Chapter 12

Janie Joyce sat on the bed with her back against the wall and held the radio close to her ear. She had turned down the volume until she was sure the music wouldn't bother Ellen or Irene and she remembered the time that Emma had asked her to turn the volume down. Poor Emma! Emma was gone now, gone to a place from where she could never return.

It didn't bother her now. Now she could think about Emma's death without feeling so awfully sick inside. It was funny how you could adjust to things like that. When it happened-that horrible morning-she thought she'd never forget Emma's face up near the ceiling and how her body had turned slowly around and around and around.

The song on the radio was a new one and as she listened to the beat of the music and the words she felt a warmness between her thighs, somewhere deep within her flesh. The warmness made her think of Stanley Scott and again she wondered how it would feel if he made love to her. She had thought about it recently-thought about it a lot. She had tried to stop the thoughts, but they seemed to be something that couldn't be stopped.

Stanley Scott had made love to Ellen. It was love-making, not rape. Ellen had told her, when Irene was asleep, had told her never to tell Irene the truth. It was all very strange. Ellen said Stan hadn't raped her. She was willing. Ellen had told her a lot about Stan. She'd said that Stan was a gentle man, a lonely man. She said she thought Stan had kidnapped them because he was so lonely.

Stan was handsome, Janie decided. Handsome in a rugged sort of way-not the pretty-boy clean-featured handsomeness of so many Hollywood actors, but the rugged handsomeness of a Burt Lancaster or a Kirk Douglas. Stan had been sort of sick the past few days, sneezing a lot and coughing a lot. He almost had pneumonia, Ellen said.

He'd been awfully quiet-she'd felt a strange urge to talk to him, to kiss him-just lightly on the lips. He'd looked so darn sad she'd wanted to do anything to make him feel more cheerful, but it seemed, whenever she washed and dried the dishes, his mind was miles away somewhere and as soon as she finished the dishes, he took her right back to the cellar every time.

Sometimes she almost wished he would make love to her and sometimes the way he looked at her, as if she wasn't a pretty girl at all, made her wonder if he didn't like her or wasn't interested in her for some reason.

She stretched across the bed and turned toward the wall. She placed the radio on the pillow near her ear. The next song was a sad song and it had a strange effect in her loins-a kind of aching emptiness she had felt before whenever she thought about men in a special way. Was this love? A kind of aching emptiness inside that you knew only a man could fill?

Her mother had told her how important it was to remain a virgin until she got married. She knew-if you weren't a virgin .when you got married, it could ruin your whole marriage. Most men wanted to marry virgins and if they married a girl and found out she wasn't a virgin, they felt cheated. It was funny, too, because most men wanted to have women before they got married and she had never quite understood the logic of it all-it had always seemed as if men wanted to sort of have their cake and eat it, too.

She closed her eyes and remembered her solution to the problem of remaining a virgin but still having a little fun. Bill Thatcher had been dating her that summer. Bill had lived next door ever since they were kids and she knew him better than any other boy. He was a shy kind of boy, tall and thin, not rough like most boys, and in some ways almost like a girl.

It turned out he wasn't sexually maladjusted!

Far from it! She'd always suspected he might be a little queer, the way they said some boys were, but she found out that night at the drive-in theater, he was far from a queer. He kissed her and felt her breasts and wanted to go all the way with her, right there on the front seat of the car while the movie was going on. She'd been scared.

She'd wanted to do it with him, but still, at the same time, she didn't want to do it because her mother had explained how important it was to remain a virgin until you got married. So there on the front seat of his car, while the movie flickered on the screen before them, she hadn't allowed him to go all the way, but she'd allowed him to do everything except go all the way.

She'd unbuttoned her blouse and taken off her bra. She'd let him squeeze her breasts until the nipples got real hard, and she'd let him kiss her breasts. She'd let him slide his hand beneath her skirt and beneath her panties, probing with his fingers. He seemed to know exactly what to do to a girl and did until she sort of raised up from the car seat, quivering, and then-not knowing what to expect-she'd felt the warm wet burst. It had left her sort of limp and cozy, a wonderful relaxed feeling.

Bill told her making love was like that-only much better. He'd kept pleading with her until finally she asked him to take her home. They reached her house just before midnight. The time was okay because her mother had said she could stay out until one o'clock since the double feature at the drive-in didn't end until then.

There, on the front porch of her house, hidden from the street by the deep shadows of the cedar trees, Bill had kissed her again and finally he had showed her what to do for him since she wouldn't let him make love with her. It all seemed so simple and easy-and Bill seemed to enjoy it so much.

Bill had unzipped his pants and stood facing the porch railing. She had stood in front of him but slightly to his side. He held her and kissed her and showed her what to do and then, after she did what he wanted and did it long enough, Bill sort of groaned and went limp as she had gone limp.

After that they did it often. Maybe it wasn't the same as making love, but it was a good substitute. There was no danger of getting pregnant and it was a way of remaining a virgin and still having some fun. They did it almost everywhere, she remembered-one time while walking through a park and stopping to sit on a bench for awhile. They hadn't been afraid to do it there because the park was so quiet you could hear footsteps on the concrete path two blocks away and they could have stopped if they heard anyone coming.

Once they did it in Bill's car at a drive-in, once in the balcony of a movie theater when they were way in the back and off to one side where no one could see, once in an alley in Trenton and once on the beach at Riverview, when they'd spread a blanket over themselves and there hadn't been many others on the beach.

It had been hard to do under the blanket. A man and woman had been sitting not too close, but not too far away either, some kids had been running around and playing with a ball. It had been a little difficult struggling with their tight bathing suits.

It had all ended when Bill's parents moved to another city and he'd had to move with them. After that, she'd dated other boys. Some of them had wanted to make love with her. To a few of them she'd suggested the substitute she'd learned from Bill.

One had gotten mad about it and said he wanted the real thing or nothing at all. One had suggested another way, a way she'd heard about but didn't like and she'd refused to do it that way. Two had accepted her suggestion. One of those boys didn't seem to be satisfied and stopped dating her. The other tried to climb on her at the last minute.

He'd gone sort of wild, tearing at her clothes and shoving her back on the car seat. She had struggled and then-while she struggled-it was suddenly too late. Her dress had gotten awfully messed up and she'd thrown it away. Two weeks later her mother asked her what happened to her pretty green dress and she'd had to lie about spilling ink on it.

She pressed her ear closer against the radio, listening to the music and sensing the aching emptiness in her loins until it became a hot throbbing. She wondered if she could talk to Stanley Scott and get him to kiss her. If she managed to get him to kiss her and if they could talk about it enough, she could suggest the substitute Bill Thatcher had shown her.

Maybe Stan would like the substitute too. She knew she would like it-she would love to have his fingers touch her and feel exactly how soft and warm she was. She could show him she knew how to do it. Bill Thatcher had showed her exactly how and she still remembered. The only danger in getting so intimate with Stan was he might decide to rape her. Worse than that, he might want her to do the horrible substitute the one boy had asked her to do....

When Janie finished drying the dishes, she came to his chair and stood close, looking down at him.

"Can I talk to you?" she asked.

"Sure, Janie. What is it?"

She bit her lower lip. She glanced around the kitchen. "Can we ... Can we go somewhere else?"

He nodded. He rose from his chair and led the way to the living room. He started to turn on a light, but she touched his arm. "Will you-leave the light off?"

The room was shadowy, with only a wisp of light from the kitchen. He looked down at her and wondered what she wanted to talk about. He could hardly see her-she was only a shadow before him.

"What is it you wanted to talk about, Janie?"

"I don't know exactly how to tell you."

He had been holding the Luger aimed at her stomach. He wondered if it made her feel nervous and, deciding it was safe enough, slid the gun into a pocket. She was such a small girl holding a gun aimed at her was ridiculous and he had been doing it mainly because it had become a habit. Irene could be dangerous-she was strong enough to cause trouble if she wanted to-and it was a good habit always to be ready with the gun whenever he was near the girls.

He lit a cigarette and waited. From the glow of the cigarette when he inhaled, he could see Janie's face-a small round face with large eyes that peered up at him through the darkness.

"Ellen said ... She thought you wouldn't do anything to either Irene or myself. Is that right?"

"I won't attack you, Janie. If you're worried about that. I don't intend to bother either Irene or yourself."

She hesitated before she continued. When she did continue her voice was only a whisper. She moved closer to him but her voice was so low he could only hear part of what she said. He listened as she explained how she had been afraid he would rape her, how her mother had explained how important it was to remain a virgin until she got married. He listened as she explained how, if he wanted to do anything else-anything at all-she wouldn't be upset.

She wants me to kiss her, he decided. She's just a little girl, afraid of being screwed, but she wants the thrill of being kissed. That's what she's hinting at....

Holding his cigarette carefully so he wouldn't burn her, he slipped his arms around her waist and pulled her closer. He moved slowly, gently, lowered his head until he felt his mouth brush against her lips. While they kissed, she moved closer until he felt the length of her body pressed against him.

She held her hands in an odd place, he noticed, instead of slinging her arms around his waist or his back as most girls would do, she held her hands on his hips. They kissed again and this time, while he kissed her, he became aware that her hands had moved from his hips. They were fumbling at his zipper.

"I know how to do it," she whispered.

He almost asked, Know how to do what? but he held back.

"Do you want me to do it?" she asked.

To avoid answering, he kissed her again and held her closer. Her small warm hands slid beneath his clothing, pulling at him. She grasped him and moved so she stood slightly to one side.

The cigarette burned his fingers and he dropped it, remembering suddenly the time he had burned his fingers when sitting in the car, waiting to dump Emma into the Delaware River. He pushed this thought aside and concentrated on the small soft hand that grasped him. Leaning forward slightly, his cheek brushed against her hair and he could look over her shoulder and see the cigarette burning into the floor. It seemed mightily unimportant.

She was gentle and rhythmic, and passion inside him uncoiled like a steel spring. He slid his hands down her back and grasped her buttocks. He wanted to explore the curves and softness of her body but she was so skilled in the rhythmic movement of her hand that he was paralyzed.

In a few minutes he finished and she sighed as if a pleasant task had been completed.

"Where did you learn that?" he asked. It was almost unbelievable, holding the small perfumed softness of her body. She had always seemed so young, so innocent.

She kissed him again, whispering, "It doesn't matter where I learned it."

She moved into deeper shadows of the room until she was almost invisible. He heard her movements but could not make out what she was doing. When he walked to her and could see better, he found she had raised her skirt and was sliding her panties down the length of her legs. She let the panties fall as far as her knees and then she spread her legs slightly so the garment stretched taut at her knees and could fall no further.

She wanted the favor returned.

He slid his right hand over her stomach and between her thighs. At his first touch she gasped excitedly and soon-much sooner than he'd expected-she moaned as her flesh trembled beneath his fingers.

When he walked with her to the cellar, when he looked at her before he closed and locked the door, she turned for a moment and smiled at him.