The Lonely Lady (7 page)

“Thank you,” she said.

He smiled. “Now maybe I can get you to talk to me.”

“I am talking to you.”

“Not really. Mostly you’re just answering questions.”

“I don’t know what to talk about.”

“That’s honest.” He laughed. “What are you interested in?”

“I told you. I want to be a writer.”

“Besides that. Do you like sports? Dancing?”

“Yes.”

“That’s not much of an answer.”

“I’m afraid I’m not very interesting. I’m not like the girls you know.”

“How do you know that?”

“They know how to have a good time. I don’t. Port Clare isn’t a very interesting place to grow up in. Nothing much ever happens here.”

“Are you coming to the dance tonight?” he asked.

She nodded.

“Maybe I’ll see you there?”

“Okay.” She got to her feet. “Thanks for the Coke. I’ve got to go now.”

“See you later.” He watched her walk toward the clubhouse. She was right about one thing. She was not like the other girls he knew. In one way or another they were all cock teasers and, oddly enough, he had the feeling that was a game she would never play.

The muscles of her stomach relaxed as she walked back to the clubhouse. It was strange the effect he had on her. The sudden intense awareness of self, and the rising sexual heat. All the time she had been with him she was aware of the constant wetness between her legs.

She went into the locker room, stripped off her swimsuit and got under a cold shower. But it didn’t seem to help. While soaping herself she touched her pubis and almost sank to her knees with the quick intensity of her orgasm.

After a moment she regained her self-control and leaned her head against the cold tile wall of the shower stall. There was something wrong with her. Very wrong. She was sure that none of the girls she knew were going through what she was.

***

“Looks like you goin’ to lose youah little friend, Fred,” Jack, the drummer, said, gesturing with his stick at the dance floor.

JeriLee and Walt were moving by in a slow fox trot. He was holding her close, too close, Fred thought. There was an expression on her face he had never seen before, an intensity he could almost sense. Abruptly he segued into a fast Lindy. The orchestra stumbled for a moment, then caught up with him.

Jack grinned. “Ain’t goin’ to he’p. You jes been playin’ it too cool, man.”

“She’s not like that,” Fred whispered fiercely. “She’s just a straight kid.”

“I ain’ arguin’. She straight all right. But she also ready. That sweet li’l white pussy is ripe an’ beggin’ to be picked.”

“What makes you such an expert?” Fred asked angrily.

“Becuz I only got two things on my mind, man. Drums an’ pussy. If’n I ain’t think about one, I’m think’ ’bout t’other.” He laughed. “You better believe it.”

Fred looked back at the dance floor but JeriLee and Walt were gone.

***

The moment she came into his arms on the dance floor he had felt her breasts pressing against him through his thin shirt. She wasn’t wearing a brassiere. He was sure of it. Instantly he felt himself growing hard and tried to move his hips slightly away from her so that she would not know. But she moved along with him, sighed slightly and rested her head on his shoulder.

“Hey,” he said.

She raised her face.

“Do you always dance like this?”

“I don’t know. I just follow,” she said.

“Do you know what you’re doing to me?” he asked. “I’m getting very excited.”

Her eyes were level. “I didn’t know I was doing that. I thought you were doing it to me.”

“You mean you’re excited too?”

“I think if you let go of me I’d fall. My legs feel so weak.”

He stared at her. He had been wrong. All the time he had thought she was just an innocent little girl. Abruptly the orchestra broke into a fast number. He stopped and looked down at her. “JeriLee, let’s get out of here.”

“Okay,” she said and followed him through the open terrace doors. They cut across the lawn toward the parking lot. She didn’t speak until he held the door of his car open for her. “Where are we going?”

“Someplace we can be alone,” he said.

She nodded as if she had known that was what he would say and got into the car. In ten minutes they pulled into the driveway of a small house just off the beach.

He cut the motor and looked at her. “There’s no one at home. My father won’t be in from New York until tomorrow and the housekeeper’s gone home.”

She looked at him without comment.

“Don’t you have anything to say?”

She looked down at her hands folded in her lap, then back at him. “I’m a little frightened.”

“Of what?”

“I don’t know.”

“Don’t be,” he said, not knowing her real fears. “No one will know you’re here. The nearest neighbor is a half mile down the beach.”

She didn’t answer.

“There’s a heated pool out back,” he said. “It’s great to swim there at night. Would you like that?”

She nodded. “But I don’t have a swimsuit.”

He smiled. “That’s one of the nice things about swimming at night. It’s dark.” He got out of the car and walked around to open her door. “Coming?”

She suddenly laughed. “Why not?”

“What are you laughing about?”

“I’m afraid you’d never understand.” For the first time in a month she was beginning to feel better. It was almost as if she had always known that this was the way it would happen.

They walked through the house and out the back door to the pool. He pointed to a small cabana. “You can leave your things in there.”

“Okay,” she said, starting toward it. “Where are you going?” she asked when she noticed he was heading back into the house.

“I’ll be back in a minute,” he said. “I just want to get a few cold drinks.”

Entering the cabana, JeriLee looked at herself in the large mirror over the vanity table. There was a calmness about her face that surprised her because it did not reflect the excitement seething within her. Quickly she unfastened her blouse and her breasts sprang free. The nipples were swollen and distended. Softly she touched them. They still ached but the touch was pleasant. Actually that was why she had not worn her brassiere. It had hurt her breasts too much. Gently she pressed her breasts again and felt the pleasure run down into her groin. She slipped out of her skirt. Her panties were moist and she could see the dark pubic hairs clearly in the wet nylon material. Slowly she stepped out of them and spread them neatly on the bench so that they could dry.

She wondered what he was thinking. She remembered how hard he had been when they were dancing, so hard that it hurt as he pressed against her mound. Twice she had almost stumbled and fallen as she climaxed during the dance. Each time she wondered if he had known what had happened, but there were no signs that he did.

She heard him call from outside. “I’m back. Are you coming out?”

She pressed the light switch, plunging the cabana into darkness, and opened the door. He was spreading some towels on the large chaises near the far end of the pool. He was still dressed, his back toward her. Silently she slipped into the water. He was right, it was warm and soft.

He turned quickly. “That’s not fair,” he said. “You got in before I could even see you.”

She laughed. “You’re the one that’s not fair. You’re not even undressed yet.”

He bent over the table and turned on the portable radio he had brought with him. The music drifted softly across the pool. With his back to her, he undressed quickly, dropping his clothes to the ground, then swiftly he turned and, almost before she could catch a glimpse of him, dived in. He came up on the other side of the pool.

“How do you like it?” he asked. “Is the water warm enough?”

“I like it. This is the first time I’ve ever gone skinny dipping. It feels good. Better than when you have a suit on.”

“That’s what my father says. He says that if nature meant for us to have clothes we would have been born with them.”

“Your father might be right,” she said. “I just never thought about it.”

“My father has a lot of peculiar ideas. About everything. He says if people would only learn to be honest with themselves it would be the end of most of the problems in the world.”

“Are you honest with yourself?” she asked.

“I try to be.”

“Do you think you could be honest with me?”

“I think so.”

“Why did you bring me here?”

“I wanted to be alone with you. Why did you come?”

She didn’t answer. Instead she swam away toward the deep end of the pool. He swam after her. Abruptly she turned under water and came up on the other side of him. He laughed and caught her at the shallow end.

He held her by the arm. “You didn’t answer my question?”

Her eyes looked into his. “Because you weren’t being honest with me.”

“Why do you think I brought you here?” he asked.

“Because I thought”—she hesitated a moment and then, unable to think of another way to say exactly what she meant, she went on—“you wanted to fuck me.”

He was startled. “If you thought that why did you come?”

“Because I wanted you to fuck me.”

Abruptly he let go of her arm and climbed out of the pool. He picked up a towel and tied it around his waist and made himself a rum and Coke. He sipped it without speaking.

She rested her arms on the edge of the pool. “Are you angry with me? Did I say anything wrong?”

He took another swallow of his drink. “Christ, JeriLee, you sound cheap and vulgar.”

“I’m sorry. I was only trying to be honest. I felt you against me while we were dancing and I thought that was what you wanted.”

“But girls don’t act like that,” he protested. “You just don’t make it with every guy that gets a hard-on for you.”

“I don’t.”

“But the way you talk. What’s a fellow supposed to think?”

“Is that what you think?”

“I don’t know what to think. I never had a girl talk like that to me before.”

Suddenly the warm feeling left her and she was perilously close to tears. She was silent for a moment. When she spoke her voice was calm. “It’s getting late, Walt. I think you better take me home. My parents will be wondering what happened to me.”

***

He let her out of the car in front of her house but made no move to get out of the car himself.

“Good night, Walt,” she said.

“Good night,” he said abruptly. Then he put the car into gear and drove off, leaving her on the sidewalk. Slowly she went into the house.

Her father looked up from the television set as she came in. She kissed his cheek. “Where’s Mom?”

“She was tired and went up to bed,” he said. “You’re home early. Who brought you?”

“A boy named Walt. He’s one of the members.”

“Is he nice?”

“Yes.” She started from the room, then stopped. “Dad.”

“Yes?”

“Is there such a thing as being too honest?”

“That’s a strange question, darling. Why do you ask?”

“I don’t know. It seems to me that whenever I answer a question truthfully my friends get upset with me.”

He looked at her thoughtfully. “Sometimes people don’t want to hear the truth. They would rather live with illusion.”

“Is it always like that?”

“In a way I guess it is. I try to be as honest as I can with people. But there are times when it’s not always possible.”

“Are you honest with me?”

“I hope I am.”

“Do you love me?”

He reached over and turned off the television set. Then he turned and held out his arms to her. “I think you know I do.”

She knelt in front of his chair and laid her head on his chest. He closed his arms around her and held her quietly against him. For a long while they did not speak.

Finally in a tight small voice of hurt she said, “You know, Dad, it’s not easy growing up to be a woman.”

He kissed her cheek and tasted the salty wetness of the tears on her cheeks. A curious sadness came over him. “I know, darling,” he said gently. “But then I think that it’s not easy to grow up to be anything.”

Chapter 9

It was like a storm that had passed. For weeks the pressure of having to know and understand the nature of her sexual being had been tearing her apart. Then one morning she awakened and the urgency was over.

She knew what she did not know. But she was no longer driven by the need to force the knowledge. The things she felt were part of her expanding consciousness and somehow she knew she would experience them all in their own time. She became more herself, more relaxed, more able to enjoy the simple exchange of being with other people.

Once again she and Bernie could be friends. Now when they parked and petted at the Point she was able to respond without having to push further and further into her desires. Sex no longer permeated her every thought. She knew that it would come in time. But it would come when she was equipped to deal with it as a part of her total being.

And it was not with Bernie alone that she had dates. Martin too was a good friend. They would sit on her porch for hours talking about the books they had read and discussing different people in town. Often they shared laughter at the ridiculous postures that some people assumed in order to seem important. Once she even let Martin read a short story she had written.

It was about a mayor of a small town who during the war became depressed because all the towns around him had war heroes and his small town did not. So he made up his mind to make a hero out of the first returning veteran. It happened to be a man who had gotten a medical discharge and had never been near the front. Nevertheless he was given a welcoming ceremony at which everything went wrong. In a way it was very much like the story of her real father but with a twist. In the midst of the proceedings, two M.P.s appeared and took the hero away, because it seemed that he had faked his discharge from a psycho ward.

“It’s great, JeriLee,” he told her enthusiastically after he’d finished it. “I recognize almost everybody. You should send it away to a magazine.”

She shook her head. “I’m not ready yet. I still feel there are too many things wrong with it. Besides I’m working on another I think might be better.”