A Summer Nowhere

James' bedroom was about the size of my living room at home and as soon as I stepped foot inside, I started planning the speech in my head that I was gonna' give Mama about how I needed a Queen size bed because I was practically a grown woman and sleeping in a twin was both embarrassing and probably not great for my joint health. The walls were painted cool, medium gray with white wainscoting and all of his bedding was different shades of black and gray with little hints of silver and blue. For whatever reason, it seemed warm and inviting anyway. On the right wall, there was a bay window with a window seat that faced the front yard and the street. On the left was floor to ceiling bookshelves and they were pretty much full. That's where I went first, skimming some authors—Salinger, Kafka, Vonnegut, Golding. All of the classics they made you read in school and some they didn't. As usual, I was impressed.

James' shifts at The Piggly Wiggly were usually on a few weekday evenings and then sometimes, he'd work all day on Saturday. We'd been on three dates since Nashville. First, the Friday right after, he took to Bowling Green and we went to a sports bar to eat dinner and play pool. He attempted to teach me, but I was so awful that we ended up laughing about how I had the hand eye coordination of a three month old baby. Then, the next Wednesday, he picked me up in the morning and we went to Bowling Green to catch a matinee, but we mostly made out in the back row of the theater, which wasn't that bad because we were almost the only people there. Then that night, a Saturday, he was off. So we went to the bowling alley and he brought me back to show me his house since his parents were off at some gathering at their country club.

Somehow, he kissed me all the way across the room to where his bed was and we sort of fell onto the mattress, giggling like idiots. I told him if he kept kissing me like that, we might do something we'd regret and he said he wouldn't regret it at all and I said maybe neither would I. He had his knee resting between my thighs and the longer we kissed, the higher it got and the better it felt. His hand was warm when he slid it underneath my t shirt and up to where the underwire in my bra curved into a horseshoe shape. His hair was crazy soft when I ran my fingers through it, like it was made of those thin little bristles on a baby's hairbrush.

I felt like maybe he was in my brain and was trying to tell me what I was thinking about him, because he mumbled against my cheek, “You're so soft.”

I felt cold and hot at the same time and all my muscles felt like liquid and his hands were everywhere and my hands were still just stuck in his hair. I felt his palm cover the cup of my bra and his fingers tuck underneath to pull down the material. It scared me a little bit, but his hair felt too good between my fingers and I didn't have the energy to make him stop. His thumb brushed over the little pink nub and it stood right at attention. Then his hand was sliding down to my waist and to my elbow, then up to my hand. He pulled it down to the waistband of his jeans and slid it easily underneath the elastic of his boxer shorts.

To tell you the truth, the only time I'd ever felt a guy's manhood was when I was little and a boy at someone or another's birthday party triple dog dared me to touch his. It was gross and soft and I cried to my Mama and she scolded him and took me home. This was obviously a very different situation. He was hot and hard and I instinctively wrapped my fingers around it, trying not to laugh when he sucked in a breath of air and let it out in a muffled groan.

Then he was tugging on my shorts, pulling them off of me and I wasn't doing anything to stop it. In the next minute, he was on top of me, his knees spreading mine out wide. I could feel him between his clothes and my panties and I tried my best not to think about how much trouble I'd be in if we were in my room at my house and Mama had walked in on us. But we weren't in my room—thank the maker—and we were all alone. I used the last little bit of my wits to blindly shove at the waistband of his pants, urging him to get rid of them.

“Are you sure?” he asked, sounding like he'd run a marathon he was so out of breath.

I almost laughed at him. I was laying underneath him in my shirt and panties. My bra was skewed all over the place and my hair was probably a hot mess. I wasn't sure about anything, but I didn't want him to stop. So I just wobbled my head up and down and fixed my bra while he took his pants off so that the underwire wasn't poking me in the sternum. He tugged his shirt up and over his head and I just about died. His skin looked like something you'd see in a book about ancient sculptures. It was like alabaster, and I could see his ribs when he lifted his arms all the way up. I never thought I'd be so hot for a skinny little white boy, but I was.

I made sure to wait until he was back on top of me to push my panties down. I didn't want him to see me down there. I had no idea what to do with that little patch of lawn, and I'd never even really thought about it until right then. I was kinda wishing we'd have turned the light off before we started all this. His hand slid down my belly until it was between my legs and then everything just snowballed from there.

It wasn't anything like what I pictured it would be. It was nice, yeah; but it wasn't anything like it was in the movies. We kissed for a lot longer than the main event lasted. It didn't hurt very bad and it didn't last very long. The only awkward part was when he had to stop for a second to get a condom out of his nightstand drawer and I started thinking about how many girls he'd used those on or if it was a new box just for this occasion and then I wondered how long he'd had them and whether or not he'd planned it and then we were back in business. It felt good, but not good enough for me to pull a diner scene from When Harry Met Sally. Did we have to practice to get to that point? I didn't know.

It was kind of like the Derby. Not because we wore fancy hats and drank mint juleps, but because there was a lot of fanfare like it was gonna' be the greatest thing in the world and then it was over in two minutes and then nobody would shut up about it for a couple of weeks.

Sam went ballistic when I told her the news. We were in her bedroom and she ran across the whole house to make sure there wasn't anybody within ear shot. Then she closed her door and locked it and turned the stereo on a little bit louder than necessary.

“Tell me everything!” she demanded. “Start at the beginning and don't stop until it's over.”

Instead of trying to figure out how else you'd tell somebody everything about something, I did as I was told. I started from the time he asked me if I wanted to go back to the his house to the time he dropped me off at mine. Then we had a big long discussion about what certain little things meant. Like, for example, did he think I was beautiful because he didn't turn off the light or was it because he was conceited and wanted me to see him or did he just get caught up in the moment and forget?

“What did he say after?” Sam asked, shoving her hand into the bag of potato chips she'd brought to her room without looking away from me.

“After what?” I asked. “After the sex or after he dropped me off?”

“Both.” she grinned, sitting up straight like she was preparing herself physically for the answers she wanted.

“After the sex, he didn't say much.” I shrugged.

“Is he a cuddler?” she asked, smacking both hands against her heart and swooning. She'd mentioned to me more times than I wanted her to that Chris was excellent at cuddling.

“A little bit.” I nodded, remembering the ten or fifteen minutes he spent with his hand on top of my head, sort of massaging my scalp with the tips of his fingers like an octopus.

“And when he dropped you off?” she pressed. “Did he meet mom?”

“No.” I shook my head, “But he invited me to dinner on Wednesday at his parents' country club.”

Sam's eyes got real wide and she stretched her already long neck out even longer as she leaned her head back. She looked like she was trying to dodge a punch to the face in slow motion.

“Apparently, they have dinner there every Wednesday.” I explained. “His brother's coming up from Knoxville.”

“You're meeting his entire family and he hasn't even met your mom yet?” Sam asked, looking annoyed at the idea.

“You think I'm gonna' subject him to the idiots I live with?” I asked her.

She lifted one shoulder in a half shrug, getting the point.

“What are you gonna' wear?” she asked.

I threw myself back onto her bed in frustration. “I have no idea.”

“You've gotta' get something new.” she insisted, bouncing to her feet.

“Yeah?” I grumbled. “With what?”

She gave me another look that said I was right and started digging through her closet. “Maybe I've got something that'll work.”

For the most part, Sam and I could share clothes. But sometimes my tops were too big for her and her bottoms were too big for me and vice versa. Usually, though, if the clothes were stretchy, we could pull it off.

“How 'bout this?” she asked, pulling out a black and red peasant dress.

It looked like something you'd wear to a Renaissance festival and I shook my head.

“This?” she offered, pulling out something that looked similar, but was made of denim.

“Did you go to a hippie store and get these?” I asked, scrunching up my nose.

“No, they were mom's.” she said her voice echoing from inside her closet, “Ooh!”

She yanked out a short sleeved dress that had purple and yellow pansy flowers all over it. It was made out of t shirt material and looked like something you'd wear on Easter Sunday.

“It's from a few Easters ago.” she confirmed my suspicions. “So it should be nice and tight in the right places.

Sam shoved the hanger in my hand and demanded that I try it on. She hadn't been wrong. It was pretty tight. Usually, things of hers were too long on me, but the skirt of the dress landed a few inches above my knee.

“Wait.” she grinned, opening a bunch of dresser drawers until she pulled out a wide, black patent leather belt.

She fastened it just under my boobs and turned me around with her hands on my shoulders until I was busy. Then she shoved me out the door.

“Mom!” she screamed.

“What?” Lynn hollered back from the kitchen.

She was sitting at the table with Jenny, shucking corn from Gary's mama's garden. That woman was always trying to feed as many people as she could. She loved to garden and usually had more produce than she could can or freeze and put away, so she shared with everybody. Mama still had about half a dozen jars of tomato sauce from her.

“Does this look country club dinner appropriate?” Sam asked, putting her hands on my shoulder and shoving me forward a little bit more.

“Country club appropriate?” Lynn repeated, shoving her rusty red hair out of her face and looking at me like she wanted to know what was wrong with her daughter.

“Jobie's got a date.” Sam sang. “She's meeting James' family at their country club for dinner.”

“James' parents are members of the country club?” Jenny asked, suddenly very interested. “How rich are they?”

“Pretty rich, I guess.” I shrugged my shoulders.

“His dad owns Merchant's Drugs?” Lynn asked, looking back down at her pile of corn cobs. “They keep ripping your Granny off on her water pills. She's thinking of switching to Wal-Mart's pharmacy.”

“Mom.” Sam rolled her eyes, “Focus.”

“I think you look cute.” Jenny said. “You should wear your hair down, though.”

“I have a purple headband that would go real good with that dress, Jobie.” Lynn nodded. “You look like a perfectly well behaved young lady.”

“Thank you.” I mumbled.

“Yeah, too bad you're not.” Jenny snickered, elbowing me in the hip from her chair.

Heather and Brad nearly died laughing when I showed them my outfit.

“You look like an old lady's wallpaper!” Brad yelled.

“Shut up!” I groaned, hanging up the dress in my closet and dangling the belt over the neck of the hanger. “It's for a fancy dinner.”

“James is taking you somewhere fancy?” Heather asked, dropping her magazine and giving me her full attention.

I shoved Brad off of my bed and sat down, trying not to laugh as he bounced onto the carpet.

After explaining that his parents were members of the local country club and that his brother was coming home from college, Heather's tone changed. She started giving me a slew of advice: keep your legs crossed, put the napkin in your lap and not at the side of your plate, keep your hair out of your face, and don't talk with your mouth full. All this was stuff I knew already, but I pretended to listen. She loaned me a pair of earrings—they were small gold hoops with little glass gems dangling from them on tiny gold rings.

All Brad wanted to know was whether or not the club had a pool, and if it did, could I get him in.

On Wednesday night, I didn't think I'd ever had so many women fuss over me. Mama ironed my dress within an inch of its life after she'd washed it with so much fabric softener, I thought I was gonna' choke from the scent of flowers that was shoving itself up my nose. Sam made me sit on the toilet lid while she stood behind me and brushed my hair so many times I was pretty sure the brush had taken at least half of it out. Then she parted it on the side and tucked Lynn's purple satin headband behind my ears. Back in my room, Heather sat cross legged on the floor by my bed and used a magazine as a table to paint my nails on. She said that purple nail polish would match better, but it wasn't very ladylike, so instead she used a sheer pink lacquer and carefully painted on little white tips so it looked like I'd gotten a French manicure somewhere fancy.

When I told her she should go to beauty school for it, she said she'd been thinking about it. While she did my toes to match, Sam peppered me with a bunch of rules about what all she wanted to know when I got home. I was supposed to call her as soon as he dropped me off and tell me everything. She wanted to know what I ordered to eat and what his brother looked like and whether or not his dad was an asshole, since Lynn seemed to think he was. She told me to talk to his mother about flowers because that's the only thing we really knew about her and it was sure to be a good first impression.

By the time James got to my house to pick me up, I felt like one of those heads that beauty school students worked on. But at least, I figured, I looked okay. Because nobody was gonna' let me out of the house looking anything other than my best.

When I went out onto the porch to meet James, he was walking up the sidewalk and I wanted to throw myself into the ocean. He had on faded gray t shirt and a pair of distressed jeans, his usual black sneakers, and his sunglasses were perched on top of his head. As soon as he saw me, he looked like he thought he was in trouble.

“Do I need to change?” I asked, feeling panic creep its way up my arms and down my back.

“No no no.” he shook his head, holding his hands out to me. “You look great.”

“I'm overdressed.” I said, finding it real difficult not to sound hysterical. “I thought you said we were going to your dad's country club.”

“We are.” he nodded his head. “I just hate going there, but they always insist, so I always just wear what I want to piss them off.”

“Oh my God.” I sighed, turning around. “I'm gonna' go change.”

“No, don't change.” he laughed, pulling me back toward him. “They're gonna' love this. You look perfect.”

“I feel like an idiot.” I grumbled, letting him pull me by the hand to his car.

“You're not an idiot.” he promised me, opening the passenger side door and ushering me in. “If anybody's the idiot here, it's me.”

“No, 'cause you do this all the time.” I argued, tugging my skirt over my legs and lifting the neckline up so my cleavage wasn't showing. “I'm like a fish out of water.”

“It'll be great.” he said. “I'm always by myself at these things, so I have to do all the mocking by myself. Now I have a partner in crime.”

“No.” I shook my head, repeating. “No.”

“I'm kidding, Jobie.” he laughed. “I promise not to get you into any trouble.”

It was a twenty minute drive and I got more and more nervous with every passing mile, even though James kept telling me over and over that it was gonna' be fine. When we pulled up into the parking lot, he turned his head to look at me and I nodded my head.

“Okay.” he said, leaning in for a kiss.

I thought it was gonna' be a quick peck, but instead he really went for it and I relaxed a little bit. Then I wondered if that had been his intention. He opened his door and ran around the back of the car to my side. Like always, he held my hand tight and we swung our arms between us like we were supposed to be skipping off somewhere.

An older man with white hair greeted him by name at the door of the dining room and told him that his mom, dad, and brother had been waiting for him for what he said was quite a bit and he never looked at me once.

“I'm always late.” James mumbled in my ear as we weaved through the tables, several of which were empty.

“You're never late.” I said, trying to remember one time when he showed up to get me even a minute after he said he would.

“Well not for you.” he shot me a smile.

Even if James' father wanted a paternity test, I don't think a judge would've granted him one because they looked so much alike. They had the same shaped face and the same small nose with the same high, full cheeks and the same dark eyes. The only differences were that Mister Merchant's skin was well tanned and James' was pale. And whereas James wore his hair sort of short and shaggy, his father wore his parted to one side and slicked back with what looked like a ton of product. He was wearing a khaki suit and a pale blue button down shirt, like he'd just come from work somewhere at an office, but I never remembered James saying he'd ever spent any time in an actual office, so he must've just been dressed for dinner. Mrs. Merchant was petite and had honey blonde hair and sharp blue eyes. Her dress was white with bright pink and orange tulips all over it and it had a high collar so you couldn't see anything below her neck. Their older son was basically a taller version of their younger one, but his hair was longer and he wore it slicked back, too. He was wearing a pair of gray slacks and a matching jacket with a white button down underneath and I thought that earlier, when I'd felt over dressed, I was dead wrong.

“Guys.” James smiled, shooting his dad a salute. “Sorry I'm late.”

“No you're not.” his big brother rolled his eyes and shifted in his seat so he was looking at us.

“This is Jobie.” James ignored him, rounding the table and pulling out a chair for me.

I was waiting for him to introduce me as his girlfriend, but when he didn't, I mumbled a thank you and smiled as best as I could.

Introductions were made. Mr. and Mrs. Merchant were actually Joseph Senior and Dianna and James' brother wasn't Joseph Junior, but Joseph the second, like he was part of royalty or something. They all wore tight smiles and looked down at their hands a lot. When a waiter brought a bowl of bread, all the men ate and Mrs. Merchant didn't touch it. Then, when our food was put in front of us, she barely touched that, either.

“Jobie, is it?” Mr. Merchant finally asked.

I nodded, giving him a polite smile.

“Where is it you're from, Jobie?” he asked.

“Yes, your diction is very interesting.” Mrs. Merchant said.

I didn't know if she was trying to compliment me or not, but it sounded like an insult. And she talked like she was in Gone with the Wind or something.

“Alabama, originally.” I answered.

“Oh, Alabama's alright.” Mr. Merchant nodded his head, cutting into his steak with so much interest that I almost thought the conversation was over.

“We vacation in Gulf Shores quite often.” James' mom said. “Are you from that area, Jobie?”

“No, ma'am.” I shook my head. “I'm from Alexander City.”

“I don't know where that is.” she said flatly, like if she didn't know where a place was, then it must not be much.

I tried to think of how far away from the gulf it might've been, but I wasn't even sure. The only memories I had of going to the gulf were the ones from when I was a little kid and Mama and Daddy would take me to visit some of their friends on Mexico Beach in Florida.

“It's inland.” I decided to tell her. “But I've lived here in Russellville since middle school.”

“What brought your mother and father to Logan County?” Prince Joseph II asked.

I explained that my daddy had died when I was younger and that my mom had gotten a job working for the cabinet as a case worker. When they asked what a case worker did, exactly, I told them that she helped people and their families get food stamps or medical cards so they could eat and go to the doctor and still maybe be able to pay their light bills. Mr. Merchant declared that those programs needed to be dismantled and if he was in politics, which he wasn't, he'd do away with food stamps because all it was was a way to take tax dollars from good, hardworking people like himself so that lazy, good-for-nothing scum could leech off of them.

I probably shouldn't have said anything, but while doing my best to keep my voice down to a conversational level, I told them that I was sort of glad that he wasn't in politics because those programs were the reason my Mama had the job she did and so, because of that, I had a roof over my head and food on the table and, furthermore, I added; most of the people who got benefits weren't lazy, they were mostly full time workers who had trouble making ends meet because the cost of living had gone up so high that they couldn't afford to buy what they used to so now they needed help. Then, because I was on a roll and couldn't help myself, I suggested that maybe he consider lowering the prices in his pharmacies to save some his lazy scum customers money so they didn't have to go on welfare.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw James lean his head back and look up at the ceiling like he was exasperated. I couldn't tell if he was exasperated with me or exasperated with his family, but he didn't look happy at all. The rest of dinner was dead quiet and on the way home, James promised me that he wasn't mad and that I had nothing to be sorry about and that his dad had it coming because he was an asshole so I shouldn't worry about it.

But he didn't kiss me goodnight, either.