It was after elementary school, and most of the kids had already left the building, but I stayed behind to clean the chalk brushes for the teacher on the high mounted vacuum cleaner in the boiler room. As I walked out the back door of the school, rubbing chalk dust off my hands, there he was, waiting for me next to the pine trees outside the low wooden school fence.
Michael Sharpe was the coolest guy in the school, especially to me and the other nine girlfriends on his list. He was a year older, and not in my class. But his Rod Stewart hair, and ex-Beatle t-shirts handed down from his older brother, made him look cool next to the other boys wearing wide lapelled polyester checkered shirts like our dads.
The school year was ending in two weeks, and the year-end sock hop was a week ago. The girls wore socks and stood against the right wall of the gym, and the boys were on the left wall. The lights were turned off, and the first dance was a slow dance. The student operating the turntable on the stage announced the song was ‘Mind Games’ by John Lennon, then the sound of the 45 being dropped from the stack of singles queued up on centrepieces was heard on the mic. In the dark gym, the girls had clammy hands, and were afraid of not getting asked to dance, and Michael stepped out from the line first and headed over to me and grabbed my hand to waltz.
We rocked from side to side with our arms around each other’s shoulders, and returned to our respective walls when the song ended. As #2 on his girlfriends list’, I was wedged between Virginia with the turned up nose at #1, and spunky Bobbie with long blonde pigtails at #3. Virginia displayed the beaded handmade ring he had put on her finger each day while she sharpened her pencils and grabbed her reader from the shelf.
Michael had barely spoken two words to me all year, save for admiring glances in the halls and holding the door open for me. He had a posse of boys on the playground at recess that relayed his messages. They were so serious, like their knuckles would be busted if they didn’t get his message to me.
Today at lunch the boys were giddy, and told me he was going to kiss me after school, so I stayed behind and cleaned the brushes, hoping to avoid him, but here he was. I walked up to him and he motioned to the pine tree with his hand and said “in here” and by some force of nature I followed him in.
We put our arms around each other’s backs and our lips touched in a tender sweet tasting kiss. And then we left, and he left the school the next year and I never saw him again. But it made me feel like #1. And I didn’t kiss and tell, until now.
photo – pixabay
story based on a true story but the names have been changed.