Richard Sharon - Diary of a Lover

Suddenly, she gave a huge sigh and shrugged, actually smiled. And then she laughed, a different laugh from any I had ever heard from her. "I asked you first." Those beautiful eyes became bright, even mischievous.

And then I understood. It all came through at once, like a downpour of insight. Instantly the whole thing, the whole big mystery, the something that was always not quite right about her, the constant thorn that bothered me so, it all carne clear in a flash.

Now I smiled.

I reached down and took both of her hands in mine, reveling in their warmth, in the feeling they sent through my body as the slight squeeze I had longed for was finally returned.

I shouted at her in delight, shouted for all to hear. "Susan Lawrence, you're a fake!"

And she laughed still harder.

"And a phony, and probably the biggest fraud of all time, and you're glad I know and don't deny it!"

Susan stopped laughing and looked very seriously at me. This time, she sought my eyes and held them, not averting. Her face, smooth, delicate features, like a fine porcelain vase shaped so subtly into lines of grace and beauty, studied me. Her whole body, her whole bearing, was graceful and beautiful. Just her touch and the way she looked at me had given me a hard-on.

"Yes, Richard," she said softly, "I'm glad you know, relieved. I wanted so much to be myself with you, but I didn't dare."

I tightened my hands on hers. "You must have known you could trust me. I think you must guess, at least a little bit, how I feel about you."

She withdrew her hands from mine and turned back to the seawall. "Maybe. Maybe that's one of the reasons I didn't want you to know."

"What do you mean?"

She turned to me again. "I mean, now that you've ripped off my mask, I'm practically defenseless."

"Defenseless? Against whom? What?"

But she was too smart for me. "Oh, Richard, don't play dumb. You've always been honest while I lived a lie with you, so don't start to lie just as I'm becoming honest. I'm a very sensitive person, like you. I've felt the same things that you've felt, what's grown between us. And you know damned well I've felt it.

"I hadn't planned on this. I wanted you to know so badly, but I'm confused. I have all sorts of stop-and-go signals lighting up at the same time. I'm, I'm really very vulnerable now, so if you care about me please don't push, please.

"I humiliated you this afternoon because I'm frightened, because I have a feeling that you're going to screw up my life and I don't want it screwed up. I don't know, I don't know what to say."

As I had done earlier in the day, I put my hand under her chin and turned her face to me. The electricity generated by our closeness was frightening, even to me, and I had to fight taking her into my arms, knowing that if I did she would come willingly. "Susan," I whispered, cupping her cheeks in my hands, "did you have so little faith in me that you thought I would ever hurt you, ever? I'd rather die. It's nice to know that under all that camouflage you're really a beautiful young girl, a good ten years younger than I had thought, but it doesn't matter. Don't you understand? It doesn't matter to me. What I feel is for what you are, and that's something not even you can hide. It's not what you look like.

"I always knew, from the first time I saw you walk into that classroom, that something was wrong with the picture I got. It just didn't make sense, but I could never quite catch it, not till just a few minutes ago when I suddenly realized that those beautiful eyes of yours were always clear through your glasses, and that meant that they were just that, glass. There was nothing wrong with your eyes, or they would have been at least slightly distorted by the prescription. You wore them for effect, and the old-lady hairdo, and the combat-boot shoes, and those ridiculous clothes to hide your body.

"Everything was to make you look older, straighter, stricter, and with the faculty you're afraid that if you talk too much you'll give yourself away. That's why you got mad at me today, because I pushed the point.

"Don't you know that I'm the one person, the one man, who you could have, don't you know?"

Running out of words with which to express myself, I brought my lips those last few inches to hers, kissing her very lightly, with all the tenderness of my feelings for her. Susan raised her hands to my cheeks, and I could feel it all being returned to me. It wasn't more than a few seconds and it certainly wasn't passionate, but it was the best kiss I had ever known.

"Please," she said, tears welling in her eyes, "don't, not again."

"When the time comes, you let me know," I told her.

"Let's walk on the beach," she said.

We descended the steps leading through the seawall. I took her hand to help her through the deep, dry sand and when we got to the wet sand it seemed natural for us to walk holding hands. She made no motion to let go.

"If you're wondering," she said, "I'm twenty-four, and I'm not going to hide anything from you anymore. I got my master's degree a year ago and I knew right away that I was going to have problems.

"All of my life I've wanted to teach, to teach and to eventually be a good wife is all I've ever really dreamed about. But not just to teach any old place. I wanted to be the best high-school literature teacher in the world, the very best. It's all I lived for.

"And then, after all those years of school, of constant work and study, after student-teaching in grammar schools in classes I hated, I finally got the M.A. I needed to teach in a high school. So I filled out applications all over the state. I didn't even care where I lived if they'd just give me what I wanted. And what happened? Letters started coming back, 'Dear Miss Lawrence: Thank you so much for your application. We are sorry to inform you that at this time we are looking for teachers who are a bit older and more experienced than yourself. Perhaps in a few years, etc., etc., etc.' They all were worded differently, but they all said the same thing, thanks but no thanks.

"So I started substitute teaching, mostly in grammar schools and junior highs. I did have a few jobs in high schools, and I kept hoping that maybe somebody would see how good I was and keep me on after I had done my few days' work, or at least put in a request that I be assigned to their school in the future."

"Why didn't they?" I asked.

Susan stopped walking. "Why? Look at me, that's why. I look more like a student than a teacher. I taught in one school in Alameda where a little freshman girl stopped me in the hall and asked if I was going to a freshman briefing. Imagine, she thought I was sixteen.

"God! I can't even get a drink in a bar without a driver's license. And all of the school administrators thought it was a big joke. Who would hire a baby like me? Nobody ever took me seriously, and so I never got a chance to prove myself.

"Then I got a call to teach here, and the association said it looked like I would be working a long time. It was a good school and it was the one subject I really wanted to teach, so I decided that I would have to become older. I fixed my hair, paid thirty dollars for those stupid glasses, got some clothes that looked like they'd been turned down by the Savlation Army but covered me up well, and refused to let a shoe salesman talk me out of buying those clodhoppers I wear to class.

"And now I live in fear. One bad move, one slip, and I'm out, back teaching rhythm band in kindergarten. And I can't let that happen. I won't. No matter what price I may have to pay, I want to stay right where I am. I love it too much to let it go now. The day I get tenure and they can't get rid of me is the day I'll throw out all of that junk, but not until then."

We walked a bit further.

"Mr. Oaks told Hugh Barnes that your tenure is assured," I said.