Fly on the Wall (28 page)

“How do you want me to?”

“Don't be polite,” he said and pulled me closer. “Be rough with this dick until it spits at you.”

“It's gonna
spit
at me?” I joked as I straddled him. I wrapped my hand around his piece, steadying it, bracing it for its entrance. As I sank onto it, I felt the thickness disappear within my tight walls and I rose up off of him, all the way to the tip, and then slid back down to the shaft.

“Don't play with me, Paige. Fuck me,” he said.

With voices beneath us, and eyes I believed were watching from the boats tied up not too far away, it was hard for me to get in the groove of things.

“Stop being so well-mannered,” Theo said. “Ride this dick like a nasty girl.” I couldn't. He was hitting my spot when I dropped down, but I didn't want to make a sound, move too fast, or get too freaky in public. “Fuck me.”

“I am,” I whispered.

“You're being cute with it.” He smacked my ass. “If you don't fuck me then I'm gonna fuck you, and you won't like how I'm going to do it.”

“I am.” I was still scared of being spotted.

“Damn it.” He grew impatient and pushed me off of him. “I'm not playing.”

“Wait,” I pleaded. I didn't know what to expect. Theo stood me up, bent me over the rail, and entered me from the back. My face and chest were dangling over the railing and could clearly be seen from the street. Theo
fucked
me. He did so hard and fast that I couldn't be the mute I started out as. I grabbed the rail and moaned loudly each time he plowed into my warm, wet, and fleshy meat.

During the ten-minute stint, there was one man in particular walking below with someone who looked up and saw me. They stopped and watched quietly. He stuck his hand into his pants. Each time I tried pushing back against Theo to get out of his view, he insisted on me staying there as punishment for not doing him right the first time . . . and I—don't tell anybody—actually liked it.

 

 

Monday morning came and I wasn't ready for it. As a matter of fact, at noon I was still in front of my computer trying to type out a resignation letter. I didn't want to mention the real reason, but I didn't want to not have a reason at all. I didn't know what to write. I searched the Internet, flipped through a book on letters, and scoured my mind again and again.

Though the possibilities for the letter were endless, none of them were quite my situation. I didn't know where to start. This was the millionth time that I found myself missing Toni. I could've called her up and said, “I need your help with this.”

“My help?” she would've answered. “You're the damn English teacher.”

“Toni,” I envisioned myself whining into the phone, “I'm serious. I don't know what to write. Help me.” I would've sighed. “At least tell me how to start.”

“I've never had to write a resignation letter.” Toni, ever the comedian, would laugh and continue. “You know I always get fired.”

I laughed to myself as I remembered my friend and began typing. Within an hour, I was able to put together about twenty cliché sentences to form my letter. As I read it over and over to myself, the sadness railroaded me. It was unreal. I slowly sat on the sofa and couldn't believe that after all of the years I dedicated to furthering my education I would no longer have a job in my desired field, and all because I allowed my foolish heart to get the best of me.

I was now forced to wonder what Theo's next step would be. Would he run to me or away from me and into the hills? Now that the heat was out of the kitchen and spreading throughout the entire house, where would he stand? He wanted to be a man, my man, so let's see if he'd be manly under pressure.

 

 

Theo came over that night with a black shoebox with a red ribbon tied around it. Before handing it to me, he said, “I feel horrible about you being without a job, all because of me.” He paused. “This is all that I can do to help you right now.”

“What is this?” I shook the box. Its contents clunked around a bit. “What's in here?”

“If I was just going to tell you, I wouldn't have spent ten hours trying to tie that bow,” he joked. “Just open it.”

I pulled the bow until it turned into a long red ribbon, and yanked the top from the box. “What is that sm—” Funk of two million years ran into my nostrils and I nearly gagged. “Yuck.” I pushed the box toward him but he pushed it back.

“Just take it out.”

I hurriedly rummaged through the red tissue paper and saw the dirtiest, smelliest, nastiest gym shoe I had ever seen.

“It's one of my lucky sneakers.”

“Yeah?” I frowned at the stench and held my nose. “What am I supposed to do with it?” I pointed at the shoe.

He smiled. “It's symbolic of something.”

“What?” I looked at him, puzzled, still holding my nose.

Theo smiled. “It's symbolic of me and what you've done to me. You saw past the things that said that we shouldn't be together, and found something within me that you decided to make a part of you.” He took my hand away from my nose and brought it down to the shoe. “Look beyond the dried-up dirt, the smell, and the scuffs of this shoe, and you'll find something that I'd like for you to make a part of your life.”

“What?” I thought I would faint, not because of the smell, but because of what I felt was waiting inside. Was he about to pop the question?
This is too much,
I thought nervously. He guided my hand into the shoe and my fingers brushed up against something tightly wrapped in plastic. I grabbed it and pulled it out.

“Open it,” he said.

I tore open the white plastic bag and saw greenbacks, dinero, bills; it was money. “What's this?”

“It's seven thousand five-hundred dollars,” Theo said. “It's the rest of the money that that coach gave to me. I know that when you resign tomorrow you won't be eligible for unemployment or anything, so I wanted you to have this money, and I hope that it'll last until you get another job, or until I can provide for you.”

“Provide for me?” His demeanor was shocking. “Are you serious?” I asked.

“Yes.” He kissed me on the forehead. “I don't want you to suffer because of me.”

“But this is all the money you have.”

“Yeah, but I don't have a mortgage, phone, light, water, cable, and other bills.” He smiled. “You need it more than I do right now.”

This was no time to cry, but a few tears managed to run out on me anyway. “Thank you.” I embraced him. I didn't know how long it would be before I would be up and running again. He had come through for me. Now I was convinced that he wasn't running to the hills, but running into my arms. “Thank you so much.”

Theo was the first eighteen-year-old I knew with sense, sensibility, compassion, and consideration for others. When I was his age, if it wasn't my mother or father, I didn't care what someone was going through. To give them my last possessions, they'd have to have a gun to my head.

“I love you,” I whispered, not so much for him to hear or know, but because the feeling was overwhelming within me.

“I love you too.”

 

 

In a very professional blue pants suit, I drove to West Dade, parked in the visitor's parking area, and walked into the school with my head held high. I sauntered into the main office with a smile and an envelope containing my resignation letter. “Good morning,” I said, as I marched up to the desk.

“Hello.” I could tell that something was up. Mrs. Jacobs, the head secretary, was acting brand new with me. “How can I help you?” The entire office fell silent.

I wanted to say, “Damn nosy bitches,” but instead I asked, “Is Mr. Courtland in?”

“Ah, yes.” She swallowed. “Yes, he's here.”

“May I visit with him?” I asked.

“Um.” She looked around like it was her first day on the job. “I don't know. I'll have to check his appointment book.” She stared me down as far as the counter and back up to my eyes again. “Have a seat, please.”

“Thank you,” I said as she walked away. “Let him know that I, Ms. Paige Patrick, in case you forgot my name, would only need a few minutes of his time.”

Instead of sitting like Mrs. Jacobs suggested, I continued standing in front of the desk and observed the office employees surfacing from a back room one by one to get a glimpse of the teacher that had done whatever the rumor had me now doing.

I pretended to look through my cell phone for a number, and then pretended to have a short talk with a friend. After that, I listened to the fat steel clock tick away the seconds. With every passing tick and tock, the constant stares turned my confident approach into insecurity. There were steady whispers.

“Is that her?”

“Oh, that's who it is?”

“There she is!”

“I can't believe she actually did that.”

They were all hypocrites, though. Had Theo, the star high school basketball player and round draft pick in the NBA, paid them any mind, they'd be happy to lie in the same bed of nails I had made for myself. Girls, don't hate, emulate.

“I'm sorry.” Mrs. Jacobs returned. “He's not seeing anyone without an appointment.”

“What?” I was too busy trying to hear the distant murmurs. “Can you repeat that?”

“Mr. Courtland isn't seeing anyone without an appointment.”

“Is that so?” I snickered. “When is the next available time?”

“Let me check.” Mrs. Jacobs grabbed the book again. This time she sighed. “Tomorrow at ten.”

“Then I'll be here tomorrow at nine fifty-five.” I continued. “You can tell him that my resignation letter is only two paragraphs, so our meeting won't even last until ten.”

“All right.” She was dumbfounded.

Without a good-bye, I snatched my envelope from the counter and felt their eyes on my back until I was out of sight.

 

 

Ten minutes after school was out for the day, my phone was ringing. “Hello?” I tried to make my voice sound as though it was the second day of a gloriously long vacation.

“‘Sup baby?” Theo asked.

“Nothing.”

“Enjoying your day?”

“Yeah.” I pretended not to have a care in the world.

“How did the meeting go?”

“There was no meeting,” I said. “I had to schedule an appointment with him for tomorrow at nine fifty-five.”

“Damn.”

“How was school?” I asked.

“Same thing, different day.” He added, “different teacher, too.”

“Poor baby.” I frowned.

“No one can take your place.” He paused. “I miss you.”

“Yeah, right. You can probably get away with everything now.”

“No, I really can't,” said Theo. “Knowing that you're not gonna be here anymore is driving me crazy.”

“Well, it's almost the end of March. You graduate in June, so you have less than two months.” I tried to encourage him. “The school year will be over before you know it.”

“True, but . . .” Silence filled the connection. “I noticed a few teachers looking at me kinda strange today, staring at me and shit.”

“You're Theodore Lakewood.” I giggled. “They always stare at you.”

“Naw,” he said, “today was different. All eyes were on me today. I mean I got stares from every-fuckin'-body; the janitors, the cafeteria ladies, the office workers, even the people that cut the damn trees. Man, it felt like everybody was saying something about me.” Then there was the dreaded confirmation. “And Mrs. Greene, the guidance counselor, stopped me in the hallway by her office and handed me a card with her office hours on it.” He finished up. “She said if I needed to talk, her office was always open.”

“Damn,” the word escaped me.

“That's what I felt like saying.”

 

 

The next day, different day, different suit, same resignation letter in the same envelope, I drove to the school and was surprised to see all of the local news station vans parked there. I was glad that West Dade had something going on. I hoped that it would take the focus off of me for the five minutes I planned on being there.

I cleared security at the gate and parked in the visitor parking again. I checked myself out in the mirror, reapplied my lipstick, and opened the car door. As I stepped out, I noticed the six or seven reporters that were conversing all looked my way. I faintly heard one of them say, “There's our girl.” I looked behind me and all around to see whom “their girl” was. There was no one else around.

“Ms. Patrick, is it true that you are involved in a romantic relationship with a student?” the female reporter asked and shoved her microphone in my face.

“Ms. Patrick, who is the student and how old is he?” a male asked.

A third reporter queried, “Is the student a male or female?”

I shouted, “What?” They weren't trying to let me get away without some type of response.

“Who is the student?”

“How long has the affair been going on?”

I began walking toward the school and tried to shield my face from the cameras with the envelope. However, the reporters were relentless. They surrounded me so I had to pretty much walk in circles to shake them individually. I tried running, but they ran after me.

“Ms. Patrick, are the accusations true?”

“Leave her alone,” A voice yelled. “Don't you guys have respect for anyone?” Theo's hand pulled me out of the vulture pit. “Why do you do this to people?” He held onto me. I could almost feel the zoom lenses tightening in on our fingertips.