What You See in the Dark - Manuel Munoz [90]
“Closer,” he urged.
From the record shop, a collection of A sides, purchased by Dan Watson and handed to her in a brown-papered package: “All I Have to Do Is Dream” by the Everly Brothers. “I Only Have Eyes for You” by the Flamingos. “Put Your Head on My Shoulder” by Paul Anka.
An expensive record player and the needles, too.
“Closer.”
The space between is a wide, enormous distance, a destination—there’s so much urgency to get across—the pinpoint of some kind of promise way out beyond seeing. Never close enough.
She moved toward him. She moved toward it.
You extended your hand and he reached for it, strong and now clammy with sweat. She raised her hand to his lips very softly, then rested it on his cheek, cupping his face. He kept his hand over yours, moved his fingers across your cheek, your nose, your ears, urging you to touch him. You kissed him and he tasted like cold, like water from a tin cup, the blue-speckled kind.
“Who’s Sorry Now?” by Connie Francis. “Tears on My Pillow” by Little Anthony and the Imperials.
He let go of her hands and she could not feel him at all, just her eyes closed to him and his lips wet and cold. She floated, nothing tethering her but Dan Watson’s lips, his lips parting and becoming his mouth, the cold giving way to a warmer feel, the dart of his tongue searching her. This was the feeling she liked, his strong hands on her arms, holding her to him, an anticipation, like walking past a flock of birds feeding on street crumbs, waiting for them to burst into the sky at the slightest threatening motion.
“Poor Little Fool” by Ricky Nelson.
Your boyfriend’s thigh pressed against yours as you sat on the porch swing, and you wanted to open your eyes to see Dan Watson, his rugged and beautiful face, to see him the way the pretty waitress at the Jolly Kone saw him.
They kept kissing, wet and deep. The bed squeaked. Dan Watson inched closer. She could feel the entire plane of his body now—his leg, his torso, his arm—and she reached down and felt the hard length of him. She kept her hand there, not moving, before giving in to his urgency, his fingers pushing her to explore.
There were men who sat at kitchen tables and sang gentle songs with the round O of their mouths. There were men holding guns, both good and bad. There were men riding sinister horses. There were men hell-bent on terrible missions. There were men who nodded their heads politely at the women. All of them had this need. All of them.
He unbuckled his belt, the sound of the metal unlatching, his jeans undone into a deep V, his underwear pulled down to give a full view. She gripped him harder, enjoying how it forced him to close his eyes, how she’d seen him do this at the drive-in, how she’d done it before. His hands rustled up her skirt and she closed her eyes, how one day they’d do this in their white farmhouse.
You closed your eyes, how one day you’d do this in a white farmhouse.
You could never tell those ladies such a thing.
“That Mexican boy,” they said, but they could say nothing more about him.
“I can’t imagine … ,” you said, but you could. That Mexican boy and his gifts in the jar, the way you could feel his hard stare in the darkness of the cantina, the same way you could almost touch the desire of the pretty waitress at the Jolly Kone.
You can imagine.
Maybe an observation, like a coin tossed into a pool of water, just to see the ripples when you tell it.
I heard, you might try, the Mexican boy showed up that night at her apartment. People could finish the story with that, jealousy enough of a fuel to explain what happened.
The people in the theater could tell you that