Beginning

She found me later that night as I was enjoying a generous mug of hot chocolate (though, I readily admit, not quite as thoroughly as I would have enjoyed it had the girl been there with me). The matronly old woman who served as housekeep or hostess or God-only-knew-what had made it for me as she protested what she perceived to be a drastic oversight of the company I’d been keeping in abandoning me on such a night. To be sure, the old woman had fussed over me all night since they had left, throwing blanket upon blanket over me and lighting a fire in the huge fireplace, complaining for me that I would be left alone in the cold as I’d been. In truth, I had welcomed the abandon and had been quite content to think freely and without distraction in the few minutes I’d enjoyed since the busy old woman had retired for the night.
My thoughts had naturally turned to the forbidden object of my affections, and every frustration and distress had returned with them. Why should I be forced to bear this burden? What had I done to encourage any of this? I hadn’t made the slightest advance and yet there she had been, all but fawning, submitting, begging, and loving as wholly and even exceedingly as magnificent perfection could love so appalling a man as I supposed myself to be. Nonetheless, her desires were clear, her intentions regarding me quite well known if only to myself and her. She’d hidden very little from me, and I to this point had been remarkably cautious in my dealings with her. She was as much my desire as I was hers, and none less forbidden for either. Considering, however, the depths to which I perceived my wicked heart could plunge unbridled, I had shown impeccable self-restraint, something in which I took a great deal of pride and not a little solace. Still, the burning of desire in the flesh of a man is an altogether unpleasant, acrid stench to his soul, and I found my heart to be altogether disgusted by it. The question I could not answer still haunted me: how could I still this desire? This is what I was pondering when the girl came to me. Alone. Where the others were I could only guess. She had a rather clever ability to make her departure unknown, and a strange ability it was considering the presence she possessed.
The statement I made to her was the obvious one to make, at least in my mind.
“Cookies on the table.” Well enough said, and as nonchalant as I could hope to be with her. Nothing given, nothing taken. Her only response was a sigh.
She asked permission to sit beside me; I hesitated for a moment, then granted it. The tempest of thoughts and emotions that was building inside me, swelling, crashing, breaking, was of such enormity as I had never borne before. My first instinct was indignation. This girl knew what she was doing: teasing, manipulating, twisting my wounded heart with the bewitchments of her words and her beauty, draining my soul to make room for her own. She was hollowing out a part of me to make room for herself where for all my life I had been comfortable in my solitude. This gypsy girl had cast a spell on me and I was determined that I could resist it. I was a man, true, but I was not so foolishly male as to surrender what I myself could barely keep hold of. Surprisingly, I was the one who spoke first, and the words I heard seemed to me of an alien tongue. “You know this won’t work.” Brilliant. Once again untainted logic, simple and rational, had won the day. I was an absolute genius. “You’ve known for weeks now what I want in our relationship, and so far you’ve managed to avoid me, but how can you say for certain that things can’t and won’t work out?” Clearly, she was every bit the genius I was. Obviously, neither of us was being driven by sagacity at the moment. Prudence was clearly not prevalent over our aspirations, if present at all. Something happened then, as I was reasoning thus, that changed everything. This was when the poorly-oiled wheels in the machine of grossly imperfect logic that was my reasoning began to shriek in my head. Let it be known that it had been unattended for some time to this point.
I had been taught to dream, to aspire, to know what I wanted within the will of God and, in time, to pursue it. Here, then, I had a perfect opportunity to employ the virtuous and trustworthy teaching of my parents and mentors. Where in this scenario could I go wrong? Surely God meant it to be. Who was I to fight His will? Things become much more clear when one’s imagination and his perception of God’s will come to coincide together.
“You’re gone.” As simple a statement as she would ever make, but one that brought me back to her. Exactly where she wanted me to be. My response, the intelligence of which still astounds me to this day, was a cross between a grunt and a sigh that she took to mean that I was listening, which I happened to be. “You’re afraid.“ she said. “So am I.“
I barely took notice of the words she was saying then. The glint of vulnerability and need, love and passion swimming in the pale, deep green eyes, the upturned curve of her mouth, her dimpled cheeks, the sun-kissed strands of golden hair that fell across her face, all of it captivated me and I was breathless with rapture. All this and the sweet, caring, cheerful, loving, unselfish spirit that had held me for so long; all of it could be mine. She was apologizing, asking forgiveness for being overemotional and pushing herself on me (which she really hadn’t), for pushing something I wasn’t ready for and being so weak. She stopped and simply looked at me, tears in her eyes and absolute, blindingly radiant beauty in her soul.
I surrendered.