Chapter Text
For two weeks now, Karen’s been together with Ivy. Well, not together-together. There isn’t a label on it yet, but they go out shopping for groceries and meet for coffee. They kiss. After seven different performances, each one better than the last, Karen waits for Ivy at the Bombshell stage door with an armful of flowers. When Ivy emerges, her face shines with pride.
The whole affair—is it an affair?—might be the most exhilarating thing that’s ever happened to Karen. (Sometimes when she’s alone in her room she literally jumps for joy about it, which makes her feel very uncool later.) Ivy’s presence dissipates the fog of the mundane. All the bodegas and hot dog stands, the MET museum and Central Park are now rendered fascinating again with the relevancy of being part of her life too. Like a quote from My Fair Lady: “I want to drink in this street where she lives.”
Karen thinks they’re lucky that no-one’s caught onto them besides Eileen, who somehow gained enough intel to confront them with the rise of her eyebrow and a tidy speech about being careful of their reputations. A referral to her PR manager. Those are the extent of the consequences, thank God. Ironically, despite her complaints with Jimmy, Karen can’t bear to kiss Ivy in the open. Something about the act reveals too much about her, even more than the way she strokes Ivy’s hand with her thumb when the other woman’s overwhelmed, or how Ivy’s learned to knock their shoulders together when she thinks Karen’s being especially stupid. Perhaps it’s a perverse silver lining, then, that Jimmy’s now too absorbed in his grief to care about her much longer. He gets mean when he’s upset. So does Derek, but she thinks it pleases him narcissistically to see his two greatest obsessions get along. The idea of kissing either of them while she could be kissing Ivy again makes her feel like her heart’s clenching into a stone. Ivy says that’s a symptom of small-town regressive monogamy, and Karen tells her to shut up, and then they’re laughing their way through Times Square again.
Despite the impulse, Karen hasn’t actually brought Ivy over to her own place yet. She planned on it, of course, said all the right things and led Ivy through the grid-streets for a while… Instead they went out for kebabs, where she got the chance to wipe away sauce from Ivy’s chin. It was no great loss. But to enter comes with expectations. She’s had boys there before without going all the way; somehow with Ivy that seems harder. As if, by opening up her home, the whole flood of desperation will rush to her unassuageable.
Ivy’s the one who brings up the subject again first. They’re together on the subway watching the space behind the windows flicker past. They both have their hands on a silver pole near the shuttle doors, overlapping. As the car rattles and jerks with each stop they’re tugged along too. The day’s already begun winding down; exhaustion sets into Karen’s joints. Her throat hurts from singing. Ivy looks about as tired as she does. She keeps rubbing at her eyes, and her eyeshadow smudges slightly before she moves on to rubbing her nose instead. Her face is covered in a fine sheen of sweat and oil, but it only makes her light up the void of the underground. Then Ivy seems to collect herself. She turns to Karen and asks, “Why don’t I shower at your place?” Gives a ridiculous, over-the-top wink, like she knows she’s being silly too.
Karen glances down at her cell-phone. No missed calls; no texts. No-one will miss her now that the day’s production of Hit List has finished. Objectively, there’s no reason why she should say no—but Ivy Lynn, in her apartment? In her room? She swallows. Considers the facts again. Why not? She nods, trying not to seem too eager to have Ivy nearby. To delay the parting—the hundred goodbyes that occur when two people occupy the space between lovers and in love, leaving every day for their own partitioned segments of being. “My stop is next,” she says.
As Karen grabs the other woman’s hand, the end of her scarf suddenly flings itself into Ivy’s face with the cold wind. It makes them both snicker—and she’s grateful for the distraction, because every step closer, crossing one street and then the next, turning at this or that landmark, brings Ivy to where she lives. It’s not a particularly notable place, either. Fine by Karen’s standards, that is, but that’s only because her parents help pay her rent and she has to share with Ana. She remembers Ivy’s place belongs to a pleasant alley of brownstones, ironically lined with greenery. By the time they actually reach it, Karen’s fingers refuse to cooperate properly; she fumbles with the key for too long, and it’s awkward now, ugh.
When they set foot into the common areas, the discomfort of Ivy—Ivy Lynn!—in her apartment, judging the place, judging her, becomes unbearable. Especially since most of the things there belong to Ana. She let Dev take all the cookware, the TV, and more besides that… Whatever he wanted, stripped from her on his exit.
She guides Ivy to her room, and finally the relief of being home again sets in. She breathes. Allows herself a moment to calm down and stop being so nervous all the time. (No wonder that Derek likes her best when she’s being Marilyn or Amanda instead of herself.) Meanwhile, Ivy cranes her head to look around. Does it reveal anything bad about her? The PlayBills and high-school track awards shoved into her closet, the CDs and nail polish and old plane tickets stacked high in a pile atop her dresser, dirty clothes on the floor near her hamper, a massive framed Chicago poster on the wall…
Karen feels the urge to reassure Ivy that she’s usually very neat, but then the breakup with Dev happened, and the long process of packing and unpacking and pressing her life into another shape. Over time it got harder to get herself to care. So she goes out at night to parties now. She lets herself flirt a little, takes it casual—even though, historically, Karen Cartwright dates for the steady promise of marriage. That’s what you do where she’s from. (And if Derek really only wants her in his bed, if Jimmy only needs her when no-one’s around, if she surrenders and does what they tell her to despite the feeling that she is floating in air, drifting away from herself… She’s a New York girl now. When in Rome, they say.)
With a harrumphing sigh, Ivy sits down on the bed. The profile of her face lights up from moonlight through her window: a nose that belongs on a coin, a strong mouth, and eyes bluer than the pale city night. The sight quickens Karen’s pulse. Then she has the sudden question of whether or not she’ll have to sneak Ivy out through the same window later. A mental image—burnt film, half-remaining—of Ivy bent over to leave, hips so wide that they stick. God. She shakes her head to rid herself of the thought.
Karen moves over to her dresser and rummages for a black stocking. Something she got for an audition once upon a time. Then she hangs it over the outer doorknob. From behind her, Ivy calls, “Seriously, Iowa? A sock on the door?”
Karen closes the door and turns to face the other woman. “It’s traditional,” she protests.
“More like cliché,” Ivy says—suddenly exposed after a single second or so that Karen wasn’t looking. Her blouse and baby-pink dance shrug are tossed over the bed like they belong. Some sort of claim on the space: she’s going to be there and screw anyone who denies it. Worse, there’s the broad expanse of her bare shoulders with its dapple of freckles. Ivy’s muscles shift as she moves in place. And her bra, a dark lace push-up. Karen’s eyes fix to the line where Ivy’s breasts press to each other. She hopes it doesn’t seem creepy that she’s trying so hard to drink it all in.
She used to reckon that those stupid leotards were form-fitting enough that Ivy got close to nudity anyways. The curve of her breasts, barely rising over the fabric. The long line of her legs in tights. The sweat of rehearsal at the end of each workshop session, darkening the crook of her knees obscenely. Karen judged her for it for so long… Surely Ivy knew her own effect, how it was hard to breathe at the sight of her wrung out from performance. It wasn’t fair. But now she understands that it’s less to do with seduction and more to do with her own obsession. Repeating lines from Bombshell to herself in the mirror over and over, wondering how on earth Ivy came to possess so much power.
Ivy dips her head and smiles at her beatifically. “You can look, you know,” she says. But already Karen’s averting her gaze, glancing to the pillows. She’s sure she’s red as a lobster from embarrassment.
Then Ivy’s off the bed, coming up near her, putting her hands around Karen’s waist. The contact intoxicates her. Warmth. All she can think is that it’s Ivy Lynn, and they’re really doing this. She presses forward, and the other woman flops back onto the bed with a little noise of surprise as Karen leans on top of her.
Their lips are so close that they could kiss again, but they don’t. Instead, Karen takes the time to study Ivy’s face. The way her lips twitch upward, the little patch of unblended foundation near her eyebrow, how her nostrils expand and contract. Her fingers drift downward to sink into the skin above Ivy’s jeans like the white underbelly of a fish, leaving scalloped shadows of indentation. Soft stomach. Soft hips. As the woman breathes, the contours of her flesh move back and forth. The effect is so subtle that she doubts the other woman’s even aware it’s happening—but it is, and Karen’s mouth goes dry. She flattens her palm and traces a light hand over the ribbed texture of stretch marks where the other woman outgrew herself at some past point in time. There are a hundred shades of Ivy Lynn in her head flickering like a supercut of old film, most from personal memory, others from story. They’ve shared countless tales of failure with each other: Karen flunked all her classes in sophomore year of high school, and Ivy got a drunken tattoo she regrets; Karen burnt her hair off making stovetop ramen, and Ivy took a baseball bat to the glass of her mother’s fourth award case; Karen missed three flights in a row, and Ivy broke her arm from falling flat on her face during an audition. All of that history etched onto their bodies. Bodies next to each other. Skin-to-skin.
They lay like that for some time until Karen rests her head on Ivy’s sternum. The gentle rhythm of their twin breaths lulls her into a state of relaxation. It occurs to her vaguely that it hadn’t felt this way with Jimmy, when he slept over. The whole night she’d kept waking up fearful, with no dreams and her pulse thrumming in the back of her neck. She hates his cologne. Maybe that was it. But Ivy smells beautifully floral, like antique gardens of jasmine and iris and rose… Karen can almost imagine herself as an emperor laying upon his bed of flowers, petal-soft.
She’s almost ready to fall asleep, stretched out in haphazard limbs, until suddenly Ivy says, “I was wondering. Am I the first woman you’ve ever been with?”
Karen nods into Ivy’s collarbone, and she can feel the other woman’s body react in mild surprise. “I guess there was Rebecca, though,” she says, despite that it’s humiliating to admit after those months of dodging phone calls with her parents and old friends. (Maybe the tabloids were right after all.) But Rebecca hadn’t said anything about lesbianism in earnest. Only sort of looked at her oddly, the one time she’d brought it up, and moved on. So Karen moved on too, because it meant nothing… A careful avoidance of the moments when she felt so lonely for other women that her throat closed up.
Usually, a cigarette helps. (Their ends turn blonde as she sucks on them.) Her voice might be ruined one day, but then again, who cares? Who cares? Her father’s own habit started as a child; when Karen stays up late and blows smoke out the window, it’s almost like swinging on the porch with him and his thick scent in the sprawling, endless air. There are no stars in New York City. She misses those the most.
Ivy is the worst of all her new vices, because nothing else takes the edge off quite the same. Karen kisses her in the gap between dialogue.
The other woman gives an immediate groan of displeasure as soon as they part. “Ugh,” she says. “That nasty, tone-deaf… I knew something was happening between you two!”
”No, it wasn’t like that. I just, like—I don’t know,” Karen says weakly. “I don’t know.” Maybe some extension of head-rush ambition, but not romantic. Not like Ivy is with her now.
Ivy whispers, “Thank God, then. I was beginning to question your taste.” An intimate press of the lips below her ear.
Karen rolls her eyes. “You don’t get to say that, Ivy. Have you noticed that we go for the same men?”
It was only meant to be teasing, but Ivy suddenly rolls to the side, pushing Karen away from her quickly. The loss of heat, of touch, makes it feel as if she’s suddenly plunged into the rain. Ivy’s lips purse; it means she’s thinking intensely about something. She looks up and puffs a hard exhale out of her nose. Finally, she speaks. “I wasn’t actually into Dev, you know.”
Karen didn’t know. Her throat tightens from the rush of memory. Of course Ivy ruined all sorts of things for her, but Dev was a good man. He could’ve had sex with R.J. and he didn’t. He could’ve called again, after she left him, and he didn’t. So for Ivy to say that she never even liked him… (And, secretly, neither did Karen. The shame consumes her whole.)
Something in Karen’s face must be revealing, because there’s a hand reaching out to cradle it. “Hey,” Ivy comforts. “There are a thousand men out there exactly like Dev. You’re special, Iowa. I mean, you’re going to win a Tony. He didn’t deserve you.”
For a moment, Karen’s stomach sinks with guilt. She can excuse submitting to the worser men. Jimmy is a cliché rogue bad-boy, exactly the type of danger that she should enjoy; Derek, so forceful that resistance seems futile. But when Ivy’s around, Karen’s own longing suddenly commands her to action—a kiss, a touch, lying on the bed together as if she’s really real again. (And the terrible risk that it might all go away if she even moves. Melting into the pillows, a beautiful dream.)
“Why did you sleep with him?” Karen asks, swallowing the bitterness in favor of her curiosity.
Ivy’s silent for a while. She’s still thinking—one of those people who’s always thinking, going over herself to figure things out. She says eventually, “He was yours, and I wanted to get back at you. And I wanted you.”
“Even then?” Karen says, because the first of the statements are obvious, but the third is new. There’s a thrill, too, a sense of flattery and excitement. Ivy Lynn—who’s always been essentially perfect—wanted her when she was only a second-rate Marilyn, even when she didn’t have the Tony nomination or a sense of style or anything? (It surprises her that Ivy wants her at all.)
“Yeah,” Ivy says, and smiles. Her eyes crinkle in the corners. “Even then.”
Karen feels a bit like crying, but she doesn’t. Instead, she tells her, “I did, too. I was actually, um, kind of obsessed. It was stupid.”
Ivy giggles. She knocks their shoulders together. “I agree.”
“Oh, come on,” Karen complains. “I wasn’t obvious, at least.”
“You stared so much that I swore you were going to sneak into my apartment and smother me with a pillow while I was sleeping. Do you have a thing for asphyxiation, by chance?”
“No!”
Ivy wraps her hand around the back of Karen’s neck. Fingers trickle up and down her hairline. “Calm down, Iowa. It’s a joke,” she says. Slowly, she moves forward with an open mouth. Karen leans in, and then they’re making out again. It’s so attractive that she can hardly believe it. God. Ivy Lynn is in her apartment. Every ugly thing dissipates. But as they continue Karen presses herself closer, and closer, and it doesn’t seem close enough to the shelter of Ivy. She wraps her arms around the woman’s plush middle. Pulls her in, and she’s on fire. When she starts to pant, Ivy suddenly withdraws again and wipes her mouth. “I can’t,” she gasps. “Not today.”
Karen says, “Oh. No, I mean, it’s fine. Sorry. We don’t have to.” She doesn’t need anything in particular. Despite that, she’s already wondering if Ivy finds her crude, barbaric, if that’s the reason why…
But Ivy doesn’t seem fine. Her eyes go unfocused. She stares through Karen like she’s seeing someone else in her place. When she begins speaking, her thin voice can hardly be heard. “Derek shows up at my place at night, and he…” A long silence. Ivy holds herself perfectly still, as if she’s trying her best to become a porcelain doll in the shape of a woman. Beautiful. Motionless. Disturbing, because Ivy’s usually full of life enough that it projects into her surroundings. She whispers, “It’s hard to say no.”
“Oh,” Karen says softly.
Ivy shakes her head and seems to come back to herself, but she’s trembling all over. She rushes, “He was the director, too—and I know it shouldn’t matter, but it did—and sometimes I just despise him, but… I wish we could have been in love. I wish that could have happened. If he would just let up, and not—not make me—”
Karen’s almost sick with sympathy, because she gets it. Derek is one of those mundane predators—and she lets herself think that word, now, before it slips away—who’s actually so unaware of himself most days that he doesn’t understand his predation. He pushes. And often it’s easier, so easy, just to let him play like a spoiled little boy with a toy he’s ready to break. Then he cries at the breaking, because he can’t comprehend that women don’t come back together again. But it doesn’t matter—Karen and Ivy are a pair. The world is better once more. (And if she feels gross and empty and half-extinguished at the thought of Derek touching her, it doesn’t matter.)
They haven’t really discussed the elephant in the room yet, either: a week after they first kissed, Ivy let her know that she wasn’t pregnant anymore. Karen gets the sense that maybe it’s a bad time to bring it up—but if not now, when? The precariousness of the situation makes her reckless. She doesn’t want to hurt Ivy, but on the other hand the idea of Ivy and Derek in love repulses her. It can't linger in the conversation like it’s valid, like if the world were different that Ivy could be his little housewife. She says, “You and Derek wouldn’t’ve been happy with each other. If you had the—a kid. A lot of my high-school friends had kids right away, you know? People just did that. But none of them were on Broadway. I mean, like, most of them didn’t even have careers. No offense, but it’s true.”
“It’s so hard,” Ivy says helplessly. She touches her shaking fingers to her mouth. Her whole face crumples.
“Well, it’s all over now,” Karen tells her, and goes to press her lips to Ivy’s forehead in a brusque manner, but the other woman sits up in an instant.
“No, it’s not! ” Ivy’s eyes go wide like she’s suffered a great shock, like Marilyn herself horrified for the world’s gaze. She’s never sounded so forceful. She’s never sounded so afraid.
Karen retreats. “I just meant that—you know, it’s going to be okay.”
But Ivy still looks stunned at herself, then stunned at Karen. Her lips curl up in vague disgust. She says, “What are you talking about? It’s going to be okay? Karen Cartwright, you have to be the most naïve girl on the planet.”
“Stop holding grudges against me,” Karen shoots back on instinct. “If I’m naïve, then you’re just plain mean.” Immediately, she wishes she could retract her words. They hang in the air between them for a second. The noise of a siren rises out from the window to fill the space. A fire on the other end of the street.
Ivy blinks once, twice. Tears well up in her pretty eyes, and she says hoarsely, “You can be such a bitch sometimes.” She grabs her shirt from the bed, pulls it over herself. Before Karen realizes what’s happening, Ivy’s already slung her purse around her shoulder, which hits hard against her own as the woman moves to leave.
“Ivy!” she calls, and reaches for her instinctively. Ivy stops in place. Karen can’t see her face from behind, only how her neck tightens and her hands twitch at her sides.
After a beat, Ivy turns back to her. Her mascara streaks like a movie star’s or a tragic theatre mask. Karen’s tempted to cry too. Despite everything, she needs to see the other woman smile, be happy, and generally succeed—even though she’s going to do all of that regardless of anyone else. Ivy Lynn glows in the dark. She enchants. When she takes her bows, she’s the most glorious thing ever made, and Karen thinks maybe she’d give up Hit List and be a chorus girl forever if it meant getting to watch Ivy every night for the rest of her life. Even if she never got to kiss her again, even if they never spoke…
Ivy commands, brittle, “No, you don’t get to do this. Don’t make me think that you’re different.”
The implication overwhelms her: her desire corrodes. Not even because of the fact of desire to begin with, but that it’s Karen’s, and no matter what she does, they always come back to fighting each other again because of it. The desire for love, for lust, for fame and riches and everything else… She isn’t different, is she? But Karen feels herself saying, “I am, I am, I want you,” and the words fall from her lips like little wisps of smoke escaping.
“But do you like me?”
God willing, Karen does. She likes her too much, almost; even when she loathes her, it’s mixed up with the knowledge that the other woman’s simply overwhelming for someone so diluted by ambition as herself. (And Ivy deserves better.) But what to do now? How can she say anything right when Ivy’s staring at her again, heartbroken, seeming small? Karen gapes for a second—too long.
Ivy’s face hardens like stone. “I should’ve known,” she says, back to that faint whisper.
Irreparably, she walks out the door.