Searching for Moore (14 page)

“Want to help me with his?” he asked, opening the condom packet. Starting the condom, he took her hands in his and hand over hand had her roll it down over him. He wanted to make it “their” experience. And what she didn’t realize was that everything that was happening was new ground, with new emotions for him, too. He loved the touch of her rolling the condom onto him and smoothing it out, with such care. She looked pleased at her “handiwork”.

He pulled her beneath him and kissed her as the head of his cock starting to sink into her. “You ready?” He searched her eyes. She nodded her assent and with his eyes locked onto hers, he mouthed, “I love you”. She mouthed “I love you” back and with a quick thrust he was inside of her.

She gasped, but was still smiling. He realized he was smiling too and just took a moment to enjoy how tight she was around him before he began driving into her. He bent down to kiss her, thrusting into her deeper, quicker, harder. She returned his kiss passionately and he lost himself in the sensation… she was so tight around his cock, she felt so damn good. He pulled his face back to look at her. Her eyes were closed and he could tell she was coming undone.

“Mia,” his voice was hoarse, “look at me.” Mia opened her eyes. He wanted to watch her as she came, but he also wanted to make sure she was ok and didn’t go anyplace dark. “You are so beautiful.” She smiled at him and he rammed into her hard. “So, so beautiful.” Harder. “You. Are. My. Baby Girl.” Harder and faster. “Come. For. Me. Baby Girl.” And those were the magic words. Her eyes widened and her muscles clamped down and spasmed around him, milking his cock. He could hear both their moans in his ears and “Oh God, Schooner,” which totally pushed him over the edge.

He collapsed on top of her, forehead to forehead, both panting. Pushing her curls from her face, he smiled down at her. She smiled back at him and his heart relaxed. She was ok.

“Wow,” she was rendered speechless.

“Wow is right.” Schooner laughed.

“Is that what it is always like?”

He shook his head “no”. “I have never experienced anything like that before,” and he wasn’t lying.

There was a self-satisfied smirk on Mia’s face. Schooner kissed her softly. He had still not pulled out of her and started to gently grind into her. Her eyes grew wide and he laughed, “Figured that would wipe that self-satisfied smirk off your face.”

“Oh, did you now?” She squeezed his cock hard with her muscles and his eyes flew open. “Two can play that game.”

“Yes, two can… and two is going to need to help me with another condom if she keeps this up.” He ground into her clockwise.

They kissed and laughed and made love again and all of Schooner’s protective instincts were satisfied for one night.

He had made good on his promise. He promised her that he would be the first person to make love to her. And he was. Seeing the way she responded to their lovemaking and her happiness in the aftermath was a heady, powerful feeling for him. He had given this to her. And she had given herself to him. She was his.

Finals and packing and goodbyes and the last tennis matches, the days were winding down quickly and if Schooner had an extra second to just stand still and feel, he would have recognized his mounting ambivalence. He was ready for the semester to end and for finals to be over, but the last month with Mia was a moment in time that he forever wanted to hold onto.

Schooner shoved the last of his belongings into his duffle bag as Mia and Caroline continued to pack and tape their boxes.

Their dorm RA, Dawn, poked her head into to the room to remind the girls that all cartons being shipped needed to be packed, sealed and addressed and out in the hall by 9 P.M.

“I’ll walk you out.” Mia grabbed her keys.

“Have a great summer, Caroline.” Schooner gave Mia’s very accommodating roommate a hug goodbye.

They stopped by Rosie’s room. She was just about finished packing. “Eight A.M. final and I am outta here!”

One more stop for Schooner to say goodbye to Henry, but he was nowhere to be found.

Mia and Schooner walked out of the dorm and stood on the front steps.

“Stop pouting,” he said to her, “you’re killing me.”

“I’m not used to spending the night without you. I miss you already.”

“C’mere, Baby Girl.” He sat down on the stone balustrade railing and pulled her between his legs. Her arms immediately went around his neck and they got lost in a kiss. “I’ll be by right after my final. We’ll have at least an hour before the limo comes for you.” She continued to pout. “You’d better put that lip away or I’m going to bite it,” he threatened.

They stayed that way for a long while, with Mia standing between Schooner’s legs, arms wrapped around his neck, foreheads together.

“Tell me again, what’s the place we have to get to by boat?”

“That’s Fire Island. We’ll take the ferry over and there’s no cars. Just little red wagons to cart groceries with and bicycles. No streets, just boardwalks. Ocean on one side, the Great South Bay on the other side.”

He smiled and kissed her, “And that’s where you want to spend your birthday?”

She nodded, smiling.

“Ok, your birthday on Fire Island. I just can’t wait to see these places you talk about. They just sound so idyllic.”

“That, they are!”

“Do you want me to bring you anything from here when I come?”

“Certainly not pizza and bagels,” she laughed, “just bring you, that’s all I need.”

He took her face in his hands and kissed her deeply. “I’d better go study. Flunking out of school will not go over well with my parents. I’m thinking I should probably finish my test between 11:30 and 12:00 and I’ll come right over, ok.”

He squeezed her hand and they held hands until he was down the steps and their fingers finally broke contact.

Schooner turned around, “Hey,” he yelled, “those pizza and bagels better be as good as you’ve been bragging about.”

Mia just stood on the steps smiling at him, watching him go.

It was dusk when he reached his dorm on the other side of campus. As he crossed the lobby, he got a lot of ribbing from the guys hanging out.

“Hey, do we know this guy?”

“I remember him… vaguely.”

“Ah, the Prodigal Son returns.”

Beau was in their room studying for a Chemistry final. He looked up when Schooner walked in, “Oh hey, did you see CJ?”

“No, why?” Schooner pulled his books out of his duffle bag to study.

“She just left a few minutes ago. She was looking for you.” He punched some numbers into his calculator.

“Did she say what she wanted?”

Beau just shook his head. “No. I just assumed it was to say goodbye. She hung out for a little bit waiting for you and then finally left.”

Schooner filled in the last of his answers and took a run back through the test to see if he’d missed anything. There were four questions that he’d put checks near to flag that he needed to go back and relook at them. He looked at his watch. 11:25 A.M. He was still in good shape to finish up and have some time to spend alone with Mia before she left. He went back to concentrating on his final. At 11:38, Schooner handed his test booklet into the professor and wished him a good summer.

Crossing The Quad, heading toward Mia’s dorm, Schooner felt that joy of freedom experience that hits once every spring when school is over and summer officially begins. What a year! So much had happened. As he walked past Brewster Hall, he smiled thinking about the first time he’d laid eyes on her. His first impression was that she didn’t belong here. He also thought that he fit in perfectly. He was wrong on both accounts.

Walking into Mia’s dorm, it was already starting to resemble a ghost town. Doors to dorm rooms were open and the rooms were bare, just institutional mattresses on frames, dressers, desks and chairs still in the rooms. All the posters were off the walls, books were gone, green plants taken home for the summer, all cartons for shipping had been removed from the hall. Schooner headed up the stairwell and down the hall toward Mia’s room.

The door was ajar, so he walked in. He didn’t immediately process that the room was completely empty. Nothing was in the room. No one was in the room. No Mia. No luggage. He looked at his watch. It was 11:55 A.M. Mia wasn’t supposed to be picked up until 1 P.M.

“Mia,” he called out. He ran down the hall to Rosie’s room. It was empty, too.

Maybe she’s waiting in Henry’s room, he thought and ran down the stairwell. He could feel panic beginning to rise. Something was not right. What the hell was going on? He knocked on Henry’s door. His roommate answered. Henry had left hours ago. And no, he hadn’t seen Mia.

He ran down the hall checking rooms, maybe someone knew where she was. He checked the lobby again. She wasn’t anywhere. He went back up to her room. That’s where she would look for him. She knew approximately what time he was going to be there. She’d meet him at the room. Maybe she was just saying goodbye to someone.

He got back up to her room. Still no Mia. No luggage. Nothing. He paced around her room. 12:15. 12:20. 12:25. What the fuck happened? Maybe the limo came early. Maybe she left a note. He searched her desk. Nothing. All the drawers. Nothing. Her dresser. Nothing. Under her pillow. Nothing. He got on his knees and looked under the bed, under the desk, under the dresser. Nothing. Nothing. Nothing. He checked her closet. Nothing.

He heard a key in a door down the hall and went running from the room. It was Dawn, the RA.

“Dawn”

“Hey Schooner,” she looked surprised to see him.

“Have you seen Mia?” He searched her face.

She looked confused. “Schooner, Mia left hours ago.”

“Hours ago?” He repeated, emptily, “Mia left hours ago?”

She nodded. A look on her face saying “sorry” — like she was sorry to deliver bad news and he also saw something more on her face, something that said sorry this is happening to you. And then she locked her door and headed down the hall to leave for the summer.

He turned and started to walk down the hall. What the fuck? Why had she left like this? Was she ok? Was everything ok? Surely she would have left him a note or had someone get a message to him. And that’s when it dawned on him that he didn’t even have her number. He was going to get all that info before she left and give her his. And now she was gone. Just gone. And he had no way to find her. No way to find out what had happened. No way to find out why she had left him. When they said goodbye last night, everything was fine. They were going to spend her birthday on Fire Island… together. And now she was gone, without a trace.

He felt like his brimming heart was rapidly deflating and the pain from it was like being knifed with a shredding blade. His handsome face was contorted with anguish as he yelled out in the empty hallway, “Why Mia? Why did you leave me?” and took the side of his closed fist and slammed it into the institutional green cinder-block cement wall. The sound of bones breaking was deafening, but he neither heard the sound nor felt the pain radiating up his arm because the pain in his heart eclipsed anything he felt physically.

One week earlier, after the last match of the season, Coach Boland had predicted to his staff that Schooner Moore would lead their highly regarded tennis program to a National Championship and be the top ranked NCAA player in the United States within two years.

Three surgeries. Six months in a cast.

Schooner Moore’s promising tennis career came to a shattering conclusion in a dormitory hallway on the last day of his freshman year.

Dr. Malcolm Faulkes was a golf buddy of Gavin Moore’s. He was also an orthopedic surgeon who specialized in Sports Medicine and had a client roster that was a Who’s Who of LA sports teams. He had seen Schooner play tennis many times over the years and had been following his impressive first college season.

When Gavin called to say that Schooner’s right hand suffered an injury, Dr. Faulkes met them at his office after hours. The x-rays showed multiple fractures and Faulkes performed the first of what would be three surgeries that very evening. He admitted Schooner to the hospital where he stayed for three days heavily drugged with his hand immobilized.

A week later, Schooner was back at Dr. Faulkes office. Malcolm asked Dee to stay out in the waiting room while he spoke to Schooner alone.

His office was dark cherry wood and his love of golf was evident everywhere. Schooner sat down in one of the Hunter Green leather and wood chairs across from the doctor’s desk.

“On a scale of 1-10 where is your pain level?”

“About a six,” a subdued Schooner replied.

“The surgery I performed was a first Schooner. From what I can tell, you’re going to need probably at least two more within the next three months.”

Schooner winced at his words and nodded as the doctor continued, “I’m not going to kid you, that hand is held together by pins right now. You did extensive damage to the bones.”

“Guess I won’t be Team Captain this year.” Schooner looked up at the ceiling.

“Son, I’d like to be optimistic, but after your surgeries, there is going to be an extensive rehab period. The good news is, you’re young and you’re strong. Will you ever regain the strength in that hand to grip a racquet tight enough to knock out those 140 plus MPH serves again?” He paused, “Schooner, I don’t know if that is going to be in your future.”

Schooner continued to look at the ceiling, trying his hardest not to let the tears burning at the back of his eyes have their way.

“The reason I wanted your mother to wait outside today was so that you and I could talk. I’ve known you most of your life, Schooner. You’re a good kid. You’ve always been a happy, level-headed kid. Clearly, there’s something going on here.” Malcolm’s voice showed honest concern and Schooner could feel that.

“Dr. F., I just got dumped. And it came as a shock and I just wasn’t thinking and slammed my fist into a wall. Not the brightest thing I’ve ever done. I just wasn’t thinking. I just reacted.”

“Heartbreak will do that to you.” Malcolm sat back in his chair.

“I got blindsided,” Schooner began, “she left without a word. I was supposed to spend the summer with her in New York. I don’t even have a number to find her. Everything was fine the night before and then she was gone. I don’t even know why she left me.” Schooner’s eyes told the doctor everything he needed to know.