In 1966, students in Pinellas County attended three years of high school, and right after Labor Day, I started tenth grade at a school in south St. Petersburg, a prisonlike structure where two thousand students studied. Classrooms were crowded, as were the hallways and the cafeteria. In the boys’ locker room, where we had to shower at the end of each PE class, muscular seniors snapped the tenth graders’ butts with wet towels. They hurled insulting names at us like “punk” or “faggot” or “pussy.”
I was still numb from losing Kevin and sort of sleepwalked through my days. I made no attempt to involve myself in campus activities. Who cared about service clubs or singing in the mixed chorus or joining the thespian society? I had already tasted the best life had to offer, courtesy of Kevin, and now my fellow students didn’t interest me in the least.
Weekends, I surfed at the sandbar alone. I didn’t enjoy the surfing all that much now that Kevin wasn’t there to share the experience with me, but at least I was out there on the rolling water. I felt the sea breeze on my cheeks and the sun on my shoulders. Plus I could brood while I sat astride my Velzy and waited for a wave to ride.
I saw Kevin only once that fall, and it wasn’t in person. One Saturday morning, I opened the sports page of the St. Petersburg Times to study our county’s high school football scores, and there was a photo of Kevin in his uniform, racing across a goal line with a football under his arm and two opponents chasing him. Kevin, according to the game’s summary, had intercepted a pass, then returned it forty yards for a touchdown. He was the first Bishop Keating safety to do so in many years, his coach said.
I studied the photograph for the longest time while rubbing my chin with a knuckle. I wondered whether Kevin had thought of me even once since the day of his departure from Treasure Island.
Why would he if he’s getting this sort of attention from the world at large?
Christmas break came. Despite my morose attitude toward life, I had worked hard at my fall studies and made honor roll the first two grading periods. My mom rewarded me with a Body Glove wetsuit as a Christmas gift so I could surf in the Gulf’s chilly winter water whenever I chose to.
One weekday afternoon during the break, I had just showered after a two-hour surfing session. My dripping wetsuit hung on the clothesline in our courtyard. I had grown my hair out—it almost reached my shoulders now—and I decided to let my hair dry in the sunshine as well. The day was cool, but the sky was cloudless, the humidity low. I wore blue jeans, a hooded sweatshirt, and sneakers. I sat in our front yard on an Adirondack chair with my eyes closed; I savored the sun’s rays on my face, then heard the rumble of a car’s motor.
I opened my eyes to see Kevin behind the wheel of a shiny Ford Mustang fastback, a metallic blue number with two white racing stripes running from the tip of the hood all the way to the rear bumper. After parking in our driveway, Kevin leapt from the car like Robin exiting the Batmobile on TV. When Kevin did so, I let my gaze travel over his sleek frame, and like always, his beauty sent a shiver through my limbs. He wore corduroy Levi’s, a V-neck sweater, and penny loafers that shone like mirrors. Sunlight reflected on his big teeth when he looked at me and smiled.
I didn’t even get up from my chair. Despite Kevin’s sexiness, I wasn’t too happy about his surprise visit. After all, he had ignored me for nearly four months, so why should I make a big deal over the fact he’d finally decided to drop by? I raised a hand but didn’t smile.
Then I said, “Nice car. Whose is it?”
Kevin walked up to me and mussed my damp hair. “Mine, stupid; it’s a Christmas present from my folks.”
I wasn’t surprised. Kevin’s parents always went overboard when buying him gifts—I think to make up for all the unhappiness in the Corrigan household—and I felt a tinge of jealousy as I studied the car’s gleaming flank.
“I got my driver’s license back in August,” Kevin told me, “and now I have wheels. Want to take a spin?”
I couldn’t say no, of course. The thought of cruising around town in Kevin’s Mustang seemed irresistible. “Let me grab my wallet,” I said.
Minutes later, we rolled down Gulf Boulevard with the radio blaring “Good Lovin’” by the Young Rascals and the wind fluttering our hair as it rushed through the car. Sunlight hammered on the Mustang’s shiny hood while we passed hotels, gas stations, and restaurants. Traffic was light because the Northern tourists would not come to Florida until after the holidays ended.
“I saw your picture in the paper,” I told Kevin.
He nodded. “Our team did great: eight wins and two losses. I won the defensive MVP award at the end-of-the-season banquet.”
Of course, I thought.
When Kevin asked me about my high school and whether I liked it, I only shrugged. “It’s nothing special,” I said. “I don’t get involved with anything there, other than attending class.”
“Sounds boring,” Kevin said.
I didn’t reply to his observation; I only stared out the windshield while we idled at a stoplight.
“Done any surfing at the sandbar?” Kevin asked.
“Some,” I said, then told him about the wetsuit I’d received for Christmas.
“I have one too,” Kevin said. “Maybe sometime soon, I’ll bring my board to your place. We can catch some rides.”
After the light turned green, I stole a glance at Kevin while he accelerated, and it seemed to me that his facial features had grown even sharper since I’d last seen him, especially his cheekbones. Beneath his sweater, his shoulder and arm muscles bulged. If I hadn’t known better, I would have fantasized about touching Kevin, but now I did know better. I wasn’t going to let him hurt my feelings again, and I wouldn’t pretend everything between us was rosy either.
“So,” Kevin said, “besides surfing and going to school, what do you do with your time?”
“Not much,” I said while I drummed my fingers on the passenger door’s sill. “I watch TV, and I still have my yard-care business; it keeps me busy.”
Kevin grunted. Then he asked, “Are you dating anyone?”
I looked at him and made a face. “Do you mean like…going out with a chick?”
He nodded like I’d stated the obvious, and in response, I blew air out my nose while I shook my head.
“What’s wrong?” Kevin said.
“I’m gay. You know I don’t like girls.”
Kevin turned his gaze from me; he kneaded the Mustang’s steering wheel as we left Treasure Island and crossed over a bridge. We entered St. Pete Beach where a new multistoried condominium towered over the Intracoastal Waterway. On the radio, an advertising jingle for a motorcycle dealership blared; it grated on my nerves so badly I switched off the radio entirely.
Kevin kept his gaze on the road before us while he cleared his throat. Then he said, “I thought maybe you’d changed. I figured since you’re in high school now, you—”
“I haven’t changed,” I said, “but what do you care? You’ve got your new car and your football trophy, and I’m sure the girls are all after you, so why would you have any time for me?”
Kevin pursed his lips and shook his head. “You sound like a girl yourself; do you know that?”
Heat rose in my cheeks. I was so angry my vision blurred. “Oh, that’s right,” I said. “I’m like a girl and you’re not. But remember something: you’re the one who crawled into my bed the first time. You started things between us, or have you forgotten?”
Kevin’s face turned as red as a ripe tomato while he kept his gaze straight ahead. Right away, I could tell I’d gotten under his skin. His usual cocky attitude was wavering, and so I kept on.
“What’s the purpose of this visit today?” I said. “To show off your new car?”
Kevin’s breath whistled in his nostrils when he looked at me. His chest rose and fell when he answered. “I came to see you ’cause I’ve missed you, and that’s all. So why are you tossing shit in my face?”
I made a growling sound in my throat while I shook my head. “I haven’t heard from you in four months. And why, because you’re too busy to pick up the phone? Are you telling me you couldn’t have spent at least one weekend with me, not in all that time?”
“You don’t understand,” Kevin said. “Friday nights there’s football. Saturday nights we always have a dance in the gym at school. The girls from St. Mary’s come over; it’s a big deal.”
“A big deal to whom?”
Kevin fluttered a hand. “To everyone.”
I shook my head again. “So you’d rather spend time with girls from St. Mary’s than me?”
Kevin pounded the Mustang’s steering wheel with a fist. Then he yanked the wheel to his left. We screeched across two lanes of traffic and into the parking lot of a vacant restaurant. An oncoming car we’d nearly hit blared its horn in protest. When Kevin braked on the asphalt, his tires squealed. After he shifted to Park, he turned to me in his bucket seat. He got his face in mine, so close I smelled the corned beef sandwich he’d eaten for lunch.
“You’re in high school now,” he cried. “You have to grow up.”
Now I was hollering. “I don’t want to grow up; I want to be with you. I want you to spend the night with me so we can do the things we used to.”
“But I can’t. Don’t you see that?”
I crossed my arms at my chest while I turned my gaze to the windshield. “Why not?” I said before returning my gaze to Kevin. “What’s stopping you?”
Kevin lowered his gaze while he let out his breath. Then he looked into my face again. “If guys on the team knew I did that sort of thing, well…I’d probably get my teeth knocked out. You can’t be gay and play football. You have to date girls; it’s the way things work.”
I scowled at Kevin. “You know what I think?”
“What?”
“I think you used me last summer, only ’cause it was convenient for you. I don’t think you cared about me one bit, even though I cared for you a whole lot. And what an idiot I was for thinking we were actually boyfriends.”
Kevin looked at me and blinked his eyes three or four times. “We were boyfriends, I guess. It’s just we can’t be any longer.”
“Why, because you’re too chickenshit to be who you really are?”
Kevin turned to face the windshield and slumped in his seat while he let out his breath again. We both sat there, listening to traffic pass on the boulevard.
Neither of us spoke for a minute or so until Kevin finally said, “What do you want from me, Jesse?”
“I already told you.”
“And I just told you I can’t.”
“But you could if you really cared.”
After Kevin drew a breath, he looked at his wristwatch. “I need to get back home; I’ll drop you off on my way.”
I flung the passenger door open. “Don’t bother,” I said while I left the car. “I’d rather walk.”