Chapter 4

Having learned sex felt best accompanied by the mind and heart, a challenging conquest promised greater rewards. As superficial as my fellow students, I failed to see the gorgeous girl hidden in shyness and self doubt. Tall and pale, with long unfettered black hair, she stood in front of English class and recited her poem. Most of the class recited old ballads or odes or a Coleridge dreamscape from memory. A couple students and I recited our own poems. Mine rhymed about a daydreaming boy in military school missing his girlfriend amidst a football game who when suddenly holding the ball and being tackled awakes in anger and forgets the girl, her memory lost in revenge and the fun of playing. It attempted humor, and I appreciated the scattered laughter. When she began her poem, her head bent down as usual, she mumbled. The teacher asked her to speak louder. She began again. Her voice, soft and uncluttered by emotion, lifted each line of blank verse so it hung in the air with clarity. Because of its length the shifting unease of the typical early teen, the boundless energy restrained causing a murmur of chairs bending and sliding and papers shuffling and voices whispering increased throughout. I attended to her poem, ears taking in and mind absorbing and transforming into pictures every line she hung. She told about a princess surveying her land. The premise seems silly, childish and romantic, typical of a girl her age or younger. However the land was the City. Two voices, a father's and a little princess's, battled. The father showed the dirt, the unswept concrete, the unbreathable air, the unwashed masses and the unpleasant facades. The princess transformed everything into beauty and nobility. Instead of easy clichés, the girl used metaphors and similes appropriate to the mood expressed. She enticed with images containing emotional weight. She enticed me. Her sad blue eyes looked up and caught mine when she finished to a smattering of applause. It would have been uncool for me to give her the ovation she deserved. Her smile raised her round cheeks. My heart shuddered. She bowed her head and shuffled back to her seat.

I began my pursuit once class ended. Clutching her books to her chest, she strode briskly. A tall girl, taller than me, her long legs provided speed. Being a City girl, she trained early to walk fast. When I caught up, she stopped. She had arrived at her locker.

After praising her poem, she praised mine. Restraining myself from exclaiming her superiority as a poet, I asked if I could read it and others. She had looked up at me from her familiar bowed position, but when I told her my desire, her head raised. She studied my face. "Really?" she said. "Okay," she said. Again her smile disarmed. I felt an urge to kiss her. I didn't.

We met at her locker after the last class. Neither one had plans. I did, but she took precedence over dance. Though often tempted, I never skipped it before. My mother had paid after all.

Shivering in the mid winter wind channeling through the buildings, we waited for the City bus. Eight blocks riding and one block walking west and one flight up, we arrived at her apartment in Hell's Kitchen situated over a cobbler. "Hi," she said to her father sitting beside a brassy and bosomy blonde, both in their late thirties, both looking stupefied, a nearly empty bottle of whiskey sitting on the low table in front of them. They said nothing, but stared at us as we slid by a door and the princess shut it.

I stood in her bedroom. Having nowhere else to sit, the only chair covered with books, I sat on her bed. The room felt warm. A hissing clanking radiator revealed the cause. The princess removed her coat and scarf and shoes and stockings and sweater. I rose and removed my coat and laid it on the bed and sat again. Meanwhile I stared. Even in the warmest months, the princess wore layers of cover. That day she wore a black dress with broad straps, the skirt hanging to her knees. Her pale shoulders and arms and legs and feet were naked. The old, too small dress clung tight at the bodice. The skirt ruffled out near her navel. The button undone at her chest made room for her breasts. Nearly as large as Shirley's, they looked smaller on the princess's tall and gangly yet meaty body. She caught me staring at the gap. "Oops, sorry," she said, though I don't know why she apologized. She grabbed a long robe and darted out the door, saying, "I'll be right back." The bed, a desk, a chest of drawers and an armoire filled the room. I opened the armoire. Two other dresses and three blouses, skirts and pants hung along with her coat. I hung mine over hers.

She returned wearing the robe. Large for her, she wrapped the terrycloth fabric around her body. The nap loose in places and nonexistent and the fabric shiny in others, it must have been her fathers when her age. She securely tied it, covering most of her body. The collar though had a tendency to open, exposing her cleavage. On a couple of occasions I could see more. I could see her nipples. They were something special, long and pink and hard little cylinders. She would adjust it to try to cover her chest, but it didn't last. She stopped bothering.

Pulling out a bottom desk drawer, she took some sheets of paper stapled together and handed them to me. They contained the poem she read. I read and I glanced at her. Everytime I glanced, she looked more beautiful. Busy in the drawer pulling out loose sheets and notebooks and giving them quick scans, she occasionally returned my glances. I commented on a favorite line. She smiled and thanked me and continued perusing. When she stopped and sat on her chair, her lap held a large handful of work. I asked her how long she had been writing. She told me her father writes poetry and she'd been around his readings and his colleague's readings all her life. She loved it. As long as she could remember she wrote. I asked if she had done any readings. She looked at me sadly and told me, "Today was the first."

"Why?" I asked.

Expecting her to admit shyness, she said, "My father doesn't want me to be a poet. He hates that I write. He asks what it's ever done for him. I tell him it makes him beautiful. He tells me, 'Don't be stupid.' He thinks the way I dress is stupid. The way I walk is stupid. Having no friends is stupid. He used to call me his princess. He doesn't anymore, but I still am. I'm his dark princess. You should read his poems. You should hear him read. As a poet, he's beautiful. In every other way, well, he's a drunk."

Like her earlier recitation, she revealed little emotion. Then she laughed loud and strong, her head back, her chest naked and open. "What's funny?" I asked.

"He'll never believe the first boy I brought home came because of my poetry." Smiling at me, she saw me glance down to her breasts. She adjusted the collar and looked at my crotch. I had been excited since her recitation, no more so than at that moment. I don't know if my excitement showed and didn't chance a look. "Are you ready for some more?" she said

"More what?" I asked.

"More of my poems, silly." I noticed her skin flush briefly. She responded to my first flirtation.

"Could you read them?" I asked

"Okay."

She pulled out a piece of paper and began reading. "Could I read along?" I interrupted.

Handing me the handful of poems, she sat beside me. As she began to read another extraordinary poem, I glanced at the words, peaked at her breasts and looked at the work in my lap.

A particular line she recited sang to me, so I closed my eyes to concentrate. Worth ignoring her breasts, I praised her when she finished.

"Could you close your eyes again?" she asked. I did. She kissed me on the lips quickly and giggled. When her hand grabbed the stack, it grazed my penis. She must have noticed because she jumped a little. Once she found the next poem, she returned the stack to my lap, this time letting the back of her hand press against me for a second. Her next recitation sounded breathier.

I glanced through the stack and a page flashed provocatively. Entitled "A Lover Beside Me," I stopped listening and read. Fantasizing a lover, she wanted her fingers to be his fingers or his tongue or his penis. She wanted the empty room to be filled with his face and when her eyes closed, her mouth filled with his tongue. The last lines made the title a pun, "Shaking, quaking my body writhes/ Pleasure spreading like the landed tide/Within that wave I whimper and cry/ Why isn't there a lover besides me in my life?"

"Oh shit," said the princess.

"Could you read me this one?" I asked. I set the rest of the poems on the chair, took off my shoes and moved onto the bed. Pillows propped up my back. Our torsos being similar heights, when she sat on my lap, her shoulders ended up in front of my face. My legs stayed together, making her legs separate around them. I felt the slit of her vagina and its heat push onto my penis. When she started reading I readjusted her so she leaned against the wall. I tilted my crotch enough to keep the same contact. My lips began to press against her neck. My hand pressed at the collarbone and eased under her robe. I didn't hesitate. Her nipple rubbed my palm. My teeth gently chewed on her earlobe. Her vagina pressed down. I guided her to lift her butt a moment, pulling the robe from between out crotches. We began the natural motion of fucking. She set down the poem. Her lips met mine. Her mouth went wide. I corrected her. When she apologized, I told her I had experience and she hadn't. I told her I would give her pleasure and I would teach her to give me pleasure.

"Please," she said. After that only moans and sighs and an occasional word of instruction or encouragement or direction verbalized.

She wanted me to fuck her. Both naked, I had brought her to orgasm twice with my fingers and mouth. She had masturbated me to completion as well. Learning the art of felatio, she had me fully erect and desired using her success. I wanted to lie between her thighs and gaze at her body and her face, both beautiful, as I sent my penis inside the heat and the wet and the liveliness of her interior. I couldn't believe her beauty and that she hid it away in clothing and shyness. I wanted to bring her to the fashion photographer, to strip her naked in front of him and let him marvel. I wanted all my artist friends to see her and sketch, draw or paint her. I wanted her to see these experts of aesthetics awed by her. Everything about her excited me. She even smelled beautiful. Her libidinous flow intoxicated me. If it were wine it would be priceless. I wanted to fuck her. I didn't.

I told her I didn't have protection.

"Pull out then," she said.

"I'd never want to leave once inside."

"Just a little," she moaned.

I thought of the other orifice and my finger entered there.

"What are you doing?" she asked.

I offered her another option.

"I want you inside me," she said.

"It will hurt."

"I don't care. A lot?"

"Maybe."

"Could we try?"

Finally I told her why I wished to wait. "You've given me almost everything. I want to leave the finale for another time. I want to be with you again. I want to be with you period. I want you as a friend. I want you to meet some people. I can't explain everything now. Come to my apartment. Come Friday after school. I have condoms there. There are things I want to show you. I want us to wait at least until then. I have things I want to tell you. I want you to know who I am. I want you to know ... Maybe I won't be the one you want to make you a woman. Maybe ... I don't know ... This is fast. You've never been kissed before and here I am ... Give it some time."

"I want you to fuck me. But I'll wait. Maybe you're right. I don't have any friends and maybe I'm desperate. But I don't think that's why. You promise to be friends? You want to be my friend?"

"Yes I do if you let me."

"Why wouldn't I?"

"I don't know. We don't know each other. I want you to know me. Maybe I'm everything you hate. Maybe I'm the devil."

She laughed. "I wouldn't mind."

"Let's get dressed. Are you hungry?"

"Starving," said the princess.

"I'll buy you dinner. We can talk safe, a table between us."

"Okay. Lord knows Dad hasn't gotten anything for dinner."

I called my mother and told her not to wait for me.

We headed to Times Square and caught a cab to Christopher Street to a quiet bistro where queers impress their dates. I knew the owner and introduced the princess. It offered good food and good atmosphere if you don't mind a romantic place for queers. She loved it. I felt relieved. As it turned out she knew a few homosexuals, mostly poets.

She told me about her father. A respected poet but too much a drunkard to hold down jobs survived because of her mother. A successful journalist so not rich, she made enough to provide her daughter sustenance and through the princess her ex-husband. The fact that her daughter chose her father to raise her bothered her mother for a moment, but the freedom to not have to worry about keeping tabs on the princess quickly overcame it. The mother loved society parties. She didn't sleep around having long term relationships that ended when they insisted on marriage.

Like me, princess was an accident. Her father and mother decided to marry. They thought they were in love. Turned out they weren't.

"Funny thing is," said the princess, "when they talk, they really enjoy it. Their minds click, but their actions, the drunkenness and the socializing, definitely don't."

At one point I asked her why she remained with her father if he abused her.

"First of all, my mother would shit if she saw me standing at her door. But most important is my father is incredibly sweet and charming when he's sober. Problem is he's rarely sober. I help him though. I think I keep him alive."

She wanted to know more about me. I kept it superficial. I reminded her of the date and promised complete revelation when she persisted.

"Tell me something," she said late in our conversation. "Do you have a girlfriend?"

I watched her carefully when I answered, "I do."

"If she found out about us, about tonight, would that be it?"

"No. She accepts my sleeping around. I accept hers."

"It must hurt a little if she's seeing some other guy."

"It's like this. We're young. I mean we're really young. We couldn't get married if we wanted to. So much is in front of us, so many changes. Why hold each other back for a romantic pipe dream."

"Okay. Say if for some reason the two of us fall madly in love. What about her?"

"I don't know. We haven't have we?"

"I really like you. I like this. I'm glad we stopped. I'm glad you brought me here. I'm looking forward to Friday."

"Me too." Ready to leave, I put down my money including a generous tip. As we got into our coats I asked her, "Do you know how beautiful you are?"

"I'm not."

I shook my head. "I want you to think about it. I want you to stand naked in front of a mirror and look at yourself. I'm glad you're not full of self love, but I guess maybe you should be. Keep it in mind until Friday. Let it spin around. Do it for me."

She shrugged and nodded. Before entering the cold world I embraced and kissed her. We couldn't feel the physical manifestations but we felt the passion. Our lips separated and we breathed heavy and stared into each other's eyes and smiled. Then we ran into the chilled City, caught a cab, held hands until I dropped her off, kissed quickly and wished for Friday to come soon.

Friday I told the princess everything. She didn't mind. Between the tomboy and her, she accepted me more. The drawings and photos on the wall excited her aesthetically and libidinously. As she perused the artwork, Mother took me aside and asked how intimate we'd gotten. Admitting intimacy, she whispered in the princess's ear. The princess nodded and removed her dress, the same ill fitting one she had worn before. She revealed her beautiful body. She only wore panties. My mother praised her body while measuring it. I gazed lustfully before handing her one of my dress shirts. She buttoned only the bottom three buttons and it only reached her crotch. Despite this we talked for awhile before urges became impossible to fight. By evening we fondled but didn't climax. I asked if she could stay the night. Agreeing, she called her father and told him she was staying with a friend and hung up. My mother walked into the living room looking bohemian in a peasant dress. Turquoise hung thick around her neck and from her ears, setting off her eyes. She handed the princess her dress. Still tight, it fit perfectly. More cleavage and back and legs showed. It displayed her sexiness. "Are you ready?" Mom asked.

Princess looked puzzled. I hadn't told her about the dinner party at the fashion photographers. I didn't then, insisting on a surprise. When we exited the cab, despite the cold wind, I stopped the princess in front of the apartment building. My mother went ahead. Grasping her shoulders I told the princess to look at me. "You're beautiful," I said. "Do you know that?"

She shrugged and smiled. "Maybe."

"Not maybe. You are beautiful. Did you look at yourself?" She nodded. "I want you to think about looking at yourself and seeing your beauty when you meet my friends. I want you standing proud and beautiful before them. They love beauty. You saw the photos and the drawings. These are the people who made them. Be confident. They'll love you. If it fits you could even impress them with your poetry."

"I don't know..."

"Be confident. Be beautiful. They'll love you. Please?" I took her hand and pulled. After a moment of resistance, a pause to decide, when she accepted, she held herself tall and proud, smiling, excited as I dragged her in.

A large elegant Negro leaned against my mother while filling their plates. Beside several hors d'oeuvres steamed a large pot of mousaka prepared by the swarthy husband. The couple had been invited by my mother to the party as well as the producer, fashionably late. My mother didn't mind. The Negro and my mother had been friends since meeting him at the speakeasy the fashion photographer had taken her to. Thankfully infrequent liaisons resulted. One or the other had the urge to spend time. At the end of a week together they battled. My mother picked me up at the couple's home; their liaisons were the only occasions my mother left me with the couple's governess. Angry and impatient, unusual for her, within a day she calmed and like the calm after the excitation of orgasm, became particularly relaxed. The rarity of the trysts kept her from drugs. Only with him did she indulge in marijuana and cocaine. The party marked the first time seeing each other since America entered the war. The Negro, a skilled jazz bassist, had spent the war traveling with a USO tour all over America and Europe playing for the colored troops. I could tell both of them wanted to go somewhere private. But for the Negro it was a gig, so they ate and chatted with friends and made introductions until time came for the Negro to work. Soon after the trio started the producer arrived, and though my mom remained with him, introducing him to a room full of strangers, her interest played bass with his trio.

Most of the guests were strangers. The host and his boyfriend, the Jewess and some artists who had drawn and painted either my mother or myself were there. I introduced the princess to the swarthy husband and blonde wife, both still stunned by their daughter's attempted suicide and residency at Bellevue as a mental patient, my discomfort and guilt I disguised, but I kept our chat brief, and they left early. I didn't want to dwell on my culpability then, nor do I now. I promise a confession when appropriate, if I find the courage. The more respectable, older, cleaner contingent turned out to be gallery owners. It may have helped that there were poets there too, because the princess knew a couple of them, but she proved remarkably charming with everyone we met. Along with introducing her to those I knew, I made it a point to meet strangers, hoping to demonstrate proper party etiquette. Her confidence amazed me. At times she squeezed my hand and gave me a scared glance, but she kept those moments between us. She also hung on to me through most of the party, but I couldn't expect miracles and had no reason to complain.

By meeting nearly everyone, we met three remarkable people. One was a painter. Unlike my artist friends, he created abstract emotionally charged canvases. And unlike my friends, his work hung at the Whitney and the Museum of Modern Art. He spoke in a thick Estonian accent. He appeared pale and weak. He hid in a corner. When we approached him and he told me his name, I got so excited he laughed. The three of us talked for nearly an hour. I impressed him with my knowledge and insight. I explained I'd been around art all my life. We talked about the gesture and how I loved how his paintings expressed that, tracing it from Rembrandt to Van Gogh to Hopper and even the art instructor's work which he knew and liked. Princess understood art minimally, but she effortlessly brought poetry as gesture into the conversation. He became doubly impressed. When we started to join the rest of the party, he gave us his address and invited us to tea after school. Anytime he said.

The second person was a poet young and new on the scene but getting noticed. The princess had heard him once and his poetry and his presentation impressed her. He had got out of soldiering for being queer, but had been a nurse like his hero Walt Whitman and had seen the aftermath of battle and its gore. When a battle surrounded him, it proved too much. Witnessing the moments of bullets and shrapnel tearing into the skin and killing and deafened by the noise made him weep and shake. Bearing through it to attend to the casualties during and after the battle, once done he collapsed and couldn't move, and was sent home. The princess told the young poet she found his poetry gritty and earthy yet exact and perfectly crafted. She said his long lines seemed to float, and his way of speaking them made them come alive and fly inside her and slither around, sparking emotions. I told the princess her poems did that for me.