The First Time Read online

  Kim had never said anything to her mother about seeing her father with another woman. Instead she’d tried to convince herself that the woman was merely a friend, no, less than that, an acquaintance, maybe even a business acquaintance, perhaps a grateful client, although since when did one kiss clients, however grateful they may be, on the lips like that? Full on the mouth, she thought, the way Teddy Cranston had kissed her on Saturday night, his tongue gently teasing the tip of her own.

  Kim brought her fingers to her lips, feeling them tingling still, as she relived the softness of Teddy’s touch, so unlike the kisses of other boys her age. Of course Teddy was a few years older than the other boys she’d dated. He was seventeen and a senior, heading off to college next fall, either Columbia or NYU, he told her confidently, depending on whether he decided to study medicine or the movies. But Saturday night, he’d seemed more interested in getting his hand inside her sweater than in getting into either medical or film school, and she’d been tempted, really tempted, to let him. All the other girls were doing it. That and more. Lots of girls her age had already gone all the way. She heard them giggling about it in the school washrooms as they hunched over the condom dispensaries. Guys hated condoms, she heard them complain, so most times they didn’t bother using them, especially after they’d done it a few times and knew the guy was all right. “You should try it, Kimbo,” one of the girls had teased, aiming a packet of condoms at her head.

  “Yeah,” several of the other girls joined in, pelting her with condoms. “Try it. You’ll like it.”

  Would she? Kim wondered, feeling Teddy’s invisible hand at her breast.

  Her breasts, Kim thought with wonder, watching the swell of her no-longer-child’s bosom rise and fall with each breath. Last year at this time, her breasts were virtually nonexistent, and suddenly, about six months ago, there they were. No notice, no warning, no I think you’d better prepare yourself. Overnight she’d gone from an A to a C cup, and the world suddenly snapped to attention. Only with breast size, it seemed, was a C preferred to an A.

  Kim recalled the hoots and hollers of the boys the first time she wore her new white Gap T-shirt to school last spring, the envious looks of the girls, the not-so-veiled glances of her teachers. Overnight, everything changed. She was suddenly popular, the object of great conjecture and gossip. Everyone, it seemed, had an opinion as to her new status—she was a slut; she was an ice queen; she was a cock tease—as if her breasts had swallowed her previous self whole, and were now totally responsible for her behavior. Surprisingly, Kim discovered, she was no longer required to have opinions. It was enough she had breasts. Indeed, her teachers seemed surprised she was capable of coherent thought at all.

  Even her parents were affected by this sudden and unexpected development. Her mother looked at her with a combination of amazement and concern, while her father avoided looking at her altogether and, when he did, focused so hard on her face that Kim always felt he was about to fall over.

  Her phone started ringing night and day. Girls who’d never given her the time of day suddenly wanted to be her friend. Guys who’d never spoken to her in class, nerds and jocks alike, were calling her after school to ask her out: Gerry McDougal, captain of the football team; Marty Peshkin, star debater; Teddy Cranston of the melting chocolate brown eyes.

  Once again, Kim’s lips tingled with the remembrance of Teddy’s gentle touch. Once again she felt his hand brush against her breast, so softly, as if it were an accident, as if he hadn’t meant to do it. But of course he’d meant exactly that. Why else was he there?

  “Don’t,” she’d said softly, and he’d pretended not to hear, so she said it again, louder this time, and this time he listened, although he tried again later, and she was forced to say it again. “Don’t,” she said, thinking of her mother. “Please don’t.”

  “Don’t be in too big a rush,” her mother had cautioned during one of their earlier talks about sex. “You have so much time. And even with all the precautions in the world, accidents do happen.” A slight blush suddenly stained her cheek.

  “Like me?” Kim asked, having figured out long ago that a baby weighing over nine pounds was unlikely to have been three months premature.

  “The best accident that ever happened to me,” her mother said, not insulting her intelligence by denying the obvious, wrapping Kim in her arms, kissing her forehead.

  “Would you and Daddy have gotten married anyway?” Kim pressed.

  “Absolutely,” her mother said, giving her the answer Kim wanted to hear.

  I don’t think so, Kim thought now. She wasn’t blind to the way her parents looked at one another, quick glances in unguarded moments that shouted their true feelings even louder than the angry whispers that emanated with increasing regularity from behind their closed bedroom door. No way her parents would be together had it not been for her unexpected interference. She had trapped them into marriage, into being together. But the trap was old and no longer strong enough to hold them. It was only a matter of time before one of them worked up the strength and the courage to break free. And then where would little Kimbo be?

  One thing was certain: she would never allow her hormones to trap her into a loveless marriage. She would choose wisely and well. Although how much choice did she really have? Hadn’t both her grandmothers been abandoned by their husbands? Kim fidgeted uncomfortably in her seat. Were the women in her family fated to choose faithless men who would one day walk out on them? Maybe it was inevitable, possibly even genetic. Perhaps it was some sort of ancient family curse.

  Kim shrugged, as if trying to physically rid herself of the unpleasant thought, the sudden movement knocking her notebook to the floor, attracting the teacher’s unwanted attention. Mr. Bill Loewi, whose broad nose was too big for the rest of his narrow face and whose overly ruddy complexion betrayed his fondness for booze, turned from the chalkboard on which he was writing and stared toward the back of the class. “Problem?” he asked, as Kim scrambled to pick up her notebook, knocking over her copy of Romeo and Juliet.

  “No, sir,” Kim said quickly, reaching for the book.

  Caroline Smith, who sat in the row beside her, and whose big mouth was inversely proportionate to the size of her brain, leaned sideways, reaching for the slender text at the same time as Kim. “Thinking about Teddy?” she asked. She slid the index finger of her right hand into the hole created by the index finger and thumb of her left and waggled it in and out suggestively.

  “Get a life,” Kim said under her breath.

  “Get laid,” came the instant retort.

  “Something you want to share with the rest of the class?” Mr. Loewi asked.

  Caroline Smith giggled. “No, sir.”

  “No, sir,” Kim concurred, returning the book to her desk, and her eyes to the front of the room.

  “Why don’t we read a few lines from the text,” Mr. Loewi suggested. “Page thirty-four. Romeo declaring his love for Juliet. Kim,” he said to Kim’s breasts, “why don’t you be Juliet.”

  Teddy was waiting for her after class, slouching beside her locker when she went to retrieve her lunch. “I thought we could eat outside,” he suggested, unfolding his lanky frame and stretching to his full height, an inch or two above six feet. He took Kim’s hand, leading her down the locker-lined hallway, pretending to ignore the looks and whispers of the other kids. He was used to the attention. It came with being athletic, rich, and “so gorgeous you could die,” according to the caption under his picture in the latest school yearbook. “It’s really nice out,” he was saying.

  “Then leave it out,” Caroline Smith volunteered from somewhere beside them. Annie Turofsky and Jodi Bates laughed uproariously by Caroline’s side.

  The Three Muskatits, Kim sneered. They dressed identically, in tight jeans and tighter scoop-necked sweaters, wore their long brown hair straight and parted to one side, and their noses had all been bobbed by the same plastic surgeon, although Caroline insisted her nose job was because of a devia
ted septum.

  “You girls are a class act,” Teddy said.

  “Try us—” Annie Turofsky began.

  “You’ll like us,” Jodi finished.

  “Not likely,” Teddy said under his breath, picking up the pace, ushering Kim toward the side door.

  “Party on Saturday night,” Caroline called after them. “Sabrina Hollander’s house. Her parents are away for the weekend. Bring your own whatever.”

  “A party full of stoned fifteen-year-old girls,” Teddy said, his voice dripping sarcasm, as he pushed open the heavy door to the outside world. “Can’t wait.”

  “I’m a fifteen-year-old girl,” Kim reminded him, as a cold gust of wind slapped her in the face.

  “You’re not like the others,” Teddy said.

  “I’m not?”

  “You’re more mature.”

  A C cup, Kim thought, but didn’t say. She didn’t want to scare Teddy away by being too clever, too knowing, too mature.

  “How about over there?” Teddy pointed toward the students’ parking lot.

  “What’s over there?” Kim asked.

  “My car.”

  “Oh.” She dropped her lunchbag to the ground, listened as the can of Coke she’d packed that morning began to fizz, and wondered if it was about to explode. “I thought you wanted to eat outside.”

  “It’s colder than I realized.” He scooped up her lunchbag from the pavement without any obvious concern and took hold of her elbow, leading her toward the dark green, late-model Chevrolet at the farthest corner of the lot.

  Had he parked it there deliberately? Kim wondered, feeling her heartbeat quicken and her breathing become short, almost painful.

  Teddy pointed a remote control unit toward the car, and it squealed like a frightened pig, signaling that the doors were now open. “Let’s get in the back,” he said casually. “There’s more room there.”

  Kim crawled into the backseat of the car and immediately tore into her lunch bag for her sandwich. “Tuna,” she said awkwardly, holding it out for his inspection. “I made it myself.” She started unwrapping it, stopped when she felt his breath against her cheek. She turned toward him, their noses colliding gently. “Sorry, I didn’t realize you were so close—” she began, but his lips stopped her. She heard a low moan, pulled back sharply when she realized it came from her.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “Nothing,” she said, facing directly ahead, as if she were at a drive-in movie, talking a mile a minute, the way she always did when she was nervous, when she wanted to regain control. It wasn’t that she didn’t want to kiss him. It was that she wanted to kiss him so badly, she could barely see straight. “I just think maybe we should eat. I’m in classes all afternoon, and then I promised my grandmother, my mother’s mother, Grandma Viv,” she explained, knowing that Teddy, whose hand was massaging the back of her neck, couldn’t have cared less about her Grandma Viv, “I told her that I’d come by after school. She had to have one of her dogs put to sleep yesterday. It was really sick and everything, and she said it was looking at her with those eyes, you know, those eyes that said it was time, but still, she’s really upset about it, so I said I’d drop by She’ll be okay in a few days, once one of her other dogs has its litter. Then she’ll have something to take her mind off Duke. That was the dog’s name. It was part collie, part cocker spaniel. Really smart. My grandmother says that mutts are much smarter than purebreds. Do you have a dog?”

  “A yellow Lab,” Teddy said, a sly smile spreading from his lips to his eyes as he lifted the tunafish sandwich from Kim’s hand and returned it to its bag. “Purebred.”

  Kim rolled her eyes, then closed them. “I’m sure it’s a really smart dog.”

  “He’s as dumb as dirt.” Teddy ran his fingers across the top of Kim’s lips. “Your grandmother was right.”

  “I don’t have a dog,” Kim said, eyes opening as the tips of Teddy’s fingers disappeared inside her mouth, making speaking all but impossible. “My mother hates dogs,” she persisted stubbornly, talking around them. “She says she’s allergic, but I don’t think she is. I just don’t think she likes them.”

  “What about you?” Teddy was asking, his voice husky, as he leaned forward to kiss the side of Kim’s mouth. “What do you like?”

  “What do I like?”

  “Do you like this?” He began kissing the side of her neck.

  Oh yes, Kim answered silently, holding her breath, aware of the growing tingle beneath her flesh.

  “What about this?” His lips moved toward her eyes, brushing against the lashes of her closed lids. “Or this?” He covered her mouth with his own. She felt his tongue gently prying her lips apart, as one hand caressed the nape of her neck and the other hand began its slow slide across the front of her sweater. Could anything feel more delicious? she wondered, her entire body vibrating. Except that the vibrations weren’t internal; they were coming from somewhere outside her body.

  “Oh, my God,” she said, her hand slapping the pocket of her jeans. “It’s my beeper.”

  “Ignore it,” Teddy said, trying to coax her back into his arms.

  “I can’t. I’m one of those compulsive personalities. I have to know who it is.” Kim extricated her beeper, pressed the button to see who was paging her, and watched the unfamiliar number flash across its face, followed by the numbers 911, indicating an emergency. “Something’s wrong,” she said. “I have to get to a phone.”

  SIX

  Oh, my God, get me out of here. Get me out of here.”

  “Try to stay calm, Mattie. It’s important for you to keep very still.”

  “Get me out of here. I can’t breathe. I can’t breathe.”

  “You’re breathing fine, Mattie. Just stay calm. I’m taking you out now.”

  Mattie felt the narrow table on which she was lying start to move, propelling her, feet first, out of the monstrous MRI machine. She tried to suck in the surrounding air, but it was as if someone were standing on her chest in stiletto heels. The heels dug into her thin blue hospital gown, piercing her flesh, puncturing her lungs, making even shallow breathing painful, almost impossible.

  “You can open your eyes now, Mattie.”

  Mattie opened her eyes, felt them instantly fill with tears. “I’m sorry,” she told the female medical technician, who was small, dark, and alarmingly young. “I don’t think I can do this.”

  “It’s pretty scary,” the technician agreed, gently patting Mattie’s bruised forearm. “But the doctor was pretty anxious for the results.”

  “Has someone called my husband?”

  “I believe he’s been notified, yes.”

  “What about Lisa Katzman?” Mattie propped herself up on her elbows, inadvertently dislodging the pillows that had been placed on either side of her head. Pain, like thousands of tiny daggers, shot through her joints. There wasn’t a part of her that didn’t ache. Damn airbag almost killed me, Mattie thought, manipulating her sore jaw.

  “Dr. Katzman will be waiting for you when we’re finished in here.” The technician, whose name tag identified her as Noreen Aliwallia, managed a small smile as she repositioned the pillows.

  “How long will that be?”

  “About forty-five minutes.”

  “Forty-five minutes?!”

  “I know it sounds like a long time—”

  “It is a long time. You know what it feels like inside that thing? It feels like being buried alive.” Why am I giving her a hard time? Mattie wondered, longing for the sound of her friend Lisa’s reassuring voice, the voice of calm and reason that had soothed her since childhood.

  “You were in a car accident,” Noreen Aliwallia reminded Mattie patiently. “You lost consciousness. You suffered a serious concussion. The MRI is to make sure there aren’t any hidden hematomas.”

  Mattie nodded, trying to recall exactly what the initials MRI stood for. Something about magnetic imaging, whatever that meant. A fancy name for X rays. The neurologist had already explai
ned it to her when she’d regained consciousness in the emergency room, but she was only barely paying attention, her mind trying to come to grips with exactly what had happened. Her head was pounding, her mouth tasted of dried blood, and she was having difficulty remembering the precise order of things. Everything hurt, although they told her that, miraculously, no bones were broken. Then suddenly she was being wheeled into the basement of whatever hospital she was in—they’d told her which one it was, but she couldn’t remember—and this young woman, this x-ray technician with the mellifluous name, Noreen Aliwallia, who looked like she was fresh out of high school, asked her to lie down on this really narrow table and put her head inside a coffinlike box.

  The MRI machine resembled a large steel tunnel. It took up most of the small, windowless room, whose dingy white walls were void of adornment. At the entrance to the tunnel was a rectangular box with a circular hole. Mattie had been given a set of ear plugs—“It gets a little noisy in there,” she was told—and pillows were placed on both sides of her head to keep it still. A buzzer was placed in her hand, to use if she felt she was about to sneeze or cough or do anything that might disturb the operation of the machine. If she moved at any time during the procedure, Noreen explained, the X ray would be ruined, and they’d have to start over from the beginning. Close your eyes, Noreen had advised. Think pleasant thoughts.

  The panic started almost as soon as Mattie’s head was fitted inside the box, and the top of the box was extended past her face to her chest, so that even with her eyes closed, it felt as if she were lying in her grave, as if she were suffocating. Then the table on which she was lying began its slow slide into the long narrow tunnel, and she felt like one of those Russian dolls, a doll within a doll within a doll, and she knew she had to get out of this damn machine that was worse than the accident, worse than the air bag, worse than anything she’d experienced in her entire life. She had to get out or she would die, and so she started screaming for the technician to help her, forgetting about the buzzer, forgetting about everything but her panic, until Noreen told her she could open her eyes, and she started to cry, because she hurt all over, and she was acting like a baby, and she’d never felt so alone in her entire life.