Yearbook (16 page)

Ro-Anne tiptoed back, plopped onto her frilly four-poster bed, and cried herself to sleep.

Down the hall, Marian moaned, still trying to stiffen the soft love-muscle of her boyfriend. But numbed by too much alcohol, it simply would not rise to the occasion.

Marian coaxed and stimulated, lubricated and rubbed. Lester started to snore.

Time to quit. Rolling over next to him, Marian slurred, almost coherently, “A hard man is good to find … and I should be so lucky. …”

Then she too gave up to sleep.

As Amy and Guy arrived at her garden apartment, Guy climbed the steps of the outside stoop. Amy remained on the ground and suddenly they were the same height.

“Did you know this is how Alan Ladd makes movies?” Guy asked.

“Standingin the snow?”

“No. Standing on aerate. Most people don’t know it, but he’s actually only three feet tall. “

“Amazing.”

“Yeah. They have to surround him with little trees and tiny horses. Undersized sets. Everything.”

“Sounds like
Gullivers Travels.”

“Sort of.”

“Well, Guy. Goodnight.”

“Good night, Amy. And thanks for a most… unusual evening.”

“Most unusual evenings should be away of life.”

“I’ll write that down.”

“Good. You may kiss me good night. For Thanksgiving.”

Taking advantage of their rare equal height status, Guy placed a hand on her shoulder, brushed a white snow flake from her hair and then kissed her on the cheek.

Amy smiled sweetly, and it occurred to Guy that for an ugly girl Amy Silverstein was surprisingly beautiful.

DECEMBER
 

TWENTY-TWO
 

CORKYPLAYED
as never before.

Valley Stream s Central High wasn’t much competition, still the quarterback could do no wrong. His feet had never exerted such strength. His endurance stretched to new peaks as he orchestrated touchdowns, one seemingly easier than the next. The day was his.

Coach Petrillo sat on the sideline bench, calm and confident.

Guy was so charged up by Corky’s extraordinary performance, he disregarded his budget and clicked off five rolls of film.

Shivering in her skimpy cheerleader’s costume, Ro-Anne screamed at the top of her lungs. The bigger the win, the more passionate the romance that evening.

Thirteen seconds remaining and Corky intercepted still another pass. As he raced down the field, without interference, an entire stadium followed with their voices. Cork-ee! … Cork-ee! … Cork-ee! they chanted.

He crossed into the end zone, the gun went off, the crowd went wild.

A walk-over: Eagles on top, 43-6!

Hoisting Corky aloft, teammates carried him to the lockers. Jubilant spectators left the bleachers, mobbing the field.

As the stands emptied, Carl Henderson remained rigid, staring ahead.

Dora studied his silence before placing a concerned hand on his lap.

He turned to her. “I don’t understand it, Dora. I always knew how I wanted him to grow up. Always. I planned it that way from the beginning. But he’s so much more than even I ever … well, it’s got me kind of mixed up. …”

Her small hand patted his tight fist.

Carl gazed ahead at nothing. “He makes me feel small, dammit.

Small, unimportant, nothing … my own son! I don’t like it, Dora and I hate myself for not liking it. …”

She squeezed his fist. “You want to go to the locker room?”

“No, Dora”—he shook his head slowly—”let’s just go home.”

Guy was taking pictures all around the locker room. Though no film remained in his camera, he hardly cared. He knew how much everyone enjoyed having their picture taken and had finally found the ticket to ingratiating himself with the jocks. He also had a knack for catching them at their beastly best.

Chuck Troendle, stripped to the waist, shoving Calvin, in full uniform, into the steaming shower.

“Hold it!”—
click-flash!

Jenkins, dripping wet, a towel around his middle, proving in an argument he could bend a locker door.

“Don’t move!”—
click-flash!

Two others in a playful face-slapping exchange.
Click-flash!

In no time, Guy had snapped a full roll of no-film.

Amy had dinner with her mother, her father and Jackie Gleason.

She finished her fruit salad and excused herself.

“Should we call you for ‘Your Hit Parade’?” Dr. Silverstein asked, unable to imagine anyone anyplace but in front of their Sylvania when Dorothy Collins was singing.

The slamming of the bedroom door prevented her hearing him.

Amy went over the pile of work she’d created for herself that evening, then stared at the black telephone on her desk.

Saturday night. Thanksgiving weekend. College boys home from school, calling girl friends.

There was energy out there, vibrating. Something going on. Something she’d never been a part of. Never… not really.

Sitting at her desk, a chill, familiar loneliness returned… .

It was the Boy Scouts’ Halloween party. Amy and her eighth-grade girl friends had arrived a little after seven-thirty.

Slinky paper skeletons and fuzzy jack-o’-lanterns covered the walls. Orange and black crepe paper streamers crisscrossed below the ceiling.

Thirteen-year-old Amy, wearing a new woolen skirt and checkered cotton blouse, stooped low, trying her best to look shorter than five-nine.

She and the other girls were introduced around the room to all the scouts. As feared, most were tiny. At the end of a row of little men, however, was Michael Katcher.

God, he’s gorgeous, thought Amy, fixing her eyes on the dark-haired, pockmarked string bean.

The party was, she told herself, a boring affair, spent in foolish games of the holiday—dunking for apples, pin-the-tail-on-the donkey, telling ghost stories.

Once the parent chaperones had left the room, someone suggested they play post office. A few giggles, a twitter here and there, no real protests and suddenly everyone was deciding who should get whose mail.

Amy was the fourth girl’s name listed, and when it came up, her heart pounded so hard she was certain everyone in the room could hear it. The boys’ hat was passed and the name drawn to be her mailman was… Michael Katcher!

What incredible luck, thought Amy. Hey, maybe there really was a happily-ever-after for Cinderella’s ugly stepsister too.

Another hat was handed to Michael to determine how much postage Amy’s letter would carry. Dipping in, he pulled out the answer.

Air mail. Six cents! Six kisses on the lips! Amy thought she would faint. Where was Charlotte Bronte when she needed her?

Michael Katcher signaled for her to follow. She glided into the supply closet, directly behind him.

Once inside, he closed the door. Never saying a word, he reached up and pulled the metal beaded string, switching off the naked bulb in the tight space.

From the outer room came whistles, laughter and catcalls.

Alone in the darkness, the two of them together, Amy braced for the romance to come. An extended moment in paradise. She imagined him taking her in his long, thin arms, a passionate Don Juan. Or perhaps he’d first put his hands behind her head, shy and sensitive. Or just kiss her gently, affectionately on the lips, like Heathcliff, using no hands at all. Or…

Michael stood right next to her, breathing. Lifting her hand, holding it tight, he inquired softly, “Amy?”

“Yes, Michael? …”

“Listen. Okay if I just kiss your hand six times! That way they’ll hear it in the other room and think we re really kissing. That okay with you?”

“Sure, Michael.” Amy wished she was dead. “Who wants to kiss for real, anyway?”

“Who, indeed
?” Amy asked the wall, snapping back from her recollection. She bit the eraser off the end of her pencil and stared at the telephone again. Wasn’t it ever going to ring?

Dressed, radiant, perfumed and fuming, Ro-Anne couldn’t imagine what had gone wrong. Nine-thirty and still no sign of Corky.

Was it possible she was being stood up? Out of the question. Five minutes. She’d give him the next five minutes to phone or show and that was it.

Fifteen minutes later, Ro-Anne vowed that at ten o’clock, no matter what, she’d step out of her clothes and into a tube of cold cream. If he arrived, Marian would simply have to explain her unavailability. Former Little Miss Eastern United States, current Miss Hawaiian Moon Ball was pissed.

Where was he?

Maybe she should call. No. What if he’s out with someone else? Someone prettier? He’s tired of me … wants out … I can’t give him enough… . don’t be ridiculous, who’s prettier than me?

She rushed to the mirror. Thank God. Still the fairest of them all. She picked up her hairbrush and started counting off her nightly strokes. Two, three, four—Oh, well—seven, eight, nine—You can’t have everything—thirteen, fourteen—And why not, dammit? She slammed the brush onto the glass-topped vanity table. To hell with Corky.

She wandered downstairs into the living room and accepted Lester’s invitation to join him for a hot old time of gin rummy. To her surprise, she had a far better time than she would have imagined. While her mother sat in front of the television, thumbing through
Town and Country
, Ro-Anne sat across from Lester, playing an off-and-on, hesitant game of footsie with him under the table.

By twelve-thirty, when she decided to cash in her chips, not only had she gotten him aroused, she was also in debt for a little over thirty-eight thousand dollars.

Crawling into bed, she cried into her lace hankie. She—the holder of more beauty trophies than anyone this side of the Long Island Sound—had, incredibly, been stood up.

Sniffling, she struggled to think of better moments, happier times … like the carnival night she and Corky first met. She let the memory sweep her away, back to the hurdy-gurdy music, the twirling colored lights, Corky’s powerful strength, the intensity in his smile and… No!

Ro-Anne opened her eyes. She would not give him the satisfaction. Let him suffer!

Instead, she closed her eyes once more and fought to remember back to what were, hopefully, still earlier days, still happier times. The handkerchief dropped to the floor as she brought her hand to the tuft of hair between her legs. Although she knew masturbation was reserved for sad and lonely ladies, she didn’t mind being just a little playful with herself while she smiled through a rerun of that last night of her two summers’ ago—let’s see, it was 1956—summer vacation… .

She stood before the full length mirror, naked and beautiful. Turning slowly, she examined herself from all angles. Each was better than the last.

She brushed her warm hands along her ribs, down her curving hips, into the darkened crevasses of her sacred privates, then back up to the flatness of her stomach and the roundness of her exquisite breasts.

She pinched each nipple hard and watched in the mirror as they sprang to life, saluting in response to her touch.

Quite a gift she was. Quite a package.

And what a summer it had been. For openers she’d excited the handsome, twenty-two-year-old tennis pro. He couldn’t believe she was only thirteen—”Wadda ya mean, only!’’ Then there was the bright seventeen-year-old busboy on his way to Amherst who put down
War and Peace so
he could pick her up. And of course the owner’s son who at nineteen still had pimples, but made up for them by showering her with cuddly stuffed animals. And she’d certainly never forget the shy cashier who worked at the front desk and one night allowed her to play with the cash register while she sat on his lap.

A summer of enticement to be sure, and after that night’s Labor Day celebration, she and her mother would be going home, back to Waterfield.

It was Marian who had first suggested the two of them spend the summer at Blueridge, a particularly fashionable resort in the Con-

necticut Berkshires. “Good hunting!” Marian had assured her thirteen-year-old daughter. And she ought to know. After all, as Ro-Anne had grown, she and Marian had become less and less like mother and daughter. More like sisters. And since Marian wanted to look younger and Ro-Anne older, it was a perfect pairing. Fittingly, they’d gone off—as a team—to Blueridge for a summer’s scouting.

Marian worked the long, crowded cocktail lounge while Ro-Anne cruised the Teen Club. Both drove the male population of the place crazy.

Under Marian’s guidance, Ro-Anne flirted coquettishly. But she never gave a thing.

“The uglies have to put out to keep their men,” Marian coached. “Not us. We’re far too in demand to give to any but the best. You gotta save it, Ro. Save it for the one man good enough. You’re worth it.”

Ro-Anne had saved it through the whole summer.

Now, on this last night, she was dressing for the Teen Ball.

After fastening the snaps on her dark-green full-skirted crinoline dress, she stepped into her two-inch pumps, fluffed her blonde hair in place and once again stood before the mirror.

She had to admit it. She was a knockout.

The Teen Ball was already crowded when she made her belated entrance at ten o’clock—keep em waiting—and the seventeen-year-old busboy and the owner’s son and a dozen others were pleased as the fruit punch to see the well-tanned, stunning vision in dark green that had finally wandered in.

One by one they came to her, all evening. She agreed to dance with the better-looking boys, pretending exhaustion whenever one of the outcasts dared ask.

She went outside with the owner’s son for a few minutes, shared a swig from his bourbon flask—hated it—and insisted they get back to the ballroom as soon as he started fingering his way through her golden hair.

She danced. She smiled. She spoke only in soft, seductive tones. She allowed her eyes to weave their hypnotic spell, hinting of untold pleasures within. She charmed them all for two hours until the final stroke of midnight when the three-piece band played “Good Night Ladies.”

Everyone began drifting out of the Blue Note Ballroom, away from the main house, back to cottages, bungalows and suites.

Adolescent couples walked arm in arm to the white arch at the top of the hill. There, as an early September wind whistled about, hinting at the death of summer, they embraced. All the boys kissed all the girls with whom they’d somehow paired off during the course of the summer, of the week, of the evening.