July ’85
Destruction aside, Conner and I educated ourselves on the anatomy of women. His brother was rarely home and had an attic bedroom with an abundance of fireworks. We snuck up one afternoon to see if any firecrackers were lying around and noticed mangled flesh glistening from the sides of the askew single bed mattress. Glossy porn magazines oozed out like grape jelly from a PB&J sandwich. Conner and I pushed up the mattress and found dozens of scattered zines. It was a cornucopia of Playboy, Penthouse, Hustler, Cherry, a gigantic leap forward from the Sears catalog bra models we ogled. We picked out some and paged through, eyes peering out the window, ready to bolt downstairs if his brother pulled into the driveway.
Days later, on the morning of July 4th, I awoke to the sounds of classic 1930s car horns. I looked out my bedroom window and saw an army tank sitting on a flatbed truck. Fire trucks were parked together. A clown on stilts practiced. A marching band hit random notes, warming up. For a large stretch of Garden Road and side roads, the Oreland Parade prepped and lined up, ready to delight the crowds with their annual tribute to America’s freedom.
Conner was on vacation with his family. Before he left, he explained that he’d leave his ground level window unlocked so I could jump in and snag Roman Candles or borrow his Atari 5200 system. It was about an hour before the parade started. I trotted over to Conner’s house and knocked on the front door. “OK, I’ll be right around!” I blurted, in case somebody was watching, and headed to Conner’s window.
When my feet landed on Conner’s floor, I shouted his name to make certain it was vacant. The disheveled stacks of porn crept into my mind. I figured Conner wouldn’t care if I took a few. His brother’s collection was too massive to notice three zines missing. I snuck up, shoved a few in my shorts and tiptoed downstairs. Upon entering Conner’s room, I heard keys slide into the front door lock and jiggle. The cats rushed to the front door from under Conner’s bed. I forgot that a cat sitter was visiting. As the door opened, I heaved myself over the window ledge, closed the window and backed myself up against the siding of the house. I waited until the cat sitter left and clomped down the walkway. I stood up and pretended that I was looking for a lost dog, just in case the cat sitter was still around, and moseyed down to the street.
A new float was positioned near my house, lined with purple and gold streamers. The side stated Miss Oreland 1985. I looked up at it and saw a girl dressed in a long turquoise dress, smiling down at me. She wore a crown, propped up on a throne, holding red roses and an American flag. “They better get here soon,” she said, nodding at the empty 2nd and 3rd place stools. “You see any lost looking girls in fancy dresses?”
I stood speechless, in awe. “No,” I said. “Maybe they’re jealous of your beauty?”
“Aw, you’re sweet. Do you want some candy? I have Tootsie Rolls and Starburst.” She leaned forward to scoop the candy from a bin, revealing her cleavage in a half second frame that froze in my mind, like a slideshow carousel lighting up the image in a dark windowless room. “Come on. You know you want some,” she teased.
I felt that if I had to bend down the zines might fall out.
“Oh, you’re getting too old for candy at parades, right?” she asked.
“Yeah, totally. I’ll be in the crowd though.”
“Cool,” she said, tossing me a can of soda from her cooler.
I cracked open the can.
“Can you do me a solid?” she asked. “See that guy way over there in the red Corvette?”
I followed her index finger to a bunch of guys in suits, standing with cigars and crouching down to inspect details of the car’s body. They passed a flask around.
“Tell the guy in the Uncle Sam tie to come over here. That’s my Dad. He’ll know what’s going on. He’s in the parade too. A commissioner.”
I jogged to the men as the firm porn zines chafed my thighs and abdomen. They took notice of my awkward steps as I approached. One man was Kova. I explained how Miss Oreland needed Daddy’s help.
“Am I in the presence of a Scout?” asked Kova, tilting his head.
“Yep, I’m in the Scouts,” I said.
“Thought so. You look familiar. Your legs hurt? You have a limp.”
Drums roared down the street. We looked down and saw the tan, leggy Brazilian girls practicing in their green and orange feathers and diva headdresses. The men turned to them, pointing and hollering. I spun off to my house, walled with fire trucks. I slithered between the heavy idling engines. I looked over toward Kova but couldn’t see him at all. I wondered if he recognized me from Treasure Island.
When I got to my front door, Mom was in the doorway, in a super-duper lovey-dovey mode. “Want French toast before the parade?” she asked. “And when’s the last time you gave me a hug?”
“Hold on a second,” I said, escaping her clutch. I jogged up the stairs. “Gotta pee bad.”
In the bathroom, I heard Mom walk upstairs and go into her bedroom. I figured that I had no choice but to hide the porn in the bottom sink cabinet. It felt wrong to put the magazines in with the plunger and Comet.
The phone rang. “Garvey, it’s Emma,” Mom shouted.
“I’m in the bathroom. I’ll call back later.”
“Oh, he’s using the bathroom,” I heard her tell Emma.
I put both hands over my face in embarrassment. “Great, Emma thinks I’m taking a massive dump,” I muttered.
Soon, Mom and I were eating a powdered syrupy breakfast. Mom thumbed through a Better Homes and Gardens. “Are you finally going to have Emma come over to hang out?” she asked.
“Yeah, that would be cool. I’ll call her tonight.”
An hour later, I transferred the zines from the bathroom to under my mattress. Although I made my bed daily, Mom randomly washed my sheets. The chance of discovery was real, but worth the risk.
#
Within the escalating head rush that naked women provided, Conner scored a floppy disk computer game called Leisure Suit Larry In The Land Of Lounge Lizards for his Apple II. We controlled a dude in his forties and tried to help him buy condoms, meet chicks and score. It was as if the Pitfall guy fled the jungle and roamed the city.
Conner’s neighbor, a lady that lived solo, asked us if we’d watch her cat for a few hours a day over the course of a four-day weekend. She was a Catholic high school teacher that was often curled on her porch wicker chair, reading. Her home had stacks of cheesy romance novels, the kind for sale in supermarket lines. On the last day, we called “976” phone sex numbers while eating Tastykakes in the lady’s living room. Late night TV commercials compelled us. We pocketed a romance novel on the way out, one that had earmarks at the steamy parts. The lady later cornered us on the street and scolded us, threatening to tell our parents, holding the phone bill in her hand.
Conner and I decided we needed a fort to store our stolen erotica. There was an old Community Center next to Shady Creek Golf Course that had a playground of rusting spring horses, slides and swings. We sat and ate candy bars, taking notice of beer caps mixed in with the safety mulch. A canopy of maple trees shaded the playground. A barb wired chain linked fence ran along one side, with the concrete Community Building to the other side.
We noticed that there were a series of breaks in a section of the fence. Pulling it apart, there was a perfect gap to sneak into the wooded area that connected to the golf course. We were in the golf course boundaries, but it was thick woods to the far right of the 16th hole that even the worst golfer couldn’t get into, a buffer of land.
Walking through the weeds, a few narrow paths appeared. One led to a large stump with crushed beer cans all round it. We headed off the path towards a group of trees with low branches and slowly built a fort over several days, fastening particle board vicked from Conner’s basement and tying down a plastic canopy.
No one could see us in our camouflaged realm. We’d see golfers teeing off, cars zooming by, parents pushing toddlers on swings, local caddies cutting through the fence slit to get to Shady Creek. We were prisoners of our disturbing natures, delighted, building a nest.