Richard Sharon - Diary of a Lover

"Oh," she said defensively. "I'm sorry, I just assumed, "

"It's all right. You couldn't have known."

There was a moment's silence. Then, "Where do you work?"

"I'm a musician. I've worked all over the Bay Area, but I just started a stint at the Jazz House."

"On Hyde Street?" Surprise showed in her face.

"That's the place."

"You must be very good to play there. What instrument?"

"Percussion, drums."

And in the next few minutes I told her briefly about my career in music, omitting all of the sordid details. When I pulled up to the stoplight at Golden Gate and Fillmore I suddenly remembered that she hadn't yet told me where I was to take her. "Shall I just keep going straight?" I asked, trying to be diplomatic.

"Oh, I'm sorry. You can just drop me on Franklin and I'll walk from there."

"Are you going home?"

"Yes." She hesitated then, and I knew that she didn't want me to know where she lived.

"Well then, I'll take you. Door-to-door service."

"Really, I don't want to put you out of your way."

"Nonsense," I said as I made a left onto Franklin. I knew she had to live somewhere near me. I looked at her again, the face of a young woman on the body of an old lady. It didn't make any sense.

She had me pull over in front of an apartment building between Sacramento and Clay. I could see my place from where I was parked. "Well," she said, going for the door handle, "thanks again, and I guess I'll see you in class tomorrow."

I don't know why, but I didn't want her to go. My mind raced, trying to figure ways to hold her a few more minutes, and I decided to take a chance. "Miss Lawrence?" She was just starting to get out of the car, but stopped when I called her name.

"Yes?"

This time I caught her eyes and held them. "Can I trust you to keep a secret?" I still had her eyes.

"I don't know," she said.

I hesitated. Then, "I'm going to tell you anyway, because I get the feeling that I can trust you to keep your mouth shut and because it's ridiculous for you to have to take the bus back and forth from school every day, when I live just a block away from you."

She looked at me quizzically. I could see that she had several questions and didn't know which one to ask first. I pointed down the street. "See that new white building on the next corner?" She nodded, still struggling for words. "Well, that's where I live. I've been on my own for the last two years, and all it would take is one word from you to school officials that I'm not living at home with my family and that I'm out of the school's area, and they'll bounce me right out, and into the high school nearest here, which isn't a very good one." I paused. "So I just want you to know that I have faith you won't say anything."

"How do you know I won't blow the whistle on you first thing in the morning?" she asked, smiling slightly.

"I can look at some people and know right away that I can trust them, and you're one of those people."

"I won't tell," she said finally, looking somewhat troubled.

After some mutual haggling I got her to agree to ride to and from school with me, which would give her an extra half hour's sleep every morning, but she insisted on paying me the equivalent of bus fare.

I told her briefly how I had moved away from home, not mentioning Mora or all that had followed. She said she'd see me at seven-thirty the next morning, and disappeared into her building, still wearing the bulky topcoat.

She bothered me badly. That itch at the base of my spine continued to tell me that something wasn't right with her. I wanted to find out more, but I didn't want to push it. I thought that driving her to and from school would give me an opportunity to know her much better. I knew I was attracted to her, but I didn't know why. It didn't seem to be sexual; she certainly didn't seem to be a sexual type of person. Yet there was something so subtle that I didn't seem able to capture it. On a sex-appeal chart Miss Lawrence would rate zero. If she wasn't my type, why was I so interested?

The following morning at exactly seven-thirty, Miss Lawrence came out, wrapped in the same large coat, looking fresh and scrubbed. She wore a bit of lipstick but no other cosmetic that I could see. Her cheeks looked so soft that I was tempted to reach over and touch them.

She slid into the car, still careful to keep her knees together, like all good little girls are taught to do.

"Good morning," I said.

"Mozart!" she said brightly.

"What?"

"Mozart! Your radio is playing Mozart."

I listened for a second. Sure enough, it was Mozart. "Adagio and Fugue in C-minor," I said matter-of-factly.

"You know Mozart that well?" She was surprised. The Adagio and Fugue is not one of his better-known works, or even typical of his style.

"Mozart's dead," I said sadly.

"Dead? He's dead? I didn't even know he was sick."

We laughed. Her laughter was soft, like her voice, muted and pleasant. I noticed how she strained in class to make herself heard.

All the way to school we talked about music and composers. We seemed to have the same favorites, Beethoven, Mozart, Brahms, Sibelius, Bruckner, and Mahler. She was delighted to know that even though I was a jazz musician I loved the old composers so much, and her entire mood was different. She smiled, joked, and was quite vocal. Her hesitation and the fear she seemed to have of me the day before were gone.

I pulled up to the school and stopped at the front entrance. As she got out of the car she said, "I've thought about it. I'm glad you trusted me. It's nice to have somebody you can trust."

I got her eyes again, clear and brilliant through her glasses. "If you don't have anybody, you can always trust me," I said quietly.

Her smile clouded. "Can I?" she asked, and ran up the steps and into the building.

In class Miss Lawrence treated me as any other student, but as we rode together day after day her eyes began to catch mine more frequently. Yet as quickly as our glance seemed to have meaning for us both, she broke it. Sometimes her cheeks would color slightly as she did so. She knew that I knew that there was something starting to go on between us.

I liked English literature and I liked the way Miss Lawrence taught the course. It wasn't hard to tell how much she loved teaching. She came alive, eyes bright, face expressive, gestures lively. I wondered if it was her whole life, she seemed so much to thrive on it. She always looked disappointed when the buzzer sounded, signaling the end of class. We loved her as a teacher, and she never tried to hide the fact that she loved us, as a class. It was a pleasure to watch her work, affecting us with her soft-toned enthusiasm.

As we talked on our drives to and from school I began bit by bit to find out more about this strange person who seemed to have only three suits and one dress, all cut so that my grandmother could have worn them and been stylish.

Miss Lawrence was from Los Angeles. She'd gone to Fairfax High School (mecca for Jewish kids in southern California, as Low ell was in northern California), U.C.L.A. as an education major, 'and U.C. Berkeley for her master's degree… She had done student teaching at various grammar schools in the east Bay Area and finally became a substitute teacher, taking jobs for a day or two here and there until she got the chance to really have a class of her own, when Mrs. Gilchrist became ill. She was vague about how long she had been a substitute, but, because of her age, I assumed that it had been for some time. She had a zest about her, a passionate love of things and of life that was infectious both in and out of class.

She didn't just like good music, she was crazy about it. Teaching wasn't her occupation, it was her life. Literature wasn't an avocation, but a major, moving force of her existence. She didn't perceive the dull colors of nature that most adults see but, like a child, caught them hi brilliant hues. It wasn't long before I found her company so pleasurable, her conversation so engaging, that I began to feel a certain sense of emptiness when I left her at her apartment. I found myself wishing that she would invite me up, and plotting ways to get invited or to have her come to my place.