Nothing More Than Alright

February 11, 2024 Leave a comment

A short story . . .

My father, on the nights when my mother goes to bridge club, makes creamed chipped beef with peas on toast for supper. He told me one time that in the military it’s called “shit on a shingle” or SOS for short. He makes me eat it even though I can’t stomach peas or the dried beef or the gravy and I’m not a soldier. Tonight again, my mother is at bridge club and I’m sitting here with SOS.

After looking at my plate for a long time, I move the peas out of the gravy, off the toast and onto the plate with my knife. I’m hoping I won’t have to eat them. The kitchen phone rings and I jump to answer it. My best friend Janey wants to know if I want to go with her and her boyfriend Nick to watch West Side Story at the Sky-Hi Drive-In. I say I sure do and hang up. My father doesn’t want me on the phone during supper.

The peas are cold and clammy now and I say I they’re cold and clammy and I can’t eat them. My father tilts his head down and tells me to eat them. I want to say no but I need his okay to go to the movie. So, I stab some peas with my fork and swirl them in the flour gravy and then I eat the green-grey mush with a bite of toast. I gag. I drink some milk and wash it down. My father lifts his head and says “alright”. I clear the dishes and wash them. I’ve done what he wanted, so now I can ask him about Friday night. But I wait until he’s sitting in front of the TV.

An hour later, my father is in the basement watching TV. I sit with him and ask about his movie. He says troops have been ordered to risk their lives and retake a hill that’s not important in the battle. I ask him why. He says it shows the enemy their resolve to continue to fight if an agreement is not reached in negotiations.

A Marlboro commercial comes on and I ask him about Friday night. He wants to know about the movie. I tell him it’s a musical about people fighting, dancing and falling in love and he says “Okay. Ask your mother when she come home from playing bridge.”

My mother finally gets home and I tell her about Friday night. She says she knows the movie. “Saw it with a friend when it came out in ’61,” she says. She knows Janey and Nick and she says it’s okay with her that I go.

Saturday night Nick’s car pulls into the driveway. He honks the horn and I yell “They’re here”. My father yells from the basement “Have a good time honey. Call if there is a problem.” Mom, on the phone with someone, yells for me to come straight home after the movie. I yell back “I will.”

I get in the back seat of Nick’s Chevy and we drive off – but not in the direction of the Sky-Hi. I ask where we’re going. Janey turns to me and says that Nick asked his friend Tom to come along. He had nothing to do, Nick says. I immediately panic. I wonder if I look alright.

I have a face full of pimples and a bony nose that’s too big for my face. I wonder if I used enough concealer. The green top I’m wearing is wrinkled. It was at the bottom of my closet. And the jeans I’m wearing are worn thin. I was expecting to sit in the dark and watch a movie with Nick and Janey.

We pull up to a ranch house on the other side of town. Nick honks the horn. A skinny blonde-haired guy walks out the front door and down the front walk. “Here’s Tom,” Janey says.

Tom gets in the back seat. Janey introduces Tom. I don’t know him from school. I give him a quick smile and then give Janey a stare. She just winks back at me. She knows I don’t have a boyfriend.

Tom is neatly dressed. He’s wearing a button-down shirt, khaki pants and loafers. His boxy glasses make him look like a bookworm. In junior high school he’d be called “a climber” and Nick “a greaser.”

The Twin Theater Sky-Hi Drive In is on the west end of our town. On the way we listen to the AM radio. A Chicago station plays Born to Be Wild and I Will Always Think About You. Tom and I sit quietly in the back. I suck in my lips and look out my window. The cloudy sky looks like flour gravy.

We arrive at Sky-Hi and pay for our tickets. Nick drives over to a center spot in the East Theater. Nick and Tom say they’re going to the concession stand. They ask what we want. Janey and I ask for Cokes and popcorn. I hand Nick some money and they head off. The guys return after twenty minutes just as the coming attractions start. I roll down my window and Tom hands me the Coke and popcorn. I say thank you. He gets into the back seat on the other side of the car.

Janey’s been sitting next to Nick the whole time he’s been driving. Now Nick puts his arm around Janey’s shoulder and they snuggle together. Janey asks “are you guys okay back there?” I say I have to move over to see the screen. I look at Tom and he gives me a nod that says it’s okay. I scooch over to the middle of the back seat and put my legs to the left side of the floor hump. “That’s better,” I say.

Finally, the movie begins. There’s an overture and then the Jets sing about being a Jet and beating up other gangs. The Jets and the Sharks want to fight each other for control of the streets. But first they go to a dance. It’s a musical, so I guess it doesn’t have to make sense.

At the dance, Tony of the Jets meets Maria, Bernardo’s sister. Bernardo is the head of the Puerto Rican Shark gang. Tony and Maria fall in love at first sight. Nobody is happy about that except Tony and Maria. Tony’s half in half out about the gang stuff but he’s all in on Maria. He wants to run away with her.

Tony and Maria start singing Tonight and I stop eating popcorn. I put my hand down on the car seat so I can lean forward and hear what’s coming from the speaker. My little finger touches Tom’s little finger. He takes my hand into his. We stay this way, looking at the movie and holding hands, until the movie ends and headlights turn on.

It’s past midnight when we leave Sky-HI. Nick says he’ll drive me home first. I go back and sit behind Nick. Tom looks out his window. Everyone is quiet. Nick turns on the radio. Ain’t Nothing Like the Real Thing comes on. I suck in my lips and look out my window. On the way home I see a car with one headlight and say “perdiddle.”  Janey and Nick kiss.

At home I get out of the car and say thanks to Janey and Nick and goodnight to Tom. Tom says good night looking at Nick and Janey.

I go inside and hear the TV on in the basement. I walk down the hallway to my bedroom. My mother is sitting in her bed reading her magazines. She sees me and asks “Susan, how was it?” I poke my head into the room and tell her it was alright.

“Just alright? Nothing more?” she asks.

“Nothing more than alright” I say.

“Okay,” she says. “Now go to bed. It’s late. Tomorrow’s another day.”

As I walk away she reminds me that she has bridge club again tomorrow night. I say okay.

In my room I take the ticket stub out of my jeans pocket. I find a pen and write on the back of the stub West Side Story Tom. I pull my keepsake box out from under the bed and put the ticket stub inside along with the Valentine cards from third grade and my second-place medals from clarinet solo contests and some poems I wrote. I close the box and put it back.

I go to bed thinking about the movie and Tom and peas on my plate.

©Jennifer Ann Johnson, Kingdom Venturers, 2024, All Rights Reserved

Filed under Short Story, short story, Valentines Day, Writing Tagged with , , , , , , ,

Somewhere in the Lost World of Love

February 4, 2024 Leave a comment

Love. Is it die-cut like the Valentine cards of grade school? Is it cliché like pop music? Is it a potion we constantly thirst for? Is it intoxication and under its influence we are not in our right minds? Is love passion? Sentimental? Carnal? Absolute? “What do any of us really know about love?” 

The last question is raised during a conversation between two couples. Their dialog and the juxtaposition of the couple’s ideas about love are found in Raymond Carver’s 1981 short story What We Talk About When We Talk About Love. Carver has us listen in.

We learn from narrator Nick that he and his wife Laura are spending the afternoon at Mel and Terri’s home. Both couples live in Albuquerque, but as Nick says and the ‘love’ dialog relates, they “were all from somewhere else”.

Nick tells us that Mel McGinnis is a forty-five-year-old cardiologist who, before medical school, spent five years in seminary. Terri is his second wife. We later learn that Mel was married before to Majorie and has two children. His movements are usually precise when he hasn’t been drinking. 

Terri, we learn, was previously in an abusive relationship with a guy named Ed. He would beat her and drag her around the room by her ankles, all the while professing his love for her.

Mel and Terri have been married for four years.

Nick tells us about Laura and their relationship: she’s a legal secretary who’s thirty-five and three years younger than he is. He says they’re in love, they like each other and enjoy each other’s company. “She’s easy to be with.” They’ve been married for eighteen months. 

Beside the four adults, sunlight and gin figure in the story.

As the story begins, the four are sitting around a kitchen table. Sunlight fills the room. Gin and tonic water are being passed around. The subject of love comes up.

(I get the sense that the older couple have argued a lot about what love is and now want to air it all again in front of the younger couple. It seems they have things they want to get off their chest. Is that why the cheap gin is being passed around? Are Nick and Laura in place to be the arbiters of who’s right and who’s wrong?)

The heart doctor Mel, based on “the most important years of his life” in seminary, thinks that “real love was nothing less than spiritual love”.  (This signals that love’s definition may not be solid.)

Terri believes that Ed, the man who tried to kill her, loved her. She asks “What do you do with love like that? Mel responds that Ed’s treatment could not be called love.

Terri then makes excuses for Ed’s behavior – “People are different”. She defends him – “he may have acted crazy. Okay. But he loved me.”

We begin to notice a growing tension between Mel and Terri. (There has been tension in their marriage about Ed and Marjorie before this.)

Mel relates that Ed threatened to kill him. Mel reaches for more gin and becomes antagonistic himself. He calls Terri a romantic for wanting brutal reminders of Ed’s love. Then he smiles at her hoping she won’t get mad. Terri responds to Mel, not with a rejection of his or of Ed’s behavior, but with what might have been her leave-the-door-open enabling response to Ed after one of his physical attacks: “Now he wants to make up.” Her past relationship reveals the continuous nature of Terri’s emotional deficit.

(Does Mel know how to land verbal blows on Terri like Ed did physically?)

Mel tries to soften the blow by calling Terri “honey” and by saying again that what Ed did wasn’t love. He then asks Nick and Laura what they think.

Nick says he doesn’t know the man or the situation to make a decision. Laura says the same and adds “who can judge anyone else’s situation?” Nick touches her hand and she smiles.

Nick picks up her “warm” hand, looks at the polished and manicured nails and then holds her hand. With this display of affection, Nick shows his love and respect for Laura, the opposite of the emotional and physical abuse Terri suffered at the hands of Ed.

Mel posits that his kind of love is absolute and nonviolent. (Then again, emotional abuse doesn’t kill or leave physical bruises.)

Terri and Mel describe Ed’s two attempts at suicide. Terri talks with sympathy for the guy. “Poor Ed” she says. Mel won’t have any of it: “He was dangerous.” Mel says they were constantly threatened by Ed. They lived like fugitives, he says. Mel bought a gun.

Terri stands by her illusion that Ed loved her – just not the same way that Mel loves her.

They go to relate that Ed’s first suicide attempt -drinking rat poison – was “bungled”. This puts him in the hospital. Ed recovers. The second attempt is a shot in the mouth in a hotel room. Mel and Terri fight over whether she will sit at his hospital bedside. She ends up there.

Mel reiterates that Ed was dangerous. Terri admits they were afraid of Ed. Mel wants nothing to do with Ed’s kind of love. Terri, on the other hand, reiterates that Ed loved her – in an odd way perhaps but he was willing to die for it. He does die.

Mel grabs another bottle of gin.

Laura says that she and Nick know what love is. She bumps Nick’s knee for his response. He makes a show of kissing Laura’s hand. The two bump knees under the table. Nick strokes Laura’s thigh.

Terri teases them, saying that things will be different after the honeymoon period of their relationship. Then, with a glass of gin in hand, she says “only kidding”. Mel opens a new bottle of gin and proposes a toast “to true love.”

The glow of the afternoon sun and of young love in the room makes them feel warm and playful, like kids up to something.

Matters-of-the-heart Mel wants to tell them “what real love is”. He goes on about what happens to the love between couples who break up. After all, he once loved his ex-wife, Marjorie, and Terri once loved Ed. Nick and Laura were also both married to other people before they met each other.

He pours himself more gin and wipes the “love is” slate clean with “What do any of us really know about love?” He – the gin Mel – talks about physical love, attraction, carnal love, sentimental love, and memory of past love. Terri wonders if Mel is drunk. Mel says he’s just talking. Laura tries to cheer Mel by saying she and Nick love him. Mel responds saying he loves them too. He picks up his glass of gin.

Mel now gets around to his example of love, an example that he says should shame anyone who thinks they know what they are talking about when they talk about love. Terri asks him to not talk drunk. (Is Mel, focused only on himself and his gin, becoming a slurring, stammering and cursing drunk?) He tells her to shut up.

Mel begins his story of an old couple in a major car wreck brought on by a kid. Terri looks over at Nick and Laura for their reaction. Nick thinks Terri looks anxious. Mel hands the bottle of gin around the table.

Mel was on call that night. He details the extensive wounds. The couple is barely alive. After saying that seat belts saved the lives of the couple, he then makes a joke of it. Terri responds affirmatively to Mel and they kiss.

Mel goes on about the old couple. Despite their serious injuries, he says, they had “incredible reserves” – they had a 50/50 chance of making it.

Mel wants everyone to drink up the cheap gin and then go to dinner. He talks about a place he knows. Terri says they haven’t eaten there yet. The heart doctor’s coherence dissipates with each drink.

He says he likes food and that he’d be a chef if he had to do things all over again. Then he says he wants to come back in another life as a medieval knight. Knights, he says, were safe in armor and they had their ladies. As he talks, Mel uses the word “vessels”. Terri corrects him with “vassals”. Mel dismisses her correction with some profanity and false modesty.

Nick counters the heart doctors fantasy by saying that knights could suffer a heart attack in the hot armor and they could fall of a horse and not get back up because it is heavy.  

Mel responds to Nick and Terri, acknowledging it would be terrible to be a knight, that some “vassal” would spear him in the name of love. More profanity. More gin.

Laura wants Mel to return to old couple story. The sunlight in the room is thinning. (And so is “love’s” illumination.)

Terri gets on Mel’s nerves with something she said jokingly. Mel hits on Laura saying he could easily fall in love with her if Terri and Nick weren’t in the picture. He’d carry her off knight-like. (Terri and Nick, of course, are sitting right there.)

Mel, with more vulgarity, finally returns to his anecdote. The old couple are covered head to toe in casts and bandages with little eye, nose and mouth holes. The husband is depressed, but not about his extensive injuries. He’s depressed because he cannot see his wife through his little eye holes. Mel is clearly blown away by this kind of love. He asks the other three if they see what he’s talking about. They just stare at him.

Sunlight is leaving the room. Nick acknowledges that they were all “a little drunk”.

Mel wants everyone to finish off the gin and then go eat. Terri says he’s depressed, needs a pill. Mel wants to call his kids, who live with his ex-wife and her new boyfriend.  Teri cautions Mel about taking to Marjorie – it’ll make him more depressed.

Terris says that Marjorie, because she isn’t remarried, is bankrupting them. Mel, who says he once loved Marjorie, fantasizes about Majorie dying after being stung by a swarm of bees, as she’s allergic to bees. Mel then shows with his hands on Terri’s neck how it would happen to “vicious” Marjorie.

Mel decides against phoning his children and mentions about going out to eat again. Nick is OK with eating or drinking more. Laura is hungry. Terri mentions putting out cheese and crackers put she never gets up to do this. Mel spills his glass of gin on the table – “Gin’s gone”. Terri wonders what’s next.

As the story ends, daylight (illumination) is gone from the kitchen. The four are ‘in the dark’ about what love really is. The conversation is also gone after Mel’s futile attempts to talk about love in any satisfying way and the inability of two characters to move on from the past and with two characters wondering what’s next.

The only sound Nick hears is the sound of human hearts beating (somewhere in the Lost World of Love).

~~~~

This story, though not of “Christian” genre, certainly would resonate with many readers. Do you relate to anyone in the story?

Terri understood Ed’s abusive and suicidal behavior as him being passionate about love. Mel, the heart doctor and would-be knight, showed himself idealistic and ignorant about the realities of the ‘heart’ and not loving towards Terri. Nick and Laura revealed the affection and passion of the heady first days of romance love. The old couple possessed an enduring love for each other after many years of marriage.

Why would I, as a Christian, gravitate to a ‘worldly’ author like Raymond Carver, especially when his stories are filled with alcohol? One reason is that I recognize myself in many of his stories. I see elements of myself at various stages of my life in each of the characters above. I could pretend to see myself otherwise, as I think some Christians do.

Another reason is that Carver writes about working class people. He doesn’t write down to people. His writes stories of domestic American life with its passions, fears, foibles, and fantasies. He writes with realism about human nature, revealing the old self that I must recognize in myself to put away.

I find his writing sobering, as in his story Where I’m Calling From.

~~~~~

RARE: Raymond Carver Reads “What We Talk About When We Talk About Love” (youtube.com)

what-we-talk-about-when-we-talk-about-love-carver-by-raymond-carver-1Download

~~~~~

Men need sex. And it’s their wives’ job to give it to them—unconditionally, whenever they want it, or these husbands will come under Satanic attack.

Stunningly, that’s the message contained in many Christian marriage books. Yet, research shows that instead of increasing intimacy in marriages, messages like these are promoting abuse.

In this edition of The Roys Report, featuring a talk from our recent Restore Conference, author Sheila Wray Gregoire provides eye-opening insights based on her and her team’s extensive research on evangelicalism and sex.

How Christian Teachings on Sex Enable Abuse | The Roys Report (julieroys.com)

How Christian Teachings on Sex Enable Abuse | The Roys Report

Filed under Literature, Raymond Carver, Valentines Day Tagged with , , , , , , , ,

How Can I Be Sure?

February 22, 2017 Leave a comment

 

Thomas found Harking Café and went in. He found Julia at a table eating a salad as big as her head. He sat down and, as usual, waited for her to begin the conversation. Two hours before Julia had called wanting to talk to her childhood friend Thomas about her Jeffery.

Julia, her mouth full, waved to Thomas with her fork. After several bites she started. “You know,”…,”Jeffery hasn’t said anything but I think he doesn’t love me.”

“And, what makes you think that?” Thomas asked.

“I have a feeling that he wants out of our relationship.”

“What gives you that impression?” Thomas looked puzzled.

“He’s avoiding me.” Julia tapped the air with her fork.

“Avoiding you as in not being with you? You two are married.”

“He’s avoiding me by not seeing what I need before I have to ask.”

“Mind reading is not easy. See.” Thomas cupped his hands around her salad bowl and closed his eyes. “I got nothing.”

“Jeffery should at least know how I feel. I don’t feel loved. Aren’t I supposed to feel loved in a marriage.” Julia took another bite.

“Maybe you have never been loved like this before.” Thomas put the menu in front of his face.

Julia stopped chewing, raised her brows and looked at Thomas.

“Oh, I know what love is and what I feel isn’t love. It is more like Jeffery puts up with me.”

When the waitress came, Thomas ordered a sandwich and then winced. High-pitched screams had come from across the room. Two young girls were fighting over the syrup bottle.

The waitress snarled, “Its Kids Eat Free day at Harking.” She put her hand on her hip and looked around. “We supply the food, you supply the environment. This is what I put up with every Tuesday.” She grabbed the menu from the table and was off.

“Have you talked to Jeffery about all this?” Thomas continued where Julia left off.

“Oh, yeah. He says he doesn’t understand what I am talking about. He says he loves me. He says he goes to work every day to provide for us and then comes home to me. It’s nice that he takes care of things but that isn’t what I mean by being loved. I need more.

And, when I ask Jeffery, he says he isn’t thinking of someone else when we make love. But, how can I be sure?”

Thomas looked out the window and thought. “I really don’t want to go there, do I?”  After some long slow chewing he looked at Julia and asked. “Do you think of someone else when you make love with Jeffery?”

“Sometimes. I mean, it’s just women’s fantasy stuff, you know? Paperback novel chick flick stuff, not real guys.”

Thomas pressed her.  “But, do you think of Jeffery when, you know…?”

After a long silence between bites, Julia said, “In a way I guess. It’s hard for me to visualize him when I’m not sure he’s thinking of me.

“You say that as if you know what Jeffery thinks.”

“Jeffery’s a guy. You know how guys are.”

“Tell me.

“Did I tell you that my father was never around because of his sales job?”

“Yes, the last time we talked.”

“Mom told me countless times that she couldn’t count on dad except for his paycheck.”

“Jeff is home for you at night. Do you take advantage of that?”

“I want him to sit with me and watch TV. He likes to go into the garage and work on his car.”

“Maybe, you two should find something you enjoy together. Take a mind reading class together.”

“Yeah, right. It wouldn’t take a mind reader to see that I like certain things a certain way. Isn’t that why he married me – to take care of me? In any case I don’t see him changing. Talking with him hasn’t changed anything. I don’t think he listens to me.”

“Why do you say that?”

“He’s distant, like he doesn’t know how to respond. Maybe he just doesn’t want to be bothered.”

Julia grabbed her purse and got up from the table.

“I’m going to grab a smoke. I’ll be right back.”

Thomas looked down at his half-eaten sandwich. He wondered if this conversation would finish him off.

After several minutes, Julia returned.

“There’s this guy outside,…Bill. He is having the same thing going on in his marriage. He doesn’t feel loved by his wife. He says his wife doesn’t understand him. We have a lot in common.”

Thomas, hoping to change the subject, asked Julia how her telemarketing job was going.

Julia was quick to reply. “Try selling something that people don’t want over the phone. They don’t know you and you are trying to get them to take a credit card offer and one with a 26 percent finance charge. I don’t like manipulating people.”

Thomas choked on his ice tea and covered his mouth with his napkin. He set the glass down on the table.

Julia continued. “Maybe Jeffery thinks he is better than me. Maybe he is better than me. Maybe that is why he doesn’t love me. He must think that I am not worthy of his love.”

“Didn’t you say he brought you flowers the other day?”

“He did. The flowers…I need more than the thought behind it, you know? So, I have a weekend planned for us. I made a reservation at a resort for this weekend.”

“Jeff never mentioned that to me when I saw him yesterday.”

“Oh, he doesn’t know yet. I’ll tell him tonight and see how he responds. If he balks, well…that will tell me everything.”

The waitress came with the check.

“Here”, Thomas offered, “let me pay. I read your mind.” Thomas grabbed her check off the table.

“Thanks.”

Julia’s phone rang. “Hi Liz. Yeah, let’s get together and talk. See you at Lou’s in about an hour.” Julia ended the call.

“Oh, before I go Thomas, I have to tell you about my dream last night.”

“There’s no sense holding anything back at this point,” Thomas said with a wink.

“I was on the platform at the Metra station. There was a large clock above me. Jeffery was somewhere inside the station paying for our tickets. A conductor leaned out the door of the train and asked me, “How can you be sure?” I looked around for Jeffery and then saw my mother. She told me, “You can’t count on tickets, kiddo.

Then the train started moving, I looked backed for Jeffery and saw my dad. He was the conductor. Then I went through a turnstile and boarded the train alone. I sat down next to a fortune-teller and I asked, “Where are we going?”  She said, “If you don’t know where you are going any train will take you there.” And then I woke up.”

“Someone is reading your mind.” Thomas put his tongue in his cheek.

Julia pulled her compact from her purse and checked her look. She then got up from the table.

“Thanks Thomas for…” Julia pointed a swirling finger at the table. “Gotta go.”

Thomas stood up. “You know where I can be found.” But, Julia had already walked out the door.

“Or, maybe not.”

 

 

 

 

© Jennifer A. Johnson, 2017, All Rights Reserved

Filed under Short Story Tagged with ,

Never My Love

February 12, 2017 Leave a comment

 

The first day of Junior High School Darren left his house and found the end of the “stand quietly” line waiting for him. That is where he put the French horn case down. On the walk to school the bell of the case had banged his left leg. The pain in his shin reminded him that his band director, who liked to tap out tempo on his head, had decided that Darren would play French horn and not his trumpet. “We need French horn players,” said Mr. Palmer, the Jr. High band director. And, when Darren sat second chair behind first chair Diane in the horn section he became aware of his loss.

As Darren walked from class to class that first day he looked around and began to wonder: “What am I supposed to be? What am I supposed to wear or even say? What are troll dolls?” Juan, who was in most of the same classes as Darren, would fill him.

“Look, if you are a greaser you wear all black.” Juan fell back into his chair so that Darren could see. Sure enough. Juan wore black pants, a black shirt, a black leather jacket that never came off, black pointed shoes and the telltale sign of all greaserhood – black socks.

“Look.” Juan pointed to Bill across the room. “That is a climber. He wears white socks and does sports. Sometimes climbers wear paisley shirts. They are freakin’ flowery.”

Darren now knew the social code but wasn’t sure what he was. With Juan being in most of the same classes he decided that day that he should be a greaser. So, that night he told his mom he needed lots of black socks and plain “No flowers” shirts. He wanted Juan and one teacher to like him.

Darren’s seventh-grade Spanish teacher was a larger than life blonde who, Darren thought, must have noticed that Darren was in her class. After all, someone with shocking red-orange hair stood out. Newly purchased hair goop would put in check his cowlick.

Darren learned his Spanish verbs and infinitives. He learned Spanish adjectives as fast as he could. He needed no incentive. To speak the Romance language in class invoked a passion he had never felt before. “Señorita, eres hermosa!” Darren would daydream his devotion to her.

Geography class offered a different topology. Mrs. Foley contained significant geography on her person. Unmercifully, the kids would snicker, “Fatty Foley,” under their breaths. Then uncontrollable giggling would ensue until the yard stick smacked the bulletin board.

In the halls, between periods, notes were passed and looks connected. If you received a note from a third party that meant that someone wanted to go steady with you. That is what Juan told Darren. So, when Darren received his first note he was at once terrified and curious. He did not know what “going steady” meant. He wasn’t going to ask Juan and look stupid. The black socks kept Darren from doing any such thing.

It wasn’t till lunch period that day that Darren unraveled the note and read it. Therein, he found out that Mary K liked him and wanted to go steady. Mary K played first chair flute in the band. Darren became filled with dread as he thought about going to band rehearsal after lunch. He had no response or “going steady” in him. When the bell rang he went to rehearsal pretending that he hadn’t gotten the note. But the pretense didn’t last long.

Mary stared at Darren from her chair. The girls around her were giggling. Darren felt his face become lobster red. He could do nothing about it except hide behind the music stand and empty the spit out of his horn tubes.

After practice Mary waited for Darren at the bottom of the risers. As she waited Darren took every single tube off his French horn and blew through each one slowly. Then he began to polish the horn never looking up. When the next period bell rang he looked up over the stand and there was Mary.

“Will you walk me home after school? Mary asked.

“Sure, I guess, sure.” Darren then rushed off to shop class leaving Mary and her gaggle of friends.

Later, not sure of what was coming next, Darren gathered up his homework, shut his locker and picked up his horn. He waited at the main entrance not knowing when Mary was done with her classes. She appeared twenty minutes later.

“Hey, I’m ready.” Mary looked at Darren and the two left the building.

Darren had no idea where Mary lived. He had no idea if this walk meant that he was “going steady.” He didn’t say anything in case her liking him would change. The walk took them across town.

“If you have a ring I will wear it,” Mary said as they neared her house. Darren had no ring. He had black socks.

“Yeah, OK, right,” Darren replied and said, “See you tomorrow.”

By now Darren’s arm shoulders and arms were aching. Carrying the horn across town had worn them out. He took his time getting home. At home, he reassured himself, no one was to know about this. He couldn’t explain it anyway. And, there was his hunger to take care of.

The next day, Darren found his way to his first period English class and to his seat. Juan was already there in the seat behind him.

“Hey, are you going steady with a climber girl?”

“What?”

“Mary is a cheerleader, man.”

“How would I know that?” With that Darren turned to the front of the class and hoped he never had to go steady again. But then again, he did like it, in a greaser kind of way.

 

Between second and third period class Darren received another note. This time it was a direct note from another Mary – Mary E.  Mary E was also in the band. She played clarinet.

Band rehearsal loomed on the horizon, 12:30 that day. There was no escaping this “going steady” business. And now there was a decision to be made – Mary or Mary or feign strep throat coming on.

At 12:30 Darren walked into the band room and over to his chair. There was another note. It was right on his stand. “Now what?”, he quietly muttered. When he did, Diane looked over at him. The note was from Diane. She wanted to go steady.

The “going steady” madness continued for Darren throughout seventh and eighth grade. His arms never stopped aching. It was no relief to learn that girls in Junior High School were fickle and flighty, especially if you didn’t give them a ring. No matter. The black socks remained a social staple for Darren.

During the summer after eighth grade graduation, Darren tried out for the High School Concert Band. He played all the major and minor scales so flawlessly on his new B♭ Bach trumpet that Mr. Gies awarded him first chair. The trumpet had been a graduation gift from Darren’s father who must have known what “going steady” meant.

 

 

 

 

 

© Jennifer A. Johnson, 2017, All Rights Reserved

Filed under Holiday, Music, Short Story, Valentines Day Tagged with , , ,

Love – Backlit, Natural and Nearly Impossible- To The Wonder

May 12, 2013 Leave a comment

Terrence Malick’s To The Wonder  

Using Scripture references, natural backlighting and encompassing music,  (and yes there are characters) Terrence Malick once again, as in The Tree of Life, helps us to reflect on life and especially now on love: 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XDWpgZROyR0

Filed under Cinema Tagged with , , , , ,

Let’s Make Some Music, Man!

September 24, 2010 Leave a comment

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hC2nFFu-mj4

(One day, a long time ago, my father came home with The Music Man LP. He had won it as a prize during an office Christmas party. I believe this LP is the first record that I ever heard played on a stereo. In fact, my dad bought a small turntable to play the LP. I played the album unceasingly.)(I was big Trouble in River City!)

Filed under Romance Tagged with , , ,

Lonely

July 8, 2009 Leave a comment

Living gniviL

Only. .ylnO

Never reveN

Even nevE

Loving gnivoL

You. .uoY

 

*****

© Sally Paradise, 2010, All Rights Reserved

Filed under Human Interest, Poems, Romance Tagged with , ,

Timing is Everything

June 25, 2009 Leave a comment

Timing is Everythingwedding-flowers

I

Monday morning Tom and Linda left the train station and walked to work in a constant sprinkle of rain. Walking together, Tom juggled an umbrella and their usual conversation.

“I’m not joking.” Tom was holding Linda’s hand when he snapped at her.

“I don’t think you are. I just think that we should wait, that’s all.” Linda countered.

“We are going to get married next July. Why don’t we just move in together? We can save some money for the wedding.”

“I want to be with you, Tom, but I think we should wait.”

“I love you Linda, don’t you know that?”

“Sure, I do.”

“Then, what’s the problem? Why are we waiting?”

“I want to make sure it’s real, that’s all,” Linda said.

“Huh? This is the real thing, isn’t it?” Tom asked.

“It’s becoming more real as we go on, Tom,” Linda explained, “but something tells me to wait till our wedding day.”

“You love me, don’t you?” Tom queried.

“Of course I do.” Linda replied, “My heart and my mind are telling me to wait and my . . . my…,” Linda leaned into Tom and whispered, “my body wants to go ahead.” Then with a smile she said, “It’s a two to one decision. Anyway, I want to be secure in our love and not just in the thought that we are living together. This engagement time will help us get to know each other better. It’s a good thing.”

Tom and Linda came up to the Dunkin Donuts and went in. They ordered two coffees: a small for Linda and a large for Tom. Linda added a small drop of cream to her cup, put a lid snuggly on top and then sat down and waited for Tom to finish fixing his coffee. Tom poured a large dose of cream into his coffee and then he grabbed five packets of sugar from the holder. He took one packet by the edge and started to shake it and then smack it against his left hand. After half a minute of settling the sugar he tore open the packet and poured the sugar into the coffee. He did the same with the other four packets. Linda waited. When the sugar packets had been poured into his coffee, Tom grabbed a stir stick and began stirring his coffee while staring at the floor. He wasn’t aware that three people were waiting behind him, waiting for the cream and sugar.

“Tom, hurry up. People are waiting.” Linda prodded from her chair.

Tom looked up to see the line of people, he said, “Sorry”, and hurriedly put a lid on his cup. He gathered up his backpack and walked over to the table where Linda was sitting, looked at his watch and said, “I’m ready. Let’s go.”

Linda smiled in response and then gathered up her bag and her coffee. They headed out the door and down the street to work. Tom, a business consultant and an investment counselor for real estate investment trusts, worked with several clients creating the investment trust contracts. Linda was an information technology support person in an engineering firm. They both worked in the same building in downtown Chicago. Tom had a small office on the 16th floor and Linda’s cube was on the 23rd floor. They rode the elevator together each morning.

Heading into the elevator that morning Linda moved to fill a space made by two others on the elevator. Tom came in as the door was closing and turned to face the front of the car. As he did this his backpack hit the coffee cup in the hand of a short woman standing behind Tom. Tom didn’t notice but Linda couldn’t help notice. She received some of the hot coffee on her new linen skirt.

“Tom, be careful. Look what happened.”

Again, Tom swirled around in the elevator and nearly hit another cup off coffee out of someone’s hand.

“Tom, that backpack is a nuisance in this elevator. Please be careful.”

“Sorry.” With those words, Tom left the elevator on the 16th floor and said again, “Sorry I’ll see you at lunch.”

“Bye Tom, call me.”

Tom reached his office, unlocked the door and turned on the overhead light. He noticed his wall plaque; the mounted gold crow bar glinting yellow under the fluorescent light. Inscribed beneath the crowbar in the plaque’s mahogany wood were the words, “Leverage Everything”. He set his umbrella down and took off his wet top coat and laid it on the credenza. He could see his phone blinking a red eye at him. He sat down behind his oak desk and took his phone messages.

His office space, an eight by twelve foot room, was cozy with one window. The view was of the elevated train and a partially hidden neon sign which offered “Cheap Eats at Murphy’s Bar and Grill” in emerald green light. His client’s waiting chairs were in the main hallway with a small end table holding a dog-eared copy of Fisherman’s World magazine. Painted on the sand blown glass pane door was “TOM LANDSURE, REAL ESTATE INVESTMENT TRUSTS, A name you can trust in real estate.” Through the glass Tom could see the form of a waiting client. Tom put the phone back on the receiver and went to the door and let him in.

“Hi, Mike.” Tom welcomed him.

“Hi, Tom, Did you get my e-mail?”

“Yeah, sure did.”

“Well what do you think?”

“I think you should act on that property immediately, get the most you can out of it. You can always walk away if it doesn’t pan out – sell your share of it. The downside is losing a little time and a little money. You can always flip it for another property. If you can handle that you’ll be fine. Do you have the people lined up? You need at least one hundred investors to make a go of it.”

“Yeah, I do and you’re right. Down the road I could have great returns on this investment. If it goes south, I’ll just ditch it. No harm, no foul.”

“Sure, I’ve seen this kind of thing a dozen times before. You will do fine either way.”

“I think so. I just wanted to talk to you face to face before I made the decision to act on the property. I’m gonna go ahead and make some calls right now, get my foot in the door. Can I use your phone?

“Sure, I’m going to visit the rest room. I’ll be right back.”

One of the phone messages waiting for him when he came back to the office was from Linda. She wanted to know where they were going to eat for lunch. Before returning her call Tom talked with Mike about his new real estate investment, again encouraging him to buy while it was cheap. The deal sounded too good to pass up. They shook hands and agreed to meet again in a week to review the investment contract. Mike left and Tom reached for the phone to return Linda’s call.

“Hi, Lin, how about the usual for lunch?”

“Murphey’s? Again?”

“How about Sam’s Deli, then?

“That sounds better, let’s go there. See ya downstairs. Bye.” Linda hung up and Mike returned to his pile of contracts waiting for his review. At 11:30 am he left his office, locked the door behind him and took the elevator to the ground floor. He waited for Linda near the building reception desk. A moment later, Linda appeared.

“Tom, I’ve got a half hour today for lunch. We have to hurry.”

They half ran to Sam’s Deli a couple of blocks away. In line were a dozen or so people with numbers. Standing in line Tom happened to notice a young woman sitting alone eating her sandwich. He stared at her while standing behind Linda. After a few moments, the young woman looked up and noticed his stare. She looked over at Linda and then scrunched her face, looking back at Tom. Tom, now flush with embarrassment, tried to start a conversation with Linda in order to pretend that he wasn’t looking at the young woman.

“You know, I like the corned beef sandwich here. It is real kosher corned beef.”

“Tom, I saw you. Keep your eyes on the lunch menu up there. Linda grabbed Tom’s arm, pulled him next to her and then pointed to the menu sign hung above the grill.

“Sorry ‘bout that.” Tom whispered.

With their sandwiches they headed over to a quiet tree-lined garden outside of the art institute. They ate lunch silently looking at each other, letting the city and their thoughts do the talking.

II

Linda’s mother called Linda on Tuesday afternoon.

“Hi mom.”

“Linda, how’s work going?”

“Good mom. I received a good review this year so I’ll be getting a raise soon and I have already told my boss about next July. I will get two weeks off for the wedding and the honeymoon.”

“That sounds great. Things are coming together it looks like. How’s Tom holding out? Anything new with him?”

“He’s doing okay. He’s written more contracts so far this year than last year at this time so he’s at a good pace. His business looks promising.”

“I mean about not moving in together before the wedding?”

“Oh! Ah, he talks about it almost daily. He is pushing hard for it but I am telling him I want to wait till we are married.”

“That conversation must be hard for you.”

“It is. I want things to move forward and yet I feel like I need to stand back and get my bearings. Things are moving too fast right now.”

“I think you are dong the best thing, Linda, though it isn’t easy. Hah, I just remembered reading something out Jane Austin’s Mansfield Park last night. I’ll go get the book. Hold on for a second, Linda.”

Linda could hear her mother set the phone down on the counter, leave the kitchen and then walk down the hall. She heard her return and pick up the phone.”

“Are you there?”

“Yeah, go ahead, mom.”

“Here’s Jane: “Oh, Do not attack me with your watch. A watch is always too fast or too slow. I cannot be dictated to by a watch.” ”

III

“What do you want, Tom?”

“Huh? What do you mean?”

“What is it that can’t wait until our wedding day?”

“Ummm. . . I guess I’m just anxious to be with you, you know.”

“Good things come to those who wait, Tom. Isn’t that what they say?”

“Yeah, I guess so, but I’ve been waiting all my life for someone like you. Isn’t that long enough?”

“Then, time is on your side, Tom.”

‘You are full of quaint sayings today, aren’t you?” Tom answered.

“Well, I want our lives together to be special, that’s all. All of this is special to me. Your mother told that when you were a kid you wanted Christmas to happen right away, as soon as you saw the presents – you wanted to open the presents days or weeks before the actual day. “

“I was so excited and I wasn’t sure what I was getting. I couldn’t stand to wait and find out.” Tom responded.

“Well, you seemed to have survived that ordeal.” Linda quipped.

“Just barely, but it was cruel and unusual punishment.” With these words, Tom evoked a smile on Linda’s face.

“You’re a good guy Tom. You can still wait for your presents. And, we’ll have many Christmases together unwrapping gifts.” Linda winked at Tom.

“Yeah, just as long as they are not wrapped in flannel.” Tom winked back with a Cheshire cat smile.”

“You can be sure of that, my Tom cat,” Linda assured Tom.

“Scratch you later.” Tom kissed Linda with a smile and headed back to his office.

IV

The week of the wedding finally came. On Friday night, Tom and Linda met at the church for their wedding rehearsal. Linda’s father walked Linda down the church aisle on their musical cue. Linda was wearing the heels she would wear in the wedding. Her father kept Linda stable as she walked slowly forward. All eyes followed Linda to her place next to Tom. She hugged her father and then she took Tom’s hand in hers. The rehearsal passed like a dream sequence. Linda was only aware of the red flush of her cheeks and how hot she felt that July evening.

Afterward, Linda packed her car with some early wedding gifts and the left-over food. Tom helped her carry the trays out to the car. Linda turned to say goodnight to Tom. She cuddled up to him and looked him in the eyes. “Tomorrow I become Mrs. Linda Landsure. Now that’s an investment!”

“I have already received a great return on this investment and we haven’t even signed the contract yet.” Tom laughed.

They hugged and kissed each other. “I’m so glad that we waited,” Tom whispered in Linda’s ear, “Wow, I thought tomorrow would never come.”

“Well its midnight and its tomorrow. We’re both tired.” Linda said, “We better get home and get our beauty sleep. I don’t want bags under our eyes for the wedding pictures.”

Tom smiled in agreement. He helped Linda get into the car and he closed the door. He gave her one last kiss through the open window and then Linda drove off saying, “Don’t forget your tux shoes tomorrow.”

Tom got in his car and drove towards home, an hour away. It was midnight and he was exhausted. He found the expressway and headed west. He thought about the Linda walking down the aisle in her blue jeans and heels, her dad gently holding Linda’s hand, her nervous smile and her watery eyes. He thought about waiting for this day and how hard he had pushed her to move in with her. He was glad that she made them wait. He wanted her more and more each day. He imagined her tomorrow night in his arms, the day’s events behind them and they would finally be alone. He imagined falling asleep next to her…

At 2:30 am Linda was awakened by a phone call. The state police were on the phone. They said that a car had careened into an overpass and the driver had been killed. Every word now began pulling her heart down. They had found a wedding invitation in the car and Linda’s phone number was listed in Tom’s cell phone. They said that Tom appeared to have fallen asleep and had driven into the cement wall of the overpass at 55 mph: “I am sorry. He died instantly from a broken neck. There was a necklace in a box on the floor of the car.” Linda did not answer. “The necklace has two hearts hanging from the chain, one gold heart and one silver heart. It looks very expensive. I will bring it to you, tomorrow.”

Linda hung up the phone and stepped backward. Overcome with grief, she cried out into the morning darkness, “Tom…Tom…Tom…” She sank down to her knees and wept. When daylight came the sun’s rays began to wash her swollen red face with amber light. Linda raised her head and stood up.  She turned to leave the room. In a whisper she heard the voice of Tom:

“I have prepared a place for you.”

Sally Paradise ã 2009

Filed under Romance, Short Story Tagged with , ,

I Suppose…

June 24, 2009 Leave a comment

I suppose you believed the words you said

At the front of the church: “I do.”

Those words were waiting for you.

They stood waiting with me.

Did you know that you would shred them?

***

I suppose that if you had kept your vows

We would be forever united in words:

Words that wrap lives with ribbons of care;

Words that tie down lives with stakes in the ground;

Words that follow balloons as they become pixels of the sky

***

I suppose, had you said,

“Let’s make this work.”,

I would be walking down the aisle with you everyday.

Un-tethering balloons, staking our lives

And letting rice fleck my hair.

*****

© Sally Paradise, 2010, All Rights Reserved

Filed under marriage, Poems, Romance Tagged with , , ,

Almost like Praying

June 4, 2009 Leave a comment

Almost Like PrayingWest Side Story

It is 1967 and that’s all I know about that. I do know that I looked in the mirror tonight and I didn’t see me. What I saw was the face of a thirteen year old girl with a pony tail pulling back on acne plagued skin. The adult woman I had wanted to see was really a decrepit adolescent in the bedroom mirror. This would-be woman, this child, this me with a hint of a baby face, stood in front of her dresser preparing herself for a night with her best friend Jane and Jane’s boyfriend Mick. They invited me along, feeling sorry for me, I think, knowing that I don’t have a boyfriend. If my mirror is any gauge, my chances of getting one are slim to negative. So, I see myself sitting alone in the backseat of Mick’s Chevy Impala Caprice tonight, hiding far from view. All eyes would be focused on Jane and Mick or on Tony and Maria. The three of us were going to the Sky-Hi Drive-In on Route 53 to watch West Side Story. I am just going to try to forget myself, hide my face and just let the movie carry me away in its arms. I wish I had someone to share it with, though. Maybe the gods of love will see me alone in the back seat of Mick’s car as they look down on me from their huge screen throne. Maybe, speaking with their muted voices in merciful tones through little black boxes, they will intervene on my behalf. Or, perhaps not.

As always, I’m not sure what to do with my hair. When I was a young girl it was easy. A pony tail was easy. Now it’s up or down, ratted or flat, sophisticated or playful? And, I’m not sure whether I should be a Greaser or a Climber tonight. In my school Indian Trail Junior High everyone has to be one or the other. The Greasers wear only black: black socks, black shoes, black clothes and black leather jackets; the girls wear black tight skirts and ratted hair above their black Dracula-like mascara staked eye lashes. The Climbers, the ones like me, wear white socks, paisley, plaid and colored school clothes and letter jackets and pink makeup. It doesn’t matter if you are a Climber or a Greaser-acne shows up where it wants to. As usual, tonight I have nothing black to wear except for some Buster Brown shoes that I wear to church. The black church shoes won’t do for the drive in. So, I’ll wear my dark brown penny loafers. But, what do I do about socks? I know, I’ll wear black socks. I’ll be a Greaser and a Climber.

My face is a blotchy patchwork of pointy blemishes. I’ve had it with puberty. I need different skin. This skin isn’t working. My body and clothes are just another battle on the same front. I tug on my dryer shrunk top until I fit inside its shamrock green sheath. My jeans, which I had pulled out of the dryer half an hour ago, are still wet. They will surrender to my lower half after I complete my wrangling dance yoga inside the resisting denim. I’ve done this before.

My friends are going to show up in fifteen minutes and I still am still not made up. This is the first time I would be at a drive-in without my parents. I am pacing myself to the AM radio: Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell are singing, “Ain’t nothing like the real thing, baby… I’ve got to move faster.

I find my purse and I am trying to find my cotton candy pink lipstick somewhere inside. My mom convinced my dad that I was old enough to wear lipstick. Lipstick and some cover stick. (The lipstick was like Chapstick, my mom tells my father. He’s not sure. “It’s good for her lips.” Mom goes on. “Every girl needs cover stick, too.”) No mascara. No blush. No eye shadow. Yet. I dab my face with the cover stick trying to hit every red spot at least twice. I look at my profile standing sideways to the mirror with my eyes shifted right. Then, I turn around and look in the mirror with my eyes shifted left. I apply move cover stick. I look straight into the mirror. There is a rose bud on my nose. More cover stick. I don’t see the pretty girl there I used to know. Pretty is not going to happen tonight. Where are my shoes? “Mom?” I yell downstairs.

“Honey,” my dad yells from the living room, “Your mother’s on the phone. She can’t talk right now. She’s talking to Jane’s mom.”

“Oh, no. Now what? Something’s coming.”

“Jane’s mom said they are on the way. They got a late start.” My mom talks to me from the bottom of the stairs. “Your shoes are under your bed, remember?”

“Whew.” I grab my shoes and do more denim leg stretching as I bend over to get them. I walk to the hallway and I take a last look at myself in the hallway mirror. “Ugh.” The figure I see is an embarrassing collision of childhood and adulthood, of Climber and Greaser. I want to go back to my room and hide. I take another look and I think that it is getting dark soon and my “ghastly” appearance won’t matter. Besides, I’ve wanted to see West Side Story. I turn around and pause to think about what I need for tonight’s movie: I have my baby sitting money. I have my lipstick. I have my comb. Where’s my good luck pink troll key chain? Ah, I remember. It’s under my pillow.

I head downstairs and my dad says, “Hi, beautiful. Have fun tonight. I’ll be waiting up.”

“Dad, I’m gross.”

“No your not, sweetie.”

“Dad, I am, too.”

“No, No, No.” Dad protests.

Mom says, “They’re here.” Then she says, “Oh, there is someone in the back seat of Mick’s car. I wonder who that is. Jane’s mom didn’t mention that there would be someone else going with. Did Mick and Jane pick him up on the way over? I wonder.”

So do I. I look out the window and see Mick and Jane in the front seat of the Caprice and in the back seat is Juan from school. “Oh, god!” Now my dad is looking out the window, too and I say, “Mom and dad get away from the window. Quick!”

Maybe we should go say “Hi” to them and see who this is? My dad talks to my mother.

“Good idea. You go first.” My mom responds.

I stand on the front door porch. I see my parents talking to Mick and Jane parked in the driveway. My dad is now talking to Juan. He shakes his hand as he does with everyone he meets for the first time. I see him smiling. I hear a scream inside of me. I look horrible and Juan, a Greaser, always looks so cool. The scream is edging upwards towards my mouth. A flood of terror rushes through my heart like a tidal wave. I take out my pocket mirror for one last look. I see my dad and mom heading towards me. I am almost fainting. I turn and face the house.

“Honey, Mick and Jane picked up Juan on the way over to our house. Juan is Mick’s friend and I guess Juan didn’t have anything to do tonight, so they picked him up. I will call Jane’s mom and let her know that he is going along. I talked to Juan. He seems like a nice kid. He says that he is in some of your classes. Is that true?”

“Yeah, dad. I didn’t think anyone would be around to see me except Mick and Jane. I look gross.”

“Honey, all I can tell you is that you look pretty, tonight. Don’t worry. Have fun watching the movie and come home right afterwards, as you promised. I told Mick to bring you right home after the movie. Here’s some money for a Coke and some popcorn. I know that you wanted to see this movie. You have been talking about it since it came out, since you sang some of the songs in chorus.”

“I do want to see it, dad, but maybe some other time. Maybe…”

“Marianne,” my mother says my name when she wants my attention, “Marianne,” her voice lowers, “your skin looks fine. I like your hair down and your lipstick is just right. You may feel embarrassed about how you look but your father and I see a beautiful young lady. Go ahead and have some fun. We’ll be waiting for you later and you can tell us how it goes. OK?”

“All right, mom. I’ll go. I’m very nervous, though. My stomach feels like it’s in a pillow fight. I’ll go. I see you later.” With that I head over to Mick’s car and get in the back seat behind Mick. Juan smiles over at me and says, “Hi, Marianne.” And, I say, “Hi.”

From the front seat Jane turns around and says, “You look great Mare. I like that lipstick.”

I see Mick looking in the rear view mirror. “Thanks. Hi Mick.”

Mick backs the car down the driveway and says “Hi, kiddo. Juan wanted something to do tonight so I invited him along. Is that OK?”

“Ah, yeah, I guess so.”

“Good” Mick smiles back in the mirror.

I lean toward my window and look out. I don’t know what to say to Juan so I’m just going to wait for him to talk. I’ve seen him at school in the hallways and waiting in line to go into the school building. I now remember him looking at me when our school was evacuated during a bomb scare. He was in the crowd with the Greaser girls but he was looking over at me standing with my girl friends. Now I remember Juan.

Five minutes later, “Marianne, you look swell.” Juan speaks to me while combing his hair straight back.

“Thanks, Juan. You look nice, too.”

“Did you hear about Mrs. Rhoades? She’s leaving the school. I guess she’s too old to teach.”

“Yeah, she must be a hundred years old. She was always nice to me but she got angry with some of the kids, mostly the Grea…” I stopped myself.

“Yeah, you’re right. She was very strict. I won’t miss her.” Juan looked over to me.

“She was nice to me. I’m not sure why.” I looked over at Juan. He was trying to get a black forelock to stay in a curl.

“I hear that you are in the band. What instrument do you play?”

“I play the French horn.”

“I don’t know what that is.”

“It’s a brass instrument.”

“Like a trumpet?”

“Well, a French horn is round with a lot of tubes and a big bell where the sound comes out. It has a small mouthpiece. It takes a lot of air to play and it heavy to carry but I like it.”

“Cool.” Juan replies, sitting slightly forward from the seat. (I think he does that so he won’t mess his hair.) “I play the radio.” Juan laughs to himself.

I break into Mick and Jane’s conversation. “Hey Jane, put on WLS. I want to hear some music.”

Jane turns on the radio and finds 890 AM. The Hollies are singing Just One Look. I sing the words to myself as I look at my orange-pink reflection in the car window. Outside the window the sunset is washing the sky like an art class project.

We arrive at the Sky-Hi and we buy our tickets. The ticket guy checks the trunk to make there is no alcohol and no food hidden anywhere. We drive in and find a good spot in the middle about half way to the screen. All around are cars driving into their uphill spots, the car windows begin rolling down. I hear music everywhere, from every car. There are people walking to the concession stand and coming back with window trays full of food. I sit back and wait. I don’t want to be the first one in the car to get some popcorn.

Finally Mick says, “Hey, everyone let’s get our food now before this thing gets started.” We all say “Yeah” and we get out of the car. Mick and Jane walk hand in hand while I walk with Juan a few feet apart. I felt like we were being watched by everyone, that we were the movie, yet I felt safely obscure.  I wasn’t alone at the drive in and all eyes weren’t focused on me, just on our group.  At least, that’s how I pictured the way our audience of inclined viewers would view us.

At the concession stand I get a medium Coke and medium bag of popcorn. Juan gets some nachos with jalapeno and a Coke. Mick and Jane share a large bucket of buttered popcorn and a large Coke. We head back to the car. From the overhead loudspeakers I hear the Monkees sing, “I’m a Believer.” I notice as we walk back to the car that there are ascending pillars of cigarette smoke coming from many open car windows. Each pillar has an extended arm attached. The approaching midnight blue sky consumes the grey smoke while dancing on the giant screen, behind the plumes of smoke is Mr. Popcorn and Mrs. Cola.

We return to the car and listen to WLS until the sun disappears and darkness pulls in front of us. We can hear the cars around us and all the chatter of voices coming from those cars. Out of our speaker box comes the voice of the drive-in announcer telling us to be courteous to our neighbors and to not make a lot of noise. He tells us: “There are bathrooms behind the concession stand.” The previews begin with a commercial about the concession stand food: popcorn, nachos, hot dogs, Coke, Seven-Up, Jujubes, Milk-Duds, Affy-Tapples…. Hmmm, Milk Duds sound good. The previews start to appear on the screen. Car horns begin beeping and some guy is shouting “Shut up!” and “Hey, be quiet!” The surrounding murmur siphoned down into the movie sound coming from the little black box hanging on Mick’s open car window:

“The Graduate, opening January 1968… starring Dustin Hoffman, Anne Bancroft and Katherine Ross and directed by Mike Nichols. A movie about an impulsive, rebellious kind of love, but the old-fashioned notion of love conquers all.”…

…“Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner, opening in December, starring Katherine Hepburn, Spencer Tracy, Sidney Poitier, Katharine Houghton…a love story of today. Does love conquer all?”…

…“Thoroughly Modern Millie starring Julie Andrews, James Fox, Mary Tyler Moore, Carol Channing, in the happiest motion picture hit of the year. Directed by George Roy Hill. “You’ve come a long way…”

…“Wait until Dark starring Audrey Hepburn who plays Susy Hendrix, a blind woman who unwittingly becomes involved in three murderous crimnals’ drug scheme. How does a blind woman defend herself? Now playing in a theatre near you.”……Feature Presentation…Technicolor…Now were getting somewhere. At last the movie is beginning. There’s another reminder on the screen to be courteous to our movie neighbors. I sit back and lean a little to the middle of the car to see around Jane’s head. Juan moves his head towards the middle also making sure his hair doesn’t touch the car seat. I can smell his cologne. It’s not like my dads. It smells musky. It smells like a rain forest would smell: fresh, earthy, inviting.

Music begins the movie. The overture fills our small space with jarring and unsettling tritones. The music sounds jazzy, modern and classical. It sounds hip (I got this word from listening to DJ Dick Biondi). The clashing dissonance of the music causes me to wonder about the story. Will it be like Romeo and Juliet? Will there be guys fighting? Will there be romance? “O Romeo, O Romeo…” Juan says that he wants the music to end and the story to begin and yet I see him tapping his hand while looking out his rear window. I crane my neck further toward the front of the car. I want to be closer to the sound. A cool breeze floods the car through the open window. My bare arms are covered with goose bumps. I shiver. Juan remains cool. Mick and Jane continue munching on popcorn while holding hands.

Juan returns his gaze to the screen when two street gangs appear, the American Jets and the Puerto Rican Sharks. The Jets have names like Riff, Action, Diesel, A-Rab, Baby John Big Deal and Ice. The Sharks: Chino, Pepe, Indio Luis, Anxious and Toro. There’s talk of a rumble and a dance. Tony is cute and so is Bernardo. Anita and Maria, two Puerto Rican women, work at a bridal shop. I find out that Bernardo is Maria’s brother and Anita’s boyfriend. Maria wants to wear a new dress to the dance and she asks Anita to make it for her. Maria wants her dress lower in the front but Anita, the older woman, is resisting her. She won’t lower the bust line of the white eyelet party dress for Maria even though Maria insists.

Something is coming. I am beginning to sense it. At the dance the two gangs meet and square off for a dance challenge. I love the warm feminine summer dresses of the Latin women. The rival couples dance the Mambo while doing a version of musical chairs with their dance partners. It doesn’t end well. There is tension everywhere in the room except in the eyes of Maria and Tony. They see each other across the room. They come together and dance. They are falling in love. They kiss warmly and I suddenly I don’t mind the chilly car.

Bernardo, Maria’s brother, does not like what he sees and he pulls them apart. He wants to fight. A war council is set up at Doc’s Candy Store. I don’t get this. Why don’t they just fight at the dance and get it over with. Maybe because the cop is there. I don’t know. After the dance, Tony can’t stay away from Maria. I like this. He finds her apartment window and he serenades Maria. I see myself on the fire escape. “Maria…the most beautiful sound…Maria”. More tritones and more melting. Maria and Tony sing to each other while the two gangs get ready to fight:

“Today the minutes seem like hours…

…Well, they began it!…
The hours go so slowly,

…Well, they began it!…
And still the sky is light.

…And we’re the ones to stop ’em once and for all,
Tonight!…
Oh moon, grow bright,
And make this endless day endless night,

Tonight!”

There’s a war council at Doc’s Candy Store. Now I’m wishing I had bought some Milk Duds. Tony tells Doc about Maria. Doc’s not crazy about the idea but Tony says he is in love. It will be alright. Tony only wants a fair fight. Things are heating up for the Jets and the Sharks and for Tony and Maria. The next day Tony meets Maria at the bridal shop. They dream and I begin to dream…

“I, Anton, take thee Maria…”

“I, Maria, take thee, Anton…”

“For richer, for poorer…”

“In sickness and in health…”

“To love and to honor…”

“From each sun to each moon…”

“From tomorrow to tomorrow…”

“From now to forever…”

“Till death do us part.”

Tony and Maria are holding hands:

“With this ring, I thee wed.”

“With this ring, I thee wed.”

A cool breeze floods in through the open window. I shiver and think to myself, “My hands are cold.” I nest them together on my lap. Juan reaches over and puts his warm hand on top of my left hand. He gently pulls my hands apart and brings our hands to rest on the seat between us. He holds my hand there. I don’t look at him. I don’t know what to do. No one has ever held my hand before. I feel the racing pulse of my wrist in my chest and my throat tightens. I try to swallow. This is all new and all good.

Tony sings:

“Make of our hands one hand.

Make of our hearts one heart

Make of our vows one last vow

Only death will part us now.”

Maria sings:

“Make of our lives one life,

Day after day, one life,”

Now they both sing:

“Now it begins, now we start

One hand, one heart;

Even death can’t part us now.”

“Make of our lives one life,

Day after day, one life,

Now it begins, now we start

One hand, one heart

Even death won’t part us now.”

The movie rolls on but my thoughts are removed from the movie. Instead, I picture myself in the back seat of the car with Juan. I imagine concentric circles of newly found energy flowing out of me. I’m not sure about the end of the movie: There is a fight. I think Bernardo stabbed Riff and then Tony killed Bernardo, Maria’s brother. I think Tony is shot by Chino. The fighting stopped. Maria is waving a gun and saying that it was hatred that killed Tony and the others. Maria is left alone to grieve about Tony. But now, I am outside their story and inside my own. I am sitting in the back seat with Juan, pimples, baby face and all, one hand one heart.

The credits begin to roll and Mick says, “Hey, that was pretty good.”

Everyone says, “Yeah, it was.” I am still not looking at Juan.

“I better get you home, Marianne. You dad’s waiting.”

I cringe under the weight of his words. “OK.”

Mick drives me home. In our driveway he looks in his rear view mirror and then looks over at Jane. He smiles at Jane. Jane doesn’t turn around. She just says, “I’ll call you tomorrow, Mar.”

I say, “OK.” I finally look at Juan. I think I had a shy smirky grin on my face. There was too much blood flowing in my cheeks to feel the words come out of my mouth. “Goodnight, Juan.”

Juan gently squeezes my hand and says, “See ya, Marianne. On Monday.” He gently squeezed my hand again and then let go.

I smile back him and when I do see moon glow sparkle in his dark eyes. I start to speak. “Juan…”, but my words are choked off when my brain decides to stop working. I return to the smile when I get out of the car. The cool night air revives my brain: “See you guys on Monday!  I had a great time! Thanks Mick and Jane. Bye Juan.”

I walk to the front door of my house. Mick waits for me to go in the house like my dad would. I turn and wave a goodbye and smile a smile that I think could be seen a mile away. I go in and shut the door. I lean back on the door. I feel that I had just begun living. I feel my heart racing.  My head is swirling.  I look at my left hand and I see his hand. I feel Juan’s pulse in my hand. I sense his heart beating as my own. The rush of romance feels like an unstoppable prayer.

Dad is sitting in his arm-chair watching his favorite movie Pork Chop Hill. He turns and sees me leaning against the door not moving. “Hey honey, how did it go tonight?”

“Dad, you would like the movie. There were a lot of guys fighting. I guess I’ll just go up to bed. Good night dad.”

“Goodnight, Sweetie. I love you.”

Now I know that I won’t fall asleep for the rest of my life. I will stay awake and be completely alive forever. I will think of Juan and how the movie gods looked down into the back seat of Mick’s Impala Caprice and made a musical out of me with a touch of his hand.

© Sally Paradise, 2010, All Rights Reserved

All Rights Reserved

Filed under Christian, family, Human Interest, Romance, Short Story, Uncategorized Tagged with , , , , ,