"It was a lonely world, and you cherished your own people. She was twenty-two before she realized that she wasn't alone … Once you admitted to yourself that you were what you were, and stopped feeling guilty about it, you came to realize that you were surrounded by companions. Now there was the boy at the Andes Candies shop on the corner, one of the older women at the branch library, a file clerk in the building with whom she sometimes shared coffee breaks, the handsome young intern who took care of her the winter she pneumonia. It was like belonging to a secret society … it wasn't easy, because, Lesbians, contrary to popular belief, have no physical characteristics that set them apart .. there were ways to find out … you watched for conversations clues. You carried a book like We Walk Alone or The Lonely Path to the lunchroom, and waited for the other person to make an opening … or you could read one of the special magazines, Different or Spiral, but that was dangerous because only people who belonged to the club would be likely to have a copy of those … there were the bars, of course. But they changed all the time, and it cost money to go to them … too, there was the danger of being picked up by the police … women were sometimes taken in when a place was raided. So it was best to meet people here and there, moving carefully and not taking off your mask unless you were sure. Dirty hypocrites they make of us, she thought. Love ought to be open and honest for everybody. Whose business is it so long as we're not hurting anyone?"