Seven Minutes in Heaven

I blinked my eyes, unable to believe fortune was smiling on me. The open end of the bottle pointed at me. Tara, seated to my right, squeezed my hand and strangled a squeal, trying to escape from her throat. She knew what this meant for me, though I rolled my eyes to convey to the others how bored I was by accepting the task for which I was just selected.

I stood and stepped over the bottle to follow Jimmy McAllister to the basement closet. He turned the worn brass colored knob and the wreck room filled with the requisite sound of a drawn out ‘ooooo’, spoken in concert by the other party guests. You know the sound. I tried to hide my smile, but there would be no containing the blush that blossomed on my cheeks.

I stepped into the closet. To close the door behind me, I needed to press my body up against Jimmy. I didn’t breathe. I was positive my breath still smelled like garlic from the pizza earlier. If I had known Spin the Bottle was in my future, I never would have added the garlic powder. Actually, there is a chance I wouldn’t have even eaten the pizza. It churned in my stomach at that moment and I willed my intestines to stay silent. I would not survive school on Monday if Jimmy went back to his friends with stories about my digestive juices or worse… what if the air collecting inside of me needed to escape my body?

Jimmy and I occupied a space between an old leather jacket and a raincoat. The couple who visited heaven before us must have pushed the coats along the rod to make some room. Hopefully, Jimmy was enjoying the scent emanating from the leather and not concentrating on that of my mouth. Would it be appropriate to ask him if he had gum? That would be silly. What would I do with it when he kissed me? I guess I could squish it between my cheek and my top teeth. When someone kissed you, their tongue wouldn’t go into mouth crevices like that, right? I felt sweat gathering under my arms. Great, now I was going to smell like body odor. I wish the entire closet was filled with leather jackets.

I inhaled slowly through my nose, reminding myself that there was no gum in my mouth and I would not need to find a place to hide it when we kissed at last. Was he ever going to do it? Was I supposed to kiss him? If you haven’t gathered, this is my first time in heaven. I close my eyes and try to remember the stories I had heard about other closet trysts. I recall a story Patty Thomas told at lunch about spending seven minutes in heaven with Bobby Bender. Bobby had put his hand down her pants on that occasion. I felt my face heat and was grateful for the lack of lighting in our cramped space.

What was taking so long? We must have wasted an entire minute already. Wait. What if Jimmy didn’t want to be in heaven with me? I had been so wrapped up in anticipation when he spun the empty bottle, with my fingers crossed and swearing on every saint I could remember from Sunday school, that I hadn’t considered Jimmy’s feelings. Then, when the bottle pointed to me, I was so eager to have my wish granted that I hadn’t spared a moment to see if his face showed relief, or dread. In this moment, my heart fell. It had been a look of complete regret for ever touching the bottle in the center of the circle. He’d been hoping it would point to Lilly Turner in her tight pink sweater, but now he was stuck in heaven with me.

I could just open the door and leave. I could spare us both this incredibly awkward silence. If I stepped out of the closet and claimed Jimmy had tried to do something gross, or that he was a terrible kisser, it would be his word against mine. Could I do that? Could I ruin his social life just because he liked another girl more than he liked me? What if he did it to me first? What if this silence was making him uncomfortable too, and he was looking for an escape? If he walked out of this closet before the end of seven minutes, he would need to have a reason or face social suicide.

Why wasn’t he saying anything? Why wasn’t I saying anything? Maybe this is what all couples did in heaven, but when they talked about it later, it was all a fabrication? Oh, why did that stupid bottle have to land on me? I wish it had pointed to Tara. Then again, she wouldn’t have stood here like a mute fool. She would have at least giggled and thought of something amusing to say to make Jimmy laugh. I was standing here like I had been turned to stone. I was barely taking in air, let alone cracking jokes.

The hangers made a little tinkling noise, and I sensed movement in front of me. Something banged into my face and Jimmy let out a little groan. Please let me die now. He had just bent to kiss me and instead, his head had collided with mine. I couldn’t let things end like this. I stretched up on my toes and leaned forward. My weight fell against Jimmy’s body and he caught my arms, but not before one of his hands accidentally grabbed at my right breast. He moved his hand to my shoulder, and we somehow lined our faces up so that our lips pressed together.

I don’t know where the courage came from, but I parted my lips. Nothing happened for a moment while I waited for the romantic head tilt and embrace that always happened in the movies, and then I felt Jimmy open his mouth as well. I am positive my heart has stopped beating. Jimmy’s tongue pushed past my teeth and swirled over my own tongue. The bumps of his taste buds grind against my own. I sort of reach out so that our two tongues swirl together, but he presses further into my mouth and I feel the urge to gag. My head jerks involuntarily and the momentum carries me backward. I fall into the wall, likely bruising my elbow, but no pain blossoms.

Jimmy gropes around in the dark, this time accidentally colliding with my left breast, and then finding my arm and pulling me upright again. Seven minutes must have passed because the door swings open at that moment and light floods into the closet. I squint at the faces before me. I know my face is inescapably flushed, but now I am awash with embarrassment. My hand smooths down my disheveled hair as the other party guests laugh and clap. As Jimmy and I stepped from the closet, I feel like royalty. I just got to second base with Jimmy McAllister, and I can’t wait to talk about it at lunch on Monday.