“Okay,” he said. “I’m handing out your papers. They represent almost half of your semester final mark. Let’s hope you gave your best efforts.” Campus wisdom thrummed with the rarity of an A from Mr. Gardiner, much less an A+.
He took a stack of papers from his briefcase and walked into the first aisle. The perfectly aligned pile he carried reminded her of his damned organization skills. Each of their rendezvous had been timed to the minute, with precise snacks laid out in the borrowed apartment. Two glasses for the half split of wine and a plate with crackers, cheese, and grapes always appeared, as though an assignation ma?tre d’ had arranged their trysts.
Only the first time did she ask why they were meeting at his mythical friend’s house and not at his apartment—though the question tortured her every time she arrived at the anonymous Jane Street apartment in Greenwich Village.
“Since your wife moved out, why don’t we go there?” she’d asked.
A pained expression covered his face. Rob shook his head as though ridding himself of memories. “Ah, bringing you to where I lived with . . . it would seem wrong. Iniquitous.” He breathed out the sigh of a million beleaguered men. “But if going there is so important . . .” His sentence trailed off in an implication of the pain and humiliation such a request would engender. Oh, but he would bring her to his home if forced.
Phoebe now faced the realization that he’d likely never left his wife.
She was third in line to receive her paper.
Abrams.
Abrams earned a soft “Excellent.”
Ahern.
Rob returned Ahern’s paper with a raised eyebrow and a clipped question as to Ahern’s interest in pursuing legibility lessons or, barring that, would he consider the purchase of a typewriter?
Beckett.
He placed Phoebe’s paper on the desk. “Good work, Miss Beckett.” A stoplight red A+ screamed from the title page. Underneath the grade he wrote a comment in his sophisticated half-cursive, half-printed handwriting: “Excellent analysis. You understand all the inherent problems. You’ll go far.”
Rob had nailed one thing in his comments. Phoebe understood. She finally understood.
? ? ?
Phoebe paced the nap off the rug waiting to be with Jake the following weekend. While he hadn’t been absent from her life, she’d avoided being close, claiming anything from exams to clusters of migraines to avoid being alone. They’d been as intimate as always, which meant staying above her beltline and his, but as infrequently as she could manage.
Now, as her waistline expanded, her mother scrutinized her morning till night. Now, when being thin meant so much, food beckoned like water in the desert. All week she’d forced herself to be calm until Sunday, when she found her moment.
As everyone readied to leave for a bris out in Hempstead, Long Island, hosted by her aunt Ruth, Phoebe feigned a migraine—one requiring cold cloths and hot tea. When Jake showed up at the house in his suit and tie, her impatient-to-leave mother sent him up to her bedroom.
There she lay, freshly showered, dusted in Cashmere Bouquet talcum powder, wearing a black silk slip as though about to be covered by her dress, with the sheet arranged around her almost bare shoulders.
He knocked on the open bedroom door. “Your mom sent me up to get you.”
Phoebe imagined them all waiting at the foot of the stairs, her mother’s arms crossed impatiently over her emerald-green dress, the one she rotated with her cornflower-blue shift for afternoon occasions.
“My head is pounding,” she said. “Driving would kill me, but I don’t want to keep you from going.”
“And miss witnessing someone snip your cousin’s son’s schlong? I can manage. I’ll study and be your nurse, okay, princess?”
She lay on her side in a boudoir pose, the thin covers draped just so, crossing her arms to make cleavage with her hormone-inflated breasts.
Jake brushed his fingers over her arm, lightly, but with intent. “I’ll get my books.”
“Tell my parents you’re staying with me.”
Phoebe shut her eyes when he left, trying not to cry. Sounds floated up. The front door closed. Her father started up the car. The front door opened. Footsteps came closer.
Tears flooded her cheeks.
“Pheebs? Honey? What’s wrong?” He stood in the doorway. “Should I stop your parents? Do you need your mother?”
“No. No. Just you.” She wiped her tears. “I only need you, Jake.”
He lay beside her, stroked the swell of her hip, the curves of her body, first slowly and then with rushing intent.
As though enchanted, her body responded. She wondered if it was wonderful or awful how she had turned from Rob with such speed.
Who cared? Rescue beckoned.
She matched Jake, bone for bone, skin to skin. Made for each other. Whereas with Rob she had watched her every move, needing to prove her worth, with Jake she became unconstrained until she understood Helen’s wide-eyed chatter about orgasms. Phoebe thought her best friend had been exaggerating when she described in embarrassing detail the wonder of sex.
Rob’s touch brought pleasure, but perhaps she’d been more excited by the idea of someone like Rob than by the actual Rob.
With Rob, she sighed.
Jake made her scream.
Afterward, he didn’t question the lack of blood. Jake understood tampons and afternoons at Catskill hotels spent horseback riding. He cradled her as though holding a crystal doll, stroking her back with a steady, soothing hand.
“How’s your headache, Pheebs?”
“Better.”
“Are you okay otherwise?” Jake tucked his head a bit, gesturing “down there.”
She cupped his rough chin. “I’m quite fine.”
“So what’s with all the jokes about ‘Not tonight, I have a headache’? Seems like we found a miracle cure.”
“You’re my miracle.” Truth, she now knew.
“I love you, Phoebe.” Jake appeared astounded at his luck; the warmth she showed after a season of remoteness. “I’ll always take care of you.”
“You’re too good to me.” She bit her knuckle, willing to rip her flesh to keep from crying.
“You make me whole. I need you by my side. You balance me. Forever, right?”
“Forever,” she repeated.
“Consider this my unofficial proposal, Pheebs. You won’t believe what will follow. I swear I’ll make this place seem like a pauper’s house.”
After the awful things she’d done, Jake would save her. Phoebe swore to God she’d never hurt him again for as long as she lived.
CHAPTER 5
Phoebe
Jake and Phoebe spent every night together, most often driving to Jones Beach on Long Island, the most secluded place in their universe. Phoebe didn’t believe that Jake had come to her a virgin, but his intoxication with her was obvious. In an unfortunate moment of introspection, she connected the dots between Jake, her, and Rob. The truth resembled an analogy from a comparative literature paper.
Phoebe was to Jake as Rob was to Phoebe.