my father to marry her. Having served that purpose, she had ceased to have any further use for me, and he had never tried to hide his resentment of me.
There wasn’t any love wasted anywhere in the family. I would have left long ago, too, but I had determined that I would finish school, and I knew how much harder that would be on my own—not that either of them did much to help; but at least this way I had a roof over my head, and as often as not there was something in the house to eat. Anyway, there were only a few days of school left, and after that I would be free to leave and make it on my own.
I drank a glass of milk before making my way back to the living room, to the corner that had been curtained off as my “bedroom.” The television was loud, as usual, and from time to time my dad would grunt or even manage a sound that was vaguely like a laugh.
I lay for a long time, staring at the white plaster of the ceiling, and thinking about the evening. One thing still worried me. I should have been sore, or even sickened, at what had happened. I had gone to bed with a man, and any way you looked at it, that was pretty queer. But I wasn’t queer, I was convinced of that.
I convinced myself, finally, that it had nothing to do with what I was or how I felt. I had done it for the sake of making money, money that I needed, and that was all. After that I fell asleep easily.
* * * *
Between finishing up things at school and working evenings at the grocery down the street, the week ended and Saturday came quickly. With the ten dollars I had earned, and the little extra I had managed to save, I was able to rent myself a dinner jacket to wear, buy a corsage for Karen, and pay for the tickets, with a couple of dollars left over for incidentals. It was costing more than I knew I should spend, but I was determined to make a night of it.
Karen was as pretty as a picture when I came to pick her up, and I knew from her smile that she thought I looked just as great. I had tried to borrow my dad’s car. He had stubbornly refused, but fortunately the school was only a couple of blocks from where Karen lived, so it wasn’t too far to walk.
The evening went smoothly enough. I wasn’t a great dancer, but I managed, and I had plenty of chances to sit out dances, as Karen was pretty popular. Any number of fellows came over to ask her to dance, and I offered no objection. After all, she was leaving with me, let them pant after her all they wanted.
The third time that Jerry Fields, the local football hero, came over, however, I began to get a little edgy. Jerry was the most popular fellow in the school, partly because of the hero status, and partly because of the big Thunderbird he drove, a slinky, blue affair guaranteed to turn any girl’s head.
And Karen was interested in him. I had seen her flirting with him often enough in the halls at school to know that, but thus far he hadn’t given her a tumble. Tonight, however, he was coming on like gangbusters, and Karen was obviously enjoying it. I was beginning to get a little uneasy as I watched them on the dance floor, Karen’s body pressed tightly against his massive frame.
“How about some air,” I suggested when she had come back to where I was sitting. She had danced three straight dances with Jerry.
“Oh, do we have to?” she pouted, giving me a wilted look.
“It’ll do you good,” I told her stubbornly, taking her hand to lead her across the decorated gym to the door that led outside. She was annoyed, but she came along.
The parking lot outside was filled with cars, but no people, and it was dark enough at the one end. I pulled her toward me, leaning against the fender of a car. “You know,” I said, trying to sound playful, “I could use a little of that attention you’re giving Jerry.”
She let me kiss her, but there wasn’t any enthusiasm in her response. When I let her go, she gave me a bored look.
“I think we should go back in,” she said coolly.
I was fighting hard not to lose my temper, but it wasn’t easy. I had spent almost every penny I had on this date, and all she could think of was getting back inside so some other guy could paw her over for a while.
“It’s after eleven,” I told her evenly. “Maybe we’d better be getting home.”
“My parents said I could stay out late tonight,” she answered, her voice just as firm and cold.
“I want to go.” I said it sharply. I didn’t care now if she knew I was sore.
“Then go,” she said flatly, and with that she turned away from me and she was gone.
I stared after her for a long time, seething with anger. I started once to return to the dance and checked myself. If I went back in now, there would be trouble. Instead, I decided finally to walk around and cool off before I went after her.
I walked for almost twenty minutes, circling about several blocks before I made my way finally back to the school. I was calmer now, and actually sorry that I had taken such a bossy attitude toward Karen. After all, this was a big night for both of us, and I was a fool to risk spoiling it. With any kind of luck, I could look forward to getting a lot further with Karen tonight.
Several of the fellows greeted me as I came back into the gym, and one or two of them gave we what I thought were funny looks. It was a few minutes before I began to catch on, and by that time I had come to the realization that Karen wasn’t there. I even went into the hall and stood for a time outside the girl’s restroom, to see if she came out of there, but she didn’t. I knew before I went back in to the dance, that Jerry was gone also.
I didn’t say anything to anybody as I left this time. I started out across the parking lot again, and stopped in the middle, a sudden hunch coming to me. I circled the lot slowly, staying as much as possible in the dark.
I saw Jerry’s Thunderbird finally, at the far end where it was really dark. I was still quite a distance away, but I could see that it wasn’t empty. I came up behind it quietly, my eyes glued to the window of the back seat.
I needn’t have been so quiet. They wouldn’t have heard a parade going by, the way they were occupied. Karen’s formal was tossed up over her like some silly sort of cape, and there wasn’t anything left to spoil the view of her lower anatomy—nothing, that is, except Jerry Field’s bare fanny bobbing up and down like a cork in a whirlpool, and just about as violently.
I didn’t stop to think that Jerry stood a full head taller than I did, or that he outweighed me by an easy fifty pounds. Given even breaks, he could have torn me in two as easily as looked at me. But a guy with his pants down around his knees has a serious handicap, and I had two things on my side—surprise, and the fact that I was out-of-my-head furious.
They just had time to look around startled when I yanked the door open before my fist caught him on the jaw, and he sprawled across Karen in a pose that would have been outlandish at any other time. He managed to get off her, and scramble out of the car, but I was pouring it on all the time. The blood was pouring down over one eye, and from a cut on his mouth, and he hadn’t laid a hand on me yet.
I only half heard his swearing, and Karen yelling at me to stop. Jerry managed to get out of the car to solid ground, yanking at his pants with one hand and poking at me with the other, but I caught him a good one on the side of the head and the pants fell again. He lunged for me, and the trousers tripped him. As he toppled by, I gave him some additional speed with a hard kick in the seat of the pants.
It was my fight, and he must have known it, because he stayed down, staring up at me as though he still hadn’t figured out what happened. Beside me Karen was still rearranging her clothes, and from the way she was panting you’d have thought it was her in the fight. But then, I reminded myself bitterly, she had another reason for panting.
Some things just come into your mind for no reason, at funny times. I saw a flash image of Jerry and Karen in the car, and it occurred to me that—size or no size—there was one way in which Jerry couldn’t half measure up to me—literally. I laughed, an ugly, vicious laugh, and turned to Karen.
“Get back in the car,” I snarled, and