been there. He was in prelaw, in his junior year, and he was in an English lit class with her. He was a tall, good- looking boy with freckles and red hair, from Louisville, Kentucky, and she loved to listen to his drawl when he talked. They were in a study group together, and he invited her out to coffee afterward. His father owned several race horses, and his mother lived in Paris. He was planning to spend Christmas with her there. He was fluent in French, and had lived in London and Hong Kong. Everything about him seemed exotic to Victoria, and he was a kind, gentle person.
They talked about their families, and he said his life had been pretty upside down since his parents’ divorce, and his mother constantly moved from one place to another around the world. She had married someone after his father and was divorced again. He thought Victoria’s life sounded a lot more stable than his own, and it was, but she didn’t consider her childhood a happy one either. She had been an outsider in her own home all her life. And he had been a newcomer wherever he was. He had gone to five schools after eighth grade. And his father had just married a twenty-three-year-old girl. He was twenty-one. He admitted to Victoria that his stepmother had come on to him, and he had almost slept with her. They had both been drunk, and by some miracle of good judgment, he had managed not to give in to temptation, but he was nervous about seeing her again. He had decided to spend Christmas with his mother in Paris instead, although she had a new French boyfriend he wasn’t crazy about either.
He was very funny about his stories, but there was something almost tragic about the tales he told about a lost boy caught between crazy, irresponsible parents. He said he was living proof that people with too much money screwed up their kids. He had been seeing a shrink since he was twelve. His name was Beau, and despite some romantic moments and a little heavy petting on the night before she left, they hadn’t slept with each other when she went to L.A. for Christmas. He promised to call her from Paris. And he seemed wonderfully romantic and exotic to her. She was fascinated by him. And this time when her parents asked who she was dating, she could say a junior in pre-law. It would sound respectable to them, although she couldn’t imagine her father or mother liking him. He was much too offbeat for them.
Beau called her over the holidays and had gone to Gstaad with his mother and her friend. He sounded bored and a little lost. And he texted her constantly with things that made her laugh. Gracie wanted to know if he was handsome but said she didn’t like red hair. And this time Victoria watched her diet. She passed on desserts even though her father expressed surprise when his “big girl” said no. It was impossible to shake his view of her as someone who ate all the wrong things and was always overweight.
Victoria lost five pounds during her ten days in L.A. And she and Beau got back to Northwestern within hours of each other on the same day. She had thought of nothing but him over the holiday, and she wondered how long it would take for them to wind up in bed. She was glad that she had saved herself for him. Beau would be her first, and she could easily imagine him being gentle and sensual in bed. They were kissing and laughing and cuddling when he came to her dorm room, and he said he was so jet-lagged that nothing happened that night. Nor for the next many weeks. They were with each other constantly, they studied in the library together, and since she no longer had a roommate, sometimes he fell asleep on the other bed. They spent a lot of time kissing and fondling, and he loved her breasts, but it never went past that point. He told her she should wear miniskirts because she had the best legs he had ever seen. He appeared to be totally enthralled with her, and for the first time in her life, Victoria was seriously losing weight. She wanted to look great for him. And she was feeling good about herself.
They had snowball fights and went ice skating, they went to hockey games, restaurants, and bars. He introduced her to his friends. They went everywhere together and always had a terrific time. But no matter how close they got to it, they never made love. She wasn’t sure why, and she was afraid to ask. She wondered if he thought she was too fat, or if he respected her too much, or if maybe he was afraid, or if his near miss with his twenty-three-year-old stepmother had traumatized him, or his parents’ divorce. Something was holding him back, and Victoria had no idea what it was. He obviously wanted her, and their makeout sessions grew more and more passionate, but their hunger for each other was never consummated, and it was driving Victoria insane. They were down to their underwear one night in her dorm room, and then he held her in his arms and lay there silently without moving for a long time, and then he got out of bed.
“What’s wrong?” she asked him quietly, sure that it was something about her. Something wrong with her. Maybe her weight. All her feelings of not being good enough came back to her in a rush as he sat down on the edge of her bed.
“I’m falling in love with you,” he said miserably, as he dropped his head into his hands.
“So am I with you. What’s wrong with that?” She was smiling at him.
“I can’t do this to you,” he said softly, and she touched his red hair falling over his eyes. He looked like Huck Finn or Tom Sawyer. He was a boy.
“Yes, you can. It’s okay.” She tried to reassure him, as they sat there in their underwear.
“No, it’s not. I can’t… you don’t understand. This is the first time this has ever happened to me… with a woman… I’m gay… and no matter how much I think I love you now, sooner or later I’m going to end up with a man again. I don’t want to do that to you, no matter how much I want you now. It won’t last with us.”
For a long moment, she didn’t know what to say. This was way beyond her realm of experience, and more complicated than any relationship she had imagined with him. And he was being fair. He knew that sooner or later he’d want a man again. He always had.
“I never should have started it, but I fell in love with you the day we met.”
“Then why can’t this work?” she asked softly, grateful for his honesty, but it hurt nonetheless.
“Because it won’t. This isn’t who I am. This is some kind of wild, delicious fantasy. But it’s not real for me. It could never be. I was wrong to think it could. You’ll get hurt. I don’t want to do that to you. We have to stop,” he said, looking at her with his big green eyes. “Let’s at least be friends.” But she didn’t want to be his friend. She was falling for him, and her body was crying out for him, and had been for a month. He looked painfully confused and guilty for what he’d almost done, and the charade he’d played out for a month. “I thought it could work, but it can’t. The first time I see a guy I want, I’ll be gone. That’s not good enough for you, Victoria. You deserve so much more.”
“Why does it have to be so complicated? If you’re falling in love with me, then why wouldn’t it work?” She was near tears, of disappointment and frustration.
“Because you’re not a man. I think you’re some kind of ultimate female fantasy for me, with your luscious body and big breasts. You’re what I think I should want, but in reality I don’t. I want a man.” He was being as honest with her as he could be, and his referring to her “luscious” body was the nicest thing anyone had ever said to her. But no matter how luscious her body or how big her breasts, he didn’t want her after all. It was rejection exquisitely packaged, but rejection nonetheless. “I’d better go,” he said, slipping back into his clothes as she watched. He was dressed again in a flash and stood looking at her lying on her bed. She hadn’t moved, or said another word. “I’ll call you tomorrow,” he said, and she wondered if he would, and if he did, what would he say? He had said it all tonight. She didn’t want to only be friends. She thought they had more than that together. For a while he had seemed totally infatuated with her.
“I guess I should have told you in the beginning. But I wanted it to work, and I didn’t want to scare you off.”
She nodded, unable to find the right words, and she didn’t want to cry. It would have been so humiliating now, as she lay on her bed in her bra and thong. He looked at her for a moment from the doorway, and then he was gone, and she climbed under the covers and cried. It was frustrating and depressing all at once, but she also knew he was right. It would have been even worse if she’d slept with him, and wanted something she couldn’t have. It was better this way. But she felt horrible and rejected nonetheless.
She was awake for hours, thinking about the time they’d spent together and the confidences they’d shared, the endless makeout sessions that went nowhere but titillated them both, as they were wrapped in each other’s arms, aroused. It all seemed so pointless now. She turned off the light and finally went to sleep. He didn’t call her in the morning, but Gracie did instead. Victoria’s heart felt like a brick in her chest when she thought of the night before.
“How’s Beau?” Gracie asked in her cheerful twelve-year-old voice.
“We broke up,” Victoria said, sounding almost as bad as she felt.
“Oh… that’s too bad… he sounded nice.”
“He was. He is.”
