Chapter 10

I called Shirley and asked her out for the following Friday night, and she accepted. Nothing was said about our previous exchanges, or about her two lunches with Betsy, or about anything else of consequence.

That Friday evening, I decided to keep it light and easy, and I drove her out to Sikeston to Lambert's, an oddball place known locally as "Home of the Throwed Rolls."

Lambert's featured down-home cooking and an atmosphere that is, let's say, just a little laid-back. Shirley almost choked on her beef roast when a guy at a neighboring table held his hand high overhead, hollered "over here" and some young man from the wait staff threw -- or should I say, throwed -- a dinner roll to him. It was expertly thrown and expertly caught. Shirley quickly picked up on the fact that this kind of behavior was considered normal at Lambert's.

"Bet you didn't see anything like that in staid old Southern California," I said.

"Well. I had a tossed salad or two, out there," she said. "And they throw bags of peanuts at you, at Dodger games. But no. Not exactly."

So the evening went well, and while we were there I invited her to accompany me for dinner and dancing on an Evening Cruise on the Mississippi, the following weekend.

"I warn you, I'm not a very accomplished dancer," I said.

"Yes, I know," Shirley said.

"You do?"

"The reunion -- remember?"

"Oh. Yeah. We danced there, didn't we?"

"Well, I did, anyway," Shirley said, giggling. "If it matters to you, you could come over to the apartment some evening this week, and I could teach you a little bit about the foxtrot, at least."

"I'd appreciate that," I said. "I was all signed up in sixth grade to learn to dance in school, but when they wouldn't let me partner-up with my girlfriend, I got all indignant and dropped out."

"You had a girlfriend -- in sixth grade?"

"Absolutely. I mean, it was all innocent and everything, but she was my girlfriend all right! If I hadn't been so devoted to her, I could have learned to dance at an early age, and, in all likelihood, might have developed into a really suave guy by -- say -- sophomore year."

"That's when you said you first noticed me," Shirley said, "sophomore year."

"Yeah. God, you were so gorgeous, even then! But it wasn't all innocent, like with little Beth, back in sixth grade."

"I made you horny?"

"Oh, God, yes!"

"But you couldn't -- or wouldn't -- approach me?"

"Think about it. You remember how it was back then. You must have known all the boys were watering at the mouth when they looked at you!"

"Oh yeah, I noticed."

"That must be something! How does it feel? You know -- being sought-after like that?"

"It was flattering, at first. And the other girls noticed the attention I got, and they were envious, so of course, I enjoyed that, too. But after a while I realized it was a mixed blessing, at best. I mean, a lot of the boys just looked at my breasts. They never raised their eyes any higher. And most of them were so tongue-tied they couldn't relate to me on any level."

"Yeah, I was one of those. Hell, I was both of those! I couldn't imagine actually speaking to you, and I was one of the ones who had trouble looking you in the eye, too."

"But boys like you -- boys my own age, were still mostly just -- little boys. The girls were quicker to mature. I think, if anything, we girls, at that point, had a certain amount of sympathy for you guys -- you guys still waiting for the growth spurt to kick in."

She was warming to her topic. "The older boys were the worst," Shirley said. "They were a little more experienced with girls; a little smoother. Their mouths were watering, too, but they still managed to come on to me like they were doing me some kind of big favor, me being just a sophomore and all."

"When did you start dating the football player?"

"Rick Quintana? It was pretty early. No later than the beginning of my junior year, anyway."

"That guy was a bear!" I said. "Any possible thoughts I might have had about asking you for a date, he was a huge discouraging factor."

Shirley laughed. "Rick wasn't so bad," she said. "He may have looked scary, but he was just another young boy, like you. Bigger. Heavier. But, just a boy."