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“What are your other interests?”
Margie looked off to the side as she considered. “I do like art.”
“What kind of art?” I asked, my interest piqued.
“Like paintings and stuff, I guess?” said Margie. “I don’t know. I mean, I’ve done some painting myself…”
“Wow! Have you considered taking art classes here?”
“I don’t know if I’d be good enough,” said Margie. “Actually, though, there’s this place I’ve been wanting to check out…”
“Let me guess,” I said. “Shadetree?”
Her eyes lit up. “Yeah! That’s the one. How do you know about it?”
“Some of my friends are artists and they’re involved, so I make it over there for shows and stuff. I considered doing an art minor, but I didn’t have the time,” I said. “But I like to paint too. When I have the free time.”
Margie laughed. “Tell me about it. I think Shadetree’s actually having another show soon,” she said. “I wanted to go, but I don’t have anyone to go with.”
“I’ll go with you!” I surprised even myself with my enthusiasm. Why was I so interested in Margie, even though I now knew she was straight? I wasn’t usually like this. I didn’t become interested in people so quickly.
“Oh, awesome,” she said. “I’m just too shy to go alone, you know?”
“Yeah, it can be intimidating,” I said, even though I honestly didn’t know. I’d never had this problem that Margie had, and I was thankful for it. I’d never had trouble making friends. Romantic partners were harder to come by, but friends? I had many of them and I wasn’t afraid to go places alone.
Not that Margie was afraid, necessarily. Maybe she just found it overwhelming. I could tell there was so much more under the surface, but I was only getting it in glimpses.
Maybe that was what intrigued me about her—I could tell that there was something restrained about her, and it made me want to probe further. I wanted to set that restrained part of her free.
Maybe going to Shadetree would be the first step.
“You should do a minor in art, at least,” I said. “You can start with the intro classes if you’re not confident in your skills.”
“Maybe,” she said, smiling. “I’ll see how going to Shadetree works out for me first. Tell me, what’s it like?”
“It’s awesome,” I said. “It’s pretty new, but I guess it filled a niche the community needed or something, because it’s hopping all the time. These two women turned an old warehouse into the gallery space, and there are even studio spaces they rent out for artists. I think there were talks of selling art supplies, too.”
“The student bookstore doesn’t have much stuff,” said Margie. “We kind of need a place like that.”
“Yeah. I don’t want to have to order all my supplies online, you know? Rosebridge is big enough to have a proper art store,” I said.
“So… What else do you do?” asked Margie. “What keeps you so busy?”
There was something coy about the way she asked the question. It really felt like we were on a date. A date date, not a friend date. I couldn’t ignore my intuition telling me that there was something about her… But then, I didn’t want to ignore the fact that she clearly implied she wasn’t into women.
I decided to do a little more poking.
“I sometimes hang out at the Spectrum Coalition,” I said.
“What’s that?”
“Basically the LGBTQ club. It’s a nice place for the queer kids to hang out. We have events and mixers, so it could be a good place to meet people, though you didn’t say…” I trailed off.
She shrugged. “I’ve just never been into women that way,” she said.
I nodded. So she was doubling down. Okay. Maybe it really was something else then.
“I also am involved with a small street performance group,” I said. “Between that and my music classes, I’m pretty much playing the violin all the time.”
