PRETENDING LAURA LOVES ME
Can I help it if I like to listen to romantic music? I know that I am only 13 , but so is Laura and I don’t want to spend my time with anybody else but Laura. There’s Bill and Carl and Sugi, but Laura is more fun.
It’s 9:30, on Saturday morning and a beautiful day. I just climbed out of bed and ate an apple and I’m running to Laura’s house which is a block away.
Hi Ma’am ! Are you Laura’s mom?
Well, it’s Saturday morning and I wanted to see if Laura would like to come out and play.
Well, I don’t know, I’ll go and ask her. Footsteps trailing off into another room and a muffled voice could be heard.
There’s a funny looking boy here that wants to know if you can come out and play. Do you want me to get rid of him ?
Oh, okay, thanks Mom. Who the heck is that. It better not be Victor, I’m tired of him telling me about him being pulled up into spaceships.
Oh, it’s Jim…. I’m thinking to myself, we may have some fun today and mischief may be involved. Hi Jim old buddy old pal. Let’s get stuuupid !
I can tell by that mischievous look on your face that we may get arrested before the day’s over. We’re not too worried about it though because we’ve also discussed that when you’re in underage minor, you can pretty much get away with anything and they won’t throw you in adult prison with father rapers.
Jim secretly has a crush on Laura that he doesn’t want her to know so he just treats her like one of the guys. But inside, Laura is definitely
not one of the guys. Shhhhhh, nobody must know or it will just screw everything up. Just keep it inside. Girls can never tell if a boy likes them or not. It’s not obvious or anything unless you say it out loud, right?
Hi Laura. Hi Jim. You want to goof off today.? Sure said Laura what you want to do.?
I thought it would be fun to go over the railroad tracks and try to catch some lizards to feed to my snake.
No, you can’t do that. That’s mean. What about the poor lizard? I know, lizards are cute but snakes have to eat something.
But, what else can we do ? I know, we could go down to the bridge and spit over the side.
Naaaa, that’s boring you said.
What I’d really like to do is shove a potato up old Mrs. Crenshaw’s big fat Buick tailpipe and cut her horn wires. She’s always honking at me. I don’t know why……….
Maybe she thinks I’m a squirrel and want to leap under her tires. I’ve heard that if you shove a potato up the tailpipe, the car won’t start or maybe the
potato or will shoot out of the tailpipe like a cannon.
You say, I got an idea. For a buck and 1/2 we could get a car bomb from Frank’s Novelties. We could open up her hood and hook it to her battery.
I can see her coming out in the morning and starting her stupid car and smoke starts pouring out from underneath the hood and scary noises happen.
That would be fun, you said, and we could take pictures of her and send it to the newspaper.
Naaaaaa, I don’t have a dollar and 1/2 and if I did, she’s not worth a dollar and 1/2.
( Have you ever noticed that when there’s couple kids and they say”naaaa” ?it’s a lot like going to the fair to the agriculture building where they keep the sheep. The sheep are constantly going “naaaaa”. It sounds exactly the same)
Well what you want to do I say, I don’t know what you want to do? I don’t know what you want to do? I don’t know, what you you want to do?
I don’t know what you want to do? I don’t know what you want to do ???????????????????????????????
I know what we could do we could get a roll of Wintergreen Lifesavers and go into a dark closet with the mirror and bite them and watch them make sparks.
You say, I don’t believe that. How can Lifesavers make sparks. Wintergreen Lifesavers really do make sparks in a dark closet but you have to have a mirror.
I can’t help but think that if I was in a dark closet with Laura we would be forced to be close together and what if my lips should brush a cross
her lips accidentally in the dark. That thought makes my heart race, but I just don’t have the guts because I’m scared of girls. What a conundrum,
to want to be with someone so bad you can taste it, but you just don’t have the courage to act on it. Maybe it’s fear of being laughed at.
I can’t understand why this feeling that has come over me is so strongly .
A couple years ago I didn’t feel this attraction. I have no idea why it’s happening, but I like it and I’m going to keep my big fat trap shut.
It could have something to do with me having wet dreams. I really don’t know what’s going on with me but it’s pretty good. I’m not going to
talk to Mom and Dad about it. Don’t ask me why. And I’m certainly not going to talk to my Brother about it because he would just make fun of me.
I can’t talk to my sister about it. I don’t understand the wet dreams but they’re kind of strangely fun. And I don’t understand why I’m attracted to Laura this year, so much more that then in previous years. Oh well forget about it. There’s a lot of things I don’t understand so the heck with it.
All of that was just a momentary thought in my head that took place in a nano second .
Hey I know, we could get some cigarettes and go smoke them at the river. You said — Yeah that sounds good but I don’t have any money to buy cigarettes.
We could go over the Regal gas station and just put some coins and get a pack of cigarettes. Nobody will stop us. But you’re right,
what are we going to use for money.
I know, we could ride our bikes over to where they are building a bunch of new houses and see if there’s any old soda bottles laying around. We could take him to the store and get the deposit money and use that to buy cigarettes.
Yeah that’s a great idea let’s go. So we’re jumping on our bikes and pedaling a mile and 1/2 to new houses are and nobody is around.
There were lots of bottles and my favorite, matchbook covers that the builders discarded that had girly pictures on them. I tried not to
not let Laura see me pick those up. I don’t want her to think that I’m a pervert. I am, but I don’t want her to think that.
When we took our bottles to the grocery store, we got almost $2. We took it in quarters and nickels and dimes so we could go to the Regal gas station and buy a pack of cigarettes quickly, out of the cigarette machine. We didn’t exactly look like adults buying cigarettes. We knew we had to swoop in there, and stick our coins in the machine fast, pull the knob, get your cigarettes, and boogie as fast as you can, before some adult catches you.
We decided to hang out at the park. Everything’s okay at the park. Just stay away from people. You wanted Marlboros and I wanted Newports so we compromised.
We got Marlboros. I was happy to give up my Newports , just to be hanging out with my bestie on a beautiful Saturday morning. Just getting sick smokin’ Marlboros.
As we were sitting there Laura, I was thinking to myself, this is so beautiful. This is the most perfect day I have ever had .
Just sitting here with you, feeling my heartbeat for you, but shutting my mouth about it. (She can never know what I feel inside. It would scare her away probably.)
I want to remember this beautiful Saturday morning for the rest of my life.
