Youth Song Three: Hurts so Good
Youth Song Three: Hurts so good2 “You’ve been doing dope again haven’t you, Chrissy?
She says no, tears streaking her thick mascara, but she’s lying. Vance can tell.
“You know how we deal with the liars don’t you, Chrissy, you dirty, dirty girl. You filthy girl.”
The phone rings and in a professional voice Vance says, “ First class escort service beautiful girls at a reasonable price, please hold.”
He puts the phone down and puckers his ugly mouth.
“We run an escort service, not a god damn hash house for washed out whores.”
Chrissy cowers in the corner, shakes her head, instinctively tries to protect her eyes.
“We’ve got to discipline you, Chrissy. We can’t have whores at First Class.”
He unbuttons his pants.
“Strip!” He commands.
He locks the door and as he turns the lights off he picks his teeth with a yellow fingernail.
“It’s for your own good.”
Remember Christina Jenkins? You were in the same Earth Sciences class with her in 7th grade. You sat in the back of the class and watched her shift her slender body and rest her tender head on her arm. You watched her lips, her eyes, her legs develop for five long years. You knew what you could do to those legs. You wrote notes to her that began with, “You don't know me but I have always loved you...” or “I know a secret about you...” and burned them in the sink at home. You coward. We claimed the embers of these notes and read them back to you during your restless nights when even Darcy's sock couldn't bring you to sleep.
Chrissy was popular and knew it, wore the nicest spandex pants and the hottest pink leg warmers. You could never hope to associate with her no matter how big the shoulder pads were in your white blazer. Your greasy hair got in your face causing inflamed pimples. You sweated and smelled bad. You were a pussy coward. You were friends with a crippled Greek kid and a dying cancer victim! What a fool to think you would ever run your fingers through Chrissy's fragrant hair.
Your clothes were dirty and out of style before they got off the racks, even before your grandma bought them and gave them to you for your lucky thirteenth birthday. Your Don Johnson coat and pastel T-shirts were too special to wear to school so you kept them hidden in your closet in hopes of wearing them on a date or even going to the prom in them. But who would go to the prom with a loser like you? The white suspenders nicely accented your pink T-shirt but meant you couldn't wear your stylish thin gray leather tie. The only time you ever wore this gay outfit was in your room late at night while Twain slept on your bed and you listened to Pat Benatar on WHEB. When your brother and father were asleep you would turn down the volume and play “Word Up” by Cameo on your turntable and secretly try on different combinations of clothes before doing some more push-ups. Your black plastic sunglasses made every outfit look radical, didn't it? You used Christmas money to buy a white dress shirt, with pockets big enough to hold a guinea pig, to wear with the tie and the pin stripe jacket, but you could never work up the Sonny Crocketts to ask any of the girls on a date. Why? Was it because you hated getting caught in the crowd even if it meant being closer to Chrissy? Was it because you ran home from High School so you wouldn’t get caught by Stoney and Kong? The crowd of suffocated you until you had no identity, until you were just part of a crowd, assimilated and faceless. The lips in the crowd moved but they didn't say anything original. You thought you were so much better than everyone.
Remember Chrissy’s polka dot blouses and frosted hazel hair? She was wholesome and unspoiled, not like Cindy Phillips who was dirty and bad and wore torn sweatshirts off her shoulders and who, according to Huggy, had given the entire basketball team blow jobs in the forest after a game. Chrissy wore clean stone washed jeans while Cindy wore tight stretch skirts above her knees and her leatherette jackets had countless zippers. Cindy would make a good whore, wouldn't she. Chrissy would make a good wife and mother, her ripe nipples meant for a baby's mouth rather than a hungry man-child with a bobbing erection. You want to be that baby, don't you? You'd be a good baby. You would love Chrissy and coo as you kissed her. She would stroke your head and say, “Go to sleep my little baby. Go to sleep on mommy's breast.” And she would sing to you. Your dick wanted Cindy but your filthy mouth wanted Chrissy. What else do you remember?
Cristo and I usually sat in the back of the auditorium during the lip-sync concert to make fun of the acts, but when Darcy, Chrissy, and Cindy all came out to sing “Venus” dressed like the Bananarama, my heart stopped. Goddess on a mountain-top, indeed: three of them to be exact. My penis bulged in my tight white underpants and I started to rub it ,hoping a Genie might pop out and grant me three wishes (one of which would be to meet Cindy, Chrissy and Darcy in the forest. They'd be cold and hungry for my body) while my orange parachute pants did nothing to hide my erection.
“Hey, Sticky,” I whispered. “Chrissy's hotter than Mallory on Family Ties. What a skank. I'd Smurf Chrissy so good. I'd take my big Smurf and Smurf all three of 'em.”
It was not uncommon in 1985 for kids to use the word “Smurf” for a variety of verbs and nouns, preferably vulgar ones. You are free to interpret them as you choose.
Cristo leaned closer to me. Even by high school his face had no more hair on it than a used whiffle ball. He made up for this outward lack of maturity by being foul mouthed and bitter. He no longer hid in the shadows, like he had at the Jones Ave. dump; instead, he rode tides of popularity like a social surfer, working a crowd of football players like a professional salesman with attention to sell instead of life insurance.
“Word! But she isn't as good looking as the Smurf you call your mom. Psych! Did you sleep in those clothes? You look like Hobo Smurf.”
I laughed mirthlessly. “Naw, your mom took 'em off before she rode me like a Bronco.”
I held up my hand for a high-five but when Cristo tried to slap it I pulled away at the last second.
“Psych-O-Rama!”
Then Buddy “Huggy” Huggington stood up and yelled, “Why don't you three girls come down here and suck my big dong!?” This request, followed by Chrissy's boyfriend turning around and spitting at Huggy's face, formally launched the brawl portion of the evening. Everyone would march out of the auditorium and towards the school parking lot, choosing sides and making grave threats. As soon as we reached the parking lot 99% of the crowd either dispersed like Cristo, fleeing up the grassy hill in sissy fear, or decided to go to Gillies for a hot dog instead of fighting. This left only Buddy and a drunk foster kid from the Chase Home Orphanage to fight it out in between cars in a one round, thirty-second blood-sport, during which Huggy would yell, “Kumate!” Or “Get him a body bag!” as he leaped into the air like a kick boxing Jean Claude Van Damme.
We love it when you give us what we want, Oggy. Maybe we can return the favor. 0-2 to Knight? Remember? Now go home and watch the tape again. Maybe this time Gedman will snag Stanley's wild pitch. You just need to concentrate harder. You need to believe in yourself and stop being a pussy like you were in Junior High School. Go home, Oggy. Stop wasting your time with this crook. He can't give you what you want. He can't give you one more strike. We can.
Chapter Nine: Rebel Yell"
I examined Vance as he squinted over the hood and tapped ash out a crack in the window. He was one of the cowards who marched out the auditorium planning to fight only to wind up watching Buddy kick the orphan in the chest. Vance had a chin like a cowboy in a cigarette ad, but if you looked close you could see he had no lips. It was like they had been burned off by his non-filtered cigarettes. His mouth just appeared uninvited somewhere above his chin and below his thin nose so he had to hold his cigarettes in his teeth. His Early Man face asked to be punched just to keep him in line. He had a tattoo of a wood chip on his shoulder and he sported these funky eyebrows that hung over his cheeks like shop awnings, casting a permanent shadow on his face. If he was in a lineup for a petty theft the victim would pick him out instinctively from ten others no matter who actually committed the crime. Why? He looks the part of a petty criminal, resigned to petty, mean efforts that are forgotten as soon as they are accomplished. From selling fake 50-50 tickets at football games to stealing from the Unitarian Church collection plate, the most important thing he had ever done was fall off that cliff at the dump. He hadn't been picked up by the world's radar since.
“Leave Chrissy alone,” I said weakly as I repositioned my hat on my head.
“Who? I don’t know a Chrissy. Who’re you talking about?”
“You know. I don’t approve of you peddling my classmates like slaves. It will not stand. I played Clutch in Whiffle Ball once.”
“Look, I’ll put an add in the paper. If nobody comes in for an interview then I’ll drop the whole thing. But you know what, Ogden? I’ve already had about 20 girls commit to a position. It’s easy money. Sex or no sex. They make money and I make money. The customer is satisfied. Life is good. First Class escort service. Beautiful girls...
“...at a reasonable price. I know Vance. You are a prince to give them this opportunity. A real Alex P. Keaton.”
“So you want to invest? I’ll let you in on the ground floor.”
“More like the basement,” I quipped. “No, Vance. When I die I want my conscience to be clear. You won't earn a dime anyway.”
“Awww, don't be queer. Starting a business is like teaching your girlfriend how to suck your dick. You make an initial investment but it pays off. It always pays off. Heh, Heh.”
While Vance made slurping sounds, I counted backwards from ten to calm myself. Such loose talk about sex makes me nervous. If I'm the only one who takes sex seriously, I figured, then I'd never get a girlfriend.
“You sicken me, Vance.”
“How many times you beat off today?”
Around 1985, the same time the word “Smurf” became part of our code-speak, the subject of masturbation broke the dike of respectability. In High School, Buddy and Oly had talked about how many times the masturbated in a day so loosely that the student council considered making it part of the morning announcements. It was voted down by a narrow margin.
My standard reply to this question was, “I lost count after ten.”
“And I sicken you? Please. You're young,
“Break my shine box a little more, Vance! Please! You sound like my grandmother. Just tell me to get a job and I'll put you on my Christmas list.”
“I'm just saying. I know you're still hoping for that Darcy chick to come back and give you head but, lets face it, if it didn't happen when you were in high school, and could still run a block without falling down, then it probably isn't going to happen now. Right?”
I wasn't listening. I was stroking Darcy's pink neon sock where it lay snug in my jeans pocket next to thirty five cents and a receipt for a Taco Bell burrito. The sock was so soft. So tight. Her toes were once right there at the end, moving around with candy painted nails, so precious. She would come back to me, I believed. She would realize the love I had inside me would fill her up, would complete her, and she would embrace me. She would return to me with the other sock and allow me put it on her tender foot. Then she would know who I was. She would understand. Would Vance notice if I took it out and kissed it?
He doesn't understand, Oggy. No one understands. They don't know Ray Knight. Of course she'll come back for you. The girl always comes back in the songs. She'll come back for her sock.
We entered a residential area called The Woodlands. Since I had mowed lawn here for three mornings as a landscaper, it was a place the Wraiths had well guarded. A light on in the Huggington home reminded me of
posted by Oggy Bleacher | 12:00 AM
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