“You’re a real discovery and a wonderful surprise in every way,” he said, and then returned to his Town Car. I watched it drive off. He waved before it disappeared around a turn.
I couldn’t help feeling wonderful, even though I knew Evan was somewhat disappointed. I thought I had handled myself like a lady, a mature lady. It was as if I had passed some test I had created for myself. Roxy wouldn’t have been as successful at the dinner when she was my age, I thought. Was it wrong for me to feel so confident now? So superior? Would I suffer for it somehow?
I looked up at the lights on the buildings and the skyline and smiled. I can’t help it, I thought. I’m pleased with myself.
Both Mama and Papa were up and waiting when I entered. I was in such a dazed state for a few moments that I didn’t see them sitting there.
“Emmie?” Mama said.
“Oh.”
“So?” Mama asked. “How was your evening?”
“I don’t know where to begin,” I said, and then just did. I described the apartment, the views, and the formal dinner. I told them I was asked to taste the wine and then related the way I explained how to do it, the way Mama had taught me. I said nothing about going into Evan’s room, of course, but I finished by telling them about the reason for the champagne toast.
Papa wanted to know all about that, but Mama was impatient to hear more about the apartment and how the women were dressed.
“You don’t sound as if you like his mother and her friend that much,” she said when I finished my description of Evan’s mother and Mrs. Vincent. I thought my mother could sense everything going on in my body and my mind, no matter how small or insig
nificant the change was. She was attuned to every little gesture or inflection in my voice. Sometimes I thought she could pick up my thoughts even before I thought them.
“Well, Evan warned me they were snobby,” I said.
“Congress, huh?” Papa said as if he had heard nothing else. “Well, this is the best year to run against an incumbent. He might win.”
“Evan’s father knew about your company, Papa.”
“Oh? Well, why shouldn’t he? We’re pretty big and growing bigger every day,” he said proudly.
I thought this was a good time to mention Evan’s coming around to take me to lunch and a walk in Central Park.
“Now, don’t go neglecting your schoolwork over some school romance,” Papa warned.
“I don’t think you have to warn her about her schoolwork,” Mama said.
He gave his usual grunt. “Let’s go to sleep,” he said, standing.
That was easier said than done, at least for me. I lay there for hours reviewing the night and my feelings for Evan. I don’t think anyone had to be a fortune teller to see that our feelings for each other were going to get intense. A part of me had wanted to give in to his advances in his room, but the rest of me had held back. That resistance was bound to grow weaker as time went by and we spent more and more of it only with each other. Was that a bad thing or just what should naturally happen? It excited me to think about it.
But it was exactly when I thought these thoughts, titillating myself with the sexual possibilities, that Roxy came to mind. She would always loom there beside and above me. Could I end up becoming like her? Could I be fast and loose with myself and maybe more sexually active than other girls my age? I had an older sister whom my father called nothing more than a glorified prostitute.
I had no doubts about many of the girls I knew. For them, virginity was always a burden. It was as if once you got over it, you were free in more ways than one. You broke the ties that chained you to your childhood, the ties that kept you from being taken seriously as a young woman. In their way of thinking, if you didn’t do this, you had no right to speak. You hadn’t paid your dues, and you weren’t in the club. I could see this in the way the more sexually experienced girls talked and looked at the less experienced.
Would I guard my virginity because I thought that was right to do or because I was afraid of what would come afterward, afraid of what sort of woman I would become? Was it wrong to think of myself as someone special, and was it naive to believe that if Evan thought so, too, he would respect me and not want me to be just another girl in the pack? How long could our relationship last?
Of course, there were high school sweethearts who went on to get married. I didn’t know anything about statistics, but it seemed to me that most of those relationships didn’t last. One or the other was always wondering if he or she had missed out. I imagined one might even come to resent the other for trapping him or her.
I had no illusions about myself and Evan. It was very possible that we could have a high school romance that would last for years, but when he left high school, he would meet other girls, and I would meet other boys. Was it possible in today’s young persons’ world to have a romance that wasn’t completely intimate? Now that I thought about it, would a boy, especially a boy like Evan who was so good-looking and popular, tolerate that? I liked him. I really liked him, but deep inside, I knew that he probably wouldn’t be that tolerant. I knew that if we didn’t become intimate, he would move on, and other girls would look at me as being the dumb one, not him. That was just the way it was.
Whatever I eventually did, however, I wouldn’t do it simply to please others and fit in. I really didn’t care about their opinions of me. Girls who worried about belonging and being accepted were very insecure, I thought. They were girls like Chastity, and in the end, they would be very unhappy no matter what they decided or did. I was sure of that, but all of my brilliant thinking didn’t keep me from falling asleep with confusion. I was almost as afraid of tomorrow as I was excited about it.
I tried to do as much of my schoolwork as I could in the morning, but at around ten, Chastity called to ask me how my dinner was. She sounded different—calmer and more accepting of my relationship with Evan. She even sounded excited for me and very interested in all I described.
“You never explained how to drink wine when I was at your house for dinner,” she whined when I told her about that, however. “As I remember, your father didn’t let your mother serve us.”
“He wasn’t sure your parents would approve.”
“Well, we could do it ourselves, drink wine, and you could show me, okay?” she asked.