“Did you really buy her that diamond ring? There’s something seriously twisted about that,” Ricki said.
“Don’t be such a tight-ass,” Sandy said. “They’re in love. It’s sweet.”
“No, it’s fucking creepy. What is she, like ten?”
“Wavy’s thirteen,” I said. Ricki was bad at math.
“There’s nothing wrong with me buying her a ring. She’s my girl,” Kellen said.
“Yeah, except for the part where you’re a pedophile.” Ricki wrinkled her nose up.
“That’s not the only thing love means. You just got your mind in the gutter. Come on, Donal, let’s go ride.”
That night, I was the only one who got what I wanted, but I never got to ride to school. I had to go on the bus, because nobody ever got up early enough to take me. If I asked, Sandy would call the school to say I was sick, but if I stayed away too many days, Wavy would come down to the ranch and make me get up. Then I was in trouble.
On the weekends, it was easy to get up early, even earlier than I got up for the bus, because I could sneak up to the farmhouse and see Wavy. If I was lucky, she would let me get in bed with her, and she would talk to me.
Before Christmas something funny happened. I didn’t get to see Wavy for three whole weeks because I had chicken pox and got really sick. When I went back to school, I didn’t get to talk to her all week, because she was at the new high school, and then Friday night was Kellen’s birthday. So I got up early, early on Saturday, and I put on my Superman costume from Halloween since she never got to see it. Then I went up the meadow to the farmhouse.
When I went in, Kellen was coming down the stairs in his bare feet, carrying his boots. He must have got in a fight on his birthday because somebody gave him a black eye. He made a funny face when he saw me, I guess because of my costume.
“Hey, Superman. You want a ride down the hill?” he said.
“I just came up the hill. To see Wavy.”
“I think she’s still asleep.”
But why was he upstairs if she was still asleep?
Here’s what I think happened: Kellen went earlier than me and got in bed with Wavy. What made me mad is that he stole all her words and didn’t leave any for me, because she didn’t want to talk. She let me get in bed and she hugged me, but she didn’t say anything. And she was naked under the covers. I felt her boobies against my arm.
“Yuck. Where’s your nightgown?” I said.
She lifted her hands over her head. I wanted her to talk to me, but she was looking at her ring. The rule was nothing belongs to you, but I think she was breaking the rule. If somebody tried to take that ring, she’d sock them. It was her ring. Kellen bought it for her so he could marry her. If it wasn’t Wavy, I didn’t know how he could like a girl that much. They’re kinda gross.
She let the sun sparkle off the ring, so it made little rainbows on the walls and on me. I liked that almost as much as I liked her talking.
9
CASEY
December 1982
On the last Friday of Casey’s duty, Wavy came home in the afternoon and took a shower. That was strange enough, but then she went up and down the stairs a few times between her bedroom and the bathroom. Casey listened to it all curiously, while she coaxed Val into doing a few exercises. Val’s lassitude wore even Casey out, so they were watching TV when Wavy came downstairs.
Instead of her usual jumper, she wore a pale green dress with a fitted bodice and delicate shoulder straps. She was starting to develop, and the dress showed that off, fitted around her little breasts and her narrow hips. The outfit looked expensive, but of course, she wore big, heavy boots with it.
In one hand, she carried a matching sweater and a camera. Under her other arm, she had a wrapped package. She put the box and the camera on the coffee table and sat in the rocking chair next to the sofa, carefully, like she was worried about rumpling her dress.
“You look very pretty. Are you going to a birthday party?” Casey said.
Wavy nodded and reached up to adjust her hair.
She’d pulled it up into a chignon, but it was already slipping out. Delicate strands of blond fell around her ears, and it looked like she had sneaked some of her mother’s makeup. Thirteen seemed too young to be wearing makeup, but Casey wasn’t her mother, who was sitting right there on the sofa. If she thought Wavy looked too adult, she didn’t say anything about it.
All Val said was, “What’s in the package?”
Wavy didn’t answer.
“Is Kellen coming to get you, to take you to the party?” Casey said.
He took her to school every morning and he was the one who brought her home so late or not at all, according to Patty. As for Mr. Quinn, Casey had seen him maybe half-a-dozen times in the four months she worked for him. At first, he was attentive and gentle with Val, but the last time he came, they argued. The kind of argument Casey had overheard many times.
Him saying, “You’re not trying. You don’t even want to get better and be with me.”
Her saying, “Why should I try? Is Dee still at the ranch? Is Sandy? Is that little cunt Ricki still at the ranch? I wish you’d left me there to die on the side of the road.”
“Well, you know what, baby? I wasn’t the one who called 911. Kellen did that.”
After that, Mr. Quinn kept paying Casey and Patty, but he didn’t come back. His brother, Sean, visited occasionally and that seemed to do Val more good than her husband’s visits. He got her talking, made her laugh.
On the last day of an assignment, Casey liked to “wrap things up” by offering last-minute advice and encouragement. With Val, it seemed like wasted effort. Instead of talking, they sat in front of the TV, as Casey’s time there ticked away. At six o’clock, she would go home for the weekend, and on Monday, she would start a new assignment.
Normally, Wavy went outside as soon as she heard Kellen’s motorcycle, but that evening she stayed in the rocking chair, smoothing her dress like she was nervous. The engine cut off and for several minutes, there was silence except for Val’s TV program. Then the sound of boots on the front porch.
Casey had never seen the front door used, but that night, Kellen even rang the bell. Wavy got up and opened the door for him. He came in, looking nervous, and frowned in confusion when Wavy handed the package to him. Casey scooted forward on her seat, curious despite the fact that she might never get to tell Patty about this.
“This is for me?” he said. “You didn’t need to get me anything.”
The rocking chair groaned under his weight when he sat down. After he tore off the wrapping paper, he looked into the box with a blank look on his face. Then he lifted out what looked like a cast iron pot. No, a motorcycle helmet. He turned it over in his hand, forcing a smile.
“I really appreciate it, sweetheart, but you know I don’t ever wear a helmet.”
Frowning, Wavy slid her hand around the back of his neck and into his hair. Kellen nodded.
“Yeah, you’re right. If I’d been wearing a helmet that day, I wouldn’t have gotten my head so banged up. Okay. Okay. You ready to go? You look really pretty, but it’s cold out there. Are you gonna be warm enough in that?”
Out of the closet she took a fleece-lined leather jacket and put it on over the sweater that matched her dress. Then the camera was remembered and the jackets came back off. Casey didn’t wait to be asked. She picked up the camera and posed Wavy and Kellen, side by side. Because of the size difference, the camera had to be turned on end to make them both fit in the frame. Neither of them smiled for the picture, as awkward as high school prom dates.
10
KELLEN
For the longest time, I’d been trying to give Wavy her poker winnings, but she kept saying no. When she finally asked for some money, it was to take me out for my birthday, to this really nice steak house in Garringer. I’d been there once before with Liam and some of his friends, but they were all tweaking and made too much noise for that place. It was quiet with nic
e carpet and leather booths and chandeliers.
I didn’t want the waiter looking down his nose at Wavy, so I got a haircut, and I wore a new pair of jeans without grease stains, with the one and only dress shirt I owned—the one I wore to my ma’s funeral. That was about as dressed up as I knew how to get. I wasn’t too sure about me, but Wavy looked like she belonged there. She went floating across the dining room after the hostess, that fancy dress swishing, and her neck all bare. We had a corner booth with candles on the table that made Wavy’s hair like a halo around her face.
“You’re so pretty,” I said after the hostess was gone. I’d already told Wavy that a buncha times, but she seemed to like it. And she was beautiful. I figured her dressing up was part of my birthday present, so I ought to let her know I appreciated it.
I ordered for both of us, which I’d been told was what a gentleman was supposed to do. Then I ordered a bourbon and coke, which was probably not a gentleman’s drink. After the salads came, the waiter left us alone.
“You know, this is the first time a girl ever took me on a date,” I said.
That made Wavy smile. She pressed her lips together and held her breath.
“Happy birthday,” she said.
“Thanks. Aren’t you glad I didn’t show up at your house drunk off my ass in the middle of the night this year?”
“I liked that birthday.” She exhaled too fast, ended up with not enough breath to get her to the end of the sentence, so the last part didn’t make any noise at all. When she reached across the table, I took her hand and turned it over so the ring picked up the candlelight and sparkled.
“So did I. I felt like such a jackass waking you up, but then you were so nice, like you were glad to see me.”
Wavy was maybe getting ready to say something else, but the waiter came back before she could. He looked at our hands together on the table, but I didn’t pull mine back. It wasn’t none of his business.
“Are you finished with your salads?”
I was. Wavy hadn’t touched hers, but the waiter took them both away when she nodded. After our dinners came, she pushed her plate off to the side to watch me eat. When the waiter came back with my third drink, he said, “Is there a problem? Is her entrée not to her liking?”
“No, it’s fine. She’ll just need a box.”
We got to giggling after the waiter was gone. Wavy took her fork and moved the food around on her plate, and I ate a few bites to make it look better.
After I finished my steak, she scooted around the booth to sit next to me. Her dress strap was slipping down her arm so I lifted it back into place. I couldn’t believe how soft the back of her neck was, where her hair was sneaking out of its pins. I’d never seen her hair up like that.
“This is a really nice birthday present. You planning it for me. Nobody ever did that for me.”
She kissed my cheek, and that was when the waiter came back with the check. I didn’t say a word when Wavy added up the tip and counted her money into the leather folder. I wanted to let her give me something. It was important to her.
She picked the movie. Not Annie, which was a kid movie, or Porky’s, which looked dirty. Poltergeist. I was the one jumping in my seat at the scary parts. She laughed and squeezed my hand. After the movie, we went by the store for ice cream. She paid for that, too.
At home, I made myself another drink and, even though I knew she wouldn’t eat it, I scooped up two bowls of ice cream. She carried hers out to the living room, cupped in both her hands like a prize. I turned on the TV to some old movie on PBS, and settled into my recliner. Wavy stood there, waiting for an invitation.
“Well, come on.” I patted my knee.
Like I figured, she wasn’t gonna eat her ice cream. She put it on the coffee table before she sat on my lap. Somewhere in the last five years, she musta been eating something, because she’d grown. There was a time when she fit all the way in my lap, but now her legs were long and her head reached my shoulder. The way she leaned into me was the same, though. She trusted me. When I pushed her dress strap up, she shivered, but then my hands were cold from the ice cream.
The movie was just background noise, while Wavy watched me eat my ice cream. Mint chocolate chip, that was what she picked.
After I set the empty bowl on the coffee table, she handed me my drink and scooted further up my legs. She leaned into me real nice, slipped her arm around my neck and put her cheek up against mine. That moment was a good birthday present by itself, just to sit with her and be happy together. During the movie, her hair had come out of the bobby pins, so I smoothed it out over her shoulder and snuck in a sniff.
When I got that first prickly heat in my crotch, I figured it was the booze. I shouldn’t’ve had another drink. It felt so good sitting there with Wavy, her hand stroking the back of my neck, but it didn’t seem right either. Even if it was just the bourbon, I had no business letting her sit on my lap when I was worked up.
“Let me up, sweetheart. I gotta step out,” I said.
She made this annoyed sound, but she got up. In the bathroom, I splashed some water on my face and took a piss. That put me back to rights.
As soon as I sat down, she came right back to my lap. With the problem taken care of, I wanted her there. She brushed her cheek against mine and then she gave me a cold little kiss on the corner of my mouth. Minty.
“You finally ate some of your ice cream?”
She nodded.
“Why won’t you eat it with me here?” I didn’t expect an answer, because I’d asked before and never got one.
“No looking,” she said.
“So, if I close my eyes, will you eat your ice cream before it melts?”
She thought hard about it, walking her fingers along the ribbing on my undershirt. When she got to my bare arm, she ran her finger over the scar from my wreck, staring at her ice cream the whole time.
“Cover them,” she said.
Once I put my hands over my eyes, she picked up her bowl. Like I was her favorite chair, she stretched back against me and rested her head in the triangle my elbow made. I didn’t cheat, wasn’t even tempted to look, but I knew she was eating. First came the squeak of the spoon scooping up ice cream. Then the sneaky sound of the spoon going into her mouth and coming out clean. After a couple bites, she put the bowl back on the coffee table.
“Are you done? Can I open my eyes?” I said.
“No.”
She shifted in my lap to straddle me, getting her knees into the gaps between my legs and the sides of the chair. Then she rested her head on my shoulder and said, “Lean back.”
I took my hands off my eyes, but didn’t open them. I eased the recliner back, and she settled into me with a sigh.
When she put her cheek against mine again, I turned my head, hoping for maybe one more kiss. She gave it to me, cold and soft. The next kiss was still cool, but getting warmer. Every one after that was warmer and softer, like ice cream melting, until she gave me a kiss that wasn’t just a peck on the lips. Her lips were warm but her tongue was still cold.
“Hey,” I said. I didn’t want to startle her.
“Hey.”
That wasted word surprised me, so I opened my eyes. She was looking at me. I couldn’t guess what she was thinking, but deep down I knew what would happen if I closed my eyes. I did it anyway. Closed them and waited for her to kiss me. It started with both of us shy, but not too long after, her mouth was full on mine, and then her tongue slipped past my teeth to my tongue. All the while her arms got tighter around my neck.
After that, there was just one kiss that kept on going, which was what I liked. She let me play with her hair, and after a while, I petted her bare shoulders. I wondered how it felt to her with my hand being so rough and her being so soft. To me, it was like all the skin on my palms coming awake after being asleep. Same way I felt lying under the sky at night. The stars rubbing across me, making static electricity.
Until she gasped into my mouth, I didn’t even know
what I’d done—slid my hand down from her shoulder to cup her little tit in my palm. She leaned into me and her dress slipped down, leaving her naked in my hand. Her nipple went hard in the curve of my thumb, and she shivered. Made me shiver, too.
I tried to pull my hand back, but she pressed hers over mine to hold it there.
“Orion,” she said.
She ran her fingers down my belly to my belt buckle and unhooked it. I brushed her hand away, and I was gonna refasten the buckle, except if I sat up and did that, I figured that would be the end of her kissing me. So I pushed her hand away and kissed her some more. Her hand went right back to my belt, like a fly that won’t quit buzzing around. She unthreaded the belt and opened the button on my jeans.
I had to stop her.
I opened my eyes and sat up, but it only made things worse. Her eyes were thunderhead dark, her lips were red from kissing, and I’d turned her hair into a tumbled mess. She was straddling my lap with her skirt riding up. Holding her by the hips, my forearms rubbed against her bare thighs. Just short of letting go of her and dumping her on the floor, I didn’t know what to do.
The zipper on my jeans came down with some help from her, but mostly from the pressure of a hard-on that had built up on me like a temperature gauge going into red.
“Wavy, you can’t—”
“I want to,” she said.
She kissed me until my blood pounded in my ears, like I was fixing to have a heart attack. She held the back of my neck with one hand and, with the other, she petted my dick like it was a wild animal. Real gentle at first. Then she closed her fingers around me as far as they would go, and goddamn, when she squeezed a little harder, it was far enough.
“Wavy.” That was me begging, and not for her to stop.
As much as I always wanted her to kiss me, I didn’t have no idea how desperate I was for her to touch me like that. I couldn’t even recollect how long it was since somebody besides me had. And Wavy. Wavy. Her hand was so soft, not a callous on it. Took less than a minute to get me off. As soon as I came, I knew what I’d done. My stomach turned over and, for a second, I thought I was gonna be sick.