“Mr. Chapman!” Shelley had shrieked excitedly as she rushed toward him.
He was as caught up in the enthusiasm of the victory as anyone. Without thinking, he clasped his arms around her waist, lifted her off the floor, and whirled her round and round, their laughter filling the small confines of the office.
When he set her back on her feet, he paused a moment too long in releasing her. When his arms should have fallen to his sides immediately, he hesitated and they remained locked behind her back. The moment was unpredictable, possibly unfortunate, certainly unplanned. That one heartbeat in time was both her death and her birth. For in that moment, Shelley was forever changed.
Astonishment choked off laughter. Silence, except for the dull roar coming through the walls from the gym, reigned. Their hearts seemed to pulse together. She could feel the pounding of his through her sweater with its stiff felt “PV” appliquéd in the center. The hard muscles of his thighs pressed against her legs, bare beneath her short wool skirt. One of his hands stayed at her waist while the other opened wide and firm over the middle of her back. Their breath intermingled as his face lowered imperceptibly.
They stood frozen, staring at each other in mute wonder. He tilted his head to one side, as though he had just been struck between the eyes and couldn’t quite figure out yet what had hit him.
Then swiftly, almost as if just realizing the precariousness of their situation, he ducked his head.
His mouth touched hers, sweetly, sweetly. It lingered. Pressed. It parted her lips. Then the tip of his tongue touched hers. Sizzling electricity jolted through both of them.
He released her with jarring abruptness and stepped away. He saw the mortified tears spring into her frightened eyes and his heart twisted with self-loathing. “Shelley—”
She fled.
The banner was still tucked under her arm when she ran headlong out of the gymnasium to her family’s car. When her worried parents found her huddled in the backseat a half hour later, she told them she had become ill and had had to leave.
“I terrified you that night,” Grant said now. He didn’t touch her, though his hand lay close to hers on the table-top. If he were to lift his little finger and move it a hair’s breadth, he would be touching her.
“Yes, you did.” Her voice had deserted her. She could barely croak. “I told my parents I was sick and stayed in bed for three days during Christmas vacation.” She tried to smile but found that when she did, her lips trembled.
She had lain in her bed, confused and distressed, wondering why her breasts throbbed each time she remembered the way Mr. Chapman’s lips felt against hers. Why, when her boyfriend’s anxious groping had never done anything except irritate her, had she longed to feel Mr. Chapman’s hands on he
r everywhere. Stroking. Petting. Closing over her breasts. Touching their crests. Kissing them. She had wept with shame, huge, scalding tears that were absorbed by her pillow.
“You weren’t the only one who was terrified. You scared the hell out of me,” Grant said quietly. Shelley looked at him in bewilderment. He laughed without humor. “Can you imagine what a community the size of Poshman Valley would have done to a teacher seen kissing one of his students? I would have been lucky to die quickly. Thank God no one saw us that night. For your sake more than mine. I could leave. You couldn’t.”
“You left right after that.” She had dreaded going back to school after that holiday. How would she face him? But she had learned before the first class convened that Mr. Chapman would no longer be teaching at Poshman Valley. He had resigned to accept a post as a congressional aide in Washington, D.C. Everyone had known that he was marking time teaching until he could go to the capital, but everyone was surprised that he had left so suddenly.
“Yes. I went to Oklahoma City over the holiday and pestered my contacts until one of them finally lined me up a job. I couldn’t go back to the high school.”
“Why?”
He pierced her with his moss-colored eyes. His voice was quiet and intense when he spoke. “You may have been an innocent then, Shelley, but you aren’t now. You know why I had to leave. That kiss was far from fraternal. It had never occurred to me to touch you like that, much less to kiss you. Please believe that. I hadn’t harbored any lecherous thoughts about you or any student. But once I held you in my arms, something happened. You were no longer a student of mine, but a desirable woman. I doubt I would have ever been able to treat you as a schoolgirl again.”
She thought the pressure in her chest might very well kill her. Yet she lived long enough to hear him ask, “Are you finished? More coffee?”
“Yes. I mean yes, I’m finished, and no thank you. No more.”
“Let’s go.”
He stood and held her chair for her. She rose quickly, careful not to touch him.
“Whew,” he said, pushing open the heavy, brass-studded door and escorting her outside. “Fresh air.”
“Hello, Mr. Chapman.”
A coed paused to speak to him as she entered the restaurant with three other girls. Her eyelashes were heavy with mascara; her mouth, glossed with vermilion, was wide and full; her hair was layered and permed to give a tousled effect. Shelley wondered if the girl had been welded into her jeans, for surely no zipper would stand that much strain. Her generous breasts were un-confined by a bra beneath her crocheted sweater.
“Hello, Miss …”
“Zimmerman. Monday-Wednesday-Friday, two o’clock class. I certainly enjoyed your lecture yesterday,” she cooed. “I’ve checked out some of the books you recommended from the library.”
“But have you read them?”
The girl blinked dully for a moment, stunned by Grant’s derisive question. Then she smiled lazily, deciding to take his jibe with good humor. “I’ve started them.”