Tuesday, December 23, 2008

Shock Theater


We used to hang out at night, just walking around the neighborhoods, talking, being away from the house. Saturday night. Somebody's party. Some of the older kids were drinking. I was kissing a girl two years older than me, the older sister of a girl in my class. We were leaning against the wall of a carport when she told me to turn my head, and then she stuck her tongue in my ear. 30,000 volts of lightening shot through me in a flash. I stiffened and shook like someone receiving electroshock. Holy God! Holy God! I thought, "Something has gone badly wrong." I had heard of strokes and wondered if I was having one. Luckily she took her tongue out just then, but I was paralyzed. I couldn't move. Alarmed, I wondered if this would be permanent? I was making a quick inventory of my senses, which slowly seemed to be returning, when suddenly she did it again, deeper this time. The sensation was too strong and violent. My trapezium was frozen. I couldn't pull my shoulder away from my neck. I thought I might puke. I felt like the fellow who played in The Hunchback of Notre Dame. But things were just beginning. She had done all this before it seemed to me as she grabbed my wrist with a practiced hand and placed it into the top of the waistband of her pants. I wanted to pray, but it was impossible now. I was incapable. Weren't there any parents around I wondered? Would nothing interfere? But darker, deeper instincts were taking charge of me by then, a twisted, unravelling curiosity that had me plunging my hand deeper, past the top of her tight jeans that cut into the fat of her belly, then further. Suddenly, though, my hand came in contact with something awful, something rough and wiry like a Brillo pad. What the hell is that?! I thought, completely unprepared by the airbrushed photos of naked women I'd seen at Allen's house. This was nothing I knew. My own hair, even my two or three new pubic hairs, was soft and downy. I knew I was done, was finished with all of this there and then. Where was the appeal? All I wanted was to make an escape, to go home and watch tv, but she had me. I was stuck. It was a trap. Pull hard as I could, my hand would not come free of her jeans. It was like a set of Chinese handcuffs. The harder I pulled, the tighter things got. But just before I panicked, the moment before I began flopping and screaming, I heard her say, "You can't go any further. I have a friend visiting tonight." Whatever that meant. Then something gave. Maybe she sucked in her belly and released me. But I was free.

I would go home and watch an old horror picture on Shock Theater, I thought. But really, it wouldn't hold a candle to this.

2 comments:

  1. Hate to sound repetitive -- but some darn good writin' here.. That image of your hand being stuck -- chinese handcuffs - the sucking in of her tummy to free you (from the Terror of it All). Just damn fine. Poetic cause it is all imagery.

    (Since "au natura"l has given way to hairless or nearly so, (( you know, down there)) boys might quite not suffer such brillo shock).

    But seriously, I loved this for its tight precision, not a word wasted.

    ReplyDelete
  2. LOL, my shock was feeling moisture!
    (I was also "guided.")
    I didn't know anything :-)

    ReplyDelete