Chapter 14: Moments
by Emmet
But compartmentalizing. Essential for day to day. Separating attraction from self, from the classroom. Except this became the class I cared about, got through the others, lived for fourth period, but could not stare, could not gaze. A decade of experience teaching through all conditions held me in good stead, helped keep me professional. Teacher as objective actor.
Thinking about Grace would make me smile, and I was happy. I saw her at most for an hour a day, in a classroom filled with other people, but the bond was there, invisible to the naked eye, and it was enough.
But it couldn’t be enough for long, could it? Because with romantic affection comes desires. Physical, certainly, but emotional as well, the need to be alone together. Wanted more. More time, more space, more Grace. Wanted to eat dinner with her, see movies, plays, discuss literature without the interruption of other students expressing their important but really irrelevant opinions.
And I wanted to walk down the street holding her hand, put my arm around her, kiss those full lips, run my fingers through that soft auburn hair, lift it above her neck and watch it fall smoothly back around her shoulders, kiss her throat, those lonely eyes, kiss warmth into them, and embrace her, fully, tightly, hold her close against me, feel her curves against me. Love her. Be loved by her.
But even thinking about it, now, how could it appear as anything other than something bordering on the criminal? I write these words, I know I was attracted to Grace on many levels, physically as well as emotionally, and that disturbed me as much as my feelings for Grace made me happy. That moment in the car, the moments in the classroom, all moments. How long is a moment? A moment isn’t enough when you are always wanting more time.
And how could Grace possibly understand or even match my feelings? A crush, a crush that she knew was returned, but it was a romance that couldn’t follow the course of mutual affection that adult relationships travel, or what has come to be the normal course today. I thought of literary romances of the past, romances that were carried on for years, affairs of the heart and longing looks, but never sex – the societal taboos were too strong. The virtue Lily retained in House of Mirth, the professionalism between butler Stevens and housekeeper Miss Kenton in The Remains of the Day. Lin Kong and Manna Wu of Waiting, protagonists who maintained a love affair in Communist China for over two decades without ever touching. They do, ultimately marry (and touch only then), but the passion is brittle, and fragile. Lily dies a pauper without loving Lawrence, and duty-obsessed Stevens pursues too late his feelings of love, and lives a life alone. Perhaps the past and literature are not the best models for me.
There was not a way this could look right, for me, for us, from the outside. Because I was her teacher. Because she was a teenager, just seventeen, if you know what I mean, so the song goes, everyone does, wink-wink. And no matter what I say, it would sound like an excuse, even to my ears, certainly to my ears. With Grace, it wasn’t about sex, it wasn’t about getting a nubile innocent, impressionable teenager into bed. I never could have casual sexual relationships. One-night stands. That brief affair with K, where I fell hard, and she left me after a few weeks, showed me. I couldn’t just sleep with someone without loving them, without really knowing them. Which may be unusual, but for me, with sex there is an emotional attachment, an emotional involvement. To be that close to someone, that exposed, that vulnerable, is not something I can slip into lightly. Giving and receiving pleasure, the ultimate exposure; trust was essential, and you cannot have trust with someone you don’t know well.
I could carry on with Chris even after we had ended our romantic liaison because we trusted each other implicitly. Neither of us had someone else then, and the physical affection was an antidote to loneliness. But I couldn’t keep on that way when I knew she was with someone. Maybe it was the intensity of the emotional connection that enabled me to remain attracted to yet distant from Grace for so long. Of course I knew, part of me knew, that couldn’t last forever, that when there are dangling attractions, they cannot remain suspended indefinitely when those involved want them to connect.
I had convinced myself, then, that all our interactions were above board. After all, nothing really did happen in the car. I told her Chris was an ex-girlfriend, that was that. We enjoyed each other’s company, that was that. If the air around us felt charged, to me, sometimes, that was that. Nothing further would happen. I was her teacher, that was that.
It is amazing how easily and fully one can deceive oneself when the desire to do so is there.
And how quickly actions become a routine. This is what we do.
A minute or two before class time, Wednesday evening Gay/Straight Alliance meetings, weekly creative writing discussions, daily class. A pattern of acceptable moments.