Clouds Up

“How it happened was, I went too fast on a twenty-one and hit a pothole.” 

“And?” 

“And what?” Farley stood there, palms out. “That’s it. That’s how I broke my hymen.” 

“Bull-shit,” this Sophomore, he spat as though it were two words. “You can’t break your hymen on a bik-” 

“That wasn’t you, that was Joey Lauren Adams.” 

“Jo-huh? Wha-” 

“Her character, I mean - in Chasing Amy? She tells Ben Afleck that- hold on, I need to look this up-” a small screen lit up Shylo’s palm. “...Yeah, see? A lot of chicks break their hymen that way.” She held her phone to Bret, Brent or Bert, whatever his name is. 

Talk had turned to birds, bees and bumpin’ uglies now that the trio were near the bleachers on the racetrack. “Half the school heads there, beneath those bleachers, to tongue-fight and dry-hump,” Bread explained when the period started. The class was a mix, freshman and sophomore. Bread limbered as he chatted up the fresh meat, his long, gangly limbs spread every which way. The shrill twitter of a whistle sent all bodies scurrying. Bread hit the track and was fast to outrun the herd. The two freshman chicks, they faked cramps and sat on the sidelines. 

Coach smacked the back of his left hand into the palm of his right. “Four laps makes a mile. I want to see that mile!” he barked at the open field. God, the power trip. Coach ticked off three laps and nodded his approval. “Take a breather,” he favored the gawky ginger. “You earned it.” Now that Bread slugged off the field, he was drenched. He was pocked with freckles, and his teeth were stained. “It’s hot chocolate,” Bread turned to rub his teeth with his forefinger. “Friedrich Nietzsche writes how he would start each

sluggish morning with a mug of thick, hot cocoa. He also said,” Bread pointed to the two freshmen planted on the bleachers, “not to put stock in thoughts that do not come from work-outs-” 

“Friedrich Nietzsche went insane, so the point is moot,” Shylo, her bitchiness, like, not uncalled for. “Hey, Bread?” Farley asked, barely loud enough for nearby joggers to hear. “Have you gone behind the bleachers?” she gestured to the gap between the metal planks. 

“Bread?” senpai blinked. “I get my freak on in private” he replied, testy. He crossed his arms over his thin chest. They bet him. They bet that he hasn’t scored. He bet the two of them haven’t either. “Bitch, I bet your hymen is still in one piece,” he snarked. The bleachers creaked. He plopped beside and one plank lower. Quips flew. As the rapid tennis-match banter drifted, so did the trio. All three clambered across the metal slats and hopped onto the gravel. Though muggy, it was toward the start of September and slowly the sultry summer had started to waver. “Get my freak on in private,” Shylo, the bitch. Her frown matched Bread’s frown. Bread seemed almost spastic, the way he flipped them off with both hands. He turned and sprinted, took off for the field. 

Between the slap of sneakers and short, shrill whistle blasts, a voice barked. “Girls-”  

“Sorry, coach, still on the rag.” Shylo flashed her full bitch face. Go ahead, call me out. Yeah, that’s what I thought. The big, burly bear turned his attention elsewhere. Shylo tapped Farley on the shoulder. Head cocked; She gestured toward the two-story building, decked in academic facade. The pair slinked off early. Five minutes before the bell found them on the gravel beside the quad.   

Shylo was almost halfway through her paperback of The Virgin Suicides. “What are you doing your report on?” Farley sorta half-shrugged. “My friend Dignan let me borrow her copy of Delta of Venus, so I thought, you know, that; but god-dam, what a BORE,” Farley drove home that last part. “Whatever. We have almost the whole year.” Shylo, a coy smile. “Delta of Venus, huh? Farley, you dog.” Farley, a small roll of her eyes. “Maybe I’ll do Tropic of Cancer?” Anais Nin, Henry Miller; heavy hitters, but that’s why these two small broads got shoved into AP English. Shylo bit her lower lip, a cheeky smile plastered across her mug. Farley chose not to see it. 

 ******

“Right, so waddle it be? The Bell Jar? Sexing The Cherry? The Marriage Plot? You said you wanted a chick novel, right?” Gwen was ready to duck outta there and join the lunch rush. Out in the corridor, a stream of disposable teens stampeded past. “How bout Nightwood? Nightwood was one of those first openly lesbian novels.” Farley paused to consider. Back there, Gwen pointed the way, back among the shelves. “The author was Djuna Barnes. You’ll find it under ‘B’.” With that, the junior girl left her post as librarian’s assistant for the period, gathered her stuff and rushed out. The librarian hung back in a corner office. From the front desk, the two of them could see her through the glass. Side-by-side, they stole past and over enough aisles to be out of sight. “So have you?” “Have you what?” “Don’t act dumb.” The truth is, was, and always will be that up to that day, Farley had not even fornicated, let alone passionately embraced a warm body of either sex, the way you would see lit up across a movie screen. Sure, these would be the last months you could say that. Seven months flashed past and Farley, yes, did score, a shag, timid but passable, one drizzly afternoon, a quiet, murky afternoon caught up in an April shower. But here, now, noonday, no, and Shylo senses as much. Girls, of any age, they can tell, sniff, taste, they know. Shylo Gardener leaned over, and planted one on Farley Granger. Farley’s lips, parted by surprise, gave way. After and after, Farley thought to herself, often and for a long time after, when she and Shylo again and again had a go, and spontaneity had by then fizzled, that first, though, that first, soft, then aggressive piece of softball action, awkward, pathetic playground bullshit, yeah, yeah, Shylo was naturally a confident kisser, and yeah, her lips had the taste of chapstick and it was cherry and all that bullshit; I dunno, Farley pondered, maybe she romanticized it. A chapstick-flavored filter. Maybe it was more like, you’re sweaty, I’m sweaty, maybe there was too much saliva, or not enough saliva, and at any rate, the important thing is, we swapped bodily fluid- no that, uh, that… what’s most important, Farley, is that you showed you’re a broad, and you’re a halfway decent broad. Down the line, her hymen, now torn how it was supposed to be torn, Farley, pressed into a pool of her own sweat, a mammal, the same as she is a mammal, stirs next to her. "One world," John Updike observed, "everyone fucks everyone." Fuck, fuck, there will be fuck, so for fuck’s sake, let it be a good, a great, a spasm, a shake, and a hip-bucking fuck.