Skipped Parts: A Heartbreaking, Wild, and Raunchy Comedy (8 page)

I had some trouble following that. “Pud?”

Maurey laughed. “They call him Pud. His real name is Montgomery and he’s the stupidest kid in the valley. I saw him in front of Talbot Taxidermy the other day with frozen drool down his shirt.”

Dothan, Florence, and Montgomery. I made a connection. “They’re all named for towns in Alabama.”

Neither Annabel nor Maurey knew that and for a while we were all three silent as they digested the information and I watched Kennedy give his Cuban crisis speech. Actually, Annabel probably digested the information and Maurey moped because I’d known something she didn’t know.

I decided it was time to move around. “You want a Coke? We can catch what’s happening at the Deck.”

Annabel said, “We have pop here.”

Maurey stood up. “That’s not the point, Mom.”

***

The light was nice as Maurey and I walked the two blocks down Glenwood to Alpine and over to the White Deck. It has to do with altitude or lack of pollution or something—whatever it is, light in Wyoming can be transparent, energetic. It reflects completely, never losing a bit of brightness, especially after new snow. The light in North Carolina is heavy and absorbent, like a paper towel. You can’t see something three blocks away as clearly as something in your hand. In Jackson Hole, distance is irrelevant.

The Tetons stood,
bing
, shining against a sky so blue it appeared artificial. Every snow crystal on the ground was separate from every other snow crystal. It’s easy to believe in beauty when it batters you over the head.

As we walked along, I gave Maurey the rundown on last night’s revelations, leaving out the part where her mother triggers the mess. She nodded and asked questions at pertinent points. “How much goo?”

“Say what?”

“How much goo came out? Two tablespoons? A cup? A quart? Surely it wasn’t more than a quart.”

“It wasn’t more than a quart.”

“More than a pint?”

I tried to remember. “It was all spread out, but I’d say less than a third cup.”

“Did you taste it?”

“God, no. But Lydia did.”

“That may be illegal.”

This shocked me, the thought that a biological process might be affected by laws. “It was on a sock. I never heard of anyone getting arrested for tasting come off the end of a sock.”

“You never heard of come till this morning.”

“I’d heard of come, I just didn’t know what it was.”

“Knowing a word, but not knowing what it means, is the same as not knowing it.” Maurey’s face was flushed pink from the cold. There were rose spots above each cheekbone.

She looked down at my zipper. “When your thing is hard, does it point straight out or down?”

“Up.”

“Up. Are you sure? Horses’ things point down.”

“Up. At least mine does. I don’t know about anyone else.”

We stopped across from the triangle and tried to picture the internal workings of the deal. Maurey’s eyes squinched as she thought. She had the advantage over me in that she knew what male things were shaped like and I didn’t know squat about females except there was a tunnel involved.

Maurey nodded. “That’s about how I had it figured. The horses confused me. I wonder where kissing comes in.”

In books people often kissed before things were either skipped or talked about so metaphorically no one knew what was going on. It seemed to be a one, two, three ritual—kiss, skip the weird stuff, fall in love. I thought about kissing Maurey, right there on the street, in hopes that one thing led to another and couldn’t be stopped once begun, but she didn’t seem interested in the romantic end of the deal. Maurey was into the mechanics.

“Maybe you could show me your thing,” Maurey said.

“It’s not hard right now.”

“How can you make it hard?”

“I don’t know. It just happens sometimes. It’s not in my control.”

We stood on the curb trying to imagine the unimaginable. This seemed like a big deal—like driving a car—only adults could do and kids couldn’t. It would involve touching a girl in places you weren’t even allowed to look at. How could you touch something you couldn’t see?

“Do you think it feels good?” I asked.

Maurey shrugged as we walked on to the White Deck. “People in books usually think so. There must be more to it than making babies.”

Dot tousled my hair—a nasty habit if ever there was one—and smiled at Maurey. “I thought you two was mortal enemies.”

“Where’d you hear that?” I asked. Older women were always touching my hair. They think it’s big fun to embarrass kids.

“Same place I hear ever’thing else.” Dot pointed at the floor. “GroVont ever gets a newspaper I could be the only reporter.”

Maurey turned sideways in the booth and leaned against the wall. “We’re experimenting with friendship. We could go back the other way any second.”

I couldn’t tell if she was joking or not.

Dot laughed like she always does. “Hate is a good way to start being friends. Better than the other way around like those two old farts.” She pointed at Bill and Oly who were back in their regular corner booth. They stared into their coffee cups as if they’d done a freeze-frame in that position.

“What’s wrong with them?” I asked.

Dot more or less sorted. “They were meat and gravy for thirty years. Had a logging business, you never saw Bill without Oly or Oly without Bill.”

“You still don’t,” Maurey said.

“We used to think maybe they’s queer, but who ever heard of a queer logger.”

“Must get lonesome in the woods,” I said.

Dot grinned real big. “That’s why God made sheep,” and she went off into a veritable gale of mirth. Maurey and I cut eyes at each other, knowing this had something to do with dicks and tunnels, but not sure how sheep fit in.

“I have to watch them every minute now. Bill’s punched out Oly three times this month. Almost broke his nose the other day. Oly don’t know what to make of it. He’s gotten skittish. The whole cafe is tense.”

I studied the two old men nodding over their coffee cups. They didn’t appear skittish, they appeared dead. Their hands wrapped around their cups, as if that was the last possible source of warmth. At one point, Bill swallowed and Oly blinked.

I ordered a cheeseburger and coffee. Maurey had a vanilla shake. When Dot brought the food, Maurey went right to the point.

“Dot, do you and your husband have sex?”

Dot’s head kind of snapped back an inch. She snuck a quick look around for eavesdroppers, but there were no other customers besides the old men practicing for death. Dot smoothed her apron with her right hand. “Jimmy’s been in the army two years, over in Asia the last six months, so there’s been a dry spell here just lately.”

I smiled sympathetically. Maurey went right on. “But you used to have sex, right, before Jimmy went away?”

Dot’s eyes went into a memory mode. “My Jimmy had the appetite. He’d of done it four times a day if I’d let him. I got scared to wash the dishes for fear of him sneaking up behind me.”

“Then men like it and women don’t?”

“Oh, I loved it, sugar, better than ice cream and chocolate cake.”

“Then why were you scared to wash the dishes?”

“I guess I was more a twice-a-dayer than four times, though if Jimmy’d come back tomorrow, I swear I could adapt.”

I stared out the window at the sunshine, pretending I had a woman who wanted it twice a day but was willing to go four. I wondered how long each time took. If it was fifteen minutes, that’d mean an hour of fucking a day.

“My mom won’t be home for another twenty minutes,” Ginger Ann purred. “You want to stick it in?”

“But that’ll be five times since school let out this afternoon.”

“Sam, it’s not romantic to keep score.”

Maurey sucked on her shake straw thoughtfully. “How much come did Jimmy put out each time?”

Dot sat down at the table behind her. “Maurey Pierce. There are things people don’t compare.”

“Why?” I asked.

“Why? Lovemaking is private. We do it but we don’t say how much you-know-what came out.”

“It’s okay to say ‘came out’ but not okay to say ‘come’?”

Dot blinked three times—blap-blap-blap. “That’s talking dirty. Kids your age shouldn’t talk dirty.”

“I don’t see how it can be dirty,” I said. “Lydia told me sex is an expression of affection and love, theoretically, and good, clean fun, practical-wise. Why is doing it clean, but talking about it dirty?”

Maurey waved her hand as if she were clearing the air. “I just want to know if a third cup is average.”

Dot tittered, which is really weird in a woman over twenty-five. “We girls can’t talk about it in mixed company.” She nodded her head at me.

I scooted out of the booth. “I’m going to the can.” To Maurey, I said, “Remember anything she says. I didn’t hold out on you.”

Dot slid over into the seat I’d just left. “What’s he mean ‘hold out’?”

In the men’s room, I discovered the deal had gotten stiff again, too stiff, and pointed in the wrong direction to pee. Could just talking about the penis make it get bigger? That would be really weird. Within the last year, kinky hair had sprouted down in the ball area. I knew that when a kid got kicked down there it hurt like shit, more than getting kicked in the stomach or butt, so those clumps in the sac must be nerves.

As I gave it a little squeeze it seemed to get even harder, about as hard as an aspen branch, not as hard as an elm. The thing had been stiffening up now and then since I was eleven, could there be a way to blow the goo without being asleep or sticking it in a girl? I couldn’t see how. By pinching the end a tad, I could make the slit open and close, like a mouth. I pretended I was a ventriloquist and could throw my voice.

“Hi there, my name is Dicky. I live in your penis. I get big when I want and I squirt when I want.” Then I wagged him side to side.

“Jesus Christ,” I said back to Dicky.

Never did get a chance to pee.

When I returned to Maurey, I had to walk past Bill and Oly’s corner booth. Neither one had moved, but a low growl came from Bill’s upper chest, kind of angry grizzly bear-like. I skirted way wide so he couldn’t grab me.

Back to my cheeseburger, I asked Maurey, “Dot tell you how it’s done?”

Maurey looked disgusted. “She said sex is a wonderful and special experience, but it can never be done right unless the two people are in love.”

“Sounds like a crock to me.”

“That’s what I told her.”

***

A letter arrived from Caspar.

Samuel,

Everyone can master a grief but he that has had it.

Pay attention. This affects the way you live and there is just a possibility that the family brains skipped a generation and you think with more than your organs.

A man in San Bernadino, California, has invented a way of dramatically strengthening tires by blending carbon black with rubber. This means the price of carbon is going to skyrocket, which means you may be forced to find a job someday. Ask your mother if she knows what a job is. I have also heard an ugly rumor of an old retiree in a garage somewhere who has discovered “carbonless” carbon paper, a way to make carbons without discoloration of the fingers. Added to this misery, a company named Xerox may do away with carbon paper completely.

So the Caspar Callahan Carbon Paper Company is searching for a way to expand. I am considering nylons.

Keep all this under your hat, Samuel.

I trust you and your mother are adapting to the weather. I understand the pass you caught against Victor, Idaho, showed resourcefulness and daring. Good work. Did I ever tell you of my days at Culver Military Academy?

Tell your mother that I have a friend in Belgian Congo whose tenant was recently devoured by rabid Negroes.

Your dignity and the Callahan name are your most precious possessions, Samuel. Guard them diligently.

Your grandfather,

Mr. Callahan

I showed the letter to Lydia. “Are we supposed to think he makes these weird quotes up?”

“It’s a tone-setter stratagem to make his thoughts relevant. I remember that dignity line from when I was your age,” Lydia said. “I told him I’d rather have a T-Bird.”

“What’s this Belgian Congo deal?”

“Next stop if we embarrass him here.”

I studied Caspar’s company stationery. He used a red ink pen in a tiny flowing handwriting that got tinier as it approached the right side of the page. Caspar was tiny himself—under five-five, to my everlasting dismay—but he drove his stretch Continental like a tank. Curbs meant nothing to the man. That military academy crack put an ugly feeling in my gut.

“Did you tell him about the pass?” I asked.

“Are you kidding? My conversations with Caspar are limited to ‘Where’s the check?’ ‘Don’t be a tramp.’”

“How did he find out I caught a pass?”

Lydia laughed. She’d been laughing regularly since the night she came in late. “Someone’s on the payroll.”

“Caspar has a spy?”

“Of course Caspar has a spy.” She took my shoulders in her hands and faced me. “Sam, listen to me. Your grandfather is Santa Claus. He knows every move you make and he will always know every move you make. Nothing can be hidden. A long time ago, I realized my job is to give the spies something to report. Caspar has never done squat. He gets his jollies off by hearing the juice of my adventures.”

“Jollies? He’s threatening me with Culver again. I know what that means. It means not having my own room and playing lacrosse instead of baseball. Only squirrels play lacrosse.”

Lydia scratched Les under the chin. “I promise, Sammy, that old goat will never separate us.”

Sounded like a hollow promise to me. The old goat could do anything he pleased so long as he controlled the wallet. “What about the rabid Negroes in Belgian Congo?”

Lydia grinned, showing an intense number of teeth. “Hell, honey bunny, I can handle rabid Negroes.”

I took that about six different ways, then gave up.

***

I forgot to mention earlier that Florence Talbot was not ugly, she was actually semi-pretty, probably the semi-prettiest girl in the seventh grade, next to Maurey. She had a Lesley Gore look, soft reddish-brown hair and brown pencil-drawn eyebrows. Florence could have even given Maurey a run for the title if she’d learned how to smile.

It was when Florence opened her mouth that the beauty flew out the window. Had a voice like a lunch whistle and this west Alabama accent that could curdle milk.

When I showed up at school Tuesday, Florence was standing in a little gaggle of girlhood, blocking the water fountain. Chuckette Morris was there, popping her retainer in and out with her tongue. And one of the LaNell-LaDell twins.

“Excuse me,” I said.

“Why?” LaNell-LaDell asked.

“I’d like to get to the water fountain.” I wasn’t really thirsty, only in a damned-if-that-Florence-Talbot-is-going-to-intimidate-me mood.

Chuckette and a couple others shuffled aside for me. Since the junior high used to be the grade school, the fountain was about a foot and a half off the ground, so I had to bend way over. When my head came back up, Florence’s face glared at me from all of eight inches away. I could see pulses next to her eyes. Her Talbot chin jutted at me like a pointing finger.

I hadn’t swallowed so when I flashed her a
What, me worry
grin, water dribbled across my lower lip and down my jaw— the ultimate junior high gross-out maneuver, next to pencils up the nose.

***

Maurey wore all black to school that day. I asked her why in the hall after citizenship.

“I’m in mourning for the nation,” she said.

“You look like the bad guy in a cowboy movie.”

“I’m Jane Eyre, bravely going on in the face of tragedy.”

“Right.”

***

Dothan razzed me in PE. We were playing dodgeball and he threw at me and missed about eight times. I might not have been strong enough to win a fight, but I was quick and he was stupid. If he looked at my feet he threw at my head, and if he looked at my head he threw at my feet.

“Hey, Sam,” Dothan called, “tell us how Maurey Pierce’s hooters feel. Are they foam rubber?”

Now I’m faced with one of those universal crises of youth: to respond to a word without anyone knowing you don’t know what it means. “Hooters” was beyond me. From Lydia, I knew knockers, twat, ass, tongue, jugs, head, boobs, whanger, and several other terms such as cock and clit that I knew were body parts, I just wasn’t sure where or on what sex they were located.

I couldn’t possibly admit to sixth-period PE that I didn’t know hooters. I had to answer, yet the wrong answer would give away my ignorance. I don’t give away ignorance.

Dothan sensed he had me. “Come on, tell us about Pierce’s hooters.”

“They feel the same as your sister’s.”

***

Lydia breezed in late again Wednesday night. She’d been snow-mobiling with Ft. Worth and Hank Elkrunner. The closest Lydia had ever come to outdoor recreation in North Carolina was fetching the newspaper off the front veranda and she wouldn’t do that in winter. I was aghast to see my mother with ruddy cheeks.

“Which one of those two jokers are you after?” I asked.

Lydia lit a cigarette, a girl’s brand called Tarreyton. “It’s time you learned about priorities, Sammy. Which one do you think I’m after?” The gleam was in her eye. Lydia considered herself on top of the situation.

“How should I know. I haven’t met Hank yet and all I know about Ft. Worth is his hairy finger.”

“Ft. Worth has more money and a new truck and a nice dog and he’s lovably charming. Hank doesn’t smoke or drink, he’s smarter, more sensitive, and seems to have an inner demon that intrigues me. Which should I pick?”

I considered. Normally, I’d opt for the inner demon because I secretly pictured myself with one that I hoped girls would go ape over, but a new truck and a good dog might be more Lydia’s speed. She could be dangerous to sensitivity.

“They both sound like clucks to me.”

Lydia hit her cigarette hard. “Here’s your first lesson on women, Sam. I’ll choose the one with the biggest dick.”

***

Lydia didn’t come home at all Friday night. I fixed myself an egg sandwich and sat in the living room, watching “Gun-smoke” and reading a
Life
magazine featuring a photo layout of Brigitte Bardot at her villa in France. The story said she slept in the nude. The concept seemed impossible. What if the house caught on fire and you had to run outside. I’d have died of smoke inhalation before I’d run into the street naked.