• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

I'd told my theory to my friend Linda, who wanted to be a social scientist and was always coming up with theories herself. I'd concluded that breasts were to sex what pillows were to sleep. "Guys might think they want a pillow, but they'll sleep just as well without one."

She'd said, "Guys will sleep anywhere if they're really tired."

—•—

That night, when Julia got into her bunk, I told her that she could go into Henry's now if she wanted; she didn't have to wait for me to fall asleep. I said, "I think I might be older than you think I am."

She stopped, and seemed to be choosing her words. I wanted her to know she didn't have to do this either, but I couldn't think how to say it without insulting her.

She admitted that she didn't really know anyone my age. "I keep trying to remember what I was like at fourteen," she said. "Other than books, I think all I cared about was my horse, Cinders."

I pictured her in one of those black velvet hats with the little bows on top. I said, "What happened to Cinders?"

"Boys?" She smiled at me. Then we said good night and she went to my brother's room.

In the middle of the night, on my way to the bathroom, I noticed that his door had blown open. Before I closed it, I saw them in his single bed, sleeping in a loose hug, his arms holding her bare back.

—•—

A few weekends later, the sky was white and the air moist; the forecast was rain, but my mother kept looking up at the sky and saying it was sure to clear up.

In the afternoon, Julia sat at the table, marking up a manuscript from work. As she finished a page, she passed it to Henry to read. "Come join us, Jane," she said.

I was a little afraid to; I thought I might reveal that I wasn't as smart as Julia might think. But I took the seat next to Henry, and read his discard pile.

I liked the pages I read, about a girl whose parents were getting divorced; it was more real than I would've expected.

When I looked up, my parents were watching the three of us and smiling.

I told Julia how much I liked the book and it made her really excited. Mostly she edited children's books, but she was starting to publish ones for my age group, which she called YA, or young adult.

Once my parents were out of earshot, I admitted that I hardly went to the library, and when I did I asked the librarian for books that she felt would be inappropriate for my age.

I told Julia that novels for my age group always seemed to be about what your life was supposed to be like, instead of what it was. Same with magazines. "Even the ads are false," I said. "Like they'll show a boy picking up a girl for a date with a handful of daisies behind his back. Nobody my age goes on dates. The word 'date' is not even in my vocabulary."

Julia was so interested that I was tempted to tell her about The House, the abandoned shack by the railroad tracks where kids went to get high and make out. I'd only gone there once, when a boy I liked casually mentioned that he'd be there.

When I walked in, he said, "Hey." I smoked a cigarette and tried to act like I belonged there. He came over and sat with me on the ripped sofa. He passed me the bong. I shook my head, and smiled as though I was already really high. Then he leaned over, just as I'd wanted him to. But he whispered, "Are you horny?"—the opposite of a sweet nothing.

—•—

They had other places to go—Julia had friends in Ama-gansett and Fire Island—and the weekend they went up to Marthas Vineyard, I brought Linda to the shore. We slept in the lower bunks. When I told her about Julia sneaking into Henry's room, she asked if I thought they had sex in there.

I heard my father's voice coming from my parents' bedroom and wondered if they could hear me. I whispered, "Can you have sex without making any noise?"

"Who knows?" she said.

I thought of the words Julia used, and imitated her breathing heavily and saying, "Exquisite. Extraordinary. You're no octogenarian, Hank." We laughed, but right afterward, trying to fall asleep, I felt terrible.

—•—

On the beach, Linda became her social-scientist self and said, "At the