He asks me questions while we walk. “Did you just move here, Jane?”
“No. I lived here my whole life,” I tell him. “I just never went to real school before.” Grandma Tressa used to home school me, ‘cause Mama says the devil’s got his hand in the public school system and the lies and filth they teach, whatever that means. But Grandma died this summer, so now I go to real school, ‘cause Mama has to work at the bank during the day.
“Well, since you’ve only been going to real school for a few weeks now, do you like it?” he asks and the way he’s smiling at me makes me wanna say yes, even though I don’t like it.
“Yeah,” I say to his smile. But the kids are mean. They call me names like dummy. It makes me sad in my tummy when they say those things. But looking at Dan makes me happy, so I say, “I like you. You’re real nice to me.”
He smiles his big smile where I can count all his teeth.
When we get to my house, we sit on the sofa right next to each other again. But before I can turn the TV on, he kisses me. I don’t know what to do back, but when he says, “Just relax, Jane,” I do. And when he says, “Do what I do,” I do that, too. And the longer we kiss, the bees stop buzzing in my chest, and my head and my tummy starts twisting, but not like when I’m sick. It’s down by my privates, and it feels good like something flipping over inside my belly that makes me tingle.
We don’t have time for popsicles.
When he leaves, my lips feel puffy, and my tummy is still rumbling in a good way. I want him to kiss me again.
*****
I couldn’t wait for Wednesday to come.
Dan walks me home.
He asks if he can see my room.
I don’t wanna go to my room. I wanna sit on the sofa and kiss him.
But I show him my room, ‘cause mama always says, “Men like it when you don’t argue with ‘em.”
He wants to lay on my bed. It feels weird at first, but as soon as he starts kissing me I decide I like kissing on my bed just as much as I like kissing on the sofa.
He touches me under my shirt while he kisses me.
He touches me under my bra while he kisses me.
He touches me under my skirt while he kisses me.
And the good twisting in my tummy starts.
But when he touches me under my panties while he kisses me, it makes me squirm. I want him to touch me but it feels weird. A good weird, but weird. When his hand stops and ain’t touching me no more, I want the weird feeling again and I push my privates into his hand. He keeps kissing me and touching me and the more he does the harder it is for me to do nothing but lie there. The feeling low in my belly keeps tightening, it feels like putting one end of a rubber band around the tip of your finger and pinching the other end between your fingers and thumb and pulling it back and just when you think you can’t possibly pull it back any more ‘cause it’s stretched too tight, it slips through your fingers in a flash and shoots up in the air like a rocket. That’s how I feel. Like a rocket. I cry out, “Oh my God,” even though Mama says I shouldn’t take the Lord’s name in vain. I keep saying it over and over again. And when the rocket comes back down I feel like someone’s pouring maple syrup into a hole on the top of my head and it’s going down slow and coating my insides all the way to my toes.
Dan kisses me on the nose and tells me, “You’re so pretty,” before he leaves.
We didn’t have popsicles.
I forgot all about the popsicles.
*****
It’s Wednesday again.
The bees are buzzing in my chest and head before Dan even walks me home.
He walks straight to my room, and I follow him ‘cause I want kissing and touching on my bed again.
We kiss for a while and then he tells me I’d look prettier with all my clothes off. I don’t wanna take my clothes off, but I want him to think I’m pretty, so I do. And when I’m all the way naked he says, “You’re beautiful.” And my face gets hot like the sun’s glowing behind my cheeks, and its rays are shooting out through the rest of me. Beautiful is better than pretty. Mama says when I’m a grown up I’ll be beautiful and men won’t mind that I’m not smart like other girls.
We kiss some more, and he takes his shirt off. His chest has hair on it, but I like touching it. It feels soft and scratchy at the same time like the rug in the bathroom that I wipe my feet on when I get outta the shower.
We kiss some more, and he takes his pants and underwear off. He asks me to touch his privates. I don’t wanna look at it, but I touch it. And when I do he makes this sound like when you take your first bite of chocolate crème pie, and it’s the best chocolate crème pie you’ve ever tasted in your life. That’s what it sounds like, and I like hearing it. And now I wanna look. I’ve seen a penis before. One night Mama had a man friend over, only I didn’t know it, and I walked in her bedroom without knocking. I saw her friend’s penis. I always knock now.