Double Tears
Chapter 107
“Summer-induced stupidity. That was the diagnosis…”
—Aimee Friedman, Sea Change
DONNA AND I didn’t become lovers that day but we crossed a major hurdle. We were no longer a teacher and student. We were a man and a woman. Beca was humming happily in the kitchen when we got back to the house and seemed to have a lot of dinner preparations under way.
“Go light the grill, Jacob,” she said. “The burgers are ready to cook.”
“Yes, dear,” I said, giving her a little squeeze and kiss on top of the head. Donna came back outside with me to show me the general operation of her gas grill then went back in to help Beca with the food. It was funny how at home Beca seemed to be at Donna’s. It was like having her visit at my house. She was just one of the family. And now Donna was, too.
We had a simple feast of burgers, salad, and corn on the cob. The first of the season, Donna said. For me, it was a treat just having teeth that could tear the tender kernels from the ear. Good stuff. After we’d cleaned up, Beca and I headed for the truck. Donna joined us and gave us each a reminder that she was joining us. Beca was pretty out of breath when she’d finished kissing our new girlfriend. I have a runner’s lungs, of course.
“Where are you staying tonight?” I asked Beca.
“With you,” she sighed. “I’m the only one of your girlfriends who never spends the night with you.”
“Um… Brittany hasn’t,” I said.
“Here,” Beca said. “And you can bet she will sometime soon. Maybe not until her birthday as the parents all want deniable culpability.”
“Is that what the big to-do at Brittany’s was today?” I asked.
“Brittany texted me while you were practicing. I guess grandma had a few choice words asking her daughter what she thought the quinceañera was for. Apparently, she assumed you’d been having sex with each other since last summer,” Beca laughed.
“B? Are you going to sleep in Em’s bed or with J? I’ve been kind of messy this summer and haven’t cleaned my room,” Pey said.
“Oh, well, I guess I’ll have to sleep with J then,” Beca said. “You should get that room cleaned up though. Em will be home Friday.”
“She never sleeps there,” Pey huffed. “Yeah. I’ll clean it tomorrow.”
“When did you become B?” I asked as Beca followed me into my room.
“Last week when I was over for dinner. I… um… kind of slept in your bed that night. Peyton said I was going to be one of her sisters and that my name would henceforth be B and she should be called Pey.”
“Bossy little thing, isn’t she?” I laughed.
“And a sweetheart. Um… If you don’t want me to sleep in here, I’ll go in with Pey, but… please?”
“Beca,” I said, picking her up to hold her face to face. There was a foot difference in our height. “I love you. I’d love to have you sleep with me. I won’t try anything. But if you’d sleep here, I’d be very happy.” She gave me a quick peck on the lips and I put her down. We brushed our teeth and got ready for bed. I just stripped to my boxers and turned to find Beca in just a pair of panties. “Um…”
“It’s hot, Jacob. Two people in a bed will just make it hotter. I don’t want to wake up in wet sticky clothes. Do you?”
“No. I don’t usually…”
“Take them off, J. I know we’re not going to have sex. I’m really not prepared. But I also know your penis is probably the only one in this universe I’m not afraid of. Bring it to bed and hold me until it gets too hot and sticky to touch,” she said. She hopped onto the bed, shoved all the covers down to the foot and lay down. I complied and removed my shorts before I lay down beside her.
I just lay on my back staring at the ceiling, not knowing at all what I should be doing. Donna had me turned on when we left the farm and now lying beside nearly naked Beca had brought my cock to attention. She said she wasn’t afraid of it and I didn’t want to change that. She rolled onto her side to face me.
“I’m glad I never had something that big to deal with,” she whispered. “It was traumatic enough to have the little weenie I was cursed with. May I… Jacob, can I touch it?”
“Beca,” I croaked. “You’re really sweet and really pretty and if you touch it, I don’t know if I could prevent what would happen.”
“You mean you’d rape me?” she asked as she jerked away.
“Oh, God, no! I mean… well… I might come.”
“Geez! Don’t scare me like that. Of course you’d come. That’s the purpose. J, you’ve gotten me off a dozen times. You’ve even eaten me to orgasm. Let me do this for you once? If Donna’s kiss did for you what it did for me, I bet it won’t take long.”
“Do you want me to…”
“I took care of it. Why do you think I was so long in the shower?”
“Okay,” I whispered.
Beca put her soft hand on my cock and began to stroke. A little bead of precome began to form at the tip of my penis but before she touched it, she licked her hand thoroughly and spit in it. Once she collected the precome with the spittle, her hand glided smoothly up and down my shaft.
I reached around her shoulders and held her to me, kissing her head. She wasn’t looking up at me for a kiss, her attention fixed on my cock and her delicate hand. I moaned.
“Tell me if you want it harder or softer or faster,” she said. “I don’t know what I’m doing.”
“Just having your hand there is all it’s going to take,” I said. I reached over and cupped her left breast with my right hand. I stroked the nipple with the pad of my thumb and it was her turn to moan.
“My nipples have always been sensitive,” she whispered. “Not quite like Joan’s, but we have that sensitivity in common. It’s like there’s a nerve or something that connects my nipple directly to my clit.” Her hand gripped a little more tightly and she collected more precome in her palm to continue stroking.
“That’s it,” I moaned. “I won’t last, Beca. My sweet love, I won’t…” It was too late. My cock throbbed in her hand and gobs of come spit out the end. The first landed on my chest about an inch from her nose. My arm was reaching across for her breast, so the next glop landed on it. She slowed her stroking a little and lightened up but didn’t stop until the last spurt had dribbled out. Then she reached up and kissed me long and gently, exploring my mouth with her tongue and nipping at my lips with her teeth.
“I brought a wash cloth to bed with us,” she said, reaching behind her. She produced the cloth and began cleaning up the spillage with the cool damp cloth. It felt fantastic. When she’d finished, she tossed the cloth toward the door and blew across my skin to cool and dry it. Then she kissed me again. “I love you, Jacob. I love you as much as any of the other girlfriends. I just want you to know that. You can hold me and pet my breasts until it gets too hot to sleep if you want.”
She rolled away and I spooned behind her. She held my hand to her breast and that was how we went to sleep. By morning, we were both lying on our backs next to each other. I looked at her like a work of art—something I would always treasure. So beautiful.
I slipped out of bed, got dressed, and went out front to meet Livy and Nanette for our run.
Rachel joined us for our run, determined to spend the year getting in shape for basic. She jogged along as the other three of us ran hard. When we hit the shower at Nanette’s house, though, Rachel was just as sweaty as the rest of us. We spent extra time washing our older girlfriend until she’d had a good orgasm.
“You guys can stay as long as you want,” she said after she was dressed. “I have to get to work. Lock the door when you leave.” We kissed her goodbye and heard the garage door close after her. I made love to both Livy and Rachel and they to each other. It was a perfect morning. We cleaned up and straightened Nanette’s house, made sure the dishes were done and left her a love note on the kitchen table.
“I have to go to work, too, dears,” I said as we walked down to my house from Nanette’s. Livy’s Jeep was there. “Big rehearsal day.”
“Give our love to Cindy,” Rachel said. “I know you’ll do great.” My girlfriends got in the Jeep and took off just as Sophie and Brittany pulled up with Joyce and Lisa. Pey and Beca came running out of the house. I kissed my girlfriends and they piled back into the car to head for the pool. Everyone had things to do. I went in the house to get my equipment.
“Mom?” I said when I saw her in the kitchen. “Are you okay? What are you doing home?”
“I’m taking a day off to go to your practice with you,” she said. “Want some peanut butter toast?”
“Sure. Thanks. Um… why are you going to practice with me? Not that you aren’t welcome. It just seems odd that you’d take a day off work for that.”
“Please, Jakey. You have a lot of hard work to do in your rehearsal with Cindy. You don’t need her mother making it harder. I’m a novice stage mom, so I thought I’d get some extra tips from Betty.”
“You’re funny, Mom,” I said. “But I love you.”
“Jacob, those people… I don’t mean Cindy, but her teacher, the orchestra director, and her mother… They want to use you to advance Cindy’s career. You are incredibly mature for a sixteen-year-old but you have a tendency to give in to pressure when it comes to those you care about, even when you think better of it. I just think that—for a while—you need someone to have your back so you don’t get anything stuck in it.”
Betty Marvel, Jannie Rentz, and Leonard LeBlanc all seemed to think I was a stepping stone for Cindy’s career. Even Vinnie Russo seemed to think it was a good thing for me to help Cindy. But Mom was right. I tended to let them make the decisions and just go with whatever they thought Cindy needed, whether I wanted it or not. I sometimes wondered if Cindy even wanted what they all planned. It would be good to have Mom there, even if it was just to watch.
I greeted Mrs. Marvel and took my instruments into the music room to meet Cindy. As soon as I had them out of my hands, she gave me a big hug. That had become common as we worked together the past two weeks. I was glad she wasn’t suddenly shy again.
“I had so much fun in Kansas,” she said. “I can’t wait for Denver.”
“I just hope our music has progressed well enough that you’re allowed to travel the western loop with us. Denver, San Francisco, and San Diego. That’s going to be a long trip,” I said. I unzipped the lute case and sat to tune as we chatted. Cindy gave me an A and I tuned to match her.
“I won’t get to go to San Diego. That’s a Comic Con. Mom and I are flying to Denver, riding with the caravan to San Francisco, and flying back from there. I’ll rejoin you two weeks later for the Kentucky Ren Faire.”
“That makes sense. It will give you more time for serious rehearsal here.”
“Too serious.”
“Are you okay, Cindy? You seem down.”
“I’ll turn fifteen while we’re on the road,” she sighed. “It seems like my whole life is planned out. My mother has a calendar of Kennedy Center events she keeps going over, trying to decide what season of the year it will be best for me to make my debut. She’s constantly on about how I should debut with the National Symphony Orchestra instead of in the Conservatory. You wouldn’t believe the arguments,” Cindy said.
“You argue with your mother over this?”
“Oh, God no. She doesn’t need anyone else to argue with; she does fine arguing with herself.” We both laughed at that and Jannie arrived just as we were warming up with a couple of our Renaissance dance pieces.
“That’s a refreshing sound,” Jannie said. “Have you had fun this summer?”
“It’s hardly started,” I laughed.
“It’s been great!” Cindy said.
“Okay, you kids. First of all, I want you to know that I’m a hundred percent behind you having a fun summer and playing together. If there’s no joy in your music, there’s no sense to it,” Jannie said as she positioned herself at the piano. That’s where she preferred to teach from since she could stop and demonstrate passages on the keyboard. “You’ve been playing and practicing the material for the faires pretty constantly, so now I want you to spend a little time with me focusing on the recital music. I think the Suite Buenos Aires is a good choice but we’ll need to design a program around it if you have the music in a performable state. I’m sure Vinnie will want to hear it, as well, so let’s just do a few minutes of it so I can assess where you are and then look at the Arabesque.”
It was a plan and Cindy and I took off with it. It’s a lively piece and we were getting into it when Jannie stopped us.
“Where’s your music?” she demanded. We’d just started playing and hadn’t bothered to set up music stands. “Come on. Get it out and on your stands so we can mark it up.” We sheepishly got out our sheet music and pencils and she started from the beginning of the piece with our entrance and tapped out the timing. We’d kind of rushed it, I guess. It was like working with LeBlanc on the piece we did for the spring concert. By the time she called it quits, there were more pencil marks on my score than music notes.
The Arabesque went better. We’d already gone over the first five minutes of the piece with LeBlanc and our scores were marked up. I figured we’d better pay attention to the music. Arabesque was written as a piano concerto but it’s been arranged and performed by almost every combination of solo and orchestral instruments you can imagine. According to the notation at the top of the first sheet, LeBlanc had arranged this one himself for guitar, flute, and strings. And it’s such an ethereal piece, you can be transported while playing or listening to it. Jannie didn’t interrupt us and Vinnie joined the room, just sitting down and listening while we progressed.
“That’s going to need some work,” he said when we finally paused. It’s a long piece. “Not the least will be endurance. Be sure to take what time you need between movements. The audience will wait for you.”
“I agree,” Jannie said. “Leonard will want to work with you a lot before he involves the strings. Cindy, honey, we need to work on breath control during the long runs. I think you forgot to breathe in there,” she said. She poked Cindy in the stomach and they giggled.
Vinnie and Jannie talked for a while about what she’d covered and she showed him the marked-up music. I was lucky to have found an accomplished classical guitarist as a teacher. He understood the music and the theory. I’d also seen him pick up an electric guitar and rock out to Henderson.
It was more of the same when LeBlanc got there. Of course, Vinnie focused almost entirely on the Suite Buenos Aires and LeBlanc on the Arabesque. Jannie was doing her best to focus on the development of our sound.
We’d been at it for six hours, with a break for lunch, when we finally wound down for the day. Mom and Mrs. Marvel were still at the kitchen table with calendars spread out in front of them. I was relieved to see Mom had my calendar through the fall marked with my practice times and cross country meets, when I was on the road with Desi, when my girlfriends’ birthdays were, and a big streak through the next week indicating Em would be home.
Betty had a performance and rehearsal calendar on her side with the dates for Cindy’s work with the school orchestra, South Community Center Chamber Orchestra, concert times and proposed recital performances with venues. As soon as the instructors joined the group, it was obvious the discussion wouldn’t end soon. I decided to trust Mom on this one and grabbed Cindy’s hand.
“Let’s go for a walk,” I said. We slipped on our shoes and left by the front door.
The mid-afternoon sun on the first of July warmed us up immediately.
“That was pretty intense,” Cindy said. “Just so you know, I don’t usually have lessons that last all day and have three instructors.”
“I think that’s my fault,” I said. “You can have three lessons a week because… well, that’s what you do.”
“And you have a life,” she laughed. “You know, I think that’s all that’s missing for me. I have a flute. I don’t have a life.”
“One of the things we learned in our personal finance class this year was that you need to have a work-life balance,” I suggested. “It seems like that should be a head-palm statement. You wouldn’t believe how many people get it wrong. They either want to drive toward success and a few million dollars or they want to get out of school so they can party. There aren’t that many people who keep it in balance.”
“I’m out of balance.” Cindy paused in her thoughts as we walked through a nearby park. I suddenly realized I was still holding her hand. I started to turn her loose but she kept her grip. “Jacob, I don’t know what ‘fun’ is. I never cared. My brothers are the same way with sports. It’s the only thing they do. We all study and get good grades, but then I play the flute and they play basketball. I… Can I hang out with you and your um… girlfriends this fall? I don’t mean like dates, but I’d like to see what it’s like to just have friends and have fun.”
“Cindy, after this summer, touring with Desi and me—and maybe Sophie and Britt, too—I think it will be a done deal for you to hang out with us. Um… you should know that we… well… sometimes…”
“You have sex,” she sighed. “I guess I’d put a damper on things, wouldn’t I?”
“It’s not quite like that. We get together and study. We go out to eat. We go roller skating or swimming or to the amusement park. We’re pretty normal. We don’t just get together and start banging. That’s one of the things we’ve learned from Nanette. And Sophie and Donna. They’re just enough older than the high school crowd to know that there are other things in life,” I said. “My sister will be home for vacation on Friday. You’ll love her and I know she already loves you, just from our videos. Why don’t you come to the farm with us Sunday for our cookout? We won’t be getting too carried away.”
“What farm?”
“Donna Levy’s. She’s invited our whole pod. The only one who’ll be missing is Joan because she’s in basic.”
“Would that make me part of your pod?” she asked.
Oh, shit! I’d been telling everyone Cindy wouldn’t be part of our pod ever since our first performance. All my girlfriends had told me I was crazy. She’d be traveling with us part of the summer. I’d be practicing and performing with her. She wanted to hang out and have fun. I sighed.
“It’s a step in that direction if you want it,” I said. She squeezed my hand and we continued our walk.
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