Sunday, April 2, 2017
Mrs St Croix drove us back to the dorm. After the dreary weather on Cliff Island for our Spring Break, it was really nice in Providence, 60º and mostly sunny. I, for one, was looking forward to getting rid of sweatshirts and boots. It did set me to thinking: just how did Sheila dress in warmer weather?
It was already November when I switched dorm rooms with MaryEllen, her original roommate, and it was rainy and raw and miserable, meaning that Sheila's every day wardrobe was a heavy pullover sweater. Once we finally became romantically involved, I'd occasionally sneak my hands inside her sweater when we'd hug, which more often than not generated a shriek of "Your hands are like cubes!" meaning ice cubes.
My girlfriend dressed for comfort and practicality, had ever since I've known her. She had a couple of 'dressy' outfits, but they were there just in case she needed them, not because she wanted to wear them. She's worn one of them, a nice blouse and slacks, on our first actual date, to the Valentine's dance, and actually wore heels, but there were no skirts or dresses in her wardrobe.
At least, in her wardrobe at Brown. If I'd been more of a snoop, I'd have looked in her closet at home, but I didn't think of it. I'd like to think that I wouldn't have snooped anyway, if I'd thought of it, but wasn't faced with that moral dilemma.
Despite the constantly dreary weather on Cliff Island, Spring Break was fun. I thought that I had struck up a pretty good relationship with her family, even her two brothers who showed up mid-week, probably to check up on the guy who had defiled their sister. My relationship with her family was just casual, as though it was accepted that I belonged with Sheila, and that was fine with me.
Of course, Spring Break was
really
fun in bed! Sheila had let it be known, from the beginning, that yes, I was sleeping with her, in her room, and whether she actually had to put her foot down about that, or if her family wouldn't have thought twice about it, I don't know. In a way, I thought that us sleeping together there brought me closer to her family, in the way I was accepted, more than if I was the boyfriend sleeping in the guest room. We made love every night, and a couple of mornings as well, and Sheila surprised me with one outrageous out-and-out screaming fuck out by the bay.
Sheila's room was just wonderful, with a tremendous view of Casco Bay, and the fireplace that made the room totally romantic. I guess that her parents realized that we were using that fireplace for the romantic setting, because I was quick to volunteer for firewood duty. There was a covered firewood shed on the property, probably three-quarters empty at the end of the winter, but Mr St Croix told me that there were still about two cords of wood left in there. Whenever a fire had been going, I replenished both the wood and the kindling from the stockpile, and I cleaned up the ashes from the grates.
I ditched my sweatshirt and boots in the dorm, after Mrs St Croix headed back to Maine, opting for tennis shoes and, of all things, a Villanova University t-shirt that William Jr, one of Sheila's brothers, had given me. He was in law school there, and depressed that Villanova, the defending national champions and a number one seed in the NCAA Tournament, had lost in the second round. Being so warm out, Sheila went ahead and pulled off her heavy sweater and t-shirt, and then I had to give a fake pout look when she put on a bra.
"Listen, buddy, I was OK going braless for you under that sweater, but under thinner stuff, I'm not going to show off for the whole campus." I knew better than to argue with her on that. Still, she looked good to me when she picked out a fairly simple button-down blouse, more of a menswear material shirt than anything else, but which was nicely fitted for her. She took off her boots as well, and surprised me by getting out a pair of flip-flops that I didn't even know she had. It took me back to that evening when we had our first tiny bit of intimacy, when I painted her toenails for her. Thinking about that, I wonder if maybe that was a 'move' on her part, because she hadn't worn nail polish since then.
Actually, Sheila was about the most practical dresser around. She wore the necklace and earrings I had bought for her, but I never saw her with any other jewelry, and never, not even once, did I see her with any makeup. The closest thing to that was the chap stick she used when the raw weather dried out her lips. And even though she now had a boyfriend, she never went out and bought lingerie; wearing the same plain cotton panties and bras she always had. Really, she was anything but a show-off girlfriend, the kind of girlfriend guys like to be seen with, but while that kind of thing might have mattered to me before I had a girlfriend, somehow it didn't now.
And the truth is, she did show-off for me, in the only real way that mattered: she liked holding hands with me.
I raised another subject. "You know, after spending a whole week with your folks, my parents are going to want some time to meet you."
"Yeah, I know, and do you know that scares me to death?"
"Huh, why? I promise, they aren't serial killers."
"That you know of, hel
lo!"
I laughed at that.
"You do realize that I was scared of meeting your parents, right? I still did it."
"Only so you wouldn't miss a week of sex," I got teased.
"What, you want me to tell my mom that the only way you'll meet them is if you get to ravish me in my bedroom?"
I was teasing, but I got a very serious answer. "Yeah, I do want to know how they're going to react to some slut from stealing their only son away from them."
"Slut?" I busted out laughing at that one, but Sheila was serious.
"OK, look, my mom wasn't concerned with you being my first lover, but she was
very
concerned about how many girls you'd slept with. She was really relieved when I told her I was your first. She had some idea that you'd run through half the girls on campus first, I guess she thinks that all guys want to do that, and she wanted to protect me."
"I can understand that. I don't know that I want to volunteer that we were each other's first to my folks, just because that's none of their business, but if my mom asks, I'll tell her the truth."
"Well, just so you know, my mom is pressuring me."
"What, to get married? I thought you didn't want to discuss that yet."
"I don't! It's way too soon, and I told my mom that, but when she gets her mind on something, she doesn't shut up. And I'm just betting that your parents are going to put pressure on us, too."
"Look, Sheila, I'm ready to discuss that anytime you are, but I won't push you and I won't let my folks push you."
I knew that it was time to drop the subject. Yeah, I wanted to talk about marriage, but my girlfriend absolutely did not. Still, meeting my folks did have to get done, so I forged on. "There aren't any more long breaks before the semester is over, but Good Friday is coming up in a couple weeks, and professors half expect students to miss class that day. I bet I could get my mom to come get us Friday, and bring us back late on Easter Sunday."
"I guess the timing works, but how religious are your folks? It was one thing for my parents to accept us sleeping together, but over Easter weekend?"
"Well, they go to church most Sundays, and I'm sure that they'll go on Easter. Our house does have a guest bedroom, but I'll just take our bags right to my room, and even if they want to say something, they won't."
"Their church going to fall in on me if I don't have an Easter Sunday dress? I can wear something nice, but it'll have to be slacks."
"Yeah, you'll be fine. But mom is big on everybody singing the hymns, so you'll have to do that."
"Oh, go ahead and call them, and get it over with. But you do know that I'll be a nervous wreck for the next two weeks, don't you?"
"Anything I can do to relieve you of that tension?" I volunteered, hopefully.
My parents were really pleased with the Easter weekend suggestion, and mom said that she'd be down early Good Friday morning to get us; she wanted as much time as possible to spend to get to know my girlfriend. After all, I'd never brought home a girl before, and heck, they'd never even seen me with a girl. They were just as aware of my shyness around girls as I was, and I know that it worried them.
Thing is, as painfully awkward as I had been around girls before, I was finally losing that, now that I was with Sheila. I don't know, maybe it was because the pressure of having to find a girlfriend was gone, but somehow, everything was changing. I could speak to other girls without getting tongue-tied, and I was feeling more confident about myself in general. One day, I actually had a girl flirting with me -- at least, I thought she was flirting -- something that would have amazed me before, though before I'd have probably fumbled the opportunity. It sure helped my ego, but even more, the idea that I could, and did, pass on the opportunity was another confidence booster.
Of course, the girl who flirted with me was a bit less obvious than Madelyn had been, but I didn't have any reason to kick myself for turning her down.
Then, another time, Liz got a little bit handsy when I was helping her through some equations for her chemistry lab. As a math major, I got called on a lot in the dorm when people had math problems, but none of the girls ever came close to flirting with me before.
It was Wednesday, April the 12th, two days before my mom was supposed to pick us up, and Sheila was a bit later than usual getting back to the room after class. Normally, we had a couple of hours between the end of class and heading out to dinner, but she hadn't shown up. I thought about texting her, but then she's got an independent streak to her, and it might have looked too much like I was checking up on her. Finally, just before five, she walked in, and asked, "Do you like it?"
