“Karen’s Room” excerpt

Our group first came together at a dance in mid-March in the gym of St. Francis De Sales High School, where Bill and I were both seniors. He and I were longtime friends even though we couldn’t have been more different: I was tall (about six-one), good-looking, and confident, while Bill was medium height (around five-seven), average-looking, and sheepish. We’d known each other practically since birth, thanks to our mothers being best friends, and he’d always been a trustworthy friend to me. I regularly got invites to hang out with some of the cooler crowds in school and in the neighborhood, but I never ditched him, and he and I had some very fun times together as we grew up.
       That night, the Senior Prom loomed, and both of us were on the look-out for potential dates. Since he’d sat out his Junior Prom, Bill’s mom demanded that he attend his Senior Prom, so he enlisted my help in finding a date. Bill had only ever gone out on a few dates in his life at that point, and he didn’t recall those evenings with much excitement. I, on the other hand, had been on many dates with numerous girls, and a few of them even morphed into relationships, though they didn’t last long. The girls I picked weren’t exactly the best and brightest, more like the prettiest and most willing, the type of girls who didn’t need much coaxing to lose their clothes and get in the sack with me. Yes, I’ll admit it: I was your typical teenage horndog back then, only interested in sex and naked girls and anything that brought the two together. A part of me did desire the type of lasting romantic relationship that some people are lucky enough to find in high school, but I had too much fun jumping from girl to girl and I didn’t want to be tied down to anything too serious, especially with graduation approaching.
       The dance happened a week or two after I’d ended a fiery affair with a redhead named Anya, so I needed a date as well. At that point, the prom was still about a month and half away, but if you didn’t already have a girlfriend, you needed to lock up any available ladies quickly and hope they still held your interest (or vice versa) once prom night arrived. We spent the first hour checking out the scene and finding girls for every taste, though none stuck out to either of us so we kept on looking.
       And then I saw her: five-six, shoulder length blonde hair, large breasts on a fit body housed in a tight blue dress, and black knee-high boots. She was stunning. She stood in the back of the gym, like she was waiting for someone. My eyes locked onto her and refused to turn away. She noticed me and gave me a smile. I wanted her. Then another girl walked up to Blondie and they started talking. This girl was cute, had brunette hair, stood an inch or two shorter than her friend, and dressed all in black.
       I pointed the pair out to Bill and suggested we go talk to them. Bill, ever the shy boy, displayed much reticence about speaking to either of them, thinking both girls were out of his league. A minute-long pep talk from me finally convinced him to take a chance and we made our way over to them. We introduced ourselves and spoke with the girls briefly before Bill and I escorted them down to the cafeteria for refreshments.
       We spent an hour at one of the round wooden tables talking over chips and soda. Initially, I had my eye on the blonde (Karen Ludlow) but ended up gravitating more toward the brunette (Joelle Lafferty), since she was very open and talkative, displaying intelligence and wit akin to mine. We shared similar interests in movies, music and books, and quickly developed a strong rapport. Bill and Karen both sat quietly while Joelle and I conversed, but eventually, they started making small talk with each other and I could see some chemistry developing between them. Karen had a soft disposition that I think allowed Bill to come out of his shell, little by little.
       Through conversation, Karen and Joelle revealed that they were longtime best friends and lived around the corner from each other (Joelle with her parents and older sister, Karen with her divorced single mother). Both were juniors and had just turned seventeen back in February, their birthdays only a few days apart (Bill and I were still seventeen at that point, with my birthday in August and Bill’s in October). The girls attended different schools, Karen a neighborhood public school and Joelle a private Christian all-girls academy.
       When we got tired of chatting, the four of us went back up to the gym and danced. Both Karen and Joelle had some good moves, swaying fluidly with the music and I (thankfully) inherited my dad’s sense of rhythm and didn’t look too bad out there myself. Bill, on the other hand, looked like a confused penguin, moving from foot to foot in an agitated waddle while moving his arms every so often. Joelle did her best to control her laughter while Karen smiled sympathetically at him. He did better with the slow dances at the end of the night, only stepping on Karen’s feet a handful of times. When the dance ended, Karen invited Bill and me for a post-dance hang-out at her house with her and Joelle, and we accepted. The girls hitched a ride with Karen’s mom while Bill rode with me in my black Nissan Altima.

       On the drive up, Bill seemed both excited and nervous. He really liked Karen, and she seemed to like him, but he feared doing or saying something that might mess things up. I told him to play it cool and be himself, since that’s what turned her onto him in the first place. I hoped he wouldn’t need my help too much, since I wanted to continue working on my chemistry with Joelle.
       We arrived at Karen’s house, located in the middle of a block of twin homes. Joelle, still dressed in her dance clothes, let us in. The interior had a shabby, wood-hued grace to it. Karen’s mom, who could’ve passed for her daughter’s twin, lounged on the couch watching TV with Jasmine the Pomeranian at her side. Mrs. Ludlow greeted us with a nice smile and a pleasant demeanor. Karen came down the stairs, now wearing a midriff-bearing T-shirt and sweat shorts, her tanned legs and perfect feet on full display. She seemed more comfortable now that she was at home and out of her dance clothes. Bill’s eyes never left her. She told us she’d ordered pizza, so we hung out in the living room until it arrived. Then Karen led us upstairs into the back bedroom.
       Once inside Karen’s room, I was immediately struck by the aroma of candles and fruit-scented air fresheners, not to mention her bright pink walls. Her bed, complete with solid posts at all four corners, was in the back corner of the room. Next to it was a nightstand, which had an alarm clock along with some lotions and other toiletries necessary for a peaceful night’s sleep for the fashionable female teenager. A computer desk with a pink swivel chair sat next to her bed and a TV, DVD player, and a small stereo rested on a wooden cart directly across from the bed. Her dresser sat to the right of the door with a tri-shelved bookcase directly across it. Naturally, I gravitated toward the bookcase and examined its contents. Amidst a plethora of teen chick lit novels (such as Twilight and Gossip Girl) and assigned-reading classics, I noticed a well-worn copy of Catcher in the Rye and smiled as I pulled it from the shelf.
       “You’re a girl after my own heart, Karen,” I said, brandishing the book.
       “That’s my mom’s copy, actually,” she responded as she sat on her bed and bade Bill to join her. “I never read it. I borrowed the Cliffs Notes off of a classmate.”
       I didn’t hide my shock: “Oh, no, that’s unacceptable. You must read this. This book changed my life.”
       “That,” Joelle said with a chuckle as she sat next to the bed on the floor, “a stupid book about a whiny kid aimlessly traipsing around New York changed your life? And I thought you had taste!”
       “This is a classic!”
       “It’s crap. Lit-hipster crap.”
       I shook my head, put the book back in its place, and sat down next to Joelle. “You should read it again sometime. The writing, the dialogue, the sense of place and character. Holden Caulfield’s the man.”
       “No way,” she said. “Holden Caulfield’s an unsympathetic goob.”
       “Name me one book that’s better than Catcher in the Rye.”
       “I can name several: Jane Eyre, Pride and Prejudice, The Bell Jar…”
       “Oh, give me a break!”
       We continued with our good-natured ribbing of each other’s reading preferences for another minute before Karen begged us to stop lest we bore her to tears, leading Joelle to quip that celebrity gossip and fashion blogs represented the extent of Karen’s voluntary reading.
       The four of us hung out in Karen’s room for two hours, chatting and joking while eating pizza and drinking soda. The conversational topics varied wildly, from movies we liked to past dating experiences. We even played a quick round of “Truth or Dare,” though the truth questions were lightweight, like disclosing a favorite color or telling about a first kiss, and the dares didn’t get terribly risqué either. Joelle balanced a can of soda on her forehead for thirty seconds and looked like a master doing it. I ate a piece of pizza crust slathered with spearmint toothpaste. Karen acted out a scene from Titanic using a huge stuffed teddy bear as Jack. Then, for Bill’s turn, Karen showed mercy and only dared him to rub her feet. He started out reluctantly but Karen begged him to rub harder and so he did, causing Karen to close her eyes and let out groans of enjoyment that bordered on orgasmic. While this went on, Joelle and I cleaned up the pizza and went downstairs, flirting with each other in the kitchen as we waited for them to finish.
       Karen’s mom offered Bill a ride home (with Karen accompanying them) while I walked Joelle to her house. Once we stepped onto her front porch, we started making out feverishly, having kept our desire for each other at bay while in the presence of our friends. After a few minutes of this, we agreed to go out on an official date the next night. I brought up the prom, and Joelle promised that as long as our first date went well, she would go with me. Then, after a long last kiss, she went inside. I later found out that while Joelle and I were locking lips, Bill and Karen also shared their first kiss, though from Bill’s description, it was much chaster than ours. Before they parted, Bill asked Karen to the prom and she accepted. Overall, the evening had been a success for everyone.