Chapter 31: Saturday Afternoon

“ ... so she ended up wearing both dresses. Pearl and I figured that together they created a decent layered look – it’s what all fashion-conscious three year olds are wearing these days,” I said.

“Well that explains that little mystery,” Mum laughed as she slowed the car to turn a corner.

“Oh! Speaking of mysteries – I wanted to thank you for taking all those grotty clothes out of my school bag and putting them in the wash,” I said. “I was all set up with the gas mask and the tongs ready to empty my bag. It took me ages to build up the courage, but when I opened it up they were already gone. It was such an anti-climax. I stood there and laughed.”

Mum shrugged. “You were busy drawing and I was about to start a load of washing, so it was easy.”

“But Mum, they must have stunk. I was going to do it, I promise.”

“I believe you honey, but it’s done so stop worrying about it.”

I wasn’t ready to let it rest, but that was when Mum pulled the car up outside Liz’s house.

“Now, you and Liz are both coming back home with Dan, is that right?”

“Yup!”

“Did Dad give you some money for the movie?”

“Yup!”

“Well then, have a good time and I’ll see you later.”

“Okay! Bye! See you later! Love you!”

I climbed out of the car, just in time to be met by Liz who came hurtling down the drive from her front door with an overnight bag in one hand and a dress on a hanger in the other.

“Hiya Bec. Hiya Mrs Freeman.”

Liz chatted with Mum briefly as she hung her dress up on the little hook inside the car door and put her bag on the passenger seat. Then we both waved goodbye as Mum drove off.

We hugged and headed up the driveway to Liz’s house and started catching up on each other’s news. I had a lot to tell Liz but I wasn’t sure what to tell her first. Liz had launched into telling me all about her night out riding with her dad and how she’d linked up with her biker friends. They were all the kids of the bikers her dad hung out with, most of whom had been in her dad’s unit back in his army days. I waited until Liz stopped to draw a breath and let her know that I had some news too. After that, pretty much the only thing she said for the next quarter hour was “he did what?” and “you didn’t” and “Oh My God!!”

We were both sprawled out all over Liz’s bed, sharing the space with the pile of stuffed animals that usually lives there when Liz isn’t actually sleeping in the bed. I swear Liz has more stuffed animals than anyone in the world. Her current favorite, Dougal the Bear, was sitting proudly in the center at the head of the bed.

I glanced at her bedside clock. “We better get moving if we’re going to catch that movie. So you better start saying goodbye to Dougal and all his friends. Bye Dougal!”

I waved goodbye to Dougal and levered myself up off the bed.

“Hah! Dougal isn’t talking to you. He hasn’t forgiven you for what you said earlier this week.”

“What did I say?”

“Don’t you remember? You threatened to kidnap Dougal and torture him if I didn’t stop teasing you. I think you should say you’re sorry and do something for Dougal so he knows you mean it.”

I smiled at Liz as I remembered the conversation, then I turned towards Dougal. “I’m sorry Dougal. Please forgive me.”

“I know what you should do. You should take Dougal with you to see the movie. It can be like a date.”

“You want me to take Dougal to the multiplex ... in public?” I was a bit doubtful about walking around the mall with a stuffed animal under my arm.

“Go on, I dare you. If you take Dougal, I’ll take Sampson and we can make it a double date. It’ll be fun.” Sampson was a white dog with big black spots.

“We’re not little kids anymore. People will laugh at us.”

“Don’t be a scaredy-cat. We’re going to a kid movie. We’ll be like a couple of big kids. I bet we won’t be the only ones there with dolls or toys or whatever.”

Liz had a wicked gleam in her eyes. She knew she was pushing me to do something a bit extreme. I guess it wasn’t really that extreme, but it would certainly make me uncomfortable if everyone started staring at us and laughing at us.

“Yeah but the rest would be, like, five years old or something.”

“I bet nobody cares. I bet most people ignore us. I bet anyone who does look will smile and make some cute comment then forget about us.”

“What will you bet?” I stood up straight and stared Liz straight in the eye. “If I do this and you’re wrong, what will you do?”

Liz hesitated and looked at me, realizing that I was serious. She bit her lip and then held out Dougal. “Dougal! If I lose, then I’ll give you Dougal.”

Her voice wavered slightly. Suddenly she wasn’t so confident anymore. Now that she thought there was a real consequence for being wrong, I could see doubts growing behind her eyes. Strangely, it was seeing her start to waver that decided me.

“I’ll do it. I won’t take the bet but I’ll do it. I don’t want Dougal. You were right, it’ll be fun. I was being a scaredy-cat. If people laugh, then stuff them. They can go jump in a lake.”

I wrapped up Liz, and Dougal, in a hug and Liz hugged me back. I let go and stepped back, then put on a posh English accent.

“I say, Dougal old chap, would you care to accompany me to the cinema? I would be most appreciative of the company.”

I did a little curtsey and fluttered my eyelashes at Dougal. Liz burst out laughing and thrust Dougal at me. Once I’d taken Dougal from her, she scooped up Sampson and her purse and we headed out of the room.

Mr Davidson had a can of beer in one hand and the handle of the vacuum cleaner in the other. He was cleaning the kitchen/living area of their small house and half-watching the TV at the same time which was showing ESPN with no sound.

Liz rushed over to him and wrapped her arms around him in a solid hug. He switched off the vacuum cleaner and returned the hug.

“Daddy, we’re off to the mall and then to Bec’s place for the night. I’ll see you tomorrow evening.”

“Okay, sweet-pea. Have a good time.”

“Now don’t forget,” said Liz. “There’s the left-over lasagna in the fridge and some frozen vegetables in the freezer to go with it.”

He smiled and continued to hug her. “That’s fine. I’m sure I’ll manage without you for one night.”

Liz was doing her usual mother hen act for her father. From what I’d seen, he was perfectly capable of looking after himself, but he seemed to enjoy having Liz trying to look after him so he usually sat back and let her. It was kind of sweet.

I felt moved to speak up. “Mr Davidson, are you going to sit here all on your own this evening? Why don’t you come over and join us for dinner?”

He was looking doubtful, so I kept talking before he could say no. “We’re having Chinese take-out. It would be no bother to get extra. I’m sure my dad would love to have you there to talk to. Sometimes he complains that he needs reinforcements with so many women in the house.”

He looked like he was willing to give in – just to stop me talking. “It’s very kind of you to offer. Maybe you should phone your parents and check with them before you go inviting folks around to your house.”

“Okay, can I use your phone?”

He nodded and Liz looked pleased.

It didn’t take long to get Dad on the phone. “Hey, it’s me!”

“Hi, me! Didn’t you only just leave? Is there a problem?”

“No problem. Mr Davidson was going to be sitting at home on his own this evening and eating leftovers so I wanted to invite him over for dinner. Is that okay?”

“Sure, tell George I’d love to have him join us. Do you think you should warn him about our little ‘heaven’ tradition?”

“Oh Dad! We’re not doing that are we?”

“Why not? It’s been ages since the last time and it’s always fun.”

I rolled my eyes at Liz. “Okay Dad, whatever. I need to get a move on. We have to leave soon to catch a bus to this movie.”

“Sure honey, that’s fine.” I raised my thumb to Mr Davidson, who nodded and wandered away to put his empty beer can in the recycling.

“It’s only you and Liz going, isn’t it?” asked Dad.

“Yeah,” I said. “Just us and Dougal and Sampson – they’re our hot dates for the afternoon.”

“Dates? Dates? Who are these boys?” Dad was sounding anxious. “Have I met them?”

“Dad, Dougal and Sampson are friends of Liz.” I had to swallow a giggle as I teased Dad. “It’s no big deal, I promise.”

“Honey, I’m not happy about you going out for an afternoon with some boys I’ve never met. What does George think about them? Does he say it’s okay?”

I held the phone away from my ear and yelled out, “Hey Mr Davidson, Dad wants to know if you have a problem with Liz and me going to the movies with Dougal and Sampson.” I held up Dougal and Liz held up Sampson so he could see who we were talking about.

“Of course I don’t have a problem. Why would I?” Mr Davidson called back.

“Did you hear that Dad? Mr Davidson doesn’t have a problem. We’ll bring them back with us this afternoon so you can meet them then. How about that? I think you’ll like them both.”

“I guess that will have to do. We’re going to have a talk when you get home about rules for dating. I didn’t think I would need to have this talk so soon. Are they staying for dinner as well? Should I buy extra food for your two friends?”

I grinned to myself. “That won’t be necessary, Dad. They won’t be having dinner with us. We’d better go. See you later. Love you.”

I hung up the phone and burst out laughing. Liz was laughing too.

I took a deep breath and stopped laughing. “I’m going to be in so much trouble when I get home. Dad thinks we’re going on a date with a couple of boys. I think he’s going to kill me when he finds out I was teasing him.”

“Don’t worry,” said Liz. “I’m sure Dougal will protect you.”

“We better go! Bye Mr Davidson. See you at about six at our place, okay?”

“Sure, Bec! I’m looking forward to it.”

“Bye Dad, see you later,” said Liz.

Liz gave her dad a last hug and a quick kiss. I lined up behind her and gave him a hug and a kiss too.

There was a middle-aged man sitting in the exact middle of the bench at the bus stop. Liz and I glanced at each other and without any discussion decided to stay standing as we waited for the bus. The man looked at us briefly then slid a tiny bit sideways as if he was making room for the two of us to sit together on the bench – provided one of us sat right next to him. There was no discussion, we stayed standing.

Liz was rabbitting on about the movie we were going to see – she’s a total fan of these animated movies. I end up going to see them with her. They’re usually good fun but I’m not as mad about them as Liz is. Pixar is the company that started off doing special effects for other movies. Then they branched out and started making movies of their own. Their first movies were Toy Story and A Bug’s Life. They’ve made a few others since then. Every one of their films has either won or been nominated for Academy Awards. How do I know this? Liz can recite them all – and she proved that to me while we were standing at the bus stop.

Liz pulled her water bottle out of her backpack and was taking a quick drink when I saw her eyes suddenly go wide. She spluttered a bit and then nudged me and indicated with her eyes that I should look behind me. The man was staring straight at us with a weird expression on his face. He had his fly undone and his penis was sticking out of it. The man was staring at us and rubbing his dick!

My first reaction was, “Eeeew, gross!”

Liz burst into giggles – I think they were embarrassed giggles but I’m not sure.

My second reaction was that this penis was a whole lot smaller than all the other ones I’d seen over the last week. That reminded me of something my mother had once told me about what to do if I were ever in a situation like this

I nudged Liz in an exaggerated way and said loudly, “Hey look! It’s just like a penis only smaller.”

Liz looked at me, then she looked at the man, then she looked back at me and we both burst out laughing at the same time. The penis, which had been getting a little bit bigger when we started looking at it, started getting smaller again. It was quite fascinating how they did that.

Liz took her water bottle and squirted a stream of water straight into the man’s crotch. That sped up the shrivelling process and wet that area of his pants, making it look as if he’d peed himself.

“Get lost, you creep!” stated Liz, forcefully.

My heart was thudding in my chest. Suddenly it occurred to me that if the man got violent, we were in a lot of trouble. There were cars driving past, but there was no guarantee anyone would stop and help us if this man decided to attack us.

“You’d better go home and change your pants, mister. People will think you peed in your pants,” I commented. “Maybe you should keep that thing in your pants next time. If you don’t want to be laughed at, that is.”

I grasped Liz firmly by the elbow and we walked away. My heart was still racing but I forced myself to walk.

It was such a pathetic little incident. I wondered why I was feeling scared. And it was all so stupid. I couldn’t understand what he was trying to achieve by showing us his penis. Did he think we’d never seen one before? Was he expecting us to scream and run away? Or was he thinking we’d be so delighted that we would want to do sex stuff with him? I didn’t think it would be a very effective way to pick up girls. Or maybe he was lonely and wanted people to look at him.

Somehow, we both managed to walk quickly but calmly until we got around the corner, then we both started squealing and ran all the way back to Liz’s place.

Mr Davidson was furious. First he wanted to jump on his bike and go chasing after the man and beat him to a pulp. We wouldn’t let him do that. Then he wanted to call the police and have the guy arrested. We didn’t want to do that either. Basically, if we reported it to the police, we would then have to spend all our afternoon hanging around and making statements and all that would happen to him was he would get a fine or something.

Liz was angry about how he’d already ruined our afternoon because now we would miss the film. Mostly, I was thinking how sad it was that a guy like that was reduced to flashing his penis at a couple of teens to get his thrills. I decided if I saw him again that I would give him a couple of dollars so he could buy himself a Playboy or something.

Mr Davidson decided he was going to get us to the film. He made a phone call and told Liz to put on her jacket and helmet and lend me her spares. A couple of minutes later, I heard a roar outside as a young guy on a motorcycle drove up. Liz took one look out the window and squealed. She raced out the door and threw herself into his arms. I recognized the rider – he was one of Liz’s biker friends. They weren’t, like, an item or anything. It was more that she’d adopted him as an older brother. His name was Jake something or other.

Within a couple of minutes, Liz was on the back of Jake’s bike, clutching him around his waist with her helmeted head tucked in behind his back. I found myself straddled across the back of Mr Davidson’s big motorcycle, clutching tightly onto his belt and trying to resist the temptation to screw my eyes shut as we roared down the road. I started screaming as soon as I felt the bike moving underneath me and I didn’t stop.

It wasn’t the first time I’d been on a motorcycle. Mr Davidson had given me a ride once before. It didn’t help that I couldn’t see where we were going. He was so wide that all I could do was look sideways and see the world whizzing past. I didn’t hate it. The experience was kind of exciting. But that didn’t stop me screaming. On that first ride I don’t think I stopped screaming for the entire trip. Screaming inside a bike helmet is a bit weird. The sound comes out funny – it bounces around inside the helmet and some of it gets soaked into the padding and then what’s left goes back into your ears in a funny distorted sort of way. It sounds like someone is being smothered underneath a pillow – someone else, I mean.