The Fall of Troy

by Dr. Rebecca Sharp

  “And is that why you were upset? Because he wouldn’t apologize for what he did?”

  No.

  I wanted to be. I tried to be. I wanted to add it to the catalog of grievances I held against him but I couldn’t.

  I couldn’t because every time I knocked on that door, the thought that answered was that if my dad had to apologize for what he did, then so would Léo. And I didn’t want Léo to be sorry for what he did to me… because I didn’t want to be sorry for wanting it.

  “No,” I answered softly.

  It was a disturbing comparison to make—Léo and my father. They were closer to the same age than not. They were both experts in their fields. But my father hurt me because he didn’t know how to be any better. Léo hurt me because he didn’t want to be any better. And I wanted to know why.

  “No?” Her eyebrows raised.

  “I mean in the moment, I was angry,” I confessed. “But she was also there, in the background, pulling the strings. And that made me mad.”

  “Why did that make you mad?”

  My mouth thinned. I should have seen that one coming.

  “Because she was there. And that means that he… cares… about her… more than what I saw.”

  “But you’re not mad at him for that?”

  I shook my head.

  “Then why were you so upset if you weren’t mad?”

  A hard laugh burst from my lips and my head ducked. I opted for a sip of tea because it gave my mouth something to do besides answer for a moment.

  “Because I realized that if I was going to be mad at him for feeling something that he shouldn’t…” I stared off into the liquid, unable to meet her eyes, as the simple truth seeped from my lips. “Then I’d have to be mad at myself.

  When she didn’t answer, I looked up to see her watching me with a mix of interest and… was that pride?

  “And what would you have to be mad at yourself for?”

  Dr. Shelly didn’t work for the school or at the school. She didn’t know my friends, classes, or teachers. She didn’t know Léo. Still, she looked at me like she already knew the answer that was coming.

  “I… met someone.”

  “That’s wonderful, Troian,” she said encouragingly. Numerous times she’d suggested I go out and make friends—that I needed to learn it was still okay to let people in.

  “Kind of,” I said cryptically. “I care about him… when I have no reason to. Actually, when I have a bunch of reasons not to, I still care about him. And somehow, the shock of my actually talking to my dad on the phone, followed by the pain of… denial… made me realize that I’m him. I’m my dad. I care about someone that I definitely shouldn’t, who doesn’t want me to, but I can’t stop it. I’m not trying to hurt anyone because of it. I’m not trying to make anyone’s life—including my own—more difficult because of it. It’s just how I feel.”

  And this was the point in the shrink session where the well of feelings overflowed and Dr. Shelly sat back and listened as they all rushed out. All those feelings that Léo told me to embrace.

  “And I think that’s how my dad must have felt when he… did what he did,” I finished softly. “Not that I’m on board with it; I’m still reeling. And slightly disgusted.”

  “But now a part of you understands maybe even just a part of his side,” she stated softly, and I tipped my head, agreeing. “I have to say, Troian. This was not what I was expecting to hear this morning.”

  Well, it wasn’t what I was expecting to feel either.

  Nothing with Léo was what I expected.

  “Don’t be mad at me, okay?”

  My head whipped up to Kev from where I’d been staring off into my coffee mug. I clutched it between two hands, soaking in the warmth. It was so cold outside and inside, too—inside me.

  “What did you do?” I asked suspiciously.

  He bit into his lip and I knew it wasn’t good. “It’s not what I’ve done—it’s what I’m going to do.” I gave him the evil-eye and waited for a better answer. “Oh, alright. You’re no fun,” he teased. “I’m switching my studio day to Wednesday this week; Jake wants to do something special for our one-month anniversary of dating.”

  Great. “Gross,” I joked back, trying to keep a straight face.

  “I know, right?” he agreed with mock disgust. “It’s a good thing he’s so hot that I can overlook his disgusting urge to be sweet.”

  We both laughed as our conversation carried through the Wise Bean. No one was really here today. It was the coldest day of the year so far and snow covered everything which meant that walking for coffee was a luxury that most of the student population was unwilling to afford.

  “I can’t believe you’re going to leave me alone in studio.” Sadly, it was the first thing I thought of when he said it.

  All week had been a battle. No… battles. Plural.

  After I met with Dr. Shelly, I felt only marginally better. Yeah, I realized that rationally, I couldn’t be mad at my dad. But I still was, although I think it was for a different reason; I think it was because he got to have what he shouldn’t. Whereas I didn’t.

  Instead, I got to go to class every other day and sit there for three hours and watch and listen to the man I couldn’t get out of my head. He was disconnected. It was the only way to describe it. I didn’t push. I didn’t try to talk to him or talk about what happened. I didn’t even ask him about my copy of Baudelaire which wasn’t in the room come Monday morning. I knew he had it. He had to.

  I stared into the vast chasm of so many obstacles between us instead of looking for ways to cross it. He was the professor and I was the student; and if there was ever a week where that was the only solemn truth, this was it.

  “You’ll have Luke to keep you company.”

  “Yeah, okay.” I rolled my eyes so hard I was surprised they didn’t pop out of my head. The last thing I wanted was to talk to the random naked guy that I saw once a week.

  The only thing I wanted was the last thing that I could ever have.

  That was my conclusion after days of forced detachment and dirty dreams. I fought to keep Léo from my mind until my head hit the pillow every night when, inevitably, the scent of him or the feel of his hair would lure me back. A small memory would be okay. But they never stayed small. The next thing I knew, the image of his mouth starving at my sex engulfed me—dark, thick hair between my thighs and his demanding tongue licking every inch. Before I could stop it, my hand would be between my thighs, flicking over my clit until I whimpered his name as I came.

  It was desire. It was a release of sadness.

  Maybe if I could pretend I didn’t want him, it would come true. I didn’t want what I couldn’t have. Just because I understood my father didn’t mean that I wanted to be like him.

  “Maybe you could let Luke draw you,” Kev joked.

  My cup clattered into the saucer. Did he know? I hadn’t told him that. The laughter in his eyes said that he had no idea I’d already let someone draw me in the nude and it hadn’t been Luke.

  My hands shook as I slid the mug back into its rightful place.

  Léo had drawn me.

  Léo had drawn me naked.

  I should get it back. I wanted to see it. I should get it back. If I couldn’t have him, he couldn’t have me.

  “I’m just kidding. We should probably get going though. I don’t want to be late for class since I’m skipping later.”

  “Thanks,” I mumbled, reaching for the layers of outerwear stacked on the back of my chair, layering them on quickly as I tried to bundle up my rampant thoughts.

  Did he look at it?

  Had he destroyed it?

  Had he forgotten all about it like he seemed to have forgotten about me?

  Question after question danced through my head as I watched him speak. I needed to know. I had every right to know. He’d drawn me sprawled out on the floor with my hand between my legs—I had every right to know where that image was right now and what was going to h
appen to it.

  I wanted to see his eyes—search in their clear, dark depths for answers—but he never met mine. Just another student. So, I stared—like it could eat a hole right through him and torture him for answers.

  I glanced down at my notebook, seeing the page littered with absentminded quick sketches of my tall, dark, and brooding professor—smaller versions of the kind we’d been doing in studio. Clothed versions. They filled the past several pages of outlines. Even my doodles of David always ended with Léo’s head on them instead.

  I traced over the curve of his shoulder that I’d drawn, imagining it was my tongue on his skin instead of pencil on paper. I thought after the humiliation of the other night that I would be too angry or ashamed to want him anymore. I thought wrong. Instead, that pressure—that burning—inside me began to build again—the one my body couldn’t contain. Stronger and stronger. Hotter and hotter. And the release I found at night was like trying to use a paper towel to dry up the ocean.

  “You sure you’re going to be okay tonight?” Kev leaned over and asked. “You could always pretend to be sick like halfway through and leave.”

  I nodded and gave him my best brave smile. “I’ll be fine. Do you know me? I can handle myself.”

  ‘Bullshit’ my body called as Léo’s gaze pinned me. Handle myself? More like hand myself right over to him. That was the only time he ever looked—when I was talking to Kev—and then he gave me the stare that said he wanted to punish me. I shifted uncomfortably in my seat as soon as he looked away. It wasn’t fair. He had that drawing. He’d seen me. Meanwhile, I had nothing.

  I needed to get that drawing—and my book—back.

  The wheels didn’t just start turning—they spun like wagon wheels rolling down a mountainside.

  ‘Sick’… ‘Half-way through and leave.’

  Kev was a genius—not that I’d ever give him that credit. Leaving wasn’t the plan though. Leaving and raiding his office—that was the plan.

  Everyone bailed on me. Not just Kev. Nope, studio tonight consisted of Luke, Léo, and I.

  “So, how’s it going?” Luke asked as I worked on my latest attempt at emotion.

  I stared blankly up at him for a moment; it was weird that he was talking to me. He never talked to us.

  “Figured since it was the two of us—well, besides…” He nodded to where Léo sat behind his desk on the other side of the room.

  “Fine,” I said quickly with a short smile. “Good, I mean. As good as it can, I think.”

  “That was convincing,” he replied with a laugh at my fragmented response.

  “Sorry,” I mumbled.

  “It’s okay,” he continued with a smile. I felt his gaze on me. Not the leering kind that Wes always had and not the searing kind that Léo always inflicted me with… I guess I’d say it was lukewarm (with all puns intended.) “Can I ask you a question?”

  No. “Sure.”

  “Do you have a boyfriend?”

  My mouth barely got open before the loud screech of a chair sliding against the floor jerked both our gazes over to where Léo sat—well, now he was standing. He must have been listening in.

  I held his eyes as punishment while I answered Luke. “No, I don’t.”

  Everything about him said that my answer didn’t faze him—everything except his eyes. It was hard to see—the emotion was buried so deep—but I’d been drowning for too long in them that the good news was I was closer to the truths he hid, even if it meant my chances of surviving them got slimmer and slimmer.

  In spite of the casual indifference he exuded, Luke cleared his throat as Léo stalked over toward us and decided to change the subject. “So, what are you going to do after school?”

  I blinked at him blankly. That was so far away from now, I was still focused on trying to survive this semester. “I-I don’t know. I only recently decided to pursue art, so I’m feeling everything out still.”

  “Really?” It was impressive how his facial expressions changed but his body stayed perfectly still. “What were you originally going to go to school for?”

  “I… uhh… I was going for a chemistry degree,” I began slowly, lowering my voice. I didn’t mind admitting that I was lost. I only minded admitting it to him. “But some family stuff happened, and I moved up here with my mom. She works in the art department. I had a plan for how things were going to be, and now everything’s changed… So, I guess I have to wait and see what happens.”

  This time when I looked up, Léo was there, sitting behind Luke on the sill of the window staring at me.

  “Hey, I hear ya. I never thought I’d be doing this, that’s for sure,” Luke said ruefully. “In a good way, though.”

  “What did you think was going to happen?”

  Luke’s head swiveled with mine as Léo barged in the conversation, demanding more answers from me. I felt my cheeks heating; my own radar for when he was near.

  I bit into my lower lip while I thought for a second and tried to ignore the way it seemed like his body tensed. He sent me away. He didn’t want me.

  “I thought that life was like a chemical equation; you put certain amounts of certain elements in and you get a predictable result. So, I did that. I put the time and the effort and the love in—but what came out wasn’t anything… wasn’t even an element that I’d been aware existed.”

  “C’est la vie,” he replied and looked at me like he knew exactly what I meant—like we’d both tried the exact same ingredients and life had returned the same kind of explosion.

  “Jeez, you’re really doom and gloom tonight, Mr. Baudin,” Luke laughed. Somehow, this guy was the only one who seemed completely oblivious to the type of man that Léo was. “Tell us about Paris. I’ve never been.”

  Yes. Anything except me.

  “It’s a city. There are parts that shine and parts that are dark and dirty—just like the rest of them.”

  “Tell us how you really feel,” he joked and even though it wasn’t really funny, I laughed. “Seriously. It’s Paris. The City of Light. The City of Love.”

  He didn’t see it, but Léo’s sneer at the last felt like ice in my veins.

  “Don’t let the lights blind you. Love is just a pretty word to describe a clutch of petty human emotions… desire, jealousy, possessiveness,” he warned with a hoarse hollowness. “L’amour est une rose. Each petal is an illusion. Each thorn, a reality.”

  Love is a rose… Baudelaire.

  He was quoting Baudelaire to me. At me.

  I wanted to cry. Or maybe scream. I definitely wanted my book and all its truths back.

  But mostly, I wanted him.

  It was the not knowing that was slowly killing me. Like the best kind of poison, each time I thought about all the things I didn’t know about her, I died a little inside.

  I wanted to know why she carried around a copy of Baudelaire, the depressing prick. Not that I was one to talk.

  I wanted to know what she would shape her life to be—not what she thought her dad would want and not what she thought she was forced to do to get away from him. I wanted to be there and not just watch from behind a desk as her future unfolded, I wanted to be a part of it.

  I wanted to know what her tears tasted like—both the ones that fell after I made her leave last week and the ones that came when her body did.

  I wanted to know what her body would feel like clenched around mine as pleasure drowned out our pain and illusion and reality became one.

  I was losing my mind.

  Non, je l’ai déjà perdu. I’d already lost it.

  I’d lost it the second I let myself touch her. Everything since had been other bits and pieces of me gone. Merde. It was the taste of her—of her sweet release on my tongue—that ruined me. The way her bare pussy opened for me. Mon Dieu, I’d never seen a sight so beautiful. I never thought… I never craved… not until I saw her.

  Troian.

  Troy.

  Ma petite bataille. She was my little battle.

&nb
sp; And with every glance into the painful longing I’d carved into her eyes, I wanted more and more to win her back.

  My dick strained angrily against my pants remembering the way her sweet, soft pussy clenched around my tongue. It was desperate to mark her—to mark its territory. It was the kind of desperate that reminded me of my entire goddamn life and, like a bucket of ice water, I knew I had to stay away. And I didn’t care if it meant locking myself up in la Bastille.

  Forget my head, Madame la Guillotine should slice off my heart.

  Ma petite had a future. And even with all the rules gone from between us, I wouldn’t tie her future to someone who didn’t have one. My future had been put on pause when Amélie, my wife, had left. No, not left. I’d finally asked her for a divorce, and she’d disappeared without a goddamn trace. I knew she was still alive no matter what the police said or the public implied. There was no body—how could she be dead? But more than lack of evidence, I knew my darling wife was somewhere, watching my life crumble to ash like she wanted.

  I wanted to be free of her. I would be free from her.

  My lawyer said to wait one year—a day that had come and gone while I was in exile here. But as soon as I got back, I would jump through every hoop the courts required to free me from her ghost. My fist tightened, wanting to punch my younger, naive self. Like a fly in a spider’s web, I’d fallen for the lies Amélie had woven so securely around me I didn’t realize they would destroy me until it was too late.

  She’d cheated on me. She’d pulled away from me. She’d left me. She’d left me in wreckage.

  For a long time, I’d been a black hole, sucking anything and everything into my anger to the point where most things learned to stay away. Troian… she came close. She let me pull on her and she pulled right back. And if I consumed her, it would end up being she that destroyed me from the inside out.

  So, last Friday night was my Last Supper, full and well drunk on the sweet heaven between Troy’s legs, because it could never happen again.