High School Seniors Get Education Ch. 02

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I was able to wrap up work earlier than usual Monday, arriving home to see Joshua's bomb parked by the door. I made extra sounds opening the garage, slamming my car door, and closing the entry door loudly to give the occupants enough warning to wind up whatever they might be doing and get presentable.

After a couple of minutes in the sun room shuffling things noisily around, I detected footsteps approaching, and my young rival appeared, looking disheveled, hair mussed and shirt hanging out. He looked unsettled at my sullen glance and looked away without saying anything. Lila was right behind him, saying hello to me with a nervous look before escorting the kid to his car. I heard the engine start and the sound of disturbed gravel as he peeled out.

When she came back in, she sat down beside me. She pecked lightly at my lips. There was a moment's silence, then I could not help asking, "So, how's it going with him? You still giving him special help?"

She did not look at me. "I'm ashamed talking to you about it. There's nothing startlingly new, and I'm not sure how much you want to hear anyway. I was hoping you wouldn't be home until after he was gone and we could just ignore the situation."

"Well, that tells me it's still going on. As for ignoring it, that won't work. Talking about it won't help my indigestion, but may help me know where your head is at."

"I don't feel comfortable talking to you about it," she said. "But Josh is like the high school lover I never had. It's hard talking to you about it, but if I was back in school, I would probably be bubbling over with pornographic details to my girlfriends."

"Such as?"

"He's more skillful in foreplay, and has calmed down enough to... prolong his time." She paused. "But you don't want to hear this."

"So he's getting good."

"Truthfully, I am feeling less like a teacher and more like a... lover," she said. "He is so good-looking, and his enthusiasm is infectious. His desire for me is a real turn-on, and..." She looked at me, but quickly looked away and stopped talking.

"So he's not only sexy, not only turns you on but is also getting more proficient?"

After a pause, she said, "He's gotten very good at oral foreplay. He's researched sexual positions on the internet and is taking more of a lead in... guiding us. One of the positions was really... great. I actually... reached climax for the first time with him." She paused as I had that sinking feeling in my gut. "He also didn't want to wear a condom and asked if we could go upstairs to the bed rather than use the couch. I let him off on the condom issue," she admitted, looking down. "And I should go clean up."

"So the kid has outgrown his rubbers," I said sourly.

"His former girlfriend had been a virgin before they hooked up, and I'm on the pill, so I didn't see any threat," Lila said.

"Did you do it with him in our bed too?"

"No, he didn't get his way on that." She began crying. "I know this shouldn't be happening, and that it hurts you. But it is happening. Truthfully, Danny, I enjoy being with him. His youthful passion is so infectious, and it's so great being with him. It's like it used to be with us. Now, you and I hardly talk. We're all on edge."

"So I guess this will continue a while," I said, my stomach churning as my mind wrestled with the fact the "beautiful boy" was evolving into a serious threat to our relationship.

"I know it shouldn't," she said. "If you want me to leave, I understand. I'll get an apartment if you want."

Conversation fell off. I had work to do after eating. She went upstairs before me and was asleep when I came up. Or at least, seemed to be. I reached out to touch her lightly. There was no response. We lay side by side without touching.

I lay awake, brooding about the situation. It jarred me to realize we had not made love for five days, which might be a "personal worst" for our relationship. The kid had become a phantom, throwing a shadow over our private happiness. Why wasn't she reaching out to me? The kid attracted her, but surely he could not displace me as her adult companion. Or could he? He and Lila had common interests in music, the age gap was not so huge and he had improved in bed, or on the couch. He was making her feel like a cherished lover, while I had become an embittered intruder.

At first, I had assumed this infatuation with Joshua was just part of Lila's growth process -- an unexpected opportunity, a second chance at the carnal puppy love she had passed on the first time around due to her conservative upbringing. It was a form of continuing education -- Passion 101: Balling the High School Stud -- But I had expected she would quickly tire of it. The youth would become boring, exit the picture, and I could go back to dealing with her other catch-up -- the thing with Eli.

Logically, Eli was more of a long-term threat to our relationship: It should be easier for Lila to drift away from me with an accomplished, admiring adult than with an immature high school kid wearing a lettered varsity jacket. Nevertheless, my stomach had become relatively at ease with the polyamorous relationship we had with Eli and Rachel. I knew and trusted Eli, and there was the fringe benefit with Rachel. Also, as the saying goes, greater risk produces greater reward: The four of us had become an informal "family," a loving group of mature adults who supported one another not only sexually, but emotionally, and in sharing life tasks.

No, Joshua had to be considered a greater risk, and not just to me. If it became known that an adult teacher was screwing one of her students she would be ostracized and barred from teaching.

I thought about Lila's anger and refusal to accept my affair with Kim a few years before, but Kim was another adult. It seemed much less a moral transgression than Lila's current obsession with a teenager.

Suddenly, I had one of those light bulb moments. Rachel and Eli had said the antidote to the teenage malady might be another teenager for Joshua to get his rocks off with. Despite her infatuation, even Lila had said that Josh would be better off with a girlfriend his age.

I could not do much about that, but my mind was giving it a different spin. I was thinking of Amber, the flirtatious dairy maid who more than once had offered me a "special treat." Maybe I needed a bit of the teenage malady. A treat from Amber would probably lift my spirits, and if it bothered Lila it would serve her right, I thought.

Further rationalization followed: A sexploit with Amber might give me more insight into Lila's state of mind -- perhaps she would be more inclined to open up to me if she knew I also was "obsessed" with a beautiful teen. Better yet, seeing me succumb to borderline pedophilia might shock her enough to reevaluate her own obsession.

Or would it lessen her guilt, and reinforce her thing with Joshua.

And so my thoughts spun. Sleep eventually came, but it did not alter my mood nor change the decision I came to before drifting off.