Chapter 9: Trouble in Paradise

“School will be out in three weeks,” Sharon said with a smile. She adjusted the cover that she wore over her swimsuit. They had decided that appropriate attire for evenings spent on the patio was a swimsuit and a cover while having drinks with the option of a swim afterwards. It was a more informal evening than those spent in the formal living room.

Cathy acted as if she hadn’t heard her mother. Harry rubbed his hands together excitedly and said, “I’m counting down the days.”

Summer had always been stressful for her since she was at work and the kids were at home without supervision. She had a feeling that this summer would be a little different. A small level of trust had been achieved over the past few weeks. She looked at her kids and asked, “Are you ready for a long leisurely summer?”

Now that he owned a car, money was a major concern. His father had told him that he was responsible for gas money and half the insurance. Harry answered, “I’ve put in job applications in every store in the mall. I’m ready for summer, but I don’t think it is going to be leisurely.”

“I hope you find a good job that pays well and gives you a little time to enjoy your summer,” Greg said. He remembered his first job. He had gotten a job as a cook in a chicken place, although cook suggested a level of skill that wasn’t present in the job. He dipped the chicken parts into a premixed liquid, then into flour premixed with spices, repeated the process and then dropped it into the fryer for a fixed period of time. He came home from work every night smelling of fried chicken. The money wasn’t great, but it was enough to pay for his car.

“I hope so. I’d like to have Friday or Saturday nights off so that I can take Lisa out,” Harry said.

“I remember my first part-time job. I don’t recall ever having to work both Friday and Saturday nights, though.”

Noticing that he daughter had not answered her original question, Sharon turned to Cathy and asked, “How about you, Cathy? Are you looking forward to a leisurely summer?”

“I guess,” Cathy answered listlessly. She took a sip of her wine spritzer and stared at the floor lost in her thoughts. The fact was that she was dreading the summer.

“Is there something the matter?” Greg asked concerned by the withdrawn answer.

“No,” Cathy answered without emotion. Out of sync with her answer, she looked over at her father and shook her head. She wasn’t going to tell him her problems. She sighed. It and her body language gave further testimony that something was the matter.

Before Sharon had a chance to follow up with her own question, the doorbell rang. She said, “Ah, the doorbell.”

Harry stood up and said, “That will be Miss McCullum. I’ll get it.”

“Okay,” Greg said with a grin. Harry had been a totally different person since his date. He remembered his first girlfriend and the slow progress of the relationship. He remembered the kissing sessions that lasted all night and left him with blue balls. It was months after the first date before he saw his first naked breast. That event had left him with wet underwear. He chuckled at the memory.

When Harry raced into the house, Sharon said, “So I finally get to meet the mysterious Miss McCullum.”

“Yippee,” Cathy said in a dull flat voice. She twirled a finger in air and sighed loudly.

It was clear to Gary and Sharon that something was bothering Cathy. It was equally clear that she didn’t want to talk about it. Even worse, she was not going to be very pleasant company. Rather than risk a scene, Sharon decided to take matters into her own hands. In a quiet voice, she asked, “Cathy, would you mind helping me for a minute?”

“I’d rather not,” Cathy said looking over at her mother. All she wanted was to be left alone.

“I could really use your help,” Sharon said. Her mind worked furiously trying to come up with some excuse to get alone with her daughter. The last thing she wanted was for Cathy to ruin the first introduction to Lisa. It would take Harry a long time to forgive her.

“I’d really rather not,” Cathy said getting stubborn.

“Please.”

Cathy stared at her mother trying to remember the last time that she had used that word to her. Even with the changes in lifestyle, her requests for help often had the tone of demands. She said, “No.”

“Okay,” Sharon said. She took a sip of her wine to calm down. She turned to look at door waiting for Harry to arrive with Lisa. She didn’t know what the matter was, but Cathy had never been the same since the night she and her husband had destroyed the formal dining room.

After a half-minute of silence, Cathy asked, “Aren’t you going to order me to help you?”

“No.”

Puzzled, Cathy stared at her mother unable to believe her answer. Her mother had actually said please and accepted no as an answer. That was a first. She stood up and said, “Well, you did say please. What do you want?”

“Come with me to my bedroom,” Sharon said thinking it would give them plenty of privacy. The sudden turn-about was a surprise, but she tried not to make a big deal out of it.

Greg watched the two women head into the house surprised by Cathy’s reversal. He realized that Sharon had passed some sort of test. Thinking about it, he realized that the kids had been testing them a lot lately. Most of the tests were little things to see if they listened or kept their promises. He suspected that more critical tests were to come.

When they reached the bedroom, Sharon sat down on the edge of the bed and patted a spot next to her. Curious, Cathy sat down and asked, “What do you need me to do?”

Adjusting her position to put her closer to her daughter, Sharon put her arms around Cathy and gave her a hug. Even as she did it, she realized that it was the first time she had hugged her daughter in at least six years. She said, “Nothing. Just sit here and let me feel my little girl in my arms. I wish I could help you, but I don’t know what the problem is. It hurts me to see you in such pain.”

Cathy went rigid and then a shudder ran through her body. After just a few seconds, she burst into tears and sobbed out of control. Once the dam burst, the flood of emotions wouldn’t stop. Despite the awkward embrace with her mother, her mother was rocking her and rubbing her back. The whole time her mother murmured assurances that things would be all right. Surprising both of them, Cathy blurted out, “I’m going to die a virgin.”

To say that Sharon was shocked to hear her daughter talking about wanting to lose her virginity would be an understatement. Rather than react to the extreme nature of her daughter’s statement, she tried to address the real issue. She asked, “Why do you say that?”

“Everyone has someone except me. All of my friends have boyfriends. Not one boy has even looked at me. Even Harry has a girlfriend,” Cathy said. That day she had gone to school wearing a very short skirt and tight shirt. None of the boys had approached her despite her obvious advertisement that she was interested in their attention. The final straw had been watching her parents greet each other with passionate kisses. She sobbed and said, “Even you and dad are boffing each other. Parents don’t do that!”

Knowing that the situation was serious, Sharon managed to resist laughing at hearing what she and Greg had done described as boffing. She had categorized it as hot raw monkey sex, but that was her opinion. The assertion that parents didn’t do it was probably accurate for reasons other than what Cathy thought. It wasn’t that the desire wasn’t there, but that the relationship was gone having been destroyed by the pressures of being parents. She said, “You’ll find a boy soon.”

“No I won’t! School is out in three weeks. If a boy doesn’t ask me out, then I won’t be seeing another boy for three months,” Cathy whined.

Curious, she asked, “Do you have a specific boy in mind?”

“No. I don’t care who it is, I just want a boyfriend,” Cathy answered. She had dreamed about Robert Green, but had given up after watching the relationship between him and Amy grow. Now she’d be satisfied by any boy.

“Oh, you have it bad,” Sharon said rocking her daughter in her arms. She remembered her years as a teenage girl.

Misunderstanding her mother, Cathy pulled back and said, “I’m not bad!”

“I said you had it bad, not that you were bad,” Sharon said. She ran a hand through her daughters hair, pulling it away from her face. She sighed and said, “I was the same way when I was your age. Oh God, I remember how that was. I wanted a boyfriend so much that I was willing to do anything he wanted. I finally got one, he wanted a lot, and, once I gave it to him, he screwed me over royally. The fucking bastard!”

The tone of voice her mother used on the last three words was harsh and bitter. Cathy sat back and looked at her with wide eyes wondering what the boy had done to her. She knew about girls whose reputations had suffered because a boy had talked. Even though every girl did those things, the social failure was choosing a boy who talked about it. If no one talked about it, then they hadn’t done it and could pretend to be good girls. Curious, she wanted to find out what had happened. However, her problems were foremost on her mind. She asked, “What should I do?”

Sharon knew that telling her daughter to wait wasn’t going to work. Social standing among teenage girls was a horribly complex thing. Girls who were interested in boys measured their value according to the boys who were interested in them. A casual hello by a boy would be grist for hours of discussion among the girls. Her little girl was growing up fast. She sighed and said, “You get yourself a boyfriend.”

That answer was almost as bad as being told to wait. Cathy groaned and stared up at the ceiling. In a tone of voice that would normally have grated on Sharon’s nerves, she said, “Don’t you get it? They aren’t interested in me!”

Shaking her head, Sharon decided to be brutally honest with her daughter. The subject was too important to hide behind half truths and round about talk. She answered, “Honey, you are a very pretty girl. Even if you weren’t, you have well developed tits and a pussy. Believe me, the boys are interested. Interest isn’t the problem.”

Pulling back from her mother, Cathy stared at her as if she had never met the woman before. Her mother was talking about tits and pussy? Mothers weren’t supposed to know those words. She grabbed the one thing in her mother’s statement that she felt comfortable repeating. “Interest isn’t the problem?”