A Slow Boil (26 page)

One Saturday afternoon I was struggling through an especially
obtuse essay and was growing frustrated by my inability to follow the author’s
argument.  I took my laptop downstairs and found Mr. Hunter in the
library, reading a book in his chair.  I gave him a smile and knelt down
next to him, leaning on his leg.  His hand slid into my hair and I closed
my eyes, feeling my stress begin to wane immediately.  I chuckled a little
and Mr. Hunter asked me what was amusing.

“I was just thinking about the first time you asked me to kneel
next to you, how weird I thought that was, but how much I liked it.”

“I don’t know quite what I was thinking that night, just that you
looked like you were about to collapse and that I wanted to touch you.” 
His fingers were now drawing patterns on my neck.  “I’m lucky you didn’t
run away screaming.”

I chuckled again.  “I didn’t have the energy.”  After a
moment I added, “I used to wonder if you liked seeing me kneel.”

“I did, very much, back when I was fighting my attraction to
you.”  He laughed a little.  “If you’d only known some of the
thoughts I had about you, you definitely would have run away screaming.”

“Maybe.  Maybe not,” I smiled and leaned a little more into
his leg.

“Now I just like having you within reach.”  His fingers
returned to my hair.

“I’m glad you asked me to kneel next to you that first time.”

“You are?”

“It was the first time I felt like you saw me as more than an
employee, that maybe you were starting to like me a little bit.”

“Sylvia, I liked you the first time I looked at you.”

“You did?”

“Your head was turned, you were looking at the Rothko, and I thought
I’d never seen a more beautiful neck.”

I twisted to look up at him.  “My neck?”

“Haven’t you noticed how much I love your neck?”

“I guess I haven’t.”

“Well, now you know my last secret.  I absolutely,
positively, love your neck.  And your hair, and your face, and every other
part of you.”  He leaned down and kissed me, then kissed me again,
harder.  “Are you working on anything terribly important right now?”

I shook my head.

“Would you like me to carry you upstairs or would you prefer to
walk?”

“Carry me.”

“Yes, ma’am,” he smiled, scooping me up.

Later that night I was putting my homework away in my office and
happened to open the closet to find one of my dresses, which I hadn't worn in
weeks.  I fingered the material, getting an idea.

The first weekend in October, Mr. Hunter brought home take out for
dinner on Saturday. That meant Sunday night was my turn.

At five-thirty Mr. Hunter came downstairs as he always now did to
see if I needed any help or to carry dishes out to the table.  He took one
look at me in my dress and apron, my silver necklace, barefoot, and stopped in
the doorway.

“Miss Lane.  What is this?”

“This, Mr. Hunter, is me on a night off.”  I went up to him,
stretched up on my toes and kissed him.  “Is that okay?”

“I thought we weren’t going to do this anymore.”  He looked
into my eyes, puzzled.

“I’m not officially working tonight, and this is what I want to
do.  So go get us a nice light red and give me a few more minutes in
here?”

His fingers eased around my waist, toying with the apron ties,
then slid down my rear.  A very slow smile crept across his face. “Okay.”

He left for the wine cellar and I busied myself finishing his
first course, a butternut squash soup with garlic croutons.

“Good evening, Mr. Hunter,” I said, pushing through the door.

“Good evening, Miss Lane.”

I placed his bowl in front of him while he rose to pull out my
chair. He kissed the top of my head after I was seated, then resumed his seat,
pouring us both a glass of wine.  I reached for his leg under the table,
watching his face as he tried the soup.

“It’s delicious. I love it.”  He reached over to kiss me and
whispered onto my lips, “And I love you, Sylvia.”

“I love you, too, Adam.”

Sylvia was so beautiful, and she didn’t even know it.  I made
a point of telling her at every opportunity, but she still didn’t really
believe me.  I could tell by the dismissive shake of her head, that sassy
little eye roll she did and that gorgeous blush that still made a regular
appearance across her cheeks.

She was sitting in her chair across from me the library now,
working on her laptop, biting her lip and frowning.  I wanted to reach
over and pull her lip out from under her teeth, smooth the crease between her
eyebrows, but I didn’t want to interrupt her.  She worked so hard. 
Too hard.  Her senior thesis was due in a few weeks and the project was
consuming all her free time and energy.  I was going to offer to make
dinner again tonight, I thought.  She had too much else to worry about
right now without having to plan and make yet another delicious meal.

Sylvia’s cooking had just gotten better and better, if that was
possible.  She still put as much effort into her meals as she had when I’d
first hired her, but that wasn’t why I loved her so much.  She could start
making frozen pizza every night and I wouldn’t care.  Okay, maybe a
little, but not much.

I put my book down and closed my eyes, resting my head back again
the chair, thinking about how much my life had changed in the last year. 
When I’d hired Sylvia, I’d truly had no idea that we’d end up here.  I’d
thought she was so pretty but she was also so young, so young that the thoughts
I quickly started having about her almost embarrassed me.  I remembered
the first time I saw her in her uniform, the color and fit setting off her
features perfectly, the instant flare of attraction I’d felt, something I’d
never expected to feel again.  I hadn’t even been aware of how closed down
I’d become, so locked away in my loneliness that I’d even forgotten what it
felt like to want someone.  It wasn’t just a physical attraction, though,
which is probably why I struggled so much with my desire for her.  The
first few weeks she worked for me I couldn’t get over how sweet she was, how funny,
how smart.  She deserved someone special, and I’d been so used to snapping
out orders, I must have come across as an absolute tyrant.  I was so lucky
she didn’t quit after her first day.

But she hadn’t quit, she’d stayed and quickly became the one bright
light in my bleak life.  When our relationship finally turned physical, I
thought I had it all.  Finally.  But I’d been wrong again, wrong to
underestimate this amazing woman.  Sylvia hadn’t been in a long-term
relationship before and was eager to try new things, exploring her sexuality
for the first time.  I thanked god almost daily that I was the man who’d
somehow gotten lucky enough to share this part of her journey into
adulthood.  She brought home some lingerie one afternoon, making me sit in
on the bed while she modeled for me, knowing she was torturing me and laughing
at my distress.  Once at dinner she hadn’t had time to make dessert and
offered herself to me instead, moving my plate aside and perching on the edge
of the table, slowly drawing up her skirt.  She let me take control when I
needed reassurance she was mine.  I loved how close I could get her to the
brink with only my fingers and lips, not letting her touch me until she was
shaking with desire.  But just as satisfying were the times she initiated,
her desire for me so necessary to me now I couldn’t imagine living without it.

But even our physical relationship wasn’t the reason I loved her
so much.  If anything, it was merely an expression of the trust and
honesty we shared with each other.  The meals and the sex I could live
without if I had to – Sylvia herself, however, had become a fundamental part of
me.  She’d been right that day in the kitchen when I’d been so worried
that starting a relationship with her was somehow overstepping the
boundaries.  She made me happy.  She made me so very, very
happy.  And I think, I hoped, that I made her happy, too.

“What are you smiling about over there, handsome?”

I opened my eyes and looked at my beautiful girl.  “How
thankful I am that you’re here.”

She put her computer on the floor and came to sit on my lap. 
I wrapped my arms around her and kissed her beautiful long neck, her skin like
silk under my lips.

“There’s nowhere else I’d rather be, Adam.”

“Good.”  I hugged her tighter. It had taken a long time, but
I finally believed her.  I’d been so convinced that I had nothing to offer
her in return that it had been months before I fully accepted that she loved me
as much as I did her.  I closed my eyes again and felt her lay her head on
my shoulder, her fingers moving gently in my hair.

“How’s your paper coming along?”

“Good, I guess.  I don’t think I’ll have to change my thesis
at the last minute this time, at least.”

I chuckled.  “Of course you won’t, my beautiful smart
girl.”  I ran my hand over the curve of her hip.  “And how goes your
application?”  Sylvia had decided to apply to the graduate department at
Noble for her master’s degree in anthropology, something else I was very, very
happy about as it kept us here for another three years.  I was glad to put
off having to pack up all my books and arranging to have my piano shipped back
to the States for as long as possible.  Maybe I could talk her into
getting her PhD at Noble as well.

“
Mmm
,” she sighed. “I don’t know. 
It’s on the back burner right now.  I may or may not get it done in time.”

“It’s not nice to tease me like that.  In fact, it’s quite
naughty of you.”  I gave the side of her rear a light slap.

She giggled and rubbed her nose on my neck.  “Well, really,
Adam, you ask me every day.”

“I’m becoming an old nag.”

“Nag, yes.  Old, no.  Don’t worry, I’ll get it done.”

“I know.  I just want to get it settled.”  I’d bumped
into the dean of the anthropology department on campus a few weeks ago and
she’d assured me that Sylvia was a highly prized student, her application a
mere formality, so we weren’t as worried this time about her getting
accepted.  I opened my eyes and looked down into her deep brown
ones.  She’d told me once how difficult it was for her to keep her
thoughts to herself when I looked at her, and I often had the same
problem.  “I just want to know for sure.  It was difficult for me
last year when I thought you might only be here for the summer.  I didn’t
think if I let you into my heart that I’d survive having to let you go.”

She smiled up at me.  “You don’t have to worry about that
anymore.”

I didn’t worry about her leaving, but I still needed to know that
she’d be with me forever.  I had a ring already in a drawer in my desk and
had been thinking that graduation would be the perfect time to propose, when
her dad would be here.  I was sure she’d say yes as she whenever she
talked about her future I was in it, and the impulse to ask her to marry me was
growing stronger every day.   Mr. Lane had given me permission to ask
her when we’d visited him over the holidays and as graduation grew closer, I
spent more and more time daydreaming about our future together.  If we
were lucky enough to have a family, I hoped our children would have her beautiful
eyes and her gentle personality.  She would make a wonderful mother, of
that I had no doubt.

“What are you thinking about?  You look so serious.”

I smiled and turned my eyes toward the windows, running my fingers
through her hair.  I couldn’t look at her right now or I’d be asking her
to marry me in my next breath.  “I wish my mother could have met
you.  She’d have loved you.”

“I wish I could have met her too.  You dad, too, for that
matter, although maybe he wouldn’t have approved of me.”

“He would have, not that it would matter.”  I turned to her
again, having gotten myself back under control.  I smiled down at my
beautiful girl and bent down to kiss her perfect lips.  “You’re perfect.”