Where the Kissing Never Stops (15 page)

“Your stomach is nice; I remember.”

“I remember your breasts, too.”

Rachel calmly started to unbutton her blouse.

“Do you want me to turn my back?” I said.

“Do you want to?”

“God, no.”

There was the rustle and whisper of clothes. I couldn’t believe it: everything I’d ever dreamed of. A real girl undressing in my bedroom.

“Now you.”

“I’m brown on top,” I explained, “but my legs are white.”

“Like dessert.” She held the covers for me and I slipped in beside her.

“They’re even smaller,” she said, peering down at her chest, “when I’m lying down.”

“My stomach is flatter like this. If there was a way to go to high school lying down, I think I’d do it.”

She peered over me at the clock. “Just a couple of minutes now. Shouldn’t you get ready?”

“Okay,” I said reluctantly. But oh, what a sad affair. Above me hung the airplane, below lay Batman, and beyond, the ticking clock as I chased my penis. I thought of Mr. Kramer: had he ever tried to stuff a gander into a stocking?

“Oh, God,” I said, falling back in despair. “It’s not fair. I’ve had a million boners I didn’t need, and now…”

“You’re nervous. Peggy said boys get nervous sometimes.”

“I don’t know what to do,” I said helplessly. I even had my forearms crossed across my face like a martyr. Saint Softy, who died for love.

“Let me,” she said. “Maybe I know.”

“Oh, my God,” she said. I smoothed her damp hair. “Oh, my God. It was wonderful. Wasn’t it wonderful?”

“Yes.”

“You were wonderful.”

“No, you were.” I tucked the sheet around her so she wouldn’t catch cold.

“No, no, no. You. I thought I’d died and gone to heaven.” She stroked my shoulder. “Are you cold? You’re sweating.”

“I’m fine. I’ve never felt better in my life.”

“My God.” She was just breathless. “No wonder everybody talks about it. It’s wonderful. Did you know how wonderful it could be?”

“No,” I said, grinning at her.

“The funny thing is that I don’t remember very much except that it was wonderful.”

“I know. It was pretty mysterious.”

“Does it always feel so wonderful?”

“I don’t know. It’s my second time, too.”

“My God, we could do it again, couldn’t we?”

I took her hand and showed her. “Yes,” I said proudly.

“Wow. I just meant sometime.” She glanced down. “Can anybody do that?”

“I don’t know,” I said happily.

Just then we heard a car turn into the driveway.

“Oh, my God,” we said in unison.

Had my mother relapsed? Had she fled the stage, feverishly driving home in her costume? Would she come sneezing and hacking through the front door dressed like some harem pushover, and find us sitting up in bed, barely covered by Robin the Boy Wonder?

Then it was gone; merely somebody turning around.

“Maybe we’d better get dressed.”

We walked arm in arm to the front door. I was feeling a little sad that she had to go. It’d been great being alone together; now I knew what Tommy Thompson was talking about. Still, I didn’t feel like I had scored with Rachel or got her or nailed her or any of the other charming phrases I’d heard Tommy toss around. I just felt close to her. She was — corny as this sounds — dear to me, and I felt privileged to have made love. Jesus, imagine airing those views while the wet towels popped in the locker room. Somebody would take away my Guy badge.

“You wouldn’t,” Rachel said, leaning on the door, “tell anybody, would you?”

“No, honest.”

“Not even Sully?”

Oh. “Not if you don’t want me to.”

“Did you say you would?”

“Sort of. Not about you, though. Just in general.”

“I’m not ashamed or anything,” she said quickly.

“No, me neither.”

“I just don’t want everybody in town to know, everybody including my dad.”

I thought about Mom. I wondered if the condom I had thrown in the toilet had gone down, or if it was still floating there like some weird sea creature.

Rachel put her arms around me and hugged. Hard.

“Peggy really likes Sully,” she said. “But she’s afraid that he doesn’t want to be with her because of the way she’s been.”

“Well, Sully’s afraid that she’ll laugh at him because he’s never done it.”

“How many people in the world,” she said reflectively, “are doing it right now, do you think?”

“Everywhere in the world? It must be millions.”

Her eyes widened. “Millions. Wow. And if most of them smoke afterward, no wonder there’s smog.” She opened the door and peeked out. “I guess I’ll just march right down the walk like nothing happened.”

“You look pretty happy.”

“Maybe your neighbors will think I finally finished my term paper.”

“They’re probably asleep.”

“Are you going to tell your mom I was here studying?”

I shook my head.

“Me neither. Dad thinks I’m at the library. God, if every kid who said he was going to the library actually went, they’d have to send out for more books.” She kissed me lightly, took two steps, then turned. The porch light made her hair glow. “I’m glad you were the one.”

“I’m glad you were, too.”

Sully and I were standing by my locker. Taped inside the door was a picture of a bright green John Deere tractor he’d cut out of some feed and grain catalog as a joke. Past him I could see other doors, and inside them long photos of girls with impossibly big breasts, their eyes half-closed in routine pinup ecstasy.

“Should I have told her about Mom right then?” I asked. “I mean, did I miss the opportunity of a lifetime?”

He stroked his chin like a thoughtful actor in a mystery.

“My dad says everybody lies sometimes. Even animals. Possums lie; they aren’t dead. Blowfish lie; they aren’t that big and tough.”

“Pretty fast crowd I’m in — possums and blowfish.”

“Dad says you can’t tell the truth all the time, anyway. You have to wait or you’ll just confuse people or hurt their feelings.”

“Okay, but what happens when Mr. Gardner wants us all to come to Thanksgiving dinner, and there Mom sits in her G-string with her snake?”

He took a step back. “She’s got a snake?”

I waved that away. “I don’t know.”

“What would she want a snake for?”

“Forget it, okay? It was a bad example.”

“Look, your mom’s been cool so far. Why would she blow the whistle now, all of a sudden?”

I raised my palms helplessly. “It’s not really about her. It’s about me. I really just want to tell Rachel, but there never seems to be a good time.”

“Forget about it. Maybe it’s like my dad says about diseases. Left alone, ninety percent of them just go away.”

“And the other ten?”

He shrugged. “I guess you die.”

O
f course, no one died. In fact, going with Rachel just got sweeter and deeper and richer. A week or so later, I was out at the Land Time Forgot (or, to be completely fair, the Land Dad Forgot). There wasn’t that much to do, really; everything was coming up on its own, but I liked being there by myself. I had a hoe and a big old heavy rake with dragon’s teeth for tines, and I strolled up and down the rows like the shoppers who would eventually take over. Except that I was on the lookout for bindweed, mallow, and fescue.

I could still lose myself out there, even without the noise of the tractor. It was a little like going diving — something Dad and I had done when we all went to Florida — being alone in all that deep silence. Occasionally as I worked, a mermaid would float by (that would be Rachel) or a shark (my physics final) or something like my mom (pretty but baffling). Mostly, though, it was just me moving slowly, happy by myself, hacking at the scrappy weeds, getting sunburned: the Farmer in the Mall.

Then, when I looked up, there were my friends in Sully’s mom’s convertible. They all waved; Rachel stood on the seat and shouted my name. Sully held up a picnic basket. I could see Peggy grin, both arms in the air like a lottery winner.

I pulled on a shirt as Rachel kissed me lightly. I probably had less of a stomach than before, and it was even more tanned — not so much like Moby Dick’s nose — but I still felt better covering it up.

“What’s the occasion?” I asked, looking at the food.

Rachel shrugged. “I ran into Peggy at the mall, she called Sully, and presto.”

Sully looked around. “It’s great out here. I’m so sick of studying.” He began to box, throwing little pitty-pat combinations first at nobody, then at me. “Maybe I could become Gerald the Fighting Psychiatrist. A sign on my couch would read
GET WELL OR ELSE.
” Then he hit me hard enough to sting and took off running.

We raced to the nearest fencerow, then turned, panting. Looking back, I watched Rachel and Peggy hold the checkered cloth taut, raise it till it filled with the warm spring air, then kneel and cover the soft earth at the edge of the field. Rachel opened a basket, and Peggy held out her hands for the napkins and for plates so shiny they reflected the sun.

“They’re really women, aren’t they, Sully?”

“Are you kidding? One of them’s wearing raccoon makeup and a man’s sport coat made into a skirt; the other one looks like she just stepped out of
Seventeen.
”

“I know, but they still seem more grown-up than I feel.”

“Girls have always seemed about three years ahead of me for as long as I can remember. And speaking of being a kid, I guess I’m not one anymore.”

“You’re kidding.”

“Couple of nights ago. But don’t let on. Peggy asked me not to tell.”

“Rachel too.” We were shaking hands and grinning like we’d just closed some stupendous deal.

“I was so scared,” he said. “And it wasn’t anything like those X-rated movies we saw in Love’s Park where the guy is always leering and sweating. First of all, it just kind of happened all on its own.”

“God, I know that one.”

“You too?”

“The first time, yeah.”

“The first time? Are you still doing it?”

“Not right now. I’m talking to you; this is
social
intercourse, remember.”

Sully laughed a little nervously, then got quiet again. I knew he had more on his mind.

“I really like Peggy,” he said intently. “She’s so…” He squinted and looked west, as if the word were written on the horizon. “Kind,” he said finally. “She’s really got a good heart. I mean, sure it comes naturally and all that, but I was still really clumsy and she made me feel like a goddamned king.”

We were leaning on a rail fence, a real one. I don’t think Lincoln had split the logs or anything, but somebody a long time ago had worked hard on them. I moved my arm so our elbows touched and Sully grinned up at me.

“What’s it like the second time?”

“Different. Better in a way, naturally. We’ve got all this birth control stuff, so —”

“What do you guys use?”

“Everything. What about you?”

He shrugged. “I guess I thought that Peggy was on the pill.”

“Probably.”

“Still, I’d better check. My dad says sperm are really tricky devils.”

I shook my head. “All that crap you hear about in health ed. about the awesome responsibility that goes along with sex turns out to be true.”

“I used to think that if I was a surgeon instead of a shrink, I’d give anybody an abortion anytime she wanted one. Now I’m not so sure. I mean, is that any way to make a living?”

“How about plastic surgery.”

“Isn’t that a lie? You’re not young; you just look young.”

I waved my hand at him, palm flat. “Plastic surgery is okay. It’s in the Bible, in the Lost Cosmetic Scrolls. ‘Thou shalt lift thy jowls if thou wantest to and thy behind also may be hoisted, sometimes in lean years, sometimes in fat.’”

He laughed at my nonsense, then turned around, resting his elbows on the rough wood like some guy at a bar.

“Look at them,” he said. “God, they’re our girlfriends. I never had a girlfriend before.”

“They’re waving to us,” I said. “Let’s go eat.”

“Do you guys do it a lot?”

“Sure,” I said. “I eat lunch every day.”

Full of tuna mayonnaise and Ruffles, the heavenly taste of chocolate cake still in my mouth, Rachel’s hand on mine, the sun pouring down on everything, me feeling happy and safe and content: we lay down — moving some things aside, putting others away — with all our heads together and our feet pointing off in the four directions of the compass.