Slowly and gradually Jacob's coming to college, where Helen taught, became less and less until it stopped completely.
By the time Steve came home towards the end of January of 1968, Jacob has given up. Helen heard from a mutual friend that his wife and he were planning to have another child! What a fruitful man he was! She also heard that he was now the partner in the law firm of his father- in- law.
Helen was both happy and sad. She was happy that he had returned to his family, that his wife's family had forgiven his foreboding. She was happy that she was carrying his baby, just part of him! But she was sad that he had not fought enough to get her back; that his effort to get her back was short and it subsided fairly quickly! She thought about men in her life, from her father, to Roger, to all those rich clients of Roger, who had wives and families, yet coming after girls like her; and of course Jacob and Steve! Her resolution was that all men were the same. They came and went in her life! They used her and then threw her out like an old handkerchief!
At this point of her life, her thoughts and feelings about men were nothing but a distasteful concept, a generalization that all of them were the same!
"They all are the same! They never be a true love. They all just want you for your body! Oh, God I wish I was an ugly, deformed woman!"
She tried to convince herself that Steve, her husband, was a better man that others that she knew. He had tolerated her and her antics for the last three years and had always come back to her. He was faithful to her. He was hard working! He was Honorable! She even thought about an abortion for the sake of saving her marriage before Steve would return. But no, no she could not do that to Jacob's seed, to the child of one man she truly loved now and forever.
"I beg Steve to forgive me. He loves me enough to forgive me. But what if he wants to know who the father of my baby is? I can't, cant ... no way ... I won't...!"
It was New Years Eve, exactly a year since she had seen Jacob in that hotel party. She recalled how she had flirted with him, how she had taken him to her small apartment!
Letting him go was like a death of a loved one, even though she had never had a true loved- one! But she could imagine how would it feel to see someone you loved, to leave for ever, like death!
She pictured standing over Jacob's dead body, and his splendid and probing glance which enveloped her, as if his eyes were not dead, while his body was all dead, She could swear that it looked as though he would at any moment would ask her a question in an understandable language ; but he was dead! He was silent and did not utter any sound! He did not move a limb or twitch a muscle. All Helen saw was that in the last moment, as though he was responding to some sign that no one could see, a whisper, no one could hear, his frown became heavy, as if agonizing over an intimidating expression! The luster of wondering glance swiftly faded into a vacant glassiness! Helen opened her eyes and realized that she was dreaming how death, or loosing someone dear looked like!!
To Be Continued
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