Well! I have been very busy the past few days. With Mary and the other girls, as well as Shannon trying to talk herself out of an attraction I need her to keep, I have used up all of my hours on Earth and could have used more. I have learned my lesson, of course, and will accept my limitations, but still I worry when I am not with my charges.
Today was another eventful day, this one in Pamela’s life. It started out innocently enough. She was in a very good mood this morning for a change. A call from Lyle last night reminded her of her magical trip to London and their romance, and it gave her faith that she will find that again. Even the sight of Daniel could not take away her smile.
Is it not strange how such small things can have such drastic consequences? Daniel saw the smile and misinterpreted it, and though I tried to suppress his hope, he could not help it. After school, he went to Pamela’s classroom, continuing on despite all I could say to discourage him.
He found her humming as she tidied up her students’ desks. “You seem happy,” he said.
She looked up, the humming coming to an abrupt halt. “I am,” she said, turning away.
He followed her, his heart beating heavily in his ears. “Pamela, please,” he whispered, catching her hand. “I am miserable. Just tell me that you haven’t forgotten the connection we had.”
She tugged her hand free. “I haven’t forgotten,” she said. “That’s the problem. So can you please go away so I can do that?”
I expected this to be a deterrent, but it had the opposite effect. Daniel twisted around her so that he was in front of her and caught her hand again. “I knew it,” he said. “I knew you felt the same thing.” He brushed his knuckles up her jaw and slid his fingers across her cheek, smiling as she shivered. “We fit together so well, Pamela,” he murmured. “I’m right for you, I know you feel that.”
For a moment, she hesitated. The truth is, she does feel it. She was falling hard for him, and the knowledge of his marriage has not changed all of the good things she saw in him. The night she discovered his marriage, she intended to sleep with him, and I was encouraging her. I could see that his feelings were genuine and would have been good for her. She could see that, too.
But he is married, and that makes him the wrong person.
“He may still seem to be a good man to you,” I said to her, “but a man who has kindness only for you and not for the woman he swore to love and protect is not a good man.”
She heard me, and just as Daniel was bending his head to kiss her, she pulled back.
“You haven’t actually talked to your wife, have you?” she asked him.
He stared at her, and she saw the truth in his face. Shaking her head, she tugged free of his grasp.
“You know, I thought you were right for me,” she said, “and maybe if you had been single you would have been. But you’re not,” she snapped, silencing him as he tried to speak. “You are married, and that means you’re weak and you’re a liar and you are not the good person I thought you were. You’re not right for me, because if I stay with you, then I’ll be the other woman and you’ll have made me into someone who is so wrong.”
He had no response to that. Leaving the mess on the desks, Pamela went to pick up her purse. “I’m looking up your wife tonight. You have one more chance to tell her the truth, because tomorrow I will find some way to tell her what you’ve been doing.” She started for the door, then stopped. “You want to be the right man? Do right by her. Tell her the fucking truth.”
And she left the room, flicking the lights off and leaving Daniel standing in the dark.