by Rona Jaffe
And yet she knew it was quite possible. All of them had always known that.
Part of a poem by Edna St. Vincent Millay went through her mind:
Alone, alone, in a terrible place,
In utter dark without a face,
With only the dripping of the water on the stone,
And the sound of your tears, and the taste of my own.
She thought of the education she had thrown away; the things she hadn’t done or tried to do. Now she never would. She would never know the mysteries of growing older and finding out about life. She would never write her book. She thought about Daniel, how she loved him, and wondered if he could have loved her and if they could have been together if not for tonight. Her parents would be brokenhearted to lose her, and her sister … Who would have dreamed she would be destined to die in a cave?
She kept moving on as she thought all these things, simply because she could never just lie down and wait for it to be over. Small rooms and large ones, tiny passageways … trying to find something familiar. She prayed. It was the first time since she was a little girl and had said her prayers by rote in Sunday school, but they said it was never too late.
And then she realized that when the kerosine in her lantern was gone she would be left alone in total darkness.
“Help!” she screamed. “Help, help, help, help!” The walls mocked her with their echo. Elp, elp, elp …
She would watch the level of oil in the lantern, keep walking, and find a room to die in.
She kept walking and screaming, her throat sore, shivering now in the dampness, hating the echo that reminded her how helpless she really was. She began to think she was losing her mind. The echo had changed, and now it wasn’t saying “Elp,” but “Hey.”
Hey, hey, hey …
Daniel!
Kate waved her lamp in wide arcs, shouting his name. “Daniel, it’s me, Kate! Here, I’m here!”
“Stay where you are,” he called. His voice was faint and far away, but she heard him. “Keep calling so I can find you.”
She suddenly felt warm, as if the blood was returning to her numb body. He would find her. She would live. She kept crying out hoarsely, and after what seemed a very long time she saw the reflection of his light against the black glittering wall, and then she saw the light itself. And then she saw him. No one had ever looked so wonderful to her in her life. She flung herself into his arms.
“What are you doing here?” he said.
“Me? What are you doing here?”
“My God,” he said, “you don’t even have a compass.”
“Don’t let go of me,” she said. She burrowed into the safety of his body, his arms around her, her face against the reassuring scratchiness of his sweater. She kept her arms locked around his waist so he wouldn’t stop holding her.
“Why are you here all alone?” he said.
“I came after you, you dummy. I thought you were going to get lost, and then I did.”
“You came after me alone in the dark?” he said, sounding amazed. His voice was soft, and he seemed very touched. “That was …”
“Was what—crazy?”
“Was heroic … and … the most caring thing anyone ever did for me.”
“I love you,” she said. It slipped out before she could stop the words. Now she’d ruined it and he wouldn’t be her friend anymore. She felt the tears start again, and knew she was only making it worse by crying in front of him, making a fool of herself.
He drew back and looked at her, his eyes wide with tenderness and surprise. “I love you,” he said.
He kissed her, and they clung together, kissing. That sensual mouth—she couldn’t believe how good it felt, better than anything she had ever let herself imagine.
“Let’s get out of here,” Daniel said.
He took her hand and led her to the passageway he had just entered. She followed him then, holding her lantern in one hand and the edge of his jacket in the other. She saw he had been marking the walls, and now he stopped quickly to wash off the markings as they left each room, and to recheck his map.
“What are you doing?” Kate asked.
“I’ll tell you later. Let’s just get out. You’ve had enough of this place for one night.”
When they reached the familiar room where the lanterns were stored they put them down and turned out their lights. Now they had their flashlights and Daniel was holding her hand again. Kate felt as if she had been in this place all night. She had no idea what time it was. They ran the last few steps to the safety of the outside world and stood there under the stars, breathing the clear, fresh air.
“I saw your bike,” she said.
“Why don’t I drive your car? I’ll come back to get my bike tomorrow.”
“Let’s put it on my ski rack,” Kate said. “Somebody might steal it, or see it, which would be bad enough.” Why was she being so logical, when all she wanted was for him to make love to her? But she wouldn’t ask him; he’d have to make the first move.
Daniel put his bicycle on top of her car, and then they got in. He tossed his bag of equipment into the backseat. While he drove she leaned back against her seat, too excited to be tired, thinking she might never be tired again. He was so beautiful she couldn’t stop looking at him. He loved her … she was so happy she could hardly believe it.
“I’ll tell you why I was in the caverns,” he said. “Maybe you won’t love me so much anymore.”
“You were burying a body?”
“I was cheating. I wanted to find out what Jay Jay had planned so I could stay ahead of him and win the game.”
“I didn’t think you cared about winning,” Kate said, surprised.
“I didn’t think so either. You know how I always said I wasn’t competitive. Well, it seems I am.” He looked at her. “I risked my life and I cheated, just to win a game. I, the guy who claimed to be a happy dropout, am probably the most competitive person I know. The midnight revelation of the caverns.”
“That’s not so bad,” Kate said.
“What isn’t?”
“Being competitive.”
“I don’t mind finding out I’m competitive,” Daniel said. “I’m sort of glad and relieved. But what about that crazy thing I just did?”
“I know you wouldn’t cheat on something that mattered,” Kate said. “Like an exam or something. This is just a game.”
“But it got to be more.”
“You’re not going to tell Jay Jay, are you?” she said.
“No. He’d be too flattered.” They both laughed. He told her how he had tricked Jay Jay into having a date, and Kate was delighted. She felt stoned: comfortable, happy, safe. The lights of the huge dorms swam before her eyes.
He took his bike off her car and locked it to the iron bike rack in the parking lot. “Are you hungry?” he asked.
“No. Are you?”
“Uh-uh. Do you want a drink?”
“Do you?”
He didn’t answer. He didn’t need to. He put his arms around her again and ran his lips across her hair. “Will you stay with me tonight?” he asked. He sounded almost shy. Daniel … shy?
“Yes,” Kate said.
The dorm was quiet when they went up to Daniel’s room, and Kate looked at her watch for the first time and realized with surprise that it was two thirty in the morning. She was glad no one had stopped them to say hello. She just wanted to be alone with him.
His skin was like silk, with firm, smooth muscles moving under it. She had always known he would have a beautiful body. But best of all was the way the two of them made love, as if they had each been starving all this time for the touch of the other; and Kate thought perhaps they had. She wanted to bite him, devour him, and at the same time she felt as if she were melting. The pleasure was so total she had never felt this way before, never even come near it. Don’t stop, she thought, don’t stop, don’t ever stop.
He didn’t seem to want to stop either. They made love all night, over and over, d
esperately and intensely. There was nothing but the world of their bodies. The waves of feeling left them surprised and insatiable. When they finally did have to stop they still clung together, looking at each other and kissing.
“I love you so much I can’t believe it,” he said.
“I bet I love you more.”
“I bet you don’t.”
“Good,” Kate said. They both laughed with happiness.
“I always thought I was Mr. Spock,” Daniel said quietly. “I thought I had no feelings, like a Venusian. I never thought I could fall in love, even though I really wanted to.”
“You aren’t Mr. Spock,” Kate said. “You’re the Tin Man. You know, from The Wizard of Oz. He thought he had no heart and all along he had the biggest, most loving heart of all.”
“I just feel like a totally different person,” he said. “I mean, it’s weird. Before, I felt like I was dead.”
“Raising the dead,” Kate said. “Like in the game.”
“Oh, wow, the game! I’ve mapped it almost as far as Jay Jay got, and I know where the good stuff is, although he’ll probably put in more.”
“Are you going to play it anyway?”
“Are you kidding? Of course I am.”
“Well don’t tell me anything,” Kate said. “I want to be surprised. It’s no fun if I know in advance.”
“I just thought of something really disgusting,” Daniel said. “I am destined to be a rich, successful captain of industry. Work in computers and make up games on the side for fun.”
“You don’t sound too depressed about it.”
“I’m a little stunned, but not depressed. It’s my destiny.”
“Good,” Kate said. “Jay Jay and I plan to be famous, so you have to be too.”
“And you and I will always be in love,” Daniel said.
“Oh, I hope so,” Kate said. “Please, let’s.”
“We will.”
She knew it might really be possible. A feeling of peacefulness and bliss came over her, and she kissed him. Then she fell asleep in his arms, so exhausted that for the first time the narrow dormitory bed didn’t seem too small for two people.
The next day neither of them went to classes. They slept until noon and appeared at lunch holding hands. After lunch they went back to Daniel’s room and made love all afternoon. They had to get up for dinner because that night they were scheduled to play the game.
“I really don’t want to go in those caverns tonight,” Kate told Daniel. “Last night is still too close.”
“But this time you have two people who know the caverns,” Daniel said.
She forced herself to go in there and the game quickly took over, as she had hoped it would, and then everything was all right. After the game, when they all went back to the dorm, Kate brought her pillow into Daniel’s room, where she was going to spend the night. They hadn’t had to discuss it; they both simply knew that they were going to be together as much as possible. When Jay Jay saw her going into Daniel’s room with the pillow, in her bathrobe, Kate thought she caught him looking sad. He’s jealous, she thought. Poor Jay Jay.
She was relieved that Robbie didn’t seem jealous at all. He didn’t even seem to notice. And anyway, they were good friends now, nothing more.
The next day Kate and Daniel went to the shopping mall after classes and bought a king-size mattress and sheets and a blanket, all of which they brought back to the dorm. The purchase would leave both of them broke for months, but it was worth it. They were dragging the mattress up the stairs when Robbie appeared. Kate had a feeling of déjà vu about that mattress number.
“Oh, let me help you,” Robbie said pleasantly.
He not only helped them with the mattress, but he helped them drag Kate’s bed into Daniel’s room and put the two beds together with the king-size mattress on top. They had to take the desk out and put it into Kate’s room.
“This looks really decadent,” Daniel said, surveying their huge bed with pleasure.
“Perfectly suitable for a future captain of industry,” Kate said. They both laughed.
“Captain of industry?” Robbie said. “I don’t understand.”
“I changed my mind about being a dilettante,” Daniel said.
“Oh,” Robbie said. Then he smiled and raised his hand in a benediction. “Bless you, my children,” he said.
CHAPTER 10
A long time afterward Daniel would look back and think that he should have noticed what was happening, should have anticipated it—he who was so bright, observant, and logical. But he had been in love, and the amazement and joy of this unexpected miracle was the focus of his attention. Besides, perhaps logic had been his downfall. To have been able to anticipate something so mad and strange took a mind that was open to anything.
But it was now; the end of winter, the beginning of love. Kate was everything he had ever wanted. He knew that things between them would keep getting better and better. They planned for her to come home to Brookline with him for the Spring Break. He had told his parents he was bringing a girl who was important to him and they were pleased. His mother said she would have a good excuse to fix up the guest room, a chore she had been putting off. Daniel felt too sanguine to argue with her about sleeping quarters, although he knew that Kate’s mother, from what Kate had told him, would probably have let them stay in the same room.
He hoped Kate wasn’t jealous about all the girls who had been before her. She saw them everywhere; in the dorm, on the campus, at classes. And that was just some of them! None of them had been in this new bed with him though—this was for the two of them and their new life. Those girls had only been physical attraction. He would have had more cause to be jealous—if he were a jealous person—of guys Kate had actually loved. He wanted her to love him more than she had ever loved them, and she assured him she did.
He didn’t want to rush things, but at the back of his mind was the idea that if their relationship kept getting better, after they graduated they would live together, and then they might get married. Why not? He wanted to marry, and have children, and he knew he would be perfectly happy to spend the rest of his life with Kate. He couldn’t say anything to her though, because ambitious women panicked if they thought you were trying to tie them down or interfere with their lives. He would have to live where the best job was, and maybe Kate would want to go to New York and get a job in publishing. She worried so much about her writer’s block that if she couldn’t write that novel she was dreaming of, then she would want to go to work in a field where she could learn more about writing. Daniel wondered if the best job offer for him would come from a firm in New York, and then everything would be solved. There was no point in worrying this far in advance. He was astonished at how much he had changed already—he who never wanted to plan for the future was now filled with plans.
She told him one night about the man in the laundry room who had tried to rape her, and Daniel wished he could kill him.
“Why didn’t you tell the school authorities?” he said angrily. “You should have demanded they hire a security guard.”
“Ha,” Kate said. “Somebody has to get raped or killed first, and then all the future victims have to make a petition … guards cost money, you know. People don’t care about other people in this world. You have to take care of yourself.”
He had never heard her sound so bitter. He held her. “I’ll take care of you.”
“I know,” she said. “But I hardly knew you then.”
“I wish I could do something to make it never have happened.”
“It helped a lot that I was able to tell you,” she said. “I never could tell anyone before—at least, no one who mattered to me—and I had to pretend I didn’t care. It was the only way I could handle it. I do feel better now, really.”
He and Kate talked about going to Europe for the summer. They could figure out a really cheap way to go, and maybe their parents would give them the money. Or maybe they could go to San Francisco, stay
at Kate’s house, get jobs, and earn enough to go for the last three weeks.
“My father’s going to have an expensive new baby by then,” Kate said. “He might say he can’t afford to send me to Europe, or, on the other hand, he might feel guilty enough to say yes.”
“It would be nice if we could go in June, after my brother’s wedding.”
“But whatever we do,” Kate said, “you and I will do it together, and it will be fun.”
She wrote a poem for him. “It’s kind of dumb,” she said, embarrassed. He didn’t think it was dumb at all. He thought it was marvelous and he kept it in his wallet.
With his life so full now, a life that had been almost too full before with all the things they continued to do, how could he have noticed anything? Even Kate, wary as a rabbit, didn’t notice anything either.
CHAPTER 11
Jay Jay knew that the Kate-Daniel romance was for real, and it made him feel alone again. He couldn’t even fantasize that Kate was giving each one of them a chance and his would be next. He hated being so young. He never wanted the girls who wanted him; they were always little kids. It was March. The grim hateful weather had started to grow softer, but he knew it was tricky. Tomorrow it might snow. April was when everything got better and you knew there was some hope you would see spring again. The Spring Break started the first week in April, and Jay Jay thought that to cheer himself up he might as well give an April Fools’ Day party, to end the Winter Semester properly and send everyone off on their way with a nice hangover.
He made a list of everyone he liked or wanted to know better. The four of them, of course; Perry and his medical friends, Glenna, Tina, the twins … he would invite all of Daniel’s former girl friends just to stir up a little mischief. He had saved his old party lists so he wouldn’t forget anybody. Everyone who was invited could bring friends, so it ought to be big and noisy, just the way he liked parties to be. It would be a normal party—no tricks or gimmicks. He had used up all his tricks on the game. The only thing he did to make the occasion special was teach Merlin to say “April fool,” a whimsical little touch, Jay Jay thought. He would start the party in the afternoon. If it was like all his others it would last far into the night.
