Beneath the Attic by V.C. Andrews

Author:V.C. Andrews
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Gallery Books

Arthur Raymond had become even better-looking, but it would always be in a pretty-boy way, with his long eyelashes, his perfect but soft lips, and his attractive kelly-green eyes that had never looked as innocent and vulnerable to me. His hair was shaped and shiny like hair just washed, probably for my benefit. It looked like he had spent more time on his coiffure than most of us girls. Since he had begun college, he had manicured fingernails and the posture of a military cadet. He rushed to greet me with a “So pleased to see you again, Corrine. How are you?” He sounded like he had memorized a page out of The Correct Thing in Good Society, one of my mother’s other bibles.

Ordinarily, a girl like me would appreciate a boy who conducted himself so politely and respectfully, but for a reason I couldn’t fathom, his well-mannered way annoyed me at the moment. Maybe I was comparing him to Garland; maybe I would always do that. Maybe every man I met from now until forever would be similarly doomed.

We sat on Bessie Raymond’s back porch. Her father, who was a stationmaster, tinkered with carpentry as a hobby and had built a swing seat with a bright blue cushioned bottom and back. Arthur quickly offered it to me, with the obvious intent to sit beside me. None of the other three would have dared taken it anyway. I sat, and Bessie brought out lemonade. I felt my stomach churn at the sight of it. I was the only one who declined and asked for just water.

Emma and Elsie might as well have sat at Arthur’s feet, I thought. They were wide-eyed and painfully obvious, exaggerating their “oohs” and “ahs” with every claim Arthur made about his good grades and achievements on the football field. He constantly watched for my reactions, hoping to impress me most of all, but I was sure I looked totally disinterested, because I was.

While Arthur spoke in his silvery perfect English, describing his college classes, his dormitory, and college social events, I found myself drifting back to images of Foxworth Hall, its silhouetted roofline against the night sky, and Garland’s firm, arrogant pride about its charm and power. Maybe it was because all the boys I had been with and even the young men I had met at dinners and events with my parents put me on a pedestal, rushing to satisfy my smallest desire. Now Garland’s really at times impolite, gruff, and aggressive ways seemed more manly to me and thus, ironically, more attractive. Despite what had happened or maybe because of it, I never felt like he saw me as a young girl instead of a young woman. He had confessed it himself: he thought I was more worldly, which I knew meant more sexually sophisticated. I was; I just wasn’t ready for how fast it all happened.

I assumed that any other woman, especially any of these three girls, would probably have concentrated on and emphasized how she was seduced.

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