Chapter 2: Sandy First Girlfriend

I have always had an almost fanatical love of the silver screen, since my first experience in 56’ when I went to my first movie; ‘The 10 Ten Commandments’ at a theater that was a mansion palace to my young mind. The Lowes Grand in Rochester NY was a perfect example of the art deco movie palaces of the 30’s. A massive lobby with gilded columns where the staff, in red and black uniforms, and little pillbox hats, stood like soldiers, ready to treat each customer like royalty, showing us to our seats. When I got inside, the screen was immense, and I immersed myself in the parting of the red sea as Charlton Heston stood there twenty feet tall, and I was hooked. So, six years later when I got a job at the local movie theater, I thought I had died and gone to heaven

That’s where I met Sandy, my first actual girlfriend. She was two years older than me, but we seemed to hit it off from the first day. Despite her being a couple of grades higher than me, she never talked down to me. She had a sly sense of humor and could talk movies all day. We were a good pairing. She worked the concession stand, while I was the doorman, general gofer, and emergency relief behind the concession counter. That’s when our relationship took an upward spiral. We got into a rhythm behind the counter, cracking jokes, and throwing out lines from our favorite movies, each trying to mesh one movie into another. The customers loved it. Eventually, we were doing a little slapstick improv while still keeping up with the crowd. At first, the manager got on our case, until one customer said our antics made the wait in line more enjoyable and we never slowed up service. I was put behind the counter anytime Sandy was on.

Before opening or after closing, we would go up to the balcony and block out some moves. Accidental bumps and casual touches got more frequent, then somehow, we were face-to-face, noses almost touching. Neither one of us can say who made the first move, but it was like two magnets coming close enough to suddenly draw the other toward it, our lips met, and we flopped down on the seat, comedy forgotten. We made out for a while before breaking away. We just looked at each other, laughed, then went back to rehearsing. When we were finished though, she took my hand as we walked toward the stairs. I turned to her---later she told me, she almost waited for the imaginary romantic background music to hit a crescendo before kissing me---we kissed, long, slow, and full of discovery.

The next night, rehearsal was forgotten, and we spent a pleasant hour with her wiggling on my lap and my hand up her blouse. That’s about as far as it ever got, and it continued until the Kennedy assassination. I told Sandy about my run-in with Wanda and said that I thought there was something I needed to accomplish with her but didn’t think it would be long before she would get passed whatever it was. “Listen, I know this is confusing to you. Hell, it’s got me scratching my head, but I think this is important and I need to follow through.”

“I don’t understand, but for some reason, I trust your intuition. I don’t know what will happen when whatever this is, is over, but I’ll always be your friend. Let’s practice.” There was a tear in her eyes saying it. Hell, there were a few tears in mine.

Sandy and I continued to work well together, and no one seemed to notice any difference, but we could, and there was an uneasiness to the bond we had formed. When Wanda moved on, I told Sandy, all she would say was we’ll see. Things didn’t get better until Wanda saw Sandy in school and asked if she could talk with her after school. Neither told me about it, but Sandy asked if we could meet after work. We walked up the stairs and sat in the back row.

“Wanda told me the whole story.” When I started to say something, she raised her hand to stop me. “I don’t know how you knew, and I realize that you didn’t either, but putting us on hold was the right thing to do, and it’s time to end it.”

“Sandy, I...”

“It’s time to end the time out, silly” She leaned over and kissed me, and that was it, we were back to being a real team. Except for work we couldn’t find a way to get away together. Then I was given the Rambler.

The next Saturday, Sandy, and I both had the night off, so we were off to the drive-in for our first real date. Since the drive-in was owned by the same chain, we both had passes, we parked, placed the speaker in the back window, and headed to the concession stand. When we returned, we settled in for a double feature. Lights dimmed, trailers and ads started. As the ‘Let’s Go Out To The Lobby’ jingle started---I’ve always hated that song. Sticks in my brain like peanut butter on the roof of a dog’s mouth---we were making out like gangbusters, her hands on my crotch, and mine under her angora sweater. By the first reel changeover, the windows were sufficiently foggy, with my girl in my arms.

When I stopped. “Reach over to the side of your seat and pull the lever,” I said. She did and the seat reclined, then kept going back and her eyes got bigger as it flattened out, I reclined my seat. Sandy just looked at me as I slid into the back, opened the passenger side of the rear seat back, pulled out a thick fluffy pad, tucked one end of it between the cushion and back, and started to unroll it. “Would you like to join me?” She did, as I finished making our new little love nest.

“This is driving me crazy, I’ve got to ask. Did you really refuse to take advantage of Wanda that first-time?”

I sighed, “It was like kissing a dry sponge. She’d been indoctrinated by her grandmother that guys were just Neanderthals with the right to drag a woman off by the hair without consent, much less enjoyment. At best, I felt she was destined to be raped by some asshole.”

“Why, at best?”

“Can you imagine going through life, as a soulless automaton? Our passions are one of those things that separate us from other animals. The way that girl was, made her a toy for any jerk to use as he wanted.”

“You’re a strange kid Tom Hardy.”

“Says the girl begging for information on how he fucked the girl he dumped her for.” She laughed at that. “To be honest---while I didn’t realize it then---there was another reason I stopped us from going too far. I got caught up in the moment when we started making out. Up to that point, our whole relationship had been centered around Kennedy’s assassination and her paranoia. I should have been with you that day and doing it behind your back wasn’t right. I needed to let you know first, I just didn’t realize that was a reason till the other day.”

Sandy drew closer to me. “How did you get like this?” She ran her fingers through my hair and gave me a little kiss, “I mean the way you think.”

I thought for a minute. “Did Wanda tell you about my girl friend?”