Hadn't we waited long enough?
Later that morning I had a talk with Cindy. "Cindy, I am shocked at your behavior. Bart had every right to be enraged, even though I disapprove of the way he was so rough on that boy. I can understand his actions, but not yours. Any young man would have entered your room when you willingly opened your door and invited him in. Cindy, you have to promise not to do anything like that again. Once you are eighteen, you become your own boss--but until that day, and while you are under this roof, you will not play sex games with anyone here or anywhere else. Do you understand?"
Her blue eyes widened, took on the shine of forthcoming tears. "Momma, I don't live in the eighteenth century! All the girls are doing it! I held out much longer than most do, and from all I've heard about you . . . you went after men, too."
"Cindy!" I snapped sharply. "Don't you ever throw my past or present in my face! You don't know what I had to endure--while you have had nothing but happy days full of everything that was denied me."
"Happy days?" she asked bitterly. "Have you forgotten all the nasty, mean things Bart did to me? Maybe I wasn't locked up, starved or beaten, but I've had my problems, and don't think I haven't. Bart makes me feel so unsure about my femininity that I have to test all the boys I meet . . . I just can't help it."
We were at that time in her bedroom, while Bart was downstairs.
I stepped forward to take Cindy into my arms. "Don't cry, darling. I do understand how you must feel. But you must try to understand how parents feel about their daughters. Your father and I want only the best for you., We don't want you to be hurt. Let this experience with Lance teach you a lesson, and hold back until you are eighteen and able to reason with . . .more maturity. Hold out longer than that if you can. When you grab at sex too soon, it has a way of biting back and giving you exactly what you don't want. It did that to me, and I've heard you say a thousand times you want a stage and film career, and husbands and babies have to wait. Many a girl has been thwarted by a baby that started because of
uncontrollable passion. Be careful before committing yourself to anyone. Don't fall in love too soon, for when you do you make yourself vulnerable to so many unforeseen events. Give romance a try without sex, Cindy, and save yourself all the pain of giving too much too soon."
Her arms were tight about me, her eyes turned soft and told me we were again mother and daughter.
Later Cindy and I stood side by side downstairs, watching everything whiten with snow, grow misty with distance, cruelly isolating us even more from the rest of the world. "Now all roads from Charlottesville will be blocked," I said tonelessly to Cindy. "What's more, Melodie is acting so strangely she makes me fear for the good health of her child. Jory's staying in his room as if he doesn't want to encounter her, or any of us. Bart saunters around like he owns all of us as well as the house. Oh, I wish Chris were here. I hate it when he's gone."
I turned to find Cindy staring at me with a kind of wonderment. She flushed when she met my eyes. When I asked why, she murmured, "I just wonder sometimes how the two of you hang on to what you have, when I fall in and out of love so often. Momma, someday you've got to tell me how to make a man really love me, and not just my bo
dy. I wish boys would look first into my eyes like Daddy looks into yours; I wish they'd look at my face at least once in a while, for it's not an ugly face, but they all stare at my boobs. I wish their eyes would follow me around like Jory's follow Melodie . . ."
Cindy put her arm around me and buried her face against my shoulder. "I'm so sorry, Momma, really so sorry I caused all that trouble last night. Thank you for not scolding me more than you did. I've been thinking about what you said, and you're right. Lance has paid a heavy price, and I should have known better." Pleadingly she gazed into my eyes. "Momma, I was serious, all the girls at school started way back when they were eleven, twelve and thirteen, and I love Lance. And I held back, although all the boys chased after me more than they did the others. The girls thought I was doing it when I wasn't. I pretended to be really with it, but then one day I heard some boys comparing notes and they were all saying they hadn't scored all the way with me. They talked as if I were some kind of freak--or maybe a lesbian. That's when I decided I'd let Lance have his way this Christmas. The special gift I had for him."
I stared at her hard, wondering if she told all the truth, as she went on to tell me she was the only girl in her group to hold out until sixteen, and that was really old for a girl in today's world. "Please don't be ashamed, for if you are, then I'll be. I've wanted to do it since I was twelve but held back because of what you said. But you've got to understand that what I did with Lance wasn't casual. I love him. And for a while, before you and Bart came in . . . it felt . . . felt . . . so good."
What could I say now?
I had my own willful youth clearly tucked in a memory closet, ready to jump forward and put the vision of Paul before me . . . and the way I'd wanted him to teach me all the ways of love, especially when my first experience with sex had been so devastating, filling me with the kind of guilt that even now I could cry to look up at the moon that had seen Chris's sin, and mine.
About six Chris called to say he'd been trying to reach me all day but the lines had been down. "You'll be seeing me Christmas Eve," he said cheerfully. "I've hired a snowplow to precede me to the Hall, and I'll be right behind. How are things going?"
"Fine, just fine," I lied, telling him Lance's father had fallen down the stairs and he had to fly home immediately. Then I rattled on and on, saying we were all set for Christmas, gifts wrapped, tree up, but Melodie was, as usual, clinging to her rooms as if they offered her the only sanctuary in the world.
"Cathy," said Chris in a tight voice, "how nice it would be if you'd only level with me on occasion. Lance didn't fly home. All the planes are grounded. Lance is, at this moment, not ten feet away from this very phone booth. He came to me and confessed everything. I took care of his broken nose, his other wounds, and cursed Bart all the time. That boy is a mess."
Early the next morning, we heard on the radio that all roads to the village and the nearest city were snowed under. Travelers were warned to stay home. We kept the radio on all day, listening to the weathermen who seemed to control our lives. "Never before has there been a winter more dramatic than this one," went the singsong male voice, extolling the virtues of weather. "Records are being broken . . ."
Hour by miserable hour Cindy and I stood at the windows, with Jory often joining us to stare as we did at the snow coming down with relentless determination to isolate us.
Behind my eyes I saw the four of us, locked in that room, whispering about Santa Claus and telling the twins that surely he would find us. Chris had written him a letter. Oh, the pity of those little twins waking up on Christmas morning, not even
remembering the good times that had gone on before.
Hearing Jory cough brought me back to the present. Every few minutes Jory suffered through paroxysms of racking coughs. I glanced at him fearfully.
Soon he was heading his chair for his room, saying he could put himself back into bed. I wanted to go with him but knew he wanted to do all he could for himself.
"I'm beginning to hate this place," grumbled Cindy. "Now Jory's got a cold. That's why I brought Lance home with me, knowing it would be this. I was hoping every night we'd have a party, and being slightly drunk would take away the pall of living under the shadows of Bart and that creepy old Joel. I was expecting Lance to keep me happy while I was here. Now I've got no one but you, Momma. Jory seems so aloof and alone, and he thinks I'm too young to understand his problems. Melodie never says anything to me, or anybody. Bart stalks around like the grim reaper--and that old man sends shivers up my spine. We don't have any friends. No one ever calls unexpectedly. We're all alone, getting on each other's nerves. And it's Christmas. I'm looking forward to that ball Bart says he's throwing. At least that would give me the chance to meet some people and brush off the moss I feel creeping up my legs."
Suddenly Bart was there, yelling at Cindy. "You don't have to stay. You're just the bastard my mother had to have."
Cindy blushed deeply red. "Are you trying to hurt me again, jerk? You can't hurt me now! I'm through with that!"
"Don't you ever call me jerk again, bastard!"
"CREEP, JERK, CREEP, JERK!" she taunted, backing up and dodging behind chairs and tables, deliberately baiting him to give chase, and in this way, give her dull day a bit of excitement.