Being in complete darkness, I was more aware of the sounds around me. They weren’t pleasant. Kissing noises. Gross. Everyone else seemed to fall into Hope’s plan with ease and enthusiasm.
I wished there was a way out of this. Being chased around a neighborhood by Michael Myers seemed less scary than this stupid game. I contemplated staying still and pretending I wasn’t there. Hope’s game would eventually be over and the lights would turn on and I could just pretend I’d been making out with someone. How would anyone know? Well, except the guy who I was supposed to be making out with. Since there was an even number of us, we’d both have to sit this one out. Hey, that was perfectly fine with me. I’d stay where I was, he could stay where he was, and no one would ever have to know.
I felt a hand reach out and gently touch my hip in the darkness. There was someone lying on the floor next to my pillow. I tried to remember who had been sitting there before the lights went out, but couldn’t. Let’s see… who could it be? There was Travis, Luke, Sam, Ben, David… They were all good-looking, popular guys. Nobody who would want anything to do with me. I was just a normal girl, nothing special.
I wondered, self-consciously, if I was the last girl picked. If, whoever this hand belonged to, was disappointed that I was the closest one to him and he wasn’t able to get to one of the hotter girls in time.
I bit my lip, feeling nervous as his arms timidly wrapped around my waist. He gently pulled me off my giant pillow and I landed next to him on the carpet. My back leaned against the pillow and my chest pressed against his. I could feel the nervous tension between us. If ever there was a time I wanted the world to open up and swallow me whole, yep — right there.
But then something happened that changed my mood. He kissed me. Even in the darkness, his mouth found mine on the first try. It felt like our lips were drawn to each other by magnetic force. When his tongue touched mine, I wasn’t grossed out. My body felt like it was melting into his like ice cream. He tasted like cherry Kool-Aid and smelled like Hugo Boss. This guy knew what he was doing. And I liked what he was doing.
I didn’t know who he was, but I knew I liked kissing him. It was different than the other guys somehow. It was neater, slower, more determined, but less frantic. And when he rolled us over so that he was on top of me, I felt something, and I sort of wanted to tear his clothes off in an animalistic rage.
He was hard in his pants. I could feel it when he pressed into me. It made me dizzy and I was surprised how hard it felt. When we learned about erections in sex-ed classes, I thought they got sort of plump, like a bratwurst off the grill. I wasn’t expecting it to feel this hard. This felt like steel. And if there was any truth to the romance novels I’d bought from a used book store over the summer, that piece of steel was probably as smooth as velvet. I’d have to wait to find out though. It would take more than a few sips of vodka to give me the courage I’d need for direct penile contact.
I pushed the sounds of the others out of my mind and pretended we were the only two in the room. When he slid his hands under my shirt, I didn’t even mind. When he pushed my shirt up, pulled the cup of my bra down, and slid his tongue across my nipple, I really didn’t mind it. Maybe I could rethink that part about courage and try to find out what was in his pants.
I slid my hand between us and under the waistband of his jeans, and he did the same to me. I didn’t think about germs at all. And when he hit the right spot, I wished I knew who he was so I could yell out his name in appreciation.
That was when Hope had had enough. “I’m clapping my hands in five,” she announced, and began to count down.
He froze for a second, and then quickly removed his hand. I zipped and buttoned my jeans and was back up on my pillow just as the countdown landed on one.
Clap, clap. The lights went on. I avoided the eyes of everyone else. I chipped at my nail polish. Hope turned the movie back on, but I was afraid to look around at the others. Their silence made it all that much worse. I couldn’t stand to be in that basement another second.
I grabbed my plastic cup off the floor and stood up. “I’m going to get a refill,” I mumbled as I headed for the basement steps. I walked up to the kitchen to pour myself another drink. A strong one. I needed it.
I was standing at the counter, with my back to the basement steps, when I heard someone coming up. Too embarrassed to face anyone in the harsh lights of the kitchen, I drank my Kool-Aid right there at the counter without turning around.
I heard the footsteps, slow and deliberate, come up behind me, and then a hand on my ass encouraged me to turn around and face my mystery make-out man. So I did.
Ben. Ben Ogea stood before me. I was too afraid to look up at his face, but I knew it was him from the Jim Morrison quote on his t-shirt. “This is the strangest life I’ve ever known.”
I looked down at his black Chuck Taylor shoes. Someone had used an ink pen to draw chemical symbols on the white part of the shoes. Ben was the smartest guy in our class. He was a year younger than us because he’d skipped the second grade. But he wasn’t one of those geeky pocket protector carrying kind of smart people who made everyone else around him feel stupid. He made getting a 4.0 look cool.
Ben didn’t usually hang out with us and I couldn’t remember us ever having had a conversation in the past. But I knew who he was. Everybody did.
I glanced up at him shyly while still keeping my head down. He smiled. Jim Morrison had a strange life, and Ben Ogea had a wicked smile, wicked sexy. I returned his smile with a shy one of my own. Then he put his finger up to his mouth and… and he licked it. Uhhh… what?
With a hand on each one of my hips, he leaned down and kissed me one last time. Then he walked backwards away from me until he reached the stairs, before he turned and walked out the back door.
We never spoke to each other that night. And we never spoke after it. But I’d wanted to finish what we’d started ever since.
Friday, October 31, 2014
7:47 A.M.
“I guess we have two Elsas in first grade today,” Ben said when they arrived at our corner. Lucie and Olive were both wearing the exact same turquoise store-bought costume.
I knew there would be a whole lot more than two Elsas in the first grade, and in every other grade, but I didn’t correct him.
“I like your braid,” Olive said to Lucie. Her own dark hair was in a high ponytail. “My daddy doesn’t know how to braid.”
I looked up at Ben and he shrugged ruefully.
I looked at my watch. We had a few minutes to spare. “Do you want a braid like Lucie’s?” I asked Olive.
She nodded shyly.
I knelt down on the sidewalk and pulled a brush from my purse. She stood still as I quickly braided her hair over to the side like Lucie’s.
A few minutes earlier I’d felt like I failure when I couldn’t get Lucie’s crown braid to look red-carpet-ready. The way Olive looked at me when I finished with her braid, it made me feel like a hero instead.
Ben looked at me the same way and I’d be a liar if I said it didn’t give my belly the squirmies.
“Thanks,” he muttered when we continued walking. “I watched some videos online, but my fingers just don’t coordinate right.”
He had actually tried to learn how to braid? I didn’t personally know any other single fathers with young daughters, but I didn’t imagine most of them braided hair.