Chapter 23: A New Flame

September, 1980, Milford, Ohio

Things with Bethany seemed normal on Thursday. After school, I helped Mrs. Seime with the YFU Exchange Program presentation. There were six sophomores who participated, and I spoke for about five minutes about my experiences and answered questions. In my judgment, only one of the students was truly a serious candidate, a Sophomore girl named Jo Filmore. I talked to her after the presentation a bit and she said she’d fill out an application. I told her I’d be happy to help her with anything she needed.

When we finished, I drove over to Dona’s house for dinner. Her mom was an excellent cook. It seemed that every mom around was an excellent cook, except my own. I thought about the fact that I hadn’t been working on my cooking as I should have been and made a mental note to start again. I wanted to be able to cook nice meals for the week Stephanie and I were together. I realized my mind was wandering again, but fortunately nobody had been talking to me at that moment.

After dinner, Tom asked me if I knew anything about guns. I explained that I had learned to shoot when I was six and he showed me his collection of rifles, shotguns, and pistols and offered to take me hunting or shooting anytime I wanted. He made light of showing his daughter’s new friend his guns.

“Dona’s her own girl, Steve,” he said in his folksy style. “Don’t think I’m showin’ you these to warn ya’ off. She likes you a lot and I’m not one to get in her way! Let me know if you want to go hunting with me, or if you ever need to borrow a gun to shoot varmints on your land.”

I laughed. He was from backwoods Tennessee and his use of ‘varmints’ just sounded odd to my ears. Wilma, Dona’s mom, was from backwoods Kentucky and spoke in a similar folksy style. Dona hadn’t picked up either the Ridge-runner or Hillbilly accents of her parents, but had a fairly standard Southern Ohio accent and didn’t use the same kinds of slang that her parents did. She’d been born in Kentucky, but they had moved to Milford when she was eight.

After spending several hours talking with Dona and her parents, I found myself pleasantly comfortable around them all. I could tell that they had taken a liking to me when neither of them even batted an eye when Dona sat on my lap on the couch to talk as if it were the most normal thing to do! I was surprised that she did that on what was basically our second date. But I guess you could call it a third date if the folk-festival was counted.

Around 9:00pm, her parents excused themselves and went to bed. Dona told me they usually were in bed around 9:00pm and were up before dawn. I told her I was almost always up before dawn but usually didn’t go to bed until between 10:00pm and 11:00pm on school nights. Dona got up and turned off all the lights except for a dim one in the corner, turned on the TV and came and sat next to me. I put my arm around her and we watched TV for a bit.

“Steve, it’s OK to kiss me!” she whispered. “Don’t you want to?”

Well, of course I wanted to, but I had been holding back. She didn’t know my reputation, and I didn’t want to move things along too fast. It appeared that Dona had different ideas. I turned my head, and we kissed briefly, just a touch of our lips, like the kiss after our dinner and movie date. She tasted of strawberries again. I kissed her again, this time our lips lingered together for a moment before we broke the kiss.

I put my arm around her shoulders and pulled her closer to me, and she pulled her legs up on the couch and leaned on my shoulder. She put her hand on my chest and slipped the other one around the small of my back to hold me around the waist. We sat like that for a while in the flickering light of the television.

My thoughts went to Bethany and Homecoming dance. I really liked Dona so far and I needed to let Dona know I was already going to Homecoming so that it didn’t cause a major blowup before anything even got started.

“You know Homecoming is in a couple of weeks, and I would love to take you, but I already have a date. I didn’t have a steady girlfriend, so I asked my best friend Bethany to go with me.”

“Your best friend is a girl?”

“That’s pretty much how it’s always been for my whole life. Before Bethany, it was a girl named Sofia in Sweden, and before that it was Jennifer, before we became boyfriend and girlfriend and before Jennifer was Melanie and so on back to when I was little in California.”

“I’m disappointed, but I’m not surprised. It would be short notice to get a dress and stuff. I know it’s early, but would you go to the Sadie Hawkins Day dance with me?”

“Sure, I’d love to!”

“Good! Now kiss me again, please!”

I leaned over for a kiss and our lips met. Dona parted her lips as an invitation and I pressed my tongue between them. She danced her tongue around mine and pressed her lips harder against mine. She broke the kiss and smiled at me and leaned back against my shoulder. Around 9:45pm I let Dona know that I needed to go so I could get home and do a small amount of homework that I had. She walked me to the door and hugged me and gave me a quick peck on the lips.

“Are you doing anything tomorrow night?” I asked.

“No. Did you want to go out again?”

“Yes. Let’s have dinner and then we can go back to my house and swim, if you want.”

“I’d like that. Why don’t you pick me up around 5:00pm?”

“See you then!”

When I arrived home, I went to my room and quickly completed my math homework. I wrote in my journal and went to bed.

On Friday at lunch, I let Bethany know that Dona had asked me to the Sadie Hawkins dance.

“That’s what, three dates now?” Bethany asked with a smirk. “Rocked her world for her yet?”

“For your information, Miss Smarty-Pants-amateur-psychologist, all I’ve done is kiss her four or five times.”

“Wow, you must be slipping! By the third date, you usually have them begging for more!”

“Believe it or not, Dona has no idea about my reputation. I’m not sure how that happened, but it did. And I want to keep it that way. She seems like a really nice girl and I’m OK with taking it slow. Right now, other than Kathy, who got her all-day thing, I’m not having sex with anyone except Debbie V.”

“And me, tomorrow!” she giggled. “All day!”

“We’re still on, even after the Becky incident?”

“Yes, of course, you dope!” she said, swatting my chest lightly. “Now, if you hadn’t made that phone call, it would be a different story altogether. But not only did you end it, you ended it in such a way that there is no possibility that she misunderstood. Hanging up on her was a nice touch. It probably made you look like a real asshole, but it was the right way to handle it.”

“What is it with you and swearing when Becky is concerned?”

“It’s the same thing that set Jennifer and Stephanie off about her. She’s a conniving, manipulative bitch. I’m kind of surprised that Jennifer told you to have sex with Becky in the first place, but I understand why she did it. You had to be sure. Well, Steve Adams, are you sure now?”

“Yes, Bethany, I’m sure. Stephanie was right all along. She knows that and is pretty damn smug about it, too.”

“You should listen to your sister. She hasn’t steered you wrong as far as I can tell.”

“She thinks I should be with Jennifer in the long run. That’s who she thinks my life partner is.”

“She’s blinded by her own love for Jennifer. That clouds her thinking.”

“I’m not so sure about that. When I asked her about where she saw things now, she placed Karin first, Elyse second, and Jennifer third.”

“I’m not surprised,” Bethany said. “I can tell she doesn’t think we’re right for each other. But you wouldn’t put things in that order, would you?”

“No. In fact, right now, I can’t put things in any order. A few months ago I would have told you Jennifer was the one, or at least the most likely one. Now I have no idea.”

“So the field is wide open. It could be any of us or none of us. Stephanie hasn’t considered that last one — that in the end, it might not be any of us. Now, none of us think that, but it is a possibility, even if it’s remote.”

“Does it bother you that Stephanie thinks that way?” Bethany asked.

“Not at the moment, no,” I replied. “I think she’ll come around. Of course, if she doesn’t, that’s a potential problem given it’s unlikely you would ever marry someone your sister didn’t approve of.”

I paused and took a moment to reply, “Do you think she has that kind of control, Bethany?”

“Well, of course she does! You would never do anything to disappoint her. If I understand what you told me, that’s why you initially agreed to take her cherry — because she expected it to happen and you want her approval and love so badly that you’ll commit incest to keep it. Later on, you realized it was something else entirely, but, in the beginning, it was to gain and keep her approval.”

“So, you think she controls my life?” I asked with a raised eyebrow.

“Not the way you mean, no, she doesn’t. She doesn’t tell you what to do. You willingly change your behavior to make her happy. It’s something you would never do for your mom, but you sure do it for your little sister, like you would do for a wife. She has a hold on you, but it’s not like Becky’s claws. It’s that you both have such a deep, intense, abiding love for each other that neither of you wants to disappoint the other. I told you before, if your relationship ever breaks, it’ll destroy your life, Steve, and probably hers as well. No divorce could possibly be messier.”

“You’ve said that several times now; is it really that serious?”

“Yes, it most certainly is. I want to ask you something and I hope you’ll honestly answer this. Besides Jennifer and me, have you told any of the other girls about Stephanie?”

“Melanie was the first one to point it out to me,” I said, “And I told Karin.”

“Melanie’s out of the picture. Was Karin OK with it?”

“She realized it was going to happen and although she wasn’t happy about it, she’ll accept it. That’s the main reason we didn’t make love when I saw her in July in Sweden. We both know that things will change after Spring Break. Only then can I begin to even think about who it is I’ll be with. Right now, it’s one step at a time. I have no idea who I’ll end up with.”

“Good! That’s much healthier than obsessing every day!”

“I’m taking Dona out again tonight.”

“Go ahead, you just better not tire yourself out with her! Tomorrow, you are mine. And you know what I want. All day. Every way.”

I sighed theatrically, “I know, Bethany!”

She laughed.

That evening I picked up Dona, and we went to TGI Friday’s in Springdale for dinner. After dinner, we went back to my house to hang out and swim. Dona wore a hot pink bikini that was cut fairly modestly. Her body had curves in all the right places and her breasts were moderately sized. She caught me getting an eyeful a few times and just smiled at me. After we swam, we sat in my room and drank Cokes and chatted.

“Who’s the girl in the picture there?” Dona asked, pointing to a picture of Larry, Birgit and me.

“That was Birgit Andersson. She was the exchange student I told you about. The one that died.”

“Oh, that’s right. I’m so sorry!”

“I’ve come to terms with it now,” I said. “It was tough, but at this point, I just have fond memories.”

“I see you’ve known Larry for a while then, too. That’s him in eighth grade, right?”

“Yes. I guess you first met him this year in Latin Club?”

“That’s right. He also plays chess, right?”

“Yes. We were both on the chess team together in ninth grade. I ended up dropping off the team in tenth grade because I wanted to work on computers. You heard about the computer dating stuff at the High School, right?”

“Yeah, some girl named Beth runs it.”

“She’s my business partner. I wrote the original computer dating program with her and we ran it in tenth grade. We also ran it for some other schools. When I was away last year, she ran it for Milford and other schools as well. We’re running it again this year as soon as the Homecoming Dance is over. I figured that’s when I’d get my Sadie Hawkins invite, but you jumped the gun.”

“I saw your lunch table, Steve. It’s like you’re the king presiding over a court! And lots of cute girls!”

“Well, Bethany and Kathy are two good friends and the only cheerleaders I’d ever even bothered to talk to, really. Bethany has been a great friend for a couple of years and I’ve known Kathy since 7th grade. Beth Pater, my business partner, is one of those girls as well. She and Brent are dating. There are some others who will pop in and out over the course of the year, including my friends Ralph and Larry. My old girlfriend Jennifer and my friend Melanie were part of the group in tenth grade, along with a few other girls who have graduated.”

“You seem to have lots of female friends, Steve. You only mentioned three guys and three of the about ten girls that were at table!”

“As I said, I’ve always had female friends. In Sweden, all my friends were girls, except for two.”

“Are you dating any of those girls?”

It was a dangerous question, but I could dance around it fairly safely.

“No. I see Bethany a lot because she’s my best friend, but we’re not dating. I went out with Kathy Will a couple of times, but we agreed that we’re better off as just friends. I went out with Beth Pater once, but we decided we’re better as business partners than as a possible couple. Erin, I dated a couple of times before I left for Sweden. Debbie is my neighbor and we’ve hung out together for years, but we’re not dating.