falling over. I got in clumsily opposite her. She scooted around and floated toward me. When her face was close to mine, I could smell the beer on her breath. âYeah, youâre trouble, all right,â she said, though she could probably tell how nervous and scared I was right then. Her hands went to my shoulders and pushed me back against the side of the big tub.
âYou know that itâs different for girls and guys, donât you? I mean, we could have a real good time right here, but what happens nine months later? A guy can just walk away, but if a girl gets knocked up, sheâs got to do something. Iâve seen it happen and I can tell you, itâs not going to happen to me, no sir, but that doesnât mean that we canât do other things that are just as much fun, well, almost as much fun.â
She moved closer. I could feel her breasts against my hairless chest, and I let my hands glide over her arms.
âYouâve gone out of your way to show me a good time, and I appreciate it.â
She rubbed my chest and arms and kissed me softly, then harder. She wrapped her legs around my hips, and even before I knew what was happening, I climaxed.
âOh, hell,â I stammered, hoping she couldnât see me blush, but I knew she did.
âThatâs fine, baby, donât you worry. Weâve got all night, and I know youâve got a lot more to show me.â
She was right. We fooled around in the tub some more. She finished all the beer, then we dried off with the big white towels and got into the Taft bed. She showed me things that a girl could do to a guy and things that a guy could do that a girl really liked. It was exhilarating and draining and frightening and not like anything Iâd ever experienced before.
When I woke up the next morning, she was gone. That afternoon when I went to her building, one of the roommates came down to the street. She had a smirky, sneering look on her face when she told me that Anna had left.
âHer real boyfriend came back for her. Heâs not a kid like you. He just got out of jail, and as soon as he was free, he flew to her side. So you can just get the hell out of here, boy.â
I went to the Spanish Marketplace restaurant, and the head waitress told me Anna had quit on Thursday, before we had our race.
With all that boiling up in my head, I spent the next week or so wandering around in a miserable dazed funk. I think I knew, even then, that whatever had gone on between us wasnât love, not the kind of love that you heard people singing about in popular songs or that you saw in movies. But it had been memorable, and I wanted to do it again. I wasnât sure I believed the roommate, but the simple truth was that Anna was gone and there wasnât a damn thing I could do about it. So I just thought about her a lot every day and wondered about what had happened. Finally, as the memories receded, I realized Iâd never understand it. But I never completely forgot her, either.
All it took was a certain kind of horniness to bring back the memory of her in the tub, and whenever that happened, I got a monumental hard on.
It was maybe two or four years after that when I ran into the roommate again. It was late on a Friday or Saturday night. I was keeping watch on a couple of mugs who were moving slots and pinball machines for Longy Zwillman at one of his roadhouses over in Jersey. It was a big loud boozy place where guys fought for the fun of it and banged things up pretty good. There was a steady turnover with all of the equipment. I made sure that all the nickels and dimes made it back to Longy, so I was standing by the open back door, where I could keep an eye on the truck and on the guys who were lugging the stuff.
A girl with a cigarette ankled unsteadily by on the way to the ladiesâ. She gave me a glance, kept on walking, then stopped and turned around.
âYouâre him,â she said, pointing at me.
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