Chapter 1

So many things happened to me in 1958 that it is difficult to pick out just one happening and say that it defined the year for me. It would be very easy to say which thing was worst and which was best though. I'd like to tell you about the best thing that happened, the first time I ever fell in love. I was sixteen, and a junior in high school. My only romantic experiences with girls had been short term, spur of the moment, sexual opportunities. I'd never so much as had a real date before, although I'd had some experience and acquaintance with casual kissing and petting and things. All of that changed when Miss Faye Watford moved to Groton at the beginning of the year. Her parents were getting divorced or separated out in Northern California and they thought that it would be better if their only child came to live with her mother's parents until after everything was settled and finalized. Faye was also sixteen and she was the most beautiful creature I'd ever set eyes on. She had long blond hair that was straight and flowed down her back almost to her butt. She had eyes so blue that they took my breath away. She was on the tall side, five six or seven, and must have weighed one twenty five or so. She had sleek and supple muscles that just rippled with pent up energy. She looked so tanned and healthy that she made all the rest of us look drab and plain. While we dressed up against the bitter winter cold in P-Coats and heavy cloth padded jackets, Faye wore warm and elegant ski parkas and down jackets. It wasn't that she had that much more money than the rest of us so much as that these were the kinds of clothing they were wearing in her part of California at the time.

She was in my civics and trigonometry classes, and walked to and from school along the same main roads that I traveled. It was during the time that my sister Annie was falling in love with Kevin Hartigan that Faye transferred into my high school. I went out of my way to try to get her to notice me right from the beginning, but to no avail. I even paid a boy $3.00 to trade me school lockers because his locker was nearer to hers than my old one. I did all this just so I'd have an excuse to see her a couple more times each day, before and right after school. I has escaped the emotional upheaval of having crushes on girls right up until that winter. I had found lots of girls attractive through the years, but none so compelling that I couldn't resist making a fool of myself in front of them. With Faye I became the same sappy lovestruck guy that I'd laughed at and made fun of since puberty. The worst part of it was that I knew it while it was taking place, and was aware of how foolish I must have appeared, and just didn't care. I had it bad. It was my younger sister Joan, fifteen years old and a sophomore, that finally got tired of watching me acting like a lovesick puppy, and embarrassing her with all her friends, that helped me break the social ice with Faye. She decided one day that she'd go introduce herself to Faye and walk home with her. I followed behind, well out of hearing range, wishing that I'd had my sister's nerve to do something like that myself.

Faye's grandparents lived about a quarter mile closer to the high school than we did, so Joan and Faye stopped when they reached it and talked for a minute right in front of the house. I experienced a terrible fear and a wonderful anticipation as I walked by them trying not to be too conspicuous as I did so. I know my face was red with embarrassment, wishing that Joan would say something to me that gave me an excuse to stop and talk as I passed by them, and, at the same time, hoping that she wouldn't, so I could avoid making a fool of myself more than I already was doing around her.

"Jackie, hold up a minute. You know Faye don't you? Faye, this is my brother, Jackie. Jackie I was telling Faye about the Friday night dances over at the new teen center, but I couldn't remember if they start at six o'clock or if it's later. Do you know?" Joan was like that, she could talk a mile a minute and sometimes it seemed like she didn't even need to stop to take a breath. Joan was also very pretty, easily the best looking girl in the family, including all my cousins and aunts. She could be a big pain in the butt at times, but she was OK most of the time.

"Sure, Faye's in a couple of my classes, hi Faye. I think those dances start at six, but I'm not really sure. I know that a lot of kids go over there early and just hang around outside til it opens. I'm pretty sure that it's over at 11:00, and that there's chaperons there at every dance." I was running off at the mouth just like Joan had done.

"Is it one of those dances where the boys all stand around just holding up the walls and talking about the girls but never dance themselves and just the girls dance?" This was the first time Faye had ever spoken directly to me. I felt under a lot of pressure to answer her question in a way that wouldn't make me sound like too big of a clod or bumpkin.

"I've never actually been there for a dance yet, but I've been thinking of trying it out one of these nights."

"Do you dance?" I knew how to dance, after a fashion, but I wasn't so confident in my dancing that I'd want to say I could. Joan saved me before I could answer.

You kidding? Jackie's like a professional dancer. He gets paid to dance at the Griswold Hotel when they hold their wallflower balls in the summer."

"Really, that true Jackie, you a professional dancer?" Faye was teasing me I could tell by the grin on her face and the glint in her eyes.

"It's a little true, I do get paid to be there at the dances. They give you a five dollar bonus if you don't step on any girl's toes for the whole evening, but I've never managed to collect one." Both girls laughed.

"If you danced with me would you step on my toes?" Now she was actually flirting with me, I could hardly breathe.

"I'm afraid so, I could practically guarantee it, in fact."

"Really? How's that, that you could guarantee you'd step on them?" My eyes hadn't left her face the whole time we'd been standing there talking.

"Because I'm not stupid, that's how."

"OK, I give up, what does that have to do with it?"

"Faye anyone who was dancing with you, and had a chance to look at you would be stupid to look at his feet instead. Since I'd have to look at my feet to not step on your toes, and since I'm not stupid, you'd get stepped on."

"You know Joanie, you were right, he is dangerous. I'll really have to watch out when I'm around him. So, will you be at the dance on Friday, Jackie?"

"If you're there Faye, a team of wild horses couldn't keep me away."

"Well I guess me and Joanie will see you there then." She did that little wave things girls do with only their fingers and turned and went up the steps and into the house. Joan and I started walking the rest of the way home.

"She likes you, you know, Jackie."

"Likes me, this is the first time I've even said as much as hello to her. Why do you think she likes me?"

"For one thing, she said you were cute. For another, she said she really likes tall guys. And, for the last thing, she told me she liked you when we first started walking home, and when we got in front of her house, she asked me to stop you so she could talk to you. She said she was tired of waiting for you to get up the nerve to talk to her."

"Good, you can tell her I like her too. And thanks, Joan for helping me out there, I appreciate it."

"You're welcome Jackie, but I had kind of an ulterior motive too. You know pop wouldn't let me go to the teen center if I asked, but he might if you were going and told him you'd look out for me. I'd appreciate that a lot Jackie, and I'd stay out of your way, I promise."

"I don't know Joan, aren't you still a little young to be dancing with boys? What are you now, twelve or thirteen?" That got me a stiff knuckle punch on my arm that was pretty painful for coming from a girl.

"I'm thirteen months younger than you Jackie and you've been going to dances since you were only thirteen and they didn't stop you from doing it."

"For a very good reason, Joan, I can't get pregnant. You, on the other hand."

"God, Jackie, please don't say stuff like that where mom or pop could hear you. I wouldn't get out until I was too old to have children. You know how they are about stuff like that. Ma would have me on my knees at the church saying rosaries if you even brought up the possibility."

"No, don't worry. I'll get you out for the dance, first because I love you, and second, because you can help me out if I get too tongue tied to talk with Faye when we're not out actually dancing together."

We finished walking home with no more talk between us. Joan was probably thinking about what to wear to her very first dance, and I was thinking about what it would feel like to hold Faye Watford in my arms. I was so far gone over her that I wasn't even thinking about kissing her or anything like that yet. You know you've got it pretty bad when your thoughts are even innocent. I talked to my dad that evening, after supper, out on the porch while we were smoking together. I told him I was going over to the teen center to the dance on Friday and that I thought I should take Joan with me so I could keep an eye on her and keep her safe from trouble rather than let her start going out on her own soon and not having someone help her in a new situation. He wanted to know how much she was paying me to run interference for her. I told him that she'd helped me with a girl and that she really wanted to go to the dance. I told him I'd really watch out for her. He stripped his cigarette butt carefully and threw the pieces out on our front yard. He turned to go in and looked back at me long enough to tell me something.