Chapter 28

They all looked so beautiful.

Especially Aleshia. Her slim legs were golden in the afternoon sunlight. When she whirled around, her pleated skirt flew high, giving Eric glimpses of her thighs and green underpants. When she jumped, plunging her arms at the sky, her sweater slid up and uncovered her belly for an instant.

He knew she didn’t wear bras to school.

If only she would jump higher …

Once, she did a cartwheel and the sweater dropped nearly to her ribs before she whipped to her feet and it fell again into place. He imagined her doing another cartwheel, this time her sweater sliding down all the way and uncovering her small, pale breasts.

He realized he had an erection. Glancing down, he saw it pushing out his corduroys. He folded his hands in front of the bulge, and turned his eyes toward Beth.

Though nowhere as pretty as Aleshia, Beth was fairly cute. Doing the cheers, she seemed more enthusiastic than the others. Compared to her, the rest of the girls looked lazy, almost bored.

Her arms snapped forward as the voices chanted, ‘Push ’em back, push ’em back, waaaay back. ’ At the cheer’s end, she bounded from the ground, arching her back, waving her arms, kicking her feet up high behind her. Eric looked quickly at Aleshia and found her in mid-air, her sweater up, her belly showing pale and smooth.

He imagined sliding his hands up her belly, up under the sweater where it was warm and dark, and taking her breasts in his hands, holding them gently, his palms barely touching the velvet skin.

‘Hi Eric! ’ Beth called, waving at him. ‘We’re almost done. ’

He nodded and yelled, ‘Okay. ’

A few of the girls huddled around Beth. Eric guessed they were talking about him. He wished he could hear them, but they spoke quietly and the distance was great.

What if they’d seen his bulge?

How could he face Beth, after that?

The girls weren’t giggling, though. Soon, they stopped talking and resumed practice.

Eric turned away. He walked along the side of the field, his back to the cheerleaders. Though he wished he could watch them, he didn’t want to embarrass himself by getting another erection. So he walked along, listening.

‘We are the Spartans, the mighty-mighty Spartans! Everywhere we go-o, people oughtta kno-ow, who we are so we tell ’em. We are the Spartans …’

He saw the football team ahead, running a scrimmage. The coach was there, so none of the jerks were likely to try anything with Eric. Just to be safe, though, he turned away and walked toward the school.

He glanced back at the cheerleaders and saw them in a line, kicking their legs high.

Finally, he reached the main building. He sat on the steps to wait for Beth. From there, he could barely hear the chants of the cheerleaders. He watched the girls dance and leap, but they were tiny now, their features less distinct. He found it difficult to tell one from another. Beth, the only stocky girl of the five, was easy to spot, but he couldn’t make up his mind which of the others was Aleshia.

As he waited, the coldness of the concrete seeped through his pants. He began to feel as if he were sitting on a slab of ice. Raising himself off the step, he slid his grammar book beneath him. He sat on it. The book felt warm under his buttocks.

Opening his three-ring binder to a blank page, he began to doodle. He drew a revolver, but it turned out crooked, the barrel curving upward as if bent by Superman. His Bowie knife came out well. He inked in drops of blood falling from its blade. Encouraged by his success with the knife, he tried to draw a P-40 Kittyhawk. The fuselage looked good, but he had trouble with the wings and tail. He went ahead, regardless, and drew the shark’s mouth on the engine cowling. When he was done, the combat plane looked lopsided but vicious.

On the back of the page, he drew an oblong and imagined it was a girl’s torso. Aleshia’s torso. He sketched breasts onto it. They were merely two circles with dots in the middle, but as his pen stroked the paper he could almost feel their smooth flesh.

Then he heard voices nearby.

The cheerleaders, done with practice, were wandering in his direction.

With a few swift strokes, he drew a nose between the breasts, a grinning mouth below them. He put ears on the torso, and a patch of scraggly hair on top.

‘Okay, see you tonight, ’ Beth said, breaking away from the group. She headed for Eric, while the other girls continued around the side of the school.

Eric stood up.

‘I hope you didn’t mind waiting, ’ Beth said.

‘No, it was fun. ’ He picked up his books, and saw that she had none. ‘Do you need anything inside? ’

She shook her head, smiling. ‘I finished all my homework in study hall. ’

‘Wish I had. ’

They started to walk.

‘What’ve you got? ’ Beth asked.

‘Homework? About six chapters of Huckleberry Finn. I fell behind this week. ’

‘You have Miss Bennett, don’t you? ’

‘Yeah. Fourth period. ’

‘I’ve got her first. She’ll be at the party, you know. ’

‘Aleshia’s? ’

‘Yeah. She’s the only teacher Aleshia invited. So, what do you think we should wear? ’

‘I don’t know. What do you think? ’

‘It’d be neat if we could go as a pair. You know, like Laurel and Hardy or the Blues Brothers. ’

‘How about Tarzan and Jane? ’

Laughing, she bumped him with her shoulder. ‘That’s awful. Besides, we’d freeze. ’

‘We’ll be inside. ’

‘You go as Tarzan, if you want. I’ll wear clothes. ’

‘You’re right, ’ Beth said. ‘Any ideas? ’

‘I’d like to be something real spooky. ’

‘Like what? ’

Eric shrugged.

‘It’ll have to be something simple, ’ Beth said as they crossed the deserted faculty parking lot. ‘We haven’t got much time. ’

‘Do you have some old, ragged clothes? An old dress or something you can wreck up? ’

‘I guess so. ’

‘Great. ’

‘What’s great? ’

‘What’s the scariest thing you can think of? ’

She shrugged. ‘I don’t know. I haven’t thought about it. A psycho, I guess. You know, like those guys that rape girls and torture them to death. ’ She wrinkled her nose at the thought. ‘Wouldn’t be much fun to dress like that. ’

‘What about the living dead? ’

‘Like Walkers? ’

‘I was thinking Night of the Living Dead. ’

‘I never saw that. I heard it’s yucky. ’

‘It’s great. Anyway, we can dress up like one of those – if you don’t mind looking sloppy. ’

‘No, that’s fine. ’

‘You want to? ’

‘Sure. I guess. ’

‘Okay. So wear a dress you don’t need anymore. ’

‘Is that it? ’