Chapter 5

You might think that given the fact that I was the Man of The House for my stepmother and her sister that I could check in with you as an expert on the female of the species, but you would be wrong as wrong could be. For one thing, I was too shy to even talk to girls. As far as I was concerned, they were beings of mystery as unknowable as the far side of the moon. My only date thus far had been to a dance with Susanne Cummings, a girl who sat behind me in English last year. (How I had come about asking her out was still a puzzle). She had burst into tears fifteen minutes into our date and ran out of the dance at the school gym accompanied by her best friend Julie Snyder. They didn’t return. All I could figure was that the disappointment of dating me was too great for her to bear. After that bit of humiliation, I made it a point to avoid any further social interactions with girls.

That’s why, for example, as I walked to the library that afternoon, I crossed the street when I saw a clutch of girls my age walking toward me, chattering like magpies. If one girl was a hazard, a bunch of them was a sure recipe for an embarrassing disaster.

I got to the library hoping that the book hog who had checked out Mastermind of Mars and Fighting Man of Mars had finally returned them. He’d had them for a month and must be a pathetically slow reader.

My finger tingled again. I had unconsciously slipped the ring back on. I was trying to get it off when my favorite librarian cleared her throat and waved me over. Miss Alice Elderkin was a tall blond woman with innocent cornflower blue eyes. Think healthy Swedish girl. As usual she was dressed in a colorful cotton scoop neck dress that according to what I heard her tell Mrs. Sanderson that her aunt made for her with whatever fabric was on sale down at Maud’s Fabrics and Notions. Her aunt used the same Butterick pattern on all her dresses, so they were alike, featuring the same scoop neck that had caught my attention first time she’d bent over to pick up a mis-shelved book.

(A couple of weeks ago, I had taken shameless advantage of her by asking her to help find a book that I previously located on the bottom shelf. The view down the top of her dress as she was bent over was awesome. See what I mean—I had become a pervert of the worst stripe.)

As I walked over, I noticed that she had an odd gleam in her eyes.

“Hello Steven. How did your report on the feeding habits of Antarctic penguins turn out? You seemed so anxious to find a book on it. I must say that I was awfully surprised you had to write a report on penguins given the fact that school was out.”

She grinned a saucy grin at me.

I blushed furiously. I was nowhere near as clever as I thought I was. I soon quit thinking altogether when she leaned over the waist high counter and showed me a nice glimpse of her big beautiful creamy titties.

“Uh, fine,” was my witty comeback.

She giggled and leaned down further and gave me a better view.

“Anything I can help you find today?”

“Uh, geez. I don’t know.”

She stood back up. “This place is dead this morning, let’s take a walk back to the 900’s. History/Geography is the perfect place to talk for a bit. No one ever goes back there.”

Odd.

Miss Elderkin was usually quiet and shy. This new person strutted with confidence the heel her shoes clicked down on the marble floors so hard that those big breasts bounced with every step.

She stopped by a section containing a ton of information about Mongolia.

“Steven, can I tell you a secret and do you promise not to tell anyone?”

I thought:

Deja Vu all over again.

She whispered,

“My mother died when I was a little girl. My dad and my uncle Jeff raised me. They were very protective. They sent me to all catholic schools--girls only catholic schools. With very strict Nuns. They hinted they wanted me to join up and become a nun after college, but I managed to escape that future. I got my library degree and came to work here. Unlike some of the creepy men that come in her and stare at me, you were a gentleman. A naughty one, but polite and respectful. It was fun and safe to tease you by giving you looks down my blouse at my boobs. It was first time ever that I felt like I was a desirable woman.”

Huh.

Then my stupid mouth ran away from me. “That is a dumb word.”

“What word.”

“Boobs. Boobs is a water balloon in the back yard. A silly word. You have breasts-- big, beautiful breasts. If a person wanted to get coarse, he’d call them really sexy tits. They are too big to be titties, so sexy tits it is.”

I literally slapped a hand over my mouth. Where the heck did that come from. I mumbled sorry to her shocked look and prepared to run. My life was really going to suck now that I couldn’t go the library anymore.

“Wait Steven, where are you going. That’s the nicest thing anyone has ever said to me.” She was looking at me with a soft look in her baby blues.