As I moved into the upper grades of high school, I was always looking at girls’ bodies, mostly surreptitiously.  One of the girls I loved to watch and think about was a blonde German girl with a very nicely shaped body, wide hips tapered to a waist that then expanded upward.   She most often wore her hair in a severe bun and wore white starched blouses with grey skirts.   She wore glasses and did very well in school but to a teenaged boy, she looked delicious.  Her face was quite pretty and her lips were perfectly formed for a kiss.
 

Whenever I tried to talk to her, however, my tongue was tied in knots and she herself tended to be haughty and dismissive in the way she treated any communication let alone romantic advances.  For some time, she was dubbed “the ice maiden” but my friend Sid insisted she was “really hot” underneath that prim and cold exterior.
 

How could he tell?  Maybe there was some sort of invisible radio wave that had to do with being “hot”, something that radiated from her.   But if he had sensors able to detect this heat, I did not.  He said it had something to do with the way she moved her hips and the way she held her upper body.  My reaction was “Huh?”  I was no love scientist.
 

I might for instance say, “Hi, how are you?” in the hall and her answer was often a “Hmmph!” and with a flip of her head in the air, she would stride off.  I don’t think I got in more than three words before that icy stare appeared in those beautiful blue eyes.
 

In groups, though, we would be sitting around joking and she surprised me by laughing at things I and others said.  I imitated Mr. Schutz’s German accent and she laughed.  Maybe there was some warmth underneath that frosty exterior.
 

This might have been my permanent impression of her if not for a brief encounter in my last high school year.  I had up until then been an outstanding student and because my schedule of classes permitted it, I was allowed to leave early on Fridays.  I was sauntering down the hall when I heard someone call my name.  I paused and looked behind me.  No one was there.
 

A silky voice then called to me from the side in a whisper, “Hey, where are you going?”
 

There she was standing in her stocking feet in the entrance to the nurse’s office, the door partly opened and leaning against the door post.  She looked different.
 

“I’m finished early today so I’m off to study or play, whichever comes first,” I explained and thought, “Boy that was lame!” 
 

When I did not move, she said, “Why don’t you come over here for a minute so we can talk?”  As her words reached me they pulled at me.  I felt enveloped by heat.
 

I walked over to her, my face fixed in what must have looked like a frozen smile, sort of like a deer that is caught in the headlights.   
 

“What are you doing in the nurse’s office?” 
 

She smiled mischievously at me and whispered, “I told them I had a headache and had to lie down.  I have to lie here all by myself.  It’s very boring.”
 

“Well didn’t you have to take a pill or anything?”
 

 “I’ve taken my pill alright,” and at this she giggled.  “Now, I’m good to go.  Why don’t you come in and join me?” 
 

She reached out her hand and grabbed my shirt.  I was so surprised, I pulled back, but my frozen smile did not leave my face.  
 

She looked at me and pouted.  “Won’t you come in and join me?  It’ll help my head feel better.”  Then I realized why she looked different.  Her blouse was unbuttoned to show some cleavage, her hair was down, and she looked very relaxed.  She inserted her index finger between her lips with one hand and smiled.
 

My mouth was dry and I felt paralyzed.  Here was my fantasy come true, yet alarm bells were ringing in my brain.  “This can’t be right!” My mind was racing.  Why would she change her whole attitude toward me overnight?
 

What was this really about?  And then it hit me.  “If I go into that room with her, she will have me at her mercy.  All she would have to do is scream while I was in there and then I would be caught, expelled from school, arrested.”  The whole scenario played out mentally even as I was watching her suck her finger on one hand and crook her index finger at me with the other.
 

“Maybe she is trying to entrap me.  Maybe she hates males.   Maybe she knows I have been staring at her crotch for years.  Maybe she is a German who does not like Jews.  Maybe she wants me not to succeed academically” These thoughts zoomed through my brain in a nanosecond.
 

“Aren’t you coming?” she asked seductively.
 

“Uh, I can’t,” I said.  “I have to get home.  They’re expecting me.”  Lame again!
 

She backed away from the door slowly, still holding my gaze and beckoning to me like the Lorelei.  
 

I walked to the entrance to the nurse’s office and smiled my frozen smile, unsure of whether to step in to the office or turn away and race for the exit.
 

Perhaps I said, “Be well,” and closed the door.
 

Or perhaps I went into the office and had quiet sex with what was a very unstable person.
 

My sensible self tells me I did the right thing by not going into that office. My adventuresome self says I would not have missed the chance to realize a fantasy.   
 

And even today I feel as if I am still standing in that doorway.    Should I enter or leave?