Chapter 25: Laverne and Shirley and Squiggy

Okay, so now I was lonely, single, horny, and left high and dry. Thanks a lot, girls.

To make matters worse, Westy's swimming season had stumbled to a close, and he was bird-dogging again. Way too often I would find him either just starting his seduction or hustling his conquest out the door when I came home.

It turned out Westy's life wasn't much easier than my own. He finally got blackballed from the fraternity for being too much of a low-life. Considering the reputation of some of the fraternities on campus at UF and around the country, to be too depraved for Greek life was low indeed. After about a week of pissing and moaning about his unfair treatment - "After all the shit I went through to please those fuckin' fags" was the typically smooth way he described it - he was back to Leisure-Suit Westy, the snake in human form.

His swimming season also pretty much went up in smoke - literally. He had some pretty amazing stories to tell about what went on during the meets, especially when they had to go to other schools. Even discounting Westy's tendency to exaggerate, those swimmers were a wild bunch. Drugs, orgies, binge drinking, and an almost total disregard for their physical well-being made me wonder how they managed to perform in the water at all.

"Shit, man, remember that one time when I got back from a meet and I, like, crashed for a couple of days?"

I remembered a few times when he did that, but I just nodded.

"We were up in Boston for a six-school meet. Dude, those Ivy League types can party."

"You mean you actually went out partying with Hahvahd boys?" I asked.

Westy just laughed, no doubt remembering the partying. "It wasn't the Harvard boys who made the party special," he said. He gave me a conspiratorial wink. For some reason, it irritated me. Nothing new, I thought glumly. Almost everything he does irritates me.

"Nope, it was the Wellesley women."

"Huh?"

"Porter, some of those hoi polloi bitches from the frou-frou schools may look like liquid nitrogen ice princesses, but pour a little hooch into them and they thaw right out. Especially if they're going to an all-girls' school."

"You mean there are still some of those left in this world?" I asked.

"Fuck, yes," said Westy. "Full of dykes and frustrated old battleaxes, if you ask me. Rich parents think their precious princesses will be safe from nasty boys. If they only knew their sweet little darling daughters were out fucking around with poor scholarship athletes like us every chance they got. And were they ever horny little bitches."

"What are you talking about?" I asked. Westy actually hung out with Ivy Leaguers? Hard to believe they would tolerate him.

"Shit, man, lubricate 'em, and they're almost as slutty as the girls on the swim team. And you know what, man?" He was waggling his eyebrows, anxious to tell me whether I wanted to hear or not. "Ivy League, richer than freakin' Jesus, but you diddle 'em just right, they'll roll over and spread like the cheapest Gator whore. Shit, man, lick 'em enough, and they'll take it hard and deep up the ass and ask for more." He sighed in remembrance. "Ain't no sight in this world like a stuck-up bitch getting it stuck up her shitter. What a time we had..."

"Yeah, well, too bad it all had to end," I said. I wanted to give him just a little dagger to remind him of his dereliction.

Westy didn't much care, though. "Hey, I got laid. Lots. That's more important sometimes than getting to the nationals."

"Like you had a chance to swim in the nationals," I said derisively.

He shrugged. "We had a pretty good freestyle relay," he said. "We just lacked the energy to compete." He laughed, an evil sound. "Discharged way too many precious bodily fluids along the way," he said.

"And then you had to go and get caught smoking dope," I reminded him. He and some of his swim team buddies had been busted by the campus police over by the athletic fields near Lake Alice. The group of them, Westy and two other guys and three girls, had apparently been having a really good time. They had driven a car through the parking lot, down a small embankment, and parked it haphazardly in the grass. They were sitting and leaning against it, passing around a couple of blunts, when they got caught. Nothing much came of it, except the car got impounded for a few days. Since they were all athletes, the whole thing got quietly turned over to their coaches for discipline.

He was unconcerned, though. "Our season was over by then," he said. "What were they going to do? Keep us out of the water? We were already done." His eyes narrowed. "Hey, Porter, I ever tell you about me and Aaron and Joshua triple-teaming our high-diver Evie Sanderson?"

"No. And I don't think I'm willing to sit here and listen to it, either."

"Shit, that's okay," he said. "Evie wasn't very willing, either. At least she didn't start out that way. By the end she was begging for more, though."

Westy strolled out the door, on his way over to Jason's room, no doubt looking for a more receptive audience. I felt like I needed to scrub my hands and face.

Alex, Erin, and I were having lunch at the Union. We had opted for pizza from one of the vendors. It was hot but it was pretty tasteless. Kind of like tomato paste and cheese had been spread on a slab of cardboard and then heated up, the crust was chewy and soggy at the same time. I wondered what marvels of chemistry were concocted to create such an epicurean delight.

"Just don't even think about it," suggested Alex. "It'll ruin your appetite."

"And you're a growing boy," said Erin with a smile. "Lord knows what would happen if your appetite got ruined."

"Probably locusts and floods would be visited upon Florida," I said as I hacked off another piece. "In point of fact, even the worst meal I've ever had was still pretty damn good."

"Food as sex," said Alex. Erin laughed, but I, typical male, was merely confused. And hungry.

"What?" I asked, between mouthfuls.

Erin's eyes were twinkling. "Even the worst sex I've ever had was pretty damn good," she said.

I goggled at her. I never expected to hear somebody like Erin say something like that. She was just too... proper. A pretty, conservative Southern peach from Georgia.

"Put your eyes back in your head, Porter," said Alex with a laugh. "It's not just the athletic types like you and me who have sex, you know. Even pretty little china dolls like Hughes here can get down and messy sometimes."

Well, that description certainly created an indelible image in my poor masculine brain. And, because of the vivid picture my mind was conjuring, my jeans were suddenly feeling a little tighter.

I looked at them both. "I think I'm sweating," I said.

"What's the matter, Porter?" asked Erin coquettishly. "Are we making you nervous?"

Alex laughed and put her arm around Erin's shoulder. "I don't think it's nervousness," she stage-whispered. Keeping her eyes on me the whole time, making sure I was watching, Alex slowly poked her tongue out and gently began licking around Erin's ear. She then took Erin's earlobe between her teeth, which made Erin start to squirm in her chair.

"Alex," Erin groaned, and she put up her hand to bar Alex from further familiarity.

"Jesus," I muttered.

Alex turned to face me. "Got a problem over there, Porter?" She laughed out loud when she saw the look of pain on my face. "If you're good, maybe one of us will help you out sometime."

I must have looked even funnier, because Erin began giggling, along with Alex. "You poor sweetheart," she said. She scooted her chair over closer to me and put one arm around my back to rest on the back of my chair. I could feel her fingertips noodling with the sleeve of my shirt, but I was a little afraid to turn toward her. She shattered my theory about being a proper Georgia peach, however, by deliberately putting her hand on my thigh. The pressure of her fingers made me look over at her, a little panicky, and she leaned in to me. With her eyes open, watching my reaction the whole time, she gave me a soft, slow kiss.

Criminey, there's a million people around, I thought, panicking a little as Erin backed off, grinning at me. Her hand on my leg stayed where it was, though.

Alex noticed my discomfort, and grinned at me unashamedly. "Relax, Porter," she said. "Those guys over there?" She nodded her head over toward a table with three guys at it, papers strewn across the table and sandwich wrappers balled up in the middle. "If they even looked up from their homework project, they'd probably be jealous of you."

True, Porter, I thought. It really didn't make me any more comfortable, though.

With one last squeeze, Erin scooted back over and calmly picked up her slice of pizza. She glanced over at me, her eyes hinting of amusement and questions.

A complex girl, I said to myself. Never get mixed up with a complex girl. And here I've got two of them sitting at the table with me. Where was Eric when I really needed him? He would know how to handle this situation.

"You're not like any other pre-law students I've ever met," I said to Erin.

She put down her food and looked at me, amusement still dominant in her eyes. "Just because I want to be a lawyer doesn't mean I want to be stuffy," she said. "Lawyers can have fun, too, you know."

"That's not a concept I've ever considered," I said.

Erin snorted. "What, you want all women to be barefoot and pregnant all the time?"

I held my hands up. "No, I didn't say that. I know women can make great lawyers. And doctors. And engineers." I smiled. "And mothers."

She started to protest, but before she could say anything I worked to mollify her. "I'm just saying that I think women can be anything they want to be. And being the world's best mom is not a second-class choice for a career, in my opinion. It takes a lot of work to be a good parent."

I was actually thinking of my brother Stephen, and how he was trying to be a great dad to Tara's little son, Kyle. My God, Kyle's going to be a year old soon, I suddenly realized.

"You mean you don't think your mom sits around all day, watching television and eating bon-bons?" asked Erin.

"I'm not even sure what a bon-bon is, actually," I said. "And my mother has a full-time job. Make that two full-time jobs. She works in an insurance office, and she works at being a wife and mother and homemaker."