Chapter 12

School, on the day after Millie learned to masturbate, was no different than any other day. Boots was there, but her actions, and Millie's thoughts, were both as normal as the day is long. Even when Boots followed her back to the little house in which her sexual world had doubled in size, Millie's thoughts were on what she was going to teach Boots that night - subtraction.

She had Boots pick up two handfuls of pebbles on the way to the house. Then, on the table, she manipulated the pebbles, having Boots lay out a particular number, and then take a given quantity away and count what remained. Eventually, she required that Boots imagine the first number, and imagine taking some pebbles away. When Boots had done that, Millie smiled.

"You just performed subtraction math in your head, Boots. You already know some of your numbers. All that remains is learning the rest."

"Well I'll be damned," said Boots. "How about that!"

So all in all it was a completely normal day for Millie. That should have included Bob's knock on the door, when he arrived to escort her to the hotel for supper. And, in fact, it was normal ... right up to the point where she opened the door and looked into his face.

Then, in that instant, she was absolutely positive that Bob could tell, just by looking at her, that she had engaged in a perversion. Her eyes darted away from his, and she felt her cheeks flame up. She gasped for air and swayed as her knees weakened.

"What's wrong?" asked Bob, immediately seeing she was in distress.

All that did was convince her he could tell she'd done something terrible. Now he was probing to learn the exact extent of her sins. Suddenly the heat suffusing her face was from anger, rather than shame. How dare he judge her! All she had done was ease her discomfort ... discomfort he had caused by kissing her, and holding her close. It was all his fault that she had had to lower herself to...

But that was wrong! She hadn't lowered herself. There was nothing wrong with what she'd done. She hadn't gone crazy. She was fine! Boots was fine.

"Millie?" Bob's voice cut through her frantic thoughts.

Maybe she was going crazy after all! She couldn't think! The world started to tilt and she realized she was falling. At the same moment she recognized she'd been holding her breath, and let it out, to drag in another gulp of air. She felt pain as her hip struck the wooden floorboards, and cried out.

Bob was in the door immediately and kneeling beside her. His hand cradled her head.

"Millie?" He peered at her. "What's wrong? Tell me what you're feeling!"

"Shame," she whispered. Tears leaked from her eyes.

Suddenly the earth was moving again. She realized he was lifting her, carrying her. She saw the doorway to the smaller room and he lay her on the bed ... the bed where, just last night, she had given in to temptation. Her mind warred with itself as part of it insisted she'd done nothing wrong, while the other reminded her that Aunt Maureen had warned her about insanity. She gasped again.

"Maureen!" she wheezed.

"Maureen?" Bob echoed. "Is that your name?"

His hand was lying on her shoulder. She could feel the heat from his body. It confused her. She wished the cloth of her dress wasn't in the way, and that his hand was touching her bare skin. Now she was sure she was going insane. She fought it, thinking of Aunt Maureen.

"My aunt," she panted. "Aunt Maureen."

"I don't understand," said Bob, his voice low. "You said you felt shame. Then you said your aunt's name. Did she hurt you?"

"No!" yipped Millie. Suddenly she felt the need to confess. Even though it was a man ... it was Bob. She could confess to him. He was a doctor. He could give her medicine ... something to help pull her back from the brink of insanity. "She warned me."

Bob realized she was shaken up, that somehow this memory that had surfaced was causing tumult in her mind. Taking things slowly was the way to go now. He wouldn't push her. Let her explore things at her own pace. The key now was just to keep her talking.

"Tell me about it," he said.

Her hands came up to cover her face. She kept a sob in by pure will.

"Self-abuse," she whispered. "She warned me not to ... not to touch myself ... that I'd go insane. But I didn't listen, and now I can't think. I'm so ashamed. My mind is flying apart. But Boots has been doing it and she's fine! I don't understand!"

Then she broke down and sobbed.

Bob pulled her up and into his arms, holding her against his chest. He let her cry while he thought furiously. He was pretty sure he knew what she was talking about. He'd heard it called self-abuse before, but it wasn't talked about much. In medical school, all he'd learned had been designed to help him cope with what the war would bring him. But in the evenings, there had been bull sessions, and sometimes one of the instructors had come around to sit and tell stories. One of them had told stories of helping women deal with something called female hysteria, which was said to be brought on by a number of maladies. An argument started between two teachers, one who said it was all bunk, and another who swore that the disease was real and that the treatment worked. It was, in fact, where Bob had learned that stimulation of the sexual organs increased blood flow and blood pressure. He had used that very technique on this woman! The argument had gone on for quite some time, and the two doctors almost came to fisticuffs. To Bob's mind, some of the information seemed logical. They didn't call it male hysteria, but he knew full well that stroking his penis until he ejaculated took care of a lot of stress. It made sense that the "hysterical paroxysm," as it was called, might do the same for a woman. In the end, he didn't worry about it. The likelihood of having to treat that malady during the war was vanishingly small. He hadn't thought of it again until after the war, when his experiences with women convinced him that the only thing that caused "female hysteria" was unfulfilled sexual desire. The only time he had ever used the " treatment" was on Millie, and then not for the usual reasons.

He looked at her hair while her sobs slowed and finally stopped. She kept her face buried in his chest. He realized she was convinced, like many were, that the behavior in question was harmful. He knew it wasn't, of course, but bucking social convention wasn't easy. Still, it was ridiculous for this woman to be harmed by such stupid moral bullshit.

"Millie?" he said softly. "Honey, I need to tell you something."

He got no answer.

"What you're talking about? It isn't wrong. And it won't drive you crazy. It's normal, honey. Doctors even do that to help people sometimes."

She went still. Then, slowly, she pulled her face away from his chest. Tear-streaked eyes looked up at his face. He knew she didn't believe him.

"When I was in medical school, I learned how to manipulate a woman's ... um ... sexual organs ... to help her with ... um ... various problems and complaints. It doesn't cause insanity. That's just a falsehood left over from the days of the Puritans. There's nothing wrong with you."

"You've done that to a woman?" she whispered.

"Well ... not exactly. I've never had to..." He trailed off. He was lying. He'd done it to her. "I've only done it once," he said.

"I'm not crazy?"

"Not at all," he assured her.

She buried her face in his chest again. "Ohhhhh I'm so ashamed!" came her muffled voice.

"Stop," he said, making her take her face off his chest. "Look. It's normal to feel that way. I don't care what the Puritans, or your aunt or what anybody says. It's normal. Men do it all the time. I do it fairly regularly. You're just normal, Millie. Try to understand that."

"But I can't be normal," she complained. "I mean it's not normal to even talk about this, much less do it."

"Right on the first," he said. "But wrong on the second." He smiled. "And if you think about it, seeing as how I'm a doctor, it's even normal for you to talk about those ... um ... feelings with me."

"I can't talk about them with you!" she moaned. "I like you!"