Absolute Beginners (Absolute #1) (9 page)

When I made it to the classroom, there were just a few people in the back and no sign of Ms. Wilde. I started taking out my notes and the book that we were discussing today:
On the Road
by Jack Kerouac.

Heh heh, Kerou-whacking
.

More students came in and my eyes were practically glued to the door, waiting for her arrival. Just as I was beginning to think she wasn’t coming, the door opened and she breezed into the room, looking completely different from the last time I’d seen her, fresh-faced and wearing workout clothes. Today, she had on a red short-sleeved T-shirt with a skull logo; a pair of black, ripped jeans that looked like they’d been painted onto her long, slim legs; and truly hideous sneakers. The hair on the sides of her head had been scooped up on top where it was fastened with pins to look like a Mohawk while the rest fell down her back.

That can’t possibly be comfortable. And oh, God, the smudgy makeup is back
.

She had even put on black nail polish and some dangly, tacky-looking earrings. Frankly, she looked like a mess. I wondered why she would choose to style herself like this, especially now that I knew how pretty she was underneath it all. A guy in the back wolf-whistled as she walked to her seat.

He likes her appearance?

I held back a chuckle when she unceremoniously presented him with her middle finger. It didn’t seem to offend him in the slightest. He merely grinned and turned his attention to the person next to him, as if this were completely acceptable social behavior. I didn’t understand young people at all. I dared to look at Ms. Wilde, who gave me a smile when our eyes met and then proceeded to unpack her bag as though nothing out of the ordinary had ever passed between us.

Thankfully, this normal behavior continued when class began. Unfortunately, this meant that Ms. Wilde was still as argumentative as ever and behaved as audaciously as she always had in my classroom.

“The entire novel is demeaning to women,” Ms. Wilde interrupted a male classmate.

“I think that’s a bit of an overstatement,” I said.

Her eyes flared. “It is not!” she insisted. “One of the characters describes the perfect woman as being demure and quiet. Is that the kind of woman that you want, Stephen?”

No. Wait, what?

“What I want really isn’t relevant for this discussion, Ms. Wilde. I think you need to see the bigger picture here,” I said. “That may have been what men thought at that time, but—”

“The ‘bigger picture,’ as you call it,” she interrupted me, “is that this novel still sells remarkably well despite the fact that it was first published more than forty years ago. Every year, ignorant yahoos embark on their ‘great adventure’ and go backpacking across the country and read this novel. They all worship Kerouac and his incessant ramblings and that includes the way he portrays women.”

“But the attitude today has changed in academic literary circles when discussing the novel,” I argued. “The male gaze is acknowledged.”

“Yes, in academic circles that may be the case,” she agreed. “But the bulk of readers aren’t found there. They’re out in the world, traveling, thinking that any single woman on the road must be an easy lay. Because that’s exactly how your precious Kerouac describes them.”

“But just because you have personal issues with the content doesn’t mean that you should disregard the impact the novel has had on generations of young people, and that includes men
and
women. It made them search for alternate ways of living and do great and daring things rather than settle for conformity. That’s why this is a great American novel and one of my personal favorites.”

Try and argue against that logic
.

“Really?” she asked, narrowing her eyes. “And what great and daring things has the novel inspired
you
to do?”

I was momentarily stunned.

If this were a movie, there would be crickets right now
.

I had no idea how to respond to her question. The truth was that I hadn’t ever traveled anywhere for more than a week’s vacation because I’d always been too busy with school and studies. I hadn’t done anything great or daring in my life and, worst of all, I was pretty sure that Ms. Wilde knew it.

“This isn’t about me,” I said weakly, suddenly feeling extremely tired. “What are some other impressions of the novel?” I asked the rest of the students.

I avoided looking at Ms. Wilde the rest of the class and after what seemed like forever, I finally dismissed them. They all rushed out, eager to start their weekend plans of partying and having fun. I watched as Ms. Wilde slowly packed up her things, the last one to leave.

“Have a nice weekend,” she said as she passed by.

“Are you angry with me?” I called after her, unable to stop myself.

She turned and gave me a curious look. “No, what gave you that impression?” she asked, walking over to me.

“Um, before,” I said, motioning to her seat.

“Oh no, not at all.” She smiled. “I tend to get passionate about that particular topic because I’ve met so many idiots who’ve read the book and believed every word that Kerouac wrote. I have problems with
him
, not you. I’m sorry.”

“That’s OK,” I said, looking down.

Dear God, has she decorated those hideous shoes herself? It looks like she’s written on them with a magic marker
.

“Well, I should get going. I’ll see you Tuesday,” she said as I watched the ugliest sneakers in the whole universe walk out of my line of sight.

“Are you doing anything fun this weekend?” I asked, remembering Brian’s question from earlier.

That’s a normal inquiry for a Friday afternoon, right?

“Yeah, I’m actually going to a concert tonight. We leave in a few minutes because we have quite a bit of driving to do,” she said.

Oh, that explains the crazy getup…I hope
.

“ ‘We’?” I asked.

“Just me and the girls,” she replied. “We’ll probably end up sleeping in the car and coming back sometime tomorrow, completely hung over,” she added with a laugh.

“Oh, OK,” I mumbled, not entirely sure how to respond to that. “Err, that sounds like a busy weekend.”

“But I’m free tomorrow night after dinner,” she said. “You can stop by if you want.”

Huh? What?

I tried to figure out what she was saying. Was she asking me over for a date?

No, she said “after dinner,” so it’s definitely not a date
.

“You, uh, you want me to come by?” I asked, feeling more than a little taken aback by her invitation.

“Sure, if you’d like and you’re not busy,” she said, shrugging.

Definitely not busy
.

“I don’t know, uh, I might have plans,” I lied.

“OK. Well, I’ll be home if you feel like stopping by,” she said. “I have to go meet the girls now.”

“OK, um…’bye,” I said, extremely ineloquently.

“’Bye, Stephen.”

She was gone before I could figure out what the hell just happened.

Did I just get an invitation to have sex with Ms. Wilde tomorrow night?

Did she think that I had asked about her plans because I wanted to see her? That hadn’t been my intention. None of this made sense. Ms. Wilde had just made a passionate argument in class about not wanting to be perceived as an “easy lay,” as she’d called it, and yet she’d just asked me to stop by her apartment late at night. Was that a…what did Matt always call it? A booty call? I ran my hands through my hair and shook my head. What would it be like if I went over there? Would she really want to kiss me, touch me, and have sex with me again? I felt a very distinct twitching in my pants when I thought about repeating the wonderful experience she had given me in her bed, and I knew I wanted to go. Yet, I could also acknowledge that wanting this was wrong on so many levels: she was ten years my junior, not my type, and, worst of all, my student, which made it forbidden.

As I walked across the faculty parking lot, I felt the conflict tearing at me. I wanted her again. Being with her had been effortless and so pleasurable. However…

I sighed, throwing my briefcase into the passenger seat before climbing into my car. For once, I didn’t know what to do. How had I allowed my life to become so complicated?

I drove home from campus, strangely dazed. I barely remembered letting myself into my apartment, but soon I found myself logging onto the Facebook, yet again, to look at Ms. Wilde’s page. She had updated her status a few minutes ago.

LA? As in Los Angeles? That’s insane!

I couldn’t believe it. Ms. Wilde had said that they had “quite” a bit of driving to do, but that was a huge understatement. Los Angeles was six hours away by car, even without traffic. The thought of Ms. Wilde driving so far with only two other girls as company bothered me immensely. Didn’t she care about her own safety? They would have to pull over at rest stops on the way, and I was sure those places were crawling with lowlifes.

Why can’t she just go to a concert here in San Francisco?

In my mind, no rational person would drive six hours straight just to see a two-hour show. Well, I assumed that it would last approximately two hours, but I didn’t actually know, never having attended a rock concert before. She’d even said that they were going to sleep in a car. Did she do that sort of thing a lot? Why not get a hotel room instead? If I were going out of town, I would never consider spending the night in my car. Of course, she’d also mentioned that they would be coming back tomorrow hung over, so it was a good thing that none of them would be driving after the show since they would apparently be drinking.

I thought about her offer to stop by her place tomorrow night. I was fairly certain that she wouldn’t divulge anything to her friends or the university if I did go over there again, but what would be the point, really? I didn’t like her. The way that she’d confronted me on my lack of adventure in life had ticked me off and I wished that I had something to say in retort.

You have horrible taste in clothes?
No, then she would probably just make fun of mine like Matt.

I hate your hair?
No, too juvenile.

You’re horribly stubborn?
No, she would most likely be proud of that.

You’re bad in bed?
A definite no. I would never be able to lie that convincingly.

I sighed and turned my computer off before putting on some classical music and lying down on the couch, intent on taking a nap. I had to be at my parents’ house in a few hours and I hadn’t slept very well the night before. Although I had refrained from eating before bed, the dreams from the previous night had resurfaced with unmitigated strength. I’d woken up painfully aroused, my head swimming with images of Ms. Wilde and me in various compromising positions.

Tired and cranky, I spent the next two hours on the couch, drifting in and out of sleep to the sound of violins.

* * *

When I arrived at my parents’, my mood was still foul. Seeing my stepbrother’s car parked in their driveway did little to help, since I knew there was a good chance that he hadn’t moved on from his incessant teasing about Ms. Wilde. I hoped he would at least keep it to himself in the presence of our parents. I had no desire to rip his head off in the middle of dinner. Also, that might give the impression that his taunting had a measure of truth to it. Decapitation was definitely not an option.

“Hi, honey,” my mother said, smiling, when she answered the door. “How many times do I have to tell you to just come in and not ring the doorbell like some stranger?”

“Sorry, Mom,” I mumbled, giving her a hug.

I took off my coat and she ushered me into the living room where Matt and my stepfather, Richard, were already sitting. Richard and my mother had met at a support group for widows and widowers when I was thirteen. After a few months of dating, Richard and Matt moved into our home, and soon after Matt and I had become stepbrothers.

Admittedly, it took me a while to accept my new brother and father. I still missed my dad, a man I’d barely gotten to know before he died of a massive heart attack at the age of thirty-eight. I was fully prepared to hate the two intruders, no matter how happy they made my mother. But I found it impossible to dislike Richard, who never tried to coax me into being more active or interested in sports. He seemed to understand my need for solitude when I’d lock myself away with my father’s books and records, poring over his keepsakes. Matt had lost his mother in a car accident when he was still a toddler and had no memory of her, so he immediately embraced his new family, including an older brother. It must not have taken long for him to realize that I wasn’t what he’d hoped for, seeing how I didn’t play sports or care for things like camping or fishing. Still, he’d always been there for me, even protecting my scrawny self throughout high school when he towered over me despite being two years my junior.

Now I could hardly remember a time when they hadn’t been there, and I knew I was lucky to have both of them in my life. Of course, that didn’t mean Matt didn’t drive me crazy most of the time. In that respect we really were just like true brothers. In fact, we always had been. It was stupid to keep referring to him as my stepbrother when we were a lot more than that.

“Stephen, so good to see you, son,” Richard said, standing up as I entered the living room.

As usual, he completely ignored my outstretched hand and instead drew me into a hug.

“Hi, Rich,” I mumbled, patting his back.

Whereas Matt had called my mother “Mom” for as long as I could remember, I had never gotten past calling Richard by his actual name—or at least an abbreviated version of it.

“Sit down,” he told me. I turned to avoid getting my shoulder punched by Matt as I sat on the couch next to him.

“So, how was class today?” My brother’s query was innocent enough, but his motivation for asking couldn’t have been more obvious to me.

I glared at him before answering with a noncommittal shrug.