Off Limits Read online

  “You mean, we never find our ideal — in anything?” Birmingham asked.

  Like love?

  “I don’t think so.”

  Birmingham said tentatively, “So you’ve been disappointed all your life.”

  Winter nodded.

  “Doesn’t it get depressing?”

  “You learn to live with getting as close to the ideal as you can. And you settle for that. The school wasn’t my ideal, but it was close.” Winter waved his arm at the view of the river through the window. “And this house would be my ideal, if all the other houses hadn’t been built where there used to be woods. But I’ve settled for it.”

  Birmingham thought of things he didn’t dare ask. Was Winter’s love for Amber an ideal love? Had Amber’s love for Winter ever been an ideal love? Both seemed unlikely. Winter slept in his study most nights. Amber slept alone a floor below, and invited Birmingham to visit her in a hotel room, and was friends with the man at the club.

  Was it another case of Winter settling for less than the ideal?

  Winter drained his cup. Birmingham took it as a signal that it was 3:30 — time for the writer to get back to work.

  Winter said, “You’ll come again?”

  He sounded anxious.

  Birmingham said, “Of course.”

  As they went downstairs, Winter murmured, “Amber said she’d be home in time to see you. She’ll be sorry she missed you.”

  ***

  The phone was ringing as Birmingham walked in the door.

  His mother answered and said, “It’s for you. It’s the . . .” She hesitated. “. . . Society of Old Lady Hippies. Something about having some old equipment they want you to service.”

  He took the phone and recognized the voice at once.

  “Hello, Mr. Glover. We have some equipment we don’t use much and we’d like you to service it. We hear you’re very good at poking into old parts and —”

  He said, “Piss off, Trish.”

  He heard giggling in the background as he hung up.

  His mother said, “I thought it sounded like Trish.”

  “She’s just fooling around.”

  “There seems to be a lot of fooling around on the phone these days.”

  “It’s just a craze,” said Birmingham. “It’ll pass.”

  He hoped so. The calls had been coming in since the stories started going around school.

  “How’s Jenna?” his mother asked.

  Birmingham was immediately on his guard.

  “She’s okay. Why?”

  “I saw Mrs. Starr yesterday . . .”

  Had Jenna’s mother blabbed about what was going on?

  “. . . And she said how glad she is you and Jenna are together. She thinks you’re a steadying influence on her. It seems some of her choices for boyfriends in the past have been . . . unfortunate.”

  Birmingham thought, Yeah. Like Jordan, and the kids Geoff told me about, and one or two thousand others.

  “Mrs. Starr thought they’d been a bad influence on Jenna,” his mother went on. “And she worries that, because of them, some of Jenna’s . . . er . . . ways of expressing affection . . .”

  It’s called sex, Mom, Birmingham thought.

  “. . . Had become a little . . . er . . . unusual.”

  Like doing it in the cemetery, and behind the Food Mart, and in her mother’s car.

  Mrs. Glover looked at Birmingham with eyebrows raised.

  Birmingham shrugged.

  The phone rang again. He got to it first. A muffled voice asked if he was interested in joining the S.S.O.H. Club. When he didn’t respond, the caller added, “That’s the Students Screwing Old Hippies Club,” and hung up before he could say anything.

  He spent the next hour in a sweat of anxiety as he paced in the living room, waiting for the phone to ring again. He thought of going out to get away from it, but then his parents would have to take the calls. It wouldn’t be long before they guessed something more was going on than just phone pranks. The best way to handle it would be not to go to school until everyone forgot about him and the stories.

  But if he skipped school, he wouldn’t see

  Amber.

  And she wanted to see him. She said so in her note.

  The phone rang. He tried to grab it, but his mother picked up in the kitchen. He hovered near the door, trying to overhear.

  “Of course I remember you, from the Cellar Club. How are you, Ms. Flood?”

  Birmingham felt dizzy and sick. Why was Amber calling his mother? Ms. Legate must have forced her to tell his folks about the stories going around school. Maybe not Amber’s part in them, but how he was making a fool of himself with his crush on her.

  Mrs. Glover said, “I’ll tell Birmingham.”

  She came to the living room. Birmingham moved quickly across to the stereo and pretended he was looking for a CD.

  “That was your substitute music teacher.”

  He looked up, pretending surprise. “On the phone?”

  “She wanted you to know she’s pleased with the interest you show in music.”

  Birmingham released his breath. He hadn’t realized he was holding it.

  “It was good of her to call, wasn’t it?” his mother added.

  When she left the room, he looked at the note from Ms. Flood again. Now there was no need for her to see him. Was that why she’d called, because she didn’t want to see him? Or was it because Ms. Legate had forbidden her to see him?

  He heard a knock at the door. Geoff came in, carrying his guitar. Birmingham stuffed the note in his pocket. He looked blankly at Geoff, his mind still on Amber.

  “Hello-o,” said Geoff. “We’re supposed to have a practice, or did you forget?” He frowned at Birmingham. “Are you okay?”

  “Yeah. Why?”

  “You look like you’ve been kicked in the nuts. Is that shit at school getting you down?”

  “Nah.”

  “Liar. I can see it in your face.”

  Birmingham sighed. “Trish called, pretending she was from the Society of Old Lady Hippies, wanting me to service them.”

  “I was there. She did it before I could stop her. I told her to quit it.”

  “I’ve been getting calls all week.”

  “Are you surprised? What are you going to do about it?”

  “Not much I can do, is there?”

  “No, except make sure there’s no truth to it.” Geoff looked steadily at Birmingham. “There isn’t, is there? At least, not anymore?”

  “Nah.”

  Geoff looked at him for a few seconds more before going on, “So you wait for a new item of gossip to come up. Meantime carry on like nothing’s happened and — bingo! — no problem.”

  Chapter 11

  Birmingham went through another day of keeping his head down, avoiding eye contact with everyone. He felt like an expert on the various types of flooring used in the classrooms and halls.

  When classes ended, Geoff punched him lightly on the arm. “You made it through another day!”

  Birmingham muttered, “I guess.”

  “Gotta run. Got my guitar lesson. Give me a call later.”

  Birmingham lingered in the hall, pretending to check messages on his cell as students streamed past him. Ms. Legate was on duty at the main entrance. He waited until she went out to supervise the departing buses before making his way to the music room.

  The sound of the piano drifted from the open door.

  Was she expecting him?

  He felt the stirring low in his body, familiar now. It was something like what he used to feel when he thought about Jenna. But it was more subtle, not so hot, and not so concentrated in that one part of his body. It was a kind of glow that
he knew didn’t need to go beyond what he’d experienced with her already. The height of this feeling was just being alone with her.

  He entered the music room and nudged the door closed.

  She said sharply, “Leave it open.”

  So she was asserting their roles as teacher and student. Ms. Legate and the gossip must have really gotten to her.

  He turned to leave, but she called, “Sorry. I didn’t mean to sound so abrupt. But the principal said it’s better to leave it open.”

  He cast about in his mind for something to say to break the tension. “I visited Winter yesterday.”

  “He told me.”

  Birmingham remembered his doubts from that day. His suspicion that he was being used forced him to say cautiously, “I wonder why he makes time for me, when he gets hundreds of letters and e-mails.”

  “Hmmm,” she said with a twinkle in her eye as she looked up at him. “I wonder.”

  “Oh,” said Birmingham. “You.”

  She nodded. “I help him with his correspondence. When I saw your name, I invited you on his behalf.”

  So his suspicions were true. He hated himself for being so naive.

  “Don’t be angry,” she said. “It was just another way to see you.”

  “Is that why you said you wanted to see me about music class?”

  “Of course.”

  “Why did you call the house, when you’d already sent me the note?”

  “I was afraid you were mad at me because Jenna was upset and you were getting teased. I wanted to talk to you — I had to talk to you — but Vera Legate told me it was better if I didn’t see you. I thought I’d try calling. When your mother answered, I had to come up with something.”

  He was still hesitating at the door. “So Ms. Legate said you can’t see me.”

  “She advised me not to, but she didn’t forbid it. And now you’re here . . .” She spoke faster, as if afraid he’d take off. “. . . Let me just play you this riff. I think you might like it. I’m trying to work it into ‘Catnip Blues.’”

  As she played, he slowly moved closer until he was standing beside her. He was just where he’d been the time before, looking down at her, but this time he kept his eyes fixed on her hands. She was swaying at the keyboard, her shoulders following the movement of her hands. He moved even closer, closer than before. He sat on the piano bench beside her. At the same time she seemed to slide closer to him, so that each time she swayed, she brushed against him.

  Suddenly she stopped playing.

  She pulled away from him.

  She said loudly, her voice hard and forced, “Do you need to hear it again?”

  As she looked at him, her eyes flickered toward the door. He followed her glance without moving his head.

  Ms. Legate was standing in the doorway. She turned and walked away.

  ***

  The next morning, the principal leaned back in the chair behind her desk, her hands behind her head. “What’s going on, Birmingham?”

  “What do you mean? Going on with what?”

  He’d been standing with Geoff before the first bell when she passed by and said quietly, “A word, please, Birmingham.” He’d followed her to her office, where she’d closed the door and gestured for him to sit.

  “I don’t want to put words into your mouth. And I don’t want you to feel you’ve done anything wrong, because I know you haven’t,” said Ms. Legate. “So let me ask you just one question, and then I’ll keep quiet while you answer. Okay?”

  Birmingham shrugged.

  “Tell me about Ms. Flood.”

  Birmingham hesitated. Shrugged again. “She teaches me music.”

  Ms. Legate nodded. “And?”

  Birmingham said nothing.

  How much did she know? How long had she been standing at the music room door before Amber noticed her? How much had she seen? But what was there for her to see, except a teacher accidentally brushing against a student as she played the piano for him? He’d done nothing wrong. Ms. Legate had just confirmed that.

  But did that mean Ms. Flood had also done nothing wrong?

  He knew how careful the teachers had to be with students. He knew that things could be interpreted as improper touching, or even improper looking. Would Amber be in trouble if the principal thought that brushing against him counted as touching, even if it was innocent?

  Was it innocent?

  Did she accidentally brush against him? Or did he accidentally brush against her?

  Did it matter?

  She had slumped at the piano as Birmingham stumbled from the music room. He’d been afraid Ms. Legate would be waiting for him in the hall, but she’d disappeared. All evening he’d expected the phone to ring, with Ms. Legate demanding to speak to his parents, but she’d taken no action.

  Until this morning.

  She was looking steadily at him. She made a rolling motion with one hand — Go on — as she nodded encouragingly.

  What else did she expect him to say?

  The bell rang for first class.

  Birmingham rose to leave, mumbling, “I’ve got math.”

  “Math can wait,” Ms. Legate said quietly.

  Birmingham sat. “What do you want me to say?”

  “Whatever you want to say.”

  He stayed silent again. Surely Ms. Legate would get tired of this and would dismiss him. But she didn’t seem to be losing patience, and his ran out first.

  “Oh, you mean about the stories . . .” He shrugged. “Just stories. Don’t know how they got started.”

  Another long silence.

  Then, “And . . . and about being in the music room, me and Ms. Flood.” He said it as if it had just occurred to him.

  Ms. Legate didn’t respond, so Birmingham stumbled on, “She just wanted to see me about music class.”

  Ms. Legate nodded.

  “She wanted to tell me she was pleased because I showed interest in music.”

  Ms. Legate nodded again.

  “She called my mother to tell her, too.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “She just wanted to play something on the piano for me. She shows me stuff because I play too.”

  Another nod.

  Birmingham looked at his feet, and the ceiling, and the coffee cup on Ms. Legate’s desk. The message on it said, If you can read this, thank a teacher.

  “That’s about it,” he said.

  “Are you sure?”

  He nodded.

  After a few seconds that seemed like an hour Ms. Legate said, “Very well. Come and see me again if you think of anything else you think I should know.”

  Birmingham left the office.

  He stopped in the hall. First class would be well underway. He didn’t want to walk in with everyone watching, everyone knowing he’d just been called to see the principal. Easier to sneak out of school and goof off again.

  He heard a whispered “Birmingham!”

  Geoff beckoned him from an empty classroom.

  “Why aren’t you in math?” Birmingham demanded.

  “Because I’m worrying about you, man. What’s up? What did Legate want?”

  “Just to talk.”

  “Legate doesn’t call kids into her office just to talk.”

  “I had to see Ms. Flood after school yesterday. Ms. Legate wanted to know what it was about.”

  “What was it about?”

  “Just about music class. That’s all.”

  “You sure?”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “Just asking.”

  “Well lay off, will you?”

  “I’m trying to help, you know.”

  “Sorry.”

 
“But you won’t say what’s going on.”

  “What’s going on with what?”

  “Jesus, man. Stop bullshitting me. I mean, what’s going on — what’s still going on — with you and Ms. Flood?”

  Birmingham’s voice rose. “I keep saying. Nothing’s going on.”

  Geoff slowly shook his head, holding up his hands. “If you say so.”

  “I do say so.”

  “Okay. We better get to class.”

  “I’m not going to class.”

  “It worked out okay yesterday, didn’t it? Just carrying on as usual?”

  “That was yesterday.”

  “Bad scene, running away. Makes it look like you’ve done something wrong, like you got something to hide.”

  “I got nothing to hide.”

  “So let’s go to class.”

  “Nah. I’m out of here. I’ll call you later.”

  “That’s what you said before, and you never did.”

  Birmingham bit his lip. Geoff was right. He had forgotten to call his best friend, and he’d lied to him. And Geoff was still trying to help. “Sorry. I’ll talk to you later.”

  He set off out of the school.

  Geoff called, “You better watch yourself. Kids are saying stuff — teachers too. Worse than before. And not just because Jenna’s spreading it around.”

  Birmingham kept going.

  Chapter 12

  For two weeks after Ms. Legate’s warning and Geoff’s pleas for him to be careful, Birmingham hardly saw Ms. Flood. He saw her only in class and in the halls.

  It seemed to be long enough for everyone to move on. Geoff told Birmingham, “Your fifteen minutes of fame is over. Two grade eleven girls got themselves knocked up. I told you something else would come along for everyone to gossip about.”

  Geoff was right. As news of the pregnancies flew around the school, the gossip about Birmingham and Ms. Flood started to die down. Birmingham kept out of the way of Jenna and Trish and their friends. In the evenings, he stayed home doing schoolwork and playing the piano. Geoff came over with his guitar two or three times a week, and the Glover-Reeve Union played at a Home and School Association get-together for teachers and parents. Ms. Legate complimented them on their performance and said they were cool. Ms. Flood wasn’t there.