Doug and I, whatta team. Who is this band he’s playing now???
“Five minutes?” I nod.
“Ok, now let’s talk. You think I can take you and Allie on dates?”
“Yea. How else are we going to get to know each other? My house is out, your house is not good. Where can we go to just be ourselves? get a snack, walk outside, normal shit.”
He smiles. “Can’t get over you swearing.”
“I love to say ‘fuck’, Doug. The old man would cut my nuts off……..There’s that new hamburger place, McDonald’s. Pennsupreme for ice cream. I heard there’s some restaurant that sells pizza.”
“Yea, Pizza Hut..”
“You get around. There’s joints out there where no one will know us. I bet you go to house parties and there’s places where she and I could go to be quiet. We won’t cramp your style, c’mon. Once every two weeks after school, a Saturday night here or there.”
“And you’re sure Allie would say yes?”
I hesitate. We never talked explicitly about it, but I believe I know how she feels about this, or so I think. “Go ahead and ask her, I’d expect you to!”
A smile plays with his lips. “I’ll consider it.” He puts the car in gear. I reach to return the dollar bills he gave me. “Na, don’t. It’s no big deal.”
As expected, he pulls behind the store and pops the trunk. I hear shit being tossed in. The RC is cold, a welcome shift from Coke. I catch snatches of a conversation. It seems one item wasn’t quite what was requested. The absent owner sounds like a clone of my old man, or a drunk, or both.
On the road again
“I bet if I took you over to my town, it would take me 2 hours to point out everything. All these corn fields and grass you have, it would take you 10 minutes.”
My turn to smile. “Try 5.”
Then I’m home, grabbing my stuff. “Thanks, Doug. It was fun. You ain’t such a bad guy for a juvenile delinquent.”
“Fuck you, smartass, You’re worse than her.” He hesitates. “Hey, you–um–ok doing this again?”
“Sure” I’m a whore for an RC Cola and the extra bucks is nice.
“Cool. be seein’ you.”
Sounds hopeful, eh?