Read Online When We Were Animals by Joshua Gaylord - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Joshua Gaylord
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something beneath the foundation of the tower, a rumbling in the earth itself that shook to delightful danger all those lattices of cold, cerebral mortar.
* * *
I had lost track of time in the attic, and when we climbed down the ladder I was surprised to see that a pale, dry dusk had infiltrated the house while we weren’t looking.
“Uh-oh,” I said.
“What?”
“Prayer Moon. It’s the first night.”
Peter went to the window and gazed up at the sky.
“It’s still early enough,” he said. “I don’t live that far away. I can make it.”
“No, you can’t. The moon’s up.”
“But look—it’s quiet. I can make it. They wouldn’t bother with me much anyway.”
But my father, arriving home, wouldn’t hear of it. He called Peter’s mother and told her he would stay in our house for the night. There was plenty of room—such a big house for just my father and me. The couch in the upstairs den folded out into a bed, and I got sheets from the linen closet and made it up.
It was the first time there had been a boy sleeping in the house, and I wanted to assure my father that nothing untoward would happen. I found him in the kitchen while Peter was watching TV in the den.
“I told Peter he shouldn’t come out of the den after ten o’clock,” I said. “You can check on us if you want. Any time you feel like it.”
My father grinned in confusion and shook his head.
“I’m sure everything will be fine,” he said. “I trust you, little Lumen.”
That was nice to hear, but at the same time I had recently grown irritated by the idea that I was so invariably trustworthy. Hadn’t I just spent the afternoon in the attic kissing, of all people, Peter Meechum? Hadn’t I kissed right through sunset?
“How come you trust me so much? None of the other parents trust their kids so much.”
He smiled again, gently. And again there was something in it I didn’t care for. Was it condescension?
“Well,” he said, “you’ve never disappointed me yet. Never once. Such a perfect record earns you plenty of trust. Besides, you’re fifteen.”
I wasn’t entirely sure what the fact of my age had to do with anything, but I had an impression—and he turned to the sink immediately after he’d said it, as though embarrassed.
He made spaghetti and meatballs for dinner, and Peter and I were responsible for the garlic toast. Peter made a big production of spreading the garlic butter on the bread, and I topped it with the ocher-colored seasoned salt.
We listened to music during dinner—as we often did during the moons. That night it was the opera Turandot .
“The opera’s about a princess,” I explained, because I had read the libretto the previous year. “She refuses to marry any man unless he answers three riddles first. If he answers any of them incorrectly, he’s put to death.”
“I guess she has her reasons,” Peter said, and I couldn’t tell if he was joking.
“She’s a princess of death,” I said with great seriousness. “It’s her nature.”
After dinner Peter and I watched TV in the den upstairs, sitting side by side on the couch that had been made up as his bed. We turned the TV loud so we wouldn’t hear anything from outside. After a while we fell to kissing again.
It surprised me how quickly the whole thing became mechanical. I found myself too aware of the way our lips met, mapping out the movements of his tongue in my mouth. First he would kiss me square on the mouth, then take my lower lip between his two lips and leave a cold wet spot on my chin that I wanted to wipe off. Then he would turn his head sideways a little, as though passion were all about angles. (If we had been able to kiss with one of our faces turned completely upside down, I suppose that would have been truly making love.) Then he would leave a trail of ticklish kisses from the corner of my mouth up the side of my face to my ear, the lobe of which he took in his mouth. Then a bite or two on the neck,
* * *
I had lost track of time in the attic, and when we climbed down the ladder I was surprised to see that a pale, dry dusk had infiltrated the house while we weren’t looking.
“Uh-oh,” I said.
“What?”
“Prayer Moon. It’s the first night.”
Peter went to the window and gazed up at the sky.
“It’s still early enough,” he said. “I don’t live that far away. I can make it.”
“No, you can’t. The moon’s up.”
“But look—it’s quiet. I can make it. They wouldn’t bother with me much anyway.”
But my father, arriving home, wouldn’t hear of it. He called Peter’s mother and told her he would stay in our house for the night. There was plenty of room—such a big house for just my father and me. The couch in the upstairs den folded out into a bed, and I got sheets from the linen closet and made it up.
It was the first time there had been a boy sleeping in the house, and I wanted to assure my father that nothing untoward would happen. I found him in the kitchen while Peter was watching TV in the den.
“I told Peter he shouldn’t come out of the den after ten o’clock,” I said. “You can check on us if you want. Any time you feel like it.”
My father grinned in confusion and shook his head.
“I’m sure everything will be fine,” he said. “I trust you, little Lumen.”
That was nice to hear, but at the same time I had recently grown irritated by the idea that I was so invariably trustworthy. Hadn’t I just spent the afternoon in the attic kissing, of all people, Peter Meechum? Hadn’t I kissed right through sunset?
“How come you trust me so much? None of the other parents trust their kids so much.”
He smiled again, gently. And again there was something in it I didn’t care for. Was it condescension?
“Well,” he said, “you’ve never disappointed me yet. Never once. Such a perfect record earns you plenty of trust. Besides, you’re fifteen.”
I wasn’t entirely sure what the fact of my age had to do with anything, but I had an impression—and he turned to the sink immediately after he’d said it, as though embarrassed.
He made spaghetti and meatballs for dinner, and Peter and I were responsible for the garlic toast. Peter made a big production of spreading the garlic butter on the bread, and I topped it with the ocher-colored seasoned salt.
We listened to music during dinner—as we often did during the moons. That night it was the opera Turandot .
“The opera’s about a princess,” I explained, because I had read the libretto the previous year. “She refuses to marry any man unless he answers three riddles first. If he answers any of them incorrectly, he’s put to death.”
“I guess she has her reasons,” Peter said, and I couldn’t tell if he was joking.
“She’s a princess of death,” I said with great seriousness. “It’s her nature.”
After dinner Peter and I watched TV in the den upstairs, sitting side by side on the couch that had been made up as his bed. We turned the TV loud so we wouldn’t hear anything from outside. After a while we fell to kissing again.
It surprised me how quickly the whole thing became mechanical. I found myself too aware of the way our lips met, mapping out the movements of his tongue in my mouth. First he would kiss me square on the mouth, then take my lower lip between his two lips and leave a cold wet spot on my chin that I wanted to wipe off. Then he would turn his head sideways a little, as though passion were all about angles. (If we had been able to kiss with one of our faces turned completely upside down, I suppose that would have been truly making love.) Then he would leave a trail of ticklish kisses from the corner of my mouth up the side of my face to my ear, the lobe of which he took in his mouth. Then a bite or two on the neck,
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