Where the Kissing Never Stops

by Ron Koertge

  I helped Rachel fold up the plaid blanket, and without saying anything, we headed for the oak like we’d done a dozen times before, always carefully picking our way among the tender shoots.

  “What’ll your dad do if all the people he needs to sell don’t sell and if all the places he needs rezoned don’t get rezoned?”

  “He’ll build something else,” she said. “He’s tried to get the Garden of Gardner up before, you know.”

  “What does he build instead?”

  “It depends on the financing. Pretty much whatever he can. Dad’s realistic. If he can’t get what he wants, he takes what he can get and moves on.”

  He sounded like Attila the Hun, but I didn’t say that.

  “I thought you weren’t going to move anymore.”

  Rachel leaned to smooth the blanket she’d laid out.

  “He moves on in his mind. He’s not a kid, in other words. He doesn’t pout. If people say, ‘We don’t want your Garden,’ he says, ‘Okay, what do you want?’”

  I sat down beside her, then got right back up again and took off my shirt. I have to admit I was getting vain about my suntan, and I was a lot less shy about my stomach. Okay, it wasn’t a plane of rippling flesh, but it wasn’t like I couldn’t see the ground.

  “I like you with your shirt off,” Rachel said.

  “I like you with your shirt off, too.”

  “Want me to?” she said impishly.

  “Right here?”

  She nodded, grinning. “Should I?”

  “Rachel, I’m sixteen. I’m at my sexual peak. If I don’t say yes now, I have to go to a monastery.”

  She undid one button, then pulled the blouse over her head. “Hi, motorists,” she said, waving to the distant highway. “Hi, Reverend Falwell; hi, Father Murphy.” Then she turned her back to me. “Help me with this, okay?”

  I had a little attack of performance anxiety, but I took a deep breath and started in. Rachel squirmed a little.

  “Does this have a combination or something?”

  “I’ll do it.”

  I sat down with a thump. “God, Sully and I saw these movies once and every guy in them could take a girl’s bra off with one hand.”

  “I saw one of those. We sneaked into this sleazo theater in Miami. All the girls had these enormous breasts.” She stared down at herself. “Do boys really like humongous ones?”

  “I don’t know. Everybody’s worried about something. Guys are worried about having a little wiener.”

  “I know. Tommy Thompson’s is supposed to be little.”

  I sat up. “No kidding! God, wait till I tell Sully. That’s the best news I’ve heard in a long time.”

  “Well, I like my breasts,” she said, “just the way they are.” She stroked one tenderly, like it was a puppy. Then frowned. “Look, a pimple.”

  I leaned toward the tiny spot.

  “Don’t,” she said. “It’s icky.”

  I shook my head.

  “Are you sure?” she asked.

  “Yes.” I could feel the warmth of her perfect flesh, then one hand on the back of my head as she pulled me to her.

  The funny thing is that we didn’t make love, not that day, anyway. And that was the answer to Sully’s question, Do you guys do it a lot? I mean, the answer is yes and no. Sometimes it was just as nice to only touch each other and kiss. That’s what we did that afternoon, getting lully and woozy with those long, oasis-type kisses, then just drifting off to sleep.

  “God,” Rachel said, sitting up, “I drooled.”

  I untangled myself. It sounds romantic to sleep in one another’s arms, but not when something goes numb. Like my right hand. I shook it violently as she dressed. Her bra wouldn’t go on right and something of my own was tangled, too. With my live hand I reached into my jeans.

  “Walker, what’s it like to have a penis?”

  “It’s handy. This way I don’t look different in gym class.”

  “I’ve always wondered. I think I secretly want one.”

  “Christmas is a long way off. Are you hinting for your birthday?”

  “It must be so weird to have this thing hanging off you.”

  “I feel that way about your breasts. I always thought that if I had a pair I’d always be touching them.”

  “Do you touch your thing much?”

  “Just to go to the bathroom and at night when I put a sock on it.”

  “You’re kidding. A sock?” She looked like I’d just told her that I breathed through my feet.

  “So it won’t catch cold when I’m asleep. When it catches cold it sneezes, and if I’m in class and my pants jump I get embarrassed.”

  Rachel began to beat on me with both fists, but lightly.

  “I like you so much, Walker,” she said, getting serious all of a sudden. “I told Peggy I did, and she said to tell you.”

  “Thanks, Peggy.”

  “She’s funny, isn’t she?”

  “How do you mean?” I stooped to help Rachel with our things.

  “She has this terrible reputation but she’s really nice.”

  “Maybe a lot of that is just talk.”

  She shook her head. “Nope. Peggy told me. I just used to think that somebody who got around like that would have to be a prostitute or a stripper or something. Now I know better.”

  “Strippers aren’t the same as prostitutes,” I said supercasually.

  “I guess not. Anyway, Peggy’s nice, and I’m glad we’re friends.”

  Rachel was tucked in under my right arm. I could feel her as we walked together. Her hair tickled a little under my chin and I could still hear her saying that she liked me so much.

  What would happen if I told her I knew a stripper? Really knew one. Would she get cold immediately just like the freeze that supposedly finished off the dinosaurs? Would she slip out from under my arm for good? Would the terrific kissing stop?

  “Are you okay?” she asked softly. “What are you thinking about?”

  “I’ve got a little chill, I guess. Maybe I’m catching cold.”

  I stayed home from school for a day, sneezed, slept, and looked out the window. It had begun to rain, so light sometimes it seemed to barely flicker, so heavy at others that I wondered if the oats could stand up under it.

  Rachel got assignments from my teachers and phoned them in, while Sully gave me the standard lecture on psychosomatic illness: I wasn’t really ill, he said, just guilty and scared. So I blew my nose into the phone.

  Mom was really nice, moving the TV in from the living room, bringing me hot tomato soup, and regularly putting her cool hand on my forehead.

  “I’m going to bring a friend of mine home from work tonight,” she said, sitting down on the edge of the bed. “You can come out and say hi if you’re up to it, but you don’t have to, okay?”

  I nodded as slightly as possible, like the Godfather, but it was supposed to mean tons.

  “He’s a nice guy. I think you’ll like him.”

  “Is he married?”

  “Divorced.”

  “Are you going to marry him?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Has he got a name?”

  “Rocco. But I call him Rocks.”

  “You’re kidding.” I almost spilled my soup.

  “Yes, I’m kidding. His name is Porter.”

  “That’s handy. He can carry your bags when you run away together.”

  “Does anybody tell you how good you look lately? Does Rachel tell you?”

  “I lost a little weight while I was working with Mr. Kramer.”

  And then she did a funny thing. She picked my hand up off of Batman’s cape and kissed it. It was very gallant.

  “I like you, too,” I said, swallowing hard. “And it’s okay to bring your boyfriends home. Better here than out necking where the cops will pick you up and I’ll have to drive down to the station and bail you out of jail.”

  She smiled again, lighting up the gloom. “We’ll be back around ten
-thirty. Will you be okay? There’s about a thousand gallons of soup on the stove.” She got to her feet, then turned and looked critically at me. “We’ve got to get you a new bedspread. Something a little more grown-up.”

  On Saturday, Sully picked me up for our field trip to the Emerald City Mall. As we drove toward Peggy’s, I assured him that I was hale and hearty, and I told him about my mom’s date.

  “So did you meet him?”

  “I staggered out in my pajamas. He was just this guy. I thought he’d have two or three gold chains and cufflinks as big as hubcaps, but he was wearing this kind of geeky sports shirt and he was going bald.”

  “So what did they do?”

  “I didn’t hang around very long, but I think they just drank some wine and talked. I could hear my mom giggling.”

  “That’s all?”

  “They never left the living room and she walked him to the door about midnight. I heard her lock up and go to bed.”

  “Things are really working out well, aren’t they? I mean with you and your mom and you and Rachel….”

  “And you and Peggy.”

  “Yeah,” he said, grinning. “God, I’m happy, Walker. I’m really happy.”

  “Me too. I’d be a little happier if I could come clean with Rachel, though. About my mom.”

  “Give yourself some time. She’s probably got some secrets too, you know?”

  “I think about telling her all the time, but… Look, if I told her this morning, what could happen? I’d just screw up the whole day for everybody, right?”

  “That’s a strong possibility.”

  “See? If we’re getting along great, I don’t want to ruin it. If we’re not getting along so hot, I don’t want to make things worse.”

  He pulled up in front of Peggy’s duplex and turned off the engine. “Look, there’ll be a good time. I know it.”

  “When, I wonder.”

  “That,” he said, climbing out, “I don’t know.”

  The trip into the city was really nice. Rachel looked just great. She’d had Peggy put streaks in her hair and sweep it back, so she looked very speedy.

  Sully had the top of his mom’s convertible down, and the sun was out. When we passed the oats, they were tall enough to wave in the breeze, and Rachel said hello and waved back.

  There was one sticky minute when we got into the suburb of Love’s Park: a giant billboard advertised Ye Olde Burlesque.

  “You know,” said Peggy, “that’s supposed to be a pretty good show. Pretty funny and kind of family-oriented and…”

  Rachel, who was looking the other way, just smiled politely.

  “Thanks,” I mouthed to Peggy, who smiled and shrugged.

  We walked — four abreast, arms linked just like in the movie — into the Emerald City, following, of course, a winding road that started with a single yellow brick in the parking lot and grew until we reached the towering entrance.

  “Tell me the truth,” said Rachel. “Don’t you think it’s kind of exciting?”

  She drew us all to one side, away from the cataract of shoppers, away from the Munchkins clapping their gloved hands and pointing little kids toward the Tin Man and beyond him the Cowardly Lion and finally the Scarecrow, each one drawing the families deeper and deeper into the mall.

  “Just listen for a minute,” Rachel advised. Grinning at each other, we cocked our heads. Sure enough: there was the surfy hiss of money changing hands, an occasional yelp or muffled name, and — my God — the footsteps. I remembered how my dad had told me that in the army soldiers broke ranks to cross a bridge because all that left-right-left stuff could shake it to pieces. I imagined I could feel the mall tremble and thought I could see the imperceptible shudder of the fixtures.

  Rachel led us into the flux. “No cars,” she said, pointing like a tour guide, “no trams, nothing bigger or stronger than a person.”

  “So people feel safe?” asked Sully.

  “Right.”

  “Safe enough to buy,” I added sardonically.

  “God, I already want something,” Peggy exclaimed.

  “What?”

  “Anything, everything. I don’t care.”

  We strolled down a mild incline.

  “What’s way down at the end?” I asked. “Oz’s castle?”

  Rachel thought for a second. “Neiman Marcus, I think.” And when I laughed, she did, too.

  We passed Interior Systems, B. Dalton, Chrome Concepts, On Stage, Digital Den, and Noah’s Ark Pet Center.

  “Some mall somewhere,” explained Rachel, “has a House of Nose Jobs.”

  “Does their ad say, ‘Come in and pick your nose’?” asked Sully.

  We took a break in the central court, sitting beside a Munchkin holding his costumed stomach. Three storeys up, a huge dome let in the light. Rachel checked her copy of the Emerald News, a one-page newspaper thrust into every hand by a fairly surly dwarf.

  “It’s almost time,” she said.

  “For what?”

  “Watch,” and she rolled her eyes skyward.

  Just then the Muzak was interrupted by recorded trumpets. The fanfare was elaborate, and I looked around for Dorothy and Toto.

  Instead, high above us, the dome cracked and rolled slowly back. There were the frothy mares’ tails and the endless blue.

  “Ladies and gentlemen,” intoned Sully, “Emerald City Mall proudly presents the weather.”

  For a moment the whole place was nearly silent. Thousands of shoppers paused and tilted their heads back like they all needed eyedrops. Then someone moved, a child cried, the Muzak came on with a groan, and the moment was over.

  “Do you guys want to shop?” asked Peggy, looking feverish.

  Sully and I looked at each other and shook our heads.

  “You should shop, Walker. Whose pants are you wearing?”

  I looked down, too, half embarrassed. “Either my clothes are growing or I’m shrinking.”

  Peggy took Rachel’s hand. “We’ll do it for you. We’ll scope out the best stores. Give us half an hour. Meet us by the Wicked Witch of the West.” Then they were gone.

  On our own, Sully and I stepped into the human stream and let it carry us along. We swept past Slack Shack, Cinema VI, Foot Locker, Lady Foot Locker, and Harrison’s Hats.

  “I can’t help it,” Sully said. “I want something.”

  “God, me too. It’s probably against the law to be empty-handed in here.”

  “How about this?” He pointed to a pink neon sign, and like weary salmon we slipped into the quiet pool of A Luv Pub.

  “Gentlemen,” said a tall brunette in a camouflage-patterned jumpsuit trimmed in rhinestones. She looked like she was ready to parachute into Beverly Hills.

  “We just came in,” I said, “to get out of the rain.” But I didn’t get a glimmer out of her.

  “Let me know if I may be of any help.” She played that little tune like a doorbell.

  “Imagine coming home to her,” I said.

  “Imagine coming home to that.” Sully pointed to a mannequin in long stockings with garters and some kind of weird panties.

  “Are those torn,” he asked, “or do they come that way?”

  “They sure look drafty.”

  On the wall hung long negligees, goofy little bras that looked like architecture projects in minimum lift, and every conceivable combination of strap and truss, all done in lace and leather. They looked frilly but uncomfortable.

  “Oh, God,” I said, gaping at set after set of tassels attached to tiny cones.

  “At last, something wholesome. Little party hats.”

  “Do you think my mom has to wear these?”

  “Beats me. How do you keep them on, anyway? Bondex?”

  Just then, a tired-looking blonde with shopping bags from Nordstrom’s led a clerk to the spangly wall, pointed to a pair of golden tassels, examined them critically, then opted for pink.

  “She can’t be a stripper, too, can she?”

  “Even i
f she is, they can’t all be.” Sully pointed to the lines at both registers. Most of the women were around my mom’s age. Had they really come to the mall to buy a hat, a blender, an oven mitt, and a G-string?

  “Would you want Peggy to wear any of this stuff?”

  “I don’t think so. Would you?”

  “Do you think Rachel would want to?”

  “Beats me. Maybe you have to be old to get into this stuff.”

  Luv’s commando ambushed us as we left. “Gentlemen,” she said, “perhaps next time.”

  “Roll when you hit the ground,” I advised her.

  Blank. No response.

  Sully pulled me out the door. “Let’s go meet the girls.”

  They were waiting right under the towering witch, and when Rachel spotted us, she handed her package to Peggy and ran to meet me.

  Man, that really got me. I’d never had a girl do that before, throw herself into my arms, I mean, much less in front of a thousand strangers. Nobody seemed to give it a second thought, except maybe a nice smile here and there. Maybe Rachel was right about malls. Maybe they were magical worlds apart.

  “It’s not so bad, is it?” she asked, just like she could read my mind.

  “It’s great,” I said, holding her tighter.

  “I meant the mall,” she said, grinning.

  “I meant the mall.”

  Peggy and Sully cruised up beside us. “There’s a free show,” she said. “Down there at the end of Munchkin Land.” She looked at us, question marks in both eyes. “With a stage and everything.”

  “Why not?”

  We slipped into one of the front rows and watched the other shoppers settle, some — like the birds out at my place — circling warily, some swooping right down to squabble over a choice spot.

  It really was like downtown used to be, at least in a way. There were lots of old people — some the condo type with white shoes and matching belts, but others like Mr. Kramer, in clean overalls and blue Big Boy work shirts with the top button fastened, sitting patiently holding a straw hat or a cane or their wife’s mammoth black purse. On the edge of the crowd stood the mothers with their strollers, moving them back and forth, back and forth, like vacuum cleaners.