Wallflower Blooming

Crash and burn, Mundy, I said to myself after I spoke.

"Maybe you're right," Sharon replied. "I'm not real good around people. That's probably why I spend so much time here. The cats - they don't judge me or make fun of me."

"I didn't know how you felt about me," Sharon continued after an awkward moment of silence.

"I don't know how you couldn't tell," I said. "I'm always trying to talk to you. How many times have I asked you out?"

"I don't know. I figured that my parents probably put you up to it - or John. Like out of pity or something," Sharon said. "I think they're trying to convert me or something. Trying to keep me from being a lesbian."

"Are you?" I asked. "Is that why..."

"No, I don't think I am," Sharon said, her big brown eyes never bigger. "I'm... nothing."

"Not to me you aren't. I've followed you around forever. I made a tape of your valedictorian speech at graduation last year that I play whenever I get depressed, and I used to go to all your debate team competitions. Didn't you notice me? It's not like there was a packed auditorium."

"I guess I did see you there a couple of times," Sharon said. "I figured you must have missed the bus and had to stick around for the late ones. They're kind of boring, except for that one that there was a fight in the back."

"That was me," I admitted. "Me and Marty Leach actually. He was being a wise-ass, so I pulled him outside."

"Was he the one going 'rivet-rivet' when I talked?" Sharon asked, and I sheepishly nodded.

"Rivet rivet!" Sharon repeated in her deep and husky voice, making me smile. "Kind of funny, and painfully accurate."

"I love the sound of your voice," I confessed. "Honestly."

"I believe you. That's kind of neat, knowing that. You were like my knight in shining armor, coming to my defense, and I never even knew about it until now."

"A very ineffective knight," I said in correction. "I got a bloody nose and three days suspension out of it. Like everything else I try to do, it never comes out like it does in the movies."

"Life is like that," Sharon added.

We sat and looked at each other in the cramped car for a few minutes, and I decided that no matter what, I was glad that I had finally gotten everything out of my system. I felt better about it all, and it seemed like the weight of the world was off of my shoulders.

"I don't make a very good first impression, or any other kind either," I finally said. "Nobody wants to go to a prom with a bawling fool."

"You would have to cry non-stop for a year to match the tears I've shed over the years," Sharon admitted. "I don't think it makes a guy less manly if he cries. Shows he has a heart. But I'm really not a prom person, Ray. Can you imagine me in a prom dress?"

"Yes. I not only could but I have, many times. I've fantasized about you in just about every way you can think about. In every manner of dress and undress."

Sharon fidgeted a bit at that, and I noticed her nervously pull her sweatshirt sleeves back down to her wrists almost in a defensive movement.

"You don't understand," Sharon said. "I'm not - I've got, you know, some body image issues. I'm not really..."

"Look, I know you don't believe this, but I find you the most attractive woman in the world," I told her. "Everything that you hate about yourself? I'll bet anything that those are the things that I love."

Sharon scrunched her nose up at that, forcing her to slide her glasses back up her nose as I continued.

"Like just now, when you pulled your sleeves down? I remember the first day I saw you, and you were wearing a short-sleeved blouse. I saw your arms and I swear that I thought you had the most gorgeous arms. You never wear short sleeves anymore, and today when I saw you with your sleeves pulled up I got so excited and - well, I loved it."

I think I must have stunned her, because Sharon seemed to be a bit taken aback by my confessions to her, but at least she didn't hit me or throw me out of the car.

"Did what I said bother you?" I asked. "I didn't mean to offend you. It's just that, well - that's the way I feel."

"Are you one of those guys?" Sharon said. "A friend at school told me about people that have these - fetishes."

"I don't know," I said honestly. "Maybe. Maybe not. I love your eyes. You have the biggest and deepest brown eyes, and that was the first thing I noticed about you. Does that make me weird?"

"Guess not."

"I confess to loving the other stuff about you too. Your bangs, and your eyebrows, and this tiny little swirl here?"

I couldn't believe that my hand was actually moving, reaching over across the stick shift and rising up to the side of Sharon's face. She didn't even recoil when my fingers lightly slid along the fur all the way down past her ear, and in fact Sharon even seemed to lean her face toward my hand as it moved.

I started to say I was sorry, but stopped abruptly, instead saying, "No, I'm not sorry. I've wanted to do that for four years, and it was even better than my wildest dreams. Just hope you weren't offended."

"Offended?" Sharon asked, her deep voice rising and quivering. "That was the sweetest thing anybody has..."

Her voice broke as the tears started to trickle down her face, and I reached up and did the same thing to the other side of her face.

"So beautiful," I managed to get out before Sharon leaned over and kissed me, taking my face in her hands and acting like she had waited a lifetime for the moment to kiss a guy that cared about her.

That impression turned out to be a correct one, as she would later confess to me, but if she was inexperienced it didn't show. Her lips were lush and full and they meshed with mine in a way that made it seem like they were meant to be together. I had kissed girls before that - 11 to be precise - but after our kiss finally ended I had forgotten all of the rest.

We grinned as we looked around the car, because even though there was nobody around it was still weird to be necking in the parking lot of the animal shelter that we were supposed to be volunteering at.

"Guess we better get back to the cat poop," Sharon said, breaking us up, and I agreed, exiting the car and heading back to work.

"That was a great kiss," I said. "Just wanted you to know that."

"I know. I mean, it was really nice," Sharon said. "Uh... there's a Bergman film showing on campus tonight. Would you like to go? With me I mean?"

"Yes!" I practically screamed. "Ingrid Bergman? I love Casablanca."

"No. Ingmar Bergman," Sharon said. "Persona. Have you seen it?"

"Oh, no I haven't," I admitted, wondering whether Ingrid had a brother or something, but not really caring because it was going to be a date.

"I can pick you up around 7," Sharon added. "Easier that way. And, please don't tell John, okay? He would probably tease you - us forever. He makes fun of me enough as it is."

I told Sharon that was fine, resisting the urge to tell her that her brother who always made fun of her looks had been peeking into her bedroom for a while, making his words meaningless.

.....

Chapter Five: My date with Sharon.

I was waiting outside when Sharon zoomed up to the front of my house in her bug, and we babbled all the way to her university campus theatre. It seemed like we had removed whatever barrier there was between us before. Sharon chatted non-stop about the director of the movie we were going to see, and I just tried to keep up and absorb what I could, since I had never heard of Ingmar, who was not related to Ingrid.

The movie? Well, let's just say that I didn't have much of a clue as to what was going on, but forced myself to try and pick up at least a bit of what was going on so I didn't make a fool of myself. Saying that the thing I liked best about it that it was pretty short would NOT score points with Sharon.

As it turned out Sharon held the conversation together by herself, and managed to not make a fool of myself when we went to a lounge nearby to continue our discussion.

We had a coffee (Sharon) and an ice tea (me) and shared a big cookie while discussing the merits of the film, which Sharon thought was great. Me, I thought Sharon was great, but then again she already had won me over, even before she took off her sweater when we sat down.

Sharon was wearing a pale pink short-sleeved blouse underneath that sweater, and when I glanced up and saw her taking off that sweater I just about fainted. There they were, in all of their glory, or at least up to her bicep where the sleeve came into play.

"Thank you," I said. "If you wore that blouse for me, that is."

"Yeah," Sharon admitted, running her hands up and down the opposite forearms, and the sight of those long, fine hairs fluttering as her fingers went through them sent a shiver right down the length of my spine. "I'm not as self-conscious around the students here. They're a little more accepting than back in high school."

"Your arms. They're even more beautiful than I remember them," I said, smiling at the way she seemed to enjoy touching the hair herself.

"Probably even hairier now," Sharon said with a shrug and a grimace.

"I don't know about that. All I know is that you have gorgeous arms, and always covering them up under sleeves and sweaters is a crime. Besides, it looks as if you enjoy the way they feel to you."

Sharon glanced down at her arms, probably not realizing what she had been doing, and stopped.

"Didn't mean to ruin your fun," I said apologetically. "I was enjoying it as much as you were."

"Habit, I guess," Sharon said.

"May I?" I asked, moving my hand across the little round barrel of a table and putting my hand above her right wrist.

When Sharon didn't object, I let my hand travel up her arm right up to her elbow, discovering that I was right. The hair wasn't course or rough like a man's, but instead was so fine and downy that it felt like nothing I had ever experienced before.

After my hand went back down to Sharon's wrist, I saw that her skin was now covered in goose bumps and that the hairs on her arm were now standing straight up, almost like a porcupine.

"Did I do that? I asked, and Sharon nodded while biting her lower lip. "That was the most erotic thing I've ever done."

"I was so wrong about you," Sharon said. "You're so unlike any other guy I've ever met. You're so gentle and sweet in everything you do. Were you always like this, even back in ninth grade?"

"Just more clumsy back then," I said as I moved my hands down to cover Sharon's which she had cupped in front of her coffee.

"I feel like I wasted four years," Sharon said. "You make me feel so - I can't explain it. When we kissed in the car earlier today? That was the first time I kissed a guy. Outside of my family, I mean."

"Really? I couldn't tell."

"Even when I played spin-the-bottle once years ago, the boy said he didn't want to kiss the girl with the moustache."

"You don't have a moustache," I told her, the very faint down not being any different that many other girls had. "Your eyes see things much differently then much of the world does."

"Well, regardless. That kiss today? I liked it," Sharon said, looking around while turning her hands over to squeeze mine. "A lot."

"Good. Me too," I said. "Maybe we could do it again sometime."

"Check please," Sharon yelped, pulling me to my feet and grabbing my hand, making me run to keep up with her as she skipped out the door.

......

Chapter Six: Walking through the gardens.

Sharon took me back to a garden area behind the rathskeller, and when I noticed that she hadn't let go of my hand I got a real grip on it. This seemed to delight Sharon, who began swinging our arms in rhythm with our walk.

"It's nice back here," I said, stubbing my toe on a rock as we weaved through the statues and shrubbery. "If it wasn't so dark we could probably see better."

"I don't want it brighter. Do you?" Sharon asked.

"No," I told her, looking into those big brown eyes and feeling my heart flutter.

Sharon was about three inches shorter than my nearly 6' height, making her the perfect height for me to wrap my arms around her, as well as for her to put her arms around my neck.

We leaned back against a stone statue, kissing and hugging each other like there was no tomorrow. My hands slid down her back, feeling the straps of her bra, but I resisted the urge to work my way into it, content to just rub her back until we heard somebody coming down the same path as we had been on.

"I've seen other couples go back here and I've wanted to sneak back here and do this all year myself," Sharon explained. "Never had anybody to come back here with though."

Well, she did now, as far as I was concerned.

For the next week or two, we kept meeting in our clandestine way, talking and necking in her car, and even going to another movie at the campus. This one, Easy Rider, I even understood.

But no matter what we did, it was always about Sharon. We hadn't progressed beyond necking but not because I didn't want to. I was just afraid that I would scare her off, and really didn't want her to think that sex was all I cared about. That was funny, because I hadn't really felt like that with other girls.

Sharon called me up Saturday morning, and after chatting for awhile she mentioned that my senior prom was that night.

"I know," I said. "I'd rather be with you.

"John's going," Sharon told me.

"I know."

"My parents are going to visit my grandmother down in Long Island. That means we have the house to ourselves, if you're interested that is."

Was I interested? I was parked down the street around 7 that evening, waiting for John to hop in his car and head down the street. He didn't see me, but I saw him, and he looked really goofy in his light blue tuxedo.

As soon as he went down the street, I barreled up the road and parked a few houses away before I ran up to the door. The door flew open and Sharon jumped into my arms, greeting me like I hadn't seen her in years instead of less than 24 hours ago.

"What's in the bag?" Sharon asked, straightening out her glasses that we had gotten off kilter in our enthusiasm.

"Champagne!" I said, proudly holding up the cheap bottle of Cold Duck that I had bought for the occasion.

"Are we going to do something to celebrate?" Sharon asked, and I stammered and blushed in response.

"What happened to my guy that has been so honest and up-front all this time?" Sharon asked, displaying a frisky side that I found adorable. "What's that for? To get me drunk so you can have your way with me?"

"I would have bought two bottles for that, because I don't think there's enough to get us very tipsy."

"Okay then, but maybe I need a drink before I show you something I bought," Sharon said, leading the way to the kitchen where I popped the cork, which bounced off a wall and the ceiling and had the cats going crazy chasing it when it landed.

We both made faces after we tasted the bubbly, but the taste didn't stop us from finishing our glasses. Motioning to the bag on the table, I asked Sharon if that was what it was that she bought.

"Yep!" Sharon said, grabbing the bag and reaching in before stopping. "it's clothes. Would you rather she it here or have me put it on?"

"Put it on."

"Not here," Sharon said. "Let's go upstairs."

I went up the stairs behind Sharon, ogling her butt on the way, and when we got upstairs and she ducked into her room, I was on her heels. As soon as I got inside, Sharon closed the door behind us.

"Just in case," she said, turning the bar on the knob to lock it.

.......

Chapter Seven: Sharon's room.

As I looked around the room, it seemed like it was just like a couple of the other teenage girls who had allowed me in their inner sanctums. Teddy bears and posters of flowers and cats all over the place, and I realized that no matter how adult and mature Sharon had always acted, she was still a young woman.

I glanced behind me to a poster of a peace sign, and figured that was where her brother must have had that peep hole. Funny how something that had seemed like such an awesome thing to do a few eeks ago felt so cheap and sleazy and invasive to me now.

"Where are you going?" I asked Sharon, who was in the process of going into what appeared to be a closet.

"Putting on this thing," Sharon shouted from behind the door. "Sit down and wait and minute."

I sat at a chair which was in front of a little dresser with a mirror on it, and I happened to glance up at the corner of the mirror. Written in lipstick, or magic marker or something else red, was my name. Ray. She also wrote it on a pad, several times, in both cursive and printed and even inside a heart she had written Ray & Sharon.

If this had been any other girl, I might have - no, I would have kidded them about it. For an 18 year old girl - woman, to have written stuff this on her mirror, I would have considered it juvenile, but this was different.

This was Sharon, and it struck me for the very first time that she had waited her entire life for this. For me. Teenage years spent visiting other girls her age who had their boyfriends names written on their mirrors and books, while she had nothing. Nothing but the memory of being called names and being ridiculed by her classmates.

I turned away from the dresser and went back to looking at the closet door, just in time to see Sharon stick her arm out with the blouse she had been wearing in hand.

"Hoo-hoo!" I shouted as she started humming that song they play when somebody does an exotic dance or something. "You can come out now."

"No, I can't," Sharon said. "Not yet."

Her hand went back behind the door only to emerge soon after with her bra in hand, and when she tossed that over where her blouse had landed I took a deep breath.

"You can definitely come out now," I suggested, my voice warbling a little at the end.

"In a minute," Sharon said, as I heard a rustling noise followed by a clattering sound.

"Crap," Sharon muttered as her glasses skittered along the floor. "Okay. Are you ready?"

Ready? I was more than ready and told Sharon just that.

"Ray, I know you're too nice a guy to laugh or anything, but if you don't like this, or if I look as horrible as I think I do, please think of a nice way to tell me. Something like throwing it in the garbage after I take it off."

"I'm waiting."

"I got this for you," Sharon said, babbling away from behind the closet door. "I promise I'll never wear it in public."

"I'm coming into that closet to get you in another ten seconds," I warned her.

The closet door opened, and as slowly as was humanly possible, Sharon stepped out from behind the door.

...

Chapter Eight: Sharon.

I think that many of us go through a moment in their lives when they are so vulnerable and helpless, that a wrong word would absolutely devastate them. Not merely upset them or hurt their feelings, but totally destroy them.

This was Sharon's moment. She stood there about five feet away from me, and it looked like her entire body was shimmering or shaking. Either that or my eyes were watering, but as she stood there, she must have felt like she was naked on Times Square at rush hour. Arms to the side and shifting her weight from foot to foot, Sharon stood with her teeth embedded in her lip as she waited for my reaction.

What she had bought, for me and my enjoyment, was just a very simple tie-dyed tank top. Orange, yellow and green designs all over the blouse, which was just a standard tank top t-shirt with spaghetti straps that exposed very little but revealed everything that Sharon was ashamed of.

"Say something," Sharon finally said, reaching down and picking up her glasses. "Please."

"If I tell you what I really think, do you promise not to tell me I'm full of it?" I asked.