate shot. Instead of triumph at the effectiveness of her barbed comment, I saw only sympathy in Katy’s eyes, though.

"Really, Tim, I think you need to try something different. If this works, if this has helped at all, then you ought to follow up on it. Don’t go back into your shell."

I opened my mouth to deny her charge but the truth of it was too strong. Instead, I just sagged a bit and said, "I’ll think about it."

That made it Katy’s turn to open her mouth, then close it when whatever words she intended seemed inappropriate. There was something in her eyes that said my answer wasn’t good enough, but she didn’t say anything. She just nodded and started to look around for her purse.

"Can I borrow one of your cars?" she asked.

"I don’t guess I’ll need more than one at a time," I said, reminded of yet another uncompleted task connected with the loss of Trish. "Take the truck, if you don’t mind."

She nodded again, then followed me to the garage where I pulled the right keys off the hook.

"You need to do more than just think about it," she said, finally unable to hold it in any longer.

"Look, Katy, I know you mean well, but this is, um, it’s just that I need to, well, I mean this was a private thing."

"I know," she said. "But there’s nothing wrong with it. And even the first little things you’ve done have made such a difference. I’ve been so worried about you."

"I know, and thank you," I said. "I really will think about it."

She nodded once more and got in the truck. It wasn’t until the garage door started up that I realized I was standing in the front of the garage wearing bright blue tights and a flashy leotard. I scurried back through the inner door and waved from behind it as Katy pulled out of the garage. She smiled back, but there was definitely a look of resolution on her face that I wish I hadn’t seen there.

I really did think about it, getting some expert help that is. Half the time I figured the expert I needed was for what my head looked like in the inside, though, not an expert in cosmetics. My mood swung from curious to thinking I was being stupid with unpredictable abruptness. When I was getting dressed, I slipped on a pair of Trish’s panties, then immediately put on my jeans and a ragged old sweatshirt that Trish had hated as though that somehow canceled out the panties.

Later, though, I realized I had been rubbing my own fanny through the jeans, wallowing in the sensations of my satiny underwear. I used to do that to Trish, enjoying the feel of a silky slip sliding over smooth underthings. My mood was swinging back to curious and I was seriously considering changing my jeans for a slip and skirt, when the phone rang.

"Hello?"

"Hi, Tim, this is Katy. Did you call her yet?"

"Who?"

"Lonna Roberts. You said you were going to call her for help on getting into the Trish role."

"Oh, her," I said. "I, um, never actually said I’d call her, just that I’d think about it."

"Yeah, right," Katy said, her tone equal parts disbelief and determination. She hung up without another word. Not for the first time I was glad that Bud was married to her and not me. When she got one of her notions in her red head, she could get pretty abrupt.

And fairly predictable, in this case. I almost left the house. I did start gathering up my keys and things, making sure I had some cash in case I felt like shopping or something. Stalling, actually. At some level I realized that I wanted something. I was less sure than ever that this was it, but the only times I’d felt happy since Trish had died had been when I was pretending she was still there. Most especially when I was playing her part in a little make-believe interchange. That was wrong on a lot of levels, but right in the most important one of all. It was true.

When the phone rang again, I almost let it ring. I was afraid to answer it, but all of the sudden I had this vision of Katy dragging me by the ear down to the salon and publicly discussing this. After last night, I was about half sure she’d do just that, so before the answering machine kicked in I found myself picking up the handset.

"Hello?"

"Hello, Tim? This is Lonna."

"Hello." Great conversationalist I am.

"Katy Weiserman called me, and said you might need some help?" Lonna offered.

"Uh, yeah. Maybe." I stalled. "What did she tell you?"

"Only that you needed some help, and might be uncomfortable about asking for it."

"She said that?" Thanks a lot, Kate.

There was another long pause, then Lonna’s soft voice said, "Um, Tim, if it helps any, I think I should tell you that I know about you and Trish playing dress-up games."

"You know about that?"

"Yes," Lonna confirmed. "Trish told me. A woman needs to trust her hairdresser, and the situation sort of forces you to spend fairly long periods together with nothing to do but talk."

"Right. Trust," I said with a sneer.

Lonna was silent for a long moment. Then I could hear a sigh over the phone and she said, "I suppose I deserved that. But I never told anyone what Trish and I talked about until now, and then only because it affects you and can’t hurt her. I suppose you’ll just have to believe me on that."

At some level I knew that I could, even as I was making my nasty response. I mean, if she felt like gloating about it or something, then there had been plenty of opportunity.

"So, what all did she tell you?" I asked, still not ready to apologize.

"Oh, lots of things, I guess," Lonna said, then she snickered. "Is it true that you tied her up one time and tickled her until she peed on the bed?"

"I can’t believe she told you that!" I said, shocked.

"Oh, chill out. From what she said, it wasn’t that bad."

"Not that bad?" I repeated, not believing it.

"No." Now Lonna giggled. "In fact, she said that she wouldn’t mind doing it again."

"She wanted to do it again? I don’t believe it. She never said anything to me."

"Of course not. She knew it freaked you out. She told me you spent the next week apologizing. But she said she also felt sort of ‘de-stressed’ afterward, as though losing control was a sort of super-catharsis or something."

"Look," I said, "this is, well, this was a mistake. I’m sorry, but this is . . . ," I said, running down when I tried to figure out how to characterize this strange conversation.

"Oh, Tim, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to put you off. I was just trying to tell you that you don’t have to be embarrassed about anything."

"Right. Sure," I snorted into the phone. Long past any chance of that not happening.

"No, really, Tim. I mean it. Look, like I said, Trish told me about your dress-up games. I think that’s cool. I mean, she told me that you only did it because she asked and all. There’s nothing wrong with playing around if it makes your partner happy."

"Well, it’s not right to broadcast our private times on the evening news, either," I said.

"Hey, it was Trish that told me, and only me as far as I know.

That’s hardly broadcasting it to the world."

Now that was a hard point to counter. I could hardly put Trish down, could I? I was trying to absorb the whole idea that what I had thought of as so private was, well, maybe not public but not private, either. I couldn’t believe women talked about such intimate things.

Lonna was waiting again. Finally, she nudged a little. "Is this about dressing? I mean, since you told me you wanted to cut your hair like Trish did, and well, because of what Trish said, and Katy Weiserman, I mean, I was just wondering. Like I said, that’s all cool with me."

"It’s okay with you?" I said, not even sure it was okay with me. I had always wondered about Trish wanting to pretend to make love with a woman, but she, that is, Trish was a married woman so she’d have to pretend on anything like that. She couldn’t do it for real. But why did Lonna think it was okay?

"Sure. I had an ex-boyfriend who liked to dress. We used to go out on girls’ night out things."

"You went out with him?" I gasped.

"Sure, it was a blast. He was pretty good, and we used to go to the stripper shows and have a great time!"

"I don’t believe it," I said. Again. Great conversationalist indeed.

"Really," she insisted. "So, is that what this is about?"

"Look," I said, "I think this was a mistake. I mean, this is too weird, and . . ."

"Um, Tim," Lonna said, interrupting gently, "This may be hard for you to believe, after finding out that I’ve intruded into your privacy, but I really do want the best for you. And I really don’t mind helping. Um, how about if I just come over at lunchtime? Or we could meet somewhere. Let’s just talk about it."

"Lunchtime?" I said, still stupidly repeating things.

"Sure, I don’t have any appointments between, oh, let’s say 11:30 and 2:00. How about if we meet for lunch?"

"I, um, don’t think . . . "

She interrupted me again, "Please? I’m serious about wanting to help. I mean, I liked her, too, and, well, it was so sweet the way you were thinking about being just a little like her. I think that’s just, well, sweet."

God, now I was sweet. Repetitiously so, in fact. I was about to tell her no, when she spoke very quickly, "Oh, hey, I have to go. I’ll meet you at Smitty’s at 11:30."

Then she hung up before I had a chance to say anything. I didn’t even know of a place called Smitty’s. I probably should have used that for an excuse not to go. I mean, I hadn’t really agreed and had been on the edge of flat refusing anyway. But somehow I found myself looking the place up, and then walking through the doors of a little bar and grill thing at the appointed time.

Lonna was already there and waved cheerfully to me to join her. I don’t suppose my own expression was nearly so upbeat. But I walked slowly over to her table and said, "Uh, hello."

Lonna’s eyes twinkled and she said, "Uh, hello." Her tone and cadence were exactly as I had spoken. Like I said, I was a great conversationalist.

It certainly didn’t help my sense of being wrong, of doing something stupid. But it was hard to get angry with someone as obviously light-hearted as Lonna. It was clear she meant no harm and that meant if I took offense, the wrong attitude was mine, not hers. So I just sort of pointed at one of the chairs, or waved my hand at it, or something.

"Please, sit down," she invited. That didn’t take any words so I pulled out a chair and plopped gracelessly into it.

Once I was, uh, there, I mean, officially arrived or whatever by sitting down, Lonna dropped her voice into a much more private tone and said, "Thanks for coming. I wasn’t sure you would."

"I wasn’t sure, either," I admitted.

Her voice got even softer, not so much to be quiet as to take any edge from it at all, and she said, "Tim, please, believe me. I think it’s a very loving and wonderful thing to want to hold a bit of Trish to your heart. Not many men ever make that sort of commitment to a woman."

"It’s just," I tried to explain, "that, well, when I, um, act out something like Trish did it, well, that makes the memories so real, and so, um, fresh. It sort of pushes the other memories into the background."

"Would it help to have someone else act like Trish for you?" she asked.

I looked sharply at her. 

I hadn’t even considered that, and surely hadn’t considered Lonna for the role though it was obvious in her eyes that she was making that offer. It shocked me to think that another woman could take Trish’s place. And it offended me, really.