WEEK ELEVEN – When Things Go Wrong
After my illuminating night with Mr. C, I decided to take a field trip over to a little adult toy store in Soho. Having had my taste of the forbidden, I was now completely addicted and determined to get my own vibrator. Don't get me wrong. It wasn't like I needed to replace Mr. C. I just thought it would be nice to have something to take the edge off of those long lonely weeks between sessions.
The experience had been weird. The girls working at the store were quite nice, offering to take me on a tour of the store. And I had to admit that there were a lot of bizarre looking items on display. Some of them were fairly recognizable: whips, nipple clamps, massage creams. But the dildos and ass plugs sort of freaked me out, particularly the ones that looked so large that they looked like something you would give birth to rather than use for fun. The vibrators were on the pricey side, but that was what I wanted. Since I was blindfolded, I never knew for sure what that vibrator had looked like. But I opted for a purple rabbit looking vibrator which looked like it would do the job nicely. I even christened him Mr. Purple.
The week flew by. The days went by at work without my supervisor at my temp job being too annoying. And the nights were filled with rehearsals, exercise, movies and hard core sexual fantasies. What more could I want?
So when I went to class, prepared to do "I Have a Love" from WEST SIDE STORY with Dawn, I was surprised that my scene partner was so tense. In fact, she was downright cold to me. It was unlike her. She had been fine during rehearsals. I just shrugged it off as pre-class nerves. It was when I was getting strange looks from some of the other classmates that I started to feel weird. I just had that feeling that people were talking about me, whispering, laughing, saying things about me and I didn't get why. Even Mr. C looked intense and edgy this morning. Shrugging it off as my overactive imagination, I tried to focus on the day's song.
Despite the strange vibes from Dawn, our song was fairly successful. Mr. C was polite and complimentary, not giving us much to work on. I was halfway starting to worry that too much sex had made Mr. C lose that perfect touch of cruelty which had made him such a great teacher. Surely he was not worried that he was going to hurt my feelings?
After our song, I sipped at my coffee, still feeling as if I were the object of stares. What in the hell was going on? I felt like I was in my own version of BAD DAY AT BLACK ROCK. The longer the class went on, the more sure I was that this was not just my imagination.
When class was over, Mr. C snapped out, "Miss Spencer, may I speak to you, please?"
The students left the room reluctantly as if they were expecting to see something of interest.
For some reason, I had this foreboding feeling of nausea. Was I in an alternate universe? I just didn't get what was going on.
Was That Movie the reason for all of this tense atmosphere?
Yes, I reasoned as I waited for the people to leave. That had to be it. The movie had opened this week to rave reviews. That Actor had earned a brand new reputation in musical theater as well as cinema, becoming more or less Mr. C's successor. Some even felt that he had performed better in the movie than Mr. C would have. I usually shrugged off such attitudes as insufferable ignorance, but that was just me. That explained the atmosphere. Mr. C was upset. All of the students knew That Movie had been opened. Everyone was just all pent-up with nerves and anger.
So maybe I was in for a really rough whipping session. Just the thought of it made my blood race. I was not afraid but anticipating him using me. That's truly how fucked up he was making me. Bring it on, Mr. C. Maggie'll make it all better. You're always number one with her, lover boy.
After the last student left the room, I turned to face him, wondering if I should take off my clothes now or let him rip them off.
While I was relishing the thought of being naked and thrown onto the small table in the corner of the room, I did not expect to have a copy of a certain New York newspaper being thrown in my face.
"What the hell!?" I stormed angrily, trying in vain to fix my messed up hair. It was one thing to spank me; entirely another to throw the paper at me like I was a dog or something!
"That's what I want to know," Mr. C rejoindered. "There's a lot that I want to know!"
"What are you talking about?" I demanded angrily. "What's the matter with you? Has everybody gone crazy or something...acting like a lot of fucking weirdos?"
After picking up the paper, I noticed a certain gossip columnist article. A paragraph had been circled.
"Proud of yourself?" Mr C jibed.
I ignored Mr. C's rage and read the paragraph silently.
"ITEM: What famed theatrical star from yesteryear is having a fling with a very young wannabe actress from an oh-so-private workshop? Is his Lolita sufficiently distracting him from the recent blows to his career and overblown ego?"
"What...?"
"I hope you were well paid for that..."
Not only was I in shock from this article, but I was confused. How did anyone know about us? I hadn't said a word to anybody, not even my mother. And now our affair was an alluded item in a popular Manhattan gossip column. How in the hell did this happen?
"Don't act like you're so damned surprised," he sneered. "This is real life now, not class."
I didn't say anything because I still just couldn't wrap my mind around what happened.
"To think that with some effort, you might have gotten somewhere on your own steam. And instead, you had to stoop to whoring...not only to me but to that columnist bitch! I suppose she paid you a lot of money for that little scoop..."
I tried to ignore the insult, knowing that he was hurt. What could I do to convince him that he was wrong? That I would never betray him like this? That I would never insult him? Hell, what did I know about newspapers or gossip columnists?
"Please..." I started. "I don't know how this..."
"...But there's really not much profit to be made from feeding off of my failures, Miss Spencer," he interrupted in a rage. "If you haven't noticed, I have very little of a career left. There's not really that much interest in me anymore. I'm practically just a museum piece now. Take my advice and screw over someone a little higher up on the food chain next time you spread your legs."
"Look, you've got it all wrong..."
"And here I thought that you were just a young girl who looked up to me as a teacher, who had a sincere interest in what I could teach you. To think that you actually made all of this..." he gestured at the classroom. "...fun for me. It wasn't a big run on Broadway, but it was fun in a different sort of way."
"I do look up to you..."
"And I got involved, even when I kept telling myself not to. I guess I was an idiot after all."
Grabbing his coat and notebook, he stormed off before I could even react.
I just stood there alone in the classroom. I felt bruised by his words, even though they weren't true. He had it all wrong. It wasn't fair. That he was so quick to believe the worst of me. It was almost as if he had been looking for some reason to run away.
As I walked along the streets of Manhattan, aimlessly just spending off energy, I felt such a weird sense like none of this could really be happening. Then again, I suppose I had felt that way about Mr. C from the first day, eleven weeks ago, when I had first set foot in his classroom. And now I had to face the fact that I had officially been dumped by Mr. C; and had we ever really been going out in the first place?
WEEK TWELVE – The Last Class
"Come on, you son of a bitch! Answer your stupid phone!"
Despite my cursing, the phone kept ringing and ringing. Again, I pressed 'redial', determined not to quit ringing the phone until Billy answered and explained his actions. Although I had no proof, I knew my ex-boyfriend was responsible for that gossip column. He had always bragged about having connections to important people, although I thought he had been bullshitting half the time just like he did about everything else.
After about half an hour of calling him on redial, I began to feel more than a little stupid.
Why call Billy? I knew where he lived. All I had to do was go to Brooklyn and wait outside his apartment...and do what? The obvious retaliation would be to kill him. I had no gun, but I did have a nice long kitchen knife. I thought of chasing after him on the street, slashing away at him with all of my violent fury, watching him rip up and bleed and scream in agony. And then I imagined the cops coming for me. I'd be thrown in a stinking horrible jail, filed with drug users and prostitutes and murderers. I'd probably get raped daily by prison guards and lesbians for years on end. Maybe I wouldn't murder him after all. Revenge on Billy was not worth such a fate.
