Teaching Willow: Session One (7 page)

“I would stay and lick every drop out of you,” I say, pulling up my jeans enough that I don’t trip as I sweep her into my arms.  “But you sound tired.  Maybe next time,” I tell her, laying her on the bed and pulling the covers up over her.

“Next time?” she asks, her voice adorably sleepy.

“If you want there to be,” I say, cursing myself for even leaving that option on the table, but knowing I don’t want this to be the last time either.  “No pressure. No strings.  Let’s just see how things go.”

What a cop out!
I bitch silently.

“Good night,” I whisper, kissing the forehead that I can see much more clearly in the moonlight pouring through the window above the bed.  She looks so much like Willow, it’s staggering. It’s always been remarkable. Only their personalities and grooming habits separate them.  But as I look down at Sage, I wonder to myself if maybe there really
is
more to her than I first believed.  Maybe I didn’t really give her a chance because I spent too much time comparing her to her sister.  Maybe she has merit all on her own if I’ll just be open to seeing it. Either way, with both sisters, there is one truth, and it’s the truth I speak because everything else is too confusing right now.  “I hope you have sweet, naughty dreams of me fucking your beautiful body.”

“Ebon.”  Her voice is so quiet I almost don’t hear it as I’m opening the door.

I stop. “Yes?”

There’s no response, no sound other than her gentle, even breathing.  She’s already asleep.

As I make my way through the dark apartment, I glance at Willow’s closed door.  I feel worse than ever, knowing that when I came here tonight, it was merely to slake this insidious craving for her using her sister’s body to do it.  And what a heartless fucking asshole that makes me.

ELEVEN- WILLOW

How is it possible to feel such conflict?  Such soul-singing ecstasy on the one hand and such heart-wrenching agony on the other?

I’m in love with Ebon.  Yet I’m lying to him.  Lying to him so that I can spend time with him, so that I can be close to him.  When I’m with him as Sage, every moment is the most incredible of my life, but afterward…afterward, I don’t think I’ve ever felt worse.

It’s not that I think I’m doing anything bad to my sister.  Number one, they broke up. Number two, she admitted that she didn’t love him.  This is not about Sage, not really. It’s not even about the fact that I’m lying to get what I want that makes this so hard, although that does make me feel like shit.  No, the worst part is that Ebon thinks he’s making love to Sage.
e
He thinks he’s kissing and touching and whispering to Sage. Not me.  To Ebon, Willow is just a student.  Just the sister of the girl he’s sleeping with, of the girl he may be falling in love with.

The time that I’ve spent with him as myself has always been wonderful.  I think I talked to him more when he was dating Sage than she did.   She would throw parties and while Sage was doing her social butterfly routine, I would talk to Ebon.  He seemed content to chat with me instead of Sage and her friends.  And other date-like occasions, often he’d be early when he’d come to get Sage, so we’d hang out while she finished her makeup or we’d watch funny cartoons or SNL reruns if she was running late from work.  Ebon never seemed to care that he wasn’t spending all his time with Sage.  And, of course,
I
certainly didn’t. 

I never really understood their relationship anyway.  They never seemed to interact in a very intimate way.  Sage hung on him like she adored him (or like she was proud to have that kind of arm candy), but it always seemed one-sided to me.  And fairly superficial.

Plus, Sage is so…cold and Ebon is so…not.  He’s warm and engaging, and the way he has always looked at me when I talk makes me feel like he values my every word and like I’m the only girl in the world.  Of course, that could all be in my head because I want him to feel that way so badly. 

Not that any of this matters.  What matters is that he seems to be engaging “Sage” just fine now and, as Willow, that still leaves me nowhere.

I turn over and bury my face in the pillow.  I take a deep breath and smell only Sage’s perfume, so I throw it off the bed in a fit of pique.  Why can’t he just see
me? 
Why can’t he just love
me?

For the space of about six heartbeats, I regret ever pretending to be Sage.  Tasting this part of Ebon has only made it that much harder to let him go and love him from afar.  Not to mention that living with the guilt of what I’m doing feels like an impossible feat at times.

But then I think of
why
I did it. I think of the unparalleled pleasure of having Ebon’s hands on me, his lips on me.  I can only regret my masquerade to a certain degree when I got so much pleasure out of it.  It’s the aftermath that seems to be slowly killing me from the inside out. 

I love Ebon.  And I can’t stop wanting to be with him.  As sick as it sounds, even though he thought I was someone else, I still have the memories as if they were my own, and I’ll treasure them as such. Maybe that will help me to swallow the bile that rushes to the back of my throat every time I think of him calling me by my sister’s name. 

I drag myself out of bed at a little after seven to shower. I get out and dress in the most comfortable, feeling-sorry-for-myself clothes that I own—yoga pants and a bright yellow T-shirt that says
When a problem comes along…
on the front and
…you must whip it
on the back.  I’m just brushing out my hair when I hear a light knock at the door.  I go to open it and nearly drop my brush when I see Ebon standing on the other side of it.

Dressed in jeans and a blue chambray button up shirt under a gray vest, he looks ready for work.  And ready to make my heart stop.  The sleeves are rolled up to his elbows, revealing his tanned forearms.  Even as I look at them, I can remember seeing the muscles flex beneath his skin as his fingers weaved their magic spell over my body.  Heat pours into my panties and my face burns.

As I watch, Ebon’s eyes turn dark, like he can see into my mind, see what I’m imagining.  My blush deepens and I pin a bright smile to my face.

“Good morning,” I say, giving no thought to which sister I’m supposed to be.

“Willow,” he says softly.  After a moment, I don’t have to wonder how he knew which name to breathe.  I’m dressed in something Sage wouldn’t be caught dead wearing and I’m too bright and shy and casual to be Sage.  So, the tone is set.  Now I have no choice about how this encounter will play out.  In the future, I’ll have to be more mindful of how quickly I answer the door
after
checking to see who stands outside it.

Disappointment trickles through me.

“What are you doing here?” I ask bluntly.

He holds up a deli bag in one hand and then lowers it to hold up a coffee cup holder in the other.  “Breakfast. Is Sage around?”

I do my best to not react.  “Uh, no, she had an early day today. She left just a few minutes ago.”

“Oh, because her car’s still out front.”

“Right, right. She, uh, she carpools with another girl quite a bit.  This is a really different type of position, evidently, so she’s scrambling to get her footing.”

Just like I’m scrambling to get mine.

“Oh, I see,” he says, showing no signs of suspicion.  He clears his throat and looks past me like he’s deliberating.  “Well, I’ve got an extra bagel and coffee. Are you up for some breakfast?”

My heart soars.  I want to scream
YES, YES, YES
!  But I keep it to a pleasantly subdued response.  “Sounds great,” I say as I step back to open the door wider.

Rather than taking his goods to the kitchen, Ebon carries the bagels and coffee to the couch and sets it all down on the table.  He stands and claps his hands together.  “What do you say?  Ren and Stimpy reruns?”  His smile is the most gorgeous thing I’ve ever seen. And I love this side of him.  It’s another thing we share in common that he and Sage don’t—our love for zany old cartoons.  Although it’s silly, it feels like yet another tether that ties me to him, something else to connect my soul to his. 

“I’ll get the cream cheese,” I say around my beaming smile and nodding head.

When I return with the tub of cream cheese and a knife, Ebon has laid out the bagels on napkins and peeled off the lids of our coffee.  Without asking, he dumps one cream and two sugars into mine, sticks a stirring straw in it and slides it across the table to me.  He does it so absently that it makes my heart melt.  I’ve had breakfast with him and my sister a couple of times, but I wouldn’t have imagined he’d remember how I take my coffee.  Yet he did.  And I’m sure it seems more precious to me than what it actually is.  Because it seems pretty damn precious!

I turn on the television and flip through the few channels that might be airing the shows that we watch together. It’s kind of like our thing. One of them anyway.  One of the many, many little things that I can’t overlook, can’t get out of my mind.

“No Ren and Stimpy,” I proclaim, not bothering to keep the disappointment from my voice.  But then I stumble upon something nearly as good.  I gasp. “Ohmigod! It’s Pinky and the Brain!”

I turn wide, happy eyes on Ebon, who is watching me rather than the screen.  His gaze is soft and his head is tilted, and my heart does a little skip-thump-skip when his lips pull up on one side into the sexiest grin in the world.

“Something else we have in common,” he says.  “I didn’t know you were a fan.”

I strive for nonchalance, anything to keep him from seeing how my eyes want to water because this—
this thing
between us—can never be.  “Oh, hell yeah.  I used to call Sage ‘Pinky’,” I admit candidly.

Ebon’s laugh is a surprised bark.  “And she wasn’t insulted?”

“Who Sage?  Not likely.  I’m pretty sure she didn’t even get that I was insulting her.”  I blush after the words are out. I’m sure it made me sound catty to refer to Sage’s…less than stellar intellect in such a nasty way.  “Not that she’s stupid or anything,” I quickly amend. “She’s just…just…  I didn’t mean it to sound like I’m more…”

Shit!  Now I’m digging myself a hole.

Ebon winks knowingly at me.  “No, I know what you meant.”

“Good because that wasn’t a very nice thing to say.”

Ebon studies me, his eyes roaming over my face.  “If I start calling you Pinky, you’ll know that it has nothing to do with how smart you are, but everything to do with the way you blush so easily.”

As if on cue, my cheeks burn all the hotter.  “My face knows you’re talking about it,” I blurt, laughing as I point to what I know is my beet red skin.

Ebon’s smile widens.  “Then I need to talk to it more often.”

Please do!

We fall silent, staring at one another, Ebon a mere twelve inches from me.  The longer the silence stretches, the louder my heartbeat becomes. I know he can hear it. I just know it.

I lick my suddenly dry lips and Ebon’s eyes drift down to my mouth.  They stay there for an inordinately long period of time before rising back to lock on my gaze. 

“Willow,” he says quietly.  It’s amazing what one word, what two short syllables can do to my insides.  In my name, I hear so much.  So much that
has to be
my imagination.  I’m not the one he wants.  Sage is.  But if he did… oh god, if he did…

I let out the breath I’ve been holding and I hold Ebon’s stare.  From the corner of my eye, I see his hand rise a few inches off his leg, as if he is going to touch me, but then it falls back again.  Only seconds later, a frown flits across his forehead and then disappears. 

Ebon leans away, clearing his throat again.  He glances down at his watch.  “Well, I guess I’d better get going. I have to put in some office hours for my 404 class this morning.”

“404?” I ask. I already know what it is, but at this point, I’d say almost anything, ask almost anything to delay his departure. 

“Yes. Didn’t I tell you that I teach a post-grad literature class, too?”

Yes, he did.  I remember everything he has ever told me.  But I play dumb instead. I’m getting really good at playing dumb.

I wrinkle my brow.  “Maybe you did,” I reply noncommittally.

He thins his lips and sighs, slapping his thighs with his palms as though he’s getting ready to leave, but he pauses.  He looks at me again. We’re both quiet, attentive.  His eyes search mine.  Then, as if something unpleasant sweeps into the moment, Ebon gives me a stiff smile.  “Enjoy the show and your bagel. I’ll see you in class.”

And just like that, he’s the teacher and I’m the student again.  It comes between us, between the excitingly tense moments as well as these depressingly estranged ones, like a physical barrier.

I get up and follow Ebon to the door.  He walks right through it, turning only to give me a polite smile and a nod before he descends the steps.  I watch him go. He’s my teacher. I’m his student.  This is what will always be between us. 

Long after Ebon has driven away, I’m still standing in the open doorway.  I’m staring at the last spot I saw him before he disappeared, remembering the way he looks at me when I’m Sage, like there’s nothing between us but heat.  It’s in this moment, in this exact moment, that I know—as horrible of a person as it makes me and as unconscionable a thing as it is—that I will be Sage again. I know that I will seek him out again and again, and that I will be with him as often as he will have me. Why?  Because I love him and this is the only way that I can have him.

So I will. 

God help me for what I’m about to willingly, knowingly, purposely do, but I’m going to do it.  I’m going to pretend to be my sister so that I can date my teacher. Because he won’t have me any other way.

My conscience screams at me as I close the door, but I ignore it. It’s surprisingly easy to drown out the smarter, kinder, more rational voice in the sea of my desperation.  She’s nothing more than the occasional gurgle by the time I sit down to make my plans. 

The first order of business is to get on birth control.  I had an ablation a few years ago, which meant I couldn’t get pregnant.  Not for a long time anyway.  I’ve spotted a little the last couple of months, though, which means that anything could be possible at this point. 

A sick feeling washes through my stomach.  I never expected to have sex with Ebon that first time. The second time either. I thought it was over.  And I knew when he asked me about birth control that he’d stop if I told him the truth, so—again—I lied.

All these lies, weaving in and out and through my life, in an increasingly complicated web of deceit.

At this point, all I can do is hope that nothing will come of those first two times, and make a plan to be better prepared going forward.  I can make the most out of my time with Ebon if I’m smart about it.  Right up until Sage comes back in two months’ time.

And then, I don’t know what the hell I’m going to do. 

To be continued…

Session Two Coming April 8
^th