|
|
|
|
By Eileen Leggett
In the morning, before school, my mother always inspects what I am wearing. She always makes sure what I am wearing is not too revealing or grungy. My attire has to meet with her approval. Little does she know, as soon as I leave the house, I pull out my "real" clothes from my oversized purse, and dress myself to my approval. The Bernstein's high thick bushes in our alleyway are a perfect dressing room, no one can see me at all. The only thing I would want is a full length mirror fastened to the branches, so I could see how I look after I change. Kelly Hurley always meets me at the end of the alley and walks with me to school. She usually carries a pack of menthols with her and we usually share one on the way to school.
"Someday we are going to get caught," she's always saying.
I just met this guy at school named Hank Henry. Hank is grunge. He always wears his hair uncombed, and his clothes are very baggy and wrinkled and he could give a ship what anybody thought of him. He has become my best friend. One weekend we met at this outside cafe and had lunch. After lunch Hank dug into his pockets to find the twenty he had to pay the bill, and there was nothing in them except some lint. We made a pretty good team that day. I pretended to go to the bathroom and walked out of the restaurant, while Hank jumped over the small fence that borders the patio. We caught up with each other at the mall a few hours later. If my mother ever found out about this she would literally die! She is a firm believer in paying your way in life. It's funny, she never mentions that my grandfather paid her way through college.
What is really odd is that Kelly doesn't like Hank either. She is always telling me that I am so much better than him, she says I could do so much better than him. I think she is jealous of the time I spend with him. Lately I have given Kelly the cold shoulder, because she's not fun to be around anymore. I am pretty sure she is hurt, but she should have kept her nose out of my business. We talk but not like we used to. Hank is definitely more important to me than she is.
The day that school let out for the summer Hank took me aside and walked with me to the creek. When we finally got to the little creek in the woods, he put his arm around my shoulders and said "I think this is going to be a great summer!" I looked into his blue byes and agreed "Yes I think so too" Hank suddenly got a very serious look on his face and said "Robin, it is about time we talked about a few things" he paused a moment and asked "Do you really care for me?" I answered very quickly "Yes Hank you know that why are you asking?" He stood in front of me looking me straight in the eyes, "It's time for you to really show me how much you like me" I stood there for a moment very perplexed at his words and then my thoughts came to me -- "I guess what you want is to have sex with me, is that what you are getting at?" He smiled a broad smile and stated "Yes, Robin that is exactly what I want!" I think in the back of my head I knew this day would come. I had seen so much sex on T.V. and in the movies, that it wasn't a shock that Hank would ask me to do it with him. In all my fifteen years nothing had ever frightened and excited me as much as the idea of trying sex with Hank. "When did you want to do this Hank, right now here at the creek?" Hank then began to chuckle "No girl not now, but soon, I want it to be nice something we both want to do." The words echoed inside my ears and my heart was pounding so hard that I felt like it would jump out of my chest. "We'll plan to do something soon, ok?" Hank said as he walked me to my parents' front door.
My mother stood in front of me that first day of summer vacation and drilled me about everything I was supposed to do and all things I could not do while she and my father was at work. I saw her lips moving but I really didn't hear what she was saying to me. When I looked at her I wondered if one day I would end up like her? It seemed as if in her world the only thing that was important was money and what you did with it. When I was a little girl my mother and I were very close, but as soon as I became a teenager she went cold on me. She lectured me every waking hour. She was driving me crazy. She reminded me of one of those security dogs at the junk yard, always barking and snapping at me. When I needed her the most, I was much too afraid to ask her anything. So instead of asking her about sex, I went to Kelly instead. My friend had her own ideas about sex, she thought the old fashioned way was best, waiting until marriage was what she had planned. I had to respect her for her opinion, but the more I thought about it the more I wanted to try it.
Hank invited me to a free concert at the lake on Friday night. I told my mother that I was going to a concert and then spending the night with Kelly and made sure that Kelly would cover for me if my mother phoned her house. And Kelly agreed to help me out. I kept thinking in the back of my head that Kelly would decide to rat on me, and tell my mother where I was. That night Hank and I sat on a blanket watching the show and I could tell by the way he was looking at me, that he was just as apprehensive as I was about our plans after the show. After the show we walked along the shore of the lake holding hands and talking. We looked at the stars and I know we talked about so many different things, but for the life of me I can't remember what they were. Hank took all his clothes off and jumped into the icy cold lake, and I sat there for a moment and then decided to join him. We kissed and swam, and then we got out and dried off and laid on a blanket looking at the stars. That night we fell asleep in each other's arms. And when I woke up I was still a virgin. I was stuffy and gritty from spending the night on the beach and I told Hank I needed to go home, that I would see him soon.
My mother was in a wonderful mood that Sat. morning, and wanted to take me shopping with her, so I went along with her to the mall, feeling guilty when she bought me a brand new pair of Nike tennis shoes. She then offered to buy my lunch at the food court at the mall and as we sat there, she started one of her mother-daughter lectures. She was talking for some time when I heard her say "You're probably at that age where you've started thinking about having sex with boys." I choked on my diet soda when she said that. "Oh my Robin did I say something wrong?" I just shook my head and thought, oh mother if you only knew how close I came to doing that last night, you wouldn't be buying me expensive tennis shoes or even taking me to the mall. "Yes ma'am" was all I could say. "I'm sorry Robin I just want to help you if I can, make the right choice, if I can?" "Yes ma'am" was all I could say. Why was she all of a sudden my buddy? My thoughts were racing through my head like a freight train. "Robin you are at that age when a young lady's virtue is easily discarded." "Oh mother I haven't done anything, really!" Then she smiled at me as if she could see right through me and said "You never know when you might be asked to do something with some young man, honey just keep in mind you are still very young and there is no need to rush anything." "Yes ma'am" was my standard answer as I thought to myself, little do you know that I could have had sex with the boy I slept with last night at the lake. I looked at my mother a little differently that day, she was finally on the same page I was on, she must have been young once. My father could have been the Hank Henry in her life. I wonder if they had sex before they were married? Then for a brief moment I imagined them as being teenagers exploring life the way Hank and I were.
That night Hank called me and we talked for hours on the phone, he told me he had a wonderful time at the lake, and that he wanted to go water skiing with me tomorrow with him and his friend Eric, he also asked me to ask Kelly to come along. After I hung up the phone with him I asked my mother if it would be alright for Kelly and I to go water skiing with Hank and Eric, and the shock of my life came when she said it was alright to go. I rushed to the phone and called Hank and told him I could go, and then I called Kelly and asked her if she wanted to go, she asked her parents and they approved so our plans were complete.
When Kelly came over that morning we spent two hours primping our hair, our face, our nails, everything had to be perfect for our outing with the guys. We both knew once we got out on the lake our work would be ruined but we wanted to look good when they picked us up. Eric and Hank showed up about 10:30am, and met my parents. My mother embarrassed me by giving us the same lecture that she gave me at the mall the other day. The day was very exciting, it was the first time Kelly and I had water skied, and by the end of the day we all were exhausted. When we finally made it to shore, Hank pulled me aside and asked if I could go with him in the boat while Eric and Kelly stayed on the shore. We sailed to a remote part of the lake and Hank turned the motor off. We sat in the boat slowly drifting, the sound of the boat churning in the water was very romantic. We laid on the floor of the boat just kissing and experimenting with different positions, when it finally happened. We just let nature take its course.
I know my parents would never have approved of such behavior, but hey it wasn't up to them, it wasn't up to Kelly or Eric, it was something that Hank and I decided. It was going to happen eventually and it just kind of happened. I know we were young, and yes we could have waited, but there was something about that summer sun, the boat, and the water, and deep blue eyes of Hank Henry's that made up my mind.
