Adventures of Me and Martha JaneChapter 10C
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Near the end of the summer of 1956, just before I started classes at Christian Brothers High School, I wrote Martha Jane and told her that the main reason I worked all summer was to earn money for a one-week visit to New York. I had saved enough for train fare, and if she didn't have room for me in her apartment I had money for a hotel.
Three weeks passed. I'd hoped for a quick reply. I wanted to get to New York before the summer ended. But as the days passed I started losing hope. August ended. I made new plans: perhaps I'd hear from her soon and could at least spend the Labor Day holiday with her.
Then Labor Day passed. And I thought: all right, then, Thanksgiving. And if not Thanksgiving, Christmas...
A letter arrived the week after Labor Day. Mom handed it to me when I came home from Christian Brothers. I pretended it was unimportant and told Mom I would read it when I got to it. I disappeared in my room for a while, then hid the letter under my shirt and rode my bike to Gaisman Park. I sat under one of the skinny, almost leafless saplings and hastily opened the envelope.
"Dear Steven: Please, please please don't spend so much money so soon on a trip up here. I don't want you to go broke and spend everything on me. Wait a little longer."
Disheartened, I read on. She had taken in a roommate, a struggling fabric designer named Veronica, whom she called Ronnie, to make ends meet. Martha's deal with Columbia didn't include summers, so she tutored privately and had other jobs on the side. And the apartment was far too small for two people, much less for three; and she and Ronnie had to lay low anyway because her lease included only one tenant; if Ronnie were found out the rent would go up.
She wrote, "You really haven't saved enough money for a week in a decent hotel in New York. There is no way I'd have you stay in a dump. You'd get mugged or even killed in that kind of neighborhood. New York isn't like Memphis. It's dangerous here."
I read on. She wanted me to bury myself in work at Christian Brothers. She wanted me to give up the paper route and return to drama and to writing. I had sent her some short poems I'd written; she was so impressed that she wanted me to contact someone at school who would look at more of my work. She thought my stepdad's decision to send me to Christian Brothers was wise and that the Brothers were singular teachers. And if I were going to spend my money, I should wait until I had more on hand so that I wouldn't be totally broke, because I would need decent clothes of my own. And I should buy a new typewriter for school and for developing my writing instead of struggling with the Black Beauty (I had not yet told her the story of the Black Beauty's sorry fate). And I didn't belong on a paper route anyway; I belonged in the theater and on the student newspaper.
So that was it. I could not refute her. In every way, she was correct. But I was not content with it.
Two days later, on a Saturday when I knew long distance rates were low, I asked Mom if I could make a call to New York and pay for it with my own money. Mom said yes. I dialed Martha's number. No answer. Two hours later I dialed again, late in the afternoon.
It was Ronnie who answered, with a youngish voice and a noticeable New York City accent. "Who's this?" she asked. When I told her she replied excitedly, "Oh, Steeeeven! Oh, I've heard so much about you from Martha! So you're really a person? The way she talks about you, I didn't think you were real! Hold on, I'll get her."
Martha was surprised and happy at my call.
I asked, "What happened to your Memphis accent?"
"Oh, hon, that's gone months ago. I call Mother and she can't understand a word I say."
We had a long talk. It took a while for me to get accustomed to the changes in her voice. She talked faster, and she sounded older, worldlier and more businesslike. She apologized for not letting me visit her right away. She said I really and truly needed more money, and she refused to let me stay in a hotel. "I want you to come up here on an airplane, not a crummy train. I want you to be patient so you can be comfortable and treat yourself like a mensch. You know what a mensch is?"
"No."
"A mensch is a PERSON, hon! I don't want you coming up here with your stuff in a paper bag and looking like a street urchin. And I want to make plans for it, and have time to spend together. Don't you think that's better than being so rushed and desperate? Life in New York is desperate enough without all that."
I didn't want to agree; but she was right, all the way down the line. She pleaded with me to buy a good typewriter, a nice one that I'd be happy with and that I would use to write and study instead of wasting my time and energy with notebook paper.
I refused. I did so nicely, but I refused to spend money on a typewriter, which in those days was a fairly expensive and exotic item for a high school kid in Memphis. And I insisted that I'd rather save the money for New York. Martha yielded on that point but insisted that I travel to New York when the timing was better.
She said, "I'm glad you called, Steven. Really. But talking about saving money, do you know we've been on the phone for over half an hour?"
Apparently she heard reluctance and disappointment in my voice. "Steven. Sweetheart. I miss you, and I know you'd love New York. Will you understand? For me? And treat yourself better, and be patient?"
"Well... okay."
"Don't say okay if you don't mean okay."
I laughed. "Okay."
"And buy yourself a typewriter?"
"No."
"Oh... stubborn! Hon, please write me. And please take it easy."
Halloween passed. Thanksgiving. Three more letters and then Christmas cards passed between us. Then Christmas. 1957 began. Then Ronnie found a better job and moved into a vacancy in the same building. Then Martha found another teaching job on the side to supplement her scholarship. Easter passed. She sent an oversized Easter card that she said was designed by Ronnie. But no other word. April passed, and still no letter.
One hot Friday afternoon in late spring, Charlie and I spent a harried day working one huge delivery after another. I was sullen and was taking my anger out on the orders, asking for the biggest ones and for the most distant customers. Finally, by late afternoon, the two of us cleared the backlog and the flow of customers thinned for a while. Soaked with sweat, I took a break in the restroom and soaked my head with cold water.
As I returned to the front of the store, Charlie called to me from the front door. "Hey, Speedy!" He motioned toward the outside with his head. "C'mon out here, let's take a break. C'mon."
"I just had one," I said crankily.
"What the hell, c'mon."
I met him out front and he mounted his bike. "Get on your bike," he said. "Let's take a ride." He lit a cigarette and handed me one. I took it and lit up.
I asked, "Where to?"
"Let's take a little ride up on High Street while it cools down. Get the hell away from this store for a spell."
Wordlessly, I followed him on my squeaky bike and we rode up a short rise for several blocks. We took a right onto High Street, a narrow avenue of dilapidated tenements that had changed little since the turn of the century. A few of the buildings were abandoned; one of them had a condemnation notice on the front door. Abruptly, Charlie turned into a narrow driveway overgrown with weeds beside a four story building of old, oily, dull red brick.
"What's up?" I asked, crushing out my cigarette.
"C'mon and meet a coupla girls I know," he said laconically. He shoved down the kickstand and flipped his cigarette toward the street.
"Girls," I said apprehensively. Quickly, I removed my glasses.
Charlie smirked. "Hell, Chrissie and Karen don't care 'bout that."
"I do," I said.
The wooden front stairs and porch creaked loudly under our feet. Charlie pounded on the screen door and hummed and waited. Presently two teenaged girls opened the heavy front door. Charlie introduced them with a few lines of friendly banter. Chrissie, the busty one with curly blonde hair and a mischievous smile, said hi. Karen was the slim, quiet one with long black hair and an expressionless face.
"What's up?" Charlie asked.
"C'mon," Chrissie said to him playfully, "I'll show ya. Karen, you and Steven... talk." She giggled.
Charlie and Chrissie disappeared into the massive dark hallway beyond the door. Karen leaned in the doorway and looked me over shyly, still with no expression on her face, her hands folded behind her. She was attractive in a lazy, slutty way, with a pale narrow face and a thin, wide mouth, black hair that draped around her small shoulders, and dark, ambiguous eyes.
"Charlie says yer a real hard worker," she said, her voice soft and hesitant and dripping with a heavy drawl that I recognized as belonging to northern Mississippi sharecroppers.
"I do my share," I said. Unaccustomed to talking with girls my age, I said lamely, "So you're Karen."
"Yeah. I'm Karen. Uh, Chrissie and me been friends for a long time."
It had been so long since I'd stood face to face with a girl, I had no idea what to do next. I looked around to see if Charlie and Chrissie were doing anything that might give me a clue as to what was going on, but they had disappeared inside the building.
Karen eyed me with an inscrutable stare. A clumsy silence passed. Then she motioned with her eyes to her right, toward the hallway. I wondered if she meant what I thought she meant.
She hesitated, and moved lazily into the hallway, where she stopped with one foot on the stairway and a hand on the dusty wooden banister. She turned toward me momentarily, her face still dull and unchanged, her dark eyes questioning. I stepped inside the screen door and let it close softly behind me. She headed slowly up the stairs, quickly glancing at me about halfway up. I waited at the door. Then at the top step her gaze again met mine, directly but fleetingly, as she turned and started up the second level.
I told myself: hey, idiot, she wants you to follow her. I moved to the stairway. It was all too unexpected and unfamiliar. There had been girls who told me they thought I was cute, but none who made or accepted my advances. What the hell -- it had been almost two years for me. Martha was in no hurry to see me. Probably New York would never happen. But was Karen serious?
Halfway up the first flight I paused and listened. The floor above creaked softly. I continued. When I reached the second floor all I saw were dusty shafts of sunlight, warped and faded walls, and several half open doorways. Then, behind the second door on my right, I heard what sounded like the squeak of an old metal bed. I moved forward and stood in the doorway; the odor of grease and rotted plaster bled from the room.
Karen sat on a half made metal bed, holding a single deflated pillow to her chest, her long legs folded under her dark blue dress. Her eyes looked at me from her dull face. "What took y' so long?" she joked. A slight smile creased her thin lips; the smile disappeared instantly as I moved into the room and looked around. The space consisted of four walls, a cracked ceiling, a closed closet, an undraped open window, the bed, and her.
I stood in the middle of the room, hands on my aproned hips. "What's up?" I wondered if, at any moment, an axe murderer might dash from the closet, empty my pockets of the tips I'd earned that day, and kill me.
She seemed confused. Then hesitantly she raised a slender, longfingered hand to her dress and touched the top button. "Wont me t' take this off?"
I don't know how many seconds she waited for me as her words slowly sank into my brain. Soon she began undoing her buttons.
She said, "It's okay to do it in here. Ain't nobody else home t'day, they all went downtown." As she spoke she allowed her dress to fall open and reveal one breast and its flat, cocoa brown nipple. "Won't nobody come in." She motioned toward the window. "Cain't see nothin' through the winder, either, they tore down all the buildin's back there."
I started undressing. As I got down to my underwear and prepared to strip them off, I heard a noise from the hallway.
She said gently, "Never mind them. They're too busy doin' it to worry 'bout us." In one motion she slid under the sheet, pulled her dress over her head and off, and held a corner of the bedsheet aside for me, carefully keeping herself covered below the waist.
"C'mon," she said. "Git in."
Nude, I slipped under the sheet. She covered us and turned to me. I turned to her, but hastily she pulled herself to me as if she didn't want me to see all of her, and curled her legs around one of mine. Against my right knee I felt her crotch and was amazed that she had become sopping wet so quickly. Like a sudden wind from under the sheet her girl's scent rose, stringent and sharp. It was disconcerting; heady because of its sheer lusty power, uninviting because it seemed so alien to her otherwise alluring, slim, white body.
Her face was uncommunicative, but her eyes were intent, waiting, deeply focussed into mine. Her arms went around me and she tried pulling herself closer to me, and me to her. I reached under the sheet and down, touching her dripping mound. Instantly, her hand shot down to hold mine away from her.
"No, don't. I don't usually like bein' touched there. It's embarrassin' sometimes."
Surprised and disappointed, I looked at her confusedly. Her eyes softened and gently she placed my hand on one of her pliant little breasts.
"I don't need much touchin' anyway," she said apologetically. "I'm ready. Cain't yew tell? How 'bout yew? Yew ready?" Her eyes on mine, her hand found my cock as if by radar, without searching. She gave me a quick, fleeting, sensuous grin -- another of her rare facial expressions that vanished almost as quickly as it appeared. "Yeah... it's gettin' there." Without removing her eyes from mine she reached under the edge of the mattress on her side and retrieved a rubber, quickly stripped open the wrapper, and reached under the sheet. Chewing her lip, she pulled my cock gently a few times, and when my eyes caught hers she averted hers and closed them, tugging again once or twice, then she held my cock with one hand and with the other unrolled the cold rubber. I watched her closed eyes and heard her breathing while her soft hand capably worked the thing over my length.
"There," she whispered, lying back, eyes still closed. "C'mon. 'S been a long time. I need it in me."
Well, I thought, if that's the way she likes it... I covered her and then settled on her, and with one whispering slide of her trim torso she raised her knees and spread her thighs. Before I knew it she grabbed me again, her light touch and long fingers warm and tickly, stimulating me briefly until I realized she was maneuvering me into her while I was only mildly excited and barely at half mast. Nevertheless, she was so wet and slippery that I slid inside; she had only to nudge her hips slightly upward, and I was fully sheathed.
Ronnie lay with her head resting on the pillow and cradled my head on her breast, cautioning me, "Careful. I'm a little sensitive, too, right now." She closed her eyes peacefully while I kept my mouth easy on her nipples. In the dark, quiet room I spent many long, long minutes fingerfucking her and then licking until she was wet and ready enough for my finger to slip effortlessly inside. Martha watched, lying on her tummy on Ronnie's other side and stroking my back and rump, kissing my...
During that same week, more complications ensued. As usual in New York, it was best to expect the unexpected, while expecting the expected to involve unexpected hassles. On Monday I got a little financial relief when Fiore announced that I was in good enough shape to get transferred to a less expensive class, out of the more costly, personalized sessions. The change lowered the overall price of Fiore's training to one-half the former cost -- a good move for me because I was beginning to see...
Ronnie set me up for my first modeling session on Wednesday afternoon. I was going to be paid seventy-five bucks for an afternoon of work with a photographer that Ronnie knew. That was a pretty hefty sum in those days for a nonprofessional my age, although a pro would have been paid more. The session went well and was similar to posing for an artist, but with many more pose changes and a constant stream of instructions from the photographer. He was a handsome, shipshape man in his late...
It was a little after eleven Friday night. Martha lay atop me, her hips over my face, her head over my cock. She ran her tongue around my glans, slowly, around and around, and I licked her tush and licked downward along the round muscles and onto the back of her thighs and then toward her pussy and along the rim of her slit, up and down, and she moaned, "Ahh. Steven." Her mouth enclosed my tip, and then slid down, down. I sighed hotly, "God. Martha." Her mouth moved up and then off me,...
Martha and I undressed in the bedroom while Ronnie went into the bathroom for a minute. Outside, the sun had descended just below the height of the West Side buildings. Martha watched me with a little smile while she stepped out of her panties and I pushed down my jocks. Naked, she walked to the window and drew the thin Woolworth's curtains closed, blocking out the pink glow of dusk, dimming the room. Martha moved to her dresser, and I watched her hazel eyes and her nipples and her auburn...
In the candlelight Martha's teeth and eyes glinted as she lay naked under me, knees drawn back, grinning up at me. She held my cock at the root with one hand and she watched my eyes while I entered her. I groaned as her creamy pussy closed around me. Her grin widened when I started screwing. She whispered, "Fuck. Fuck." Her cunt gripped, tight. I groaned again, my head arching back. Martha whispered, "Fuck." I looked at her eyes. They sparkled with lust. I knew by the look in them...
When Martha saw I'd stopped she rose upright and put a hand on Ronnie's shoulder, and Ronnie let her head fall back and closed her eyes and sighed. I watched her rest for a moment, and then I withdrew my wet finger and put my palm on Ronnie's tummy. She opened her eyes and looked at me, her eyes intense and edgy. I smiled and asked, "Okay with you if we stop?" She didn't say anything, didn't blink her eyes. She smirked, but her eyes didn't change. She laid one hand on the back of my...
Sunday night after dinner we went to Ronnie's apartment again. The previous Friday's coupling had left the three of us less needful. Sunday night began as a languid body massage session, without lotion. We caressed and teased, and lay for some time doing little more than running a finger along an arm or leg while we talked. A long time after we lit a candle and undressed, I was lying on my back with Ronnie sitting up on my right and Martha lying alongside me on the left, and while Ronnie...
Some events are like dreams. Their cause, their meaning, their place in one's history remain forever unexplained. They occur once in time, surprising us sometimes, but always making a mockery of our expectations. In memory they are recurring, timeless, with vague borders and an always jumbled, inexact sequence. In the aftermath all one can say is that they occurred, and defiant memory recalls only the pieces, never their source or their reason. In the yellow-white sun Martha and Ronnie...
Our Friday night dinner with Ronnie had a late start because Martha had to stay at Columbia late for a staff lecture. By nine o'clock the three of us were in a diner, with Martha tiredly picking at her food. Ronnie announced, "Martha, Steven has consented to letting me draw his perfectly proportioned body. So don't make plans for late Sunday afternoon. He's mine for the day." Martha said dully, "Oh. That's nice, Steven. Wait until you see her work. She's good." Ronnie said,...
Everything I did in New York had me thinking of Memphis. My Saturday night date with Becky was a lot of fun. Innocent fun, despite the fact that Becky was such a lively, sweet tempered turn-on. I took her to see 'Bridge Over the River Kwai', which I'd seen before but wanted to see again. It was an exercise in socializing. Merely sitting next to cute Becky in a movie house was sexually arousing. I couldn't help but feel affection for her, she was so likeable and bright. But my emotions...
The small, candlelit room seemed untouched by time. The earth stopped turning. As if in a dense, humid fog of sexuality, I let Ronnie relax onto her back and gave each of her nipples a gentle suck for a moment while she lay with her eyes closed, her breath easing. Then I rose and enfolded Martha in my arms, my sweet, beautiful, sexy Martha, and we held each other longingly and she lay back on the floor and opened her legs and smiled, her eyes simmering, and she whispered, "Lick me, hon....
On Friday night Ronnie had a date that precluded our usual threeway dinner and "extended dessert," as Ronnie called it. Martha met me for a quick dinner at a diner in the West 70's and prepped me for my meeting with yet another of her teenage girlfriends, Jessica. She said while we ate, "The man in charge of the summer drama program at Jessica's high school is a friend of mine. His name is Howard. I told him about you several times, and he's looking forward to meeting you. I haven't...
Wednesday. The nude beach at Fire Island, again. A breezy, slightly cloudy day. Martha grumbled, "Out here in broad daylight." She glanced quickly up and down the beach. "So who's around?", Ronnie said. "There's nobody for miles." She sat Indian style on our big towel in front of me. I sat upright, my knees under me, while Ronnie's left hand cradled my balls. Her right hand, lathered with suntan lotion, rhythmically squeezed my cock in a well controlled milking motion. Martha...
Each day in New York introduced me to a different and fascinating experience that I hadn't imagined in Memphis. Wednesday was no exception. The Long Island Railroad was a world of its own. We rose at five thirty and Martha and Ronnie and I had a quick, greasy breakfast in Pennsylvania Station before boarding a commuter train bound for eastern Long Island. We shuttled through Jamaica Station just as the westbound rush hour mounted; for miles and miles as we headed east toward Bay Shore, we...
I massaged lotion into Martha's arms and shoulders, my strokes growing slower and more sensuous to test Martha's state of mind -whatever the hell that might be at this point -- and moved tentatively to the swell of her breasts and then between them for a while, and then to her tummy, and down the tops of her thighs. Martha closed her eyes and I asked, "Okay?" and she said, "Hm. Take your time, hon." I got more lotion and massaged along the tops of her thighs and calves, and then lightly...
Thursday I was on my own all day. After Martha left for work I went back to sleep. I woke up so late that I knew I could never make it to Fiore's on time, so I called the health club and cancelled for the day, playing sick. I managed to meet Ronnie for lunch, but I sat feeling like a truant. My guilt piled up as I listened to Ronnie talk about how hard she had worked to get through college. I could hardly speak, and soon I was almost too ashamed to look her in the eye. For the rest of the...
Thursday morning her alarm beeped away and she shut it off roughly and flopped onto me naked, her arms sleepy and hot and her lips on my neck. After a couple of minutes I said, "You have to go to work." She groaned. She hugged me. She lay still. I kissed her shoulder. "Hey." She sighed and raised her head and looked at me, her eyes thinking, thinking, and she swept her hair back on both sides. Then her eyes looked at mine and she whispered, "All right." I started the coffee. I had...
For several weeks I saw Martha Jane only now and then as she walked across the grounds on her way in or out of the project. She caught sight of me once from a couple of blocks away and smiled and waved and yelled Hi. Meanwhile, it seems my Mom and future step-dad had gone through a brief spat. They started dating again a few weeks later. But my sitter was not Martha Jane. In fact, I had two different sitters at first. The first must not have been very interesting, as I have absolutely no...
Wednesday, Ronnie's half-day off, Ronnie met me at her apartment. I gave her Anita's birthday for a chart. Ronnie told me that she couldn't borrow the calculator from the office, so I'd have to help her work out the numbers using manual tables that came with her books. It was a pain in the neck. I spent more than half an hour calculating the figures, and another half hour checking them. Ronnie lounged on her sofa, watching me as I bent forward over her coffee table, working. She said,...
Monday. Monday of my last week in New York. I awoke with Martha and her alarm. While she was in the bathroom I was in the kitchen with a big towel wrapped around my waist, getting the coffee started and filling a sink with soapy water to clean up last night's coffee and cake dishes. While I stood waiting for the sink to fill, I thought: What the hell should I do today, find something interesting or just go crazy waiting for the week to pass? While I had my forearms sunk into the soapsuds,...
We strolled down East 86th Street. It was getting late, yet I was amazed that the traffic and the people on Lexington Avenue were as frenzied as they were during the day. Martha led me to a newsstand so besieged with customers that we had to push our way through to get a copy of the Sunday Times. "This is not the way you get it in Memphis," she said, offering me the hefty newspaper with both hands as if it were a precious gift. She saw my eyes bulge: the complete New York Times, including...
We dropped by Martha's place, changed clothes, and then spent the rest of the afternoon on the Staten Island Ferry. Martha showed me what she called the "expected tourist attractions" -- the Statue of Liberty, Wall Street, City Hall. As dusk was underway we walked uptown toward Greenwich Village, where she took me to a hairdresser for a very expensive haircut. Gradually, Martha cheered up. Gradually, I became more sullen. The city was dark. We strolled through New York University and...
Saturday. Rain. Saturday morning Martha and I took a shower together. When she shut off the water I put my arms around her and we stood hugging in the shower stall. She said, "We can't start anything right now. I have to see my gynecologist at ten." "I'm not starting anything. Just hugging." She snuggled closer. "What are you going to do today?" "Pack some. I guess." "Sounds depressing. Why don't you wait, and let me help you?" "I have to get used to the idea." She...
I lay on my side with Martha spooned behind me. Gazing out the small window that overlooked East 87th Street, I gradually returned to earth. I was startled at how quickly and completely I had fucked and climaxed. In trying to recall each detail of the past few moments, I felt I'd lost all control and all awareness; the whole event seemed blurred. Martha slid a hand down my arm and up again, as if learning anew the textures her fingers found there. She said softly, "I missed cumming like...
That was a sensuous summer. Mom's relationship apparently ran smoothly for a while and my stepdad-to-be took her out infrequently but regularly. Often it was on weekends when I was with my grandparents or godparents. But now and then they went out on a Friday, and I could be with Martha Jane. Each time, Martha Jane would show up on time and we'd fix dinner for each other, clean up, do a little homework, and then undress each other in the tiny bedroom. Soon the room echoed with our sighs and...
Perhaps, when I awoke groggily at my Mama Rose's house that Saturday morning, July 2, 1955, I had been dreaming of my father while asleep in that room. I had little else to hold before me as a model of what I might do and how I might behave when I went to Union Station later that day to say goodbye to Martha. I wondered how Steven Senior might handle it: he was a hero, a winner of the Air Medal, two Purple Hearts and the Silver Star. He had faced the terror of war with the Nazis twenty-two...
In December 1953 my Mom married and my stepfather moved into the apartment temporarily while they searched for a new house. The ceremony was little more than a small tea party in a room in the reception house at St. Mary's Church. This being my mother's second marriage, she didn't think a large wedding would be appropriate, and my conservative step-dad agreed. They took over the old bedroom, and I slept on the pullout sofa in the living room. Business problems at my stepdad's supermarket...
Candy met Martha at a friend's party. She had noticed Martha moving around the room. Everyone else seemed to notice Martha too. It was, she mused, not only because of Martha's generous proportions -- but also because of her easy laugh, booming voice and the animated way she flung her arms and head when chatting. You could see Martha was accustomed to being noticed and she did nothing to make herself any less the centre of attention by her style of dress, which was a loud floral clingy number...
Sunday. I woke at seven. I left Martha sleeping and donned my new-made cutoff shorts and my new running shoes and I jogged to the newsstand on 86th Street. But I was too rested and energized to stop for the Times. Something got into me; I kept jogging, picking up the pace and heading for Central Park. I zoomed into the park and across the small meadow beside the Metropolitan Museum. The few people who were about ignored me, and I chided myself for worrying in the first place that people in...
It was very early Thursday morning and a woman on the airplane who sat next to me and looked like my mother was smiling at me and asking, "You're going back?" I smiled at her politely and said "Yes." She said, "Oh, you'll love it in Memphis," and I smiled politely and shook my head and said, "No, New York." She said "But we're going to Memphis." I said "No. New York." I rested my head against the padded headrest. I closed my eyes, and it was just as it was when I was on the...
I had a bad cold. It was just before Thanksgiving. Wearing a heavy brown flannel robe, I sat up against the headboard as Martha Jane settled near me on the bed and sat Indian-style. In her hand she had a bottle of green cough syrup, a bottle of cod liver oil, and a bottle of ear drops. "Okay, hon, time for dessert." "That's not dessert," I complained. "This is dessert for sick folks." She shimmied her hips into the mattress to get comfy. "Now, let's see, what does this say... ?"...
Any predictions, premonitions or expectations I might have had about New York were quickly and unexpectedly undone and/or displaced at every turn. Life in Memphis, like its population, was fairly uniform and predictable. Not so in New York. Martha turned out to be a pretty decent companion during the week, despite an occasionally cranky outburst. If Ronnie was in the throes of her period, she showed little sign of it; she was as eventempered as ever at our two lunch dates during the week....
Sunday. I had been in New York six weeks and two days. Sunday morning Martha and I went to an Appalachian Arts exhibit at the Metropolitan, and late Sunday afternoon we went with Ronnie to see an old Greta Garbo movie at the Museum of Modern Art. Then we went to a diner. For the first time, as we ate, Martha asked me about the party. She said, "It must have been great. He was out until two o'clock." Ronnie said, "Two o'clock? Hey, hey. And how did Anita hold up?" I said flatly,...
The week preceding Martha Jane's last weekend of packing before she left her charming apartment near Memphis State was a long, numbing one. As far as I knew, it would be my last chance to spend time with her before she moved to East Memphis under her new stepdad's watchful eye. Although we spoke by telephone briefly during the week and set the schedule for my Saturday visit, there was no mention of what might or might not happen after that weekend. I was too fearful of bringing it up. When...
Her eyes and her words left me speechless. I cleared my throat and concealed my state of shock, nodding firmly to signal my acceptance of what she had said. I shuffled nervously. She waited, staring at me almost apprehensively. She seemed at once both resolute and vulnerable. She said softly, "I hope... I didn't blow your fuses." I said with a brittle smile, "They're not fuses. They're circuit breakers. They reset after a few minutes." She smiled sweetly. "Have I... burst all your...
Neither my parents nor Martha Jane's mother were home that week. For the first time, Martha Jane slept overnight with me. When I woke, earlier than usual, the morning sun was just peeking over the rooftops of the project buildings beyond mine. Two radiant shafts of sunlight poured through the bedroom's double window and across the middle of the bed. Martha Jane was not with me, but I knew where she was by the muffled sound of running water behind the closed bathroom door. I could not have...
I sat dumbfounded while viewing my first foreign language film, so amazed, that at first I didn't feel Martha nudge me with her elbow in the dark theater until she did so insistently. I turned to her. She wiggled her fingers near my face. Understanding, I took her hand in mine. She smiled contentedly and hugged our clasped hands against her thigh over her skirt. She rubbed my arm cozily, and turned back to the movie. I had never seen such a film. The movie was "Bicycle Thief," which had...
I blinked. The room was black. The candle was out. Vaguely, I heard distant sparrows. Vaguely, I felt a warm, small, still hand resting on my cheek, barely touching my skin. I saw lips near my face, and a face so close to mine that my sleepy eyes couldn't focus on it. Before I saw any features or sensed any other signals, I knew the face and hand were Martha's. I was on my back but leaning slightly to my right, my right arm slung across the bed toward the night table at the right of the...
Ronnie said to me as I sat nude on a three-legged stool and she started drawing, "Martha won't let me draw her, you know." I asked "Why not?" "She sat for me about the time we first met. When we were roommates. And she had such a classic, gorgeous figure, I told her she just had to pose nude for me, just *had* to. Or in a swim suit or something." "She wouldn't?" Ronnie sighed, erasing something. "No." I said, trying to balance myself with one foot on the floor and my other...
Monday morning, Martha went back to the same old grind. After she left for work I went back to my same old grind, jogging to Central Park and hanging a few chin-ups from a tree limb. I was closer to Memphis, no closer to staying in New York or finding ways to get back more often, no nearer to a conclusion about my feelings for Martha or Ronnie. I did have cash in my pocket and a bundle of traveler's checks I'd earned from posing. While I was cleaning up at Martha's, Ronnie called on the...
Saturday, August 24, 1957. I woke up at six. Martha slept like a log beside me. Even after a good night's sleep, I was grumpy; I was ready for life to ease up. Nothing was turning out the way I wanted it to. Two weeks left in New York. I had a hard run through Central Park, trying to run past unease and frustration but feeling it keeping pace with me. When I arrived at Martha's I was covered with sweat. Martha was in the kitchen shower. She swept aside the shower curtain and peered out...
One day in early October when I came home very late from school, Mom said as I entered the kitchen, "Oh, there you are. You missed Martha Jane's call. I told her I didn't know where you were. I said tonelessly, "Okay." I opened the refrigerator, looking for something to eat. Mom stood with her hands in the dishwater. "That reminds me, she called a couple of weeks ago, and you weren't here then, either. I guess I forgot all about it." I took a milk carton out of the refrigerator....
Saturday. In my mind, it was Anita Day. Anita didn't attend the Saturday class. I called her on the telephone the day before. She said she had a busy schedule and wouldn't be at Fiore's, but I was to meet her for the party with her friends at her godparents' home. My exhausting Friday night with Martha and Ronnie had me in a calm mood for handling myself in a sexually civilized manner with Anita. In fact, I found myself hiding out again when I met Anita and we strolled to the expensive...
I had a few disastrous flirtations. The Brothers held a sophomore class prom. Those who couldn't find a date could get one through Brother Lawrence's contacts with the Catholic girls' schools in town. At first, my sister was going to fix me up with a blind date. After meeting several of her girlfriends I decided I'd be better off with pot luck through Brother Lawrence. How bad could it be, I told myself, after some of my dates in New York? But trying it was. Being driven to and from the...
During the week, Ronnie set me up with two posing assignments. They went well, although I found myself very restless while trying to hold a single pose for more than fifteen minutes. I posed twice for the same artist, a middle-aged woman in Greenwich Village whose apartment walls were literally flooded with drawings, paintings, and photographs by herself and others. She seemed quite pleased with me, and she gave me some pointers on how to promote myself and register with various services. I...
When I opened my eyes Saturday morning the sun was shining with a brightness that told me it had been daylight for hours. The little fan on the window whirred steadily, streaming air toward the bed. I glanced at the clock. Eight twenty. Martha was half on me, using my chest for a pillow. I stroked her hair. She didn't stir. I kissed her hair and caressed her shoulder. On my other side, Ronnie had turned away and slept curled on her side, her tush against my hip, my arm still cradling her...
Martha Jane and my mother helped me walk into our apartment, where they settled me face up on the sofa and placed a wet rag over my face. Mom called the relative who lived closest to us in town, my Grandma Rose Ricci, to hurry over in their car and get me to nearby St. Joseph's Hospital. But Grandma Rose was too distraught to drive and she called my Aunt Frances, who in turn was so distraught she called my Aunt Josephine, who in turn was also so distraught she called her niece, my cousin...
Friday. Martha woke with a start at a quarter to seven. "Damn! The alarm didn't go off!" She ran into the bathroom. I shook my head and rubbed my eyes. It occurred to me that I had not changed Martha's alarm back to its regular wake-up time after setting the alarm for Fiore's appointment the day before. Crap! As if I hadn't already disrupted Martha's existence! I ran into the kitchen and got the coffee started and made toast. In the bathroom, Martha was on the rampage, dropping...
Wednesday morning. My last Wednesday in New York. While Martha showered that morning in the kitchen I finished making coffee and toast and I put on my running clothes. Then I remembered that I was supposed to take a day off from working-out. Martha hurried into the living room to gulp down her coffee and toast. She saw me lounging at the table. "You didn't run yet?" "Takin' a day off." "Good!" She bent down to me, then she sat on my lap with an arm around my shoulder. "Good. You...
Mom convulsed into a tight ball on her side and retched feebly, making a small sticky red stain in the kleenex she held to her mouth. Then she relaxed with a pitiful moan. "What's wrong?" I asked, going swiftly to her side of the bed. She licked her lips clean and tried to catch her breath. Not getting an answer, I raised my voice fearfully. "What's wrong? What happened?" "I'm sick, Speedy. It came on... all of a sudden." "What's wrong? When did it start?" "Called your...
At the time, most of this went right past my very young level of awareness--but I clearly understood that she was troubled. I knew that I somehow had to stay with her and believe in her and help her in some way. I wanted to bring indescribable pleasure and comfort to her. She was making me feel loved and tickly now, and I wanted desperately to do the same for her. I found the folds of her skirt and tried to gather them up, but had a hard time; my hands were too small. She stepped back, not...
She led me to the bedroom and I jumped onto the mattress, as I usually did, and waited for her to turn out the light and fluff up the pillows, as she usually did. But this time she stood very quietly in the dark near the edge of the bed. She took off her bra and panties. I had seen her bra-less often enough, but now she was totally nude. I remember how she looked, her smoky green eyes and frizzy auburn hair reflecting the moonlight. She was slim but not skinny, slightly curvy in the upper...
Twenty teens gathered in the small theater in Anita's building. They were a very mixed group from all over the metropolitan area, some of them rich kids that had attended Anita's earlier party, others were apparently not so rich. A very democratic crowd. I was surprised to see a couple of black couples, an unlikely presence in Memphis. Both couples appeared to be from overseas. Maury sat down front with his coterie of seven or eight admirers, all of them in suits. Chris sat in the farthest...
I whispered, "Let's do this for a while. Just this. Okay?" She swallowed again. "Yes." For a while we silently enjoyed touching and stroking each other with no particular goal in mind other than pleasing ourselves and discovering all the things about us that had changed. As we touched and played we talked. I told her about the plays I'd done, how movies and photography and history had captured so much of my life. She told of her classes, her work, what she had learned. I didn't...
We reached the top of the stairs. She stood in the middle of the living room and looked about. She sighed downheartedly, "I'm so tired of this." Suddenly she started crying; she frowned and then squinted hard, and her eyes closed and squeezed out small pearly tears that tumbled quickly down her cheeks. "I'm so tired of this," she wept, and covered her face quickly with her hands. I went to her and held her shoulders, letting her lean against me with her face in my chest. For a minute...
During the night I awoke twice, finding it dark and still outside. Each time, I felt creepy and giddy and unable to define the vexing nervousness in my legs and chest. When I awoke the third time, it was daylight. Martha was walking into the bedroom in her heels. Dressed and ready for work, she came to my side of the bed. She asked, "What on earth were you dreaming about all night?" I turned onto my back, rubbing my bleary eyes. "I was dreaming?" She sat on the bed and rested a hand on...
The birthday party went on and on, with no surprises disturbing the world of my dead father's family, nothing changing, nothing learned, nothing decided. Soon everyone was hugging and kissing and saying goodbye. During the party I longed to be anywhere but there. I spent the whole time waiting for next Saturday to arrive. This world was a far cry from the world of Martha Jane, an eternity away from our secrets in the dark, of naked flesh reveling in affection and pleasure, of whispered...