An Idiot in Love (a laugh out loud comedy)

AN IDIOT IN LOVE

DAVID JESTER

Copyright © David Jester, 2012

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Twitter: @DavidJester

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An Idiot in Love.

1

Kerry Newsome

              My ignorance of the opposite sex, and of relationships, began when I was eight.

              Kerry Newsome was in the year ahead of me. She was a nine year old underachiever with the charm of a fairy-tale stepsister. I had seen her on the playground a number of times, and she had giggled her way through a handful of awkward conversations with me, but I rarely gave her a second thought.

              That all changed during one confusing break-time. I was kicking a battered football around a chalked, concrete pitch when one of her friends interrupted me.

              ‘Kieran!’

              I turned to see Laura Bell hollering at me, anxiously shuffling on her feet as she did so. She beckoned me over and I reluctantly scuttled her way.

              She stood near the boundary of the playground, where a five foot metallic perimeter shaded a view of the thick woodlands beyond.

              ‘Kerry wants to see you,’ she said with a wink and a smile.

              I made a gesture of looking around the playground.

              ‘She’s behind the bike-sheds,’ Laura inserted.

              I frowned at her, unsure what she was suggesting.

              Her mild manner changed to frustration as I remained standing. ‘Just go would you?’ she pushed.

              Laura had judging eyes that bore the hallmarks of prepubescent psychopathy and windowed the mind of a future dominatrix. I didn’t want to obey her but I didn’t want to disappoint her. I found myself following her sternly pointed finger and drifting towards the rear end of the school where a shaded corner housed three bike-sheds and an unused, dilapidated, janitor’s shed.

              Kerry was waiting by the side of the bike-sheds with her hands on her hips, chewing her lips as she surveyed the playground with anticipated disappointment and annoyance.

              She often wore her golden-blonde hair in pigtails, but Peter Armstrong -- an effeminate, mini metrosexual who passed his break-times playing Hopscotch and skipping games with the girls -- had spent his morning braiding her golden locks into three long strands that swung pendulously down her back.

              Her hazel eyes twinkled with delight and she ambled towards me.

              ‘Laura said--’

              Kerry grabbed my hand and quickly turned away, not interested in anything I had to say.

              ‘Where are we going?’ I asked, careful not to trip over the heels of her scuffed black shoes as she pulled me across the playground.

              ‘Come on,’ she urged without explanation.

              The side of the furthest bike-shed was bordered by a thicket of outstretched bushes. A thin, wood-chipped alleyway led to the rear of the sheds and a secluded spot used by the older, more delinquent, juveniles.

              Cigarette butts covered the ground like a carpet of discarded cancer. I stepped through the slalom of filters -- blackened and soggy from the rain -- and found a patch of clean mud to rest my tattered trainers on.

              Kerry didn’t seem to mind the ashy assault course. She waded through the butts with tiptoed glee and rested her back against the shed, her hands tucked behind her backside. She eyed me with a sly smile.

              ‘What do you want?’ I asked, wondering why I had followed her this far.

              She giggled, looked away awkwardly and then exclaimed: ‘You show me yours and I’ll show you mine,’ without lifting her eyes.

              I let a smile creep onto my face. I didn’t know she was interested in
that
, if I had I wouldn’t have been so reluctant to follow her. This was what my schooldays were made for after all, this was the reason I became excited at the thought of going to school.

              I looked around to double check that no one was looking. There was no movement in the bushes, no eyes peeking through the many holes in the back of the shed.

              ‘Okay,’ I said with a “
prepare yourself for this”
inflection.

              I pulled it out and beamed a broad, dimpled smile.

              Slowly, preparing herself for what she was about to see, she lifted her eyes from the ground.

              ‘What the hell is that?’ she declared, twisting her face.

              I looked down at my hand. I turned it this way and that, examining the grasped item.

              ‘What’s wrong with it?’ I said, worried, ‘It's perfect.’

              She shook her head as she stared at me, disbelief in her eyes. ‘A football sticker?’ she spoke slowly.

              ‘Not just any football sticker,’ I said proudly. ‘It’s Andy Cole. Leading Premiership goal scorer, record breaker, signed from--’

              ‘I’m not interested in bloody football!’ she spat, annoyed.

              I looked around, visibly aware that she had dragged me to the middle of nowhere. ‘But you said--’

              ‘I didn’t mean
that!
’ she spat.

              ‘I have Teddy Sheringham, but it’s nowhere near as--’

              An exasperated sigh stopped me short. ‘You’re useless!’ she said, throwing her hands in the air. She barged forward, knocked me aside, and trudged angrily back towards the playground.

             
That’s hardly fair,
I thought to myself as I watched her stomp away.
I never got to see hers.

              The playground can be a fickle place and in an instant Kerry’s affections turned sour. For the rest of the week she shot cold, despicable glances my way and more than once I heard her giggling with her friends and turned to see their eyes on me.

              I didn’t know what I had done wrong and my ignorance worked in my favour, less than two weeks passed before Kerry’s affections turned my way again.

              I found her waiting for me outside the school gates one morning, the bell had already rung, the children had already flooded into the building and I was already late, but that didn’t stop Kerry from waiting for me.

              ‘Where have you been?’ she demanded to know, a look of devilment in her eyes.

              I was breathless, having run the last half mile. ‘I missed the bus,’ I blurted out. I tried to squeeze past her, eager to get into the building, but she strafed in front of me.

              ‘I’ve been waiting for you,’ she said, crossing her arms over her chest.

              ‘Okay,’ I nodded and smiled. I waited in the momentary silence and then tried to duck past her, she blocked me again.

              ‘I’m late because of you,’ she accused.

              ‘Well...that’s...I don’t think--’

              ‘Stop blabbering!’

              ‘Sorry,’ I hung my head.

              ‘Come with me,’ she ordered.

              ‘Again?’

              ‘Kieran!’

              ‘Sorry.’

              I followed her around to the back of the bike-sheds. She had more of a purpose in her step than she had two weeks ago; she practically dragged me through the gap leading to the rear of the sheds and the cigarette graveyard.

              ‘What is this about?’ I wondered.

              She didn’t answer me. Instead she shoved me, the force in her push strong enough to send me sprawling against the wooden facade. A small gasp escaped my lungs as I collided with the solid surface. I opened my mouth to complain, but I stopped when she dove forward and pressed her lips against mine.

              I mumbled an objection, but she didn’t move. Her eyes were closed, her concentration on the kiss.

              The lingering taste of sweet cherry confectionary had stuck to her lips, it pressed into my mouth and made it water. I had overslept and as a result I skipped breakfast, she was making me hungry.

              After a minute that seemed like an eternity, Kerry pulled away from me with a superfluous
muaw
sound.

              When she smiled she exposed a small gap between her front two teeth, she was showing that gap to the world now with an ear to ear grin. ‘Well?’ she wondered.

              I paused, unsure what to say. I had never kissed a girl before, I had never wanted to. I didn’t even want to now, but it was done. I tried to remember how it went in the movies and on television, but if the screen didn’t fade to black after the kiss then my parents usually pulled me away and told me it was time for bed.

              ‘Thank you,’ I said slowly, gauging her reaction with each syllable.

              The smile stayed on her face fleetingly, it started to fade when she realised that was all I had to say. ‘Thank you?’ she asked, seemingly offended. ‘Is that it?’

              I didn’t want to tell her the truth, that it had been uncomfortable, sticky and generally unpleasant, and I felt too awkward to convincingly lie about how good it was.

              ‘Well?’ her hands were on her hips, the expression of contempt that had blossomed in her during the last two weeks was back in her eyes. ‘Kieran!’

              I licked my lips. ‘Have you got any more of those sweets left? I haven’t eaten all morning, I’m really hungry.’

              I watched a fury build up on her little face. It crossed over her lips and left them snarled and menacing. It cut to her nose and flared her nostrils as they drew in rapid, annoyed breaths. It passed to her eyes which burned with a deep ferocity, and it ingrained in her brow which raised and furrowed.

              She stammered through a number of replies, her head twisting from side to side, her eyes burning into mine and then into the wood behind me. Then she gave up and let out a protracted sigh, her head lowered.

              Subconsciously I had covered my privates during her aggressive state, when she calmed down I removed my hands and breathed a sigh of relief.

              ‘I’ll tell you what,’ she said after a moment’s silence, the calm now completely restored. ‘I’ll give you all I have left,’ she produced a half empty pack of sweets from her pocket, ‘
if
you kiss me again during lunchtime. A longer kiss this time,
and
you have to enjoy it.’

              I didn’t like those terms, but I didn’t want to upset her any further. We made a deal and I wolfed down the sweets before I even made it to the school building. I wiped a mess of sticky cherry residue from my mouth with my sleeve and hurried to my classroom, nearly thirty minutes late.

              I had hoped to slip in unseen but the class was silent and in the process of reading. All eyes, including those of my teacher, turned to me.

              ‘You are tardy Mister McCall,’ Miss Henderson said, looking up from a copy of
Robinson Crusoe
she had been reading aloud.

              ‘Thank you,’ I beamed proudly.

              ‘It means late.’

              ‘Oh. Sorry.’

              ‘Sit down.’

              ‘Sorry.’

              ‘And stop apologising.’

              ‘Sor -- okay.’

              I sat down with an apologetic sigh and held my breath until the teacher started reading again.

              Sitting next to me, pretending to follow the words in the book, was my best friend Maximilian Chester House, a child whose name held more potential than his intelligence or personality. His father called him
“the MC”
, our teacher likened him to a brand of coffee and my father often said he was an idiot with a smart man’s name.

              Our parents had been friends for years; we lived three houses down from each other, were born within two weeks of each other and went to the same school. He was a friend of convenience, and the best friend I had.

              ‘Where were you?’ Max whispered.