“I love you,” I gurgled through the molten treat.
She licked long, lavish slurps up one of my cheeks and then the other. I spread some on her nose and nibbled it off.
By now, we were coated, hands, faces, necks, shirts too. We both lit up with the idea, “shower?” Even in our chocolate ecstasy, we realized that would be hari-kari.
After sponging each other off, we found Katie’s bed and began where we had left off in the middle of the night. Our repertoire changed a bit: some solos, many duets, and often with full orchestration. Our loving was musical, a Siren’s call, but this time to safe harbors.
Again, we took a midnight snack and showered. Again, I dreamt of Sicily and building a dream house. Now, I was sawing some boards while Katie used a chainsaw with a sixteen-inch blade. She proceeded to cut through trees and beams. The ground shook with the felling of massive chunks of wood. Boom, boom, boom!
I stood in awe of Katie’s might and smiled up at her face, which filled the breadth of my vision. No, not Katie’s face…yes with a Halloween-like screech. “Jesus! Dorotea!”
Chapter Sixteen
Divine Tragedy
I sat up clutching the covers. I was no longer dreaming. This time I couldn’t tell Katie to hide under the bed.
Dorotea was no apparition; she was flesh and blood and standing three inches from my face, screaming at me in German, fully open-mouthed, “Hieraus! Hieraus! Out! Out!” I felt like I was in the play Macbeth and I was the “damned spot.”
She took a broom to me. I took a sheet wrapped around myself, clutched at the neck. All I lacked was the candle.
I had no choice but to go to my room and dress. I had a zillion questions and twice as many fears. Thoughts and movements seemed like a time-lapse sequence from a scary movie. I could barely put one thought together with the next. Could I even be sure that that was Dorotea—that she really had come in on us, in the act, or post-act? What did she see? I no longer knew anything, except one thing: I had to save Katie.
I listened outside Katie’s door. Dorotea was still spouting, in English now.
“You, you…” she was saying. “You are good, Katie, yes! But she, Pina, she must go. I will see to that, but enough. We finish the talk.”
I heard Katie mumble, “I’m sorry” in a small voice, so different from an hour ago. She asked what Dorotea was going to do. Dorotea continued to babble that Katie was good, but not me, and that I must be stopped. Then, all was quiet.
I had the harebrained idea of going in to explain. Before I could think, I was in the room. Dorotea came at me with a wild look in her eyes. She curled her lip and targeted me with a wicked smile. “You will see. Beware!” And with a bloodcurdling “ha!” tossed back over her shoulder, she marched away from me. Katie motioned at the door with her head.
Katie joined me back in my room almost immediately. She repeated Dorotea’s veiled threats, but added that Dorotea seemed particularly weird, almost trembling with fear and not rage. Although Katie had learned some German from her mother’s distant cousins, she wasn’t sure what Dorotea muttered in German about going to Craney.
My stomach tightened. I just about made it to the bathroom down the hall from my room. My throat closed up; my head throbbed. When would the shoe drop?
I slithered back down the hall to Katie in my room. We had to think. We also had to find out why Dorotea was here. What had happened to Alda’s plan to bring Dorotea back Monday morning, not in the middle of Sunday night?
To say I was scared was an understatement. Katie, well, maybe she was safe. Her father was on the Advisory Board, and besides, Dorotea had said Katie was good. Yes, she was. Katie was also trying to convince me that we were in this together, and we should wait and see what Alda had to say upon her return later this morning.
We would have wanted to curl up together for another hour with the door locked, but after our near-escapes with Craney and Dorotea—or were they?—we didn’t dare. That would be suicide.
I looked at my love. We had just touched heaven and now? I wanted to expire. I couldn’t imagine a before or an after. Maybe I was really dead.
And yet, I felt a new life in me. Katie looked different too. She held my face with her awe-filled look, and through tears of joy and fear, she said, “I just love you so much.”
Nothing broke her stare. She kissed my eyes. “I just love these eyes, like they’re calling me to hold you.” As she played with my hair, she went on, “Your hair…God, it’s like begging me to curl it around my finger.”
I was swimming in her eyes.
“Pina, I’ve never felt this way, even in communion!” Katie blushed and smiled, a slow smile, her head tilted towards me.
I sighed. “You are my world. I can’t lose you now.” And in a small voice, I said, “I’m scared.”
Our foreheads met. We shared the moment in silence, our own special communion.
Chapter Seventeen
Alda’s Return
Sharp, metallic screeches sliced through our moment of silence. We separated like limbs being amputated. Alda’s troubled look, as she burst through the door, was as effective as a surgeon’s knife. Her feeble attempt at a smile didn’t put our pieces together again. We were in a Humpty-Dumpty fairy tale, but there was no make-believe.
Alda shifted her glance from my face to Katie’s to try to read our story. Her own face seemed to reflect confusion: should she smile or grimace?
Katie and I finally hugged Alda, and I immediately started to cry. Katie squeezed my shoulder. “We’ve got to talk,” she said, as she pushed Alda into a chair.
“Dorotea? Oh God. She didn’t?” asked Alda.
“She did,” I said.
“Oh boy,” said Alda as she closed her eyes, cupping her nose and chin with her hand.
All three of us blurted out, “What happened?” at the same time. Katie and I explained our story, as well as its gaping holes: What did Dorotea see? What was she going to do? And why did she act more petrified than angry?
Alda listened and gasped in all the right spots, but something was off. Her wide-eyed looks and the sounds coming out of her mouth didn’t match her stiff body and hands, alternately clutching together and flicking cuticles. Her reaction to our story was like steam after a hot shower, rising off her surface.
I found myself snapping at her, “What the heck happened on your end?”
Alda’s eyes were shifting again. She apologized for having let Dorotea leave. She said it was almost the middle of the night, and she was unable to stop her.
“But why?” Katie was practically shaking Alda’s arm.
Alda’s hesitation, sucking her lips and staring to the side, was troubling, so unlike the normal Alda, quick with an answer, a humorous one at that. She claimed she was ashamed to admit she and Dorotea had argued over something stupid. When Katie asked what, Alda froze. She finally answered it was so stupid, she had actually forgotten.
When we pushed Alda with our “Huh?” and “What?” she whimpered a bit.
“My father yelled and yelled. I’m still upset.” Alda stopped crying as quickly as she had started. We had never seen her like this, kind of like the heroines on daytime TV. I noticed she was peeking at us out of the corner of her eyes.
“She-it,” I said. “C’mon, Alda, why did Dorotea leave? I might get branded as a lesbo and banished, and you’re worried about your father’s yelling?”
“Oh, right.” It was as if she had to shake herself to focus. “My father yelled. You got that. Well, he yelled really loud at us because we were making so much noise arguing, and then, he slammed a door. Dorotea freaked out.”
“You couldn’t convince her he wasn’t going to kick her out or worse?” I had started to joke and wondered if people joked that way about a man associated with the Mafia.
Alda said Dorotea must have snuck out and gotten a cab to Idlewild Airport or Grand Central Station. She switched the focus along with her demeanor. “What are we going to do about Dorotea? I guess she w
as more upset about our little fight than I thought.”
Alda’s typical playful spirit returned, and she was full of reassurance concerning Dorotea’s harmlessness. She suggested she make up with Dorotea, and we would see everything go back to normal. She was trying hard to convince us Dorotea had probably seen nothing going on between Katie and me.
Again, I fretted over my fears about what Dorotea might do, but Alda clapped me on the shoulder and clamped her hand over my mouth.
“Details,” she shouted. “I want all the sexy, gory details! Remember, I made it happen.” She was dancing around us. Her silliness was so contagious, Katie and I soon found ourselves revealing even the juiciest parts of our tryst, almost without blushing.
Chapter Eighteen
The Walls Have Eyes
Daylight came. Alda said she needed a few minutes and would join us at breakfast. Scared that everyone would know everything about our night of love and look at us with dagger eyes, Katie and I walked, almost slinked along the walls in the direction of the refectory. The crisp, early October fog was a helpful, if bracing camouflage. We slipped off the path to hang out unseen behind a massive yellow pine.
“Something’s fishy,” I whispered to Katie. Now I was sweating, despite the chill, thick dew. Scraping off the sap that had fallen on my arm and navy Villager shirt, I scrunched up my face. “I don’t know, Katie. Alda was fudging.”
“She sure was slow in coming up with easy answers, like why they fought. Had to be something else. And she seemed real nervous.”
We both agreed to be careful and observe every little move and sound Dorotea and Alda made. Katie said she’d be pure delight around Dorotea. I promised to stay away from Dorotea, except that we had French class together today.
After checking that the path felt safe, we went to breakfast where Alda joined us, playing her normal self. Katie and I asked Alda to meet us for lunch, figuring safety in numbers. Until then, I had some breaks and decided to go take a nap alone in my room.
I hit the pillow and went to la la land an instant later. All was comfortable, like pasta and sun comfortable! That could only mean my grandmother was doing her magic in my dream.
I began tossing and turning and started to come to. I had ideas about “something foul in Denmark,” but then I was in Rome where I heard, “Beware the Ides of March.”
I awakened. I was at Albert in my room. Right. I had been dreaming about Hamlet and Julius Cesar.
Just as quickly, I faded off again to half-awaken to “walk softly and carry a big stick.” There was my grandmother looking like Winston Churchill, fading back and forth.
I was fully awake now, sitting up. I expected to see a neon sign, flashing, “Beware, beware, beware.”
Chapter Nineteen
Off to French Class
I got out of bed to go to class. Classes couldn’t be as bad as my dreams.
Still sticky from my wrestling match with the covers, I wound my way through the humid corridors, almost sticking to the walls, to arrive at my French class.
I started to become unglued when I spotted Mademoiselle in the doorway with Head Mistress Craney hunched over her. It appeared as if Craney had been dictating orders to Mademoiselle before she cranked her head in my direction. I froze; even Craney’s gushingly warm grin couldn’t move me.
After Craney slithered off, I slipped into my seat and discovered I had motor mouth in French to cover my anxiety. I was personally engaging Mademoiselle in a French discussion about the weather and the benefits of an Indian summer!
I came to my senses when Mademoiselle raised her voice, saying, “Arretez! Stop.” She drew everyone’s attention to me and said far more important news than the weather caused her to interrupt my meteorological exposé. I had been chosen for the Intensive French Living Program and was to be relocated to the prestigious Albert Hall.
Mademoiselle called for a round of felicitations and added that while the class was offering heartfelt appreciation, they might also acknowledge Dorotea Cabanus who would share the honor, as well as a little French chambre with me in the French-speaking wing of Albert Hall.
I smiled a limp-lipped smile and was grateful for the loud clapping, which hid my deep gasp. I couldn’t recover quickly enough to lower my eyelids before Dorotea filled my field of vision.
Within two of her huge strides, she stood before me, hand extended, with a formal nod of her fleshy chin. “Je suis tres reconnaissante de partager la gloire avec toi. I am most grateful to share the glory with you.” She pumped my hand to the rhythm of a chorus of “bravos.”
I think I dissociated for the rest of the class. I had a vague recollection of a sexual fantasy, mixed with horror. As I tried to focus on the brass doorknob, Dorothea’s head loomed up through the frosted glass panes, a vision from my dream. I suddenly felt waves of nausea as I realized it was the same version of Dorotea’s head as it floated above me in a sexual embrace in my living nightmare.
I ran to the bathroom, and when I emerged, I spotted Katie and glued myself to her side on our way to lunch. So far, no one stared at us; no one rolled her eyes. Katie kept on whispering, “So far, so good.” I was just about to say I couldn’t wait to tell her and Alda my French news when I caught a glimpse of Alda and Dorotea.
In an alcove of the loggia off the refectory, Alda stood blocking Dorotea’s path. A sneer painted her face as she pointed and jabbed her index finger at Dorotea. There appeared to be a flash as Dorotea’s glass beads swung wildly up around her chin and dampened with freely falling tears, broke, and glistened their way down the hall. Dorotea’s shriek of verdammte vater, damned father echoed down the hallway.
Katie and I hung back, trying to make sense of what we had just seen. I certainly wasn’t ready to eat with Alda and talk about my new roommate to be. And yet, there was Alda, smack dab at our sides, swinging both our elbows, almost waltzing us down the hall.
Katie threw me a puzzled look before pulling Alda to a stop.
“What’s up with you and Dorotea?” Katie asked.
“What, my dear, are you talking about?” Alda answered, rolling her eyes at Katie.
“Duh! The two of you looked like flyweights about to slug it out,” I said.
“Oh, Pina, I think Craney and your grandmother are getting to you. I haven’t seen Dorotea since early this morning,” Alda said, twirling us by the arms before excusing herself to use the bathroom.
Katie’s look said, “Shush. This is a biggie.”
“Yes,” I said out loud, “We’ll go to the library later.” I made the form of a tree with my hands to signal I really meant Katie and I would meet privately under our yellow pine hideout.
Katie nodded she understood.
We had to put our heads together to deal with the newest of our mysteries. There were now three: Dorotea, Craney, Alda.
Chapter Twenty
Library and Ancient History
Hidden under the yellow pine hugging the path from Smythe, I could make out Katie entering the library and coming back out almost immediately. Smart. She was covering her tracks in case someone checked up on her. I had told Alda, who was acting normal again, I was going for a walk.
“Psst! Over here, Katie.”
Katie flopped down with a huge sigh. “Finally.” She hugged me hard, yet pushed me away with the heel of her hand. “I hate this hiding.” And in a quiet voice, she said, “Will you really have to move to Albert Hall? How will we see each other?” She jerked her head away and gnawed on her lip.
I touched her cheek to make her face me. “We will. I swear I’ll find a way—if I’m not kicked out.”
“I don’t get it,” Katie said. “One minute Dorotea threatens to rat you out with Craney. The next, Craney’s courting you and squishing you together with Dorotea.”
“Maybe Dorotea’s her spy. I won’t be able to breathe with Dorotea in the same room. You know, I’ve had nightmares about both of them seducing me. It was gross. Dorotea’s head was almost dripping drool, looming huge
and lecherous above me in a sex scene.”
“I think I’m going to be sick. Can they force you?”
“Force me to what?”
“Well, you know, threaten to throw you out if you don’t.”
“Oh. But Dorotea is so scared of queers, I mean, of us,” I said.
“Pin, Dorotea is petrified, but it might really be of Alda. Did you get a load of Alda, jabbing her finger into Dorotea’s chest and the sneer on her face? That was the worst bullying I’ve ever seen. My own chest squeezed real tight.”
“Yeah. I felt ice cubes instead of my backbone. So much was happening, I almost forgot. And afterwards, she acted as if we were seeing things. Even back in the room, Alda looked at me like I was crazy when I asked about Dorotea.”
Katie disappeared in her head; I had to call her a few times before she brought her eyes into focus. Her look was softer now, and she placed a hand on my knee.
“Listen, you’re not moving to Albert Hall right away, right?”
“Right. Couple of weeks.”
“We have time to act nonchalant with Alda and Dorotea to find out more. And, sweetie, we do need Alda on our side if Dorotea squeals.”
“Yeah. I know. But Katie, us?” I didn’t dare go there in my head. My insides were knotted up. No Katie? It would feel like dragging myself up the scaffolding for my impending hanging.
Katie had dropped her head. Her chin, drenched in cascading tears, rested on her chest. She started several times to talk and finally let herself topple over onto my lap. I stroked her head and risked a soft kiss.
“I’ve got to say this.” Katie sat up and closed her eyes a few long seconds. “I can’t lose you. I told you this summer. You were the first person, the first thing I ever had that was all mine. Like we were one. When my mother disappeared this summer, you were it, all I had, besides my dad and Joe.”
“I know,” I whispered as I reached over to pull her closer.
“No,” she said, placing her hand on mine to stop me. “No, you don’t really know.”
Love and Lechery at Albert Academy Page 6