"We'll not discuss Alice," he said flatly. "That's not what I came in here for." Acting on impulse he reached under her pillow and drew out the magazine she'd been reading. He sucked in a deep breath. It was a swinger-type magazine, the type that featured naked girls throughout, and also a few naked men thrown in for good measure. It contained stories and articles of interest to swinging men and women. A type of magazine that was usually kept under the counter at newsstands.
"Where'd you get this?" His voice was sharp.
She flushed. "Some of the kids around school were passing it around. I borrowed it from Angie."
He leafed through the book, his face getting more fluted with each turned page. "Such trash!" he said. "Get rid of it!" He tossed it on the table alongside her bed.
"Yes, Daddy." Her voice was soft.
"Maybe it's a good thing I looked at that magazine," he observed, leaning back reflectively. "I came in here to talk to you about… sex!" He stumbled over the word.
Her eyes lit up. "You did?"
"We… er, I was thinking, you're getting to be a big girl now. I was wondering how much you know about boys, and such things." He blurted out the words haltingly.
A tight smile curled on her pretty mouth. She settled back against the headboard, drawing her legs up and resting her hands on her knees. She chuckled inwardly at Daddy's discomfort. She knew how embarrassed he must be, trying to fill her in on the facts of life. Facts she was well aware of, as were most eighteen-year-old girls these days.
She had lost her cherry several months ago when she had just turned eighteen. She had been fucked several more times since by eager boys from high school. She had sampled of sex and had talked it over extensively with her friends, especially Angie, who was practically a whore, though she was only eighteen and a half. She knew for a fact that Angie accepted money from men. She, herself, had been tempted several times to go with Angie on one of her paying dates, but so far she'd resisted the temptation.
Pretending innocence, she turned her big brown eyes toward him. "What
should I know, Daddy?" "I mean… like boys are built different than
girls."
"I know that!" She picked up the magazine and impishly began turning pages.
He grabbed it from her and tossed it back on the. table. "Never mind with the pictures! What I mean is… do you know what happens when boys and girls-" Again he broke off.
"What, Daddy?" Again the big pretense of innocence.
"Aw, hell, Karen, I can't explain this kind of 'stuff. It's too embarrassing!"
She grinned. "Would it help, Daddy, if I were to mention that I've taken several courses in school?"
"Courses?"
"About sex. You haven't been in school for so long, you don't know what's happening. They start teaching kids about the birds and the bees in the sixth grade. I'm a sophomore in high school."
"You mean they actually teach that kind of stuff? The difference between girls and boys? About babies? How they happen? How girls and boys get together?"
"Aw, Daddy, don't be such a square." Hopping from her bed, Karen zipped over to her bureau. Grabbing a book from a pile, she tossed it to him. "Here's my biology book. Glance through it."
He did. His eyes opened wide. The book was loaded with facts and illustrations. It went the entire route. It showed in clear, concise, clinical words and pictures, the entire concept of reproduction. Diagrams of the reproductive organs, male and female.
"I'll be damned." He had vaguely heard about the new concept of schooling, but this? It was mind-popping to a guy who'd been out of school for so long. He'd had a year of college after graduating from high school. But even in college long ago he hadn't been subjected to books like this.
Karen flopped back on the bed and leaned against the headboard. "You still want to talk about the birds and bees, Daddy?" She grinned impishly.
Shaking his head dumbly, he placed the book on top of the girlie magazine on the table. "Maybe you can teach me a few things, Karen. Guess maybe I missed the boat when I was growing up." He smiled wanly.
Her eyes lit up shrewdly. A calculating look crept into her eyes. "Maybe I could teach you something, Daddy. Or perhaps," she added nastily, "you'd rather learn everything from that woman!" Again the hostile reference to Alice.
"Knock it off." He frowned. A thought was tugging at his mind. Something Alice had mentioned. It clicked. "Oh, the reason I came to see you, Karen. The other night, you were parked in the rear of the house alongside the garage. In some boy's car?"
"I was with Derek. We were parked." The smile drained from her face. "Why?"
"You weren't exactly necking, were you?"
"Necking?" She frowned at the unfamiliar word.
"I mean, you and Derek weren't just kissing, and talking, were you?"
"And just what do you think we were doing, Daddy?" Her voice was sharp..
"I was thinking… I happened to be in the kitchen. I heard a noise. I looked out. I didn't turn on the kitchen lights…" He stumbled over the words.
"You were spying on me."
"No!" He hastily set the record straight. "I wouldn't spy on you. Like I
said, I heard this strange noise. I thought maybe it was a prowler. I peeked out. I saw you and the boy in the back seat of his car."
"What else did you see, Daddy?" Her voice was low, her eyes cold.
"I…er…your skirt was way up over your hips. He had his pants down…" He stumbled over the vague description he was trying to conjure of a sight he didn't actually see, but had heard about from Alice.
"And?" she asked.
"Suppose you tell me exactly what you two were doing in the back seat of that car?" he blurted defensively.
"You really want me to tell you, Daddy?"
"I do." His voice was firm.
"Derek was fucking me." She let the words slip out casually.
He hopped to his feet. "Karen! Don't talk like that! Don't say such things!" He was appalled.
Karen placed her hands behind her neck and stared tauntingly at him. "You asked, I told you. Derek was fucking me, Daddy," she repeated,
enjoying his discomfort. "He was fucking me! fucking me, do you hear?"
"Shut up! Shut up!" He leaned forward; his hand raised to slap her. "Damn you! Shut up! I don't want to hear that kind of talk!"
"Why not? You fuck Alice, don't you?" she taunted, her eyes alight with crazy glints. "Every night you fuck her, don't you, Daddy?" She was sobbing.
"Don't talk like tat!" He held his temper in check with great effort. He had never hit her in anger before. A few slaps on her fanny when she was growing up, that was all. He backed away, before he did something he'd regret. He lowered his hand. She was deliberately taunting him. Needling him. Why?
He stared dumbly at his sobbing daughter. She had vented her pent-up rage on him. ' His father-daughter talk had fizzled completely. It had been a disaster. It had only brought out what Alice had feared. His little girl had grown up. She had admitted to having been fucked. It seemed inconceivable to him that someone had taken advantage of his little baby. Some boy had actually found out she was a grown-up girl-a woman.
She glared at him. "I'll talk like I want! You came in here. You accused me of things!"
"But you did it. You admitted it!"
"How would you know what I did? You weren't even home that night. It was Wednesday. You were at your lodge meeting!" With this final reminder, she flopped onto the bed and gave way to her sobs.
He stared down at her slender form, now racked with tears and sobs.
His face was flushed.
He had goofed. Boy, how he'd goofed. What should have been a pleasant exchange of confidences between a worried father and a growing daughter had turned into a complete disaster. He had been caught in a big lie. Like she had said, he couldn't have seen her in action. He hadn't even been home that evening.
Now he was more confused than ever. Had she or hadn't she fucked Derek? He'd probably never find out now. Karen would probably never speak to him again. At least about such things as they were trying to discuss.