Caught! (A True Story.)

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by ElfenSciuridae

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True Stories

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It was the second term of our sophomore year in high school, when I noticed Cathy acting funny. Though we have cut classes and made out in the halls before, she was acting more wanting of my attention than ever before. Each day before dismissal she would ask me to walk her home part way, with increasing distance and through a different route each and every day. Adding to the strangeness is that she would hold onto my arm close to her in public when she would not in school.

In most times she would lead the way through the Downtown Brooklyn Mall, often around the Macys Department store or through the Albee Square mall and though the back ways of the Brooklyn Streets. At a certain point she would say, “This is far enough,” separating from me and giving me a kiss before running away in a random direction. Or for me it was a random direction, for I was Manhattan boy and not a Brooklyn boy, for her it was within three blocks from her home any way she went. I was left alone to my own vices to find my way home, usually getting on the nearest train station and go through the maze of tunnels on the Iron Horse to get home.

But there were days when I also had my after school prerequisites to fulfill: the tournaments with the fencing team, the gymnastics team, the swimming and diving team, or meetings with The Shortfellow Society, and the BTHS Physics Department Computer Team/Club. She knew that in fulfilling those requirements that she had to wait for me. And though there were many times I was too out of it to take her on her way home, I did it anyway.

Little did I know that in most times of taking her partway home that we were followed. Because she had to honor a family debt, she was engaged to somebody she did not love and in a couple of years when she graduates from high school, will be forced to marry. Making her situation worse is that she had fellen in love with me as I unknowingly had fell in love with her. It was not that I was in denial; it was that I was not paying attention to my emotions at the time. Before transferring to Brooklyn Tech, I had already gone through a nasty break up with a former girlfriend, and was not interested in girls anymore. But there was Cathy – a girl who was in half of my classes, followed me through my after school life and was softly tugging on the strings to my heart.

Being legally blind was not always a handicap to those who live through it and have managed to adapt through its limitations. But it was school policy for so-called handicapped kids to have a Handicap/Disability Pass (HD-Pass) which allowed us to leave classes early and arrive late though some teachers thought it to be an excuse. It was during these times of leaving early and arriving late that she stated to take me to secluded areas of the school and things would start out with a simple kiss.

It was in one of these short make sessions in late February, she asked of me to take her all the way home. But I had a fencing team and Shortfellow meeting to attend too. She did not like having to wait for some reason that day, but she did, staying on my side during the meetings as she waited. It was 6PM when we left the school, already dark well into the night from the short winter days and day light savings time, it also a cold night. She complained of her short coat stopping at her waist being not enough to cover her short skirt, or of her thick winter tights, leg warmers, extra layers of socks and Mary-Jane shoes keeping her lower half warm. At the point where we would usually break off, I take off my fur-lined trench coat and put it over her shoulders. The warmth of my body heat in the coat engulfs her from past her knees to all over as I over lap the front on her.

“Fernando! You going to get sick!” Cathy squeals.

“You live a few blocks that way?” I ask her.

“Yeah, only three blocks, but... its cold and you’re going to get very sick!” she tells me.

“Then lets go.” I tell her. Pulling on her arm, I make her cross the street, as the traffic light is a changing against us. In my mind, I have just a couple of minutes before my body temperature goes into critical and I go into hypothermia – just enough time to go through those three blocks and to her home. After crossing the street she takes the lead into heading us to her home. We get to a project building on Carroll Street, which she calls home.

We take the elevator to the 9th floor, which she says she lives in apartment 9H. But instead of going to her home, she takes us to the staircase next to her home’s door. She takes off the coats and puts them on the floor under the window of the staircase’s floor landing. She takes our book bags and put them by the wall and the steps. Stepping up to me, she looks over me, seeing that my skin has a slight tinge of blue on it.

“Don’t tell me that you’re not freezing because I know you are.” She says to me. I do not answer for the moment. She gives me a slight shove, forcing me to sit on the steps behind me. “Look, we got homework to do, and I would like it done before I go home.”

“Math homework then?”, I ask.

That’s a start as she takes out her math book and notebook, giving me a sheet of paper and a pencil.

“Problem one, two sets of parallel lines A B, X Y and C D, W V intersect at points a E, F, G, and H. Prove that angle A E C and angle X G V are equal. It’s a ten step proof.” She says.

“Better make that three.” I say to her.

“How?” Cathy asks.

I explain to her, “Step one – everything that is given – the intersecting parallel lines. Step two – intersecting parallel lines create equal opposite adjacent angles and supplementary adjacent opposite angles. Step three Angle AEC and GXV are adjacent opposite angles of intersecting parallel lines and therefore are equal.”

She sits there staring at me for the moment with her jaw slightly dropped.

“Mr. Weinstein is an idiot.” I say to her.

“Look. This is the number three school of the nation, not that diploma factory you went to before transferring to here.” Cathy complains.

“Do you want my help or not?” I ask her.

For months before she used to stay after school for me to help me with my homework as my eyesight improved from near nothing to seeing something through dark glasses because of a light sensitivity issue. But for me the work was easy to do at times, perhaps too easy. Though warmer than it was outside, it was still chilly in the staircase we were in, we did not noticed it as we did the Math, English, and then Science homework for the next two hours. During this time we do not notice the faces peering into the staircase from the staircase door window.

She sighs as she closes her books, keeping my work with hers ‘for safe keeping.’ With her hands folded on her notebook, she stares at the floor from the steps we sat on. I tried to reach over to her to get my book-bag but she blocks my arm from going past her. She turns to face me.

“Look Fernando. There is something I have wanted to say for a long time now, but haven’t. And in truth, it should not have happened.” She says as she puts her notebook in her book bag and then takes my hands.

“If you don’t want me to be around anymore, I can understand.” I said to her.

She looks down at our hands for a moment, “Its not that. Look. I’m engaged to marry somebody else to pay off a family debt but I do not want to do it. I want to be with you because I’m in Love with you.” She pats her chest with her fingers clenched to a point at saying the last words.

“So what do you want to do?” I ask.

“I don’t know. But I know that I want to be with you but it might get you in trouble with my fiancée.” She answers.

“Why don’t you tell him that you want to break up?” I ask.

“I wish it were that easy.” She answers.

“Alright.” I say to myself. I look at my watch, “Shit. I need to go home.”

“Why? What time is it?” Cathy asks.

“Its almost 8o’clock!” I hold back from shouting.

Cathy thinks to herself for a while. Though she was just a few feet from her home, she was still late. But at this point, she did not care. Pushing to our book bags to the wall, she the turns to face me and before I could say anything, she straddles herself onto me, pushing me by the shoulders and holding me back against the step of the stairs I sat on. Usually in our make out sessions is done standing up, as there is no place to sit down on except for the floor. This was one of the few times where we had a place to sit down, and the only time she straddles herself on me. She breaks off a second, imposing some limits as to what we can or cannot do. I complain that I have a two-hour train ride home. Instead our make out session continues for another hour.

During our homework session, a couple of people had passed by walking from floor to floor instead of taking the elevator with all of them knowing Cathy by name. But during our make out session, things got strangely quiet and alone, for it was late and everyone was home having dinner, watching TV or sleeping. We were getting intimate with each other’s bodies.

As the clock passes 9PM, the upstairs door closes with a load slam. It was followed with a voice just like hers, “CATHY!” It makes her push off me and look up the stairs.

“How Could You!” another similar voice but slightly deeper by a note or two lets out loud.

Thinking it was her mother and her sister she told me about, I turn around to see who it was. I could not believe that I was seeing another Cathy holding the doorknob of the upstairs door closed. She was there with two other older girls who are twins, one who was in shock at us making out and the other angered by what we were doing, as was the other Cathy.

“Fernando – Those are my sisters... my older twin sisters Carol and Corin and my twin Katherine – like me but with a ‘K’.” Cathy explains in a defeated tone. Carol walks down the stairs and takes Cathy by her wrist, trying to pull her off me.

“You’re late for home.” Carol tells her.

“But we were doing homework!” Cathy says loudly.

“Yeah right! What was it- Biology or Sex Ed?” Carol says before sending her though the doors into her home. Katherine was next to go downstairs. Corin was a few steps behind.

Katherine picks up Cathy’s book bag and coat, then turns around to face me, “I don’t know who you are but you are to stay away from her at all costs if you know what’s good for you.”

I could only look at her in both awe and fear. In having my own twin, though living some 3200 miles away from me, I know who bad twins can be. The third and last twin steps up to me as Kathy walks through the hallway door. She bends over to me putting her hands on my knees, leaning as close to my face as possible.

“Too bad you’re too young for me, for you are rather cute.” She says to me.

“CORIN!” Kathy yells out as she opens the hallway door. She then reaches over and grabs Corin by the wrist and hauls her through the doors into their home.

I sit there for a moment. Looking at my watch I see it’s after 9PM. All I can think to myself is, “God, I’m going to be late...”

Eventually I get up and take my things, putting on my coat and leaving the building by going down the stairs. I do not get home until almost midnight. Least to say I was grounded. But it was the start of a strange but beautiful relationship.

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