by Selena Kitt
Leah glanced into Mr. Nolan’s basket. “Strawberries and chocolate?”
“Yes.” He cleared his throat, letting the basket down to swing at his side, as if he didn’t want her to see. He nodded toward what was in her hands. “Lettuce?”
“Ada’s making tacos.” She peered into his basket anyway. “For dinner tonight. She asked us to pick up the lettuce. My mother’s waiting in line.”
“Well, then.” He turned and picked up a pint of blueberries—a clear dismissal, and her chest burned with it. “Guess you better get back.”
“Wine?” Leah crossed her arms and nodded toward his basket. “And shrimp… and capers… are you cooking?”
“Yes.” His voice was hard. “I’m making a nice dinner for Virginia this weekend.”
“Leah!” It was her mother’s voice from behind them.
“She’s the one you came home with that night.” She frowned. Something thick was lodged in her throat. “The Marilyn Monroe blonde?”
He nodded, putting the blueberries back and looking over her shoulder. His voice changed, becoming the fake tone all the adults seemed to speak in. “Patty! How are you?”
“Hi, Rob.” Leah’s mother pushed the cart up beside them. “I’m good, how are you and Erica?”
“Great.” He smiled. It wasn’t his real smile. Leah tried to catch his eye but he was clearly avoiding her.
“Can you believe they’re in college already?” Leah’s mother reached for the lettuce and she relinquished it. “I forgot, Ada asked me to get cheese too, Leah. I don’t know where my head is lately!”
“They sure do grow fast,” Mr. Nolan agreed, still avoiding Leah’s eyes. “It was good seeing you both. I’ve got to beat it.”
“Mr. Nolan,” Leah said and he turned back, only halfway, his body stiff. “Erica and I need to work on our World Religion project this weekend. Can I stay over?”
“That’s due next week, isn’t it?” Leah’s mother put her heel up on the bottom rack of the cart. She was still in her work clothes and when she leaned forward, her blouse parted at the neck. Leah saw Mr. Nolan’s eyes settle there and she made a face at him, but he didn’t see it. “Maybe Erica can spend the night at our place instead? I hardly ever see Leah anymore, it seems!”
Mr. Nolan raised his eyebrows. “That would be—”
“Oh, wait!” My mother sighed, opening her purse and glancing at Leah. “I forgot, I have the ladies auxiliary meeting at my place this weekend.”
“That’s all right.” His jaw tightened and Leah noticed his hand gripping the handle of the basket hard—his knuckles were white.
“I’m sorry, Rob,” she apologized, flipping through her date book. “Yep, it’s this weekend.”
“So we can do it at your house then, Mr. Nolan?” Leah moved to stand slightly behind her mother and winked at him from there. “Since it’s due next week and all...”
“That would be a favor to me too.” Leah’s mother smiled at Mr. Nolan, leaning forward again, almost like she knew he was looking. “I’d appreciate it.”
His gaze went from mother to daughter and when Leah knew she had his attention, she put her finger to her mouth and touched it to her lower lip, wetting it and rubbing it there, trying to tell him with her eyes how much she wanted him. Leah thought he got the message—his face went white and he looked quickly back to her mother. His mouth opened to speak but nothing came out.
Finally, he pursed his lips, blinking fast, and nodded. “Sure, Patty. That’s fine.”
Leah smiled, trying to get his attention, but he turned away, saying, “Good to see you.” He didn’t sound like he meant it though, and he started walking away without even looking back.
Leah’s mother started pushing the cart in the other direction, heading towards the dairy section. Leah followed her, head filled with Mr. Nolan, her chest burning with the thought of him making dinner for some woman. She knew she had foiled his plan—and then she felt a twinge of guilt.
“Oh, fiddlesticks.” Leah’s mother made a face, turning toward her daughter. “I forgot to get Minute Rice. Will you grab it?”
“Sure,” Leah agreed, heading back toward where she had last seen Mr. Nolan.
He wasn’t there and she strolled down the end aisle, looking up and down the rows. She found him in the “International” section, putting a box of pasta in his basket. Luckily, Minute-Rice was in the same aisle.
“Hi again,” she said, coming up behind him and tapping him on the shoulder. He turned, glancing past her, and she knew he was looking for her mother. “She sent me for rice.” She held up the box as explanation. “Easy is best.”
“Uh-huh.” He raised his eyebrows and she realized what she’d said, blushing.
“Are you mad at me?” She cocked her head and frowned.
He cleared his throat. “No, Leah. I just...” His eyes fell to the tile and he shifted the basket from one hand to the other. “I don’t think we should… do this.”
Her heart was pounding in her ears. “Talk in a grocery store aisle?”
“No, Leah.” He shook his head and sighed.
“Hey.” She touched his arm.
His gaze went to her hand and he gently took it off his forearm, and the look on his face was kind, but a little sad. “I’m sorry.”
He turned and walked down the aisle. Leah watched him go, willing him to look back, but he didn’t. She had this awful feeling, the same one she got when she knew she’d done something really wrong. She fought it, but it curled up in her middle and stayed there, even after she took the rice back to her mother and they went through the checkout lane.
She saw him again in the parking lot and waved, but he didn’t wave back, although she knew he saw her. She could tell, the way he slammed the trunk of his Cadillac closed and got quickly into the vehicle, like something was chasing him.
Leah couldn’t understand it. It made no sense. The more she thought about it, the more she knew what she had to do—as much as she didn’t want to. Father Michael had been right after all. Even if she was hiding her sin from everyone else, she couldn’t hide it from God.
That’s how she ended up standing in line at the confessional with all the rest of the girls after they got out of class for the day, waiting her turn. She didn’t even have Erica for moral support—she had skipped altogether to go meet Bobby, long before Leah had left for her dentist appointment.
“Come on, go already,” the girl behind Leah whined, she was gangly with thin brown hair and glasses.
It was Leah’s turn. She stared at the door and started forward and then stopped.
“You go ahead.” She waved the other girl past.
The brunette rolled her eyes, pushing up her glasses as she swept by. There were six more girls to go, and she slipped quietly down the line against the wall, falling in behind the last. It had been two years since she chewed her nails, but she was seriously tempted by the time the line had dwindled to just her and one other girl.
“Do you want to go?” the girl asked as the confessional door opened. “You’ve been waiting the longest.”
“No!” Leah exclaimed. “No, that’s okay. I don’t mind waiting. Take your time.”
The girl gave her a funny look, going into the confessional. Leah paced the wall, up and down, chewing on one of her cuticles and then sucking at it when it started to bleed. She secretly hoped the girl ahead of her had a lot to confess. Leah didn’t know her very well—maybe she shoplifted, or maybe she was a compulsive liar, or maybe she did something really awful, like murdering babies in their sleep or…
Or maybe she just slept with her best friend’s dad.
The door opened and she came out. Definitely not a baby killer—she hadn’t spent anywhere near enough time in the box. She practically skipped past, and Leah knew, if she could just manage to get the words out in the confessional, that she would feel lighter too.
“Bless me father, for I have sinned...”
Boy, have I sinned.
The darkness engulfed her and she heard the priest’s slow, even breathing through the screen. She knew it was probably Father Michael—he was the one who almost always took their confessions, but she wished it wasn’t him.
“My last confession was… um...” How long had it been? She couldn’t believe the things that had happened since then—it felt like a lifetime.
“Go on.” To her surprise, it was Father Patrick’s soft voice. She could picture him in his robe, balding gray head nodding. She could hear the smile in his voice. Well that was going change in just a minute, Leah thought with a grimace
“Father, I’ve done… I’ve really done some terrible things...” she admitted, twisting her hands in her lap. “Mortal sins. Lots of them. Really bad ones.”
There was a movement behind the screen, like he was sitting up straight in his chair. “Go on, my child.”
“I’ve… I’ve looked at dirty pictures, Father.” She decided to start at the beginning and work her way up.
“What do you mean?” His voice moved closer to the screen. “What kinds of dirty pictures?”
“Oh, Father.” She sighed. “All kinds. There were ones with men having sex with women in all sorts of ways, and ones with women having sex with other women...”
“How do you feel about looking at them, child?”
“I… guess… I feel guilty.”
“You don’t sound like you feel guilty.”
Leah sighed. He had her there. “Well… when I was looking at the pictures… the things I saw made me feel… funny.”
“Funny… how?” He shifted in his seat again.
She blushed, glad for the darkness. “Between my legs, Father. Down there.” He didn’t respond, and she went on. “And it felt soooo good… I couldn’t help it, Father. I had to touch myself.”
“You touched yourself… down there?” His voice got even lower than the normal confessional tone.
“Yes,” she admitted with a sigh. “I looked at those pictures, and then we watched the movies...”
“Movies?” he inquired. “Who is we?”
“Oh...” She swallowed. “My best friend and me. We found the pictures and the movies in… um… under her dad’s bed.”
“She watched them with you?”
“Yes, Father,” she said. “That’s another thing… we… we touched each other too.”
There was a long silence.
“Father?”
“Go on,” he urged, clearing his throat. “Tell me everything.”
“She had a machine… a toy… thing… it vibrates,” she continued, feeling her cheeks reddening. “You’re supposed to use it for wrinkles, I guess, on your face? But she showed me… how to rub it against… how to masturbate… with it...”
“Is that all?”
“No.” She lifted her hands to her cheeks to cool them. Now that she’d started, she couldn’t stop. “Not even close. Oh, Father, we were so bad...”
“How bad?” His voice was definitely closer now.
“The first time, I just played with the… the toy, and then I watched her do it… and we both… we both had orgasms. Watching the movies, where all the people were having sex and touching each other and...” She gasped for breath, remembering it and feeling the heat from her cheeks spreading through her whole body. Her nipples were hard and she felt an urgent tickle between her legs.
“Go on,” he insisted. “You should tell me everything.”
“Okay,” Leah agreed, closing her eyes. “The next day… we watched them again. This time there were two women who were kissing each other in the movie. They were kissing each other down there.”
Something like a soft moan came from behind the screen.
“And my friend… she said… she would do that to me… down there,” Leah went on. There was that moan again, and he whispered something, but she couldn’t hear it. “So I let her, Father. I let her put her tongue between my legs and lick me and lick me… oh Father, it’s so bad, I know, but it felt so good!”
Leah squeezed her thighs together, feeling a burning throb. The priest didn’t say anything, so she just kept talking.
“Then she asked if I would do it to her. Oh Father, I knew it was wrong… but she wanted it so much, and I knew how good it would make her feel… I couldn’t help it. I licked her until she… she had an orgasm too.”
Father Patrick took a deep breath. “Is that all?”
“Oh no, Father!” She leaned back against the wall. “I forgot to tell you… about her dad.”
“Your friend’s dad?” She heard the frown in his voice.
“Yes,” she said, remembering that first night. “I saw him… the first time we looked at the dirty pictures, I got up that night to go to the bathroom, and I saw him touching himself.”
“He was masturbating?”
“Yes, Father,” Leah confirmed. “He had his hand… wrapped around it… and he was pumping it in his fist… while he watched three people have sex...”
“Three?”
“Two women and a man,” she clarified. “The women were on top of each other, and the man was… putting his… penis… into both of them...”
“Both of them?”
“Not at the same time,” she added. “One after the other… first one… then the other...”
“Oh good Lord,” he breathed and then cleared his throat. “Good Lord, please hear this girl’s sins so she may be cleansed… go on, child...”
“I watched him… stroking himself like that...” Leah’s breath came faster in the dark. “And I touched myself too...”
“Did you have an… orgasm?”
“Yes,” she whispered. “Right when he did. I’d never seen a man… not a real one… there was stuff everywhere… all over his hand and his stomach...”
“Oh my child,” Father Patrick breathed. “This is all… so… very wicked...”
“Yes,” she agreed. “That’s why I had to come tell you, Father. I never meant for it to go so far, but I couldn’t seem to stop… I can’t seem to stop...”
“How far?” He leaned in again.
“Too far,” she admitted, blushing. “All the way too far...”
He was quiet and so was she. Then, he asked, “You’re no longer a virgin?”
“Father, you… don’t understand,” she breathed. “He’s so… he makes me feel so good. Just being around him. And I know he really likes me—I can tell.”
“What happened?”
Leah sighed. “He caught me looking at the dirty pictures and… and touching myself… ”
“What happened then?”
“I was embarrassed, but I could see that he was excited from watching me so I… well….”
“Well?” he prompted after a moment. She was too lost in her thoughts, remembering Mr. Nolan and the way he looked at her, like a drowning man.
She felt her body respond to just the memory. “I got down on my knees in front of him… and I told him… I wanted to make him feel good...”
Father Patrick groaned, not softly this time. “Did you?”
“Yes.”
“Did you give him your virginity?”
She shook her head, even though she knew he couldn’t see her. “Not that time. That time I only took him into my mouth.”
“You… what?”
“I… took him into my mouth and… I sucked it… until he came...” She didn’t know if he would know that word, but she was so distracted, and he didn’t ask for clarification. “He filled my mouth with all of his stuff… the stuff I’d seen shooting over his hand before… and I swallowed it all...”
“Oh,” Father Patrick breathed, and she heard him make a low noise, and there was some shuffling going on behind the screen.
“It was the next time I gave him my virginity,” she whispered. “I caught him again, just like before.”
“Did you… consider… perhaps you shouldn’t—?”
“Oh, Father, I know.” Leah nodded in the dark. “I knew it was wrong, but
I couldn’t help it. I wanted him so much. You don’t understand. I don’t understand.”
“It’s all right, child,” he soothed. “Tell me what happened. Tell me everything.”
“He was hard again,” she explained, closing her eyes and remembering, reliving it. “And he was stroking himself. Moaning and thrusting up into his hand. It made me so wet.”