Isabel Sharpe - Back in Service

She walked rapidly toward her car, breaking into a run when her steps weren’t getting her there fast enough.

Damn it. Damn it. What the hell was wrong with her? How could she let him affect her so deeply?

She unlocked the car, wrenched open the door and hurled herself inside, started the engine and peeled out of her parking space.

Santa Monica Pier, here I come. She was going to go there alone and drink herself into a stupor, how pathetic was that?

Very! And it was exactly what she was in the mood for. A long parade of drinks, surrounded by happy partyers and the wild, wavy ocean. She’d sit by herself, looking mysterious and sultry, indulging memories she hadn’t allowed herself to call up for years, brooding and wallowing in emotional agony.

Then she’d sleep soundly in the apartment she shared with her best friend and be fine tomorrow. Chris would again be safely part of her past and she could really move on this time, having gotten this first post-relationship encounter over with and ending up unscathed.

An hour later, she was standing at the pier’s end, inhaling deeply, pulling her jacket around her for warmth against the stiff, salty wind. Of course she was much too sensible to get drunk. One beer and the crush of bodies around her had gotten annoying, the noise not conducive to proper misery. Her big scene, like most, played better in fantasy than in real life.

But she loved it out here, staring at the black sea, a whole world under there, not one single resident of which had gotten his or her heart crushed by Chris Hamilton.

They’d met in class her senior year. He was teaching a seminar on music and culture in Paris around the turn of the twentieth century. She’d thought he was hot from the first day. In fact, she and her girlfriends—including a new friend named Clarisse—had giggled and oohed and aahed and had a great time dissecting his every word, gesture and look. As crushes went, hers seemed particularly intense, but so what? He was a professor. She was a student. And never the twain shall sleep together.

They’d gotten to know each other through a shared love of all things French, had talked earnestly after class one day, then another, had gone out for croissants and café au lait. Then lunch at a French restaurant he particularly enjoyed...

Later they’d admit that they’d known what was happening, but since they hadn’t the slightest intention of doing anything about it, the attraction was harmless. What counted were the ideas they shared, their similar views and tastes and humor.

Ironically, the crossing of the line had happened because of Clarisse’s first “suicide attempt,” a low-risk grab for attention after a guy dumped her.

Eventually, Matty had realized Clarisse suffered from pretty serious mental issues. Compulsive lying, sociopathic tendencies and a deep need to screw her friends’ boyfriends. But at the time, Matty had been terrified and extremely upset. Who wouldn’t be? The woman had tried to take her own life!

Matty had called nine-one-one and ridden with Clarisse to the hospital. When she’d heard Clarisse was going to survive—of course she was—Matty had finally broken down, tears that wouldn’t stop. Walking home to her dorm, she’d run into Chris, returning from a Pomona orchestra concert. One look at her face and he’d invited her out for coffee. She hadn’t wanted to be out in public looking like hell. No problem, he’d drive her to his apartment, where he’d set up the spare bedroom if she wanted to stay over. They’d shared a bottle of wine. Talked until very, very late.

She’d never made it to the spare bedroom.

The next morning they’d agreed it could never happen again. They weren’t that kind of people. He was too old for her—more than ten years older. She was his student. An affair was wrong, and he could lose his job. They’d stay away from each other.

They couldn’t stay away from each other.

For the next six months they’d tried to break up, gotten back together, then did both again. All those agonies of longing and pain followed by the joys of giving in to temptation, the guilt, the fear—by the time Clarisse caught on and set her sights on Chris, Matty was frankly exhausted. When she’d caught them together, along with the pain there had been relief. Finally it was truly over. No more temptation. Because Matty understood what he was and how foolish she’d been.

Chris had come after her, he’d explained. He’d laid the blame on Clarisse. It wasn’t what it looked like, he’d sworn to her...

Please. It was always what it looked like.

Three weeks later, Clarisse took enough sleeping pills to look ill, but not really threaten her life, and Matty had known it was over for them, too. She’d waited, even telling herself she shouldn’t, but Chris hadn’t come looking for her again.

On the pier now, arms wrapped around herself, squinting into the wind, Matty thought about how she’d come such a long way since then. She’d built a good, rich life for herself. Dated a couple of guys seriously, though none who took her over the way Chris had.

Yes, she was comparing. She’d always been comparing.

But unfairly. Her feelings in college had been intensified by her youth and inexperience, by the lure of the forbidden, by the perfect bubble in which their encounters took place. She hadn’t met his friends, he hadn’t interacted with hers. They’d had no problems to cope with but the drama of their own taboo passion.

A tear made its way down her cheek. She flung it forward into the sea, sniffed angrily and turned to go home.

Enough. She’d done what she’d come here to do. Brooded. Remembered. Cried one beautiful tear. The actress side of her had been fed.

Now she’d do her father proud, march home, get up at 0700 hours and take on the next day of her life.

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