CHAPTER 35
Maria
1944
Date Rape.
I knew many people my age ridiculed that term, believing it was a way of pinning the rap on a boy when a girl later had regrets, but I embraced the concept, because it eased my guilt about what happened toward the end of the summer of 1944.
That was the first summer that Charles spent his weekdays in our new home in Westfield while I remained at the bungalow with my parents. Charles was doing his residency at a veterans’ hospital, choosing it over pediatrics because he was passionate about continuing to serve his country in whatever way he could. The war permeated every aspect of our lives, from the constant newscasts on the radio to the rationing that affected our food and our gasoline and nearly everything else we needed to exist.
I’d considered staying in Westfield with Charles, only going to the bungalow during the weekends as he did, but he insisted there was no point in my staying in the heat of the suburbs when he would be able to spend so little time with me there. His hours were long and grueling, but he loved what he was doing and the contribution he was making. I was very proud of him, yet I missed him during the week. I missed sleeping next to his warm body and our long, happy conversations about the future. We’d talk about the children we would have and all the things we wanted to be able to provide for them. And we made love, though not as much as I would have liked. I knew he was tired, but I often wondered if I simply had a stronger sex drive than most women. My friends and I never talked about that sort of thing, so I was not sure if I was normal.
My parents had developed a thriving social life as more people who were tolerant of my mother’s heritage moved to Bay Head Shores, so they were often out having fun, and my old girlfriends were either working or busy with new babies. Many of their husbands were enlisted men, some of them fighting in Europe. I knew I was lucky that my husband was safe on American soil. But without Charles or my friends around, I was lonely, and loneliness could be a dangerous thing. In the fall, I would begin my second year as a teacher, but that summer was nothing but one lazy day after another. I read a great deal and thought about Charles and had far too much idle time on my hands.
One weekday night when my parents were out, I was on the porch reading A Bell for Adano when I spotted Ross sitting alone on the bulkhead in his backyard. Dusk was quickly falling, and I could see the burning tip of his cigar. He’d flick the ashes into the canal from time to time, and I felt mesmerized by the red glow arcing through the darkness.
I watched him smoke for the longest time, my book forgotten. I imagined how his mouth would taste—like wood and leather—and then, as if on automatic pilot, I stood up from the rocker and walked outside. I let the screen door slam behind me so he would not be surprised when I appeared in my own yard.
I walked toward the canal and sat down on the bulkhead, bending my legs and wrapping my arms around them. The water was as smooth as gelatin, and the reflection of the nearly full moon was a brilliant white disk floating on its surface. I was perhaps four yards away from Ross, and although he had put out the cigar, the scent of it was still strong in the air.
“Beautiful night,” I said, turning to look at him. I could see him more clearly than I’d expected, the moon was so bright. His eyes were on me, his hand rubbing his jaw lightly as if he were deep in thought.
“It is,” he agreed.
“How come you’re able to be here during the workweek?” I asked.
“I took the summer off from law school to be with Joan and the baby,” he said.
I turned to look back at their darkened bungalow. “Where are they tonight?”
“Joan has some friends in Brielle,” he said. “She took Ned over there for a visit.”
“Ah,” I said. He, too, was alone.
“I imagine it’s hard not having Charles here during the week,” Ross said.
“Yes,” I said. “But it could be worse. He could be overseas.” I thought of how, without Charles at the bungalow, I felt like the single girl I used to be, ready to go to Jenkinson’s at night with my gang of friends or to the movies with a date.
Ross stood up and stretched, and for a moment, I feared he was going to go into his house. But he walked toward me and my head felt light as he sat down next to me, letting his legs hang over the bulkhead.
“I’m glad you found someone like Charles, Maria,” he said. “His politics are screwy, but he’ll be able to lift you up. Your social status, I mean. The wife of a doctor.”
“That was not why I married him,” I said.
“No, of course not,” Ross said. “But that’s a nice bonus for you.”
“I really don’t care about that sort of ‘bonus,’” I said.
He smiled. “You’re still a feisty one, aren’t you.” He lifted his hand to my chin, turning my head toward him. “I’ve missed you,” he said. “Not just…you know, the physical part of our relationship. I’ve missed you. All of you. The friendship we used to share.”
I wasn’t certain how to answer. Did I miss him? Yes, I did, but it was the physical part of our relationship I missed. Charles met my needs for adult conversation and companionship, but there was a puritanical quality to his infrequent lovemaking that left me wanting more. I longed for the stolen, impassioned sex Ross and I used to enjoy in the blueberry lot.
“I miss…” I gently pushed his hand away. “I miss things I have no right to miss,” I said.
Ross glanced toward my house. “Where are your parents?” he asked.
“Out,” I said.
He stood up and held out his hand. “Come with me,” he said.
I stood up, not stopping to think, and took his hand, which was smoother than Charles’s, the skin softer, cooler. I had almost forgotten the feel of it. We walked through my small yard, then along the path between our two houses and past the bedroom window through which I used to escape to meet him. We continued down my short, packed-sand driveway and only then did I admit to myself where we were headed. I felt the cool orange dirt beneath my feet as we crossed the narrow road, and then we were on the white, moonlit sand of the blueberry lot.
“We shouldn’t do this, Ross,” I said.
He didn’t reply, and I didn’t let go of his hand. I could feel my heartbeat—or perhaps I was feeling his—where our hands were pressed together. The delicious sense of doing something forbidden and daring propelled us, as it always had, and soon he was pulling me down inside the half circle of blueberry bushes. He plucked a few of the berries from one of the bushes and held them to my lips. I took them in, rolling them around in my mouth before biting into them. I would never again be able to taste blueberries without feeling the rising tide of guilty pleasure.
He lay me back in the sand, then leaned over to kiss me. Briefly I thought of Charles, of how the feral hunger I felt in my body at that moment was something he had never experienced from me. I returned Ross’s kisses as I unbuttoned his shirt. He took off my blouse, my shorts, my bra, my panties, leaving me nude and aching with desire for him. I felt the moonlight reflect off my skin as he sat back on his heels to look at me.
“I’ve missed your beautiful body,” he said. He leaned over to run his tongue across my nipple. “Joan has a boy’s body,” he said. “Even when she was pregnant, she had no breasts to speak of.”
The words were his mistake. At the mention of Joan, my body went cold. I could not do this to her. I could not do it to Charles.
Ross pressed his thigh between my legs to spread them apart, and I gripped his thigh with mine to stop him.
“Let’s not do this, Ross,” I said.
“Don’t be crazy,” he said. Somehow, he’d managed to get both his legs between mine. I felt the pressure of his penis against my pubic bone.
“Ross, I mean it,” I said, trying to squirm out from beneath him. “I don’t want to do this.”
He drew back slightly, letting his penis find its mark. No matter how desperately I wanted to keep him from entering my body, the earlier hunger I’d felt had left me wet and vulnerable, and he slipped inside me effortlessly. Furious, I pushed down on his shoulders. I bit his collarbone and dug my fingernails into his back. My attempts to stop him only seemed to increase his ardor, and he thrusted harder and deeper, his breath ragged in my ear. I started to cry, my body going limp, my own breath coming out in small gasps.
“Please, Ross,” I begged. “Please stop.”
He finished quickly, and for that much I was grateful. He pulled out of me, then rolled onto his back, and I sprang to my knees as I searched the sand for my underwear.
He caught my arm as I picked up my bra. “What are you doing?” he asked. “Don’t get dressed yet.”
I stared down at him, incredulous. “I told you to stop,” I said.
“I didn’t think you meant it,” he said.
I swatted his chest with my bra. “I did mean it. You forced yourself on me.”
“Maria,” he said. “Come on. You were an animal. Just like you used to be.”
“I was trying to fight you off.” My voice broke.
“If you really wanted to fight me off, you could have.”
“You’re a thousand times stronger than I am,” I said.
“I don’t remember any objections when I kissed you,” he said. “Or when I undressed you.”
He was right, and I was so filled with shame that I wished I could rewind the night back to the moment I spotted him from my porch. I would have chosen differently if I’d taken two seconds to think about Charles and Joan—and the little baby, Ned.
I put on my brassiere while he watched.
“Let me do that for you,” he said, when I struggled with the hooks.
I stood up, nearly leaping away from him as I tossed my blouse on over my unfastened bra.
“Are you really upset?” He sounded perplexed.
“Yes!” I said. “I’m extremely upset.”
I pulled on my shorts; I could not find my panties.
“I’m sorry,” he said, sitting up. He reached for my ankle and missed. “I’m very sorry, Maria,” he said. “Honestly.”
I ran through the lot, kicking sand behind me, and I didn’t stop until I was in the bungalow. I sobbed as I heated water on the stove to bathe in. I wanted to clean any trace of Ross Chapman from my body. I changed into my robe, shook the sand out of my hair, then stood barefoot in the kitchen watching the water slowly warm up. I felt crazy. Insane. And I repeated over and over again, “I’m sorry, Charles, I’m sorry, Charles.”
I never really got over that night or forgave myself for it. Even at eighty-one years of age and with the knowledge that what happened could well be considered date rape, I would sometimes still wake myself up in the middle of the night, chanting that phrase of apology and guilt.