"I just am," I said. He nodded, smirked again, and went up to his workshop.
After breakfast on Saturday morning, Uncle Jacob had the nerve to ask me if my working on the weekend meant Kenneth was paying me time and a half.
"Yes, he is," I said.
"Good. Don't forget to put half of the overtime as well in the pot," he ordered.
"I'm sure if I did forget, you'd be the first to remind me," I said brazenly, knowing I was sure to get a lecture.
"You're old enough to know responsibility and obligations," he replied. "Your mother never had an inkling of what those words meant and that was because everyone spoiled her. Spare the rod and you spoil the child," he recited.
"I am not a child," I fired back, but he didn't retreat an inch.
"Kids today don't grow up as fast as we had to grow up. They're given too much and don't have to give back much in return. It's gettin' harder and harder for me to find anyone under forty who wants to do a day's work. They all-think it's just going to come to them," he declared.
"Yes," I said dryly. "I'm the living proof of a spoiled person."
He blinked, twisted his lips, and then shoved his pipe into his mouth, grumbling to himself.
I recalled how Kenneth had called him a moral horse's ass. It brought a smile to my lips.
"What's so funny?" he demanded.
"What? Oh, nothing," I said as I hurried out, praying harder for the day Kenneth would suddenly turn to me and say, "Come live with me and be my love."
He was already waiting for me. I hadn't heard him drive up, but it cheered my heart to see him there early. He was just as anxious to be with me as I was with him, I thought, and got into the jeep. We sped off and I saw there was something different on Kenneth's mind, some new excitement painting itself on his beautiful face.
"What are we going to do today?"
"We're moving ahead," he said. "I've completed the first stage and now I want to get into the meat of it." He glanced at me. "Neptune's daughter is coming up higher and revealing more of herself as she emerges out of the sea. She's filling out the female form."
I knew what he meant and it filled me with so much excitement I could barely breathe. I sat back, my heart thumping, the wind blowing my hair. Was I ready? Yes, I thought, I was ready. Almost overnight, I had grown up. I was ready to shed my innocence and share myself with Kenneth.
Ulysses barked because I had been ignoring him. I' laughed and gave him a quick hug as we drove onto the dune road and Kenneth's studio.
The studio looked different to me this morning, perhaps because of what I knew was about to occur. It seemed darker, the shades drawn lower on the windows. As soon as we stepped through the door, Kenneth did something he had never done before, he locked the door behind us. His eyes shifted guiltily away when he saw my surprise.
"I'm too far into this to bear even the smallest interruptions," he explained. Since we had never been interrupted before, I didn't think much of his reason, but I smiled and nodded anyway.
He went to the model of the wave and studied it intently, his hands on his hips and his right hand stroking his beard as he continued to think and envision.
"Okay," he finally declared. "Here's what I want. Undress to your waist, take your usual position, and then come up until you're exposed up to here," he said drawing an imaginary line just above his stomach. Got it?"
I nodded. He returned to his easel and waited as I went around the wave and pulled off my sweat shirt. I hesitated a moment, my fingers actually trembling so badly I couldn't get them to undo the fastener on my bra. Finally, it was unfastened and I slipped the bra down my arms.
I had studied myself often in the mirror in my room, anticipating this moment. Mommy used to say I was a late bloomer, but that when I bloomed, I would bloom fast. I imagined it had been that way with her and that was why she knew. When I was fourteen, I barely had the bumps on my chest May now had. I thought I would never develop the curves and figure Mommy had.
And then, suddenly, between the ages of fifteen and sixteen, I began to develop quickly, finding a change in my body each succeeding day. I once went to Mommy and cried, p
leading with her to get me to a doctor, afraid that my breasts would never stop growing. She just laughed and told me not to worry; they would stop growing eventually, and in the meantime I should learn to enjoy all the attention they brought me. I tried to do as Mommy suggested, but it was hard to enjoy yourself when you felt as if an alien had taken over your body.
Soon though, I did gain self-confidence. The boys no longer teased me about being flat as a board and instead took long looks at me and began spending more time trying to win my attention.
But now, I couldn't help thinking of all the beautiful, mature women Kenneth had seen naked. I was terrified that he would gaze at me and think of me as just a teenager and not a young woman. Cary had been in awe of my body, but was I shapely enough for a man like Kenneth? Would he gaze at me naked before him and think he had made a big mistake in asking me to model for him? What if I was not the budding beauty he envisioned?
All the while I was trying to gather up my courage, to calm my trembling limbs, Kenneth was preoccupied with his preparations and never noticed my shyness and fears.
"Ready," he called.