Girl (7 page)

The next thing I knew we were creeping across the lawn to one of the windows, which was flashing from a TV inside. We crouched under it and Brad smiled at me and did
shhhhh
with his finger and then straightened up enough to peek inside. Then he bent down again and his face was dark in the shadows and he froze for a second and then he squeezed my hand and led me around to the front of the house. “Mom's got company,” he whispered and he pointed at the pickup in
the driveway. He snuck over to it and quietly opened the passenger door. Then he waved me over and made me hold the button so the inside light wouldn't come on. I asked him whose it was but he was busy going through the glovebox and looking under the seats. Then he popped the seat-back and pushed it forward and whispered “Score!” I was pretty much terrified by this point and looking around but the street was deserted and the other houses were quiet. And then Brad started handing me stuff, a half-carton of cigarettes, a big flashlight, a bottle of whiskey, and then there was a
clunk
and Brad pulled himself out from behind the seat and he had a gun. It was a real gun. It was big and black and totally scary. He opened it and pulled out one of the bullets and snapped it shut again. Then he dropped into a crouch and pointed it at the house and made a silent motion like he was shooting. And I was so scared my finger slipped off the light button and the light came on in the pickup and I grabbed for it and we both ducked down and looked around the neighborhood. But nothing happened. And Brad was pressed against me and his blond bangs hung in his face and his eyes were alert like a scared animal. Then he started grabbing stuff. He jammed the whiskey in the front of his pants and shook a couple packs of cigarettes out of the carton. He put the gun behind the seat and eased the seat-back until it clicked. Then he took the light button from me and shut the door, slowly and quietly and just until the door latch caught. And then, oh my God,
did we run
!

·    ·    ·

I fell in love
with Brad that night in a numb way, in a physical way, like I knew he was the one. And that night in my bunk I could still smell him on my hands and on my shirt where I pressed up against him. And I laid my head on my pillow like it was his chest and stared at the wall and thought of what a hard life he had and probably nobody loved him when he was a child. And the next day I walked by the shop and looked in and Brad and Mr. Fitch were working on the riding lawnmower. Brad saw me and when Mr. Fitch turned away he grinned and gave me thumbs up and he just seemed like the cutest boy.

But after lunch I felt differently. I felt like Brad was a hick. I mean, like a hick in his actual face, like his face was a little too narrow and the smile lines were a little too deep for being seventeen and he had this toughness in his shoulders and his bony arms that wasn't like a jock, it wasn't graceful, it was just hard. And I knew that part of my feelings were because he was here now and afterward I would never see him again and in a way I would have been ashamed if Darcy or Cybil saw him. And when I saw the preppie counselors I didn't feel so superior anymore, I felt like I had fallen somehow, that they were hanging on to something that I had lost my grip on.

That night I sat on the steps with Rita and watched her smoke and we talked about men and sex but even that was weird because with my perfect teeth and my nice clothes I must have seemed as rich to her as the counselors seemed to
me. Not to mention what Brad must have thought. But then in my bunk all I could think about was Brad. I hugged my pillow and imagined us making out and I was practically delirious with lust. And then when I saw him the next day I was suddenly all nervous. And at lunch I was just babbling like an idiot and teasing him about the stupidest things. And then later we were cleaning the horse stalls together and at first it was awkward but then he threw some hay on me and I threw some back and we were laughing so hard and chasing each other around and I swear, it was the funnest time I ever had with a boy.

And then one night I was sitting on the steps trying to write to Darcy and all of a sudden I looked up from my pad and I knew I was not going to be a virgin anymore. Brad was inside reading a comic book. Rita was sitting on the porch, smoking and reading and drinking some of Brad's whiskey out of a coffee cup. And then Brad came out and stood on the steps above me. He had his hands in his pockets and he mumbled something and he was trying to ask me out. And my heart was pounding and Rita cleared her throat like,
Say something
. So I said, “Do you want to go for a walk?” And Brad said okay and he ran inside and got his coat and his whiskey bottle and off we went.

We walked around the lake to this old cabin that was boarded up and full of mice and had ferns growing out of the window sills. We sat on the dock in front of it and Brad lit a cigarette and took a long drink of the whiskey, which was pretty scary like he probably drank a lot and he was only seventeen and his parents were probably alcoholics. But he still smelled good and he hung his feet over the water and I guess he was just trying to calm his nerves. And he gave me the whiskey bottle and I tried to drink a little but God, it was awful. It burned my throat and choked me up and made my eyes water. “Rancid stuff,” he said. He always said anything gross
was
rancid
. So I handed it back and he took some more and I got the feeling that he was too scared to do anything. And it occurred to me that I might be rushing it and maybe he didn't even like me that much and why had I assumed he did? So I just tried to relax and enjoy the pretty night, the moon and the trees and the stillness of the lake.

Then he laid back on the dock and leaned on his elbow and started talking about his mom and stuff, out of the blue, how he had a stepfather and a sister in Montana and it was this long sad story that I sort of didn't want to hear but fortunately it didn't go too long. Then he asked me about my family and I told him my dad was a dentist and about my friends Cybil and Darcy and how Cybil shaved her head which I knew he wouldn't understand. And I told him a little about Mark Pierce but not too much. And he handed me the whiskey and I took it and pretended to drink some. And then I scooted closer to him and picked at the splinters on the dock and we were talking really soft and whispery and then I sort of tipped forward, right into his chest, right into his flannel shirt, like I just stuck my face in it for no reason. And at first nothing happened but then he touched my neck and pulled me on top of him and I kissed him and straddled him and I could feel him through his pants and I was pressing against him before I could even stop myself.

After a while he got up and ran behind the cabin and came back with a sleeping bag. So I guess I wasn't rushing it. I guess we were both thinking the same thing. He untied it and spread it on the ground and then we laid down and started kissing again. Then he took off my shirt and my pants and he pulled the sleeping bag over us and took off his own pants and he even had a condom and everything. And I just laid there and he got on top of me and tried to put it in and it felt really strange at first, like I didn't quite know where it was. But then he got it in. And I just held my breath and then he
started doing it and it felt so weird. And I waited for something to happen but nothing really did except he made these little grunting noises. And then I thought of stuff I should do like grab his butt but I couldn't really reach. And I wondered if we were going to do positions or stuff like in magazines but he just kept doing it and getting faster and faster. And then it sort of hurt and I closed my eyes and tried to shift my position and then I got this warm shiver up my back and it felt pretty good. So I shifted again and that felt even better. So then I pushed back against him and got it in this one spot and that felt great. And I was sort of describing it to myself in my mind and also to Darcy but then he stopped and it was over. And I just laid there staring up at the stars and the tops of the trees and I thought,
My life, my real life, has just now begun
.

After that Brad smoked some cigarettes and we talked for a while and then we made out again and this time he kissed my breasts and licked me and he was even going to lick me down there but I couldn't stand it because it tickled too much. And then he got on top of me and started doing it again but this time he was propped up on his arms and I touched his chest and grabbed his butt. And I mashed up against him and got him right in the right position and did it really hard and I was like “Oh! Oh!” which probably sounded totally corny. But then it was over and I was buzzing so hard and squeezing him between my legs and trying to keep him inside me for as long as I possibly could. And I could hear myself telling Darcy: “Oh, you have to do it, it's the most wonderful thing!”

The next day was so weird. Brad was nowhere to be found. It was okay in a way because I wanted to be alone and think about things and try to get used to myself, my new non-virgin self. In the morning it rained and I swept and mopped the main lodge and it was quiet and you could hear the raindrops hitting the roof and echoing in the rafters. In the afternoon I
worked in the laundry room and I was getting these weird pangs and then I started to cry for no reason. Then at dinner I was so excited and nervous and I wore my favorite shirt but Brad wasn't there and Rita didn't know where he was. And all day I'd been so hungry but now I just stared at my food. And it seemed so weird that he wasn't there and I couldn't understand why he'd be avoiding me. So I left and started back to the cabin but then I heard Brad's boots in the gravel behind me. And he said, “Hey, Andrea,” and it just floored me, the sound of his voice, saying my name. And I turned around and he was grinning so big and I walked up to him and slugged him in the arm. He was like, “What?” and I was like, “
You know what
” and he said, “I don't.” Then he said he'd been helping Mr. Fitch with the tractor and he'd been in town all day getting parts. I was like, “Really?” He said yeah. And then he said he thought about me all day and Mr. Fitch yelled at him because he kept spacing out. I said I'd felt sort of weird too and he said, “It was your first time, wasn't it?” I said, “
No, it was not
!” And he didn't say anything and then I wanted to kiss him so bad or go riding on his motorcycle or go to the lake or just anything as long as he was with me, in my sight, in grabbing range.

What I didn't understand that first couple days was if sex was so fun why didn't people spend, you know, like six or eight hours a day doing it? I felt like I could have. And I looked at all the grownups and older kids and the counselors and I thought how everyone on earth complains they can't get sex but why can't they? Just go meet someone and do it. Everybody wants to, how hard can it be? And even if you don't like the person that much you'll be having sex with them and sex is so fun of course you'll start to like them. I even thought about Mark Pierce and how if he had been halfway nice about it we could have done it all last year except of course he was not as cool as Brad. He was just a spoiled suburban boy and
Brad was much more worldly and his hard life had educated him so that he
understood
what he was getting and wasn't a jerk like Mark or Scott Haskell and always getting drunk and bragging about every girl he ever made out with.

The next night Brad was sitting on the porch and I tried to sit close to him but he was acting shy. But then Rita went inside and we made out and I tried not to gush too much but I couldn't help it and I just sighed, “Oh,
Brad
.” And the next night we went back to the lake and I couldn't wait to get started but he was acting weird and not saying anything and it was just a lot of waiting around. And I tried to kiss him and get him interested but you could tell something was wrong. And finally we stopped and he started talking and saying how I didn't really like him, I was just like the other camp girls, just having my vacation and that's how everything was in Harper's Ferry, just summer people getting drunk and getting laid and going back home to their real lives. And then he said how much he hated Harper's Ferry and he was going to move to Spokane or Montana except his mom needed him or something, it didn't really make sense. I didn't know what to say because I thought that's what he wanted, to have sex with me because it didn't seem like I was really his type, I mean, not bad or good, just different, like we were friends for the summer and lovers. Then I started talking and I told him he was right, it was my first time and I would always remember him because he was so sweet and then I started to cry because it all seemed so sad. And he just sat there, looking out at the lake and drinking his whiskey but I guess he felt better because after a while he leaned over and kissed me on the cheek. And then we laid down and made out and he pulled off my pants and I was getting so horny. And then he put it in and we did it for a long time and it felt so good my whole body was humming with pleasure.

·    ·    ·

The other thing
I learned from Brad was how to smoke. I started that night at the lake. At first it made me dizzy and sick but it was so fun holding it and having it burning in your hand and it was the perfect thing to fiddle with while you're talking, especially a deep conversation about feelings and love. And I could feel how it calmed you down and I understood that contented look Rita got on her face and how she would stare off into space. That's how I was, sitting naked in the sleeping bag, Brad on his elbow beside me, and the lake so smooth and the stars and the satellites and the moonlight on the water. And when something splashed in the lake I was totally calm and unafraid and I realized that cigarettes weren't just about being cool and having a prop but they also made you really still inside and you could understand things and accept things better than you could before.