Chapter 7
It was positively embarrassing, but-I had a crush on Brian Steele!
I fully realize that the term-having a crush on someone-dates me somewhat, but dammit, that's exactly the way Brian Steele made me feel! It was the craziest goddam thing in the world, but that seventeen year old stud made me feel things I haven't felt since I was a flirty fourteen year old! The first time I saw him, my mouth literally dropped open, and I was dumbfounded. I could actually feel my heart pounding in my breast. I was certain that it wasn't that mythopoeic enigma known as love-at-first-sight, because what I felt toward Brian Steele decidedly was not love. It came a lot closer to lust. In short, to be perfectly honest about my feelings, he turned me on! He gave me hot pants! He made me wet! And-thank God for the Women's Movement!-he gave me a hard-on!
It was the craziest goddam thing that had ever happened to me in my life. I could barely talk rationally about it without finding myself resorting to the wildest forms of excess over him. It was as though I had no control over my emotions. I was embarrassed and humiliated, and I thanked god that no one, other than myself, had noticed the utter shamelessness of my behavior toward him. Had they, I was certain that my friends would believe I'd gone insane, I'd probably get fired from the school, and I'd be branded for life as some sort of reversed Lolita.
This strange hold that Brian Steele seemed to exercise over me was, on another level, positively frightening. By nature, or inclination, I have always been a very reserved, almost detached person, choosing my friends very carefully, and my lovers with extreme caution. But the moment I laid eyes on Brian Steele, I felt all this necessary caution, all those years of discipline, suddenly ripped away from me. And, even after I'd rationally convinced myself that this obsession was foolish, and perhaps even dangerous, I still couldn't prevent myself from not only fantasizing about him sexually, but wanting, aching almost, to act upon those fantasies and make them real. I had completely lost all control of my thoughts concerning him, and I was rapidly on the road to completely losing all control of my behavior toward him.
And what was infinitely worse-Brian Steele seemed to know exactly how I felt!
How did it happen? I've asked myself over and over again that very question. In a matter of a few weeks the entire pattern of my life has been totally disrupted, perhaps beyond all repair, and I found myself either upon the brink of a nervous breakdown, or upon the brink of consciously contemplating an affair with a seventeen year old boy. An affair, I might add, un-like the trifling exercises I engaged in with any of my young, innocent students. The thing that I felt toward Brian Steele-and perhaps this was the most frightening aspect of all-was much, much more than a simple sexual attraction, and the affair suggested many, many more levels of involvement than anything I'd ever engaged in in my life.
I did not want it to happen, but I did not know how to stop it! It was as if my life, and perhaps his, had suddenly gone out of control, and I was incapable of exercising any brake upon it, a prisoner of my own existence, as I rushed headlong, blindly into a fate which could only end in despair and tragedy.
How innocent I had been that first day when Kermit Rhinegold, the assistant principal, called me into his office just before class, to introduce me to Brian Steele. How willingly I'd gone to that office, the proverbial lamb being led to her own slaughter.
"Miss Harper," Rhinegold said, in his grating nasal voice, "I would like to take this opportunity to introduce you to Mr...." He looked at the record card he was holding in his hand. "...Barry Steele-"
"Brian," Brian corrected. "Brian Steele, sir."
"Huh?" Kermit looked at him. "Oh, yes, of course-Brian Steele. Brian is a new student here at Jefferson High, having just moved into our neighborhood, as it were, and we have determined that you shall be his homeroom teacher, as well as grade advisor."
I nodded politely at Brian. "Pleased to meet you, Mr. Steele."
He smiled back at me, flashing a set of dazzling teeth. "The pleasure is all mine, Ms. Harper."
Kermit went on, obhvious: "Barry has transferred here from New Mexico where he was going to school. He's been in several schools actually, and has, to say the least, quite a varied academic background. He will also be in your senior English class, and will, if we can so arrange things scholas-tically, be graduating in June. I realize, Miss Harper, that this is somewhat of an inconvenience to you, but it would be appreciated if you could prepare him for the English Regents examination which will be given two weeks from Wednesday. I know I'm not giving you much time, but I'm confident you can handle this matter." He smiled at me.
"I'm sure she can handle it," Brian said cryptically.
I was a little upset, to say the least, but what could I do but follow orders. Besides, I found myself liking Brian almost immediately, although I must confess my first reaction to him was considerably much more innocent than the feelings that would follow.
"Fine," I said, smiling at Brian. "In fact, you can come along with me right now, because my senior English class meets this period."
Kermit Rhinegold nodded to me with his head, indicating he wanted to speak to me in private. He stepped about a foot away from his desk, still in full hearing range of Brian and he began to whisper to me in his usual loud voice.
"Here are his records," he said conspiratorially. "He's a very bright boy, Miss Harper. Just take a look at the I.Q. Well above genius level. I don't foresee you having any difficulty with a student of his caliber." He handed me the records, then smiled.
Folding the records into my notebook, I stepped over to where Brian was standing. Kermit followed me.
"Well, Barry," he said, sticking out his hand, grasping Brian's fingers, and pumping vigorously up and down, "it's good to have you aboard."
"Thank you, sir," Brian said crisply. "I'm glad to be here."
"Sir?" said Kermit appreciatively. "I like that, Barry. Did you hear that, Miss Harper? Sir! Well, let's hope you have something of an influence on the rest of the rowdies in this school. Sir...I like that very much."
In the hallway alone with Brian, walking to my classroom, we began to talk.
"Where in New Mexico did you go to school?" I asked. , Brian laughed softly, and it sounded like music. "God, which one?"
"Have you been to many schools?"
"Well, let's see. I've gone to school in California, Nevada, Colorado, Paris, Germany-"
"Wait a minute, Brian," I said, stopping him. "I don't think I understand?"
"My father," he explained, "is a Colonel in the Air Force. We've kind of moved around with him from base to base, wherever he was stationed. That's why I've gone to so many schools, and have had so much difficulty in graduating. I realize I'm kind of old to be in high school."
"How old are you?"
"Seventeen."
"That's not so old, really."
He laughed again, that strangely musical way. "Oh, I don't know, Ms. Harper. I'm probably a lot older than you think-in many ways."
Even then, innocent as yet to the real potential of his personality, I found the remark peculiar, and somehow disconcerting.
I had reason, I soon learned.
In class, Brian was brilliant. He was well read, literate, and could write as well as any professional writer I've ever read. I found myself liking him initially because of the novelty of having a student appreciate what I was talking about, and I found myself calling upon him more and more, favoring him in the classroom, always giving him the benefit of the smallest doubt on any of the examinations he took. Yet, despite his obvious superiority, I found myself tutoring him after class and during my free periods, at Kermit Rhinegold's insistence that he be prepared for the Regents. And, much to my shame, I found myself enjoying being alone with him, even though I knew the extra lessons were totally unnecessary.
"Lisa," he said to me. We were in my office, after class hours, and we were discussing the ambiguity of symbolism in Moby Dick, a subject which had absolutely nothing to do with the Regents, but a-subject nevertheless which we both found fascinating. To my surprise, Brian had not only read the Melville classic several times, but understood it well, and could converse intelligently with me about it, without my having to condescend to explain it on a high school level. And, to my further surprise, and consternation, I found that his insights into the book, in many cases, were unique and fascinating in their possibilities. "Lisa," he said again, "could I ask you something?"
I looked up from the passage I was reading. I had long since given him permission to call me by my first name while we were alone, since I could hardly consider him the usual high school student. Actually, I found myself considering him a peer; and, in some cases, I was very much aware of a reversal in our roles, where I saw him as the teacher, and myself as the student.
"Yes, Brian?" I said.
"Can I ask you a personal question?"
"You can ask," I said. "And, if I don't think it's too personal, I'll answer you."
"What do you think of me?"
I laughed, sensing he was playing a game with me. I'd observed him do that on many occasions. He'd have something very specific in mind, but he would never approach it directly, and instead would come upon it obliquely, asking a string of pyramiding questions which would lead inevitably to the original question he had in mind all along.
"What do you mean by that?" I retaliated. "What do I think of you as a student? What do I think of you as a gifted young man? What do I think of you as-"
"A lover," he offered.
I laughed, not taking him seriously. "As a lover, you say. Well, let's see now.. . . "
He touched my arm, and I stopped instantly, as if he had communicated more with that random physical contact, than anyone had ever said in all the words I'd ever heard.
"I'm quite serious, Lisa," he said softly.
I found myself trembling inside, and because of that, because I was too ashamed to reveal my actual feelings, I responded with a protective mask of aloofness.
"Really, Brian," I said, pulling my arm out from under the touch of his fingers. My flesh tingled and my mouth was dry. "I hardly think this is a subject suitable for discussion between us." In my mind I dismissed it. "Now, if we could get back to Melville...."
"Have you ever wondered how it would feel to have me make love to you?" he persisted.
A very familiar image flashed in my mind, and I tried, unsuccessfully to push it out. I saw myself naked, bent over on a bed, and behind me, also naked, was Brian. His prick was erect, and he was pushing it into my anus. I shuddered, closed my eyes, then opened them again. The image remained at the front of my thoughts.
"Brian, let's just stop this, please," I said angrily, directing the anger more at myself than at him. "I'm almost twice your age, and I am your teacher. I find this subject matter very offensive, and I wish you to stop it immediately. And I never, never want you to mention it again."
Our eyes made contact, and I felt another surge of raw sexual energy course down the length of my spine, curve under my ass, and explode in the growing wetness between my thighs like a bolt of lightning. The contact had happened by chance, or design on his part, I could never be sure of anything when I was dealing with him, but the accident soon escalated into an all-out test of wills. I found myself staring deeply into his eyes, and he staring back into mine, as though we were waging some form of silent combat, with the soul of the loser the ultimate prize hanging in the balance. I found myself thinking of Melville suddenly, and the line that Ahab spoke of Moby Dick:
All visible objects...are but as pasteboard masks. But in each event...some unknown but still reasoning thing puts forth the moldings of its features from behind the unreasoning mask....
The idea, and the chilling reality of Brian Steele's cold, powerful stare frightened me, and I broke off the contact. Perspiration had made the back of my dress stick to my flesh. My hands were trembling.
"Brian, I think we'd better be going..." I Said, my head spinning dizzily around. I felt naked under his gaze, as if he were looking right through my facade, into the black pit of my personality. "It's getting late."
I pushed my chair back and stood up. So did Brian.
He reached for me gently, but with a strength I'd never experienced, and he pulled me against him. His body was hard and thick muscled against my softness, flattening my breasts against his chest. The thickness of his erection tapped against the mound of my cunt, as if asking for entrance. He tangled his strong hands into my hair, and he pulled my head to the side viciously. Pain exploded in my skull, and my eyes closed in anguish, and my lips parted as I began to cry out.
Brian pressed his open mouth over mine, sliding his thick, licking tongue between my lips, stuffing the cry back down into my throat, where it had come from. I struggled against him at first, trying to hit him, trying to work my knee up between his thighs, but the grinding press of his kiss, and the excruciating pain burning at the side of my head where he was pulling at my hair, robbed from me every ounce of resistance.
He kissed me deeply and wetly, lashing his tongue over the roof of my mouth, pushing it down my throat, prodding my tongue with his as if it were a lazy animal he were attempting to arouse. His saliva was warm and wet, and I found myself sucking it from his tongue, drinking it greedily down, as if it were the elixir of life. The pounding hardness of his erection maddened me with its teasing in-and-out thrusts, as if he were purposely taunting me with the promise of its fierce penetration.
His hand came up and circled my breasts, pressing into the tender mound through my dress. He squeezed his fingers into my swollen breasts, grinding his palm flatly against the tip of the mound, pinching the erect nipple through the thickness of my bra, until the sensation was deliciously excruciating, and I found my knees weakening.
And then, all of a sudden, without my having realized it had happened, I found myself kissing him back, with all the surging, untapped passion bubbling inside of me, that I'd refused to acknowledge had ever existed.
I broke the kiss off, not yet ready to face that kind of truth about myself, and I slapped Brian across the face, as hard as I could, with every ounce of strength I could muster. The stinging slap stung the air, pealing like a clap of thunder.
I was trembling with rage and shame. "You...bastard!" I cried, tears streaking my makeup. Wetness oozed down the sides bf my legs. "You...little boy!"
Brian stared at me, unperturbed. His eyes were cool and dispassionate, like two chips of clear blue ice. The red marks of my fingers branded his face.
"If you ever," I said, shaking so terribly I could hardly stand, "ever!...come near me again...I'll have you arrested for attempted rape!"
He said nothing.
"Do you hear me!" I screamed, addressing the inscrutable thing I hated behind the veil of his features.
He shook his head and sighed, speaking to me as if I were a child. "Lisa...Lisa," he said, his voice soft, patient. "Why are you trying to fight it? Don't you know it's useless?"
"Get out of here!" I screamed, not wanting to hear his words. "Get out of this office, get out of this school, and get out of my life! If you ever so much as speak to me I'll...." My anger sputtered in frustration when I could think of no punishment suitable to fit his transgression.
Brian shook his head, shrugged his shoulders, and left. The moment the door closed, I cried for fifteen minutes, then went home and masturbated until my forearm ached, my thoughts filled with degrading sexual fantasies of Brian Steele.
I didn't see Brian after that, for almost a week, and I found myself growing frantic. Time and time again I was tempted to call his home, to see whether anything had happened to him, but I'd convinced myself not to. That would be exactly what he wanted me to do. So I waited for something to happen, knowing full well that I had not seen the last of Brian Steele, not by any stretch of the imagination. And, hatefully, I found myself covering for him, marking him present in my class attendance book, marking him present in my English class. Hatefully, I say, because I knew he was staying away on purpose, and because he knew I had no choice but to cover for him. I waited up until the last day of school, the day of my final exam, when he walked into my classroom, as boldly and as brazenly as he had that first day, smiling at me with his awesome charm, as though he'd never been away, as though nothing at all had happened.
"You're late," I said, whispering hoarsely. The other students were already ten minutes into the examination. "I hope you've studied."
He accepted the examination booklet that I'd, handed to him. "Would it make a difference?" he asked.
My anger flared. "Sit down and get to work!"
He turned, smiling and walked down the center aisle, to the back of the room, and he seated himself in the last desk, well behind all the rest of the students. He dropped the test booklet on the desk, slumped in the chair, with his legs straight out in front of him, and continued to smile at me, ignoring completely my final examination.
You prick! I thought, staring back at him with contempt. Well, this time you've gone too far. This time you've overestimated your strength. This time I'm going to win. I may have marked him present for a few days, but I was not about to falsify his final exam. If he handed in a blank paper, then, by god, that was the mark he was going to get! In the end, as it was with all of them, the power rests with me! Lisa Harper! And then, as if in answer, he won again.
Numbly I watched as he slid his hand down between his muscular thighs, and he began to fondle himself. I could see his erection stiffening through the material of his jeans. He rubbed himself lazily, as if he had all the time in the world.
I was shocked, repulsed, but fascinated. My mouth opened slightly, and I found myself breathing deeply. My eyes stared in total disbelief as his fingers moved up to the hp of the zipper, and pulled it silently down.
Smiling, Brian inserted his hand into the zipper, and pulled out his thick, erect cock. He continued to stroke himself up and down, the swollen thickness of his shaft slipping effortlessly through his fingers. I watched as the tempo increased, as his legs parted slightly further, as the smile on his face took on a look of wicked pleasure.
Sweat poured down my face, and I found myself holding my breath. No...no! I cried, calling out to him with my mind. Don't!
But it was too late-he began to come.
I watched the sperm bubbling from the tip of his prick, flowing like thick milk over the pole of the shaft, oozing between his tightly clenched fingers, and I was overcome with a sense of my own doom.
Regardless of what else happened-I had to have Brian Steele.