Sunlight on My Shadow (5 page)

Most of the girls from Our Lady of Perpetual Help went to Regina Dominican High School and the boys went to Loyola. Since we couldn’t meet boys in class, the Rolling Stone in Wilmette was a godsend. They converted the auto-body garage into a teen nightclub by painting the cement floor a woody color and suspending strobe lights and glistening mirror balls from the ceiling. The atmosphere gave me a comforting incognito feeling. The strobe lights made us look like Tin Men from the Wizard of Oz as we moved in jerky staccato. I felt unusually brave, alive, and excited to meet the boys. I didn’t have to worry about whether my hair was parting to expose a bare scalp or if the Clearasil on my zit was still camouflaging the red.

The place had a musty smell mixed with wisps of Brut aftershave and Shalimar cologne. Sexy innuendos bounced off the walls, filling the air with pheromones and agitated sexual tension. For me, it coalesced and focused on a boy from Glenbrook South named Mick Romano. The guy was short as far as boys go, and I found that reassuring. My dad and brothers were over six feet tall, and their propensity for loudness and bouts of temper had me intimidated by large men. Mick was approachable and soft spoken. He had dark-brown eyes and a sinister little laugh that erupted from his innards, causing his eyes to squint in a way that melted me with rapt interest. He could dance too. A lot of the boys had bad rhythm or just stood on the sidelines talking to each other, but Mick broke the gaggle of Regina girls and approached me. Granted, his friend Kurt had already picked out Annie, so the competition was lessened. I felt like the golden girl, getting asked to dance by a boy who didn’t even know me.

Ever since I was nine and my brother Jim taught me the cha-cha, I have been intoxicated by dancing. In eighth grade my partner and I took first place at a dance contest. Tonight I felt like a puppet being moved by the strings of the drum beat. The words to the song jazzed me up a notch. I felt free and uninhibited. It went something like this: You know she comes around here at just about midnight—She makes ya feel so good, Lord—She makes ya feel all right—And her name is G-L-O-R-I-A.

As Mick and I danced, I felt a surge of sexiness oozing out of my body. I wondered if he liked the way I was shaking my butt. My boldness shocked me. Eventually a slow dance came on. I could smell his spicy cologne and see the stubble on his clean-shaven face. They weren’t those newly clipped peach-fuzz whiskers, but well established, like he’d been shaving for years. He was so manly. He put his hand on the small of my back and led me around like I’d sprouted wings. I skipped my ride home with Diane’s mother and even though I wasn’t allowed to go in a boy’s car until I was sixteen, I let Mick drive me in his ‘62 white Chevy Biscayne. Not only was this guy cute—he had a car, and he knew how to drive it.

When we pulled into the driveway, he asked for my phone number. He didn’t write it down. I was impressed that he could hold it in his head, but worried that he wasn’t going to call. I skipped upstairs, giddy with the words to the song swirling in my head, “she comes ‘round here, ‘bout midnight.” I couldn’t believe that an upperclassman had noticed me. It was a miracle night. I knocked on Mom and Dad’s bedroom door to tell them I was home. They didn’t notice it was past eleven or that I had been delivered by a boy in his car. Luck was on my side. I wondered if Mick would call. He did ask for my phone number but what if he forgot it? Or maybe he didn’t really care. Boys were like that. Sometimes they acted interested to be polite and then just disappeared.

I opened my window, then crawled in bed. There was a storm coming in and the curtains tossed and twisted, clanking the gold rings. Snow started to fall and blow in the window, so I got up and closed it. I fell into a fitful sleep too excited to really settle down.

Sure enough, the phone rang the next evening while I was in the kitchen making popcorn. I turned the fire off, ran upstairs, closed my bedroom door and picked it up. It was him. “This is Mick, do you remember me from last night?” I was beside myself and all ears. I found out he had a dad who was Italian and that he lived in Glenview on the other side of town in a newer blue-collar neighbourhood. He took calculus, no wonder he could remember my phone number; he was smart. He had one younger sister. His parents both worked. I thought it must be strange to come home from school to an empty house; so lonely and quiet. As we talked I could hear jets from the Glenview Naval Air Base flying over his house. He said he didn’t get along with his dad so well. It didn’t sound like he spent much time with his parents.

Mick asked if I’d like to go out Saturday night to a drive-in movie. I knew kids just sat in their cars and made out at these shows. I wasn’t ready for that, but it would be fun to sit next to him, maybe I would scoot close, eat candy, sip a coke, and gawk over some romantic movie. But, what should I tell him? I wasn’t allowed to go on dates. I had four months until I would turn sixteen. Then, I was supposedly old enough for dating and riding in boys’ cars. Should I tell Mick I couldn’t go? Should I tell him my Dad didn’t allow it, but to meet me somewhere else secretly? Should I ask Dad about it again? Maybe he would ease up on the rules now that I actually had someone to go out with. I told Mick I’d have to see if I could go and could he call back tomorrow?

I approached Dad with the same assurance that I was going to finally find that horse in the back yard that I had been asking for ever since I was six. But I gave it a go. I told Dad I met this really nice, clean cut boy at the dance the other night and he asked to take me to a movie, “Could I go?”

Dad held up his hand and said, “Now, Judy, you know the rules. Not until you’re sixteen. What’s the hurry?” he said. “You have plenty of time ahead of you for that sort of thing.” What sort of thing was he talking about? Talking to Dad was like a conversation with the tar baby from the Uncle Remus stories—it wasn’t up for discussion. His lack of consideration made me angry. Plenty of time? Like Mick is going to sit around and wait for me? I was sure there were other girls who could go in his car that he could ask if I was out of the picture. This thing with Mick was not going to stay fresh forever.

I wasn’t used to having the line drawn like this. Dad didn’t prepare me for laying down the law because he had been lax in the past. For instance, he taught me how to drive when I was only thirteen and then he let me take the car all by myself. I was allowed free range within a five mile radius of the cabin– up to Heinz’s grocery store to get candy or an ice-cream cone; that made me feel like I had arrived and I was ready for anything.

I could also take a sip of booze anytime I wanted. Dad offered it to me at a very young age. I remembered the adults laughing at the face I made when I tried it. Dad knew the strong taste would regulate my intake and letting me try it took away the mystique.

The point was Dad trusted me with adult-type responsibilities and Mom was the same way, so I didn’t get why I couldn’t go out with boys. When I asked Dad, Mom just sat there and said nothing, her silence showed she agreed with Dad’s rule. The no dating thing seemed unusually strict and inflamed my sensitivities. I didn’t like it.

I thought Dad was ridiculous and bullheaded. “It didn’t matter what he thought,” I told myself. I would just do it anyway. Mick and I could go places. Free as birds. Cool places, like McDonald’s on Waukegan Road, the local hangout, or maybe even down to the beach at Lake Michigan to watch the waves come in. If Dad wouldn’t budge on the rule, it was too bad. I just had to roll in that ‘62 Chevy. I told Mick I could go out Saturday night but he had to pick me up at my friend Jane’s because my dad didn’t allow me to date. Mick was okay with that.

The first kiss happened when we’d parked in the beach lot by Lake Michigan. We were watching the waves roll in and he leaned over and put his lips on mine. They felt soft and smooth and the stubble from his upper lip rubbed in a delightful way. It added manliness to the mix. And the smell of him; Oh that Brut men’s cologne – just melted my raw edges until I felt like I was in a pool of liquid gold. I could smell a little bit of sweat mixed with the cologne. This drew me closer.

I liked kissing Mick, and I liked the warm, churning sensations that accompanied the kisses. When I heard the song “Puppy Love,” I knew that wasn’t me. This was deep. This was real. It wasn’t “only” anything. I admired his intelligence and his dry sense of humor. We laughed and talked about things that mattered. He sometimes had a rocky relationship with his dad and when they had an argument, Mick got in a dark mood, his words full of anger. I didn’t like seeing this side of him. He was too serious. But I always empathized and thought his dad was too hard on him. I loved Mick’s straight white teeth and the way he looked at me longingly, with his eyelids at half-mast. His rapt attention started me thinking about letting love take us to the physical wonderland.

Since it was expected that I would keep my parents informed as to my whereabouts, each time I left home, I had to come up with a lie if I was meeting Mick. Jane lived across the empty field at the end of our street, so it was reasonable to say I was going over there and having somebody’s mom pick us up to go roller skating, or shopping, or to a football game. The lies stabbed at my integrity and made me feel cheap, but I put a band-aid on the icky feeling by telling myself I wouldn’t have to be lying if I had a reasonable father. If he wanted to treat me like a child, I would just break free. I was almost sixteen and fed up wih his old fashioned rules. And Father Monson telling us we shouldn’t hold hands, we weren’t robots. I was ready to skip the pursuit of purity. Mick was cute and cool and I just wanted to be with him as much as possible. If our lust carried us away, let the sails fill with the winds of love.

We continued our physical explorations, and even though I rationalized that confession was worthless and the church’s stand on morality unrealistic, I had pangs of guilt that were hard to shake. I started to have this sick feeling that because I was letting Mick’s hands wander while we kissed, he didn’t respect me. Even though I’d heard that boys preferred girls that were virgins when they got married, I didn’t think that was true. Would there be any virgins left by the time we all got married? But yet, the sliver of doubt wedged itself between my heady rush of sexiness and the thought that Mick might just be using me. But if he didn’t really love me why did he want to hang out with me all the time. We did a lot of things together besides kissing. The realization that he got more interested after I started putting out frightened me. I rode my Catholic religion and my sexual desire like a see-saw, teetering between what I “should” do and what I “wanted” to do. It was so confusing. To stabilize the tug of war between my desires and my faith, I decided to throw out the religion. How could they co-habitate? I hated the guilt. The intensity of desire paled the doctrines of morality.

Intrigue and mystique filled my thoughts about sex with my love, this boy I idolized and respected for his intelligence and good looks. I wanted to be closer to him. I wanted to share everything with him. Messing around was enticing, so I figured the ultimate act of sex would be the perfect ending to a perfect day—starbursts and ecstasy. The heavens would open up and I would be transported like an angel to the beauty of true love. I eventually made the decision to follow my desire for love and throw away the doctrine, although I never was able to quiet my pesky conscience.

Mick would call to set up a time. I’d walk to the end of our street, cross the field, pass the two giant weeping willows, and there he would be, sitting in the restaurant parking lot with the car running. I’d hop in. Now the fear would ooze down and around me—the fear of getting caught.

As we approached a stoplight I would duck down in the car. Then Mick would peek at the nearby cars: if he didn’t see a blue Lincoln Continental, like Dad’s, he would declare the coast clear and I would pop back up. Then we would continue over to McDonald’s. Sometimes we drove down to Lake Michigan, parked, and walked along the shoreline, holding hands. I felt pretty safe here because Dad and Mom never went down to the lake.

Not only was the car a means of getting around, it was also a means of hanging around. We spent as much time parked as we did driving. This saved on gas. We’d drift down residential streets until we found something deserted and dark. Then we’d park and make out. It was decadent to be using the car as a bedroom, just sitting there in the dark, kissing, and rounding the bases, practicing for a home run.

We were heavy into it one evening when a bright flash scanned our car. We zipped up and popped up as the officer walked over to the driver’s side of the car and shone a flashlight on us. Mick rolled down the window.

“What are you kids up to?”

“Nothing, Officer. We just stopped to take a look at this map,” Mick said as he grabbed one off the floor.

“Let me see your license.”

The cop left for about five minutes, came back, and said, “Okay. Well, get along then. There’s no parking along here.”

My heart was exploding and my hands shook. When the cop walked away, my thumping heart eased as gratefulness washed over me. What if the cop had brought us to the station and I’d had to call Dad? The thought made me sick with fright. I wanted to say a thank you to God for the cop letting us go, but then I thought it wasn’t God who helped me get away. God had probably disowned me by now because I hadn’t been to confession in many months. First, in the dark booth, I skipped the impure thoughts because I had gone way beyond any of those innocuous sins. Then, I rationalized, what was the point of going to confession if I wasn’t going to confess—especially if I wasn’t sorry and had no intention of quitting my deviant behavior? I didn’t do much praying, these days. Besides it seemed duplicitous to ask for stuff from God when I wasn’t following his rules.

Mick and I agreed we had to find a better place for this sort of messing around.