do you mean?” I said, startled at his reaction.
“What do you think I am, a girl?”
I shook my head. I didn’t know what to say, so I said nothing.
“Look, I’m not a queer,” Jack said, looking around to make sure that no one was listening to our conversation. “And neither are you. Got it?”
He thrust the valentine at my chest, letting it go so that it fell to the ground, where the snow smeared the ink and stained the ground red. Then he turned and started to cross the street. I looked at the card, crumpled at my feet, then bent to pick it up. Jack was already on the other side of the street, walking quickly away from me. He turned and looked back. “Are you coming or not?” he called out.
I tucked the valentine into my notebook and ran after him. Neither of us said another word as we finished the walk to school, and when we walked home that afternoon, Jack seemed to have forgotten all about the incident. Alone in my bedroom, I took the valentine out, tore it into as many pieces as I could, and deposited it in the wastepaper basket beside my desk.
A minute later the phone rang. When I answered it, it was Jack, telling me that he had asked Mary Shaughnessy to go to the movies that night, and that I was taking her friend Bernice Kepelwicz. He would pick up some cards and candy for the girls. All I had to do was be ready to go at six.
Defeated, I did as he told me. At the appointed time, I arrived at his house, where he handed me a red envelope and a small box tied with a pink ribbon. “You can give these to Bernice,” he instructed me. He had slicked back his hair and applied aftershave. The smell, as it always did, reminded me of being next to him in bed. I felt my heart tremble, but was able to control myself as we walked downtown to the theater. It wasn’t snowing, but the air was bitterly cold, mirroring the chill in my soul.
Mary and Bernice were waiting for us in the theater lobby. Jack handed Mary her card and candy, accompanying it with a kiss on the cheek. Bernice looked at me expectantly, and so I did the same, adding, “Happy Valentine’s Day.” The girls looked at one another, exchanging smiles, while Jack scanned the marquee to see what was playing.
“How about Fantastic Voyage?” he suggested. “I hear it has great special effects.”
Mary screwed up her nose. “I don’t like science fiction,” she said. “Bernice and I want to see The Singing Nun, don’t we, Bernice?”
“Debbie Reynolds is the best,” Bernice agreed.
Jack rolled his eyes at me behind the girls’ backs, but walked to the ticket window and plunked down two dollars for tickets for himself and Mary. I did the same, handing Bernice her ticket. Then Mary meaningfully suggested that popcorn and Cokes would be nice, so Jack and I waited in line at the concession stand while the girls went to find seats.
“Man, this movie is going to suck,” Jack said.
“Why are you pretending to like Mary?” I asked him, suddenly angry.
“What do you mean?” he said. “I like Mary all right.”
“Since when?” I demanded to know. “You just invited her this afternoon.”
“So?” said Jack defensively. “Maybe I didn’t think of it until then.”
I bit my lip to keep from accusing him of anything else. I knew full well why he had suddenly decided to arrange Valentine’s dates for us. He knew, too. But neither of us would say it, not in a crowded theater. Maybe, I thought, not ever.
We got our popcorn and sodas and joined the girls, who had artfully arranged themselves so that they were seated together and Jack and I had to sit on opposite sides, as far from one another as possible. Mercifully, the lights dimmed soon after, and we settled into silence as the movie began. It was, as Jack predicted, monumentally dull, despite the catchiness of the hit song on which it was based. Only Agnes Moorehead, who I recognized from my Thursday-night viewings of Bewitched, provided any amusement in her role as a cranky nun.
When, halfway through, I felt Bernice lean against me in an invitation of affection, I dutifully obliged. Upon placing my arm around her shoulders, I found my fingers come into contact with Jack’s, who had his own arm around Mary. To my surprise, he left his hand where it was, even going so far as to hook one finger around mine, linking us together across the barrier of the girls. We remained like that through the rest of the film, none of which I can remember.
Afterward we said good night to the girls, who thanked us with actual kisses on the mouth. Bernice’s lips tasted of salt and Coke, and I was relieved when we parted after a short time. I don’t think I was her idea of a perfect Valentine’s Day date, which was just as well. I had no intention of taking my performance any further, and was not looking forward to days or weeks of having to feign excitement at her presence.
Mary appeared more content with her experience, kissing Jack several times before being led away by Bernice. He and I then walked home through the cold, our hands stuffed deep into the pockets of our coats. When we reached his house, he stopped.
“That was one bad movie,” he said.
“It sure was,” I agreed.
“The girls had a good time, though.”
“Sure,” I said.
Jack stepped forward, and his lips met mine. It was only for a second, and then he moved away, his eyes on the ground. “I’ll see you tomorrow,” he said.
He ran up the steps to his house, the door shutting loudly behind him in the still night. I ran my tongue over my lips, trying to taste him, but all that remained was the lingering syrupy sweetness of Coca-Cola. I couldn’t tell if it was from Bernice’s kiss or Jack’s, but I savored it until it grew faint. Then I walked up my own steps and into the house.
Many years later, I would discover that the real singing nun, Jeanine Deckers, left the convent after the success of her song “Dominique” and in 1985 committed suicide along with the woman believed to have been her lover for over a decade. But that night in 1966 all I knew was that, like her, my heart was singing.
CHAPTER 8
There are few things more defiant in the face of almost certain failure than a romance between young people. Despite the fact that a relationship begun when one is 14, 15, or 16 is highly unlikely to last the length of a school year, much less forever, millions of boys and girls blissfully ignore the statistical probability and pair up. When the inevitable breakup comes, they act surprised, as if the possibility had never occurred to them. And perhaps it didn’t. The future, after all, is not something the young often consider, believing as they do that time is an endless commodity. They live in the moment, oblivious to the danger of heartache, even when it is all around them.
There are, of course, exceptions to the rule. We have all at one time or another met the couple who came together in high school, only to marry and thrive. Secretly, we hate these couples because they have managed to escape what most of us go through at least half a dozen times on the road to emotional maturity. We tell ourselves that avoiding this maturation is how they’ve managed to do it, and pity them their simplemindedness, much as we pity the former cheerleaders and quarterbacks who remember high school as the best times of their lives.
For the rest of us, high school dating was practice for later life. By dating, we were allowed to act out the dramas and comedies that are part of being creatures who love. We tried and failed, won and lost, and hopefully learned a thing or two before the stakes were raised. As the only real consequence at the time was pregnancy, we had free rein to do as we liked, or at least as far as we dared.
At least as long as we were heterosexual. Those among us who leaned in another direction were, with almost no exceptions, left to figure it out on our own. I maintain that this is why so many of us had—and continue to have—trouble when we finally did begin dating. We hadn’t had the years of practice that our straight brothers and sisters had. We weren’t given the opportunity to find out what we liked, and what we