Secret Shared

1 CASSIE

THREE THOUGHTS OCCURRED to me that morning while stretching awake across my bed in Marigny.

One, it had been six weeks since that incredible night with Will.

Two, I had fallen asleep with my S.E.C.R.E.T. bracelet on again, which hadn’t been a problem when it had only one or two charms on it. But there were ten now, so the gold pressed into the tender flesh of my wrists, leaving marks.

And three, it was my birthday. My cat, Dixie, blinked at me from the foot of the bed. I reached down and pulled her into an embrace, where she purred herself back to sleep, a skill I wish I had.

“I am thirty-six years old today, Dixie,” I said, scratching her ears.

Another year had snuck up on me like a bratty prankster. I hadn’t been paying attention to time passing until after my night with Will. It had been six weeks, and time had begun to slow. Some days ached past, work at the Café Rose being both a major comfort and the salt in the very wound I needed to heal. How could I get over Will when I saw him every day? How could I continue acting like nothing had happened between us the night I’d danced in Les Filles de Frenchmen Revue and we’d kissed our way back to the Café, up the stairs to that dusty room, where he tore off my burlesque outfit and tossed me backwards on a mattress lit by moonlight? Though he didn’t know it, I had chosen him that night as my final fantasy. He knew only how badly I wanted him.

For me the lines between fact and fantasy had dissolved and he became real to me. His skin felt like home. We kissed like we’d been doing it for decades. We fit, our bodies perfectly molded for the things we did to each other naturally, wordlessly. It was beyond fantasy. And to think that all this time he had been right under my nose and I hadn’t seen him, couldn’t see him. But after a year of S.E.C.R.E.T., after a year of pushing myself past self-imposed boundaries, I had unleashed something very real inside of myself. And when Will told me he and Tracina had broken up, I felt the universe finally aligning in my favor. The morning after our magical night, I thought Will was my reward for coming back to life.

I was wrong.

More than any other memory from that night, it’s Tracina’s face that haunts me—ashen yet hopeful, her steady voice delivering the kind of hard facts that kill fantasies. She told me she was pregnant with Will’s baby, and that he was thrilled when he found out.

What do you do with that very real information just when you think you’ve found the love of your life? You feel the final bubble burst around your fantasy and you walk away. That’s what I did. All the way across the city to the Coach House, where Matilda dried my tears. There she reminded me that embedded in every fantasy is reality.

“People love the fantasy,” she said. “But they ignore the facts to their detriment. And there’s a price to pay when you do that. Always.”

Fact number one: Will and I were finally together.

Fact number two: I was quite possibly in love with him.

Fact number three: His ex-girlfriend was pregnant.

Fact number four: When she told him, they got back together.

Fact number five: Will and I cannot be together.

Because Will was my boss, I had planned to quit my job right away, but Matilda urged me never to let heartbreak get in the way of very practical concerns, like work, paying rent, being responsible and fulfilling obligations.

“Don’t give men that much power, Cassie. Get on with the task of living. You’ve had a lot of practice this past year.”

I was such a tear-stained mess that morning. I wasn’t certain whether joining S.E.C.R.E.T. was the right decision. But at least I was making a decision. That was new for me. Prior to S.E.C.R.E.T., I always went with the most powerful force governing my life at any given time, usually my late husband Scott’s. He had brought us to New Orleans almost eight years ago, but his drinking erased any notion that we’d made a fresh start. We were separated when he died in a car wreck; he was sober at the time, but still a broken man. I was broken as well. And for five years after, I worked hard and slept fitfully, falling into a pattern of isolation and self-pity, until one day I found a diary detailing one woman’s journey through a mysterious set of steps that seemed to have a lot to do with sex—a journey that was transformative, to say the least.

Then I met Matilda Greene, the woman who became my Guide. She said she had come to the Café Rose for the diary her friend had dropped, but really she came for me, to introduce me to S.E.C.R.E.T., an underground group dedicated to helping women liberate themselves sexually, by granting them sexual fantasies of their choice. Joining the group, letting these women arrange fantasies for me, and finding the courage to go through with them, she said, would pull me out of my malaise. She told me she’d help me, guide me and support me. Finally, after a week of turning the idea over in my head, I said yes. It was a reluctant yes, but it was a yes nonetheless. After which my life changed completely.

Over the course of a year, I had done fantastical things with unbelievably attractive men, things I would never have thought possible. I let a gorgeous masseur pleasure me without asking for a thing in return. I met a sexy British man in a dark bar who secretly brought me to orgasm in the middle of a boisterous jazz show. I was taken by surprise, in many ways, by a tattooed bad-boy chef, who stole a bit of my heart while ravaging me on a prep table in the Café’s kitchen. I learned to give the most mind-blowing orgasm to a famous hip hop artist, who enthusiastically returned the favor, the memory of which still makes me tingle when I hear his songs on the radio. I took a helicopter to a yacht, then went overboard in a storm with the most handsome man I had ever laid eyes on. Not only did he rescue me, but his whole (incredible) body restored my faith in mine. Then the Bayou Billionaire himself, Pierre Castille, took me in the back of a limousine, after making me feel like the most beautiful girl at the ball. I skied the risky black diamond runs with Theo, the adorable Frenchman who pushed my sexual limits further than anyone had before. Then I went into sensory overload with a man I could only feel, not see, during a night that was blindingly sexy in more ways than one.

Then came my final fantasy, when I chose my beloved Will. I chose Will over S.E.C.R.E.T. and couldn’t have had a happier night, or a more glorious morning after.

Now, six weeks later, there was no Will waking me up on my birthday with a thousand kisses. Instead, he was probably sleeping soundly next to Tracina, maybe even spooning her, his arms wrapped around her growing belly. She was just shy of three months pregnant, but yesterday afternoon she suddenly began lumbering around the Café like she was about to give birth at any moment. She kept one hand in the middle of her back while pouring refills, groaning and stretching between serving tables. She hadn’t cut down on her shifts yet; she wasn’t at the point of asking for help. Still, I wasn’t the only one rolling my eyes at her exaggerated discomfort. Dell wiped down tables while I refilled the salt and pepper shakers. When Tracina made a show of bending down to pick up a dishrag, Dell let out a long, slow whistle.

“That girl’s making an Academy Award–winning performance out of a regular baby growing in her. I had overdue twins and it wasn’t such a burden.”

We watched Tracina meander from the kitchen to her customers to the cash register, making everyone around her look like they were in fast-forward. She even made Dell—at age sixty—look spry. During a lull, she lumbered over to where Dell and I were clearing a large table. Her belly barely protruded through her tight T-shirt.

“Oh, let me help, Dell,” Tracina said, waving her away from a tray of half-filled ketchup bottles. “My legs are sore. You take the next tables. I don’t mind losing the tips. I just don’t want to push things while I can still work. ’Cause soon I’ll be all ‘feet up watching TV,’ right?”

“Why thank you, Tracina,” Dell said, hoisting herself off the chair. “Nothing like the pregnant one giving the old one more to do.”

“I’m just saying …” Tracina began, but Dell threw up a hand and followed the bell to the kitchen to fetch ready plates.

After the lunch rush, almost on cue, the hammering began. Will needed to make more money from the Café and the only way to do that was to expand to fine dining upstairs. After finally securing the proper permits and a business improvement loan, Will had started renovating. And now, with the baby on the way, the work was more urgent. The loan covered materials, but not much extra labor, so Will was doing the renovations himself, one wall, one window, one beam at a time.

In those six weeks since Will and I had been together, I had done everything in my power to avoid small talk with Tracina, because it felt littered with landmines of truth. So I avoided Will and work topics as best I could, switching to Dell, or the baby, or gossip on the street. I still couldn’t tell how much she knew about what had happened that night between Will and me. Everyone at the Blue Nile saw us leave together, and half of Frenchmen Street saw us kiss, so she knew something had occurred. And even though she hadn’t participated in the burlesque show on account of the pregnancy, she had hung out afterwards with Angela and Kit, both of whom were S.E.C.R.E.T. members, and both of whom danced in the Revue. Now, sitting side by side at the big round table, we gave each other matching high-eyebrowed, tight-lipped smiles.

“So, uh, things are good then? With the baby and everything? You seem good,” I said, nodding like an idiot.

“Yeah, I’m, like, sooo good. Amaaaazing really. Doctor says the baby’s suuuuper healthy, though Will and I both agreed we don’t want to know the sex. But I swear I’m carrying a boy. Probably a linebacker. Will wants a little girl,” she cooed, her hand circling her belly.

The sound of Will’s band saw coming from upstairs caused her to jump, nearly sending her off her chair. I grabbed her arm to steady her.

“Oh my god! Has he been upstairs all morning?” she asked, trying to hide the real question buried beneath. Have you been alone with him today? Since reconciling over the baby, Tracina had moved back in with Will, so I assumed she knew where he was all day.

“I have no idea,” I said, lying. I had seen him that morning. We had said our awkward hellos to each other when he walked by me in the dining room and bounded up the stairs, wearing his stiff leather construction belt, shiny new tools hanging off it.

“He brought some big spools of wire upstairs yesterday. But at least he’s saving the loud work until the breakfast and lunch crowds die down.”

Tracina slapped her hand on the table to brace herself, then, without another word, headed up the stairs.

If avoiding small talk with Tracina was a hobby, avoiding alone time with Will was becoming an art form. The last few words he’d spoken to me in six weeks, or the last few words I’d given him the opportunity to speak to me, were “We need to talk, Cassie.” It was a harsh whisper delivered in the corridor between his office and the staff washroom.

“There’s nothing to say,” I replied. Our eyes darted around, making sure Dell and Tracina weren’t nearby.

“You realize that right now, I can’t—”

“I realize more than you know, Will,” I said. We heard the trill of Tracina’s voice as she cashed out a customer.

“I’m sorry.” He couldn’t even look me in the eye as he said it, and the agonizing moment made it all the more clear that I couldn’t stay.

“Maybe we shouldn’t work together, Will. Actually, it’s probably best if I quit.”

“NO!” he said, a little too loudly, then, more quietly, “No. Don’t quit. Please. I need you. I mean, as an employee. Dell is … mature, and Tracina’s not going to be much help soon. If you leave, I’m sunk. Please.”

He clasped his hands into a fist beneath his chin, begging me. How could I leave this man in a bind, when his hiring me so many years ago had plucked me out of mine?

“Okay, but there have to be boundaries. We can’t be whispering in the halls like this,” I said.

Hands on hips, he waited a beat to contemplate the condition, then nodded at his shoes. The chemicals were still coursing through my system, ones awakened by the sex we’d had. We needed rules until they subsided.

Maybe Will wasn’t happy about the baby at first, maybe it had come as a complete surprise and he was as gutted about our truncated relationship as I was, but over the past six weeks, you’d never have known it. I watched him go from pinched attentiveness towards Tracina to textbook superpartner, never missing a doctor’s appointment, reading the books that only pregnant women seemed to dog-ear, and helping Tracina in and out of his truck, though she still hardly showed. This seemed to bring out a new sweetness in Tracina as well, even if it was in service of making her life easier and the lives of others a little harder.

Just before the end of my shift, I made a last-minute assist, helping Dell deliver food for a party of six. I was already cashed out, refilling my condiments and wiping down the counters. I had plans to go for a run and to have an early night, when Tracina came bounding back down the stairs, rubbing her neck. She did look pale, so when she told us she was leaving early, Dell wasn’t surprised.

“I’m just so sick. I feel like I’m going to throw up. Will told me to go home. Sorry, guys. It’s going to be like this for a little bit, I guess. Second trimester is supposed to get easier.”

There was no way Dell could handle dinner on her own. I pretended to stifle my exasperation, but truth be told I wanted to stay. I needed the money and I had nothing better to do. Plus, there was that awful, painful, marvelous chance I’d accidentally be alone with Will, something I longed for despite all my genuine attempts to avoid it. And sure enough, an hour later, after business died down and a few minutes into the post-dinner hammering, his plaintive voice called from upstairs.

“Can someone come up here, please? I need a hand. Cassie? You there?”

Instead of heading up, I waited for Dell to garnish the final platters for our last customers.

“Please! It won’t take long!”

“Are you hearing that man? Or is it just me hearing that man?” Dell muttered, handing me the hot turkey specials.

“I hear him.”

“Good, ’cause he’s not talking to me.”

“I’m coming!” I yelled over my shoulder, thinking to myself, No pun intended. I’d preserved an internal sense of humor even while nursing my wounds.

I dropped off the plates and headed towards the stairs. I had a flashback to the fake tumble Kit DeMarco had taken on the floor, the one that secured my spot next to Angela Rejean in the burlesque show six weeks earlier. I had had no idea they belonged to S.E.C.R.E.T. too. As I stood now looking up the stairs, more flashbacks played out in my mind’s eye: Will’s face contorted in ecstasy above me, the light from the street illuminating his features. I’ve wanted this since the day we met, he whispered, while I lay beneath him. I wanted you too, Will. I just didn’t know how much.

When does this stop? When do memories quit hurting so much?

If he were to say, We need to talk, Cassie, one more time, I would say, No, we don’t, Will. I would add, I told you we should not be alone, and I would say this while lifting my shirt over my head, tossing it into the corner along with all the unwanted memories stored in that room up there. Will would say, You’re right, Cassie, we shouldn’t be alone. Stepping towards him, I would place my hand on his bare chest, letting him reach behind me and undo my bra. This is such a bad idea, I would say, pressing my skin to his, kissing his mouth, pushing him back until the window ledge stopped us. There, with his thighs straddling mine, his hands on my body, unsure where to touch first, his fingers finally traveling up to entwine my hair, his hands pulling my head back, opening my neck to his hungry mouth, I’d say, See? We don’t need to talk. We need this. We need to make each other moan and sweat. We need to fuck each other again, well, and often. And then, I need to decide what I’m going to do, because I can’t be alone with you, because look what we’re doing to each other, because everything pointed to me and you and now there is no me and you.

And then the words would stop and we’d be just hands and mouths and breath and skin … and awful consequences.

As I took the steps up to the second floor, that delicious, piercing pain went through me again, the one that caused me to throb in places that had once been dormant but now came awake every time I was near him. At the top of the stairs, I stepped around a sawhorse and over an empty roll of cables. The hallway was lined with the detritus of recent renovations—empty pails of plaster, stray nails, remnants of two-by-fours. Behind a roughed-out wall where the new bathrooms extended, Will stood atop a stepladder, framed against the exposed brick between two windows. He was shirtless and covered in white dust. There was no furniture in the room, no evidence of the night a dozen giggly women got ready for an amateur burlesque show—no chair, no storm-tossed bed. He was holding the end of an iron curtain rod with one hand, a screw gun with the other, his T-shirt tucked into his belt.

“Thanks for coming up here. Can you eyeball this for me, Cass?”

Cass. When had he ever called me that? It made me sound like a pal.

“How’s this?” he asked, balancing the rod.

“A little higher.”

He jerked the rod a few inches too high.

“Nope, lower … lower.”

He had it nearly perfectly positioned, and then he brattily dropped the rod way below the window line, at an awkward angle.

“How’s this? Is this good?” he asked, throwing a goofy smile over his shoulder at me.

“I don’t have time for this. I have customers.”

He brought the rod even. When I gave him the go-ahead, he quickly drilled a screw to hold it in place and stomped down the ladder.

“Okay. Are you going to stay mad at me forever?” he asked, stepping towards me. “I’m just trying to do the right thing, Cassie. But I’m at a loss when it comes to you.”

“You’re at a loss?” I hissed. “Let’s talk about loss, shall we? You lost nothing. Me? I lost everything.”

Matilda would have slapped my mouth shut. Have you learned nothing? she’d have said. Why do you paint yourself as the loser?

“You didn’t lose anything,” Will whispered. His eyes met mine, and my heart stopped beating for three whole seconds. I picked you and you picked me. “I am still here. We are still us.”

“There is no us, Will.”

“Cassie, we were friends for years. I miss that so much.”

“Me too, but … I’m just your employee now. That’s how it’s got to be. I will come to work and I will do my job and I will go home,” I said, avoiding his eyes. “I can’t be your friend, Will. And I can’t be that girl either, the one who … who hovers on the sidelines, waiting like some buzzard circling overhead, to see if your relationship with Tracina dies and turns cold.”

“Wow. Is that what you think I’m asking you to do?”

He brought the back of hand to his forehead and wiped his brow with it. His face was lined with sadness, exhaustion and maybe even resignation. A tense silence fell between us, one that made me question whether I could continue to work at the Café while my heart’s pain still existed. But I also knew this was my problem, not his.

“Cassie. I’m sorry for everything.”

Our eyes met, seemingly for the first time in weeks.

“For everything?” I asked.

“No. Not everything,” he said, quietly placing the hammer on the sawhorse and tugging his T-shirt from his belt to wipe his whole face. The sun began setting over Frenchman Street, urging me to get back downstairs and close up shop.

“Okay. You’re busy. So am I. Curtain rod looks good. My job here is done,” I said. “I’ll be downstairs cashing out if you need anything from me.”

“It’s not a matter of if I need you. You know I do.”

I’ll never know what my face looked like in that exact moment, but I imagine the flash of hope was impossible to conceal.

I went home and made a solid set of promises to myself. No more pining. No more pouting. That was yesterday.

Today was my birthday. I was meeting Matilda to talk about my new role in S.E.C.R.E.T. When you’re fresh off your own fantasies, it’s a tricky year. You’re not on the Committee. Not yet. You have to earn your spot. But you’re given a choice of three roles, and I was eager to plunge in, to have something else to do, someplace else to be, someone to think about other than Will or myself.

One of the roles was Fantasy Facilitator, a S.E.C.R.E.T. member who helped make fantasies happen, by booking travel, acting as a background player or participating in scenarios like Kit and Angela had the night of the burlesque show. Without Kit faking her injury, I wouldn’t have danced on that stage. And without Angela’s help with the sexy choreography, I would have made a complete fool of myself up there. This year they were becoming full Committee members, so those two slots were open.

I could also be a Recruiter like Pauline, the woman whose misplaced diary had originally led me to S.E.C.R.E.T. She was married, but her husband wasn’t threatened by her role as a recruiter of the men who’d participate in the fantasies, because, well, he’d once been one of them. Recruiting men for S.E.C.R.E.T. was different from training them; Pauline merely enticed them into the fold. Full-on training, or fine-tuning a recruit’s sexual skills, that was reserved for full Committee members, as was participating sexually in the fantasies—not that I was ready for that anyway. The third role was Guide, providing encouragement and support to a new S.E.C.R.E.T. candidate. There was no way I could have navigated the strange terrain of my crazy, sexy year without my Guide, Matilda. So I chose Guide, the least daunting of the three roles, though Matilda’s advice was to keep an open mind. “The most surprising opportunities could come up,” she said. Last thing left was to sign my S.E.C.R.E.T. pledge and bring it to our lunch.

I, Cassie Robichaud, pledge to serve S.E.C.R.E.T as a Guide for one term, doing whatever is within my power to ensure that all sexual fantasies are:

Safe

Erotic

Compelling

Romantic

Ecstatic

Transformative

I vow to uphold the anonymity of all members and participants of S.E.C.R.E.T., and to uphold the principles of “No Judgment, No Limits and No Shame” during my term, and forever after.

___________________________ Cassie Robichaud

I signed it with a little flourish, while Dixie pawed at the reflections cast across the bedspread from the charms on my bracelet. It was time. Time to take a whole new set of steps—away from Will and my past and towards a new future, whatever it held.