!!!!!!!********WORKING DRAFT********!!!!!!!
Mike drove back for Christmas break. Saturday afternoon, he stopped at my house first before going home.
“How was it, the drive,” I asked. “Did it take long, did you go all night?”
“No, I left at noon yesterday, drove a friend who lives on my hall home to Queens, spent the night there. Then I came the rest of the way on the Pennsylvania Turnpike. It’s fun, driving all by myself. I get to think, listen to music, look at the countryside. It almost started snowing near Columbus, luckily we out ran it.”
“We?”
He turned sheepish as he went on, “By that time, I think, I was either getting lonely or crazy. I started imagining you in the seat next to me, and talked with you the rest of the way home.”
“What did we talk about?” I laughed.
“Well, first you told me about how worried you were about college. I said you were the last person who needs to worry, you’re going to first of all get into Radcliffe, and then you can do and go wherever you want from there. You kept perseverating on how much everyone, your mother, your teachers, Lizzie, expect from you, how you didn’t think you were the person they thought you were. I said, ‘You’re the best possible Sarah Jane Stein there is.’ Then you gave me a box of fruit and disappeared.”
“A Thousand Clowns! Martin Balsam! I love that scene. So I was good company?”
“The best.”
We were downstairs between the den and living room. Mom was boxing up the last of the Chanukah stuff, carefully wrapping the menorah in tissue paper, saving those candles which were still long enough, and putting the blue lights in a separate bag, all to go up in the attic until next year.
He nodded over to her, turned back to me and asked, “What’d you get? Anything special?”
“Come on up to my room, I’ll show you.”
My mom must have overheard us, as she cautioned while we walked the stairs, “Honey, keep it down, your dad’s taking a nap.” I guessed she really meant, “No funny stuff.”
While Mike sat on the bed, I took a [Leigh what do you call those bags that clothes come in from the store, like Nordstrom’s would be a dress or suit in. The most informal term possible] from my closet. I yanked the zipper down, and carefully extracted a wool suit, dark tan. “Wanna see me in it?” When he nodded yes, I went on, “Well, you’ll have to give me a couple of minutes to change, then.” He didn’t budge, so I added, “Um, wait in the hall, OK?”
I opened the door, let him in, and paraded around in a very clumsy imitation of a fashion model. I skipped the hair toss, knowing what it would do to my already unruly locks. “I’m sorry, but I’m not one of those girls who was taught to walk as if she were carrying books on her head.”
“That looks just right for you,” he said quickly. “Listen, next Sunday, we go to the conservatory, to look at the Christmas displays. It’s our one family tradition. Do you want to come?”
I started doing a very klutzy hora and sang, “Tradition! And who does Mama teach to mend and tend and fix, preparing me to marry whoever Papa picks?”
“Huh? What’s that?” Mike blurted.
“Fiddler! Fiddler on the Roof? We saw it a couple of summers back on Broadway.”
Mike’s smile looked a little sad. “You’re so lucky, you’ve got a family that does things like that. Four kids, it must be fun, when you’re all together.”
“Well, Eddie’s so much older, George never talks, Linda always in her own world, daddy’s away working, I never thought of us as ‘fun’. More like together, but apart.”
That next week, the week before Christmas, we spent every day together, just exploring the city. We’d walk all afternoon, around his neighborhood or mine. Sometimes we’d walk through a department store, or go to one of the new shopping centers, and make fun of all the people rushing for presents, buying things they didn’t want or need, just because everyone else was doing it. One night, he drove me through Clifton to look at lights on houses. I’d never done that before. It was enjoyable, kind of fairy-like, as long as I didn’t think about the holiday behind it. Another night, we finally got to see Alfie, walking out talking like cockneys. Mike tried to hold an handkerchief over his arm, waiter-like, the same as Michael Caine. It kept falling to the ground because he couldn’t keep his arm still. He was always throwing it around to point at something or emphasize his thoughts. I started feeling warm and safe again, cocooned with Michael in our own special world, one where we alone knew what was right and wrong, where everyone else didn’t have a clue. Walking, we fit together perfectly, his arm around my shoulder, mine across his back, locked at the hips, legs moving synchronously. I felt us becoming one person, one being, with two minds, merging closer. When he brought me home, we’d hug tighter than than the night before, locking ourselves together for what seemed minutes, ending with kisses, fast and slow, never wanting to let go. Reluctantly, we’d separate, knowing we could start again tomorrow.
The night after Alfie, on my porch, we rubbed noses along with everything else. He started laughing, “Your nose is cold, so cold. Is this why Eskimos do it, to warm their noses?”
I felt the tip of my nose. It didn’t feel at all cold to me, but then, maybe my hands weren’t all that warm. After all, we’d been walking around in almost freezing weather, and I was never one for gloves. I remembered what my mother said to me when I was little, and complained about feeling cold there, at the end of my nose. So I laughed along with him, saying, “Yeah, I guess I’d make a good dog, wouldn’t I?” He looked puzzled, so I went on, “Dogs. They always have cold noses, don’t they?” That became one of our little things. Whenever our faces would get close enough to touch noses, and he noticed mine was cold, he’d cup his hand over it, to warm it up.
I’d heard other girls talking about the boys they went out with, how they were always asking to “go farther”. I wondered why I never felt that sense of urgency from him, especially since he’d gone away to college, where parents weren’t around and restraints were gone. He seemed content, happy, maybe even overwhelmed just by what we were doing. I was very relieved by this unspoken attitude, as one of my biggest fears once I found myself growing physically from girl to woman, was having to submit to a boy’s physical advances, just to get his love. It seemed wrong, unfair. I was every bit as smart and capable as any boy I knew at school, and didn’t want someone else to rule my life or desires. With Mike, I was sure we were equals, in every way.
********