Chapter 4: Settling down

Thursday, March 8th, 1984

Today when I woke up my first thought was that I had just dreamed about going back forty years. That lasted until I opened my eyes and realized that the bedroom was the one I had gone to sleep in last night, not the bedroom in my apartment. Looking across the room, I saw that Jason's bed was already empty. Thinking about it, I remembered that while in high school, Jason would get up and go for a run, or work out with weights early in the mornings. Normally he would make it back home and be taking his shower, if he hadn't already finished it, before the time I got up.

Since I was already up, I decided to try to go ahead and start the day. I collected my uniform and went towards the bathroom. The door was locked when I got there. A minute or so later Marilyn exited, with me taking her place. After my shower, I had gotten as far as putting on my pants when Lisa opened the door which I had left unlocked.

"Good timing. I was just about to get out of here."

"Okay, whatever." my flustered sister replied.

Picking up my shirt, socks and shoes, I returned to my room. As soon as I left the bathroom, Lisa entered it in my place. After she closed the door, I heard the distinct sound of it being locked. I knew Jason would be glad that we had individual electric shower heads instead of depending upon a single hot water heater. During the 1982-1983 school year my family lived at my paternal grandparents house in Bedford, Texas. That year, my sisters studied at Bedford Heights with Jason and I going to Bedford Junior High. If we each took short showers in the morning we all got hot water. There normally was a rush to get in the "kids" bathroom since, more often than not, we ran out of hot water before the last one was finished.

While I was taking that trip down memory lane, I finished getting my school uniform on. Jason appeared covered with sweat from his morning jog just as I was tying my shoes.

"How far did you go today bro?" I said standing up.

"Today was my light run — only about three miles. Of course, I did practice my uphill sprints towards the end. You should try running with me sometime."

"I'll think about it ... Ok, how about you wake me up Monday and I will see how far I can keep up with you. If need be, I can start on my way back while you are finishing your run."

"Sounds like a plan. Are you sure you don't want to go ahead and start tomorrow?"

"Tomorrow I was thinking of running to and from my PE classes. That will be nearly a mile, plus, we'll probably do some running there as well."

As we were talking, Jason had been collecting his uniform clothes.

"See you at breakfast then."

Apparently deciding our conversation was finished, he left our room as we heard Lisa turn off the water in the shower next door.

"How much longer will you be in there?"

"Five or ten minutes — just hold your horses Jason."

My alarm went off just then. As I turned it off, I was glad that I had gotten up earlier since otherwise I probably would have to take a shower in our parents bathroom. They really didn't mind us doing so on occasion, but many times we had been told not to make that into a habit. I realized in college that by doing so, our parents had been trying to get us in the habbit of not hogging the bathroom, and being aware that others might need the bathroom as well.

I made my way downstairs as Jason was entering the bathroom. Dad was in the kitchen fixing coffee and "volunteered" me to make fresh orange juice. Marilyn and Lisa came down as I was doing that and got assigned to set the table. By the time we finished our tasks, Jason and Mom had made their way to the table. Today we had something more like a traditional Brazilian breakfast comprised of rosquinhas, which is a type of sweet bread, papaya slices, orange juice, milk, and coffee. After I had eaten, I took my dishes into the kitchen and set them in the sink.

Back upstairs, I briefly considered taking my text books with me. Since I didn't need them yesterday, I decided to leave them home again today. I was at the door when I remembered that I needed to talk to Dad and Mom about a couple of things. Unfortunately, Dad had left for work right after breakfast, so I was limited to talking with Mom.

"Mom, since we are planning on going to Sucupira on Saturday as part of my birthday celebration, yesterday I invited two of my classmates to join us. They both told me that they would like to go there with us. On the other hand, both of them told me that they would have to get permission to go from their parents so I do not know if they will actually be able to join us or not."

"So Keith, will these two classmates of yours happen to be the same two attractive young ladies who were here yesterday?"

"Yes Mom, it just had slipped my mind to mention that in our talk yesterday."

"I have no problem with them allowing them to go with us as long as they have permission from their parents. We might need to think about how to get the two of them, along with the six of us there since we will only have one car this weekend," Mom said with a smile on her face

"What's a matter with your car this time Mom?" I asked vaguely remembering that Mom had a lemon while I was in high school.

"Actually, this time it's your father's car that has the problem. Your dad and I had to take his car in to the shop last Friday. While you were taking Kris and Alessa home yesterday, we got a call from our mechanic. He told your dad that it would be Monday at the earliest before his car would be ready. Apparently, he had to order a part to fix it, and because of places being closed for Carnaval, the part was not expected to arrive until Monday morning at the earliest," Mom continued.

"Well, I could have either Kris or Alessa sit on my lap," I suggested, "and maybe Marilyn could sit on Jason's lap going there."

"Do you mean to tell me that you don't want either of your girlfriends to sit on Jason's lap?" Mom asked sounding a little amused.

"First of all I consider Alessa and Kris to be my amigas (friends who happen to be girls) not my namoradas (girlfriends.) But yes, I don't want Jason to have the privilege of one of them sitting on his lap before they sit on mine." I replied trying hard to keep a straight face. Actually, I said the last more to get a reaction from Mom than because of any jealousy on my part.

"Let me talk to your dad. I think we might be able to work things out so your friends can go with us as long as they have permission from their parents." Mom said laughing, "Now you better get to school because if you get there late, he might decide to cancel going to Sucupira this week altogether."

My talk with Mom took a little longer than I had planned on so I had to run to school, just barely making it in before the bell rang. Because of that, I was not able to talk with Alessa and Kris before classes started.

School had become boring for me as I got into high school and later in college. Instead of concentrating on class work, I often found myself daydreaming. Without fail, while I was daydreaming the professor would go over a critical concept and I would miss his explanation. Today my efforts in keeping my concentration in class as opposed to my mind going off to fight interplanetary battles — my most frequent daydream - paid off, since I realized that I had forgotten a lot of the material we were covering. Actually, there were some concepts presented to our class today that I never really understood in Take One.

That is not to say I didn't have any distractions in class today. Unlike in Take One, when I often distracted myself, today the source of my distractions was outside of my mind. Several times Alessa who was sitting to my right, or Kris who sat down to my left tried to attract my attention away from the teacher. They did this by either one or on occasion both of them putting one of their hands on my thigh closest to them and rubbing it. Kris put her hand on the inside of my thigh supposedly since my injury was on the outside — or at least that is what she claimed when I asked. Alessa didn't have the same excuse, but that detail didn't keep her from doing the same on "her" thigh.

Kris and Alessa had both seen my nearly-healed road rash yesterday. After lunch, I had changed into a tight T-shirt and the pair of cut-off jeans I had worn when I had my bicycle accident, before we started our study session.

Kris showed some concern and wanted to know how I had gotten hurt. I was glad that I remembered enough details of the accident to satisfy her curiosity. Alessa of course had seen my leg during the days immediately following the accident when I had to wear shorts to prevent the road rash from sticking to the inside of my jeans. The doctor who treated me said that it would be best to not try to cover it up since if we tried that the scab might come off when we changed the bandages. His treatment was correct since, in later years, I could not find any sign of that injury.

Almost as odd as feeling their hands rubbing on my thighs was watching Kris. Every time I happened to glance over at her, she appeared to be taking notes. This was surprising on two levels. First that she could understand enough to take notes, and secondly I remembered her either reading or writing letters most of the time previously. I felt fortunate that the way our classroom was arranged no one could tell where Alessa and Kris had their hands. Not that I would get in trouble with my teachers because of that, but because we would likely have to deal with jealousy on the part of our classmates.