Desire in Any Language

by Anastasia Vitsky

  I wonder, guiltily, if my tutor was ever disciplined during her school days. Compared with my stammering and blushing, she’s so comfortable with assaulting students with a stick that she can even joke about it.

  “Well, Mira, you wanted to fully experience the culture here, so what better opportunity is there than learning how we deal with our students? Did you know that in the old days we used the phrase ‘picking up the rod’ to mean becoming a teacher? How deprived your education has been!”

  Balefully suggesting that I might prefer to remain deprived was only met with affectionate laughter and a squeeze of my shoulders. As if I were a petted and precocious child.

  I both resent and enjoy the vulnerability of being a foreigner. I like the freshness and softness it gives me, like being a child again. For my application essay, I described my study abroad experience as a “second childhood” and expressed thankfulness at the new lessons I was learning. I had no idea that entering a second childhood would make me subject to the rules of childhood once again.

  The next week, I again enter rather late. Not because I blithely forgot the time but because there was no courteous teacher to usher me into the office. As a result, I stand outside of the office door for a good fifteen minutes while studiously ignoring the curious looks of students passing by.

  At long last I reflect that tardiness is probably not the best way to start the lesson off on the right foot, and I make my way over to her desk. I set a small grammar textbook onto her desk and smile expectantly. I had so many questions during our last translation that she mentioned a recently published grammar book for foreigners. I spend so much time at the local bookstore that the manager has jokingly threatened to charge me rent, so I was happy to pick up one copy for myself and one for her.

  She opens it and smiles at me delightedly. “Oh good! You were so fast! How much was it?” I tell her the amount, and she opens her purse to hand me the next largest bill. When I search my pockets for change, she pats my hand. “It’s all right. It’s ‘shimboolum gahp,’ money for doing an errand. We give it to children,” she teases.

  Only four years older than I and yet still able to rub it in! I make a face and briefly wonder what it would be like to graduate from all this student stuff and be a professional, a colleague. Finally an adult. I have a hard time imagining it.

  We immediately plunge into our work, previously delayed for two weeks in a row. She chuckles at one of my spelling errors.

  “It’s omgee, not omgway,” she corrects me. “Omgee is thumb. Omgway is someone that babies are afraid of. Sometimes a mother will say to her baby, ‘omgway will get you!’ and the baby will cry and cry.” Sort of like my mother’s bogeyman, I think, and I marvel at the similarity between cultures.

  “Does omgway also ‘get’ teachers who are too scary to their students?” I can’t help asking. She taps her red felt-tip pen playfully in my direction.

  “No, but I’m sure they would be interested in a student who calls her teacher ‘princess disease.’”

  I burst into laughter. Her last name is almost the same as the word for “disease,” and here “princess disease” means a girl or woman who is always concerned with looking beautiful. Ever since I learned that, I’ve addressed every e-mail and note to her as “To princess-disease teacher.”

  She tries to scowl. “For shame! Don’t you know you aren’t even supposed to step on your teacher’s shadow?”

  “Aww!” This is another proverb, one that means a teacher should receive so much respect that even her shadow should be honored. It’s her standard weapon whenever I’ve succeeded in teasing her.

  “There’s no shadow when we’re inside,” I complain.

  “I can make one,” she answers cheerily. She pushes her chair back directly underneath the ceiling light until a very faint shadow forms next to the bottom of her chair. I can’t resist. I stomp happily.

  Even as she laughs, she wraps her right hand—with such strong fingers!—around mine. “Son day!” she says to me.

  I look at her in shock. It’s the traditional order for a student to hold out her hands for punishment. Against my will, my hands uncurl themselves and start to tremble.

  “P-p-please...I was just joking...”

  She smiles at me, so warmly that I can’t help trusting her. She lifts her pen and strikes it ever so softly against my outstretched palms. A sudden unexpected gladness fills my heart. If this is a joking matter, I have nothing to fear. Yet again my eyes prick with sudden tears, this time at her amazing and compassionate intuition. She knew I was afraid. That’s why she wanted to do this last week.

  “It’s still me,” she says softly. “This doesn’t change how I feel about you. Or our work together.”

  “Th-thank you,” I stammer incoherently. In answer, the pen flicks against my palms a second time.

  “Don’t be afraid,” she tells me. “You have no reason to fear. I’m on your side.”

  For the briefest moment, I wonder if being struck —but it seems too harsh a word—is too small a price to pay for receiving her seemingly limitless love. I’m almost ready to ask her to give it to me. Almost.

  Desire Lost

  It’s the familiar Wednesday-morning stomach-sinking realization it’s been another week and I have nothing to show for it. The hurried scrambling through my book to read and jot down notes, underline, highlight, anything to make it look like I’d pored over every word. The panicked scribbling of a translation in the hope it would take up some class time. Every Wednesday night I swear I’m going to spend the next week like a study hermit, and every following Wednesday morning I berate myself for not doing so. My roommate knows the best parties and clubs. Every time I promise that I will stay home the following night, and every following night I persuade myself that I am learning my new culture firsthand. A translator needs to know the cultural context of the words she translates, right?

  I throw in some big words for impress value and dash to the bus late. But by some miracle, I actually arrive to my tutoring session on time. Maybe the traffic was light today. I honestly can’t say since my nose was pressed against my book the entire trip. I’m early, she’s late, and I silently thank her for giving me a few more precious minutes of preparation.

  After she comes in—“Oh, you’re early today!”—and we begin to study, the inner nervousness builds. I’m not sure exactly which side of the slacking-off/squeaking-by line I’ve crossed today. Is it enough? Or was she really serious? About...treating me like her students? The hickory is nowhere in sight today, but I can’t help giving a small shudder of both anticipation and dread.

  “You have to come to my hometown,” she says suddenly. I look at her blankly. Is this an invitation? “I’m getting married,” she says. I gape at her, staring at the silver “couple ring” she began wearing a few weeks ago. Engagement is a formal affair involving nearly as much expense and ceremony as the actual wedding, so very few couples purchase an engagement ring. Never able to resist marketing opportunities, jewelry stores began promoting “couple rings” instead.

  In the time we’ve studied together, I’ve heard her say over and over again that she’s not ready to be involved with someone and that she wants to focus on her graduate work. How she manages graduate school, teaching, and caring for her father I have no idea. I have enough trouble getting myself to class each day.

  “At the end of the month, so we can’t have class for the next three weeks.” Still silently watching her, I feel something sink inside. I’d never in my wildest dreams...I’d decided to be really diligent and make the most of our class time together...

  “Are you serious? Is this a joke?”

  “I wish,” she grumbles. “It’s crazy. But since my father is so sick, he wants me to get married quickly. My parents and my boyfriend’s parents decided the date, and for the first time my father looks so happy.” She’s the oldest child and the first to get married. “I can’t erase the smile from my father’s face.”

  I have to
blink rapidly. I know I’m being a baby, I know that of course she has a life of her own, I know this is a volunteer thing and she didn’t sign on for life, but I thought...was counting on...I can’t believe this is happening. I wonder, in a slight panic, if after the wedding she will be too busy adjusting to her new life for her teaching. And not just my selfish reasons, but she’s said herself that she’s not entirely certain she wants to be married to her boyfriend. I wish she could have the fun and anticipation and exasperation of preparing for her wedding. Not this insane hurry-up reminiscent of a 1950’s shotgun wedding.

  We talk at great length about the pros and cons, her reasons and doubts and fears. I understand her wanting to please her father—and she wants to marry soon in case he doesn’t make it—but it’s still too soon.

  “But if you don’t love him...why don’t you wait? Just a few months. Giving away your entire life to another man is too important to decide just yet. You should be able to enjoy your wedding.”

  She laughs ruefully. “I know. But there’s nothing I can do.” Forces a smile. “Now come on, you look so sad. Sadder than me, and I’m the bride-to-be.”

  “I am. I thought your wedding would be something special, something to anticipate.” And I thought we would study together for a good long while... In the smallest part of me, the secret unspoken selfish part, I feel incredibly let down. Just as I was preparing myself...I promise to attend her wedding, but it’s with a heavy heart that I say good-bye. For who knows how long. Her wedding, her honeymoon, getting-adjusted-to-marriage...if I could picture her happily married it would be one thing, but this... I am left to wonder if I expected too much, if I allowed myself to hope in vain, if I was foolish enough to think someone could fulfill my needs. She is just a tutor. But sometimes our heart listens not to reason...

  Three weeks later, after the “till death do us part” (death of the couple or death of the ill father who precipitated this wedding?) and endless pictures and waving goodbye as she leaves for her honeymoon, I imagine her opening the letter I secretly tucked in her purse. I’d written many and torn them up, including one for her new husband. “Be good to her. If you make her cry, I will kill you.” Needless to say, that did not get delivered. But the one for her, the one that finally made the cut, was just a short note saying I wished her the best and hoped that we would still keep in touch.

  I turn back to my studies, intending to make good use of this time, but the formerly exciting fairy tales only make me remember how much I enjoyed our study together. I give myself a mental shake and put the books away. Enough mooning about that. She’ll come back, or she won’t. Either way, I’ll deal with it. I managed before I met her, and I’ll manage again.

  In the past few weeks I’ve had a lot of spare time, a previously unknown luxury. Even my roommate’s constant partying isn’t enough to fill my days. Normally I would relish the time to space out in front of the television or computer, but these days time weighs heavily on my hands. Out of curiosity and rather self-consciously, I type the word—the word I can’t make myself think—into my computer search engine.

  The sheer number of results, combined with the graphic photos that come up, leave me speechless. Is my lurking, barely understood curiosity/longing/wistfulness a sign of some underlying psychological problem? Is this “thing,” this desire, only manifestable as some sick kind of pornographic deviant sexuality? I enter a chat room, two, three, and my initial elation at discussing this desire with others rapidly dissolves into confusion. I don’t want to collar my name and call strangers Sir and Lord. I quickly tire of men who belittle my lack of interest in sex. My desire for discipline is taken as a permutation of an unpaid whore’s come-on.

  At first I turn to the Dommes thinking that a feminine touch would be softer, but instead I receive tongue-lashings for wanting “it” without the seemingly requisite accompanying sex. The ones who deign to speak with me merely use me for their mind games. I am their pet one day and verboten the next. The only consistency is the bitterness of the break-up drama.

  I am left to wonder if this feeling of mine is wanting the unattainable. I want to feel...I want to experience...I want to maybe actually be hurt by someone I love. That sounds so mental. I don’t mean romantic love or sexual love, but the “agape” pure love that knows neither gender nor race. Love itself. After being touched and leered from a young age, I’ve learned to distrust physical contact. Never mind romance.

  And yet the human body needs touch, needs intimacy...and a part of me longs for intimacy in this way. Not lust. Love. I want to feel someone’s hand on my bottom, the striking sharp blows of flesh against flesh, straining against something bigger than me. Implacable and restraining and loving, holding me while making me cry. Someone who will let me fight against and draw away and protest, let me fight until the bad feelings are all washed away by pain and tears and the lovely warm throbbing afterward. Kisses and cuddles and stroking me as I cry with abandon. I am left to wonder if I want too much.

  And when she comes back, if she comes back, whether this unspeakable desire will ruin our relationship.

  Desire Frozen

  I could say that she abruptly pushes her chair back and stands up. Or that she paces in tight circles in front of me. Or that her mouth is drawn tight and her voice has become brittle. But what it all amounts to is this.

  She’s angry.

  I didn’t think she became angry. Even her tongue-lashing four weeks ago after my aborted attempt to withdraw from the language institute was measured, deliberate. Setting limits. Telling it to me straight. But this time it is anger. Pure and simple.

  Of course, it didn’t start out that way. At first it was the cheery exchange of hellos, looking through pictures, discussing the changes in her life now that she’s become a staid matron, and happily unwrapping the exquisite tiny decorative plate from her honeymoon in the Philippines. And on my part, it was the sheer delight of being reunited with her, mitigated only by my scathing self-disparagement. What a little idiot I was, thinking marriage would end our relationship. She’s married, but she’s a teacher as well. Except for the thin gold ring on her left hand, we are exactly the same sipping tea in our forget-me-not china cups and enjoying each other’s companionship.

  Until the phone call. She had invited me to come in to “catch up” after our month-long hiatus, and in the midst of our chatter she asked about my other classes. It was so unexpected that I felt the blood drain from my face. I’d truly thought this would be a tea-cookies-and-photo affair. Otherwise I would have prepared some story...

  “Yes? This is Mira’s advisor...mm-hm...yes, the honeymoon was wonderful, thank you.” My ability hasn’t developed enough to catch the blur of the following words, but I gather that she is checking on my academic record. Last week was final exams. “Are you sure you’ve got the right student’s record? Student number 7605489? Yes, that’s right...mm-hm.”

  By the time she hung up the phone, I have already assumed the hands-clasped-together, head-slightly-tilted-downward-and-to-the-side, and shoulders-hunched position reserved especially for these occasions. And there’s only one word to describe her reaction.

  “What on EARTH were you thinking skipping class for three weeks? Not even showing up for your finals? And then sitting right here chatting for thirty minutes without ONCE bothering to mention that, ‘by the way, I failed all of my classes while you were gone’?”

  I’m sorry, I think feebly, but I’ve frozen into unresponsiveness. I could never, ever have imagined that she would raise her voice.

  “What the HELL happened to you last month?” she storms.

  Only the clock ticking and her constant footsteps answer. What am I to say? That last month she awakened in me some stirring I’d never known before? That, just as I was beginning to acknowledge this unspeakable desire, she suddenly had to leave? That I was left to wage a battle of my ever-increasing desires against all the proprieties I had learned growing up? That what I felt for her scared me? Not romance, bu
t something deeper. A kind of connection. The hours scouring the internet hoping to make sense of my conflicting secret feelings, and the despair that maybe I had become some kind of sexual deviant? And in the midst of all this, conjugating verbs and making vocabulary flashcards became immaterial? I am motionless, speechless. Suddenly she slaps her hand down on her desk.

  “I take it from your silence that you have nothing to say for yourself?” The question is pointed, accusing.

  No, I plead silently. Numbly. I have too much to say. So I say nothing.

  She closes her eyes and takes a long, slow breath. She sits down and carefully controls her voice.

  “Mira, please tell me that you were hospitalized for three weeks and you were physically unable to go to class. Tell me that the registrar mixed up your records and this hooky-playing, irresponsible, future-trashing student is anyone but you. Tell me that you didn’t just casually throw away your entire school year’s work. Tell me anything, because right now you’re putting yourself in a very bad position.”

  My chest feels like it will explode, but I can’t respond. I can’t breathe. Her voice is fresh-burned steel, hard and soft at the same time.

  “Mira, do you want to leave this school?”

  I numbly shake my head.

  “You want to study here, don’t you?” A small nod.

  “Are you angry with me because I left for a month? Do you want to be assigned a new tutor?”