Everything You Want Me to Be(35)

HollyG: There you are.

Her words, always so vital and direct, able to cut through all my bullshit, appeared on the screen and erased every thought of Mary or infidelity. Everything in me came to attention, but I was surprised. She usually wasn’t online this early.

HollyG: Things are slow tonight. I’m bored and want to see your face.

LitGeek: I’ll take that as a metaphor.

I’d been a teacher for less than two months and I was already doing that speech correction crap.

HollyG: No, actually I meant it literally.

LitGeek: ??

HollyG: Do you want to meet me?

I sat bolt upright in the creaky dining room chair, scanning the words again to make sure I hadn’t misread. I typed, deleted, started again.

LitGeek: I do, but it’s not a good idea. You know my situation.

HollyG: Yes, I know. So how about we meet without meeting?

LitGeek: Again with the “??” What are you up to?

HollyG: There’s a community theater production of Jane Eyre in Rochester next week.

LitGeek: Does the wife take all in this version?

HollyG: You’ll have to come see to find out.

LitGeek: I don’t understand. You’ll be there?

HollyG: I’ll be at the Thursday matinee. I’ll wear a gray dress with white cuffs. We won’t talk or even sit near each other. Just a glance across a crowded room. We’ll meet without meeting.

LitGeek: I can’t. We’re walking a fine line already.

HollyG: Don’t worry, I won’t let you fall. Think about it. I’ll be there, whether you go or not.

God, I couldn’t get the idea out of my head. For two straight days it tortured me. The temptation to see, to give face and form to the only person in a hundred miles who gave a shit about me was overwhelming. By Sunday night I’d all but given in. What could be less illicit than two strangers watching a play on opposite sides of a theater? And I had this hope that seeing her in the flesh would kill my demented infatuation. Maybe she’d be sixty or covered in eczema. I could dream.

Calling in sick wasn’t an option. Mary would hear about my sick day before the play even hit intermission, thanks to Elsa’s cozy chats with the principal. I wasn’t eligible for vacation time yet either, but when I walked into school Monday morning I had a plan. We were reading Jane Eyre in my senior Advanced English class, so why not take a field trip? I’d have eighteen kids with me, all eager for a day out of school with their cool, new teacher. It was the perfect cover. I got the principal’s approval, reserved a bus, and printed out permission slips, all before the first student walked into my classroom that morning.

As Mary and I got into bed the night before the play, though, my duplicity was making me nauseated.

“What’s wrong?” Mary asked.

I told her about the field trip. “I guess I’m just nervous about what could happen.”

“It’ll be fine,” she said, yawning.

I flipped around to face her, seized with an idea. “Why don’t you come? You could meet us at the high school and ride along on the bus. It’d be just like Minneapolis, except I get educator rates now.”

Hope leapt in my chest, but she shook her head and fluffed her pillow before settling on her side, facing the wall.

“I’m taking Mom to the cardiologist tomorrow. Remember?”

“Reschedule it.”

“No, Peter. We’ve waited three months to see this guy. You’ll be fine.”

“Why can’t you ever make time for me anymore?”

Swiveling back toward me, she pulled the covers toward her side of the bed. “Are you kidding? You ask me the night before and expect me to drop everything?”

“I thought it would be fun. Excuse me for wanting to have fun with my wife.”

She shook her head and jabbed a finger at my chest. “No, you just said you were nervous to go by yourself. Don’t try to pretend like you were thinking about us. If you want to take me out, ask me when you don’t have twenty teenagers tagging along.”

She tossed herself as far away from me as possible on the bed and fell asleep a few minutes later while I lay awake, staring at her back in the darkness.

The next day I couldn’t concentrate on anything. I made all my morning classes work in small groups. I had no appetite at lunch, and when Carl asked me what was wrong I mumbled something about a cold or my sinuses. On the bus, one of the kids had to remind me to take attendance and only then did I remember that Hattie Hoffman, my favorite student in that class, was out with an excused absence. The drive to Rochester was short and before I was ready we filed into a small two hundred–seat theater with faded red velvet chairs. The room was over half-full and I scanned the crowd as subtly as I could, but no one was wearing a gray dress. Even after the lights dimmed and the play started I kept watching that damn door. HollyG would show up, I knew it. She might show up late, though, just to be perverse. I had no idea what was happening onstage until the student sitting on my left gasped and elbowed me in the ribs. “It’s Hattie!”

“What?” I whispered and she pointed at the stage.

I focused on the play and saw Hattie Hoffman in center stage, exchanging lines with an older woman sporting a severe bun. Flipping through the program I saw her name listed at the top of the page in the title role. The little shit. She didn’t mention a word about it when I passed the permission slips around. I had assumed she’d say something about the field trip, because Hattie always had an opinion on everything, but she’d kept silent with her head buried in a notebook. Had she been embarrassed about being in the play?