Post 5 Drew: The Summer I Turn Seventeen

My comrades are Spence Cole, Arnie Verklin, and Chris Malcolm. We drop Arnie off for

his late half-shift at McDonald’s which would end at eleven.

Alternately razor-sharp, then amorphous and soft, images of our teenage selves emerge. Arnie’s shock of blond hair falls over his forehead. Chris’ face is slightly pudgy and rose-cheeked. And Spence’s square jaw and earnestly searching eyes convey his simmering undercurrent of vigilance.

The story plays mostly without sound. I see events unfold, but with little conversation at first. Distinct scents of French fries, cigarettes and beer waft through my unconsciousness. Despite the fact that I already know the ending, the images and side-commentary play out. It is both satisfying and nostalgic.

“See you in three fucking hours.” Arnie said “fuck” a lot, peppered with other profanity the rest of us were still too green to throw around with any semblance of authority.

Arnie and his family were transplants from upstate New York, who adapted to the Southern way of life in fits and starts. Arnie wore his blond hair long, not in deference to the preferred style of the day, but in defiance of his father, ex-Sergeant Robert Verklin, US Marine Corps. “Sarge” as he was known, spent Saturday mornings in their garage with weights. Despite his father’s invitations to lift with him, Arnie scoffed at the effort. “Arrogant asshole,” was Arnie’s under-the-breath reply. Just another attempt to turn me into a limp-dick version of him.

Arnie also laughed at my attempts to build muscle on my thin frame with dumbbells in the basement.  Ironically, Arnie didn’t care about being built but, like his dad, was naturally muscled in a way that I secretly envied. The adventurous girls in our class were drawn to him, giggling as he took his shirt off on the exercise field during PE. The rest were cautious, daring to stroll by the smoking block behind shop class, just to see their very own version of James Dean light up, smile their way and motion them over. They kept a safe distance, like good girls did.

In the most unlikely of pairings, Arnie was my best friend. He was the defiant one. I followed rules. I was the compliant Richie Cunningham to his R-rated Fonz.

“Don’t forget. We’re coming in around ten for food,” Chris reminded Arnie. Chris, like the rest of us, was on the swim team. Unlike the rest of us, he was from a family who lived in Barnwell Estates and had a pool in their back yard. Chris seemed to wear a new LeCoste polo every week. If I wanted a twenty-eight dollar cotton shirt, I would have to mow Mrs. Barlowe’s lawn five times, under her critical eye and disapproving glare.

“Do I ever forget, dipshit? You’d all starve if it weren’t for me.” Arnie took a final drag of his cigarette, flicked it into the mall parking lot and sprinted for the McDonald’s service entrance.

  “It’s five after eight. You’re gonna be late!” I said, my voice trailing behind Arnie, part warning, part encouragement. I was the good boy, from a good family, who got good—no, exceptional—grades. At that point in my life, I strived to do all the right things. Mostly.

With two hours to kill, Chris threw the car into Drive and headed for Deyer Lake. “We might as well pick up Spence.”

Spence Coles and I were lifeguards at the country club pool. He was from a handsome all-American family where the men had square jaws and the women were quietly brilliant and willowy. His family lived in a custom home on one of the lakes which dotted our neighborhoods. His parents were young, energetic and assumed leadership positions in the PTA as well as at the country club. “Go getters,” as my dad described them.

When we arrived, Spence was in the driveway shooting baskets. Chris guided the Buick into the driveway’s apron, navigating a perfect three-point turn that aimed the massive hood away from the Cole house and toward a night of freedom.

“Did he get there on time?” Spence took a final shot at the basket in the Coles’ drive. Sinking a fifteen-footer, he grinned. “Nothing but net.”

“Almost on time,” I said.

Spence sent the basketball rolling into the garage as if bowling for a strike and jumped in the back seat next to me. “If it weren’t for you, he’d probably be in jail right now, you know that, right?” Spence waved at his mom who was in the kitchen window watching our departure.

“Hardly,”  I said. They were hard on Arnie. He just needed a push sometimes.

“Jeez, Chris. Can you hold your cigarette down? My mom’s watching.”

It occurred to me as we floated down the Coles’ driveway that Spence was destined for leadership, Arnie for difficulty, and Chris? He would casually collide with but easily welcome all the good things life would hand him—to a point.

 I was headed for an extraordinary but not necessarily easy life.

With no particular plan, we sped from the Cole house on Deyer Lake back to the McDonalds parking lot to wait for Arnie. And kill time.

That June night, none of us would be particularly good, or do particularly right things. As if a timer in our genetic codes had gone off simultaneously inside each of us, aided by four six-packs of Coors, we each felt a shift that propelled us to the edge of adolescence (and the questionable judgment that comes with) but not quite to the responsibility of adulthood. We certainly weren’t youngsters anymore. But there, in the parking lot of the neighborhood McDonald’s, while Arnie was inside manning the fryer and stuffing bags with the nation’s favorite fast foods, we asserted our naïve arrogance and tested our swagger.

    *                     

I smile, distracted from my movie by movement in my room, sounds that come and go. At least it feels like a smile. I’m unsure my body is getting the memos from my brain. The movie images are vivid and full of movement and laughter and a knowing that, faced with safe or seventeen-year-old choices, we were going to choose the latter. It’s a classic story spoiler, but in my floating state it doesn’t bother me. I eagerly await the next scene, unfolding as if for the first time.

           *

We rode that night with Chris, in his mother’s land yacht: a beige, 1969 Buick Electra 225, a monster of a car with a four-hundred-horsepower engine and a living room ride. With all their wealth, Chris’ parents resisted giving any of their teenage offspring a car. Chris seemed unable or unwilling to take on the typical summer jobs that the rest of us worked in order to get the things we wanted, the things that our parents thought we should earn. So, Chris settled for the free and utterly suburban family car, the Electra.

I took a long swig of my third Coors and remember wondering, What if we get beer on the upholstery of these plush seats? His mother will not only kill us, but she’ll call our mothers and we’ll all get killed again. Chris lit a Kool, and, without asking, passed the pack to Spence and me in the back seat. When finished with his shift Arnie, as always, would sit in the front. If he wasn’t driving, he’d ride shotgun, which was the pecking order that summer.

I lit up and inhaled. I remember laughing, silently liking the idea of being with these popular guys who didn’t seem to give a fuck about being bad boys, even if just for the night. I didn’t really smoke at that point, though I would toy with the idea of being a smoker for the next thirty years. My smoking experience usually involved my unwillingness to commit to a dirty habit and, at the same time, my complete willingness to bum from someone else who had.

Spence lit a cigarette and exhaled like a pro.

“I didn’t know you smoked,” I said. Spence smiled.

“Only sometimes.”

“But you’re the county record-holder for the 100-meter freestyle.”

Spence exhaled. “Hasn’t seemed to hurt my times yet.” I’m sure it was unspoken in the Cole family that the children were not to smoke. All this despite the fact Spence’s father--who had the physique at forty-something that most of us teenage guys envied--was known to light a Silva Thin 100 after one of his frequent diving exhibitions at the country club pool. He defied the idea that smoking wasn’t healthy. His vice was just a side attraction, not the main event.

Our main event that night focused on food. We were all victims of the gluttony that followed. After our first few beers, we stood patiently in Arnie’s line, letting others go ahead of us as other lines opened up. We each ordered the same thing, almost unable to control our beer-induced laughter: one cheeseburger, one small order of fries, and one small Coke. Then we stepped aside while Arnie intently filled our orders. In on the joke and wishing he could have been drinking in the parking lot with us, Arnie handed our orders across the counter and took a dollar and forty-two cents from each of us. No one broke a smile.

Once we cleared the door, the movie slowed. We sprinted in slow-motion for the Buick, howling with laughter and eager to see what a dollar and forty-two cents would buy this time. Each bulging McDonald’s bag held a remarkable treasure: three double cheeseburgers, two orders of large fries, two apple pies, and an extra-large Coke.        

*                     

John, do you ever remember being so young? I mean, think about it. Not including the beer, we each consumed about seven thousand calories that night, courtesy of Arnie and his employer. Then I remember: we were seventeen. The following morning at precisely nine a.m., Spence and I would blow the whistles to start swim practice. Chris and Arnie would grudgingly execute whip-starts into the pool, breaking the glass-like surface of the still-cool water. The rest of the team would follow. You were a lifeguard, right, John? You remember how it was.

The metabolism and graceful exertion of youth would burn off the previous night’s calories and those to come for the remainder of that somewhat aimless and eerily reckless summer. We would all remain, for that summer and many to follow, lithe, lightly muscled, and utterly unconcerned about calories or food groups.

My inner satisfaction with this pleasing memory is interrupted by an annoying, mechanical beep-beep-beep of machinery that is, for the moment, keeping me alive. I wish the shrill sound would go away. As if she had heard me, the female voice drawls into my ear: “Time for your medication, Mr. Carter.” And then, on a cloud of pain meds, I drift gratefully back to 1972.