12. Tutoring

MICHAEL

Tutoring El was worse than what I prepared myself for. I prepared a mental list of things , avoid closed spaces, make her comfortable, making it a point that we were both of the same page ( since she had a bad experience with belly) , avoid staring at her, keep my distance with her, trying not think about kissing or touching her and various other things. Yesterday had been wonderful. I've never seen Elizabeth be so comfortable before. She actually looked happy, I loved that she looked happy, she looked even more beautiful than she already was( if that was possible) . I loved calling her El. It was as if it was ' our' thing. Our little secret. She seemed to love it too. When I saw her to the door yesterday, I didn't want her to leave. I wanted to grab her wrist and ask her not to leave. Stay, that's what I wanted to tell her. To just stay, whatever that meant. I loved how she called me Michael even when I called her by my own nickname. So I was always going to be Michael. Only mom called me Michael, everyone else called me Mike or Mikey or whatever shit. But the problem is I wanted to be her Michael. I know that it's a bit overboard but that was how I felt. It was as if she belonged here, with us. I've never felt at home with new people. Even when grand dad and grand ma came I always felt out of place at my own home.The minute it was just me and mom, that's when the feeling of home returned. But with El, I didn't feel like that. I was home from the minute we stepped in. At night I thought how our conversation in the car. I can't believe that she hasn't seen any movies since the last 5,6 years. I am a hugeee movie junkie. I loved films. To me it was the finest form of art. I loved how collaborative it was and the escape it provided me from monotony. Okay Iron man and Dark Knight , we'll leave them aside, Harry Potter? Not even Harry Potter? Normally I would instinctively hate people who did not like or watch it ( since I'm a hardcore Potter head) but it made me only like her more. Nobody even knew that I was a Potter head. Apparently it's not boyish or manly enough for boys to like it. Stupid double standards. I steered clear from that and imagined her binge watching french movies and talking fluent french and God the image was lovely. To make matters worse she wore lipstick by the time I showered and came downstairs. It only made me want to wipe it off.I imagined how her lips would feel against mine. Those beautiful full pink lips. Fuck! At the end of the day I was just a teenager with raging hormones. If I was gonna have a hard-on everytime I think about Elizabeth and her lips, the situation is going to be bad. It was taking me a lot of self control to hold myself back and the shittiest thing is I've never ever ever felt like this before. I never had this problem with any female in my entire life. God not even while I was kissing! Yeah two petty kisses some up my entire love life so there we go. I went to sleep imagining all the things that were possible if I wasn't my mom's son. Would things be different? Of course, I would've asked her out the minute we talked at the same time she wouldn't be having dinner with us either.I was , am and always will be proud to be my mom' son. I definitely wasn't going to take advantage of that. I'm better than that. So we'll stick to tutoring for now. So in the morning I showered and brushed my teeth more vigorously than I usually did. Mom had some work in town and she's not going to be there. Great ! I thought I would make good use of that to spend whatever time I have on my hands with El. We'll get comfortable with each other and we'll be great friends by the end of the day because that's the only thing we can be. To be good friends. But she was making it utterly difficult for me. First she helped me do the dishes and clean the kitchen. Not that it's a bad thing but she made doing dishes something to look forward to. And you never look forward to doing dishes! I hate doing dishes. No wonder she never did them but I loved doing dishes with her , loved cleaning the table top , God i think I would even love mopping floors and doing laundry and these are the things that people usually hate because they're boring. But no not with Elizabeth involved.She was making everything great with just her presence. I was sinking deeper into this everyday and I hated it. Is she feeling remotely close to how I feel about her? God knows because she's impossible to read. Impossible I tell you. When she decided to study in the living room I was more than relieved. But it was very very short lived. I started with the basics as she suggested and good Lord, the entire time I spoke she blinked only three times. She stared right at my face. With intensity. She looked at me as if she wanted to kill me? Kiss me? I have no clue. I can not do this if she was looking at me like that. I wanted to ask her what she was thinking, demand her thoughts. But I didn't, I couldn't, how could I? I barely know her, I cannot just impose on her like that. So I just wanted to know if she was paying any attention to what I was saying. Nope she wasn't. I wanted to know if she didn't want to study, so that we could do other things, like watch TV. But she took it the wrong way! I would never belittle her, hell why in the world would I do that? Just because I was tutoring doesn't make me any better than her in any way. Surely she must know that! Why would she even think of me that way? Because she doesn't know you idiot! You guys are strangers to each other! My mind was processing this information when she stood up to leave. Like hell she's leaving! How do I make her stay? I don't want her to leave, not like this! Yep.I know exactly how , I'm gonna use the Mom card.

" Okay , will you just sit down, mom thought you would be staying for lunch" I said hoping it would work.

" Lunch? " I think Mom would be more than okay to have her for lunch even though she never mentioned anything about lunch. She looked at the clock and it was 11:15 already, how the hell did time fly away.

" She'll be disappointed in me, if you leave, please stay" Mom most definitely will be disappointed if she knew about this but she's not gonna know anything. I'm gonna make things right.I gave her my best puppy eyes that work wonders on mom and apparently they worked on her as well because she dropped her bag ,walked around to the sofa near the flat screen and plopped right down on it.

" Fine, just don't disturb me,okay" she mumbled.Is she sleeping? I went to check on her. She folded her hands over her plain blue top and closed her eyes. She was very still. Her hair was no longer tied up and was spread out on the sofa. Waves in the ocean. I wanted to touch her hair. I wanted to run my fingers over her golden skin.Get yourself together! I went ahead and sat down in the chair directly in front of the sofa. Okay what do I do now? How do I do damage control. I looked at the time 11:20. Fine I'm gonna start my case

" You know I would never look down on or belittle you in any way " she should know. She has to know.

" Stop talking" she said with her eyes closed. That only made me want to talk more.

" Where do you want to go ? For college?" Please talk , please talk.

" NYU " she murmured after a beat.

" You want to stay in New York? " That surprised me.

" Yeah, I have no plans to go anywhere else, what about you?" she said still with her eyes closed.Why wasn't she opening her eyes? I loved her eyes.

" I want to go to Harvard business school, I've been wanting to go there ever since dad said that it was his dream college" I never told anyone this before.

" I thought your dad studied here, along with my dad at Columbia" she still didn't open her eyes but her eyebrows drew closer indicating a surprise.

" Yeah he couldn't afford Harvard at that time"

" That's sad, we never had to think about tuition fee or anything of that sort right" she said nodding her head.

" Yeah that's true." I agreed

"So you like art?" I asked after a beat.

" I'm good at art" she said nonchalantly

" What's the difference?" that made her open her eyes. Great!

" Just because I'm good at it doesn't mean I like it"

" I feel you're only good at things you like. That's when you can give it your best, otherwise you can never reach your full potential" I was talking too much. She slowly turned to face me, lying on her side, with her head propped up on her hand. She was smiling. Wow. She seemed to be in a better mood. Now that I think of it, she seemed a little off ever since she arrived. I tried not to pay attention to that and only focused on my task ahead but that was so wrong. How was she going to study if she was not in the right mind, I should've talked to her about it.

" That's a wonderful observation Michael" she said smiling at me. I think I'm in love.

"Earlier, when I said , do you even want to do this, I meant if you wanted to do other things"

" What other things" something flashed across her face

" Um like watch TV?" I mumbled. She was laughing now. Her top rode up giving me a glimpse of her underwear and her golden skin. Look away, look away, be a gentleman. Calvin Klein. I averted my eyes to the ceiling, that's a nice chandelier . I wonder how smooth her skin was. I suddenly wanted to be on that couch. Nope, not helping. When I looked down after five seconds she was sitting cross legged with her hands on her thighs. That's so much better.

" So you love math then" she asked still smiling.

" I do" as a matter of fact, I'm pretty sure I love you too.

" I hate math," she said and made a gag impression.

" I got that" I said with a laugh

" And bio is boring" she rolling her eyes. No, it's not but if she says 2×2 equals 3 I'll agree at this point.

" I think it's because you don't know it enough" I tried to say.

"Trust me when I say I know enough biology by now" she said with a smirk. What do i say to that?

" What do you know about biology Michael," she asked with that smirk on her face. Something about her tone told me that she was teasing me.

" Hm, not much in the practical aspect" Why did I even say that!

" Uh huh, tell me more" she asked

resting her chin on top of her hand

" Um , my first kiss was when I was 15, her name was Mary Jane, we called her MJ, I liked her name more than I liked her" I don't even know why I'm doing this to myself. I'm bewitched.

" Why's that?" She asked surprised

" You know I was a huge Spider-Man fan so," right she doesn't know Spider-Man

" She's his girlfriend in the movie"

" Oh, that's why you liked her?" She looked shocked.

" I mean we went to math leagues together, studied together" I drawled.

" Haha, oh boy you do love math" she said laughing.

" Anyway so we kissed each other on Halloween" God!

" And?" She seemed so interested to know what happened next.

" And that's it. Nothing happened. We wanted to focus on studying. Now that I look back I think it was because the kiss was horrible"

That made her laugh, hard. Like the one I saw yesterday in the cafeteria.

" Okay the next one" she asked. I have no idea why she's so interested in my lame love life.

" Her name was Casey, she lived next to our grandparents. We became good friends over the course of years but I never thought she had feelings for me. She kissed me when I told her that we were relocating"

" A goodbye kiss, wow, that's great" it was great actually, it made me feel good.

" So your turn" I'm not letting her off the hook that easily.

" You want the list " there's a list. Great!

" Bring it on" I said faking enthusiasm.

"I've kissed a few guys, made out with two, did other things with one and had sex with one" she said tallying off her fingers.

" Thats it?" I expected more.

" What did you expect, that I slept with half of the school?" She asked laughing. Um yes from the talks of it.

" I'm sorry, I shouldn't have said it, that's what I've heard in school" I said raising my hands in defense

That made her smirk again

" What did you hear about me in school" she asked crossing her legs.

No, I don't want to do this.

" Just some things," how do I avoid this

" It's okay you can say it" she said reassuringly.

" Say what" I tried to feign innocence.

" That you've heard that I was a bitch" okay, that's what I've heard but I would never refer Elizabeth like that.

" I would never say that and hey A freedom that is only interested in denying freedom must be denied" I said meaning what I said.

"Simone de Beauvoir" she finished raising her eyebrows. Come-on she's hiding the fact that she is french.

" Can I ask you something"

" Yeas" she said doubtfully

" Of all people, why Sebastian Monroe?" that made both of us laugh

" It was nothing special Michael, I just wanted some distraction and I'm not proud of it"

" You know what, that's not a long list , I think it's being blown out of proportion. Come-on David's slept with three quarters of school and he's glorified for that. It's gender bias and it's bad"

She looked at me appreciatively.

" I mean if I wasn't the way I am, maybe I would have more to my list as well" why am I even talking so much.

" What do you mean by that" she asked intrigued.

" I mean if I wasn't-

"Shy?" She was smiling at me.

" I guess so ... " I mumbled

" and also I've never really wanted to do it" I continued.

" Really?" She was surprised again

" Mom always said there's a huge difference between making love and having sex. "

She seemed to be thinking about it. I don't know what possessed me to ask this but I did

" Have you ever been in love?"

" No" she said after a beat. She seemed sad about it.

" Have you" she asked softly

" Yes, " I said with conviction

" With math" We both laughed. I'll give it to myself, that was a good one.

" Yesterday you said, you live in your head because it's better than the world outside, what did you mean by that" I've thought about it since yesterday.

"You haven't forgotten about it, have you" she said shifting.

" No because I know exactly how it feels. I've lived at lot in my head because I had my dad in there, the world outside didn't. I wonder what's making you live in yours"

" My mom .....and my dad"

I looked at her wanting her to go on

" You don't know anything about me do you?" She said after a beat

" I don't think anyone knows much about you Elizabeth" I said and that was the truth though.

" Fair enough " she said with a smile.

That's when she told me about her family. How her parents divorced after ,how her mother has been absent from her life ever since and about her addiction. God that explains a lot actually.

" If it wasn't for Aunt Rose I don't know how I would've been." She whispered

" No one knows about all of this?" She's been through hell all these years. My poor little girl. I wish I could take it away but I know that I can't.

" Belly knows some of it.I don't talk much. It's difficult to make friends if you want to be left alone" I know that.

" I had one friend back in Washington, his name was Arun, he's an Indian and that's how my love for Indian food started"

" I love Indian too, our house keeper Sandra is an excellent chef, you should come over sometime" That made my heart swell.

" I would love to" she just smiled and nodded her head in response. I wanted to lighten the mood and I really wanted to help her in some way, any way.

" So now that we're friends shall we go back to where we left off" I smiled encouragingly. Maybe I'll just help her study for now but that's all I can seem to do.

" So all of this was for tutoring?" she was smiling too.

" No El, all of this was to be friends, tutoring was just an excuse" I couldn't get more honest than that

She gave me her best smile and it made my heart flutter. At this rate my heart is going to explode I'm telling you.

" Fine on one condition" she said standing up.

" What's that?"

" You have start from the beginning"

We both laughed at that.