Love for Leona Ch. 02

All characters in this story are over 18 years.

*****

In the months that followed Leona suffered acute bouts of depression. Her GP eventually referred her to a psychiatrist; she had been seeing him for six months.

She told Dr Golde how she had never forgotten Alan Markham since her schooldays, and then meeting him again after ten years, then losing him to Faye so soon. The shock of Alan's betrayal, as she saw it, had unhinged her emotionally. The hurt had been unbearable.

'It's almost finished me,' - brokenly - 'and they're still together.'

'Almost,' her therapist answered, 'I'm pleased you said 'almost'.'

She then went on to tell how her thoughts continued to torture her. 'I can't stop thinking about him; he invades my mind all the time; and I'm powerless to stop it.' She told how Alan and Faye were still together as he was painting her portrait. 'I was convinced that their 'love' would last only until the passion was satisfied.' She was probing the wound that festered. 'It's like a recurrent nightmare. My feelings for Alan will always haunt me.'

'The problem with 'always', said the doctor, 'is that depression is mainly the result of dwelling too much on things. And this can set up a vicious cycle or a pattern with the moods worsening as time goes on. We must work out a way of breaking this pattern.'

The next time she saw Dr Golde, he was telling her that she must learn to like herself.

'That's just it. I don't like myself. My big body. I want to look different,' She felt she wasn't 'feminine' enough, she said. 'No doubt,' - sardonically - 'I'll be forever leading apes in hell.' She'd read that phrase in a magazine. 'It's the ultimate fate of old maids!'

Like every plain woman Leona owned another woman inside. A more beautiful creature hidden, imprisoned inside her like a chrysalis bursting to get out.

She told Dr Golde that here must always be one man who is more to a woman that any other. In her heart she felt, I am such a woman.

The doctor pointed out that very few people form a permanent relationship with their first love. 'You need to get out more and meet a wider range of people.' He said that this was the only way she could break the vicious cycle. 'Your depression will only intensify if you continue to spend so much time alone.'

But Leona knew that her heart hurt with a longing she could never satisfy. 'It's as though I've stopped living,' she said. 'All I can feel deep inside is a kind of numb despair.'

'It's not good for you to be alone with your sorrow,' - words that were slow and implacable - 'you're living too much inside your head. By withdrawing inside yourself, you're becoming lost. Your self-pity will only lead you into becoming morbid if you don't break your pattern.'

Leona knew that her therapist was trying to hold her together; he was endeavouring to get her head straight.

'Unless you change, you will continue to short-change yourself emotionally. We're all isolated,' - saying sagely - 'that's why we need other people.'

Mad Ophelia rave and tore her hair in unrequited love, so we're told. Alone in her room, in self-inflicted solitude, Leona really came apart.

It was madness, she knew, to keep going over it in her mind; all, she had no control over her thoughts. Alan with Faye would always torment her.

Late one night she was at her dressing-table, idly touching the array of ointments, creams, lotions. She picked up a silver-backed brush and swept back her hair.

She dropped her chemise and stood nude before the long mirror that held her entire form. She took in the maturity of her large-bodied figure, the wide rise of over-sized breasts, prodigious brown nipples; abashed at her own nakedness.

She was not dog-ugly, she supposed. Her breasts were the one feature she had always been proud of. Guys would hit on her just because of her chest, she knew. But such a big-breasted beefy girl!

She stood breathing hard, feeling the thud of her heart. She was a woman with a woman's urgent need. But womanhood unsatisfied, she realized, could lead to reckless, unpredictable behaviour.

She recalled the words of her therapist that there are some people who persist in trying to escape from life by long periods of self-seclusion. 'One day soon,' she told herself, 'I must step out and meet life again.'

So following her doctor's advice Leona started going out most nights.

I'll find a man in the anonymity of a crowded bar, she thought, any man. She would seek consolation when the nights were lonely. She frequented several different pubs in other suburbs wearing white shoes and a red dress.

One night she made her way into the lounge bar of a hotel in East Brunswick. She had decided not to wear a bra that night. Her breasts strained against the fabric of her dress. She knew that men would fantasize about releasing them.

She settled on one of the stools at the bar, crossed her legs, asked for a shot of Jack Daniels.

Around her silent solitary men were hunched over beer glasses. Most of them were contemplating her body; some were indifferent.

She swallowed her drink. She wondered how it would feel to be completely intoxicated. A wondrous ecstasy, no doubt. But cold sober, her heart felt like broken virginity bleeding.

Tonight, she knew, would be the night of decision.

The man on the stool next to hers was appraising her appreciatively.

Without looking at him, she could feel his eyes on her. She knew it would not be long before he spoke.

She glanced up, caught his eye, gave a Mona Lisa smile and he nodded back.

'You've finished your drink,' he said. 'Let me get you another.'

'Jack Daniels,' she answered, uncrossing her legs. He moved closer, his knee touching hers.

'Roger's the name, Roger Urquart,' - smiling - 'now how about telling me your name?'

'Leona.'

'Leona, all lonely,' he quipped. 'Leona? That can't be all.' He was sipping at a Heineken.

'That can be all,' she said flatly. 'Just Leona.'

Conversation was not too difficult because Roger did most of the talking, telling mostly about his work. He was a cost estimator in a construction company, he said, and Leona told him she was behind the counter in a city department store.

She took in his blond clear-cut face, his brown eyes, and saw him as firmly fleshed of arm and thigh. She pictured herself holding him by the biceps.

'My gorl walked out on me and married somebody else,' he told her.

She felt her heart-beat quicken, thinking of the man she herself had wanted. She sent him a speaking glance and he looked intently at her, seemingly unable to avert his gaze from her chest.

'Okay then,' he continued, shifting gears, 'tell me something about yourself.'

His eyes were looking right through her; she felt naked.

'I'm not much of a talker.'

'You're.' - with lowered voice - 'a gorgeous woman though.' He was looking at her low-cut dress.

She was taken aback - momentarily - for here was a man who could appreciate her physically, she thought.

She was aware of strong sexual feelings inside herself; like most women she ached for physical love. But a woman needed to be admired, needed to be tsreated ... pleasured with a gentle touch.

'You have beautiful eyes,' - smoothly - 'grey and clear like amethysts. Has anyone ever told you?'

She made a face, recognized the standard come-on line.

'Yes,' - gasping in mock shock - 'every time a man wants to get me into bed!'

His voice held an edge of amusement, 'I like your sense of humour,' - brown eyes stared into hers - 'you haven't finished your whiskey.'

He gazed the palm of her hand with his thumb, a tiny caress with maximum seductive power.

A laugh escaped her. 'I haven't started it yet.' She drained her glass. Adrenaline was quickening in her blood.

He noted the ease with which she downed a double scotch straight. And as the night wore on, she felt the liquid dulling her senses. She was drinking recklessly, losing inhibitions, losing control over herself. By ten o'clock her mind was spinning in circles. She felt like a rabbit caught in the headlights.

But she was able to make her way out to Roger's car. An older-style sports model with a canvas hood. The night was icy cold.

Roger eased the car into the night-time traffic and they headed down Nicholson Street in the direction of the city.

Leona had known she would have to get very drunk to go through with it. But since her emotions were not involved, Roger could not hurt her as Alan had. It would be just a physical act, she thought.

His apartment was in North Fitzroy, and she was stumbling as they climbed up a staircase at the back of a shop. His hands caressed her shoulders as he steadied her; his mouth brushing hers as they entered his rooms. Her heart was thumping against her ribs as she felt the slight stiffening of his body against hers.

He took her by the hand, pointed to an armchair where she was to sit, took her coat and dropped it over another chair. She felt remote from what was happening.

'Take a seat,' he was saying, 'Can I get you a drink?'

He was leading her, she felt, like a director would lead and actress through a difficult script. Perhaps he was as nervous as she.

'No thanks,' - and then shyly - 'where's the loo?'

'Over there. Through that door. Perhaps you'd like a coffee?'

'Later perhaps ...'

She looked at him. He was busying himself in the small kitchen.

His rooms were sparsely furnished, she noted looking round as she came back from the toilet. Odd armchairs, a sagging couch, a table supporting a television. Bare floorboards partly covered with worn linoleum.

He approached her, hands sliding possessively down her flaks, cupping the swell of her hips. He was hard against her, letting her feel his bulge. Her instinct was to hold back but her body surrendered allowing him to lead her to the bedroom.

Lowering her to the bed, he was sliding his hands up the smooth nylon of her thighs. Wrapping herself around him, she returned his caress, then arched against him, gripping his back with her hands. She wanted to wipe Alan Markham out of her mind. That accounted for the prolonged ferocity of her love-making.

Later that night Roger felt her weight on him again.

Towards morning Leona found herself waking in a strange bed. Her stomach and head felt terrible, the inside of her mouth incredibly dry. As she dressed in the dawn-light in front of Roger admiring eyes, she felt that her big naked body must look like a marble statue.

She shivered. The room was cold.

Roger was putting his shirt on hurriedly, was thanking her for a good time beneath the sheets. He belted his trousers, saying he would like to meet up with her again some time. Her own memory of the night was dim, but she was inwardly pleased, knowing he had admired her body.

But it seemed to Leona as he drove her home that she had been down some awful abyss, wandering alone. Her sense of unreality made her feel she had been acting in a play.