Never Love a Stranger (13 page)

Janet and I became very friendly, and around school we were considered as going together. I liked her but thought somehow, after having known Julie, things weren’t quite the same, or ever would be. But we continued to go around with each other, continued to kiss each other good night after Saturday night dates, and continued the tedious process of growing up.

School went on. Soon it was Easter, and then summer vacations. I passed all my subjects and that summer went to Rockaway with my relatives.

It was the best summer I had ever had. There were a crowd of youngsters at the beach and we had some swell times. I swam a lot and loafed on the beach all day. I grew tanned and dark. I don’t suppose I was any different than any other boy at the beach. We looked at the girls in their bathing suits, talked about their physical attributes, and speculated whether they did or didn’t. I found out one girl did, and thought I had something exclusive till I found out that almost all the other boys thought the same thing. Then I dropped her cold.

I gained about seven pounds as the summer went by, and soon it was time to close the bungalow and go back to town and school. I guess that was the happiest summer of my life. I often wonder why I can’t remember every detail of it, but it was so pleasant that every day seemed to flow into the next and, before I knew it, it was over.

School again. This term I was a sophomore. I made the regular basketball team and the swimming team, and before the term was over, I was wearing the big orange-and- black “W” on my sweater. I was now one of the top men in the school and always had a

crowd around me, and was catered to and flattered as only a high-school hero could be.

All of us had grown that summer, Jerry and Marty and I—Janet too. But I didn’t know how much until one day after the Thanksgiving Day football game when I took her home. She was going to her grandmother’s for Thanksgiving dinner. Her parents had already left. She was to meet them after she had changed her clothes. I waited in her apartment for her to change because I was to walk over to her grandmother’s before going on home. I threw my coat across the couch in her living-room and sat down and began to read the paper.

A few minutes later she came into the room, wearing a bathrobe and carrying a slip over her arm. “I have to iron this,” she said. “It wasn’t dry enough this morning.” She went into the kitchen. I sauntered over to the door and watched her. She let the ironing board down from its niche in the wall, plugged in an electric iron, and then came into the parlour with me. “It takes a few minutes to warm up,” she said. “I won’t be long.”

“That’s O.K.,” I said. “I have lots of time.”

She went over to the window. “Look,” she cried, “it’s snowing!” I went over and stood beside her. “Whadda ya know!” I said.

She turned towards me. “First snow this year.”

“Yeanh,” I said, putting my arms around her and kissing her. “First this year.”

For a moment her arms were around me. Then she dropped them. “The iron must be warm,” she said, walking into the kitchen.

“So am I!” I said.

She laughed and tested the iron. “Not warm enough.”

“Who said so?” I demanded, purposely misunderstanding her. “I’m boiling over.”

“Not you, silly, the iron!” Then she saw the smile on my face and walked over towards me.

I kissed her again, holding her close. She had very little on underneath the bathrobe. Together we moved towards the couch and sat down. I drew her head across my lap and kissed her. She kissed back, her lips growing warm. I slipped my hands inside her bathrobe. Her skin was smooth and soft and tingled my fingers. She drew in her breath suddenly as she felt my hands on her. I kissed her again, moving my hands in circular motions on her back. Her arms went round my neck, holding me close to her. I put my head down and kissed her throat and then her shoulder.

“Frankie, stop!” she said, almost moaning as I touched her.

“No, darling!” I murmured. Her hands held my head close to her. “Oh, Frankie, Frankie!” she said over and over as I kissed her.

I tried to loosen the belt of the robe. Suddenly she stopped me. Her hands held mine. “Frankie, we mustn’t! It’s not right!”

I tried to kiss her but she turned her head.

“We’ve got to stop, Frankie. It’s so cheap,” she said breathlessly.

I held her closely for a minute. Then she pushed me away and stood up, straightening her robe. “We’re not children any more, Frankie. We mustn’t get so worked up.”

I took her hand and kissed it, then rubbed it against my cheek. “No, we’re not. I guess you’re right.”

She leaned forward impulsively and kissed me. “Frankie, you’re sweet!” Then she went into the kitchen.

I walked over to the door and watched her. “Janet,” I said, half smiling, “you’re a wicked woman to tease me so.”

She looked up from her ironing board, a hurt expression in her eyes. “I wouldn’t tease you, Frankie,” she said seriously. “I think I’m in love with you.”

“I know you wouldn’t, darling,” I said equally serious.

She finished her ironing, put the board and the iron away, and went into her room and dressed.

When she came out again I kissed her. Then we left the apartment and walked over to her grandmother’s house.

We wished each other a happy holiday and parted. I walked down the street thoughtfully. Janet, too, had grown up that summer.

Chapter Six
‌

I
T
was three days before Christmas when I heard about Sam Cornell. Oddly enough, though I was on the student-teachers’ advisory committee, I had not been present at any of the hearings that he had been called to. I had missed many of them because of basketball practice and simply because I was too lazy and not interested enough in them to attend.

Marty stopped me in the corridor and asked me to see Mrs. Scott that afternoon. I asked him why.

“It’s about Sam Cornell,” he answered. “They’re talking about sending him to reform school.”

“How come?” I queried.

“He got into some jam. You’d have known about it if you’d attend a meeting once in a while,” he replied.

“I haven’t time for that crap,” I said. “Besides, I’ve decided not to run again this term. I’ve got enough to do without bothering about that. I’m on the basketball team, or haven’t you heard?”

“All right, big shot,” he answered, smiling. “You’re going down to see her?” “Yeanh,” I said, “I’ll go now while I have a free period.”

We walked down to the main floor together. He left me at her door. I walked in. “Hello, Mrs. Scott,” I said to her. “You asked for me?”

“Hello, Francis, I did,” she answered. “Where have you been keeping yourself lately? I haven’t seen you at any of the meetings.”

“I’ve been too busy to come,” I told her. “I’ve a lot of practising to do. I’m on the basketball team.”

“I was aware of that,” she said, “but you should attend meetings; that is one of the reasons you were elected class president.”

“I know,” I said defensively, “but I’ve decided not to run this term.”

“Because you’ve decided that you don’t want the job is not reason enough to shirk it while you still hold it. That’s not being fair to the students who voted for you, and in some ways that is what I want to speak to you about.”

“I thought you wanted to speak to me about Sam Cornell,” I said.

“Yes, I did,” she said, “but I wonder if one of the reasons we failed to get anywhere with Sam Cornell is that you weren’t there at the meetings. You see, Sam is one of the boys who voted for you. And when he got into trouble and was sent up to see us, you weren’t present. If you had been there he might have had more confidence in us, seeing a friendly face, that of someone he knew who would give him a square deal.”

“O.K.,” I said. “So what do I do now—say I’m sorry?”

“No, Francis. That isn’t the attitude you should take. You’re not sorry—not really. You’re a little too selfish and self-important right now to feel sorry for Sam. But I’m not concerned with you. You’ll get along all right. I would like to help Sam though, and

maybe you can help.” “How?” I asked.

She walked over to her desk and sat down. “Sit down, Francis.” I sat in a chair near her desk.

“As you know, Francis, I hate like the dickens to have to send any boy to the reformatory. I refuse to believe that any child is intentionally bad. The entire theory behind my work is to prove to certain people that incorrigible children are only incorrigible because we make them that way—that their failure is not theirs alone, but ours as well.” She smiled at me. “Do you understand what I’m saying?”

“I think so,” I said doubtfully.

“Good!” she said, a ghost of a smile twinkling behind her glasses. “We can work better if we understand one another.” She picked up a file from her desk and opened it. “All through his first and second terms here Sam was a good student. He had an eighty-five average in his studies and always an ‘A’ in conduct and deportment. He had a good attendance record: absent only one day in that time and late but twice.

“This term he has already been absent thirty days, has cut innumerable classes, and has been generally annoying in his demeanour. He has failed most of his subjects thus far and no doubt will fail them this term. But this in itself is not a serious enough reason to have the boy sent away. He has also been caught stealing petty things, and in his neighbourhood has been accused with several other boys of breaking into stores. Naturally, this has been investigated and we found out that many of his absences had been unwarranted. He had been on the hook, as you would so aptly put it.

“We have spoken with his parents and they seem at a loss to explain it. His mother just tells us that Sam was a good boy and that his friends are spoiling him. And I’m inclined to believe her. I think Sam is still a good boy. But somewhere along the line during the past summer, Sam has changed his idea of what is good. Sometime during the summer vacation Sam went wrong and didn’t get back on the right track. I spoke to him and can’t get at the crux of the matter. You see, if I could find out just what it was that made Sam change his mind, I could explain it to him in such a manner as he could see what is right. But Sam doesn’t trust me and without his confidence I can’t help him.

“He has been under parole from the juvenile court since October, and he has already broken it. Automatically he would go to reform school, but I’m trying to prove that he can straighten out and wouldn’t give them any more trouble if I can only get to the source of it and explain it to him. I have already said that I can’t. I thought perhaps that Martin could, but he doesn’t know Martin any too well either, and Martin didn’t get anywhere with him. Then Martin suggested you. He told me that you and Sam had been very friendly the first term you were in school.”

“Yes,” I said. “I came into the term late and he helped me a great deal.”

“You see,” she said, “if you could help him, you would only be repaying a favour.” “But how can I help him?” I asked. “I don’t know anything about this sort of work.”

“You don’t have to know anything about it,” she said, leaning forward in her chair and speaking earnestly. “Just be friendly to him. Cultivate him. If he likes you, he’ll talk to you himself and tell you what he’s doing. Then you tell me and I’ll show you what to do next.

If he has confidence enough in you, then you can help. That is one of the reasons behind this committee. If the offending pupil faces only strangers and teachers, he immediately puts himself on the defensive, which automatically thwarts us and we can’t help him. But when he sees his fellow students, he relaxes sufficiently and confides in us, and you would be surprised how many students we have already helped. If a doctor can win his patient’s confidence, then he’s won half the battle, and if Sam believes in you, then you be the doctor.”

“I’ll try, Mrs. Scott,” I said.

“I think you can do it too, Francis. Would you like to read his file?” “No, thanks,” I answered, “I’d rather hear his story from him.”

She smiled. This time she almost beamed. “I’m glad you said that, Francis. That’s the way you should feel about him if he’s your friend. You seem to have an instinct for what is right. How old are you?”

“Fifteen,” I told her.

“Funny,” she said, “but at times I feel you’re much older. You have a certain sureness of yourself that most young people your age haven’t. It would surprise you if you knew just how much other pupils look up to you. Why, Marty talks about you as if you were something holy.”

“I guess that’s because we’ve known each other for a long time,” I said. “It’s more than that,” she said. “Marty told me how you met.”

A picture of Marty as I first met him jumped through my mind—the slightly pale, unafraid kid waiting for me to hit him. “He told you?” I asked.

“Yes, he told me also how you taught him to box and how you used to go swimming off the docks and how you worked after school and in the summer. I know quite a bit about you.”

Just then the gong rang announcing the end of a period. The next period was a math class for me. I stood up.

“I’ve a class,” I said.

She stood up and walked to the door with me. “I have a feeling that you’ll work things out with Sam.”

“I hope so. He’s a good kid.” I opened the door.

“And Francis,” she stopped me as I was about to step out into the corridor, “think it over about your decision of not running for class president again. It’s really a lot more important than other things.”

“It’s a matter of opinion,” I said, stepping into the hallway already crowded with pupils running to their next class. “Good-bye.”

She smiled. “That’s true, but we’ll talk about it again some other time. Thanks for coming down.”

“No hay de qué,” I answered, practising some of my Spanish on her. She closed the door and I walked down the hall.

Chapter Seven
‌

I
RAN
into Marty again after the math class. “Did ya see her?” he asked.

“Yeanh,” I said.

“What are you going to do?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “I don’t know where in hell to start.” “You gotta see him first,” he said, smiling.