I look at him. I can’t help it. His voice sounds strange. It has a strangled note.
“It’s not worth discussing.”
“Do you still love him? Is that why you believe you cannot love another?”
I close my eyes, irritated beyond measure. And yet somehow also close to tears.
“That’s the truth, isn’t it?” Alfred says. “I have never seen your face look as it did when he came into the shop.”
The silence that follows his words is awful.
Nothing but that silence could convince me to speak about this subject.
“No,” I say, my eyes still closed. “Once I thought I loved Frank—but that was many years ago now.”
“Then why won’t you speak of him?”
I open my eyes.
“It is embarrassing.”
“And I have never done or said anything to warrant embarrassment in front of you.”
His eyes are warm. He even has the hint of a smile on his face.
“Please tell me,” he says. “I want to understand.”
I do not know if Alfred will judge me. But he must already know the material facts of the matter. There is no use trying to hide the truth, in that case.
“He was my first lover. As I said to you, my father did not disown me for my first transgression—and my first transgression was Frank.”
“You fell in love?”
“I certainly thought so.”
“How old were you?”
“Sixteen.”
“And what did he do to win you?”
I scoff. “Very little.”
“How old was he?”
“Really, are these questions necessary?”
“Please,” Alfred says.
“He was eighteen.”
“Why was he your first lover?”
“It is a long story.”
“I want to hear it.”
Our eyes meet again. I cross my arms.
