Chapter Text
November, 1961
Odessa offers up the beauty parlor as a meeting place for the SJCC in October, after the cops start taking a little too much of an interest in Deano’s cafe; two casual, menacing “drop-ins” were more than convincing enough for a relocation. Ray is grateful for both the risk she’s taking, and for the privacy of the salon’s curtains. He is utterly unprepared for the jolt that goes through him when he locks eyes with the woman across the room.
He feels his heart stutter, freezes, recovers – but that’s it, he’s gone. He finds himself searching for the mystery woman every time the SJCC meets, sees the way she busies herself in some back corner while listening in to every word. Takes note of her silence and the red, angry scar across her throat. Wonders if he’s imagining that she studies him right back, glancing away when he turns in her direction.
Odessa sees him looking, because of course she does. Ray’s increasingly flimsy excuses to drop by the salon more often are fooling exactly nobody, least of all her. She waits until he happens to come in on the woman’s day off with a bundle of flyers, then waits some more while he talks through the SJCC meeting schedule for the next week.
“So, same as last week, then,” she says when he’s done.
Ray feels his face get hot, does his best to keep his smile steady. Casual, Ray. Be casual. “That’s right. Same as last week.”
“Uh-huh,” Odessa says, leaning back against the counter and crossing her arms across her chest. She gives him a look that would almost be pitying if it wasn’t so fond. “Is there anything else I can help you with today, Ray?”
Ray does one last glance around the room to confirm that the mystery woman is nowhere to be found, then turns to meet Odessa’s grin with a sheepish one of his own. “So,” he says, as nonchalantly as he can, “I see you hired a new cleaner.”
“Yep,” Odessa says. “Sure did.”
Ray can’t help his laugh – of course she’s not going to make this easy on him, not when she can poke fun at his see-through attempt at being smooth. She’s enjoying this way too much. “So,” he says again, “what’s her story?”
Odessa’s smile fades. After a beat, she sighs. “Poor girl all but dropped out of the sky, about six months back,” she says. “She was in a bad way and running from trouble. You’ve seen the scar on her neck?”
Ray nods.
“She can’t talk, but she’s written out some bits and pieces – told us that she’d been attacked, that her vocal chords got sliced clean through. Seems like she’s healing up, but it’s slow going. Won’t say a word about who did it.”
“That’s horrible,” Ray says. His imagination fills with all kinds of scenarios that he doesn’t want to dwell on. Odessa shrugs her shoulders, jerks her head toward the back of the shop.
“I gave her my back room to stay in, got her into some clean clothes, and the next day she grabbed a broom,” Odessa says. “She’s been with us ever since and never gave me cause to regret it. Whip smart, for all that she’s shy – Vernetta’s started training her on hair, reckons she’ll be ready to start as a stylist in a few months.”
“So she’s sticking around, then?” Ray asks. “No family to go back to?”
“Says she had family up North, but they’re gone now,” Odessa says with a sigh. “Spent some time searching for them when she first got here but nothing turned up. Far as I can tell, that girl is alone in the world except for us. She’s an odd one, but she’s ours.” She fixes him with a stare that lets him know she means business. “So you better be careful with her, Raymond Chestnut.”
“Yes ma’am,” Ray says automatically, ducking his head with a smile. Odessa looks satisfied.
“Now git,” she says, shooing him toward the door. “I’ve got an appointment coming along and these rollers won’t prep themselves. I’ll see you at the next meeting.”
He’s got a lot of information here to digest, but there’s no denying the undercurrent of relief that there’s no husband waiting for her at home. That, in a roundabout way, he’s got Odessa’s blessing to try and turn all his looking into something more, something real.
He scoops up his hat, buttons his coat against the December chill. He hesitates at the door, though, and finds himself turning back.
“‘Dessa,” he calls. She lifts her head from where she’s bent over the counter, bobby pins in hand. “What’s her name?”
Odessa smiles, slow and pleased, then winks at him. “Why don’t you ask her that?”
Ray laughs. “You know, I think I will.”
___________________
January, 1962
It takes months for Allison’s voice to come back, for her to be able to rasp out more than a couple syllables at a time. Ray learns to read the discomfort on her face when she’s pushed herself too far – learns when it’s time to revert to yes or no questions that she can nod to, or to bust out the notepad he now carries with him everywhere, just in case.
Most of the time, though, Allison has no problem making herself understood. She rolls her eyes at him when he’s being ridiculous; wrinkles her nose in frustration when her voice fails her and she has to write out her thoughts in aggravated cursive; rewards him with a soft and dreamy smile when he takes her hand.
She loves movies, and Lena Horne, and Friday night square dances; she hates checkers, and strawberry milkshakes, and Price Daniel. The first time she has a proper Southern barbecue it’s like she’s having a religious experience right across the table from him. The word ‘negro’ makes her flinch. She dutifully follows Odessa to church every Sunday, and smiles at the old aunties who press her hand and cluck over her after services, but he can tell that the service itself bores her to tears. Every expression she has speaks volumes, and Ray has never felt so attuned to another person in his life.
I’m not quiet, she writes on her notepad, somewhere in the middle of their third date. She lets him absorb this for a second before huffing out a breath and adding, Usually.
Ray blinks for a moment, then laughs. “Is this you trying to warn me?” he says. “When your voice heals up all the way, I’m not gonna be able to get a word in edgewise, is that it?”
Allison just raises her eyebrows pointedly, tilts her head to the side. Gives the notebook a little shake for emphasis.
“Baby, I am under no delusions that you are some shy, shrinking violet,” he says, leaning toward her across the table. He reaches for her hand, the one holding the pen, and gives it a small squeeze. “You’ve got more opinions than anyone I’ve ever met, and I expect to hear every single one of them.”
Careful what you wish for, Allison writes, but Ray is pleased to see an edge smooth out of her smile.
____________
April, 1962
The months go by and Allison’s voice gets stronger, clearer. Ray keeps the notebook on him out of habit, but realizes abruptly that he hasn’t had to take it out in weeks.
Allison looks surprised when he points this out. “You’re right,” she says, after a beat. “It’s been – god, it’s been a year.”
He’s dropped by to visit her on her lunch break, and they’re tucked away together at the table in the back of the salon. The whirring of the dryers, the hiss of the sinks, the back-and-forth chatter of women trading gossip in their curlers – it all comes together to create a curtain of sound, makes him feel like it’s just the two of them. Their own little island.
He watches her face go sad and still, the way it does every time her attack comes up. “You want to talk about it?” he says quietly. He’s asked this once or twice before, but he’s never pressed.
“No,” she says, like always. “No, I’m fine. It’s fine.”
“Okay,” he says, like always. His heart aches for the things she still can’t bring herself to say.
But she breaks script, now, doesn’t just change the subject and smooth over the moment like she has before. This time, she looks at him with a challenge in her eyes.
“I don’t – I don’t think I’m ever going to want to talk about it,” she says. “I want to leave the past where it is. I’m here now, with you, and that’s what matters. Okay?”
Ray can read the meaning underneath her tone: You may never learn the truth. Make your peace with that, or lose me.
He takes a breath to think this over, and realizes that there’s no thinking necessary. Wherever Allison came from, whatever happened before she ran into Odessa’s salon, it’s clear that it was painful all around – life has taught him that you can’t just ignore trauma like that, but it’s not for him to tell other people how to deal with their hurt.
She’ll tell him someday, or she won’t. He doesn’t need answers to know that he’s got something special here, something worth holding onto for the rest of his life.
Allison’s watching him warily and it all suddenly seems so simple: he wants that expression to go away. He leans across the table and kisses her, feels the eyes of the hair salon track in their direction and doesn’t let it linger the way he wants to.
He hopes he’s made his meaning clear, regardless.
“Okay,” he says, leaning back. Allison smiles at him shakily, her cheeks flushed the faintest hint of pink. “That’s fine, as long as you know I’m here if you ever change your mind.”
“I know, Ray,” Allison says. She holds his hand like it’s a lifeline and looks so, so relieved.
____________
May, 1962
It’s the kind of spring day where you can’t bear to be inside, and Ray is feeling right with the world.
He’d convinced Allison to cut out from work early and head to the park – after clearing it with Odessa, of course, they’re no fools. Allison had thrown together a picnic basket, he’d grabbed a blanket, and now they’re stretched out beneath the trees like two lazy cats taking in the sunshine.
She’d frowned reflexively at the sign when they first arrived – Oak Hill Negro Park – but she seems content enough now, bringing their linked hands up to her mouth to press an absentminded kiss to his fingers. Ray props himself up on one elbow to watch her hum a dreamy melody to herself, eyes closed and grass in her hair. Ray is struck again with the thought that Allison is the prettiest girl he’s ever seen. He wants to know her, in every way she’ll let him.
“Tell me more about your family,” he says, lying back down so their shoulders brush together. Her humming breaks off mid-tune. The hand that’s not holding his comes to rest on the back of his arm, where she starts tracing a slow figure-eight pattern.
“What do you want to know?” she asks.
“Anything, really.”
She huffs out a sound that could be a laugh, though it’s more bitter than he’d like. “I come from a big family, up in New York,” she says after a long and careful pause. “We’re not… we’re not close.”
“Big family, huh?” he says. “Brothers and sisters?”
“Six of them, actually.” He can hear the fondness in her voice, stacked on top of a lot of other emotions that he can’t quite decipher. He whistles a one-two note of surprise.
“Wow, you weren’t kidding,” he says. “And here I felt like the house was crowded with just me and my brother running around. What was that like?”
“Growing up, it was… hard,” she says. Her fingers continue their steady journey across his arm. “My dad was a real piece of work. Always made everything into a competition, which didn’t exactly encourage us to get along.”
“Was?” he asks.
“He and my mom both passed, not long before I came to Dallas,” she says. “My siblings – I don’t know where they are. I tried to find them, after, tried everything I could think of.” She cuts herself off, and he squeezes her hand in sympathy. Feels a pang of guilt for bringing this up and pulling a cloud over the day’s sunshine.
“I don’t think there’s anyone to find,” she finishes. “I think – I’m pretty sure they’re dead.”
“I’m so sorry,” he says, quietly.
“It’s okay. Or, well, it’s not,” she amends, “but I have to be okay with it. I just wish things could have been different, you know? I wish we’d had more time.” She pauses for a moment and then adds, softer, “I wish we could have fixed it.”
“Fixed what?” he asks. Allison laughs again.
“That is great question,” she says, that note of bitter humor back in her voice. “God, where would we even start? We were a mess." She lets out an unladylike snort. "We were a trainwreck, start to finish. I didn’t even like them, most of the time. But they’re also – they’re the only ones who know what it was like, growing up that way. They’re the only ones who could really understand. And I don’t even know what happened to them.”
She turns, abruptly, and buries her face in his shoulder. “I don’t really want to talk about it, I’m sorry,” she says. He wraps a soothing arm around her waist and takes a moment to regret his whole line of questioning. “It just hurts, thinking about what could have been. Not knowing.”
“Hey, hey, it’s alright,” he murmurs gently. “You don’t have to explain yourself to me, I get it. Family is hard.” He lets her hide away in his shoulder a minute longer, then pulls back to meet her eyes.
“Hey, you’ve met my brother Barry, right? Is he, or is he not, a grade-A jerk?” Allison laughs wetly despite herself, no doubt remembering Ray’s non-stop griping for the entire week that his brother was in town. “I’ll take that as agreement,” he says, letting a smile steal over his face. “He’s a punk who knows how to push every button I have, but he’s my brother. It’s a complicated set of feelings.”
“He’s not that bad,” Allison says, teasing now. “You’re just mad because he wouldn’t shut up about how his car was more expensive than yours.”
“And because he got drunk and threw up in my sink,” Ray points out disapprovingly.
“If that is your threshold for bad sibling behavior, then it’s probably for the best that you’re not going to meet my brother,” Allison says with a wistful sort of smile. Ray grins back, relieved to have chased some of the clouds off her face.
“You could talk about them every now and then, if you want,” he says, brushing her hair back with his fingertips. “Talking about my mama is the only way to deal with how much I miss her, sometimes.”
Allison gives him another smile – more genuine, this time – and pulls him toward her until her face is tucked back in his shoulder. “Maybe I will,” she says quietly, after a long moment. “You’re right. I do miss them.”
Ray hums in affirmation and closes his eyes against the sunshine, lets the sound of the leaves and the smell of the grass ease over them.
______
June, 1962
Ray is a smart enough man to know that when you’ve got something this good, there’s no point in wasting time. He is head over heels in love with this woman – and, luckily, she loves him right back. Told him so while they were making out like desperate teenagers at the local drive-in, laughing in between kisses and ignoring every frame of the movie. Told him so again in a quiet, nothing moment; just the two of them sitting on a park bench on a Tuesday, watching the world go by.
“I love you too,” he says with a smile, and he knows. He knows.
So he asks, and Allison says yes, and it’s maybe the best damn day of his life. Odessa’s so smug he can hardly stand it, but it’s hard not to appreciate the bone-deep affection in her teasing.
Wedding planning, though, is providing its own set of challenges. Ray doesn’t want to pry, not when the bits and pieces she’s shared are so clearly painful, but –
“Nobody else you want to invite?” he can’t help asking. He’s looking down at the list of attendees in his hand and there’s no one on there he doesn’t know, nobody outside of Dallas. Nobody who’s known Allison longer than a year.
“Not really.” Allison has that look on her face, that one that says she is planting her feet and nobody – not god and certainly not Raymond Chestnut – is going to be moving her. Ray can feel his own stubborn streak rising to meet it and tries to take a breath, push it back.
“No one?” He can’t quite keep the incredulity out of his voice. “I know you said your family is a mess, but no friends you'd wanna see? Or, hey, maybe we could try looking for those siblings of yours again – it’s been a while, might be there’s something new to find after all this time.”
“I told you,” Allison snaps at him now, real fire behind it, “I tried. There’s no sign of them anywhere.” She takes a deep, shuddering breath of her own and closes her eyes. "And I’ve – I’ve accepted that. Mostly. And there aren’t really any friends from before, either. Is it so bad to just want to share this day with the people that know us, that know what we are to each other? I don’t need anybody else there.”
Ray trusts Allison, trusts the goodness he sees in her every day. But this has the faint and unmistakable ring of bullshit.
Allison must see some of his skepticism in his face because next thing he knows, she’s crossing the room to sit next to him on the couch and take his hand in hers. He watches the fight drain out of her while she chews over her next words.
“Ray, I don’t know how to explain this to you,” she says. “Before I came here, I was living this whole other life and it wasn’t – it wasn’t a happy one.”
“What were you doing?” he asks, when it’s clear she needs prompting. Her face does something complicated.
“I was an actress, actually,” she says ruefully.
“Oh?” He’s surprised, in spite of himself. For all that she's confident and beautiful, she doesn’t seem the type. Too grounded, somehow. “What movies were you in?”
“Nothing you would have seen,” she says, waving a hand dismissively. “And it wasn’t – that life, that world, so much of it was built on lies. I realized that the person it made me into wasn’t someone that I wanted to be, not anymore.”
He can imagine too easily the grind of a young black woman, even one as gorgeous as Allison, trying to make it as a star – automatically relegated to bit parts as the nanny, or the maid, or worse. He can imagine how the years of frustration and dashed hopes would add up, warp you, make you desperate to leave that world behind. “So how’d you get from there to here?” he says.
“My parents died,” she says with a shrug. “I ended up… traveling, after the funeral. Didn’t really have a destination in mind. Ended up here, and decided not to leave.”
Ray is a smart enough man to spot the gaps in what she’s saying. He realizes that if he pushes, right now, really dug in, he could probably learn more than she wants to tell him. Unravel more of the mystery behind his mystery woman.
“Well,” he says instead. “Thank goodness for that.” He smiles and leans in for a kiss, soft and apologetic, the list forgotten in his lap.