look older. Also his chin sort of blends into his neck more than it should. Unlike Mark’s, for instance. In Jill’s opinion, Mark is better looking than Erik Estrada.
She has only seen one naked man in her whole life. In June she will make a vow in the sight of God that she will never be with any other man ever. She wonders what it might be like with someone different. She thinks about the noises Donna Summer makes on that record “Love to Love You, Baby.” She can’t imagine making noises like that with Virgil. Sometimes she has heard her father, in the night. But her mother never makes a sound except afterwards, when she runs the water.
Jill and Virg will be nothing like Jill’s parents, of course. They’ll still smoke grass, go roller skating. Jill will do crazy things like draw a face on the tip of his penis with Magic Marker. They’ll let their kids stay up late if they want to, teach them the words to all the top forty songs. Sometimes—even though they have a double bed—they’ll still go down to Packers Falls and screw. Jill will never look like her mother. She would kill herself first.
But she knows Doris and Reg were not always the way they are now. She has seen pictures of her mother as a teenager—never pretty, but always grinning, in spite of her buckteeth, with curly blond hair that always looked a little out of control. There’s one picture of Doris and her two girlfriends dressed up like boys for Halloween. The other girls look pretty flat on top, but Doris was really busty in the picture, and she’s looking down at her chest, making this funny, surprised expression. Jill wonders what happened, because now Doris is all withered-up-looking on top, and the only expression she ever makes looks like a prune.
Jill has seen pictures of her father too, when he was just Virgil’s age. You couldn’t call him cute, like Mark or Virgil, but there’s something about him in those pictures—Jill feels a little funny admitting this—that’s very sexy. He never smiles and he always stands straight in front of the camera, looking like something important is going on. In most of the pictures he’s wearing a checked coat and a bow tie—always the same clothes—and the occasion is almost always Easter Sunday, with the family heading off to church. But there’s one (Jill’s favorite) of Reg wearing baggy work pants and a sleeveless undershirt, holding a giant pumpkin with a ribbon taped to it. First prize in the 4-H fair. When you look close you can read the names “Doris” and “Reginald” carved in the pumpkin, with a heart around them. When she was little Jill thought that was some type of magic pumpkin, like in Cinderella, but then her father explained that what you do is, when the pumpkin’s very little, just forming on the vine, you scratch the words in the skin, and by the time it’s ready to pick there’s a deep scar forming the letters. He wrote “Jill” on a baby acorn squash one time, but it got killed by frost before it was ready to eat.
Her parents had to get married. They don’t know she knows that, but she figured it out. First of all, her mother was always so vague about their wedding date. When she was little, Jill loved making greeting cards for every special occasion, even things like Arbor Day and Richard Nixon’s birthday. “So when is your anniversary?” she kept asking. “Sometime in the spring,” Doris said. “I’ve stopped keeping track.” And then Jill looked in the family Bible her uncle had, and sure enough, the date was just six months before Timmy’s birthday.
She can’t imagine her mother lying on pine needles with her knees apart, or in the backseat of some old jalopy, her father telling her (the way Virgil used to), “Honey, I have to or my dick could get petrified.” She was fourteen years old, and she actually believed him.
Her mother was probably asleep when it happened. She’s sure her mother never felt the way Jill does, which is very
She has only seen one naked man in her whole life. In June she will make a vow in the sight of God that she will never be with any other man ever. She wonders what it might be like with someone different. She thinks about the noises Donna Summer makes on that record “Love to Love You, Baby.” She can’t imagine making noises like that with Virgil. Sometimes she has heard her father, in the night. But her mother never makes a sound except afterwards, when she runs the water.
Jill and Virg will be nothing like Jill’s parents, of course. They’ll still smoke grass, go roller skating. Jill will do crazy things like draw a face on the tip of his penis with Magic Marker. They’ll let their kids stay up late if they want to, teach them the words to all the top forty songs. Sometimes—even though they have a double bed—they’ll still go down to Packers Falls and screw. Jill will never look like her mother. She would kill herself first.
But she knows Doris and Reg were not always the way they are now. She has seen pictures of her mother as a teenager—never pretty, but always grinning, in spite of her buckteeth, with curly blond hair that always looked a little out of control. There’s one picture of Doris and her two girlfriends dressed up like boys for Halloween. The other girls look pretty flat on top, but Doris was really busty in the picture, and she’s looking down at her chest, making this funny, surprised expression. Jill wonders what happened, because now Doris is all withered-up-looking on top, and the only expression she ever makes looks like a prune.
Jill has seen pictures of her father too, when he was just Virgil’s age. You couldn’t call him cute, like Mark or Virgil, but there’s something about him in those pictures—Jill feels a little funny admitting this—that’s very sexy. He never smiles and he always stands straight in front of the camera, looking like something important is going on. In most of the pictures he’s wearing a checked coat and a bow tie—always the same clothes—and the occasion is almost always Easter Sunday, with the family heading off to church. But there’s one (Jill’s favorite) of Reg wearing baggy work pants and a sleeveless undershirt, holding a giant pumpkin with a ribbon taped to it. First prize in the 4-H fair. When you look close you can read the names “Doris” and “Reginald” carved in the pumpkin, with a heart around them. When she was little Jill thought that was some type of magic pumpkin, like in Cinderella, but then her father explained that what you do is, when the pumpkin’s very little, just forming on the vine, you scratch the words in the skin, and by the time it’s ready to pick there’s a deep scar forming the letters. He wrote “Jill” on a baby acorn squash one time, but it got killed by frost before it was ready to eat.
Her parents had to get married. They don’t know she knows that, but she figured it out. First of all, her mother was always so vague about their wedding date. When she was little, Jill loved making greeting cards for every special occasion, even things like Arbor Day and Richard Nixon’s birthday. “So when is your anniversary?” she kept asking. “Sometime in the spring,” Doris said. “I’ve stopped keeping track.” And then Jill looked in the family Bible her uncle had, and sure enough, the date was just six months before Timmy’s birthday.
She can’t imagine her mother lying on pine needles with her knees apart, or in the backseat of some old jalopy, her father telling her (the way Virgil used to), “Honey, I have to or my dick could get petrified.” She was fourteen years old, and she actually believed him.
Her mother was probably asleep when it happened. She’s sure her mother never felt the way Jill does, which is very
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