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"No, no."
"But--"
"I promise. If I don't feel better in the morning, I'll have you do so," I said quickly.
"All right. I'll instruct Curtis to bring your dinner up here. It'll be lonely for me, though," he said, smiling. "You know what it's like eating in that big room with Curtis standing right behind me waiting for me to drop a spoon."
I laughed. How well I knew that!
"That's better," he said. "I'll check up on you later," he promised and left.
Oh, Tony, I thought after he closed the door, I don't know whether to pity you or to hate you. I felt like someone riding a merry-go-round, all the horses constantly moving up and down and around, nothing still enough to afford a point of reference, to show where, in fact, solid ground could be found. All my feelings, like those fanciful ponies, were being pulled from both directions, up and down and spun around until I felt dizzy inside.
I wanted to-be alone to try and sort them out, and yet I was afraid to be alone. Lying there in the silence of my bedroom, I fought back thoughts of Troy, thoughts that were now more forbidden than ever. It was on this bed, wrapped in Logan's arms, feeling his kisses on my lips and cheeks, that I had uttered promises of love and devotion to him as he had uttered them to me. It seemed a terrible betrayal to rest my head against the pillow and envision Troy's eyes, Troy's lips, Troy's kisses, while the scent of Logan's cologne lingered on the sheets.
Trying to fight back these invading images of Troy, I tried to picture Logan when he first came to Winnerow, for first love, young love, is something a woman can never forget. It carries special charms that linger forever and forever. Even when I became an old lady, older than Jillian, older than Granny, I knew that I, like every woman, would stop in my rocking chair, senile or not, and recall the special excitement I felt when my heart first fluttered because of a boy's look, a boy's touch. Such memories can warm the loneliest heart and turn the saddest eyes into gleeful ones. They were like the perennial fruits--apples, peaches, plums--that blossomed on the trees over and over again every year. No matter how old the trees were, there was always some fruit, something fresh and wonderful. Good and happy memories, especially memories that made you more aware of life's thrilling moments, were the fruits of life's labor.
And so it was with Logan and me when we were both young and fresh in the Willies. I could draw the images from my precious trunk of recollections and once again picture Logan that first time I set eyes on him in school. He stood out like a prep school boy in his sharply creased gray flannel slacks and his bright green sweater worn over a white shirt and a gray-and-green striped tie. No one ever came to our school dressed up as Logan Stonewall did.
I could still hear my brother Tom first introduce us. "And this is my sister, Heaven Leigh." There was so much pride in Tom's voice.
"What a pretty name," Logan said. "It suits you very well. I don't think I've ever seen more heavenly blue eyes."
After he said that our eyes seemed to cling and strike a gong t
hat would resound throughout our lives.
Logan Stonewall, my beautiful first and forever boyfriend, good-looking in the kind of way I'd seen in books and magazines, like someone with years and years of cultured background that had given him what none of us in the hills had--quality.
As if they were a protective cape, I wrapped the memories of these early days around myself to keep out the feelings and temptations knocking at my door and for a while, a long while, that worked well. Curtis brought me my dinner and I ate most of it. Afterward, Tony came, as he had promised, to see how I was doing. Satisfied that I was merely sleeping off a minor head cold, he left, telling me he would be leaving early in the morning to catch a plane for Winnerow.
"I won't see you before I leave, but I'll call during the day," he said, "to see if you're indeed all right."
He lingered before saying good night, as if he wanted to say more or ask more, but there was a fog of silence between us best not penetrated. I think he sensed that.
"Good night," he said.
I closed the door after him and once again retreated into my own thoughts, reaching back through time to find diversion in the happier memories.
Only this time my mind betrayed me. Instead of remembering the wonderful early days with Logan, I recalled Troy coming to my graduation from the Winterhaven School. I had been terribly disappointed to learn that Jillian and Tony would be in London that day. I would have no one to see me reach the accomplishment that had once seemed so distant and impossible when I lived in the Willies.
In single file the graduates paraded in to take their seats. I was eighth from the front girl and at first I saw only a blur of unfamiliar faces. Then I saw Troy, seated out there, looking up at me with such an expression of pride and delight. I had felt a rush of happiness such as I'd seldom known before because Troy had come and had asked several of Tatterton Toy Corporation officers and their families to show up as my family.
"Did you really think I wouldn't come?" he had teased as we drove home that night after the school dance. "I never knew a girl who needed a family more than you, so I wanted to give you a huge one."
How I had wanted to hug and kiss him then. I think that was when I first realized I was falling in love with him, slipping and sliding down a tunnel of affection, the walls of which were greased with sympathetic words, loving phrases and touches, soft, compassionate eyes, and hopeful promises.
I recalled how we had walked quietly in the garden and talked until it began to rain and how he had fled from me that night. When I had asked him why he was leaving me so early, he told me it was because I was young and healthy and full of dreams he couldn't possibly share.
How prophetic he was.
Oh, Troy! I crushed the pillow against my face, smothering the sound of my sobs. Can I let you die a second time?
EIGHT Forbidden Passions
. IT WAS AFTER TWO A.M. I FELT AS IF I WERE IN A DREAM. FOR hours I had dwelled fitfully on the rim of sleep, tossing and turning, moaning and crying softly. Finally I fell more into a state of troubled unconsciousness than the peaceful oblivion I had so desperately sought. I saw myself hanging from the edge of a sharp cliff, dangling hopelessly above the darkness. The jagged edges of the rock to which I clung cut painfully into my fingers until I had to let go. I felt myself endlessly falling and awoke with a start.
I sat up quickly. The illusion of hanging from that cliff had been so vivid that I actually felt pain in my fingers. I opened and closed my hands and looked about the room. Moonlight cast a thin white beam through the curtains. I felt as though I were looking through gauze.
