Then there were things we shared that I put in boxes to store in the attic of my mind, like the memory of how we were distant friends at Yale until that night she slipped into my bed and made love to me. I also kept the smell and visual recollection of those Hot Springs up at Mammoth Mountain where we sat together in the water, leaning against a snow bank bringing each other up to date about where we had been since graduation.. And too, I carefully wrapped the memory of that red dress she wore with the spaghetti straps up at Mendocino and how she took my breath away with her incredible beauty and saucy attitude.

Then I packed our marathon love making in Newport Beach that one weekend after we had made up from a fight about there being a Howie in my life. I put that magic hair brush in a velvet pouch and the peanut butter and jelly sex in a bottle where I could one day hold it up to the light and see it happening again. Newport held a lot of memories for us. There was that exchange of giving each other the same diamond crusted, heart shaped necklaces for Christmas. There were our walks. She brought her mom to me and told her mom she was gay, with me there for support. I wondered then as I bundled up these things if I would ever, ever be able to think about Newport Beach without breaking down into tears of sadness.

I did not really have enough boxes and space to store all the things we shared in so short a time. Was it only less than three months we had been together?

Wisconsin. How bitter sweet that package was to save but it was where we had our only phone sex, where she flew in Terry’s jet to get me. Where she met Howie and even admitted after the fact that he was not such a bad guy after all.

And our last trip. Mexico was really all about Bette. Her triumphant discovery of Chavez, a bullfighter drawn to her, then her wild flamenco dance on a table top. How could I ever get this high energy, phenomenally beautiful woman out of my mind let alone my heart? I knew I never would and I know still, 20 years later that I never will.

I also bundled up funky Venice and put it on a shelf in a closet of my mind, very visible every time I would, in the future open up that door. The city itself will always be special to me because it was home to Bette and it suited her. Her waterbed, the hot tea, all her paintings, her future.

And lastly, I took with me the memory of us riding bikes, down the path off Venice Beach with her looking back to make sure I was safely keeping up with her. I always waved or smiled, to assure her I was. But when in reality, as I closed her front door for the last time and hid the key into a potted plant, I got a visual of her riding that bike and never turning around again. She just seemed to pedal faster and faster away from me until she was gone, out of sight..

I spent several weeks in Newport. I hoped she would change her mind and that she would know where to reach me but she never called. and she never came.

Eventually, I gave up and called Howie.