Little House Lewd: Chapter 12

Friday was very quiet. The school shanty was consumed in a thick anxious silence.

Everyone was more preoccupied with looking like they were studying than actually studying, but Laura was too sick at heart to address it. She did not have them recite. She told them all to study their previous day’s lessons, and she did her best to do the same at her own books.

In the afternoon the clouds began to break up, allowing sunlight to come into the dreary little room. It seemed to wake them all a little from their dull listlessness. Still, every few minutes they were all looking at the clock that had never moved so slowly.

Clarence offered to go out to get more coal for the fire, and when he stepped out the door the sound of sleigh bells came in. the brown horses quickly passed the window as they came to a stop.

Casually, Clarence yelled through the still open door, “Teacher, your beau is here!”

Almanzo Wilder must have heard. There was no way he could not have heard. She was aghast, furious, embarrassed. She could not face Mr. Wilder, but what else could she do?

He was waiting in the cold wind and the horses were not blanketed; she had no other option.

Quickly she dismissed school. She wanted to scold Clarence good for his antics but he was already gone.

Mr. Wilder seemed to be smiling under his muffler when she got to the cutter, but she could hardly bear to look at him. He helped tuck her in and they were off. The horses went swiftly, their strings of bells chiming merrily in opposition to her stormy mood.

“So, I am your beau?” he asked, and his voice made it clear he was chiding her.

“I am sorry, Mr. Wilder,” she said miserably. “I don’t know why he said that. I promise you I’ve done nothing to give him such an impression!”

He chuckled quietly, putting her more at ease. “Well, I’ve been called worse.”

They rode along in a companionable quiet after that. It was really too cold to talk anyway, but she appreciated that he had gone out of his way to make it less awkward.

They stopped at the Brewster’s where Laura got her things and Mr. Brewster removed the chastity device while Mr. Wilder waited outside with the horses.

At home that night Laura was so relieved to simply sit in the warm sitting room and listen to Pa play the fiddle. Her whole body was sore from the stress of the week in ways that manual labor had never incurred. She reminded herself that two weeks were done, but the looming dread of the remaining six overshadowed any comfort that line of reasoning brought. Even if she dreaded to return, there was nothing she could do but keep trying.

The music stopped, and she noticed that it was only her and Pa and Ma. While she had been lost in thought her little sisters had already gone to bed. She was startled to see that both her parents were watching her worriedly.

“What’s the trouble, Laura?” Pa asked. “Don’t you want to make a clean breast of it?”

“I’m alright, Pa. Just tired is all,” Laura lied, feeling worse for lying to him.

He gave her a look that plainly said he did not believe her.

“It’s not like you to sit half-asleep, Laura,” Ma countered. “We can tell something is bothering you, so why not tell us?”

Laura looked at her shoes, fighting with herself. She had tried her best not to show that she was troubled, but it was no use. She could not bottle up everything, but she knew she could not tell them everything either or they would not only forbid her from going back but may go to the sheriff over Mr. Brewster’s inappropriate actions towards her. If that happened she would never be able to get any job again at all once word got out that she had allowed herself to be touched for so long without talking.

She settled for telling them what was easiest to talk about.

“I am having trouble with the students,” she admitted. “They quarrel with each other, they won’t study, they won’t listen to me. A good whipping would set the worst of them straight but I can’t. I’m failing, and I can’t fail. I don’t know what to do. Mr. Brewster told me to tell him if I was having trouble, but how can I tell the head of the school board that I cant manage the school?”

Pa leaned back in his chair and smiled at her. “There you have it, Laura; it’s all in that word ‘manage’. Perhaps you can’t get through to the ones who need whipped, but brute force isn’t always the way to go. Everybody’s born free like it says in the Declaration of Independence. Good or bad, nobody can ever boss anyone but the body themselves, so all you can do is manage.”

Laura considered this for a moment. “I guess I just don’t know how to manage.”

“If I were you,” Ma gently began, “I’d give way to those worse students. Pay them no attention because it is attention they want. That’s usually why bad students cut up. Just be pleasant and nice to them, and put your real efforts into the others. Straighten them out, and the others may yet come around.”

“Your Ma is right. Wise as a serpent and gentle as a dove she is,” Pa teased, playing a quick little tune on the fiddle as Ma fluttered her hand at him.

All weekend long Laura thought about what they had said. Was Clarence making trouble to get attention? Why would he want to? If he wanted her attention he had it, undivided, if he wanted it during their secret lessons. He must know that! Or did he think that by having threatened her to get that time it was somehow spoiled?

These thoughts went round and round, eventually always landing on how he had announced Mr. Wilder as her beau Friday afternoon. She thought hard about how he had done it. He hadn’t sounded playful or saucey like he did when he was cutting up. He had sounded somewhat carefully measured, as if he had steadied himself before saying it. Not only that, he had left immediately after doing it before she could even dismiss the school.

These thoughts made her heart pound at the implications, but she ignored it. Despite his age, he was her student, and not established in any way to begin courting anyone anyway.

Mary Power’s teasing came back to her then, that Mr. Wilder must think a lot of her Pa to do such a favor as driving 24 miles round trip in negative degree weather to pick up a friend’s daughter. And the way he had responded Friday, that he had been called worse things. Surely he was not actually expecting to be her beau either! But it would make sense, especially if Mary Power was right that he would be looking for a capable woman to marry over a prettier one. Hadn’t he sought her out to walk her home when there were girls like Nelly who would have happily threw themselves at his feet for the chance?

No matter if either were interested in her, she did not have room in her life for a man. Her family needed her wages to get by. Even if she wanted to, it would be years before she could even consider it. It would be three more years before Mary was through with college. Pa could not afford to keep her there on his own on top of the family expenses.

Laura felt a twinge for only a moment that she quickly snuffed out, refusing to acknowledge it had happened. Instead, she determined that she must make it clear to both men that she was not available for such things if that was their intents. It would not be fair to lead them on even if it were not intentional.