Bittersweet Dreams (10 page)

But sometimes I did feel like a potted plant, bored and unhappy, just waiting for someone to care enough to water me.

Lately, I felt invisible in my school when it came to boys anyway, even though I had been returned to regular classes. That came as a surprise. I didn't know it at the time, but both my father and Julie had gone to the administration and requested that I not be separated from the rest of the students when I was in high school. The guidance counselor, Mr. Martin, agreed. He said it was damaging to me socially.

“She has to grow as a person and as a student,” he said. “I hope she considers joining one of the clubs or going out for drama, something that will help her have social intercourse.”

“That would be wonderful,” Julie said. “We worry a great deal about her.”

I had heard all about it afterward. My father told me about some of the things they'd said when he came into my room to explain why he wanted me returned to classes so I could be more of a regular student. How would I explain to him now that everyone, including some of my teachers, looked right through me most of the time, whether or not I was in a regular classroom? Actually, it was more difficult than ever for me to function within the normal classroom structure. I was happier working on my own. Being in regular classes held me back.

As far as socializing went, I couldn't force myself on the rest of the students, either, by joining a club or a sport, even if it was something like chess club. No one would want to play against me, and all of them would resent how I left them in the dust. The envy and resentment would only be compounded. How could I describe the situation without sounding like I was whining?

Despite how much he loved me, my father would have to face facts, and some of those facts were that other students either were disinterested in putting in the extra effort to make friends with me or simply afraid of me or badly put off by me. We couldn't depend on my teachers doing anything to help, especially those who knew they were incapable of motivating me very much and saw me as evidence of some failure on their part. It was very clear to all that I could do very well without them. Why should they have any concern for me?

I couldn't blame them entirely. The school day was already overwhelming them, with growing class sizes even in our expensive private school and the disciplining they had to do, without adding special attention to someone like me, perhaps special lesson plans or one-on-one sessions. They were struggling to keep up with their normal responsibilities. Watching them and how they were weighted down soured me on ever pursuing a teaching career of any kind.

Yet I wasn't going to disagree with my guidance counselor about all that he was trying to do. It wasn't difficult to see what a miserable school life I was having, if it could even be called a school life. I might as well be attending school on a deserted island or maybe in a monastery where everyone had taken a vow not only of silence but of lack of sight. Never look at each other, and, especially, never look at me.

After I was forced to return, it got so that in class, no matter what subject it was and what we were doing at the time, I could read whatever I wanted even while the teachers were talking. None of my teachers ever bothered me or reprimanded me for it. I had yet to get a grade lower than 100 in any of my subjects. If I ever did pay attention or raise my hand, it was because my teacher had done or said something incorrect. It got so that they looked frightened if I showed any interest in what they were saying. They tried to ignore me, and if they did so long enough, they knew I would put my hand down and go back to what I'd been doing.

There was nothing a teacher hated more than being corrected by a student, especially one like me. Some reluctantly said thank you, but most brushed over it as if it were just a small glitch, not worth more attention. Lately, it had gotten so that even the other students resented me for doing it, as if I had no right to ruin their image of their brilliant teachers.

I had met few teachers so far who would put their egos behind their interest in truly educating someone. Those who did were more secure about themselves and didn't mind a student teaching them, too.

One of them, my tenth-grade English teacher, Mr. Madeo, said, “You're always a student, even when you become a teacher. Once you think you know it all, you're a puppet, with ignorance pulling the strings. Don't stop asking questions, Mayfair.”

The point is that the attitudes of most of my teachers toward me spilled over onto my classmates. They, too, avoided talking to me, even nodding at me in the hallway. I usually sat alone in the cafeteria. Others could accidentally bump into me in the hallways and act as if they had bumped into the wall itself. No one apologized. Sometimes my father brought Allison and me to school on his way to work. Other times, Julie had to do it, and she usually picked us up. If I wanted to go somewhere else, I called a taxi. None of the students who drove ever asked me to go somewhere with them. This was supposed to be the year that I got my driver's license, and my father was getting me my own car. No one even mentioned it now. Like most teenagers, I thought that once I had my license and a car, I'd gain in popularity. I didn't want to admit to myself that it was a motive for getting my license and my own car, but it was.

Of course, I told myself that those kinds of friends wouldn't be sincere. They would use me and make me feel foolish for trying to win their friendship that way. I wondered why other girls and boys my age didn't see all the phoniness hovering around them. Maybe they didn't want to see it. Maybe that was the solution: ignore the truth so that you could feel happy. Perhaps, deep down, that was what my father was doing when it came to Julie. No one who fools himself wants to be reminded of it.

I looked at the book I had given Allison and reread some passages describing foreplay and orgasm. Even though the other girls in my class never spoke to me about anything social, I couldn't help overhearing them talking in the locker room before and after PE or in the cafeteria when they sat at a table close to mine. Most of them struck me as airheads, but I was still somewhat fascinated by the discussions. It surprised me just how much intimate stuff they would reveal.

“He got behind me, put his hand under my blouse, and said I should let him pretend to be my bra,” Joyce Brooker told the others one afternoon. “While he kissed me on my neck.”

“And?” Cora Addison asked when there was too long of a pause.

“My father came home early.”

She was doing this in her own house? Maybe that made it more exciting. Would I want to be alone with any of the boys in this school at my home, in my room? How would I feel if Julie or my father burst in on us? Embarrassed, titillated, or just annoyed at the interruption?

“He got his hands out just in time, but . . .”

“But what?” Denise Hartman asked.

“My father looked at my face and knew something. He didn't say anything, but he told my mother, and she gave me a lecture. I don't know what would have happened if my father hadn't come home early,” Joyce admitted. “And I still don't know what will happen next time, despite my mother's lecture.”

I thought it was a stunning confession. The others looked mesmerized, lost in their own fantasies, wondering if they would surrender completely, even if it wasn't safe sex. It was written on their faces. They were excited just by the possibility.

As was I.

A similar thing happened whenever I read information about sex and then thought of myself, just as I was doing after my confrontation with Julie about Allison. I'd see myself with a boy, even with a teacher. It wasn't that I grew frightened as much as I grew nervous and unsure of what I would do. The only time I felt as if I were skating on thin ice at school was when it came to boys, talking to them, reacting to their rare flirtations or approaches. Being scientific about it or pointing out that I knew what they were up to was the only way I could be comfortable, but what boy liked that? It was like tearing off their masks or telling the emperor he was naked, that he wore no clothes.

It was clear to me that boys were more comfortable with girls who were either really dumb about it all or good at pretending to be. Boys needed their egos pumped up more than girls did, I concluded. But what other girl would even care to think about it as much? Many times, I was tempted to say something to one of the girls after I overheard a conversation she had been having with a boy she apparently liked. I felt the need to warn her, to guide her, as if she and I were on the same team, but one look at her face told me that I would have my advice or concerns for her thrown back into my face.

“What do you know about it?” she would surely snap at me. “You have the love life of a mannequin.” It would bring a crowd of gawking onlookers, who would surely enjoy my being taken down. I wasn't going to put myself in that sort of jeopardy. It wasn't worth it.

However, I was as guilty as Julie when it came to imposing how I felt on Allison. I knew she was thinking about boys constantly now, and I had offered her the book thinking that knowledge would make her feel as comfortable and as safe as it made me feel. Of course, I knew that she would be titillated by it, especially the graphics, just like I was, even though I knew in my heart that it wouldn't be enough. She wanted her romance novels and enjoyed toying with her own emotions. She didn't want to explore in a classroom with a health teacher. She wanted to explore in the rear seat of a car or in a bedroom when no one was home. What I had to offer her would educate her, but it wouldn't satisfy her. I knew that. I knew because it wasn't satisfying me.

Once, when my father was trying to step into my mother's empty shoes and give me some advice about boys and dating, he told me I shouldn't depend on my superior intelligence when it came to physical relationships.

“Just because you're miles above the guy you're with, that doesn't mean you won't lose control, Mayfair. Lots of smart people get into trouble. It happens so quickly sometimes that you don't even know it. You know the drill.”

I was acting as if I were listening with half an ear, but I was totally absorbed by what he was telling me. “Drill?”

“Sure. You're at a party. You want to be one of the girls, so you drink or do whatever, too, and then you go off with someone, and you go too far.”

“Oh, Daddy, please,” I said. “I'm not Suzie Bubble Brain.”

“Don't be arrogant when it comes to your emotions, Mayfair,” he warned. “Aside from those who were forced into it, I bet there's not one pregnant teenager who didn't know the consequences but did it anyway. Regrets come too easy.”

“Okay,” I said. “I get the point.” I just wanted him to stop, not because I didn't appreciate his concern for me but because he was nudging places in my brain and stimulating thoughts and feelings that frankly frightened me.

All my life, I felt I had complete control of everything and everyone around me.

Sex was an area where I knew I might not.

He shrugged and smiled, holding up his hands. “I've done my duty,” he said.

I thought of all that as I thumbed dreamily through the sex manual I had given Allison. I found the graphic drawings and some of the photographs with detailed explanations more than just interesting. They were fascinating, because I was able to see myself in the drawings and some of the photographs. It was like getting on a roller coaster. I was sure that Allison, even though she was much older than I had been when I learned all this, had similar reactions and feelings.

Actually, despite how Julie had reacted, I still was hoping that Allison would come to me and we could talk about it, the way two real sisters might, but Julie wasn't going to let that happen if she had any say about it, especially now. It had gotten to where she was frightened of me herself, not just for Allison. It had been gnawing away at her for some time now. I could feel it. This was why she was at my father so much, demanding that he rein me in as if I were a wild horse, complaining about the influence I could have on Allison. She was champing at the bit to complain every chance she got now, and I was sure she believed she had finally found the in-house scandal big enough to get me severely reprimanded, maybe turn me into a meek and obedient stepdaughter. I braced myself for the inevitable confrontation.

An hour after he had come home from work, my father was knocking on my door. When I opened it, he just stood there shaking his head, a look of great disappointment on his face.

“Okay, Mayfair, exactly what did you do now? Julie is fit to be tied.”

“Now, there's a good idea.”

“Stop it.”

“She's being ridiculous, Daddy,” I said. “I didn't give Allison a porn magazine, you know.”

“What did you give her?”

“I gave her a scientific, informative manual written by a college professor.”

I went to my bed and got the book. I handed it to him, and he opened it and thumbed through some of it. “Kind of graphic stuff,” he said. “Where did you get it?”

“I bought it over the internet.”

“Didn't they ask your age?”

“That's not a work of pornography, Daddy. It's a scientific discussion about sex. Besides, what is my age?”

“I'm not talking about your mental age, Mayfair.”

“What's more important? Days? Months? An accumulation of years? There are twenty-year-olds who shouldn't be driving or drinking and certainly not having unprotected sex and becoming parents.”

“Okay, okay,” he said, handing the book back to me. “I'm not going to debate you about that. However, you have to remember that Julie is Allison's mother. She should be the one who decides what she reads, not you. You want to give her something, you ask her mother first. Do you understand? Do you?” he followed when I didn't respond.

“It's not brain surgery.”

“Don't be smart, Mayfair.”