66: Rhonda

The year was moving quickly to a close. The last five weeks of school seemed to be flying past. Somehow, I managed to spend time with each of my local girlfriends, even though Elaine was in Indianapolis until Memorial Day and Jennifer and Courtney were in school until the twelfth. Once I understood what Whitney's plan was, I took the beatings she gave me every day with good grace—as much as possible. I got pretty sore. I found a local natural health store that sold arnica cream. I was going through it like water. Sometimes I had someone to help put it on. The only ones who knew about how I got bruised were Whitney and Rhonda. Rhonda continued to slip into bed with me on Saturday mornings. I slept on Friday night with underpants on. Rhonda usually came to bed with a t-shirt and panties on. Twice she asked me to massage her feet and we ended up in a hot make-out session. I loved touching her breasts when she gave me permission—usually by pulling my hand up under her shirt—but I was certain that neither of us came while we were together.

I was surprised when Whitney started arriving early on Saturday morning and getting into bed with us as well, sometimes beside Rhonda and sometimes beside me. That was when she told Rhonda what she was doing to me and the two of them started applying the healing salve to my bruises. Rhonda watched us work out one morning and made sure she came over more frequently to put the salve on. It was sweet.

"I guess Whitney is being pretty hard on me," I laughed as Rhonda put salve on one of the marks on my leg. I could have done it myself, but I wasn't going to complain. Rhonda looked at me seriously and I raised an eyebrow. "What is it, sweetie?"

"What you've always said, Brian," she whispered. "You do whatever is necessary. I'm not very good at it. I promise I'll get better, though. And you always have to keep your promise, right?" I opened my arms and Rhonda hugged me.

"Honey, I don't know how all my so-called 'life rules' came to be so publicly known, but they are for me. It's not even that I made rules and then started to follow them. I just wrote down what I discovered I was living by. I don't expect other people to have the same rules. Don't try to follow my rules if they don't fit your life."

"But I want them to fit my life," she said. "I want to be the kind of strong person you are. The kind of person you can always depend on. I want to be good enough for you."

"No! No, no, no, sweetheart. Please don't ever think you aren't good enough. It doesn't take following my rules to be good enough for me."

"What does it take, Brian?" She was serious. What did it take for her to be good enough for me? You've got to be kidding, but it was obvious she wasn't.

"Rhonda, I don't think we should ever in this life discuss being good enough. That's a stupid leftover from the religious dark ages. If I had to think if I was worthy of you, or of any of our girlfriends, I'd curl up in a ball and never show my face again. How could we be worthy? We love. I've never doubted your love, Rhonda. You never have to doubt mine."

It was the last Wednesday of the school year and I was really ready for it to be over. I'd managed to keep a 'C' grade for the semester in debate and the rest of my classes were 'A's. Great. The class I took so I wouldn't have to think about it and get an easy 'A' was the one that dragged my grade-point average down for the year. Not like a college would mark me down for it, but I was sure Barb Stackhouse still had a 4.0 GPA. Things were getting harder, but she was scary smart. She'd undoubtedly be our valedictorian. I was sitting at our lunch table mulling over the fact that Mr. J stopped me in the hall and suggested I get started on my college classes this summer. I could get some pre-reqs out of the way at IUSB and since I was a high school student, I wouldn't have to pay tuition. I'd do it, but Bill and Crystal already got a second level internship set up for me this summer. Since I was sixteen, they could enroll me for a full credit and work me forty hours a week.

I'd scarcely said hello to people at our table when Brenda sat next to me and slammed her tray down. I looked at her and her lower lip was sticking out. She grabbed me around the waist and hugged me. I turned toward her and put my arms around her. Brenda was crying. I don't think I'd ever seen her cry before.

"Hey, what's up, beautiful?" I asked softly. "What happened?"

"We broke up again." Well, that explained that. I looked around, but I didn't see Carl anywhere in the cafeteria. Maybe we'd avoid public name-calling and a big display in the cafeteria this time. This was, what, the fourth time they'd broken up?

"I'm sorry, Brenda. Are you going to be okay?"

"I haven't been very friendly to the rest of the group all year," she whispered. "Is it okay if I sit with you?"

"Of course it is! And since when haven't you been friendly with the rest of us?"

"I know we sit at the same table and sometimes we come over to study, but it seems like since we started limiting our dating to our steadies, we haven't done anything together. You're the only one that dates more than one person. Except Doug, and that's special." Yeah. I wasn't quite sure how Doug was making it work, but it was a cinch that if you saw Doug and Rachel out at night or on the weekend, Doreen was with them.

"I don't know how it all got started, but I guess that's just a side effect of us pairing off. All the girls who didn't have a steady decided they weren't going to date outside the group. I was all that was left. Don't get me wrong. I love it. I loved it when I took you out and Rachel and Sora and Sugar and Denise, too. It's not exactly the same as having a steady girlfriend."

"Think about it, Brian. Carl and I both turned sixteen in November. That's over seven months ago. Seven months that the ban on skin-to-skin genital contact has been off. Tell me honestly. If Jennifer and Courtney were here in town and saw you every day and went out with you every weekend, could you have possibly stopped from going all the way?"

"Is that what it's about? Did you ... never mind. I shouldn't ask that."

"You have a right to ask it, Brian. You proved that on New Year's. The answer is no. That's why we broke up."

"You told him no."

"He told me no."

"Oh, shit."

"I should be happy, right? He saved my virginity. He kept his promise. He said, 'We can wait.' What more could a girl want? And then he said that maybe it would be better if we weren't together all the time and maybe we should see some other people." Brenda was crying in my arms again, our lunches forgotten on the table. I glanced up and there were tears sparkling in the eyes of all my special girlfriends and of Doug and Rachel, too. They were the ones close enough to see what was going on. It was the first time I realized that Rhonda was sitting on my other side, quietly eating her lunch with one hand, her other hand laid softly on my leg. I looked back to Brenda and took a big risk.

"Uh ... Brenda. I know what you said at the lake a year-and-a-half ago, but I signed the agreement and we're not seventeen yet. You know I'm going to say 'no, ' too. Right?" She looked up into my eyes and her brows shot up. It was all I could do to keep a straight face and she lost it first. As she laughed, she hit me in the chest with her fist, but not very hard.

"Trust you to remember I said that!" she laughed. She raised her right hand. For a second I thought she was going to hit me again. "I solemnly swear that I won't ask you to shred the remains of my holy virginity until we are both..." She stopped suddenly and looked across the table. Sam, Whitney, and Cassie were sitting there. "Until we are both ready," she finished. Something had been communicated, but I wasn't sure what. I knew my girlfriends controlled my sex-life and they were pretty damned good at it. I wasn't going to ask questions.

"I just wanted to make sure," I smirked.

"Is it really okay?" she asked. "I mean to be a part of the group again? And not a couple?"

"You know it is," I answered. "And you know it's okay for Carl, too. Is that going to be a problem?"

"You should ask yourself that," Brenda laughed. "Who else in the group is he going to date?" Shit. "Don't worry. He's got his eye on Louise Bacon."

"Louise? Really? She's kinda like..."

"The class slut? Yeah. I don't know where he's going with that, but you know, saving your virginity for a particular person could be a big disappointment. Maybe we should all find someone we'll never see again and get the nasty stuff out of the way so we'll be real lovers for the one who is important."

We continued to hold each other until the bell and then I went to Government and Political Science with Rachel, Whitney, and Rhonda.

"Wait till you see what happens," I laughed. Jennifer and Courtney cuddled up against me after we'd had a quiet but satisfying round of loving. I'd insisted we all put on underwear, at least the bottom half, before we settled down for the night. They'd been waiting for me when I got home from school Friday night and Mom, Dad, and Anna went out for the evening. The girls snuggled up against me.

"Ride safely, honey," I whispered at four-thirty. I started to close my eyes again when I realized that Courtney was looking at me. She smiled and snuggled closer, rubbing her face against my shoulder. Jennifer, under my other arm, never stirred.

At six-fifteen, Rhonda came up the stairs, stripped down to her panties and crawled over Jennifer to lie on top of me. Right behind her, Donna repeated the actions and got in bed beside Courtney. Courtney and Jennifer hardly stirred. At seven-thirty, Whitney came into the room, stripped to her panties and crawled in behind Jennifer. It was getting pretty hot in the bed and Rhonda threw the covers off. By eight o'clock, I was buried under a squirming mass of cute, mostly naked girls.

I got knocked around by Whitney, salved by Rhonda, and fed all five of my girlfriends. Just as Rhonda and Donna were taking off to do the paper collections, Elaine arrived. I scooped my petite girlfriend up in my arms and swung her around in circles.

"Are you home for the summer?" I asked.

"No. I got a summer stock job at the Wagon Wheel in Warsaw. I've already started. The first show opened two weeks ago. That's why I can only be here for the first bit of the party. I have to be back and in costume by six-thirty."

"I love you, Elaine! I wish you could stay."

"I can't do it for every show, but I'll get you tickets for a couple of them this summer. And besides, you've got a date tonight."

"And we promise not to interfere," Courtney and Jennifer said in unison.

"Yeah. How's that going to work?"

"We can't actually leave you alone," Court said. "I mean, except when nobody is looking, your Mom's rule has always been 'never just one.' But we talked to Donna and promised that we'd put the air mattress at the other end of the room and would be too involved with each other to notice anything the two of you do."

"You two are too sweet," I said hugging both of them. Elaine and Whitney joined the hug.

"I think all our girlfriends should come up to your room and test that air mattress to make sure they can't hear or see anything that happens in the bed," Elaine whispered to us.

"How are they going to be able to tell?" I asked.

"We'll have to do a test," Elaine grinned.

We didn't actually go down on each other, but our fingers got busy as soon as we were in bed. I wasn't too concerned about getting off simply because I'd had a lot of action the night before. Elaine was really primed, though, and I fastened my mouth over hers to stifle her screams. Frankly, I don't think Mom and Dad and Anna would have heard. I hadn't seen the three of them since breakfast.

"Oh my god! They're naked," Cassie said as she came to the head of the stairs. Sam, Liz, and Rose plowed into her from behind as they came up the stairs.

"Wow! Why don't we just have the party here?" Liz said. Of course, she came straight to the bed and started stripping off her clothes.

"No, no, no, no. We're getting up and dressing. This was a scientific experiment," I said, jumping up and running for a pair of underwear. Cassie was staring. Liz reluctantly pulled her shirt back on. Sam was already on top of Whitney, Jen, and Court. Rose had an arm around Cassie and was whispering in her ear.

"Um ... what was the nature of the experiment?" Cassie asked, shifting her eyes from Elaine to me as we dressed.

"Uh ... Cassie, you see, this is a special night with Donna, you know?"

"Oh yeah, your date. Oh!"

"But Jennifer and Courtney and Rhonda are all staying in the room, too, so they wanted to find out what level of noise would disturb their sleep if they slept down there." I pointed at the air mattress behind my desk.

"We didn't hear a thing!" Courtney said. "You can be much louder than that." We all laughed and headed to the party.

Elaine and Rose both drove to the party, but I waited until Donna and Rhonda came by. Donna came to the door and rocked back and forth on her heels when Mom answered.

"Can Brian come out and play?" she asked.

"Let me see," Mom responded. "Brian, have you done your chores?"

"Yes, Mom."

"I guess you can have a play date, then. Donna, sometimes it takes boys so long to get ready to go out; I hope you are patient. Two carloads of girls already left without him. Can you wait?"

"Yes, Nona-mom, but not for long. I've got my baby sister in the car, you know."

"What on earth is she doing waiting in the car? Why didn't she come up?"

"Brian is my date," Donna said with finality. Mom looked at her and then at me.

"Don't keep your date waiting, honeybunch," Mom said. Donna took my hand and we laughed as we walked to her old Mercedes. Rhonda was sitting quietly in the back seat and Donna and I got in the front.

"Everything go okay at the office, today?" I asked Rhonda.

"Yes, but your girlfriend has been so anxious all day that you'd probably better give her a kiss before she tries to drive." I glanced over at Donna and she gave me a pleading puppy-dog look.

"Please?" she asked. I leaned across the console and our lips melted together, warm and loving. She sighed. "That's better, but I think you'll have to renew it often this afternoon."

"Then as often as you'd like, you may have a kiss of whatever degree you'd like."

"Okay. Then I'd like a kiss after each time you kiss any of our girlfriends this afternoon and another if I kiss any of our boyfriends ... or girlfriends. And one dedicated to just me at least every half hour all day long."

Donna got a dozen kisses in the first half-hour we were at the party. For a while, I thought that all I was going to do all afternoon was kiss. Once the rest of the girls found out I had to give Donna a kiss any time any of them kissed me, the line started recycling. The only reason it broke up was because Brenda was trying to get us all to the pool. I noticed that even though Lamar and Renee were at the party with us, Carl was missing. I didn't get a chance to ask Brenda about it, though.

We played all our usual silly games in the pool, but I noticed that things had changed a little. All of us except Rhonda were sixteen now. And I didn't swim exclusively with Donna. We were both having a good time playing with all our friends. But the difference was that each of my girlfriends traded off being with me and then with each other as we played the games and thought up a couple new ones. I think Sugar must spend a lot of time in pools and the water in the summer. I remembered it was her that started paired up Marco Polo a couple years ago. This time she wanted to play Make-out Tag. The person who was 'It' had to try to tag another player below the knees, which meant they had to dive underwater since we were all in the deep end treading water. Once you were tagged, you had to kiss the person who caught you and then you were 'It.' Not to be outdone, Rachel and Doreen demonstrated 'pair swimming.' You had to work with your partner so that one did the arm strokes and the other did the leg strokes. As we changed partners and changed swimming strokes, that one got really interesting.

The most interesting thing, though, was that when each of my girlfriends was partnered with me, she whispered, "I give you explicit permission to touch me anywhere outside my clothing while we're in the pool." That was aptly demonstrated by Rose who immediately planted my hand on her left breast and kissed me like her life depended on it. Donna, who was across the pool paired up with Samantha called out, "You owe me one!" Every time a girlfriend kissed me in the pool, Donna would count out the number of kisses I owed her. It got so people were all watching and shouting out the next number.

"You owe me six!" Donna shouted out a while later. Huh? No one was near me in one of those rare instances where we were switching partners. I looked over at Donna and she was hugging Lamar. She grinned and shrugged her shoulders. I laughed.

Rhonda and Cassie came up to me at the same time. Rhonda had a mischievous glint in her eye and Cassie looked nervous.

"I give you explicit permission to touch me outside my suit anywhere above my waist," Rhonda declared. She wrinkled her nose and grinned at me, then launched herself at me for a kiss. I kissed her and she dragged my hand to her breast for a squeeze then pushed away. "See? It's easy," she said to Cassie.

"It's not evil?" Cassie asked. Rhonda shrugged.

"Maybe." They laughed. Cassie turned to me. Oh crap! Was she going to invite me to touch her?

"Brian, I give you explicit permission to touch me anywhere above my waist while we're in the pool," she said. She was blushing brightly. Rhonda's mouth fell open as she looked at me. She mouthed the word "anywhere." Oh, my. Cassie had not qualified her statement, but she was closing on me for a kiss. When our mouths met, it was apparent that it was a kiss with real intent, too. I put my hand on the bare skin of her tummy. This was the first year Cassie had ever worn a two-piece suit and I wondered if her father knew. Oh well. In for a penny, in for a pound. I slid my hand up and it went easily under the band of her top and I cupped her bare breast in my hand. Oh, Cassie! She pushed away from me with her eyes wide open. Rhonda was giggling.

"You didn't say 'outside your clothes, ' Cassie," Rhonda laughed. "You just said 'anywhere'."

"But I meant..." Cassie started. Then she launched herself at me. "Do it again!" Her lips fastened onto mine and she pushed my hand under her top. I caressed her for a few seconds and then we moved apart again. She had a glazed look as she and Rhonda paddled away.

"Fourteen and fifteen!" Donna called. This was going to be a major make-out session before long.

Brenda stood in the middle of her basement game room. Everyone knew what would happen next. I knew they were going to push Donna and me into the closet. Well, maybe I could start catching up on the twenty-six kisses I owed her.

"And it's time!" Brenda announced.

"Seven minutes in heaven!" everyone shouted.

"And today, our first contestants are Brian ... and me!" Before anyone could respond, Brenda grabbed my hand and dragged me into the closet, slamming the door behind us. She was on me, hungrily kissing me and pulling me to her. I kissed for a moment and when she started to pull my hand to her breast I pulled away.

"Brenda, are you okay?"

"No! Please hold me. Please touch me. Please kiss me. Brian, I miss him so bad. Kiss me. Kiss me."

I kissed her again and allowed her to push my hand against her breast, but when she started to sniffle through our kiss, I just pulled her to me and held her. We sank to the floor and I rocked her against me while she cried.

"I'm not a good substitute, sweetie," I whispered. "I don't want to be. But I'll be your friend. I'll hold you and let you cry. I'll even go talk to him if you want me to."

"Thank you. Don't talk to him. But please come over this week and hold me again. I miss that more than anything. You know, I'm not substituting you for him, Brian. I always meant for it to be both of you." I was still rocking her in my arms in shock when Renee opened the door a crack and peeked in.

"Okay?" she asked. That wasn't the way seven minutes usually ended, but Renee had been in the closet with me last year. I also think she knew what condition Brenda was in. Brenda surprised us both, though. She wiped her eyes on my t-shirt.

"Let me get my pants back on," she shouted. I busted out laughing. So that was how she wanted to play it.

"Ow! Ow! Ow!" I yelled. "Don't zip yet!" With that, we could hear everyone in the room laughing and they thought it had all been an act. When we got out of the closet, Brenda was making a big show of pulling the strap of her top up.

"Okay. Go to bed," Mom said. The five of us were standing before her in 'appropriate sleepwear.' She and Anna turned to go toward the bedroom. Dad was not allowed to inspect the sleepwear, even though he'd been the one who bought me the pajama bottoms. I had a t-shirt on with them. Anna stopped and plucked at it.

"You need a wife-beater to go with those pajamas, not a Purple Rain t-shirt." She smirked and joined Mom on the way to the bedroom. The rest of us turned to file upstairs. Donna pulled at my hand and stopped me.