"Gold Pinky Ring"

I'm going to get you, Maury Fixler. You stole my body and I'm going to steal your soul. Grab hold of something, turn your hearing aid up and I'll tell you, and the world my story:

It started when I was 5. You were the panting, post-pubescent father of my first boyfriend Max. You chased me up the sidewalk of

our Brooklyn apartment building, the gold pinky ring on your finger flashing in the sun. When you caught me you pinched me wherever you thought my skin was winking at you.

I remember your red, pudgy fingers from the pomegranates you ate before spitting the seeds on the sidewalk. Were you marking your territory where you played poker at my father's bridge table? Whenever you saw me you chased me up the sidewalk. And I became your territory.

The first time, you flashed a Tootsie Roll and the second time a Mars Bar. I remember the pinch of your red, stubby fingers clamping down on my upper and lower cheeks, the lower pair throbbing with pain - a weird sense of something precious lost.

I told my mother about the pinching and she repeated her favorite story about her battle with the lobster we were having for dinner. It was still in the shopping bag when she sat on it and it pinched her buttocks . She got so angry at the lobster, she dropped it in boiling water, brushed her hands together and smiled at the pot. "Take that, you red monster!" The worst part was what she said to me about you: "That's what men of their generation did because their fathers pinched them."

Well, Maury, I don't have a lobster to blame for catching and shaming me. I had you, your red fingers and humongous pinky ring. My father was no help. He did nothing to stop you from chasing me. Terrifying me. My mother said maybe he wanted you out of breath so you would lose the poker game. But you groomed me for attacks of the shameful kind.

Aren't parents supposed to protect you?

I remember wishing you would lose the poker game or a hurricane would hit and blow the bridge table over the rooftops, across the street, and you, my father and all your money would land down the chimney of the poor widow with six children. When I think of it now, I wouldn't want to wish you on that poor woman. But no problem, Maury. You wouldn't fit down anyone's chimney. You were the Joker to the Batman I loved.

Sometimes, I wished you'd lose your pinky ring in the card game and I'd pull it off my father's finger when he was asleep and throw it in the toilet. Your ring was big and shiny like you and had a pale-blue star sapphire in the golden center. The stone also had tiny puffs of white and gray, like the sky looked from our apartment building. They were storm clouds and lightning to me.

At my sixth birthday party, you came with your son, Max. I tried to ignore you, but you handed me a pink ribboned and bow-tied present. It was summer and I smelled chocolate, so I took it. But before I could dash into my bedroom with the present, Max pulled the bow open and opened the box. You grabbed it, lifted me on your lap and parted the tissue paper, your red fingers and pinky ring glowing in the light from our pole lamp.

You jiggled me up and down on your knee and pulled me close, hugging me as if I were the box of chocolates. The layers of fat overlapping your stomach jiggled too. Your hot breath blew shivers on the back of my neck. You wheezed.

I looked up at you. Were you going to die like my uncle who had asthma? But you grinned, your lips wet and trembling, your pale blue eyes glazed over like, oh for sure, the cloudy, blue stone in your gold pinky ring.

Max grabbed a truffle and you took three, wolfing them down. The smell of chocolate betrayed me. I pulled a chocolate, cherry cordial from the box, my mouth watering. And then, I felt a stiff bulge probing my behind. I squirmed on your lap. You breathed hard as you chewed and danced me on your lap. My stomach squeezed and the chocolate cherry sailed out of my mouth and landed on your gray pants.

Fingers of fear played up and down my spine. I remembered my grandma telling me never to sit on a man's lap and my cousin adding: "You'll get pregnant."

I jumped off your lap, knocking Max to the carpet, now littered with colored foil wrappings and naked chocolates. My mother entered the living room, carrying my birthday cake. It was lit with pastel-tinted candles. My relatives sang "Happy Birthday to me," but I only saw their lips moving. Maury disappeared into our bathroom, probably to wash off his pants.

Flashbulbs popped like giant fireflies and my father said, "Make a wish." I wished for the happiest day of my life to happen again: A trip to Coney Island with my dad - taking as many rides as my stomach could tolerate - shooting a rifle at the arcade, my father teaching me how to aim while he held the rifle steady. I hit the target three times. It was the day he called me "kid" and bought me a baseball hat. He was proud of me. And then I grew up.

I didn't hear the word "Pedophile" until I was older when a newscaster spoke it from our new black and white television.

I didn't tie the word to my father until his fast, slender fingers

tickled me to see if I grew breasts. He breathed hard like you, Maury and played "touchy-feely" games with me. When I matured, he stopped handling me. His targeted goal turned out to be boys.

My father didn't wear a pinky ring. He wore a gold wedding band on his ring finger. I'm not afraid of wedding rings. I wear one, but keep my hands to myself.

Your eyes, Maury Parsons, when you noticed me on the sidewalk, were as round and glittering as your pinky ring and the silver coins my father gave me after winning poker with you. I recall the flaming tip of your cigar, the candy treats. Your hungry eyes. I want you to know that if you're still breathing hard up the Brooklyn sidewalk, chasing children, it's not a game like poker. We're all losers.

You Dad? You molested my heart.