The Education of Sebastian & the Education of Caroline (10 page)

God! How I wanted him. To renew the sensation of him inside me, to understand, to feel that I was desired and loved and needed.

He forced one leg between mine and ran his hand along my bare skin, up my knee, my hip, teasing the material of my panties, before moving up to my waist and then running his hand over my breast and squeezing gently.

I was desperate to take it further but I was held back by the thin edge of reason, and the knowledge that one more step would tip me into the darkness.

“We have to stop,” I groaned against his lips.

“No,” he gasped.

His hand moved determinedly under the thin fabric of my strappy t-shirt, stroking and caressing my breasts.

My breathing was becoming ragged, as if I was running.

Summoning my final ounce of will power, I pushed feebly against his chest.

“No, Sebastian.”

He stopped instantly, and with a soft moan, rolled onto his back.

“I want you, Caro,” he breathed out. “I want to make love to you. I want to make love to you forever.”

My breath caught in my throat.

I want that, too. So much.

I didn’t answer, but lay unmoving, feeling my body float back to earth.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw him adjust himself. I felt guilty for making him uncomfortable.

Hell, was there anything I
didn’t
feel guilty about?

“Is this what it’s going to be like for the next four months?” he said, sounding aggrieved.

“Or I could join a convent,” I muttered, almost to myself.

“I’d still find you,” he said darkly.

I smiled.

“Okay, no convents. Or monasteries, come to think of it.”

I fished around for a new topic of conversation.

“Tell me about this job you mentioned. When do you start?”

“I haven’t applied for it yet.”

“Why not?”

“I wanted to make sure it was okay with you first, Caro.”

I was surprised. Yes, that was the word, surprised and plain amazed.

“You … you were waiting for … what, my permission?”

“Well, not exactly.” He sounded puzzled. “So we could discuss it together and then decide.”

Oh. Like a real couple
.

David never discussed anything with me; I simply received his Decree from on high.

“And you’ll be working the late shift? Well, that sounds fine to me.”

“Great!” he said and turned on his side to look at me, smiling. “I’ll have to do some day shifts,
maybe. The pay is shit but Ches said the tips are pretty good, especially from older women.”

I winced and his expression froze.

“I didn’t mean … I don’t think of you like that! Caro, no!”

But the genie was out of the bottle, a vintage one at that.

“It’s not far off the mark, Sebastian.”

He sat up, his face alarmed.

“Don’t say that! I love you so much, Caro. I … what I feel for you … I’ve never…”

He grabbed my hand and held the palm against his cheek.

I sat up, too, shaking sand from my hair.

“It is what it is, Sebastian.”

We sat in silence for some minutes.

I could tell he was mortified, wishing his candid words unsaid.

“So,” I said at last, my tone deliberately light, “no girls at high school who grabbed your attention? No cheerleaders waving their pompoms at you?”

He smiled ruefully, relieved, I thought for yet another change of topic.

“Not really.”

“Not really isn’t not at all. Tell me, I’m curious.”

He sighed. “They didn’t mean anything.”

I couldn’t help laughing. “I’m not jealous, Sebastian!”

But even as I said the words, I wasn’t entirely sure they were true. I remembered the hungry look of the surf shack girl and how much I’d wanted to punch her vapid smile into the back of her throat.

“What do you want to know?” he said in a resigned voice.

“It’s not important, honestly, I was just curious.”

He lay back on the sand, his eyes closed.

“It’s always been you, Caro. The first time I saw you, I thought you were the most beautiful girl that I’d ever seen. I thought you must be a princess, like Cinderella. It’s only ever been you.”

I was stunned by his reply.

Yes, a fairy tale. That’s what this was—a lovely fantasy. But somehow I couldn’t bring myself to care. I longed to run my fingers down his smooth skin, over his bare chest, across the defined muscles of his stomach. My gaze lingered on the waistband of his cut-offs.

“What about you?” he said, his eyes still closed.

“What about me what?”

“Did you go out with anyone before … before David?”

I didn’t really want to hear David’s name and certainly not from Sebastian’s lips, but it was a fair question.

“I dated a few times in high school—movies, bowling, that sort of thing. I met David when I was in my senior year.”

“My age,” he said softly.

“Yes.”

Where was he going with this?

“Did you … did you … sleep with him then?”

I really didn’t want to go there.

“Yes.”

“But you won’t sleep with me?”

“Oh, Sebastian! Please don’t do this!”

“But I don’t understand. You were my age. You just said so. How can it have been right then and wrong now?”

He sounded really angry and he turned his head away from me.

“Please don’t, Sebastian.”

My voice was suddenly hoarse with tears.

He didn’t reply.

I swallowed and took a deep breath.

“Because we were in Maryland and the age of consent is 16. It wasn’t illegal.”

“And that’s the only reason?” he muttered.

“Of course!”

He paused and then said,

“Are you still sleeping with him?”

“What?” I choked the word out.

His voice was barely a whisper. “Are you still sleeping with him? Now, I mean.”

This was ghastly.

“We share a bed, Sebastian, but we haven’t … had sex. Not since … you … since us.”

I thought that would be enough, but I was wrong.

“Are you going to sleep with him? While you’re still living there?”

He turned toward me, his face desperate.

“Will you, Caro?”

Appalled by the direction of his interrogation, I closed my eyes and spoke with a cold, controlled voice.

“The thought of David touching me is utterly repellent, Sebastian … but my husband is not a patient man.”

I heard him gasp.

“You mean he’d
force
you?”

Sebastian’s voice was horrified. I saw rage flare in his eyes; his expression scared me.

“No, not the way you mean…”

“You can’t, Caro! You can’t let him! Promise me you won’t let him touch you.”

How on earth could I keep that promise? I wanted to, desperately.

“I’ll try.”

He looked like he wanted to say more.

“Sebastian, it’s a beautiful day; we have a few precious hours left, please let’s not spend it fighting.”
Or talking about David.

He took a deep breath. “When I think of him touching you, I just…”

“Please, don’t.”

“I’m sorry.”

We paused, our lives at opposite sides of a gorge, a delicate tightrope stretched between us.

He reached over and pulled me to him, so I was splayed across his chest.

“That’s better,” he said. “You were too far away.”

I smiled sadly. His words were truer than he knew. But I was where I wanted to be, in the enchanted circle of his arms.

He nuzzled my neck, the tickling sensation making me squirm.

“You’re all sandy,” he murmured against my throat.

“I wonder why? Could it be because we’re at the beach?” I tried to match his playful tone.

“You’ll have to wash it off,” he said, his voice soft and seductive.

“Mmm, I suppose I shall.”

He sat up quickly so I was cradled in his lap.

“I want to help with that,” he said, his eyes glinting with mischief.

He stood up with me in his arms and started striding toward the sea.

“Sebastian! Don’t you dare!” I half-screamed, half-laughed.

“I’m helping!” he said, smiling broadly.

And he dunked me in the sea, fully dressed.

“Aagh!”

The water was shockingly cold.

“Sebastian!” I gasped, spitting out seawater, “I’m soaking!”

“Mmm, I’ve always wanted to see a wet t-shirt competition.”

“Sebastian!” I yelled, trying to maintain some shreds of dignity as I struggled back to the dry sand. “Just look at me! I’m furious with you!”

“What are you going to do, spank me?” he said with a wicked grin.

My mouth dropped open in shock.

“I’ll think of something,” I huffed ineffectually.

“Bring it on!” he replied, his tone amused.

I dripped back to our cozy dune and stripped off my strappy t-shirt and summer skirt, draping them across the long grass. The material of both was thin so there was a good chance they’d dry out before I had to go home. If not, well, David hadn’t looked in the laundry hamper in the 11 years we’d been married.

I turned to watch Sebastian. He dove through the waves, swimming strongly. I caught glimpses of him, silvery in the sea as he bodysurfed back to the beach. He saw me watching him, waved once and disappeared into the ocean again.

I lay back in the sand, a strange sensation of happiness filling me.

My underwear, however, was uncomfortably damp. I slipped off my bra and spread it out in the sunshine, then lay on my front, the coarse sand doing a better job of exfoliation than any expensive beauty salon.

The sun was deliciously warm on my back and I began to doze, lulled by the rhythm of the waves.

“You look so beautiful like that.”

Sebastian’s words roused me gently. His hands, however, were chilly.

“Whoa! Cold hands!”

He laughed out loud, a happy carefree sound.

“Sorry, I couldn’t help it.”

“You didn’t try,” I muttered petulantly.

“No, not really,” he admitted. Then his voice was serious. “I want to touch you, Caro.”

“I know. I want that, too. But we have to wait.”

He groaned. “I’m going to go crazy!”

“And it’s not even a full moon.”

“I’d love to see you in moonlight,” he said, softly.

His sudden change of tone made me look up.
What his words did to me
. No one had ever spoken to me like that. It was all so new; I was adrift in a sea of unfamiliar feelings, as innocent as Sebastian in one way at least.

I shifted my shoulders and rolled them awkwardly; I’d been lying on my front for some time.

“Are you okay?”

“Just a little stiff.”

“Shall I give you a massage?”

“I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

“Why not?”

“You
know
why,” I said, patiently.

“I think I’ll risk it,” he said and reached out, sweeping my hair from my neck, massaging my
shoulders and back, running his strong, supple fingers along my spine.

The feelings that his touch ignited.

Then he knelt across me and pressed down with more force, loosening my tight muscles but stoking the flames that burned within me.

Without warning he leaned forward, kissing the nape of my neck.

I groaned and his weight pinned me down. I could feel the cool skin of his chest on my back, the chilly dampness of his sea-soaked cut-offs against my backside.

“Oh, hell!” he said suddenly, throwing himself down next to me and squeezing his eyes shut.

“What’s the matter?” I said, concerned.

“Nothing,” he muttered.

“Tell me!”

“I’ve got another boner,” he admitted, sounding embarrassed.

I laughed with relief. “I did warn you.”

“Yeah, yeah.” He paused. “Are you sure we couldn’t…?”

I groaned again. “Stop trying to tempt me. When you talk like that … I feel like there should be a booming voice coming down from the sky pointing a fiery finger at me saying, ‘The devil is at your elbow, my child’.”

“Oh, come on, Caro! Four months, I mean …
four months!
”

He had a point. But so did I, and the thought made me miserable.