Chapter 37

After dinner, Kate, Clara and I stayed in the living room and played a game of Scrabble. We tried to use as many swear words and words with sexual meanings as possible. We finally had to quit when Kate claimed that PUZY was an accepted alternate spelling. It was a lot of fun just lying on the floor and playing a game together. At around nine, I walked Clara home. I felt more relaxed with her than I had before we had our problem.

On my return trip home, I asked myself why this was. Why did I feel more relaxed now? The answer was obvious, if a little unexpected. We had worked together to try to make Kate feel better, and I had finally opened up to her a little bit about my own intentions regarding seeing those other girls. Clara had mentioned other girls before, but I had refused to speak of it with her. Now that I had told her what my intentions were, and she had accepted that, I didn't feel like I was attempting to deceive her anymore.

I was still going to see other girls, but, I had now assured her that it wasn't going to be a permanent activity on my part. When I told her that, it had surprised me. Walking back home, I knew it had been true. Probably, it had always been true, but I hadn't wanted or needed to admit it. Karen and Denise were dalliance's to me. I was a dalliance to them as well. None of us had been that open or honest with each other.

In the beginning, all three of us had spoken quite a bit about the feelings we had for each other. The more sexually involved we became, the more we spoke of, and emphasized our physical pleasures with each other. Once I found out that Denise and Karen did sex things to each other, some of their competition started to make a certain kind of sense to me. Clara and Kate had something like that going on as well.

I enjoyed having sex, including having different partners. I had felt a sexual attraction to Eileen, but hadn't gone as far with her, mostly because I didn't think doing things with me would mean that much to her. She just wanted to do things. I got the impression that she wasn't that particular about who she did them with. Was I becoming like that? I knew the answer was yes, but, even so, I still wanted to have all those varied experiences. In fact, now I wanted to have sex with Eileen as well. Admitting exactly what I was doing, and what I wanted to do, was actually liberating for me. I liked kissing, touching, and I really liked the actual sex itself, whether it was me licking, them sucking, or actual screwing. It all felt good to me. It was exciting to think about too.

Clara was different. I wanted to do all of those things with her too, but in addition to all of that, I wanted to protect her, and keep her separate from my other activities. She was the girl I wanted to play scrabble with, eat dinners at home with, sit around just holding hands and talking with. She was the only girl I could be satisfied to just kiss and hold hands with.

As I walked home, a surprising revelation came to me. I was going to stop fooling around and playing with other girls as soon as I finally made love to Clara. From the moment that I first thought it, it made sense, and seemed fitting to me. The only drawback to this, at least that I could see, was that it probably would mean that I would try to delay when I actually first did do it with her. Making love to Clara would be a moment when I felt I was making an irreversible commitment. Even as I thought this, I knew I was already rushing too fast into something I wasn't emotionally mature enough to handle. Love doesn't wait for you to grow up enough to handle it. I loved Clara. She affected me in a way that no one else did. I felt as protective of her as I did of Kate. I could act on the love I felt for Clara, but not on what I felt for Kate. In some ways, what Kate and Clara did together made it easier for me to stay true to what I knew I must avoid.

Back inside my house, I felt better. I smiled over at Kate while I put my coat back in the entry way closet. She smiled back. Spending the time with the three of us together, had calmed all of us down. We had gotten through a trying time, helping each other, and avoiding falling into some dangerous pitfalls. I felt like Kate and I could discuss what had happened now, while working to make sure we didn't come too near the edge of the incestuous relationship we both were imagining.

I had no experience with discussing that with anyone. Denise had told me about Tommy Lampkin and his sister, Jane. It seemed to me that the whole subject of incest was so forbidden. Just to think about it was like begging for trouble. And yet. I couldn't deny that, maybe because it was so forbidden, it had a powerful attraction to me as well. Knowing that Kate had those same attractions only made it seem that much closer to being obtainable.

I sat on the sofa and stared at the television. I noticed my mother and father were both missing from the living room area.

"Where's mom and dad?"

"In their bedroom. I think they're doing it." Kate giggled when she said it. This wasn't really all that unusual for us. It was unusual for either of us to speculate out loud about what they were doing, but we had both known what they were likely doing for a long time. Since Agnes came to live here in America, my parents didn't get nearly as much time alone together as they used to. My mom worked at the dance studio now, and because of her working, she didn't have dinner already prepared when dad got home, or all of the laundry and cleaning done, like she always had before she went to work with Agnes. It was also likely that, as we got older, and our thoughts turned to sex, we just started paying more attention to any possible sexual situations around us.

"Are you okay now about everything? With Clara, and about what happened before and today?" I looked at Kate, trying to see her real reactions.

"She and I talked when she first came over. She told me that she wasn't going to go with me if I ever went to see Keith again."

"Are you planning on going to see him?"

"If you'd let me, I would. If you did it without telling on me."

"I would only do that if I first told mom and dad that I was all done with looking out for you. I could probably do it in a way that I didn't have to tell them anything other than it was too big a responsibility for me to handle. Which is the truth."

"Then they still wouldn't let me go out or do anything until I get to be fourteen. If you remember, that's why you went to them in the first place, so I could do some stuff at least, and not always be stuck here at home."

"Probably they wouldn't, but, they might. I think mom knows they can't just keep you locked up until then. On the other hand, whatever they decide, I wouldn't have to be worried about you all of the time. I think the only thing you might have to worry about is if mom makes you go straight from school to the dance studio, like she did last year. This year, she thought I was old enough to watch out for you. If I tell her I don't want to be responsible for you anymore, then she might decide to do that again."

"Couldn't you tell her that you don't mind watching me when I'm home? Then, not say anything when I sometimes come home late?"

"No. That would make me your accomplice, and I don't want any part of that. If you're going to sneak around, you have to fix up a way where I'm not involved, and where I don't have to lie for you."

"That would mean I'd probably have to give up my afternoons with Clara too."

"You might have to do that anyway, once she and I start going steady."

"Why would I have to? You said it didn't bother you, what we do."

"Not now. But we aren't going steady right now either. Did you think I'd let you two go on if Clara and I were going steady? If I'm not going to be doing anything with any other girls, I'd expect her to be like that too, and be only with me."

"Why? If it doesn't bother you now? What difference does it make?"

"I don't think I can explain it, but there is a big difference. Going steady means not doing things with anyone else. I won't, and she won't."

"Did Clara say she would quit doing things with me?"

"We haven't ever talked directly about that, but once she said she would stop, a long time ago. She was talking about you knowing that she would stop doing things with you when I finally started to realize that I loved her. I never asked her about it after though. You can ask her if you want to. It doesn't matter now though, because we aren't going steady yet."

"But, you are going to be soon, you already told Clara that you were."

"Not right away. Just like I told you that you shouldn't plan on having Clara here in the afternoons forever."

"I don't see why you would have to take her away from me. I was with her first. I told her you were going to be this way."

Kate was once again starting to show that she was getting upset. By the time she started hurling accusations around, she was working herself up to an explosion of some kind.

"Kate, stop! It isn't your choice, or even my choice. Clara will have to decide. If she wants to go steady with me, she will decide not to do any more things with you. If she wants to keep on with you, then she'll decide not to go steady with me. There isn't anything for you to get all worked up about now. I was only trying to get you to take everything into account before you decided about what to do as far as going over to Keith's or not."

"It would be better if you would just do what I'm asking you to, Larry. I could come home by four everyday. I could even tell you that I was being late because I wanted to go to the library."

"Tell mom that's what you want to do. You like to use me as the guy you hide behind, and that's exactly what I don't want to keep happening. I don't try to pin the blame on you whenever I get caught doing something bad. You want to use me to get out from under mom's supervision, and then you'll go do something that you know mom would never let you do. As soon as you get caught though, it will all be my fault for letting you do that."

"They listen to you. They won't ever listen to me."

"They trust me. That's only because I'm older. I don't always try to get away with as much as you do. At least I don't try usually. They will treat you the same as me when you get older."

"Clara says she thinks you should allow me to make my own mistakes. She says you're too protective of me."

"Then it's settled. Tomorrow I'm going to tell mom that I'm too young to act like your parent. I'll tell her that you should only have to worry about sneaking around on two parents, not three. I really don't want to stay caught in the middle of this. I don't think you should just go screw Keith and Leon, just because they are willing to do it, but I don't want you to think I'm the one who wants to make those decisions for you. You should only have to deal with mom and dad and your own wishes."

"Do it, if that's how you want to be. Just don't say anything to get me into any trouble. Mom might let me keep coming home by myself anyway. You need to quit trying to catch me doing things after you do that though."

Kate glared at me. She had worked herself up in spite at my attempts to be conciliatory with her. Whenever she felt thwarted, it was always everyone else that was against her. She didn't try to focus her anger, preferring to be mad at the whole world.

Saturday morning, even before my father got me started on my punishment chores, I told my mother what Kate and I had agreed on. She listened as I spoke. I watched her eyes, and I could tell that she was reading all of my mannerisms, and could see that I was nervous and upset about having this talk with her. When I was finished, she looked at me, and told me to finish my breakfast. She went down into the basement, probably to discuss things with my father. She came back in about five minutes and told me that she had decided that I was probably right. Then, she surprised me by thanking me for doing the best I could for Kate. She told me to put my plate and glass in the sink and go down to see what my father had planned for me in the basement.

It turned out that he and I were going to re-paint the basement walls together. I went back up to my room and changed into my oldest clothes, ones that didn't even fit me anymore. I knew I was going to get a lot of paint on me while I worked. My dad gave me all of the middle area to paint, while he did all of the corners and edges. We used drop cloths, but I still managed to get paint all over me. I was wearing an old pair of my father's brown dress shoes that he didn't wear anymore. When we got done, he looked at them and told me to just throw them away. I did that with everything I was wearing, except for my socks and underpants. It was after one by the time we were all done. My father had worked me for longer than my three hours. I didn't complain though, because he would have just gotten mad, and then started telling me about when he was a boy my age back in Hungary.

I had taken a shower and was getting dressed when Kate came and knocked on my door.

"You were right, Larry. I have to go to the studio, straight from school everyday. Mom says that Clara can come with me though, and she's going to pay us to help her with her classes. Now remember, you don't have to be worried or interfere anymore with anything I do. Mom said that you can still take me places if you want to. You would have to agree to follow her instructions about what I can and can't do. I'm going to wait awhile, and then I'll tell her I have a lot of homework to do, like you did. If she tells me I can go do it at home, instead of going to the studio, you know what I'm going to do."