The hand, warm on her elbow, was bad, and she wanted to shake it away,
and she wanted to leave it there.
"Yes?" she said weakly.
"... Uh.... Let's talk," he said, taking the hand away.
"Talk?" she said, trying to gain time and marshal her thoughts.
Then there was laughter from behind them, along the lane they had
followed.
"Two of the kids from school," Clyde said disappointedly; he turned to
wave. "No. It's all right. I see their adult bands."
Shortly, the adults, nodding pleasantly with the confidence and
understanding of hundreds of years, passed them and continued down the
lane, looking no older than the two adolescents.
When they had gone, vanishing around a sharp bend in the lane, Clyde
said, "Uh, Margy. Have you ever thought, I mean _really_ thought, of
having to grow up?"
"... Yes," she said, feeling a calmness come to her, an almost iciness,
a resignation.
"It's awful puzzling: I mean, they _know_ so much. It takes so long to
become an adult. And you're always doing silly things that they don't
do, and you don't know why. You don't _understand_. It's hard, to
understand. And sometimes you're almost afraid you'll _never_ be able
to grow up."
* * * * *
He was a boy again, now, and she felt her heart swell in sympathy as
she watched him and listened to his words, and for a single moment,
many things seemed possible.
"It's awful hard," he said. "And if a man has to do it alone...."
The calm was gone. _No, No!_ she shrieked mentally, _No, please don't
ask me!_
"It makes it so much harder," Clyde continued. "Have you ever ... I
mean ... uh, Margy, it's kinda nice, I mean ... to make an early first
marriage, don't you think?"
She felt herself trembling, and her lips moved soundlessly.
"What I want to say, it's so much nicer to have someone. I mean, it
helps you grow up faster. Gives you responsibilities. _Teaches_ you, I
mean."
"I ... I...."
"What I'm trying to get around to saying.... Look. Sometimes these
first marriages just go right on lasting. I mean, if two people,
they're alike, they just stay on married."
She felt fire in her cheeks.
"Margy, will you marry me?"
Anticipation had not blunted the effect, and maturity shone in his
eyes. Her face was white; blood fled from her lips.
"Clyde...."
"We're a lot alike, Margy," he said intently. "We could make it last.
We've got a lot in common. For us it wouldn't be just a first marriage.
It would be _the_ marriage, the one to last always. And we both need to
get married. To help us grow up."
"I ... I...."
"Listen, Margy. I always thought ... I mean, well, I've always thought
you like me. A lot, I mean. I've always thought that--well--that you
were in love with me, sort of."
It felt like her chest was being crushed by emotions; and she could see
him spinning farther away from her. And she could not let him go. She
could not lose him like this, just let him walk away. It wasn't fair.
"I ... I guess I am."
"Then we'll go down tomorrow for licenses? We'll have our check-ups,
and...."
"No," she moaned, "no, no, no."
He drew her against him. She tried to turn her lips away, but she did
not want to, and then it was too late, and there was nothing she could
do.
She forced him back. "Wait," she said. "I love you," she said. "Listen,
you've got to do this. Listen. You've got to meet me tonight. At the
library. At ... at ... nine o'clock." She took a deep breath. "You've
got to do that."
"What's...."
She turned.
"Margy!"
Without daring to look back, she said, "Don't come any farther. Wait
until tonight." Inside, she was crying and hurt and desperate and
ashamed. Most of all, ashamed. Her nails dug into her palms until she
felt the sharp pain. _What can I do?_ she thought. _I won't go.
I'll ... I'll ... I won't go. I'll leave...._ There was a thin
trickle of warmness across the inside of her hand.
But she knew that she would go, deeply, she knew that. And she was
in love with him, and life was unfair, so terribly unfair, so unfair
beyond all imagining.
* * * * *
Waiting for him, she was sick with a strange excitement that kept her
blood alive and racing. She was afraid, too--mildly afraid, but fear
could not stop her. Waiting, she remembered: their laughter, and a
picnic lunch, once, when he had tried to hold her hand during the hour
when they listened to the Music, again when he chose her twice in the
social living game; and how unafraid and _warm_ she had been then,
until it began to break and crumble around her, and she could feel him
drifting away, toward Them--toward the utterly terrifying and complex
and baffling and painful life beyond her, where she was afraid to go.
But she could not let him escape from her: for he owed her something
more--he _had to_ owe her something more; life owed her something more,
and she would not be cheated. Then she would go away, and leave school,
and go somewhere and try to start all over again, and most of all,
really try to understand.
She was waiting for him just beyond the light that cascaded down the
steps from the open doors of the library, and finally, when she saw him
coming, a tall, lanky form coming uncertainly from the darkness, she
felt her temples pound, and her knees were trembling.
He came to her side. Her hand, not shyly, now, went out for his, and
he tried to draw back, startled by the strange intensity of her eyes.
Then, without a word, she led him by the hand across the smooth grass
toward the aspen trees around the tiny, moonlit lake.
When they were safely hidden among the trees, she pressed him to the
ground, and to her the moon seemed pale and ghostly, and the water
lilies, coffin flowers, and the cat tails, dead, furry fingers. Life
was no longer sweet and innocent, and the lake smell was like decay
upon the air.
"There," she said huskily. "Sit there. I'll sit by you."
Again she took his hand, and the wind rustled the trees.
"I want you to be in love with me," she said.
"Uh ... you love me, don't you?" he said uncomfortably.
"I want to be loved," she echoed stubbornly, and the wind sighed.
Lake water gurgled at the shore, and she thought it might be going down
a drain, somewhere, the way time goes down a drain; although time goes
silently.
* * * * *
She closed her eyes, trying to think, but she found only the eternal
confusion in her mind; and the wind carried back some of her own
sweet perfume smell to her, half sickening her. She licked her lips
nervously, and her cheeks were hot.
"We'll get married and have our own home, and you can...."
She shrank away from him mentally; and looking at him, filtered by
moonlight, she saw that he was old and although the aspen leaf that
fell between them was still green, she knew that it was old and dead,
too, and the grass under her left hand, though green, was dying. Terror
filled her, and as a very small child, she had been in a dark room,
somewhere, and there was rain and lightning; her father had come to
hold her hand; she could remember his saying: "You won't die for a long
time," although how he had come to say it, she could not remember.
Ever since, she had, in the back of her mind, the thought: I'm dying
now. And late at night, very often, she would awake with icy sweat on
her body to realize that some day there would actually come that last
minute, as real as the present one, and how could she stand it?
"... the house," he finished; but she did not know what he had said.
"We don't have to get married," she said.
"Why not? I don't see why not?"
Her lips were trembling, and she wanted to cry. "Don't you see: I don't
_want_ to."
"I don't understand you," he said. "I don't understand you at all."
The moonlight patterned the ground.
"Look," he said. "We want to hurry and grow up, don't we? We want...."
Scarcely understanding, herself, she repeated, "We don't have to get
married!" Her mouth was dry, and her hand, hot in his.