Chapter 25

I thought I would call Sally but realized something I hadn’t thought of before. I grabbed my bike and rode to Bad Kitty. I’d been there enough times that people probably thought I was eighteen. I asked for Cheryl and was told she’d moved on. When I asked the clerk if she knew where Cheryl had moved on to, she didn’t want to say.

“She’s a friend. I didn’t realize she’d moved on.”

“You’re not Mickey’s friend?”

“No. I met him once but that was it. Why? Oh, oh.”

“Yeah. She quit working here and changed apartments because of that asshole. I don’t want to tell you how to find her and then have Mickey find out.”

“I would never do that. Look, if you don’t want to tell me, I understand.”

I could see her wheels spinning. “If you’re her friend, how is it that you didn’t know this?”

“I know her from when she worked here. She helped me out a lot and my fiancée and I met her and Mickey for breakfast one time so they could share some more. It’s not like we grew up together or anything, and I didn’t date her. I appreciate her and just wanted to say hey.”

“Okay. I get it. What if I take your name and number and give it to her? Then, if she wants to, she can call you.”

“Perfect,” I said and wrote it down on the back of one of her cards. Jackie Trois. I wondered if that was her real name. Probably not. “Now, I could use some advice. I want something that will drive my fiancée crazy.”

Jackie smiled at that. “Is this for her to use by herself or for you to use on her?”

“Me to use,” I said, following her to the far side of the store.

“This is what you want. It’s cordless and that’s a big plus.”

“It’s skinny.”

“Right. It’s not designed to be a replacement for a dick. Just the end of it vibrates. You can use it for clitoral stimulation or insert it for G-spot stimulation.” I asked and she told me all about that. It sounded like a winner to me. We took that and some lube to the counter.

“It’s waterproof, too. You can use it in the shower. I don’t think I’d submerge it, though. I’ll tell Cheryl you asked about her and give her your number, okay?”

I thanked her and rode home. I couldn’t help but think how crazy it was to be talking about sex with a perfect stranger like that. Jackie was helpful and not the least bit embarrassed. It pissed me off that Mickey had turned out to be a jerk and I hoped Cheryl would call. Maybe there wasn’t anything I could do for her but at least I could listen. Sometimes, that was a big deal.

Then I realized that if Mom took her call, it might be a problem. “Hi, this is Cheryl from the sex shop, calling for Jack.” Nah, that didn’t sound good. I didn’t think she’d do that. I hoped not. That would truly suck.

With time before dinner, I went to the library and did something I hadn’t done in a long time and picked up a couple of volumes of the encyclopedia. First, I read a lengthy article on horses, sort of surprised that I hadn’t done that before. Actually, I had but I’d probably been nine when I read it the first time. There wasn’t an entry for biomedical engineering but that wasn’t surprising. There was a good one on engineering and a couple of good ones on the legal profession. When I finished, I thought I needed to push even harder in math and Kim would have been better off taking a class in Latin than Spanish. Plenty of time for that, though.

After dinner, I joined Dane to watch a bowl game between two teams who had come in second in their conferences. It was like the also-ran bowl or something. I asked Dane if he cared who won. He didn’t and I couldn’t think of a reason to keep watching. When I told him there was a Gilligan’s Island marathon on another channel he gave me a weird look.

I started to leave and he asked, “No interest?”

“Not really. I don’t know the colleges and haven’t followed them all season.”

“You’d rather watch Gilligan’s Island?” he asked.

“Nah. I was just pulling your chain. I don’t think it’s on. Mary Ann, if you were going to ask,” I said, solving the age-old Ginger or Mary Ann question so he wouldn’t have to lay awake all night trying to figure it out.

Back in my room, I picked up the next book on my list, Heart of Darkness, by Conrad. I was a little surprised at how many highly rated books had previously escaped my attention. That probably happened while I was busy reading Catcher in the Rye instead of doing something productive. How could so many people identify with Holden Caulfield? Was everyone that did as judgmental as he was? I wondered how he would do on the deserted island with the other kids in Lord of the Flies. They probably would have killed him off on the first day. It was too funny to think about.

The next morning, I decided to try something Vince had mentioned. It was a personal challenge that wouldn’t mean anything to anyone but me. After breakfast, I skipped rope just long enough to break a sweat and waited for the minute hand to work its way to the top. At nine I started my thirty-minute challenge to lift as much weight as I could. The reps had to be strict but I could lift whatever I wanted, then add it all up at the end. I started with squats and kept the weight low so I could do more reps.

I knew there was a strategy to this and I figured that was it. I’d lift somewhere in the neighborhood of sixty percent of my max, but do it for a lot of reps. I gave my legs a break and used my chest to do bench press. I started with too light of a weight and moved it up, then switched back to legs. At the end of thirty minutes, I tallied up my weight, laughing that I could do so in tons, rather than pounds. It was a weird challenge. I thought I’d keep my tally sheet and try again in a few weeks.

As I walked up the steps to the house, I realized just how much pain I was in. I had done so many squats and deadlifts that I had a hard time going up the steps. Thanks a lot, Vince. In the kitchen, Mom took one look at me and asked, “What did you do to yourself?” Pretty obvious, I guess.

That night, Bobby and Mel picked me up and we drove to get Kim. Twenty minutes later, we were at the west entrance to the North Charleston Coliseum, looking for Vince and Lani. Fifteen minutes later, the six of us found our seats, ten rows up from the arena floor. After a brief conversation, we came to the conclusion that none of us knew anything about ice hockey. The Charleston Stingrays took the ice to warm up, followed shortly by the Greenville Swamp Rabbits, and we were busy trying to figure out the rules of the game. Like soccer on ice, right?

Vince asked the guy behind him, and he knew everything anyone would ever know about ice hockey. He was a Yankee, so of course he did. The game started and we tried to follow the action. We cheered when everyone else did and booed along with the crowd.

“Is that legal?” Vince asked. It was.

We found out what high-checking, boarding, slashing, and a host of other penalties were. And we found out why icing and two-line passing were illegal. Crashing into another player at eighty miles an hour wasn’t, though.

“Whose idea was this, anyway?” I asked, laughing. We were having a great time, enjoying something fresh and interesting.

“Lani,” Vince said. “Blame her.”

At the end of the first period, a couple of cameramen found couples in the crowd and zoomed in on them. Their faces showed up on the huge scoreboard with the caption ‘Kiss Cam’. If your face was on the big screen you were supposed to kiss each other for everyone’s entertainment. We laughed as people hammed it up. After six or seven couples, the camera found me with Kim on one side and Mel on the other. I decided to ham it up and turned to Mel. She played along until Bobby pulled her back and Kim pulled me back. Mel kissed Bobby and they ended up on the big screen. I kissed Kim anyway. “That was my big chance and you ruined it,” I said.

“Uh-huh. Your big chance is right in front of you, Aquaman.” We kissed again.

It was five to four at the end of the second period and I offered to get snacks. Everyone gave me their order and I started to slide out. “Can I get you something?” I asked the couple behind me. “We wouldn’t have a clue what was going on without you.”

“I’ll go with you. You’re going to have too much to carry by yourself,” he said and we walked up to the snack bar together.

Standing in line, we talked about the game. I asked a few questions and he explained a little and told me who to watch in the final period.

“Are you three in high school, or college, or do I have it all wrong?”

“Vince is right in front of you. He’s in college and Lani, his girlfriend is a senior, and so is Bobby, on the end. The rest of us are juniors in high school.”

“I don’t know what you three did to land your girlfriends but you should bottle it. Damn, they are good-looking.”

“No argument from me.”

“The tall brunette is your girlfriend? Kim?”

“Fiancée, actually. Yes.”

“Fiancée. I knew it. I knew I’d seen your faces before. You were on the news a couple of weeks ago.”

“We didn’t realize we’d be famous in the Lowcountry. Yup, that was us.”

“Mark Mahaffey. You don’t have to do this, you know,” he said, meaning I didn’t have to pay for his stuff. I insisted, but when I tried to pay, they couldn’t take it from me because Mark had a couple of beers. I handed him the money, he handed it to the gal, and she gave Mark the change and he gave it to me. She shrugged and we all laughed. Rules are rules.

We got to the top of the row and were about to start down when he stopped me. “I don’t know how long any of you have been dating. Missy and I have been married twenty-three years. I just, well, I don’t know.”

“Don’t screw it up,” I said. He nodded, we laughed and took food and drinks to our friends.

The Swamp Rabbits won, but no one seemed terribly upset about it. The next day was New Years Eve and they had plans so we split up. Bobby dropped me off with Kim at her house. Her folks were reading in their den. I followed Kim in and she told them about ice hockey. She was a great storyteller and got them laughing pretty good. I don’t think either of them knew much about ice hockey either. When the laughter died, Kim drove me home and we made plans for the next day.

New Year’s Eve was dry but cold. My body was still sore from my previous workout but I wanted to do something. I skipped rope, then worked the heavy bag for close to an hour and I was done. I poked around in the attic and found an old building block set I hadn’t seen since I was about seven. Perfect. By the time Kim showed up at noon, I’d showered, had lunch, and found a large paper drop cloth.

Mom stepped into the rec room to see what we were up to. She watched quietly for a few minutes and asked if we needed anything. She returned a few minutes later with a bunch of markers.

“We don’t have the stuff to make a fancy model but this ought to do,” I said.

“I take it you’re going to color the pasture green and the pond blue once you’re happy with the layout.”

“Yes, ma’am. We’re trying to lay it out to scale as best we can and it just seems like doing this with sort of 3D buildings and stuff makes it easier to visualize.”

“He just likes playing with blocks,” Kim said, putting a different roof on her barn for the third or fourth time.

“Take a picture when you get done. If you go to the store, would you pick up collard greens? What am I thinking? Everyone is going to be out. If you happen to be in a grocery store, and you happen to see them, grab some.”

“Got it. Where are you going to be?”

“Dance studio is open tonight for anyone that cares to dance in the new year. You’re invited. I’m helping host, so I’ll be there. Marie will be there. Franklin, Karen, and Angela won’t. Kim, I don’t know about your folks.”

“They usually stay home. Crazy drivers out there.”

“Yes. If you two go anywhere, please be careful. Dane is planning on dancing but he’s also on call so we have to take both cars. He just went through some sort of emergency room refresher and I think he expects to spend the evening in the ER. Maybe not.

Kim and I went out for dinner at a little Greek restaurant we liked and then went to her parent’s boat. We would have privacy for a couple of hours and then enjoy fireworks over the harbor. I had a backpack with snacks, water, my new little pink vibrator, lube, and extra towels for whatever I might need them for.

Kim parked the truck on the far side of the lot and away from the lights. At night, it didn’t look like a light blue truck. It looked gray. We held hands walking down the dock toward the boat, noting that several boats were out. I figured they were taking an evening cruise before the fireworks began. I held my hand out and Kim stepped down onto the boat, kicked off her shoes, and went down into the cabin.

“It’s not as cold as I thought it would be,” I said.

“It’s still too cold to be naked. I think being close to the water might help it stay warmer. Body heat.”

We sat on the bed and pulled a blanket over us. We talked about the planning we’d done for the property for a while. We knew the one thing we needed to fix was our map of the trees we liked. There were probably twenty or more trees that we thought of as untouchable, meaning we wouldn’t cut them down no matter what. But there were at least another twenty or thirty trees we’d like to keep if it were possible. We needed to put them on a map.

We talked about Vince and Lani, Bobby and Mel for a while. Then we talked about a few other couples we didn’t know as well. Some of the match-ups were odd and some were just plain silly. We agreed that it was impossible to figure out Marci, probably because Marci hadn’t figured out Marci.

“What I don’t get is why Mom and Dane haven’t set a date yet. What are they waiting for?”

“Maybe they have and you just don’t know it.”

“Maybe, but I don’t see the profit in that. What about Hank and Lula Mae?” I asked.