Page 76 - WTP Vol.X#1

Act Two (continued from page 44)
curiosity about sexuality slightly freer rein. As I sat at my wooden desk in my darkened room, angling my tensor light directly on Donne’s “To His Mistress Going to Bed,” I read his frank plea to his girlfriend: “Licence my roving hands, and let them go/Before, behind, between, above, below.” I grinned, letting my imagination dwell on the almost unimaginable excitement of a man’s palm caressing my shapely breasts, about the only part of my body I felt proud of, and further down. Oh God, I thought, how good would that feel!
~
Perhaps I needed the outlet of verse for my con- fused feeling about sex that fall. Joe Starshak often came by to scrounge tea and chat in the clever pat- ter he and I had picked up in Oxford. I warmed to the verbal wit and unaccustomed attention from a man. One afternoon in November I heard a strong knock on my door and Joe strode into the center of my room, his raincoat dripping. “Any chance of tea?” he asked, unwrapping his striped Magdalen scarf. I hung his wet things on my pegged hat stand, excited that he’d come—and trying to figure out how to behave. While I put the kettle on, Joe slid into my orange chair and leaned toward the small warmth of my gas heater where tiny flames glowed behind
a shiny metallic grill. Hunching his right thigh up, he dug into his pants pocket for a few shilling coins, stretched his long arms forward and dropped the change into a slot on the side.
Glancing at him, I wondered how a guy felt when he moved his thing around, even so slightly. Did it feel good? Was Joe even aware of it—as aware as I was at that moment? I felt a stab of desire, so quick it startled me.
“Thanks,” I said trying to distract myself from the buzz I felt down there—because I didn’t know what to do with it. “That’ll keep us warmish. For a few hours.” Like a parking meter, the gas fire would only last a while before we had to feed it shillings again.
“This would never get us through a Chicago winter,” Joe said. He spun a chocolate cookie like a coin on the black trunk I used as a coffee table. I walked over to the tall window and swung the red woolen curtains shut against the early November dark, wondering why he had come, still feeling a yearning in my hol- low place. In a chair next to his, I ran my thumb along my corduroy pants and made clever remarks. All the while I watched myself chatting, not sure how to fit myself into this unfamiliar scene, unable to figure
out what Joe was thinking or feeling, afraid to probe. When he asked about my studies, I resurfaced.
“I’ve been strolling about with seventeenth century wits. Donne and that lot.”
“Ah ha! Poems about guys undressing their girl- friends.”
“In verse. Though come to think of it, Donne’s wife was a teen when he married her.”
“About time too, no doubt.”
I giggled and lit a cheap Players cigarette. It was fun to trade these slightly sexy comments—all in the safe confines of talk about poetry. Mrs. Bed had got me used to doing this. The fire was warm, the man intriguing. He had wanted to see me. I gradu- ally loosened up; or rather, allowed myself to get hyped up, depending on my pleasant low voice and quick wit to keep him interested. Tempted to touch him casually, my hand jerked toward him but I was afraid to put my scaly fingers on his arm. Would he squirm away from it, maybe even betray disgust?
I hid it underneath my thigh, forcing my thoughts up to our idle chat. We talked about booking plane flights home to Philly and Chicago for Christmas. He told me he’d heard about a cheap rate avail- able to members of some club in Oxford. “I’ll snoop around for you,” he said, brushing cookie crumbs off his gray Fair Isle sweater. “See how you can join this crew.”
“That’d be nice.” I could count on my dad for a ticket. His work as a lawyer provided the funds to pay for my Oxford education after all. I didn’t need to worry about money—a fact which made me feel lucky and safe. But it surprised me that Joe had made the sort of small gesture I’d take for granted in a woman friend. I’d have to get used to kindness in a man.
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