None of us spoke. Cathy’s eyes were big with fear. Momma realized it right away. She had gone too far.
“But I haven’t had that dream for years and years, and when your father came into my life, he washed away the sadness,” she said quickly, with her beautiful smile born out of the memories she obviously cherished.
Cathy’s face softened and then grew sad again. “He’s gone, too,” she whispered. I decided to pretend I didn’t hear her.
Afterward, to lift the gloom and doom, I suggested to Cathy that we take on a big job: teaching the twins to read and write. At first, I didn’t think she would be interested, but she was, and she was good at finding ways to overcome their resistance and make learning fun. One night, I told her how proud of her I was. The twins were asleep, exhausted from their lessons and their playtime, which Cathy ran like a school monitor and then followed with more lessons. I slipped onto the bed beside her. She opened her eyes with surprise.
“You were wonderful today,” I whispered. “I watched you. You were so into it.”
“What else is there to do?” she replied bitterly.
“It’s going to get better . . . soon,” I said.
She put her fingers on my lips. “No more promises, Christopher. I’m tired of promises. It’s like waiting for rain in a drought.”
“We’re going to get through it,” I said. “You’ll see. That’s not a promise. It’s a prediction.”
She smiled. I was just realizing how cute a smile she had. It had something of Daddy in it but more Momma’s lips. I leaned forward and kissed her on the forehead. As I drew back to return to Cory’s and my bed, she grabbed my wrist and then, to my surprise, kissed me quickly on the lips the way Momma often did. The instant she had done it, she turned quickly. I lay there a few moments more. I could see the graceful turn in her neck to her shoulder. I wanted to touch it, but I retreated.
That night, I woke during a seminal night loss that lasted so long it actually frightened me for a moment. Right before it happened, I had dreamed of touching Cathy in her private places, pretending I was explaining things to her like some health education teacher. In my dream, she saw what was happening to me as a result and then decided she should be able to touch me, too.
And that’s when it happened.
Kane put the diary down beside him and stared up at the ceiling. Then he turned to me slowly. I saw a deeply serious look of yearning in his eyes.
“What?” I whispered.
“Last night, I had a wet dream, what he calls ‘seminal loss’ . . . thinking of you. It was almost an identical dream.”
I did not know how something you heard could embarrass you and yet fascinate and excite you at the same time, but that was exactly what his revelation did. My close girlfriends and I trusted one another with confessions about our sexuality. Sometimes we told things to one another simply to confirm that our experience was normal. I know that for most of the girls, it was easier to tell one another these things than it was to tell their mothers or even their older sisters. They wanted to disclose their secrets to someone who wouldn’t impose any judgments. None of us would be critical or make fun of one of us for what she had told us.
But I couldn’t remember any of my girlfriends ever telling something as personal as this that her boyfriend had revealed to her. Even Suzette had nothing like this to tell us. Of course, Kane would trust that I would never tell any of them what he had said. I don’t know whether he expected to hear something similar from me, but I did feel that I should give him something to show him that I had as much trust in him as he had in me.
“I fantasize about you, too,” I said.
He smiled, and then we kissed. “Maybe we should live our fantasies,” he whispered, his lips so close to my ear that it felt like his words caressed me. “What was your fantasy?”
I hesitated.
“If you can’t tell me, who could you tell?”
“Maybe I should tell no one.”
“Okay. Don’t tell me. Show me,” he said.
Just the idea brought a flush into my face. I started to shake my head, but he leaned forward quickly and kissed me.
Then he said, “Please.”
My two voices that usually argued didn’t even begin. A wave of delicious warmth rose up my legs, consuming me in a rush of desire just like I had experienced in my fantasy, desire that had awakened me to the sound of my own moans of pleasure. And just like in my fantasy, my fingers moved to the buttons of my blouse. As I began to undress, Kane lay back on the pillow and watched. I saw his lips tremble when I unfastened my bra and then began to undo the belt on my jeans. As I lowered them, he put the diary down.
“What did I do in this fantasy?” he asked, sounding fragile, almost helpless.
“You just watched,” I said. “To prove to me that you could control yourself.”
His eyes widened when I stepped out of my panties. “That’s cruel,” he said. It looked like tears had come into his eyes.
I smiled and lay beside him again. “Just kiss me,” I said.