“Didn’t you tell me you were engaged?” Big Swiss had asked, somewhere in the woods.
Greta nodded. “Stacy and I were engaged for a whole decade, but it only felt like a few months.”
“Does she live around here?”
“California,” Greta said. “And Stacy is a man.”
“When did you break up?”
“A year ago,” Greta said. “We still talk on the phone, though that’s tapering off. His new girlfriend says she doesn’t like the look on his face when he talks to me, so I don’t call him anymore. But we share custody of Pi?on, so they FaceTime.”
“He FaceTimes with the dog?” Big Swiss asked.
“Of course,” Greta said. “How else are they going to see each other?”
“Why’d you break up?”
“I was ready to live alone,” Greta said.
“But you don’t,” Big Swiss said, and bit into her second apple. “You have a roommate.”
“I was ready to sleep alone,” Greta said. “Stacy was a teddy bear. With a penis. It startled me to cuddle him and then feel an erection. And yet I was extremely attached to him. I relied on him for everything. That’s why I’m living the way I am now.”
“And here I was convinced you were gay,” Big Swiss said. “Are you?”
“Not all the way,” Greta said. “I mean, I’ve had sex with women.”
“How many?”
“Oh, I dunno,” Greta said. “Five or six?”
“Do you have a type?”
It was hard to say. Apart from her one girlfriend in high school, she’d only ever slept with stone butches, and they were mostly one-night stands, a few long weekends.
“So, like, emotionally distant women?”
“Stone butches prefer to touch rather than be touched. They’re not stony, per se. In fact, they’re often very doting. The last one told me that I wasn’t a bottom, that underneath my girl clothes and makeup, a butch was waiting to emerge. This was news to me. Of course, I never did anything about it except shave my head, which I regretted instantly.”
“Why?”
“Turns out I have a criminal head shape.”
Speaking of, Greta looked around for Keith. Unless he was wearing camo or hiding behind a tree, she and Big Swiss were alone.
“When did you become aware you liked girls?”
“Puberty.”
“Were your parents still married?”
“They split up before I was born.”
Greta paused to yell at Pi?on, who’d performed an elaborate water dance in the freezing creek and then covered himself with mud, and was now barking in Silas’s face. Pi?on was a mess, but everything about Silas was immaculate: his feet, his jet-black fur, his calm.
“Are your parents still alive?” Greta asked.
Big Swiss didn’t answer. Maybe they were dead.
“What do you miss most about Switzerland?” Greta asked.
Big Swiss shook her head.
“Did you vacation in the Alps?”
No answer.
“I’ve heard the Swiss are good swimmers. Is that true? And is the chocolate really that much better than—”
“Nice try,” Big Swiss interrupted.
“Pardon?”
“You seem to want to change the subject,” Big Swiss said.
“What?”
Greta felt Big Swiss studying her profile.
“Your mouth is trembling,” Big Swiss said. “Are you suddenly uncomfortable talking about yourself?”
“Wait a minute, were we not having a conversation?”
“I refuse to play into your program,” Big Swiss said.
“My program?”
“What’s your fear?”
Scientology, Greta thought.
“Are you afraid to reveal too much?” Big Swiss asked. “Tell me your fear, and be honest. Don’t compose your answer.”
Greta composed several answers. “Ticking clocks,” Greta said. “Childbirth. I’m not crazy about confrontation. Marriage, most wood-paneled rooms. Feet. In fact, feet might be first. That’s partly why childbirth scares me. It’s actually a fear of breech.”
There, Greta thought. Plenty to investigate.
“You were telling me about your girlfriend in high school,” Big Swiss said. “Then you suddenly shifted the focus away from yourself, and it seems habitual, and I’m just wondering what’s behind it.”
“Maybe I’m just not much of a talker.”
“My guess is you adopted this role pretty early on,” Big Swiss said. “I imagine it’s a role you’ve been performing your whole life.”
“Being polite?”
“Listening,” Big Swiss said. “That’s your role: listener, confidante, confessor. You sit around all day, not talking, listening to other people talk, writing down what they say, and then you do the same thing in social situations. Are you writing a script right now?”
“Are you always this intense?”
“I’m direct,” Big Swiss admitted, “because I don’t care if people like me. I distrust people-pleasers. They seem phony to me, and dangerous.”
“It’s easy to picture you in the schoolyard. Towheaded children tend to look angelic, but they’re often little assholes,” Greta said, and smiled. “Another fear of mine is seeing old photographs of the person I’m dating. Not baby pictures—I don’t mind those—but anything after age five, because a person’s essence becomes visible, and I always have trouble reconciling it with who they are now—”
“I protected kids from bullies,” Big Swiss interrupted. “That was my role in the schoolyard.”
“You bullied other bullies,” Greta said.
Big Swiss nodded.
“Well, I hope you’ll protect me from… yourself.”
An uncomfortable silence passed. Maybe it was only uncomfortable for Greta. Big Swiss seemed relaxed and amused, except she wasn’t walking so much as skulking. Her steps were measured and cautious, as if she was worried about making too much noise.
“I’m disappointed when someone immediately turns the tables,” Big Swiss said. “Seems lazy to me.”
“You know, you might want to ease up,” Greta said. “We just met.”
“Doesn’t feel that way. Do you agree?”
Greta shrugged.
“Talk to me about your first girlfriend,” Big Swiss commanded, her mouth full of licorice, “and don’t hold back.”
And so, Greta had told her all about Robin, who’d been a few years older than Greta and, as far as Greta knew, the only other girl in New Hampshire without a perm and waterfall bangs. In fact, her hair had been buzzed all over and bleached platinum, and she dressed like a dude. Everyone called her Rob or Robbie. The first time they’d met, Greta had been at the library, tossing books out of the window. Rob had been on the sidewalk below, doing tricks on a skateboard. Greta watched as the skateboard suddenly flew out from under Rob, and Greta saw—could almost hear—Rob’s head smack concrete. She immediately descended the stairs and exited the building. Rob was still on the ground. Greta crouched next to her.