Exploring Maggie Read online

  Exploring Maggie

  KT Morrison

  This is a work of fiction. Similarities to real people, places, or events are entirely coincidental.

  Models on cover are meant for illustrative purposes only.

  EXPLORING MAGGIE

  A MAGGIE novella.

  First Edition. July 1, 2017.

  Copyright © 2017 KT Morrison

  Written by KT Morrison

  Cover by KT Morrison

  Contents

  1. State

  2. Exhibition

  3. Field

  4. & Stream

  5. Royal Morris

  6. Props

  7. Megabus

  8. Transit

  9. Switchboard

  10. Avowal

  Afterword

  Other Books by KT Morrison

  1

  State

  Thursday, October 5th

  Maggie found the crowds of students at Vermont State to be overwhelming. Farmingham had under two thousand students, and here at State there was maybe six or seven times that. She walked on a path that skirted the outside of the campus, trundling along in a flux of students she couldn’t get past. She followed along with them like flotsam until the trail diverged into three and she cut to the right. Now she headed to the center of the campus in lighter traffic. VSU was a big school with a sprawling campus, but the age of the buildings surprised her. They looked older than the ones at Farmingham.

  She followed behind two girls with black hair who talked in hushed voices to one another. She heard their quick patter of Cantonese. Getting next to them she asked if they knew the way to Drillfield. They nodded and pointed, eyed her warily but smilingly.

  She followed the direction of an aimed finger, turned and asked if it was far and they both shook their head no. “Thank you,” she said, nodded and smiled graciously, headed where they had aimed her.

  She hustled now, the path open and wide without much obstruction. At the next intersection, under a tangled network of old oak branches, she read a directional sign. It pointed to the northwest for Drillfield. She went on her way again, glancing at her watch. It was just after ten in the morning now, her travel to Rhode Island would begin at 1 P.M. This was cutting it close. She hated cutting it close on anything, but somehow this was all right. Like it heightened the wrongness. This was yet another thing Maggie Becker would never do in a million years. She was doing it. She quickened her step.

  Ahead, looming like red brick spires from the campestral expanse she assumed must be Drillfield, was the main campus building. It was a four-story Gothic Revival monolith, a tower in the middle poked up with a pointed roof. It looked exactly like Nassau Hall in Princeton, but this was in red brick. It screamed Ivy, but it technically wasn’t.

  And there in its early morning shadow, spread out on the grassy field, were the milling forms of student athletes and a gathering crowd of spectators. The Athletic Department had set up a wrestling demo, arranging five mats on the grass of the field, wrestling-marked circles in the middle with the VSU logo blazed across the center. Preparing at the edges of the exhibition mats were wrestlers in tracksuits and warmup jackets with WRESTLING blasted across the back. Coaches and assistant coaches hashed last minute details with them in a loose huddle.

  She saw Jay then, at the front of the huddle, rocking back and forth, kicking each leg loosely in succession, nodding and exhaling, a puff of steam whispering above his head. The head coach, a graying guy in his fifties, tapped Jay on the forehead with papers rolled in a tube, emphasizing something good-naturedly. Some of the other wrestlers laughed. She clenched her fists and opened them, did it over and over, feeling a tension seizing her. Her mouth went dry and her throat clicked when she swallowed.

  She approached slowly, trepidation making her muscles work in constricted movement she felt tug at her reluctant joints. She checked her watch again. The bus pickup was in two-and-a-half hours. Moved then into the crowd of spectators that ringed the platforms laying in the grass.

  It was brisk out, not enough to make frost of your breath unless you were a warmed up athlete, but cold enough she huddled into her wool poncho. Her arms folded underneath and she ran her hands up and down them under the wool in an absent, worried sort of way. Chewing her lip and hiding in the crowd, she put spectators between her and Jay but kept an eye on him the whole time. There were no socks or tights under her kiltie loafers, legs bare under her above-the-knee-length skirt, and the cold of the grass made wet drops run rivulets on the tops of her feet.

  Two hours from now she should be on a Megabus bound from Brattleboro to Boston, then on a train to Wickford Junction. There would be a limo for her. She would take it home and she would stay with her parents, and on Saturday she would select a wedding dress to wear on the day this next summer she married the boy she loved. What she planned between now and that bus trip was absolutely insane. Yet her tummy fluttered, her heart raced, its suction whoosh echoed in her ears. She might not do it. She didn’t have to...

  The athletes undressed. Pulling off their snap-away pants and doffing their satiny jackets. Her eyes focused only on one wrestler. Jay Carmichael, star athlete, star student, multiple scholarship winner, handsome, muscular, driven, hung. Not the man who put the ring on her finger. Jay’s amiable face chatted and nodded, encouraged his teammates as they came together and this exhibition got itself under way.

  Jay had been previously working out or warming up. She knew his body, having spent time with it naked, drawing it; then later, touching it and kissing it. His veins roped his arms, two thick ones running up his biceps and slipping into the round globes of his muscular shoulders. His skin shone with the vibrance of activity. An excitement began low inside her.

  Not someone who gave an ounce of concern for sports or wrestling she suddenly was aware of a psychic arousal swirling in her. A desire to watch her man best other men.

  Her man? That’s a little possessive...

  Jay’s head rolled on his wide neck, he bounced it from side to side. She had got herself hidden behind a tall State student with dreadlocks, standing and talking to his friend with his hands tucked into his front pockets. Maggie peered around the guy’s JanSport, watching, but not wanting to be caught.

  Like the other wrestlers, Jay wore a wrestling singlet. Some of the other team members wore T-shirts underneath, but Jay was bare-chested. The singlet was a satiny, midnight-steel blue; white trim in a band around the cuff of the short leg that ended high up at the top of his thigh. She thought they would wear a jock or something but he clearly wasn’t. None of the other boys were either. There was a tightening in her belly, low and primordial, and the feel of it made her laugh at herself. How primitively wicked.

  Some of the boys headed across the squares set in the grass, pairing up with similarly sized partners. The coach and his assistant, a burly young guy with a long beard, each pointed and maneuvered their athletes out into the throng. More people had gathered. The delay seemed to come from waiting for a camera crew to set up at the perimeter. The camera had the NCAA logo blazed on its side.

  As Jay passed from the enclave of athletes out to the mats, a hand from the crowd reached out and lay on his chest, stopping him. The hand was thin, elegant, black, feminine.

  The student standing between the hand-wielder and Maggie, leaned to their side to say something to a friend, and she got a glimpse of the girl who’d stopped Jay. She was tall, beautiful, long-limbed and graceful; a pair of jeans clung to her endless legs. Her hair was bleached auburn, hanging in tight curls that spilled over her narrow shoulders and down to the middle of her back where they grew frizzy and almost blonde. Her skin was smooth and caramel, her smile effortless and white and wide. She whispered something to Jay, drew him clo
se to her and he fell for it, leaning in to hear and she cupped that pretty hand on his neck and told him something that made him laugh. His hand rested on her hip.

  Without realizing it, Maggie’s expression had melted from anxious and eager to a down-turned grimace of anger. When she caught herself she shook her head and forced a smile for her own sake. Watching Jay talk to another attractive girl had roused a fury in her she hadn’t expected. Jay could talk to a girl. Jay could date girls. Jay could have sex with them...

  She held that fury, examined it like a fiery comet, marble-sized, held in between her thumb and forefinger.

  It brought a sneering smirk to her face, chastising herself at such a ludicrous emotion. Though addressing it didn’t seem to lessen its hold on her. She watched this girl get in a few more moments of his time before he tapped her waist and trotted to catch up with his teammates. She had left a smile on his face. They hadn’t kissed though, not even an attempt. As she contemplated that, a hand came to rest on her shoulder and a familiar deep voice said, “Margaret, Margaret, what are you doing here?”

  Her heart thumped in her chest and her head turned on her creaky neck. Knew who it was before she saw him. She recognized the voice from lectures. Professor Carmichael. Jay’s father. Her mouth fell open, and no sound came out. She stammered for a moment, croaked, said, “Puh-Professor Carmichael...”

  Professor Carmichael laughed, his head rolling back and his mouth showing his perfectly even and viciously white teeth. “Did I startle you?”

  “Yeah,” she admitted, laughing sheepishly with him.

  “We’re both a long way from Farmingham,” he said.

  “We are,” she agreed with a smile. “I’m just passing through. I’m heading home for the weekend...”

  “Ah,” he said. He extended a long finger over to the mats, said, “I’m here to watch my son. We’re heading away as well. Not far, just to have dinner with his mother in Ogunquit.”

  She watched Jay now, walking to an empty square, another boy waiting in the center of the painted circle for him. Jay was strapping his headgear on, cups over his ears, fastening the strap under his chin.

  She was frozen on what to say. Did she know Jay was his son? Does she know Jay at all? Nodding slowly, she watched the two wrestlers get in a crouch.

  He continued, “Jay’s D1, today’s an exposition...they don’t start the conference until the first week of November, but Jay...Jay is predicted to be in the NCAA Championship next spring. We work him pretty hard...”

  “Uh-huh,” she said. Jay launched an attack on his opponent and thrust his arms around his hips. His leg shot out, and he threw him over his own hip and took him to the ground. "Wow," she said, "he’s fast."

  “He is...”

  Jay won the point, or whatever happened… She was unfamiliar with the rules. A coach called the play and they stopped. Jay looked pleased and his opponent did not. They set themselves up again, the two of them facing each other.

  “And how is school for you this year, Maggie? You were one of my better students...”

  “It’s going well,” she said absently, eyes still on Jay.

  “Good, good. What are your plans for graduation?”

  Jay exploded again, the two of them coming together hard, slapping their bodies against each other. Jay’s arms slipped around the other kid, a strapping corn-fed farm boy, and he locked one arm out so it was useless. They both struggled for control but it looked like Jay had the upper hand. Straps of muscle in his thighs stood out, his arms bulged and flexed.

  Her eyes still on the action, she said, “I’m getting married in the summer, then...”

  Professor Carmichael paused her with a long-fingered hand, eyes shut in concentration. Well-groomed, hair in a close-cropped halo, his black skin was much darker than Jay’s and it gleamed in the fall sunlight. He wore a tweed jacket and chambray shirt, a striped bowtie, and with his arm held up she saw matching braces in the gap of his open lapels.

  “Max,” he said, “Max, correct? ...I’m sorry, I’ve forgotten his last name...”

  “Milton,” she said with a smile.

  “Max Milton,” he said with a grin. “Smart kid, Maggie. He’s handsome too...”

  She beamed. “I know... I’m marrying him.” She chuckled, then added, “I’m picking out my wedding dress this weekend.”

  “Congratulations, Margaret. I wish you lots of happiness.”

  “Thank you, sir,” she said.

  “And after the wedding? Have you plans? ...”

  “No...”

  “Nothing post-grad? ...”

  “I don’t know,” she said.

  Jay had his opponent now in a hold, the two of them arms locked over one another, both on their back, side by side. Jay’s heels were planted in the mat, his back arched. The generous bulge between his legs jiggled under the satin singlet.

  “You’re an excellent student, Margaret. You should consider...” He stopped to applaud, his big hands slapping together in controlled enthusiasm for Jay who had just one his third match.

  Maggie clapped as well, said, “I have been thinking recently...”

  “You’re no longer in my class, but my office is always open.”

  “Thank you,” she said.

  When she looked back to the match her face fell. Some of the mats were clearing out, new wrestlers coming on, and Jay’s opponent headed back toward the coaches. Jay was off the mat, feet in the grass, coming their way, less than ten yards away. He was pulling the headgear off, his face incredulous and pulled up brightly.

  “Maggie?” he said from far away.

  She froze. Afraid to move, horrified to look to her side and see Professor Carmichael. Her mouth hung open again, and she attempted to close it. Jay strode toward them, getting a clap on the back from a spectator as he passed. He drew close, and he said, “Hey, Dad,” but he kept his eyes on hers.

  He came to her with his hands held out, palms up. She was drawn to him, drawn to his eyes, his smile. Meekly, her hands raised and he took them and held them. He kissed her cheek.

  When he pulled back, he said, “I can’t believe you made it. Maggie, I’m so glad you’re here...”

  “Yeah,” she said breathily, painfully aware of his father’s gaze turned her way.

  “I thought you had to go to Rhode Island?” He held her hands still and loomed over her, his handsome face glowing with ardor. His teeth were as perfect as his father’s, eyes gray but in the cold, early morning light she could see flecks of frosty blue.

  “I do. I...my bus leaves from Brattleboro...I came...early...”

  “Aw, I...thanks for coming, Maggie, I mean it...you know my Dad...” he said, letting her hands go and including his dad on their conversation now.

  “Yeah,” she said guiltily, “We were just catching up.”

  Professor Carmichael nodded reservedly, his eyes on his son with scrutiny.

  Jay threw a glance over his shoulder, saw the new matches underway. He said, “I’ve got two more rounds of matchups. Forty minutes. Give me twenty for a shower. Let me take you out and get a coffee. What time is your bus leaving?”

  “At one...”

  “That gives us an hour.” He laughed again, a breathy exhalation, said, “I’m really...I just can’t believe you came.” Their eyes held for too long a moment, then he turned and trotted back to the coaches and hopped in place trying to keep warm while he waited.

  Maggie stayed where she stood, her feet nervously shuffling in the grass, her gaze locked forward desperate for release from the proximal dread, standing next to a smart man who most definitely knew what she was up to.

  2

  Exhibition

  Thursday, October 5th

  Max watched Jay wrestle while sitting at the base of a wide Scotch pine on a slight rise from the exhibition area. Jay in his skimpy singlet never lost, manhandling men of the same size and even larger. His muscles popped and bulged. His skin took a wet sheen like the day Max had watched him fuck Maggie
while hidden in her roommate’s closet.

  Standing in the crowd (watching with lustful intent, he was sure) was his fiancée, the woman he’d followed here. She’d warned him. Told him to keep an eye on her.

  She stood in a woolen poncho and skirt, her hair pulled back neatly, a twisting black, blue, and platinum tail down her back. Next to her stood her lover’s father. A man they both knew. Farmingham’s intellectual keystone, tenured professor, tall and handsome Professor Carmichael. They watched his impressive offspring get the better of every contender and they applauded.

  The matches were held at the foot of the main college building and most people just passed by on the pathways, looking over mildly and not breaking their step. Spectators gathered and watched, but not enough to close the spectacle off completely. It allowed Max to watch from a safe distance. His belly was hard like a rock. His jaw ached from keeping it clenched too long. He couldn't believe she had come here. Couldn't believe that she would want to do this.

  His chin came to rest on his knees that he had bent up, feet in the grass, arms around them. Maggie was so beautiful and he couldn't love her more. He watched her profile, her exquisitely shaped jaw and pouting lips, her long black lashes scoring her narrow sultry eye. She looked nervous but excited just the same. She hadn’t expected Professor Carmichael to be there he figured, given her reaction to his greeting.

  His phone buzzed in his hand and he flipped it around to see the screen. His brother, Connor.

  “What’s up, dipshit?” he said as an introduction.

  “Dude, you’re not coming home?”

  “Nah. I have too much work to do. I’ve...fallen way behind...”