Chapter 14

Toni

Toni had spent a lot of her morning, after 'Berto left, thinking. Getting dressed for work was easy – a clean pair of scrubs, this one with the Donald Duck print, her running shoes, and her hair into a ponytail. It wasn't a difficult intellectual process, and anyway she could put it off till almost time to go. It wasn't like she had to be especially pretty – the only people who would see her would be others in similar clothing, and perhaps a few patients or visitors when she went up to the cafeteria for lunch. So she sat at the table in the kitchen, and thought.

What was 'Berto to her, anyway? She supposed she'd introduce him as her boyfriend. That word, which had once meant someone you were dating, had become, over time, something else. It had become, as a great many people used it, the one whom you were living with. At least, that was one very common meaning; she supposed that there were people who still used it as she had done during the days when she was just getting interested in boys.

All right, he was her boyfriend. But was that it? Was he just the boy she was living with? She certainly was doing that, but that wasn't a minor thing to her. Not then, and not now, she thought. She didn't move in casually and she didn't have anyone move in casually, however casual it might appear to someone else – and she supposed that an observer would have thought it very casual. She'd had plenty of opportunities for that, beginning back when she was in high school. At least two of the boys she'd dated back then had been willing to move in with her, but she'd refused to take the bait. It wasn't just that she'd have had to explain to her parents what was going on, or else keep it a secret from them, and both alternatives had left her cold. It was that however much she liked those boys, liking was all there was between them.

Well, there'd been more than that with one of them, the sweeter of the two. But somehow, as he started to unbutton her shirt, she'd found herself backing off, physically getting off the sofa and backing away from him. What she'd told him then was the exact truth. She might have thought of lying had her breath not been so harsh and fast in her throat, but just then she couldn't have thought of a lie if she'd had to. "I'm a Christian," she'd told him, "and I don't do that."

"But you got this far without it bothering you."

"But it did bother me. That's why we're stopping."

"I bet you're saving yourself for marriage," he'd said, and the sneer was obvious.

"Yes," she'd said in a voice suddenly calm and confident. "That's what I'm doing."

"Then I'm out of here," he'd spat, and he'd gotten up and left, not even bothering to tuck in his shirt.

She'd never regretted stopping when she did. In fact, she wished she'd stopped sooner. It might have saved a friendship, but after that night he'd started telling his friends that she was a tease – the actual term he'd used had been vulgar – and he'd not even acknowledged her in the hall from then on.

And yet just a few years later, without benefit of marriage, she hadn't stopped. She took a swallow of hot coffee, allowing herself to remember for the first time in five years. Garry had been at her house that night, and they'd kissed, and they'd held and kissed and caressed each other, and before she knew it she was in bed with him. She'd held him tightly afterwards, telling him that it hadn't hurt much, and that didn't matter anyway. And she'd been telling the truth, too, at least in part.

And they'd had a year or so together. She'd moved out of her apartment, and into his, and she'd held her head up just like nothing had happened. She'd cooked his meals and washed his clothes, and slept with him just as though she'd had the right to do so. And then...

But that was too painful. Some thoughts she could allow herself, in the effort to understand her relationship with 'Berto. But some thoughts were not going to come up. She'd crammed them tightly down into the bottom of her mind, and they would stay there – period.

So, passing over that part of the past, what did she know? What could she conclude? Well, I went to bed with Garry because I loved him. That was the first fact she would consider. And it brought up a question: Why did I go to bed with 'Berto?

The conclusion here was obvious. But she wasn't sure she was ready for it. I didn't realize how I felt about Garry till we'd been together for several months. Surely I can't be sure of anything with 'Berto this soon. But it was a hard conclusion to avoid. The one time in her life she'd jumped into bed with someone it had been because she loved him. It had been a while between their meeting and that night, an interval in which he'd pursued her – courted her, actually. He'd wooed her with flowers, with such dining out as he could afford on his Air Force pay, with endearments and caresses. Was he just after my bed? she wondered. It could be. But it seemed like he'd invested a lot of time and energy and money if that was all he'd wanted. And besides, with Garry it wasn't just that. It meant more than that.

There was a crucial distinction. She knew that men and women were different. Men found it easy to disconnect themselves emotionally from the act and function on a purely physical level, while women were physically capable even if the man disgusted them. She knew that from girls she'd known who hadn't been terribly scrupulous. Some of them had spoken of men who lay with them, and then got up and left as though they'd been alone the whole time. "He used me," she'd heard more than once.

So, there was a difference. What, then, was that difference? It's the word "love," she decided. Sex doesn't necessarily involve love. And for that matter love doesn't necessarily involve sex.

So Garry had loved her, as she'd loved him. There it was. However wicked their liaison had been, it was a relationship with love at its center.

Right there she wished she could stop. It was getting too close to the present. But her watch told her that she still had time before she had to leave. And in the empty house – it hadn't been empty with her alone in it before, but now it was – she sighed, and drank coffee, and allowed her thoughts to proceed.

I loved Garry and he loved me. So what does that say about 'Berto and me? It was another question with an obvious answer, but again she didn't want to face that answer. But she couldn't avoid the conclusion – not and remain honest. And as sinful as I am, as filthy as I am, I have at least not given up on honesty. Purity, yes – that I've lost. But my honesty is still intact. So she had to face the conclusion.

She folded her hands in front of her, looking at them, her eyes dry but her heart leaping within her. She took a few deep breaths, and forced herself to state it as a proposition: I love 'Berto.

There – she'd said it. And the sky hadn't fallen. And she wasn't any more unclean than she'd been before. But then I couldn't possibly become any more unclean. I defiled myself long ago, and now it's just a matter of living with the disgrace. She had come to love a boy she barely knew ... and she realized that she'd loved him since that first afternoon. Probably I loved him the moment he stepped in my door, she thought. For everything changed at that moment. I noticed him, not Angelina. I thought of what he wanted, not what I wanted. And I decided very early to ... to be with him.

Now it was time to begin getting ready. She knew it would be a new day for her. She might look the same – certainly she had when she'd brushed her teeth earlier – and she might sound the same, as she had when she'd talked with 'Berto earlier, but nothing was the same. Life was different, she was different, the future had changed dramatically, and she wondered how long it would be until others noticed.

But don't let 'Berto know, she half prayed and half told herself. I can't afford to let him know. For I'm afraid that once he hears that word, it will scare him off. And I would rather he never knows, than lose him.

'Berto