Babylon Sisters by Pearl Cleage Page A

jumping-off point for a wide-ranging discussion that touched on sex, love, AIDS, desire, birth control, romance, religion, and whether or not any of us could imagine paying for sex, no matter how good it was supposed to be or how long the drought had lasted. We ranged in age from Aretha, at a blossoming twenty-five, to Miss Iona, who admitted to sixty-plus, with a few stops in between for the rest of us, but everybody said no way to the brothels. Paying for sex was beyond where their imaginations could take them. More important, as I picked up in the easy ebb and flow of our confessions and critique, my sisters had no reason to consider such an option because all of them were currently having sex. Every single one, including Miss Iona, who was keeping company with Mr. Charles, one of the senior gardeners, who was seventy-five if he was a day, and Aretha, who was due to deliver in less than a month. I was a minority of one.
    Even Amelia had chimed in with an anecdote and answered my raised eyebrows with a giggle and a conspiratorial wink. Maybe I should have taken Bobby Hicks up on his offer just to see if I still remember the basic moves. I’d hate to have an opportunity present itself and be too rusty to take advantage of the situation.
    As the evening started winding down, we found ourselves examining what it takes, other than sex, to make a relationship last.
    “The thing is, you gotta have truth or the whole thing falls apart,” Aretha was saying. “I tell Kwame everything.”
    “Some women think that telling a man the truth will ruin a relationship faster than infidelity, but I think they’re wrong,” Amelia said. “I have found that truth is a great aphrodisiac for men. If you tell them the truth, they know you don’t need their approval. It changes the balance of things in a way that is always sexier than pretending. Don’t forget, it’s a short step from feigning an interest in football to faking orgasms, and an equally mind-deadening waste of time.”
    “I never told any man everything,” said Miss Iona, rolling her eyes. “There’s some things men don’t need to know.”
    “Like what?” Amelia smiled.
    “Like whatever I decide not to tell ’em,” Miss Iona said. “Telling a man the truth about everything all the time takes the mystery out of it. I’d rather keep them guessing.”
    “Not me,” said Flora, whose husband was a well-known defense lawyer flirting with a career in politics. “I like to lay my cards on the table.”
    “Me, too,” Regina said. “I believe that old Mark Twain thing about if you always tell the truth, you never have to remember anything.”
    “I’m not saying you have to lie,” Miss Iona said, clarifying her position. “I’m just saying you aren’t required to tell everything you know.”
    “What’s the difference?” I said. The distinction was starting to elude me.
    “A lie is a deliberate distortion of the truth,” Amelia said. “I think Miss Iona’s talking more about letting people draw their own conclusions.”
    “Exactly.” Miss Iona nodded, pleased. “Too much truth will drive a man crazy.”
    Aretha just laughed. “Does Kwame look crazy to you?”
    “As a bedbug,” Miss Iona teased her, knowing Kwame was as solid as a rock. “I’ve been meaning to speak to his mama about that very thing.”
    Our evening floated to a close on the music of our laughter, and I thought how lucky Kwame was to have found a woman who would gift him with her secrets, because she trusted him to handle them as gently as he was going to hold their baby. Thinking truth could do that was crazy, all right. Crazy like a fox.

18
    Amelia’s office was a bustling beehive of activity tucked away on a quiet midtown street whose only other commercial entity was a quiet little French bistro on the corner that Amelia used to woo her upscale clients and reward her associates after a successful trial. We had gone there for lunch to celebrate Jason’s acceptance to Yale and