Love Lessons (2 page)

I sometimes feel there is nothing in the world that matters but that you love me.  I am lmost ashamed to admit how unimportant all my previous hopes and plans have become next to my d
esire to be with you under any condition you might set upon me.  What has become of the ambitious Elena?  She is no one now, but Jane’s Elena.  And yet, I believe that should I succeed in my hopes and become a lawyer I can do my darling Jane more good tha
n
if I were only to keep his house for her.  You believe this too, don’t you?  All my hopes have become nothing to me unless they will please you.

I blush to write these things, darling, but they are true.  They are true!  I am glad my mother doesn’t know,
and yet, at the same time, I want to run into the street and shout them to the world!

What have you done to me, Jane?  I have never been so bold in my life—not for any cause.

Come Saturday at noon, my love.  Until then I am nothing but a shadow of

You
r own Elena

Jane finally sat in the chair by the fire and poured herself a tepid cup of tea.  She hated to admit how she feared Mrs. Whitman.  She and Elena’s father took their daughter’s education very seriously.  Elena was the only surviving child of he
r parents, her mother having lost one newborn infant before and another after her birth.  Elena wanted to be a lawyer.  Jane knew she did.  But Elena’s parents—especially her mother—seemed to want it nearly as much, perhaps even more than their daughter.
  Jane hoped Elena had not said anything to her mother that would lead Mrs. Whitman to think Jane stood between Elena and her success in a legal career.

And yet, beside these concerns, Jane’s heart warmed with pride and love at Elena’s brave vows on her b
ehalf.

She found stationery in a small desk in her room and answered Elena:

Darling,

I am so glad to know that we will be together again soon.  I am longing to see you, though you only left me yesterday!  After three nights in your sweet arms, I ached
last night without you.  I hope you don’t mind too much how I want and need you. But I do, Ellie.

Please thank your mother for inviting me for Christmas.  I’m sorry she wasn’t pleased about the ring.  I hope you told her that I adore you and support your every ambition.  I do not want her to worry that my love for you should compromise your plans in a
n
y way.  Please never say you would give them up for me, Elena.  That is something I could not think of asking.  I am so proud of my brilliant girl.

What can I do on Saturday to please your parents?  Please tell me just what to do and I will do it.  I am a
nxious that they should not find me too backwards and western. Tell me anything you can think of that will help things to go well with them.

Sweet, sweet girl, please dream of me tonight as I will be dreaming of you.  It is an eternity until Saturday.

I
am kissing you everywhere, my love,

Your own Jane

Jane sealed the letter with Eleanor’s red wax and sent it back with Christine and the breakfast tray to be posted.  She dressed and went out to find Christmas gifts for Elena’s parents.

***

Elena met Ja
ne at the door in a brown velvet dress, her hair swept up fashionably.  Jane’s anxiety fled at the touch of Elena’s hand.  “You’re so beautiful,” she whispered and kissed her on the cheek.

She handed Elena the gifts.  “For your parents,” she told her.

“O
h,” Elena bit her lip.  “You’re a darling.” And she kissed her once more quickly and ushered her into a little parlor where Mr. and Mrs. Whitman stood waiting to shake her hand.

“It’s such a shame you are so far from your family during the break in terms,
Miss Sparrow.  Tell us, what do they do in New Mexico to celebrate Christmas?” Mrs. Whitman smiled and Jane felt herself relax a little as Elena’s family settled down for dinner.

“It’s not so extravagant for us as it is to be in Boston,” Jane answered. 
“My aunt Susan makes cookies and my uncles play music.  There’s dancing.  The children have candy from town.”

“That sounds perfectly lovely,” Mrs. Whitman told Jane.  “My own parents would probably not even approve of this duck—and certainly not the Clar
et,” Elena’s mother waved her fork just a little and smiled.

Elena noted Jane’s blank expression, “Quakers in those days didn’t celebrate Christmas,” she said with a quiet smile.

“Oh,” said Jane, suddenly worried about the brightly wrapped gifts she had brought.

Elena’s father turned to Jane now and asked, “Elena says you are a student of art history, Miss Sparrow?”

“Literature,” Jane confirmed.

“What will you do with this knowl
edge?” Mr. Whitman asked.

“I’m…not certain yet,” Jane admitted.

Jane gave a worried glance towards Elena, who interjected quickly.

“Jane’s aunt has a beautiful piano.  I played the harp etude for her the first time I was there for dinner.  She said I
belonged in a concert hall.”

Mrs. Whitman did not look at Elena, but at Jane as she said, “You play beautifully, Elena.  I have always said so.”

Jane tried to smile.  “She does.”

“Elena plans to go to study the law, as I’m sure she’s told you” Mrs. Whit
man said, continuing to look at Jane.

“Yes, of course.”  Jane felt that in spite of her soft eyes and slight smile, Mrs. Whitman was offering her a challenge.  She took it up.  “Everyone says that she is the best student at college in any year.”

“If her
social calendar doesn’t become too distracting, perhaps she’ll be able to live up to that reputation,” Mrs. Whitman said, and returned her attention to her dinner.

“Mother.”  Elena dropped her fork quickly but quietly on her plate and looked at her parent
s each in turn.  “I have very little on my social calendar.  There’s no danger of it overwhelming my studies, I’m sure.  Jane will tell you from her own experience how difficult it is to eject me from the library.”

“It’s true, she won’t even stop working to eat sometimes, unless I plead with her,” Jane added, hoping it was not a terrible mistake to speak at all.

“Well, she must eat.  Thank you, Jane, for encouraging her not to starve,” Mr. Whitman said and smiled.

And Mrs. Whitman declared it was time for dessert.

“Your parents don’t like me,” Jane bit her lip and frowned over her lunch in the dining room of the Hotel Vendome.  It was three days after Christmas.

Elena sipped her wine.  “It isn’t you in particular,
it’s me, having—someone like you in my life.  They’d rather I was a spinster devoted to nothing and no one but my work.”

“If I were a man…” Jane began. In fact, she was dressed as a man today—as she often was when she left the confines of college and
went about the city. Today, she had worn a suit not unlike one a young man at Harvard might wear to take his girl for a Christmas lunch.

“If you were a man, they’d feel the same way,” Elena insisted.  “They might not mind me marrying—when I’m forty and
have a successful career.”

“They married each other,” Jane objected.

“Yes, but they were mutually devoted to the cause of education.  They are colleagues as well as husband and wife.  They grew up together.  They understand each other.”

Jane frowned.  “
We understand each other.  We may not know everything about each other…” Jane bit her lip to remember all the things she had yet to explain.  “But you know me.”  Jane reached over the table and picked up Elena’s hand.  “You know me and I know you.”

“Yes
.”  Elena assented almost inaudibly.  Jane knew her—knew at least a part of her that no one else did.  And whatever the details that remained to be discovered between them, it was that part that mattered most.

“I want your parents to see it.  How can I c
onvince them to trust me?” Jane asked.

“Don’t let it concern you.  It doesn’t matter to me.”

“It matters to me then,” Jane said.

Elena changed the subject.  “Let’s go back to your uncle’s house before you take me home.  I want to play for you.”  And she smiled.

***

Elena didn’t play. 

Instead she found herself in Jane’s room, tearing away her clothes like a fallen woman in one o
f the French novels she’d secretly read as a girl.  When Jane took her in her arms, Elena might have dropped to the floor, so weak was she for wanting, but Jane led her to the bed, and made her cry out three times before she finally whispered “enough, Jan
e
,” with a weary smile.

“You’re sure? Jane grinned, propping herself on her elbow as the girl caught her breath.

They were quiet for several minutes.

“Jane?” Elena said at last.

“hmm?” Jane trailed the back of her hand down Elena’s throat, across her br
easts and over the soft rise of her stomach.

“I want to touch you,” Elena whispered.  And she reached up and slipped her hand under Jane’s right suspender strap and slid it over her shoulder.  The gesture unbalanced Jane and she tumbled back onto the pill
ow.

“Ellie, no—” Jane began, but Elena stopped her with a kiss.

“Shhh…” she hushed her, then whispered, “please, Jane,” pushing the other suspender strap down as Jane pulled her arms out and reached them up to the girl.

“Ellie…” Jane tried again, w
eakly as Elena unbuttoned her shirt, reached through and found the fastening of the bandage that Jane had wrapped tightly around her breasts.

“It’s alright,” Elena whispered, kissing Jane by her ear as her fingers worked gently to loosen the bindings.  Sh
e sat up, pulling Jane with her and slowly drew the bandage away, dropping it beside the bed.

Jane squeezed her eyes shut and took a shuddering breath. “I can’t—” she whispered, but made no move to stop the girl who was now pushing the shirt
down over her shoulders.  Instead, she pulled it off by the cuffs and let it fall, as Elena pushed her back again and leaned over her, making little circles with her tongue around the very parts of Jane she most wished would disappear.

She took Elena’s h
ead in her hands and raised her face to kiss her.  “I love you, beautiful boy,” Elena whispered, and her hand slipped to the buttons on the front of Jane’s trousers.

Jane reached down and stopped Elena’s hand.  “I can’t,” she whispered again urgently.

Bu
t Elena put her lips very close to Jane’s ear and said in a low voice, “John, my darling boy, your girl only wants to please you.”

Jane gasped and all her will turned to liquid as Elena unfastened her trousers and slipped her hand inside to the warm, wet
place between her legs.  “Oh my god, Ellie—oh…” Jane breathed as Elena found the tight, slippery button beneath her tangle of hair and stroked it gently at first, then harder as she felt Jane panting under her.

“John,” Elena kept up a whispered monolog
ue in her lover’s ear as she touched her, “handsome young man, your Ellie wants you so…”

Jane bit down on her lower lip as she almost involuntarily pushed her hips up to meet Elena’s hand.  “Elena…” she whispered again.

“Brilliant John—how I want yo
u—lovely John, beautiful boy,” Elena whispered as if chanting a spell, weaving her words like clothes around Jane’s nakedness until at last it seemed to Jane that every muscle in her body convulsed hard, then melted to water beneath Elena’s touch.