The Obstacle Course (22 page)

I pulled the paper off. It was one of those plastic photo books, the kind that accordions out. This one had about a dozen pictures in it, and they were all of Darlene. Her class picture, a picture of her in her cheerleader’s costume, all kinds of pictures. There was even one of her in a two-piece bathing suit.

Naturally, I got a hard-on looking at her in the bathing suit. I couldn’t wait for summer, when we could go swimming together, so I could see the real thing, most of it anyway. Of course, I already had seen the whole real thing, but she didn’t know that, and I sure as hell wasn’t going to tell her.

“Do you like it?”

“It’s great,” I said.

“I did it so you can always be thinking of me, even when I’m not with you.”

“I do think of you,” I told her. “Even when you’re not around.” Like when I’m lying in bed with my tool in my hand.

“So do I,” she said. “Think of you.”

She kissed me again and we walked back to where everybody else was hanging around. I really felt great—anybody could look at us and tell we were going together even though we couldn’t officially, because of her mother.

We’d had two dates, two Friday nights in a row. The first time we went to the Cheverly movies, which is where everybody goes on Friday night—there or the Ravensburg Fire House, which has a sock hop.

We’d sat in the back row and made out like bandits. Even though it was our first official date she let me have a good feel through her bra. We made out for at least a half-hour straight, and I had my hand on her almost the whole time, even the nipple. She wouldn’t let me have bare tit, though. It was our first date and she didn’t want me to think she was a slut or anything. That was okay, I wasn’t in a hurry.

The following Friday afternoon we took the Greyhound down to the District and saw
Trapeze
at the Capitol, which is a great old movie theatre. We sat way up in the balcony. It was a pretty good movie, what I saw of it. Most of the time we made out, and this time I got bare tit, although Darlene made a big deal out of trying to stop me and finally “not being able to help myself, you get me so hot, Roy.”

Of course, that was a crock of shit. This girl was a firecracker under that goody-goody pose she put on for the public. It was just a matter of time before we went all the way. I knew she was a virgin, and I was glad I’d stayed one for her, even though it hadn’t been my choice.

“I won’t be able to go out with you next week,” she’d said as we were walking up to her front door that night.

“Because of your mother’s rule.” Her mother had a rule that Darlene couldn’t date any boy more than twice in a row—one of her many stupid rules.

Darlene nodded. “But I want to,” she assured me.

“Who’re you going to go with?” I asked. I was nervous, wondering who it would be.

“I don’t know.” She giggled. “Do you think Lewis Sarkind would go out with me?”

That about cracked me up. I could just see the two of them together.

“You want me to fix you up?” I volunteered. That would’ve been great. There’s plenty of guys out there I wouldn’t want Darlene going out with, but Lewis was definitely safe.

“I can get my own dates, thank you,” she told me. “Don’t worry,” she’d continued, seeing the nervous look on my face, “it won’t matter who it is. You’re the only one I care about.”

I stayed late at school, studying in the library until closing time. When I got home, there was a birthday cake waiting for me on the kitchen table, baked by my mom—a chocolate cake with orange frosting, my favorite. My mom’s a great baker when she wants to be.

I made a wish and blew out all the candles. My first thought about a wish had been to fuck Darlene within the month, but I changed it to getting into Farrington Academy. I knew that sooner or later Darlene would do the dirty deed with me. Getting into Farrington was more important in the big scheme of things, and it wasn’t as much a sure thing.

“Happy birthday, sweetheart.”

My mom handed me a package. I ripped off the wrapping. It was a model, a plastic aircraft carrier.

“Thanks, Mom.”

“I hope you like it. The man at the store said it was their most popular one.”

“Yeah,” I lied, “it’s great.”

I gave her a big hug. She really is a good mother—she does her best, and it isn’t always easy. It’s not her fault she doesn’t know anything about models. This was the kind of model a ten-year-old kid could build. They don’t know anything about models in this hick town, but she didn’t know that. She thought she was getting me something special.

“Do you really like it?” she asked anxiously.

“Oh, yeah, it’s great.” I put the box down on the table.

“Ta-da.” Ruthie handed me a big package, all wrapped up. “Happy birthday, baby brother.”

“I’m taller now than you are, Ruthie.”

“You’ll always be my baby brother, Roy,” she said.

I almost creamed my jeans when I saw what she’d given me. It was this incredible sweater that she’d hand-knitted, every stitch. She’d been working on it since the beginning of the school year, and all winter long she’d been telling me she was making it for some boy she was hot for in her class. All that time she’d been doing it for me.

“You sure pulled the wool over my eyes,” I kidded.

She groaned. “Try it on.”

I pulled it over my shirt. It was a little big, which was good, because I could get a lot of wear out of it. It was a V-neck in white and blue, Ravensburg High colors. I could wear it under my jacket, it would be a great combination.

“Thanks, Ruthie. This is really nice.” Then I gave her a big hug, too. I almost felt like crying, I hadn’t expected anything.

“We’ll have the cake for dessert,” my mom said. “I cooked your favorite dinner—stuffed pork chops. Go on upstairs and wash, dinner’ll be on the table in a minute.”

I started up the stairs.

“I almost forgot,” she said, calling me back. She rooted around in her wallet, pulled out a five-dollar bill.

“This is from your father,” she said.

“Isn’t he coming home for dinner?” I asked. I knew things would be calmer if he wasn’t, but I wanted him here for my birthday anyway.

“It’s his bowling night,” my mom reminded me, her voice taking on an embarrassed tone. “Normally he would’ve bagged it, but if they do good tonight they have a chance to get into the playoffs. He didn’t feel he could let the other fellows down.”

“That would be great if they could make the playoffs,” I said. They’ve never made the playoffs in all the years my dad’s been bowling with them. I didn’t see how they could this year, either. They suck, plain and simple.

“He said he knew you’d understand.”

“You can’t let your friends down,” I told her, turning away in case my face had a look on it I didn’t want her to see. “I’m going up and wash, I’ll be right back.”

I took the stairs three at a time. Make the playoffs—that was the biggest laugh I’d had all year.

My favorite room in the Smithsonian is the Hall of Dinosaurs. It’s filled with skeletons of practically every dinosaur that’s ever lived, including the huge suckers like
Tyrannosaurus rex
and
Brontosaurus.
Next to it is the room with all the Ice Age shit, mastodons and mammoths and saber-toothed tigers, all rebuilt to look real, complete with skins and furs. They look pretty authentic—whoever makes them over does a good job. Most kids like the main building, with the
Spirit of St. Louis
hanging in the front hallway and all the other old planes, trains, and cars. I like it too, I like everything about the Smithsonian, it’s my favorite building in Washington—it’s just that I like the dinosaurs best of all. There’s something about going way back in time that’s exciting to me. If I didn’t want to go to Annapolis and have a career in the Navy I’d become an archaeologist, digging up old bones all over the world. You could see some incredibly neat shit doing that.

We were on our field trip. Once a year every class in our school gets a field trip. That’s one of the good things about living near Washington—there’s a ton of great places to visit on field trips. We’ve been to the White House, the Washington Monument, the Capitol building, the Lincoln and Jefferson memorials, all those places. Mt. Vernon, where Washington lived. One of the things I vividly remembered about Mt. Vernon was that there were quarters for about sixty slaves. We went there in fourth grade. It must’ve been hotter than shit down in those slave quarters in the middle of summer. Living in Washington in the middle of summer’s like living in a steam bath, and those places didn’t even have windows.

“Isn’t that interesting, class?” Mrs. Fletcher was trying to get us to respond to this old guide who was giving us the tour. He looked as old as one of the skeletons, like he needed to be propped up, too. Mrs. Fletcher was trying in a half-assed way to get us to pay attention, but she wasn’t having too much luck; it was almost lunchtime and the natives were getting restless. The old guy was as bored as we were. What he was mostly interested in was checking out the girls, who were dressed up for the occasion, wearing stockings and high heels and girdles and all the rest. There’s some righteous pussy in our class, I shit you not—not just Darlene, lots of the girls are sexy. They work hard at it.

“Does anyone have any questions before we move on?” Mrs. F. continued.

Half the class didn’t even hear her. Old Burt was standing near her, though, and he raised his hand.

“I have a question, Miz Fletcher.”

“Yes, Burt, what is it?”

Me and Joe were already cracking up. If Burt ever had a serious question about anything in his entire life I’d shit a gold-plated brick.

“What’s black, has six legs, and catches flies?” he asked, in this super-serious voice.

We actually did crack up. So did about half the other kids. He’s a natural-born comedian, that kid. Somebody ought to put him on “The Ed Sullivan Show.”

Mrs. Fletcher tried to keep things under control: “I fail to see what that has to do with what we’ve been talking about.”

“Well, it doesn’t, but I was wondering if you knew,” he said.

“No, I don’t,” she said, pissed off. “Let’s move on, please.”

“The New York Giants outfield.”

We’d all heard it before, but we laughed anyway.

“If you care to sit on the bus for the remainder of the day you’re more than welcome to,” she told him. Then she turned on her heel and marched off down the hall. You know she won’t be teaching when she’s an old lady, she hates us all already. If she lasts another year past this one it’ll be a miracle.

All the time we’d been there I had hung with my buddies, but at the same time I was trying to bird-dog Darlene, who was in the middle of a bunch of her giggling girlfriends. Everything’s funny to the girls in ninth grade this year, it must have something to do with their tits growing out. She’d catch my eye and smile, but she stayed with the other girls.

When we moved into the Ice Age room I managed to get next to her for a moment, and accidentally-on-purpose brushed my hand against her left tit.

“Don’t, Roy,” she whispered, looking around to see if anyone’d seen it.

“It was an accident.”

“It was not and you know it.”

I pretended like I was sulking. I wasn’t actually, I just wanted her to think I was.

It worked: “You can’t do that in front of everyone, Roy,” she said, sweet-talking me, “now just wait until we’re alone.”

“Jesus, it already feels like I’ve been waiting my whole life practically.” I really was horny for her—if I hadn’t jacked off every night, usually more than once, I’d have a case of blue balls like you couldn’t believe, that’s how hot I was for her.

“Listen, Roy, I don’t even kiss every boy I go out with, let alone make out like we do.”

“I know you don’t, but ain’t I special?”

“I like you, Roy, really I do, it just scares me is all.”

“That’s okay,” I said. Anything to make her come around.

“I know how you feel,” she said. “I do, too.” She thought for a minute. “Why don’t you take me to the movies Friday night?”

“Friday night?”

“I mean if you’re not busy or anything,” she said, trying to act hurt.

“No, I ain’t busy. But what about your mother?”

“I’ll lie to her.”

“How?”

“I’ll say I’m going out with a friend. Joan. I’ll even have Joan come pick me up, then I can meet you at the movies.” She looked around to see if anyone was spying on us. They weren’t. “You aren’t mad, are you? That I’m not being with you today?”

“No.” But I was. Not mad, actually, just pissed off that we couldn’t be together all the time, especially in a place like this, away from school.

“Listen,” she whispered, like we were concocting up a plot, “I’ve got an idea. We could get together by that fountain outside if we finish our lunches early. Okay?”

“Sure,” I whispered back, sucked right in.

“We’d better not let anyone see us too friendly now,” she said. “Nobody even knows I’m going with you.” Then she drifted away to rejoin her circle of friends.

I was floating, not knowing whether to shit or go blind. She’d said “going with you.” From her lips right into my ear.

Like the idiot I am, I was the last student out of the museum cafeteria line. Everybody else had gone through by the time I’d woke up that it was lunchtime, because I’d been in my own world, mooning about Darlene. My girl, true love, all that stupid bullshit only girls are supposed to think about. I didn’t give a flying fuck, though—when the other boys in my class saw her on my arm next week, I would be king shit of Ravensburg Junior High.

I found a seat at a table which was occupied by three ladies, real old-fashioned southern types, the kind that keep their hats on inside and carry lace handkerchiefs in their sleeves and have pale white skin with liver spots all over their veiny hands. They were eating sandwiches with the crusts cut off, and drinking iced tea. My plate was piled so high I could hardly see over it—not really, but there was enough food on it for three ordinary people. The old ladies looked at me like I was a dog turd somebody’d dropped in their laps. I wasn’t that keen on sitting with them, either, but it was the only seat I could find—lots of people, like government workers, eat here because the food’s good and it’s cheap.