pure and forbidden

Our love was different. It was pure, but not by any other standard than our own. Disgusting they would have said, unnacceptable, a horrible sin. There were many obstacles that could have destroyed our love. She was my teacher, and while she was only five years older than me, right out of college, I was still in high school, and in this way it was not simple to be in love. She was also a woman, not a problem in itself, the problem only arose in the fact that I was as well.

It was during softball tryouts on that spring day, during my first year at Deberton Academy, that I spotted her. Coach Addison, who prefered just 'Dana'.I had transfered just weeks ago, halfway through my senior year in public school, graduation just months away, but as close as it was, my life was important to me, and I did not appreciate death threats by fellow classmates.

I saw her standing there, drenched in the rays of an early April sun. I held my gaze a moment too long, exploring the depth of her eyes, until the girl in line tapped my calf with her bat, urging me toward the plate. Turning my eyes to the pitcher, I pushed her out of my head, to focus on the ball that was in no way soft, as it plumetted toward me. I held the ball in my eyes, slowed it's descent in my head to find the right swing. And then it collided, a perfect slice through it's center, leaving behind a clean, concise explosion of sound.

For four hours I pushed my limits, I let more energy seep from my arms and legs than I had to offer. I sprinted, I jumped, I caught ball after ball that soared through the air, and between each movement, I looked toward the coach, who scribbled frivolously on her clipboard. My desire to impress her was almost humiliating, even to myself.

I made the team, as I knew I would. Each day I drifted off during class, scribbled sketches on my notebook, anything to make the day go a little faster. In the afternoon's I exerted all that I had to offer, I swung hard, ran fast, anything to make her smile, to make her say "you are a truly talented athlete" the way she had that day of tryouts.

There were times when I was convinced she was as attracted to me as I was to her. She would stare at me sometimes, when she thought I wasn't looking, and I would do the same to her. When she called the team in for a huddle, she would slip her a little lower down my waist than she did the other players.

She lived at my boarding school, although I was only a day student. It wasn't until that May evening, half way through the season that my desires were fulfilled. She had invited us all to her apartment in the dorms for a team dinner. We ordered pizza, and ate it along with ice cream sundaes while discussing strategy and uniforms. At 8:30 the team began to leave, but I stayed a moment longer, asking to use the bathroom. Dana was the only person left in the room as I prepared to leave. As I stood by the door, I turned to say goodbye, but when I tilted my head around, I saw hers, inches from my face.

"Goodbye," I said. She smiled and looked at me. I tried to smile back but I couldn't. Standing this close to her, feeling the heat from her body drift toward me made my muscles tighten and breath quicken. I looked into her eyes and they stared back as her smile faded. For a few minutes we stood, only inches apart from each other's faces, and without realizing it, my face moved in to hers and now our lips were only a centimeter apart. She closed her eyes and I knew she was ready. Our lips touched, soft and light at first, but then they began to quicken and wander around one anothers. I moved my hands to her neck. They massaged her skin, circling to the back of her head and then toward her collarbone where they rested on the tenderness of her chest.

I tilted my head and parted my mouth. I grabbed her bottom lip with my own lips, pulling her into me. And then she did the same, she reached her tongue through my mouth, encompassing it around my own. Then her lips left mine and brushed across my cheek. They rested below my jaw and I tipped my head back, allowing her tongue to grope my neck.

She took hold of my waist and pushed me into the wall, and we continued, for what seemed like hours, feeling every inch of one another's bodies with our fingers, with our tongues.

That night, when lay in bed, I could not get the image of her out of my head. I closed my eyes, but she always appeared. She was stunningly beautiful, but not in the average way. Her skin was light and brushed in freckles, her lean body held muscle, long and strong. Dana's hair was not one shade, but many, naturally. Dirty blondes, strawberry browns, and reddish chocolates filled her strands, like a sepia tone photograph. But the feature that I noticed above all were her lips. They were not thick and sexy, simply thin pink lines. The top lip potruded just a little more than the bottom, giving a her a youthful, irresistable smile.

Our nights continued, long through the May and June. It made me work harder during practice, and at the same time threw me entirely off course each time my eyes landed on her. It seemed perfect, everything was perfect. Our love was hidden, forbidden and I liked it that way. It was not until one thursday night. I had told her I would not be seeing her that night, that I was required to attend a dinner with relatives, but they had cancelled, and I did not call Dana to tell her I would be coming over. I thought she might appreciate a surprise. But I was wrong.

I stood in the entrance to her apartment for six seconds. The longest six seconds of my life. They passed so slowly, so murderously that it was as if I was watching for an entire year. Their bodies swayed in time with one another, her back arched as he held her breasts in his hand. A man. She had chosen this man, my physics teacher, a 30 year old and his breastless body over me.

Six seconds passed, and finally she saw me. Jumping up to cover herself with the sheet. I did not yell, or gasp, I just ran, swift as a tiger in the other direction. A moment later I turned to see her sprinting after me, in jeans and an inside out tee shirt she had thrown on. How could she do this to me, how could she destroy my heart this way, kill this beautiful thing that had flown between us. I threw open my car door and jumped in, but before I could hit the gas pedal she jumped in as well.

"Please, Liza, let me explain. Don't just leave like this." she pleaded.

"No," I responded "Please get out of my car, get out of my car, get out of my life, I do not want to see you. Leave."

"No," she cried, "I won't"

I turned to look at her. "Why?" I asked, "I am nothing to you, I'm just the 17 year old you fuck in your spare time when you get bored. I am absolutely nothing and you know it. You're not even a fucking dyke, you're a liar, a bitch. I thought I was something to you but I'm obviously wrong."

I could see the tears swell in her eyes.

"You know," she sobbed, "you know that is not true, you are everything to me. You are everything I can't have. You don't understand how hard I have fallen for you, but I don't know what to do Liza. Help me, I don't know what to do. You are everything I can't have, you are beautiful, and young, and talented, and amazing, but you are out of my reach and I needed someone, if just for one night that I could honestly be with, someone who was my age, someone I could have without being looked upon as a slut, as a criminal if someone found out!"

And then she touched me, she reached out and grabbed my wrists. She sunk her nails deep into my skin, tearing at my flesh, and then pushed her lips onto mine. And I did not argue, or pull away, instead I did the same to her. I scraped her skin, bit her lip, tugged at her hair and drenched my fingers as I slid them into her, and pushed hard until she screamed. And we continued, in the dark parking lot, until we both screamed out in pain, until it became torture. But we didn't mind, because love hurts.