Rapture

"Ah, I know it. I tell you, Jeff, sometimes I think teaching kids is a bit of a drag, you know. It stops being exciting or even fun after a few years. The administration, the parents-it's all a load of crap, for the most part. But then I think, Hey, I have a woman I love dearly, who loves me dearly, and we have a beautiful, very bright daughter who shares the love and makes us proud every day. And we have this house, so ... what it all adds up to, I guess, is that however much I might want to gripe or complain, I know I've got the world by the balls. I mean, as long as we're healthy, we should all be grateful for what we have, and consider ourselves lucky. Right?"

"That's exactly right," Jeff said, putting his hands in his pockets so he wouldn't punch Sean in the mouth. What a smug little bastard this guy was. I've got it, I've got mine, the wife, the daughter, the house. So long, pal, and come back in another twenty years if the smoking hasn't killed you in the meantime. That's how it all translated to Jeff, a kind of gloating dismissal.

Then Georgianne and Bonnie came out of the house, and he didn't have to suffer Sean alone any more.

"Well, good luck with the work and all that," Sean said as he shook Jeffs hand.

"Thanks. Take care of yourself," Jeff said. "And these two fine women."

"I Will."

Bonnie was wearing cutoffs and a blouse now, and her hair was brushed. She stepped forward to shake Jeffs hand.

"It was nice to meet you, Mr. Lisker," she said rather too formally.

"Jeff," he corrected, smiling. "And it was nice to meet you. I'll expect to hear that you're knocking them out at Harvard. I know you're going to do really well."

"Thanks." She smiled at him.

He turned to Georgianne. "You know," he told her, "it's impossible for me to look at Bonnie and not see you. She looks so much like you did in high school." Georgianne smiled warmly, a little embarrassed perhaps, but proud. "It's been very good to see you again," he continued. "Really very, very good ..."

"And you, Jeff," Georgianne said.

She hugged him, and he squeezed her tightly to his body, holding her as long as he reasonably could, and then a little longer. He knew that if he did nothing in the future, if he failed to come up with an idea, this embrace might have to last him the rest of his life. They kissed each other, like friends, on the cheek. Then they promised to keep in touch, perhaps by letter but more likely with the occasional telephone call.

Jeff thanked them all again, got in his car, and, after a final wave of the hand and honk of the horn, he drove slowly back to Danbury.

Sean will think, Good riddance, Jeff told himself as he rolled on out of Foxrock. Bonnie would probably forget him within the hour. And Georgianne? The memory of Jeff's visit would stay alive in her for a few days, perhaps, a week at most. But then she'd be back in her little groove, and he'd be three thousand miles away.

He had to shower, pack his suitcase, and check out of the hotel. Then on to New York, Los Angeles. He still hadn't made up his mind whether to take the first available flight or to waste a night in Manhattan. But he was glad to be on the move again.

He had reached the point where it hurt to stay in Danbury and see Georgianne with Sean. His curiosity was now completely satisfied, and the visit had been worthwhile. To see Georgianne looking so glorious, and to meet Bonnie ... he envied them Bonnie. It could have been different, he thought, so very different. Georgianne could have been his wife, Bonnie his daughter. But that was another lifetime, and he had misread it all, back then. Seeing Georgianne now had cleared it up for him, and that was another part of the hurt.

A wonderful, terrible truth had been revealed to him on this trip east. He understood now, consciously and clearly, as he never had before, that he loved Georgianne-and that he wanted her, more than ever. He'd been secretly in love with her all the time they'd been in school together, so secretly and so deeply that he'd never managed to articulate it to himself, much less to her. But the spell was never quite broken in all the years that had followed. And there had been times over the years when he had actively thought about Georgianne, and he had done things he would rather not dwell on now...

He had to do something now, that was now painfully obvious. If Sean was turning Georgianne into a house plant, Jeff could see that he had been turning himself into a zombie with his work obsession. The two of them, Jeff and Georgianne, had been drifting blindly through-life. They needed each other, and a way out. Jeff began to see himself and his life in a shocking new light. He hated what he saw, but at the same time he felt a new sense of exhilaration.