a DVD.
“Are you dating anyone?”
“How can you ask me that?”
“It's a logical question. I know you have a life outside of us.”
No, I don't, I think. “You and school,” I say.
“What about your friends?”
“What about them?”
“You don't mind spending so much time with me? Don't they ask questions?”
“Only Honey Fowler. You remember her.”
“The girl who likes you.”
I scoff. “We're just friends. For years.”
Lori gives me a skeptical look. “Well, she isn't that pretty. Not your type.”
“What is my type?”
Lori leans over and kisses my neck, sending shivers up my body. “I am.”
“Prove it.”
She does.
•••
“What do you want to do over Christmas break?” my dad asks me when I walk into the kitchen on a Saturday morning in December.
Spend every second with Lori, I think. “I don't know … hang, I guess.” I go to the fridge and pull out the OJ.
“Come on, you must want to do something fun. I'm off the road until after New Year's.”
The realization hits me—Dad's going to be home 24/7 for two full weeks. I take a swig from the carton, set it on the countertop. “What do you want to do?”
“Road trip?”
“I'm too old for Disney World.”
“We could buzz up to Baltimore and see your aunt Debbie. She's invited us.”
She's Dad's sister and lives up there with her husband and my two boring cousins, Robbie and Karen. “Whoopee,” I say.
“I don't like your attitude.”
“You want me to be honest, don't you?”
“I want you to act as if you care about some-thing—anything. You disappear into your room when I'm home. God knows what you do when I'm not.”
I hold my breath, exhale slowly. No good will come of pissing him off. Especially when I want a car for Christmas. Man, if I had a car, I could hook up with Lori more often. Riding the bus is really getting to be a drag. She takes me home after dark, sometimes will even pick me up, but not too often, just in case anyone's watching. If someone finds out … “Going to Baltimore will be fine,” I say.
Dad looks surprised. I guess he didn't expect me to cave without more arguing. “Well then, okay. I'll call Debbie and tell her to expect us for Christmas. We can go into D.C. and see the Capitol, the White House, and the Smithsonian—that's one great museum.”
He's getting excited just talking about it, while I'm getting sick just thinking about it. What fun … a road trip to Washington to look at boring buildings and visit relatives I don't even like. I turn and fish two pieces of bread from the cupboard and plop them into the toaster, but my appetite's totally gone.
eing with Ryan feeds something deep inside me I can't describe. Such a beautiful boy. And so willing and eager to make me happy. His enthusiasm is an elixir. Even the way he avoids eye contact with me in the classroom is exciting. This thing between us is like water simmering on a low, constant fire. I need him. He makes me feel alive. Especially now.
I was called into the main office for a conference with the powers that be. It seems my “apparel” is offending some of the faculty and some of my students' parents. It makes my blood boil. The old hags. I look at the way they dress, like bag ladies. They hate my high heels most of all. Why shouldn't they? Lumbering around like water buffaloes in their sensible shoes. Our esteemed principal, Estelle Dexter, kept coming back to my heels time and again. She cited “insurance concerns” as the reason I need to lose them in the classroom when I teach.
“What if you fall? These floors can be really slick. If you fall, you'll hurt yourself, maybe even break a leg or something. That will keep you from doing your job. It won't help lower insurance rates, either,” Dexter tells me.
“Fall? I don't think that's a problem for me. I'm very physically fit.”
“Yes, everyone can see that you're fit.” Her tone is condescending. She taps a pencil on the edge of her desk. “Ms. Settles—Lori—please don't make this an issue. Your attire just isn't absolutely appropriate for the classroom. There are impressionable young people, immature young men. No sense inflaming them.”
Inflaming them! How dare she say this to me? “Have my students complained about my teaching methods? My lack of skill in imparting world history to them?”
“No, not at all, but that's not the issue. I don't understand why you're getting so worked up about this. It's a simple request.”
“It speaks to my character. As if a woman in a dress and heels is somehow unfit to stand in front of a classroom.”
Her mouth puckers and tightens. “I regret you see things that way. However, this isn't up for debate. Change your way of dressing. Don't make me draw the county superintendent into this.”
My blood's boiling and I want to reach across her desk and choke her. The sanctimonious old bitch. I could make a case to the teachers' union, fight for my rights. Then I think of how ugly such a case could get. Sides would be taken. Kids would be jacked around. I'd lose my ability to see Ryan every day. I stifle my fury and ask, “And just what do you consider acceptable attire?”
She looks mollified and comes in for the kill. “Longer skirts, more coverage of your cleavage, heels no more than two inches high, nothing too avantgarde.”
In other words, look like a frump. I stand. “Are we through?”
“Yes. Have a good day.”
I walk out of the office and go into the faculty lounge, so angry I can hardly speak. Only Mr. Ishiwata, the music instructor, is there, on break. He looks up, smiles, but his smile quickly fades. “Is something wrong, Ms. Settles?”
Only if you count being told by your principal that you look like a whore. “Nothing a cup of coffee won't cure,” I say as pleasantly as I can. I know Mr. Ishiwata isn't one of my enemies. I've seen the way he looks at my breasts—his favorite part of a woman's body, I'm betting.
“Please, let me pour you a cup.”
He's solicitous and too eager, but that always works to my advantage. “That would be kind,” I say. “Two sweeteners and some cream.”
He falls over himself fixing the coffee, brings it to me ceremoniously and sets it on the table in front of me. “Thank you,” I say.
His eyes are magnified behind his glasses. I turn, lean slightly forward and give him a full look down the front of my dress at the curve of my breasts pushing up from my lacy black bra. He blinks and stares hard. I lean back and sip the coffee.
“It is my pleasure,” he says, and leaves the lounge.
I think, Lecher. All men are lechers, but I know how to handle them. Just the way I know I'll handle Dexter's unreasonable request. I want to stay under her radar, and causing a scene over my clothes won't accomplish that. I calm myself with thoughts of Ryan, of his smooth young body, of his raw and hungry passion.
Everything else is a distraction.
