"Well, Mom and Marina, at the very least. Well, if they had been asleep, that is. They’re not-they’re downstairs."
"OH SHIT!" she blurt out. "I forgot where I was!"
"Don’t worry about it," I laughed. "This is Mom, OK? You think you’re the…well, forget it. Just that Mom won’t care."
"What were you going to say?" she pressed.
"Nothing. Forget it."
"Mikey, come on. No secrets."
"Fine, all I was going to say was, do you think you’re the first girl I’ve ever had up here."
"Oh, is that all," she said. "Hey, I know you have a past. I have a past. I’m actually rather glad I wasn’t your first, nor you mine. When I lost my virginity, I wasn’t capable of what just happened."
"Yeah. How old were you?"
"13. Summer after seventh grade. You?"
"14. Eighth grade. Right after my 14th birthday, which is in January. The 25th."
"Cool, you’re an older man," she giggled. "Slightly. Mine was a couple weeks ago. March 10th. You turned seventeen also, I assume?"
"Yeah," I said. "Have you had a lot?" I asked.
"Yeah, I’d say. 8 or so, I think? As I told you, I’m not a one-night-stand sort of person, generally, though I did have one. I mean one that I knew exactly what it was when I did it. Of course, that was the one time I was with a considerably older man."
"Oh, really?" I laughed.
"Yeah. Look, that’s a topic of girl-gossip when you’re teenagers. How much better older men are. I was 15. He was 26. I wanted to try it out. And I have to admit, he was good." She looked at me. "Oops, maybe I shouldn’t have said that."
"Why not?" I asked reasonably. "My male ego’s pretty resistant, you know. Besides which, I have eyes. If you tell me anything you’ve ever had was better than what I just saw, you’re lying, lying, lying."
She cracked up laughing. "OK. I admit it. Hell, I thought our roll in the outfield yesterday was the ultimate. Until this. Five times I came. Unbelievable." She took a breath. "You like doing, you know, what you did to me tonight?"
"Sure do."
"GOOD!" I had to laugh at that. "Anyway, back to my experience-except for the older guy, it was never a one-night stand. It might have ended up not being many more nights than that, but it was always what I considered a relationship. Even if it ended up being short-lived."
"You ever had your heart broken?" I asked her.
"Once. Bill Shumer. I went out with him last year, sophomore year, over most of the winter. I thought I was in love, but I was fooling myself. You see, he knew, in his mind, that I was a baseball player-but it was winter, so he was able to avoid it. Then, right after the season started, I was walking home from practice and I ran into him downtown where I used to live. I still had my uniform on, spikes, eyeblack, dirt, the whole bit. He broke up with me that night. Said he thought he was going out with a girl. I told him he knew I played baseball, but that didn’t matter. Confronted with visual evidence of it, he freaked."
"Oh, damn, Lily," was all I could think to say.
"Lucky for me, no more of that," she said, smiling at me. "Now you. How many?"
"Ten or so. I’ve done a few one-night stands. Mostly relationships."
"All right, I have to ask. You said a few one-night stands. Have you ever done Maggie Benson?"
"Yeah," I laughed. "Right here, as a matter of fact, about a year ago. And that’s why I know that Mom doesn’t care-because Maggie’s so loud, I think she shattered a couple bulbs in the dining room chandelier." She howled. "You know, it’s kind of incredible that I can tell you this stuff."
"Look, your past is your past, that’s the way I look at it. And I would’ve been surprised if you hadn’t been with Maggie Benson. That’s a small list."
" Speaking of Maggie, she sits next to me third period, and when I opened my bookbag today, she leaned over and said ‘I smell pussy.’" Lily really broke up at that one. "When I told her why she smelt pussy, she said she liked you already."
"Uh-huh," she giggled. "Have you ever had your heart broken?"
"Once myself. Marcia Ryerson."
"She’s in my English class."
"Maybe I shouldn’t tell you this story, then. Ah well, it was two years ago. Freshman year. We went out for a couple of months, and were doing it the whole time. She always told me her parents were strict, she had to keep it secret, we snuck around a lot. That part wasn’t the greatest, but I had really fallen for this girl. Unfortunately, it wasn’t her parents she didn’t want to find out about her guys-it was her other guys."
"Oh, shit." Lily saw what was coming.
"Oh, it gets better. Despite all her grand schemes, some guys just can’t keep a secret from their best buddies. I can…but Eddie can’t."
"Oh no," she said.
"Yep. He sidled up to me one day and told me about this great relationship he was in, but he had to keep it hush-hush because of her parents, but he wanted to tell me. And then named the girl I had been fucking not two hours before. I almost hit him. Then I realized that he didn’t know."
"What happened then?"
"We confronted her. She got all weepy, ‘I love you both so much I couldn’t decide’ yadda yadda yadda, all that crap. We both turned our back on her, and shook over it. And we made a vow, right then and there, that, no matter what, we would always tell each other about the girls in our life, so that this never happened again." I grinned at her. "Of course, I didn’t have to tell Eddie about us-you did that yourself at the Burger Hut."
"Yes, I did." She giggled.
"I don’t like sneaks. I treat everybody on the up-and-up, and prefer to be treated that way myself. We’ve told you about Jared and Amanda. Now, while that might not be my style, I respect that, when they stray, they’re open about it. And I actually have enormous respect for Maggie. She like sex, she likes variety, and doesn’t apologize for it. I just don’t like sneaks."
"You don’t have to worry about that with me," she said.
"You, Miss Blunt?" I laughed. "No, I didn’t think so. If you ever got pissed off enough to cheat on me, you’d scream it from the top of the school building."
"I might at that," she giggled. "Though, you know," she said softly, "that’s never going to happen."
"I know." We just smiled at each other.
PART FIVE FRIDAY DAYTIME
What a day. What a day, what a day.
I floated to school on cloud nine. Because I got to pitch today. And because of what had happened last night.
I got in the car, started it, and turned on the radio.
U2 was singing. "It’s a beautiful day, don’t let it get away."
Damn straight. The sun was shining, I was in love, and I got to pitch today.
In love. What a concept. Though I hadn’t actually said it, and neither had he-just that "I’m falling" bit. Which isn’t quite the same thing. But I was done falling and I think he was, too. I almost said it when he dropped me off last night. I’ve only said those words once in my life-and that was that asshole, sophomore year. I don’t give those words away. I knew, deep in my heart, that Mike would never do anything like that to me-but I don’t give those words away.
Sometimes I’m too damn stubborn for my own good.
Anyhow, plenty of time for that. I didn’t see anything happening to this relationship any time soon. Talk about what a concept. I usually spent most of my time in relationships waiting for the other shoe to drop. Not this time.
It really was a beautiful day. And I had no intention of letting it get away.