What kind of beer are you going to buy?
Any kind you want.
Do you have any weed?
Sure. I’ve got great weed.
You’ve got great weed? I find that hard to believe.
I’ve got the best weed. California Sensemilia.
No shit? I’m there, she said, pulling him toward the exit, I want to see this great weed.
The weed was great. He pulled a plastic bag of light green, red-haired, sticky buds out of the glove compartment of his Chevy Nova. They both sat in the front seat and locked the doors and cracked their windows open. Madeleine was impressed.
I didn’t know smart guys like you smoked killer pot.
What do you mean?
You hang out in the computer room all the time. I didn’t know you computer nerds smoked weed.
We smoke the best weed there is. All your freak friends smoke shitty stuff.
Fuck you man, they smoke good stuff.
Mark expertly rolled a tight joint, licking the paper with flicks of his tongue.
Bullshit. They smoke homegrown, leafy stuff that gives you a headache.
How do you fucking know what they smoke?
I’ve gotten stoned with them before. With that crowd.
She laughed at him, saying, I doubt that.
I have.
He lit the joint and took a huge drag and passed it to her.
They’d kick your ass before they’d let you get stoned with them.
Not true, he said, his voice muffled from holding in the pot smoke. The car filled up with a sweet, strong odor as he slowly exhaled. He smiled and coughed a little and said, you’re just too busy giving head so you don’t notice anything.
I keep my eyes open when I give head. I notice everything.
Well, I’ve gotten stoned with your stupid freak friends and their pot sucks, he said, smiling confidently at her, and you’ve never noticed that.
The pot made them giggly. Madeleine felt especially giggly because she was with a nerd. His hair was short and he wore brown loafers. They drove to a liquor store and Mark went in and bought a six pack of Budweiser. They drove to Howard Park and sat parked facing the St. Joe River, drinking beer. She worried that they would run into someone she knew and she didn’t want to be seen with him. After they finished the six pack, she put her hand on his crotch. He wasn’t hard.
Stop that.
Why?
She grabbed harder.
Seriously, stop that.
Oooh, you’re shy, she laughed, no one’s ever touched you before.
That’s not true.
Then why are you scared, stud boy?
I’m not scared.
Why can’t I touch you?
Because I want to kiss you first.
Madeleine laughed.
You want to kiss me?
Yeah.
Okay.
He leaned toward her, his eyes closed and he placed his lips gently on hers. She began to laugh again.
Stop laughing, he said, pulling back.
I’m sorry, I can’t help it. I’ve still got the giggles.
He pulled her close to him, saying, you shouldn’t wear so much make-up.
I like wearing a lot of make-up.
But you’re pretty and without make-up, I could see you better.
Maddy, very stoned, thought this was funny and began giggling again. It was dark out. Other cars with other teenagers sat parked around them. He began kissing her, more firmly, licking the corners of her mouth and sucking gently on her tongue. She felt herself relax. She had never kissed anyone before, not there on the mouth, not really kissed.
6
The first time Mark gave Maddy head they were in his bedroom and his parents were out to dinner at his aunt’s house. His sisters were out God knows where. Maddy and he had been going out, fucking in his Chevy Nova, for a few months. It was a special occasion having the house, doing it in a bed. They were naked and the only light was from a streetlight outside and it lit up her large bones nicely. He could see the riverlike stretchmarks on her breasts and stomach, how the inside of her thighs sagged delicately. She lay on her back, her strong arms stretched above her head and he kissed her breasts and put his tongue in her navel and then, using both hands, spread her thighs apart, spread her cunt apart and he could feel her muscles tighten and was about to put his face in it when she sat up, looking confused and said, wait.
What, he said. She huffed and looked away and put fingers in her mouth. He said, don’t you want me to and she said nothing. He put his face there and licked gently and she moaned and pulled away again. He said, what’s wrong. She said, I’m embarrassed, really quietly, not like herself.
Whenever Maddy and he fucked she grunted lustily. She swore at him and sneered almost cruelly when she gave him head. She sucked his dick with a passion. She was a slut, a sex specialist, a high school whore. She wore the tightest jeans and the brightest make-up. She never smiled and no one scared her. Other kids made fun of him for fucking her, saying, you’re going to get a disease, that girl’s pussy is rank, she fucks everybody, she’s a skanky ho. But he didn’t care and now he knew he was waiting for that moment when her face would light up all scared and all her hardness melted away and her voice became so little and she had never had anybody eat her out or make her come.
He gave her head that night and he had her smeared all over his face and his nose burned from breathing out of it, his teeth were numb and his lips swollen and he made her come so hard that she cried. Big scary sobs, wordless words, whole sentences that made no sense. Her pussy swelled and shook and she grabbed his back and tore holes in his skin and screamed so loud he knew the neighbors heard her.
He had her. He had the girl no one else could have and no one wanted because she was such used trash but he had her in a way no one had ever had her. He broke her shell and what was inside was so pink and so vulnerable it scared him at first. Then he liked it. Then he loved it. Then he knew what it was he had. He had her.
When they fucked she still slit her eyes and made noises and sometimes she’d still curse but it was different. She lost her meanness. They’d go to drive-in movies and instead of grabbing his cock with her teeth gritted, she’d smile all shyly at him and sometimes she’d put his hand between her legs and give him this pleading look. All she ever wanted was head. She perfumed her cunt with peach-flavored lotion and powdered it with honey-tasting powder and shaved it and wore silky underwear with little bows on them. Pink panties and a black garter or a red G-string that went right up the crack of her ass like a strand of licorice. She spread her legs so wide and said Mark, give it to me, that’s it, don’t stop, oh God don’t stop. He watched her change so quickly and she changed just for him because she still walked around that school with her eyes all hard and her make-up too bright and the thick seam of her jeans rudely splaying her cunt lips apart, her hips jutted foreward. But she’d take one look at his skinny ass in the hallway and all that hardness melted away like butter. She stumbled over her words and blushed and fidgeted and would whisper and giggle in Mark’s ear like a virgin. People said what are you doing with that disgusting ho bag but he never listened to them because he knew her soft side and it was so soft it seemed it could disappear.
He’d make her beg for it say please Mark, say pretty please and she’d say it with her voice quivering, her cheeks all hot and red. He’d say, what are you going to do for me and she’d say anything, anything. He said let me fuck you in the ass and she’d say okay, okay. And she’d roll onto her stomach and lift her hips into the air, her pink, crinkly holes right out in the open and say, get the KY, her head pressed into the pillow, her voice all muffled.
That’s when she started to show him her tricks. She put her fingers inside herself for him and she said, I can do more. If I show you will you eat me? She said, I used to do it alone at home. She said, now I’ll do it for you, don’t you want to see it? She put her fingers in there and then her hand, concentrating, eyes wide and her mouth stretched open like her cunt. He said let me do it, Maddy, and she’d say do it and he put his fingers in her and then his hand. He put all sorts of things inside of her. Her breathing would become deep and regular, so rhythmic and steady, like a swimmer or something and her eyes became focused inward, wide open, glazed, never blinking. He tied her legs apart, her knees bent up and he put a fist or a shoe in her and she’d exhale so so slowly and close her eyes.