Towelhead (11 page)

“Does he want to come in?” Thomas asked.

“I don't think so,” I said.

After a second, Daddy put the car in reverse and backed out. I waved again, but he ignored me and drove off.

“You look nice,” Thomas said when I'd turned back around.

“Thanks.”

“Your leg is bleeding a little,” he said.

I looked down to see what he was talking about. It was true. There was a cut on my right ankle, just above the back of my loafer.

“C'mon,” he said. “I'll get you a Band-Aid.”

I followed him inside, and he left me standing in his living room while he went upstairs. There was a long tan couch with high seat backs, like in an airplane, and their Christmas tree was already up. I liked how it stood next to the stairs. It seemed like you could probably climb them when you wanted to decorate the higher branches.

When Thomas came back, he got down on the floor and swabbed my ankle with a gauze pad, then put the Band-Aid on for me. “How'd you cut yourself?” he asked.

“From shaving,” I said. “I was in a hurry.”

“Try to go slower next time,” he said, and he stood up. We went in the kitchen then to meet his mom. She didn't hear us at first because she was running the blender, but then Thomas yelled, “Mom!” and she turned around. Her hair was a short Afro just like Thomas's, and she was tall and pretty. I liked how she had two gold studs in her left ear. “This is Jasira,” Thomas said, and Mrs. Bradley stepped forward to shake my hand.

“It's so nice to meet you,” she said. “Welcome to our home.”

“Thank you,” I said. Then I held out the wine and chocolates and said, “These are for you.”

“Aren't you sweet?” she said, taking them from me.

“Daddy picked them out,” I said.

“Really?” she said, and she laughed a little. “He didn't even want you to come.”

I nodded. “He thinks I should have more friends that are girls.”

“Don't you have any?” she asked.

“No.”

“Huh,” she said.

“The girls at school are jerks,” Thomas said. He turned to me then and asked if I wanted to see his room. I looked at Mrs. Bradley, waiting for her to say no, but she didn't. She said, “Thomas, while you're upstairs, tell your father that I need him to come down and open the wine.”

Mr. Bradley was in his office, working on a computer. “Dad,” Thomas said from the doorway, “this is Jasira.”

“Jasira!” Mr. Bradley said, and he came over to shake my hand. “So nice to meet you.” He wore khaki pants like Thomas's, except he was a little bit fat, so he had to fit the waistband under his stomach. “I hear your father works at NASA,” he said.

I nodded.

“How interesting,” he said. “I might like to talk to him sometime. I'm sort of an amateur astronomer.”

“Okay,” I said.

“C'mon, Jasira,” Thomas said. “My room is down here.”

“Leave the door open, please, Thomas,” Mr. Bradley called after us.

“I will,” Thomas said.

He had a double bed instead of a single, like mine, with a dark blue quilt on it. There were swimming ribbons stuck to the cork-board above his desk, and a small TV in one corner. His walls were covered with music posters, only I didn't really know any of the bands. My parents listened mostly to classical.

“Want to sit down?” Thomas asked.

“Sure,” I said, and I settled myself on the edge of his bed.

“Check this out,” he said, and he picked up a guitar on a stand near his desk. He put the strap over his shoulder and started playing, but it was hard to hear since there was no amplifier. When he was finished, he asked me if I recognized the song, and I said no. “It's ‘Hey Joe,'” he said. “Jimi Hendrix.”

“Oh,” I said.

He asked if I wanted to play something then, and I said okay. I got up off the bed, and he slipped the guitar strap over my head. I was a little embarrassed about how it squashed my left boob, but Thomas didn't say anything. “Put your fingers like this,” he said, and he started positioning them for me on the strings. When he finally had them in place, he told me to strum a little with my right hand. “Recognize that?” he said, and I shook my head. “It's Neil Young,” he said. Then he said, “Here,” and he took the guitar back and played the song better than I had. “Recognize it now?” he said, and I nodded, pretending that I did.

When the song was finished, he took the guitar off, and we sat down on the edge of his bed. After a minute, he lay all the way back, with his feet still touching the floor. I wasn't sure if I was supposed to stay sitting or lie back with him. Finally, I lay back. “How far up do you shave?” Thomas asked me.

“What do you mean?” I said.

“I mean, like, do you shave your pubes?”

“Yes,” I said.

“All of them?”

“No. Just the sides.”

“I like how it looks when girls shave all of them,” he said.

I didn't say anything.

“Maybe sometime you could do that.”

“Maybe,” I said.

We lay there for a few minutes, until Mrs. Bradley called us down to eat. In the dining room, she had laid out hummus, baba ghanoush, lamb kebobs, salad, pita bread, rice, and tabouleh. I said it was good, and it was, even though it wasn't my favorite kind of food. While we ate, Mr. Bradley asked me different questions about my family in Lebanon, and I felt kind of embarrassed that I didn't know the answers. I couldn't tell him when my grandfather had died, or what he had done for a living, or even the name of my father's older brother. I tried to switch the conversation to my mother being Irish, but Mr. Bradley didn't seem as interested in that country.

For dessert, there were ice-cream sundaes that we got to make ourselves using cherries, nuts, bananas, hot sauce, M&M's, whipped cream, and sprinkles. Once we'd started eating, Mrs. Bradley asked me what my mother did, and I said she was a teacher. Mrs. Bradley nodded. “So you just prefer to live with your dad?”

“No,” I said. “I prefer to live with my mom.”

“Oh,” Mrs. Bradley said, and I noticed that she looked across the table at Mr. Bradley.

After dessert, Thomas and I went in the family room to listen to music, while his parents stayed in the kitchen to clean up. I kept thinking they would come and join us, but they didn't. Mr. Bradley only poked his head in later and said that he and Mrs. Bradley were going upstairs and to please keep the volume down.

We listened to Jimi Hendrix, and Thomas stood in front of the fireplace, playing air guitar. Any time there was a solo, he scrunched up his face, like he was in pain. After a while, he came and sat next to me on the couch. He played drums on his thighs, and whenever there was a cymbal part, he hit one of my thighs.

A slow song came on, and Thomas reached over and started touching my breasts through the outside of my shirt. Then he reached a hand under my shirt and touched them through my bra. Somehow he knew to keep touching the nipples, and I had an orgasm. I started to cry then, and he seemed really worried. “Did I hurt you?” he said. “I didn't mean to hurt you.”

“No,” I said.

“What happened?” he asked.

“Nothing,” I told him, and I crossed my arms in front of me.

Thomas got up for a second, and when he came back, he had a tissue. “Here.”

I took it and wiped my face.

“Are you sure I didn't hurt you?”

“I'm sure.”

“Then why are you crying?”

“I had an orgasm,” I said.

“You did?”

I nodded.

“Was that the first time?”

“No.”

“Oh,” he said. He seemed disappointed. “Well, when did you have one before?”

“With myself,” I said.

“Oh,” he said again.

“But I don't want to have them anymore.”

“Why not?”

“I just don't.”

“You don't like them?”

“No.”

“I thought everyone liked them.”

“I don't,” I said.

“That's too bad,” he said.

I shrugged.

“I like them,” he said.

I didn't say anything.

“I wish I could have one now.”

“You can if you want,” I said.

“Will you watch?”

“I don't know.”

“You don't have to do anything,” he said. “Just sit there.”

“What about your parents?” I asked.

“They won't come down.”

“How do you know?”

“They don't like Jimi Hendrix.”

I thought about this for a second.

“Just watch,” he said, and he unzipped his pants and pulled out his penis. He wrapped his fingers around it and started moving his hand up and down. After a while he said, “Okay, I'm going to come,” and he reached over and took my hand and used it to catch what came out. He was breathing kind of heavily, so I waited a minute before I asked him what to do with it. “You can go wash it off,” he said.

I got up then, being careful not to spill, and went in the bathroom. I sniffed it a little before turning on the faucet, then stuck the tip of my tongue in it. I knew from
Playboy
that men liked for women to drink it. I thought maybe it would taste like pee or glue, but it didn't. It was just thick.

After I washed my hands, I looked under the sink and found a box of tampons. I didn't really have any place to put them, so I just carried a bunch of them out in my hand. “Can I have these?” I asked Thomas. He was still sitting on the couch, but he'd zipped up his pants.

He shrugged. “Sure.”

“Could you bring them to school for me on Monday?”

“Can't you just take them home with you tonight?”

“No,” I said. “Daddy won't let me wear them.”

“Why not?” he asked.

“I don't know.”

“Because you're a virgin?”

I looked at him.

“You're not a virgin?”

“I don't know,” I said.

“How can you not know?”

I didn't say anything.

“I could tell if you are.”

“No,” I said. “I don't want to.”

“All right,” he said. “We don't have to.”

“Don't tell your mother about the tampons,” I said.

“She probably wouldn't care.”

“Just please don't tell her,” I said, and he said okay.

When I hadn't called Daddy by nine o'clock, he called Thomas's mom to say that he was on his way, and to please make sure I was waiting outside for him. Mrs. Bradley gave me a bag of leftovers and said, “Tell your father that I'm sure it's not as good as what he's used to, but I hope he enjoys it.” Then she hugged me good-bye, even though we had only just met.

While we waited for Daddy on the front steps, Thomas leaned down and kissed me. His lips were a little bit open, and they caught one of mine in between. While he was kissing me, he started squeezing one of my breasts again, and touching my nipple. I tried to push his hand away, but he kept it there. It was the first time all night that I really liked him.

A few minutes later, Daddy pulled into the driveway. “See you Monday,” Thomas said, and he leaned down and kissed me again, this time on the cheek.

“See you,” I said, and I went and got in the car. “These are leftovers from Mrs. Bradley,” I told Daddy, showing him the bag.

He nodded, then put the car in reverse. As we pulled out, I waved to Thomas, and he waved back. When we were finally driving away, Daddy said, “I have to talk to you about something.”

“Okay,” I said.

“You're not allowed to see that boy again.”

“Thomas?” I said.

He nodded. “When you told me about this dinner, you didn't give me the full information. So I could make a proper decision.”

I didn't know what to say to this.

“Do you understand what information I'm referring to?” he asked me.

“I think so,” I said, even though it didn't make any sense.

“Good,” he said. “Because if you continue to visit this boy's house, no one will respect you. I know what I'm talking about.”

The smell of Mrs. Bradley's food had begun to fill the car then, and I took a deep breath of it.

“Are you listening to me?” Daddy asked.

“Yes,” I said.

“Then say so.”