20 - Xmas

The season was upon them, it was to be 1968 soon, and Tasma's first Christmas away from home was but a few days away. September, October and November flew by it seemed, she had been there little over three months.

Johnny kept odd hours working: that is, working during the day, and barhopping at night with a less desirable group of guys than Tasma would have like him to join; it bothered Jill as well. It was right around this time that Johnny was starting to sleep with Jill, when Tommy was at work, and Tasma had seen him go into her room, but said nothing. Johnny knew Tasma was aware of some of his activities but for some reason he seemed either not to care, or trusted she'd not tell; kind of like: let the cards fall where they may.

"It was a Saturday afternoon, both, Tasma and Tommy were in the living room, Tommy on the couch, and Tasma in her usually armchair; that sunk her body to soft depths.

"You're a very interesting person," commented Tasma, she really wanted to say, 'likeable person,' but knew it was not time for such talk, again nonchalance she stopped her reading, looked over at Tommy, completely over at him, leaning on the arm of the sofa-chair, Tommy sitting back into the couch a little more comfortable than usual, holding his manuscript in one hand, and a pen in the other. His heart seemed to beat at a fast pace, pounding. The longer she looked, the faster it beat, it nearly choked him"his comfort zone had left, his mouth dried up, and his lips shut. He couldn't help but size her up, and remembering the day he saw her naked"his mind now was blank. He somewhat froze in his position.

Now feeling a little foggy, actually forgetting she was staring, and not talking, she absently and casually pushed out of her lap a lump in her stomach, and up it went to her lips and out her mouth, with a cracking voice (and a blush): "I shall always think of you with pride, you work so hard, and have accomplished so much in such a short life span."

"And I," said Tommy, "shall always love that part of you." She wanted to ask what part he was talking about, but in fear she'd mess the moment up, she just smiled and said, "Thank you." It was better than in the movies she thought. She had been paralyzed for a brief moment, as Tommy was; neither one of them knowing the other was the same as they. As Tommy, at present, turned to the curtains, the sun was creeping in, beams from the sun were highlighted on the walls and floor, blinding them a speck.

That night, Tommy worked late at the bar and Jill and Johnny came in late also, but before Tommy, and they both ended up in Jill's bedroom, they were drunk and leaning against each another.

21 Smoking

Johnny had to make it more spacious and found an armchair in the garage to use, an old standup ashtray, which he put alongside of the chair, and put several of Jill's hunting magazines by the chair, lit a cigarette and started to read; it was an old copy, but he hadn't read for a long spell.

"Another week had passed, he had gotten paid, and it was Saturday again. It was a heavy week, and he was exhausted. He had made a deal with the foreman at work that instead of him taking a fifteen minute break during the morning and one in the afternoon, he'd simply work through them if he was allowed to smoke. He agreed to it, and before the day was over, about ten other guys (about half the team) were signed up for the same privilege, thus, giving up their breaks for smoking while putting together the frames and windows glass together, which amounted to: inserting the glass into the frames, and screwing the frames in place, and making sure the double storm windows were able to shift up and down easily.

He walked to work everyday, it was less than three miles each way, but it was a good walk he felt, plus he could buy a hamburger on the way home if he liked, and the cool mornings were good for walking. He was doing some gambling with his gang friends after-hours, after the bars closed; some mornings he was really hung over at work and the cigarettes seem to give him lasting power, or some kind of stimulus, what he needed to make it through until after lunch, along with the free coffee at work. And so here he sat in the sofa chair, relaxed as if life was worth living"thinking, just thinking. By all observations, he looked a little spiral shaped (wound up)"as if his insides needed to unwind; consequently, he had gathered a few phone numbers from the bar, and a gal he was seeing now and then, he had her phone number also called: Lorie"he had a growing crush on her, in a light kind of way, but he never told the household group about it, she was the other group's mascot, sort of; and they didn't take a complete liking to it or to him for that matter, but she was fun to be with, and she provided him with sex he wanted, and she was laidback, and several years his senior, for he was now nineteen

[Indians Hill] His mind drifted back to Tasma's graduation, and the neighborhood party that took place on Indians Hill

[Johnny in his thoughts, talking to himself] "Yes, I remember it quite well; she had on a red linen shirt and a black skirt; pleated, which seemed to sway with the movements of her walk. She was a dumb kid. The party started, oh, yah; it must have been 9:00 PM, somewhere around that time I suppose. It was the whole neighborhood. Several people from Washington High School graduated in that year from the neighborhood; I suppose that is why Tasma showed up, for she usually didn't at drinking parties.

So we had a real reason to drink, start a fire on the hill and just get tight. (The area was a collection of some several lots, possible four-acres of land, with a hill to the back of the lots consisting of a forest almost, trees and bushes hiding most everything. The kids could drink there without being caught by the police, and on occasion when the police chased them, Larry would beat them up, along with a few of the older guys.)

So as I was saying, I took Tasma with me from her house to the party, it was about four blocks away. I remember when she first had seen the goings on: the fire, the twenty or so kids drinking, familiar faces, new faces, she asked: 'Johnny, gosh, what's going on.' I told her it was nothing to worry about, just a bunch of kids getting drunk, some graduated like her and others just joined in because it was a party. Then I left her alone, I shouldn't have done that, it was like leaving a baby-lamb with starving wolves around. But you can't think of everything. So she met Leny Landsmen, and he was drunk and he found her between the pathway leading to the bonfire area, cornered by some isolated bushes, people walking about, around and in-between. And Leny well, he was a good kind of fella, spunky, nice looking, but a he got drunk and freaked out, pulled Tasma down to the ground and was ripping her pretty cloths off, or trying to. I heard her scream, and when I got there her skirt was up to her waist and Leny was trying to sip down his zipper.

'Leny,' I said to him, 'stop, what the hell you doing, she's yelling rape.' And he told me to, 'Fuck off,' and I told him, 'Not yet, not until you stop.' I was a bit tight myself, and I had a beer bottle in my hands and the next thing I knew I was hitting him in the head and face with it. He flipped over like a broken balloon. I had to get Tasma out of there, in fear everyone was drunk and I'd start a war. He had a lot of relatives there. Well, Tasma's parents called me up the next day and thanked me for my actions.

Leny had asked me after getting out of the hospital, and the loss of sight with his right eye, 'why'd you have to hit me with a bottle,' I didn't really have the answer, but I told him the truth, 'I didn't realize I had the bottle in my hand, just like you raping a girl, what did you do that for?' He had no answer either. Anyhow, she thanked me for a month, and that was the end to her party life. But you know I'm still glad I stopped the jerk; too bad he got hurt so bad though."

but what was really troubling his mind was Jill, in two bedrooms from his. It was 9:00 AM, Jill was sleeping, Tasma in her room he suspected, and Tommy was gone. He pulled out a Playboy Magazine from under his pillow; opens it up and starts looking at the naked girls.

Where his disillusioned mood was coming from, was beyond him, but he convinced himself: when you know it is there for the taking (in his case, Jill): and no one there to stop you (so he repeated to himself) 'why not take it?' his mind was calculating. And he stood up, walked out into the hallway, walked up and down the hall, standing outside of her room like a hungry lion, then he walked halfway down the hall again, then back to doorway, stood there, listened to her breathing in her sleep. He told himself, she liked him: they had both fooled around with each other since he was there, and her bedroom was right here, she was half naked in her bed, if not all naked he told himself; peeking now through the slightly opened door he gazed upon her. He had only his shorts on. He looked back at the Belmont's room, it was partially opened, but he saw no one looking. His underwear was stretched out. As he stood by the door, opening it a little wider, he noticed a strange woman leaving the Belmont's bedroom, she was not as old as the Belmont's but not as young as he or neither Lorie, possibly in her mid-thirties. A nice looking gal he thought. She saw him, smiled, and said not a word, just walked down the stairs, and then he hurried through the doorway, before someone else came out.

He knew they had something going on in their bedroom for she was counting money, it wasn't one dollar bills either, but this was the first time he saw any proof of it. Now he looked into their bedroom again (thinking of the girl that came out of it): Lorie was younger than her, slimmer than her, he told himself, but then so what; they were both older than him, Lorie perhaps twenty-four or even twenty-seven, could be, and she liked him for whatever reasons, this gal he'd check out later also, he told himself. Now back to Lorie, his mind went, she: was a waitress in a bar and he had met her as he was drinking alone one night there. She introduced him to her crowd"which ended up being the same guys that went occasionally to the Due-Drop-Inn"and that had turned out to be a pleasant surprise; it didn't take long for this relationship to start, the second time he saw her, he had gone to the 'after-hours drinking houses,' with her and normally he'd find a room to sleep his drunk off, or make love to her, or do both. He was even caught once by the group who really said nothing about it afterwards, but were doing some heavy thinking at the time: they had slipped into the house during an afternoon made love and fell to sleep, and here comes the gang with guns and all.

Johnny could hear them walking to the door and then through the door, but he pretended to be sleeping, while she really was, and they were talking about hurting him, but felt if Lorie was ok with this guy, so be it, and left. Johnny then got Lorie up and they left"that was when he slowed up in seeing her and she was kind of hurt, but she started dating another guy soon after, thus, she was dating two, him and the other guy (I suppose she was creating a cushion incase Johnny dumped her, like Johnny was doing with Jill); for some reason they both seemed to be lost souls, and gave no hoot to what the other one did after they left each other, or pretended not to care anyhow. He never mentioned to her he was aware of this"or their presence and he figured he'd be leaving her sooner or later anyhow.

"As Johnny walked slowly up to Jill's bed, her face becomes animated and prettier. She had only underwear on, no top, he remembered those same breasts from long ago, and they had filed out quite nicely now. He looked at her possessively, explaining to himself: she wished for him to be there, and doing what he was doing (creeping into her bedroom), could she have come right out and say it, she would, but no, she couldn't, she was sleeping. Yet she was only a diversion, an experiment for the moment for him: a pause in his life if you will. Had this been in Minnesota, a like case, she'd be doing the same, so he convinced himself.

He now laid on the bed gently, pulling his body slowly across the bed to her backside, she was sleeping now on her side, she had moved from her back in the middle of the bed, to her side, on the right side of the bed. He held himself up by his left forearm, whispered softly in her ear, his mind was windless, and his voice scared her, as she opened her eyes he was staring down into hers like a panther. She went to scream, and then saw it was him, "Johnny," she cried, "What are you doing?"

"No, not like this, not here, not now," she bellowed. It was like she was talking to the wall, he continued with his movements, as if it was urgent, as if something was pending. Passion has no equal only fear and that sometimes does not stop the panther in a man. He pulled her torso up to him with one hand, "Open your legs," he demanded, then entered her. There was no passion, only immediate gratification for him"pleasure. She wanted to enjoy it, she was hoping to enjoy it, but she was robbed this day.

"My god," she said with a tear in her eyes, "I'm not thirteen years old anymore, not like this." She didn't scream and he didn't' threaten, but produced thick tears.