“How’d it go?” Susan asked as she joined Sean on the terrace late that evening.

“Huh? What?” Sean asked. She had been watching a few clouds in the moonlit sky float by, relishing the faint breeze on her skin. For some reason, all her senses seemed heightened, more alive. She was surprised to register a tingle of arousal it was such a rare occurrence, she barely recognized it at first. But there was no mistaking the faint aching pressure between her legs and the heaviness in her loins.

“Earth to Sean! Come in, please!”

Sean started guiltily. “Oh, class you mean? It was fine.”

“Your nose okay?”

“My nose? Oh, my nose! Yes, no problem.”

Susan peered at her sister carefully in the half-light shining out from the house. Her normally grounded, matter-of-fact twin had a slightly dreamy, almost vacant, look on her face.

“Sean, you’re not taking drugs, are you?”

Sean turned to look at her sister. “Drugs? Are you crazy? You know I hate drugs!”

“Well, you looked awfully spacey where is your mind?”

“Oh, nowhere special. I was just relaxing,” Sean answered evasively. She didn’t want to admit to her sister that she had been thinking it would be nice to touch herself out here in the still twilight, or that when she looked at her own hand on her thigh, shed seen the long-fingered hand of another. She didn’t want to admit it to herself, because she had no idea what it meant.

“Ellen and I are fighting again,” Susan said in a small voice.

Sean finally gave her sister her full attention. “Oh, Suse how come?”

Susan shrugged. “The same stuff she wants us to have a baby.”

“A baby! She’s never said that before!”

“Well, she’s saying it now. She’s thirty-two, she wants to have children before she’s too old to be a good parent. You know, the usual biological clock stuff.”

“Well how do you feel about having children?”

“I’m not keen on having one out of my own body, but I think kids are neat, and it would be something to have a child with little parts of Ellen in there. Its just such a big step and there are so many ways to fuck up!”

Sean thought she began to understand. “Is that what you’re scared of? That you’ll fuck up and make the kids life miserable?”

“Well, why not?” Susan demanded bitterly, “I’m a thirty-five year old alcoholic who’s afraid of intimacy what kind of parent would I be?”

Sean took her hand and squeezed gently. “You’re a bright, funny, loving woman who would make some child a wonderful parent. But you have to really want it, Suse. Ellen, the commitment, the child all of it. Its too important for all of you not to be sure.”

Susan sighed. “That’s the problem my heart says yes but my head says no. Oh, well she’ll get over it. She always does.”

Sean didn’t see any point in stating the obvious. Ellen had been looking pretty unhappy lately.

“Do you think you two will still come to my dojang party for Master Chos birthday next weekend?”

“Absolutely,” Susan responded. “Ellen wouldn’t miss it, and I want to see what other crazy women are into this medieval torture stuff.”

“Oh, do shut up, Suse!”

~The evening of the party was clear and warm. Sean, Susan and Ellen had set up long tables on the broad stone terrace with sandwiches and an ample bar. The CD player was stacked with dance music, and outside speakers broadcast the sound. It was the first time all of her classmates and teachers had been to her home. Sean was a little nervous. She had been anxious all day wondering if Drew Clark would come, and the fact that she was anxious about it made her even more anxious. By seven o’clock she was a wreck.

“Sean,” Ellen said, grasping her arm and pulling her over to the stone banister which flanked the stairs leading into the garden, “What’s up with you? This is not the calm, cool always collected Sean Grey who I know and love.”

Sean shrugged. “Just a little anxious about the party.”

Ellen shook her arm lightly. “Sean, dear, this is Ellen. I’ve seen you address a room full of stuffed-shirts without blinking an eye and host a dinner party for fifty. This is not about the party.”

“I’m a little embarrassed about it,” Sean finally confided.

“About what?” Ellen asked.

“I think oh god, this is hard I think I have a crush on one of my teachers!” Sean finished hurriedly, blushing furiously.

“That tall, blond hunky one, I hope,” Ellen said.

Sean nodded.

“Well!” Ellen pronounced. “And how does the good Doctor Grey feel about this crush?”

“She feels ridiculous that’s how she feels! I’m thirty-five years old, a responsible professional and straight, I might add.”

“Are you?”

“What?”

“Straight.”

Sean hesitated before she answered. “I never questioned it before, I never had reason to. All I can say is that I’m terribly attracted to this woman, and I’m afraid it shows.”

“What attracts you to her?”

“How about everything? She’s fiercely intense, focused, powerful not to mention kind, and caring and beautiful.” Sean didn’t add what else she sensed the hidden pain, or rather, the torment, that Sean had glimpsed that night weeks ago.

“Would you sleep with her?”

“In a heartbeat!”

Ellen gazed down the long expanse of lawn to the trees below.

“This is more than a crush, Sean. What are you going to do about it?”

“Hope that it goes away before she notices, or before I make a fool of myself.”

“Why?” Ellen asked in surprise.

“Because I have absolutely no indication that she is interested in me, and even if she were, there’s the problem of her being my teacher.”

“Oh, Sean get a grip. You are both adults. Were not talking about the impropriety of a high school student and a thirty-year old teacher. It might create some problems in the what do you call it? Dojang ?but, it is not inherently an unethical situation.”

“I think she might see it that way.”

“Didn’t you tell me that your head teacher and a student were lovers?”

“Yes, but they were lovers before Sabum Roma started training. That’s different than becoming lovers with one of your students.”

“Its a pretty fine distinction!”

“Not necessarily would you sleep with one of your patients?”

“Of course not!”

“Even after the therapy had ended?”

“No, Sean you know that.”

“Well, how about just being friends with an ex-patient?”

Ellen hesitated. “Almost certainly not. But the patient-therapist relationship is a long way from what you’re talking about.”

“There is still a lot of room for abuse. Many female students have been taken advantage of by male instructors. There is a tremendous power imbalance, especially in a formal school like ours.”

“Do you feel like your attraction is coming from some unhealthy place?”

“No, but she might. That’s all I’m saying.”

Ellen turned around and looked toward the house. “I think you’re way ahead of yourself here, Sean,” she said. “First let the woman know you’re interested then let her decide if that’s a problem or not. You cant write the whole story by yourself.”

Sean didn’t ask the question she really wanted answered. How, exactly, did you go about letting another woman know you were interested in her? With men it was easy with this she felt completely out of her depth.

“Hey,” Susan called from the house, “they’re here.”

By eight o’clock the terrace was crowded with women and a few men, partners of the heterosexual women in the class. Master Cho sat quietly, Chris Roma at her side.

“Happy birthday, Janet,” Chris said softly.

Janet smiled gently. “Thank you, love. It is a nice birthday they are a wonderful group, aren’t they?”

“Yes and they all care about you, and each other.”

Janet nodded, a slight frown on her usually smooth face.

“What is it?” Chris asked, ever sensitive to her lovers quiet moods.

“Drew is not here. I was afraid she would not come.”

“Why not?”

“She is not one to make friends but I think she needs to. She has been too long inside herself, and she suffers.”

Chris knew of the nightmares she couldn’t help but know. Too frequently, she and Janet had been awakened by muffled cries coming from the guest room down the hall during the few weeks that Drew had stayed with them before moving to her own apartment nearby. Chris didn’t know the circumstances and she didn’t ask. Her lover and Drew had been friends for many years before she met Janet Cho, and the confidences they shared would never be revealed except by Drew herself.

“She’s happy at the dojang , don’t you think?”

“Ah, yes thank goodness for the students. There she has women to care about but, it is too safe.”

“Too safe?”

“She can care about them from a distance, but they do not touch her heart. And, she does not have to accept the responsibility of being cared about in return. That is necessary for her to teach, but it is a hiding place, too.”

“Is there anything we can do?”

Janet smiled and stroked Chris’s hand. “No. Someday, I hope, she will let another claim her heart when the want is greater than the fear.”

“Is that how it was with you?”

Again the small smile. “Ah, yes but, with me the fear was of you not wanting me.”

Chris laughed. “Then you will never have anything to fear.”

Sean watched the party from the doorway of the dining room. She was touched by the tender scene between her teachers. She could not hear their words, but the gentle touches that passed between them as their heads bent close spoke of love. She looked for her sister and Ellen and found Susan in the midst of a group of laughing women. No doubt she was accosting them with questions about their masochistic tendencies. She couldn’t find Ellen.