The Wave by Kristen Crusoe (ebook reader online txt) 📗

life. I was your wife in everything but the bedroom, and now, it’s my turn.’

She had stopped pacing and sat in the chair opposite his desk. She crumpled over, holding her head in her hands, resting on her upper thighs. He could see her back shaking but was curiously unmoved by the sight. She’s acting. She’s dangerous, he thought.

‘Claudia, I have to get to work now. I have a lot to do to get caught up. Can we talk about this later? Maybe over a drink?’

He knew she would put the department first; of that he was sure. So, he could appeal to her sense of professionalism, for now at least. And a drink, that was not a good idea, but he could find a way to put her off. Until he came up with a better idea. He didn’t want her going to Clair. And if needed, he could always pull the sexual harassment card, she was in fact his superior. She’d had trouble in the past with that, with a male student. For now, he just wanted her out of his office.

She looked up, eyes reddened by rubbing, but not wet.

‘OK, but we’re not finished here. A drink, after work today?’

‘Not today. I’ll need to get home.’

He wasn’t ready to talk about Clair’s cancer. And certainly not with Claudia.

She looked at him. He held her gaze.

Finally, she stood, and walked to the door. Sensing her need for a final word, commitment to a date, he hurried to open the door for her. Placing his hand on the small of her back, he gently guided her through.

‘I’m sorry, Claudia. It’s the best I can do.’

‘That’s always been your final escape, Adam. But you know, it isn’t about doing your best, it’s about doing what’s right.’

‘Maybe so, and if that is true, then what’s right is that I stay with Clair.’

He felt anger at her insinuation that she was right for him.

He heard her stacked heels clicking down the linoleum hall. Closing the door to his office, he felt his bowels tighten. An all too familiar feeling that he remembered happening for the first time when he was fifteen. The first time he realized he had power over women, and that sometimes, it went too far.

Chapter 17

Adam

Adam stood still, the vibration of the slammed door vibrating through his cells. Old feelings of confusion and remorse surged through him. Had he brought this on? Did he send out signals that made Claudia think he cared in that way? That he wanted her as a lover? Before Clair, yes, probably, he thought, but not since, surely.

He slumped back into his chair, staring at the door, his breath coming in short, staccato sips. For the hundredth time he wished he still smoked. He opened a drawer beside his desk, pulling out a bottle of Scotch he kept there for special needs, good or bad. Never a man of action, he found relief from others’ expectations in presenting an aura of mystery, as though he was too deep to be understood. An escape artist, he rode the rip tides of passion and desire until he found an eddy where he could ease out, leaving no wake behind him. Or so he thought.

The whisky burned going down. He took an imaginary drag off a camel, unfiltered, feeling the acute sensation of loss of neurons, bringing an immediate placebo high. Holding his breath, he looked around his office, his sanctuary. Degrees, certificates, honors, awards, photos of productions, graduations, all the hallmarks of a successful career. And inside, he felt like an imposter. Exhaling, he took another sip, savoring the burn, the feeling of calm that came with it. It wasn’t his fault, he thought. It never was. Old memories surged up, like spring bulbs, underground through the winter and, with heat and warmth, pushing through to the open.

He had been a magnet for women of all ages. Since his earliest memory, his mother’s female friends had fawned over him, saying how handsome he was, even as a young boy. They would go out of their way to smooth his hair, brush his cheek. When he had reached adolescence, they would do more. At thirteen he looked eighteen. At fifteen he looked twenty-one. The first time he had sex was at thirteen. He had gone to visit his girlfriend. They had just begun dating, as much as teens too young to drive or be away from home for any length of time, could date. Within their small circle of friends, it was known that Adam and Carolyn were a pair. When he would visit, her mom, already intoxicated and slightly manic after school, would sit in his lap, pull him out onto the living room rug to dance with her. Wearing clothes that were too tight, too bright, her full body overflowing the seams, smelling of cigarettes and gin, Patty fed him lust in small bites, but enough that he knew he wanted more. The girlfriend, hurt and embarrassed, would go to her room, waiting for Adam to free himself from her mother’s hold on him. On a sunny Sunday afternoon, he had gone to visit Carolyn, forgetting she had a swim meet out of town. Patty invited him in. That was his initiation into sex.

His first serious romantic relationship was with his ninth-grade literature teacher, Miss Corrigan. He had just turned fifteen. Tall and rangy, his hair yellow gold, Adam vibrated with poetic potential. His father had left, stranding Adam in a house without joy or hope. His mother, emotionally isolated, depressed and angry, blamed Adam for his father’s absence. He wrote beautiful, sorrowful verses, full of longing for love, connection, and Lisa Corrigan, an almost young woman in her early thirties, was drawn to his beauty and pain. It began innocently enough. Talks after class. Walks on weekends, in parks and along beaches where they weren’t seen by anyone who might recognize her, or him. But if they did, so what? She was being a