DOUBLE DATE

Because I couldn’t join Britte, Kita, and Meryl on their trip to Mexico, I went instead to spend a week with Linda at her grandmother’s in Los Angeles. We went to Disneyland, stayed up till all hours talking, read Darkness at Noon out loud in the evenings, pulled taffy her grandmother made, and visited her boyfriend Bob’s family in Riverside, even though Bob was away. Actually, Linda was in a bit of a dilemma because she didn’t know where she stood with Bob—and confessed to me that she was attracted to his younger brother, as well.

But I was the one to hit it off with John, partly because we both played the guitar—though he was a much better player and wound up teaching me a complicated finger pick—and also, no doubt, because he wasn’t about to step on his older brother’s turf. I wrote:

“That evening we all went to a drive-in movie—Bikini Beach—with his friend Jerry. We folded back the front seat and all lay squished together. When John would rub my arm or take my hand, which he did in a kind of abstracted way, I couldn’t stay focused on the screen.

“When we came back, I wanted to go swimming in the apartment pool. Linda said no—it was against the rules after midnight—but I felt like doing something a little daring, so I asked John if I could borrow one of his T-shirts. The idea seemed to surprise him and please him a little. It was warm, private, beautiful, still. The water made lovely lapping sounds. I felt like a water ballerina—luxuriously happy. John came down to bring me a towel, and later I thought I saw him watching me from the second-floor railing.

“The next morning at breakfast, Mrs. Cliff asked, ‘How’s our little mermaid?’ She pronounced it ‘mirrormaid,’ so I thought she was making a joke about the fact that Linda and I had spent half the morning in the bathroom making ourselves presentable.

“’Which one?’ I asked, before I realized what she was referring to—that she knew about the episode in the pool. I felt a little guilty and embarrassed then, but everybody was nice about it. One of the neighbors had told her he heard something in the pool. A dog had fallen in only a week earlier, so he went to the window expecting to find a struggling puppy and saw me instead. He said I reminded him of a Greek goddess—that he was going to charge out in a draped sheet, but thought better of it, figuring it would scare me to death.

“That morning Tom, another friend of John’s, came over. I liked him right away but figured he’d be Linda’s date. When John told him about the episode in the pool, Tom seemed intrigued, wanting to know what I had worn. John said I was covered adequately. I laughed and asked, ‘How would you know, when most of me was underwater?’ ‘Water magnifies, you know,’ he said, and to Tom, ‘And those T-shirts cling!’

“Later John drove me up into the hills—the site of the first non-sectarian Easter sunrise service in the world, he told me—through hot, rocky desert country that reminded me of lizard hunting with Dad. Linda and Tom followed us on a motorcycle. At one point, John put the canvas top down so we could get a little sun. But who needs sun? I just freckle. I buried my face in his shirt to hide. At first he thought I was just being affectionate, so he put his hand on my neck. But then he asked, ‘Does it really bother you?’ I nodded. ‘OK, boss,’ he said, and put the top back up. ‘OK, boss.’ He said that a couple of times that afternoon—very affectionately, though.

“Next we went boating on a lake, and when we got back we played guitars and sang songs like “Johnny Be Good” and danced rock and roll. At one point Linda whispered to me, ‘Looks like you two are getting pretty cozy.'”

“That evening, before we headed for ‘home,’ Tom kissed Mrs. Cliff good-bye, and John made some comment about kissing that I didn’t quite hear. That’s when I got uneasy. I didn’t want to neck with him—I knew I’d probably like it, but I was still nervous. When the boys stopped to buy soft drinks on the way, Linda and I had a whispered discussion in the car. She: ‘Should we a little?’ Me: ‘No,’ with distress. ‘Well, it’s not like I want to get involved…but are you sure you don’t want to?’ ‘Yes!’ ‘Hmmm…I don’t know what to do. I do like Tom…’ ‘I wish you wouldn’t—don’t you see? John’s going to expect the same thing. If you do and I don’t…’ ‘They’re coming!’ ‘Oh great!’ And we continued towards home.

“For the next five minutes, Linda and Tom were laughing and thrashing around in the back, then suddenly it got quiet. The next thing I heard was the sound of short kisses. Well, what a mess I was in, I thought. I was nervous all the way home. We got temporarily lost. Then, in front of Linda’s grandma’s house, Linda said quickly, ‘Well, let’s get out.’ She was trying to rescue me, I realized. I collected my purse and sweater hurriedly.”

Though I didn’t write about it, the next weekend the four of us went on another double date to Knott’s Berry Farm. In the parking lot afterwards, John tried to kiss me, but I turned my cheek, afraid I’d bungle it so badly, he’d realize I’d never been kissed before. What he did then, as we talked, was draw me very slowly towards him. When he was close enough, he gently began to kiss my neck. I felt a little thrill of pleasure—and I remember feeling embarrassed because my body jerked suddenly in response, my back arching reflexively. Still, I never let him kiss me on the mouth.