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They were about to leave when the door opened once again and a striking, raven-haired twenty-year-old in a form-fitting blouse and tight shorts came out onto the porch, carrying a knapsack over her shoulder. Shelly’s eyes bulged.
Vera smiled awkwardly, slightly embarrassed at the scene she knew they must have overheard. “Hi, everybody,” she said. “What’re you looking at? Let’s go.”
“Is everything all right?” said Chris.
Vera shrugged. “You know, just your basic, old-fashioned mother problems. So, which one’s my date?”
Shelly stepped out from behind Andy. “Hi,” he said sheepishly, practically shuffling his feet.
“You’re Shelly?” Vera said, unable to hide her disappointment.
He sighed apologetically. “Sorry.”
That’s what I get for agreeing to go out on a blind date, thought Vera. Her mother had been outraged at the idea: not only was Vera going out on a date with a boy she’d never even seen before, she was going away for the weekend! Vera’s mother was very traditional and she thought that the whole thing was scandalous. She had forbidden her to go, which of course had been a sure way to guarantee that Vera went, no matter what. Now it was too late. If she backed out now, her mother would never let her hear the end of it. Like it or not, she was stuck with this guy for the whole weekend. The expression on her face clearly mirrored her thoughts.
Andy rolled his eyes. Debbie had been right. This wasn’t such a great idea. Why had he insisited on bringing Shelly along? The weekend was going to be death.
“Hey!” Debbie shouted, pointing. “The van’s on fire!”
Smoke was billowing out of the windows in the van. They ran across the street and threw open the door, but instead of a fire, they were confronted with the sight of Chuck and Chili, sitting cross-legged on the floor in the back of the van with imbecile grins on their faces, puffing away on plastic bongs that were so huge they looked like oboes. The sickly-sweet smell of mariju
ana smoke permeated the van’s interior. In order to dissipate some of the smoke, Chris and Andy rolled the windows down all the way as they drove off. All they needed was to get pulled over for speeding or running a stop sign and have a cop take a whiff inside that van. It would be all over.
Shelly watched disapprovingly as Chuck and Chili organized their stash. Chuck was a round-faced nineteen-year-old with a full black beard and a headband holding down his bushy hair. He wore well-faded jeans and tinted aviator glasses. With his sixties look, Chuck might have stepped right out of a time warp. His girlfriend, Chili, was a darkly attractive, slim eighteen-year-old with curly black hair and a facial expression that made her look as if she was always pouting. Chili was actually her real name. She had a twin sister named Pepper. The girls were born in a commune in Santa Fe and their parents were a little loaded at the time.
“Is that all you’re going to do this weekend?” said Shelly disapprovingly, watching them sort their plastic sandwich bags filled with grass. “Smoke dope?”
“Why not?” said Chuch wryly. “There’s no law against it.”
He seemed to find his comment extremely funny. But then, dopers were liable to laugh at anything, thought Shelly. He shook his head.
“There’s better things to do with your life,” he said.
“Like what?” said Chuck.
“I can’t think of anything,” said Chili.
Shelly decided to forget about it. It wasn’t his business to tell other people how to live their lives, but he wished that people that insisted on their right to ruin their health would respect other people’s right as well. He wasn’t crazy about having to sit there and breathe in their smoke. It was as bad as actually smoking.
“Hey, Chrissie,” Andy said, “how much farther to the lake?”
“We could’ve been there already if some people didn’t have to go to the bathroom every five minutes,” Chris said wearily, glancing pointedly at Debbie.
“That’s what happens when you’re pregnant,” Debbie said defensively. She had only known about it for a month or so and she hadn’t started to show yet. She also hadn’t told her parents. They didn’t even know that she and Andy were sleeping with each other, much less planning to get married. They figured she was still going out on casual dates.
Chili offered a joint to Vera, who was sitting between Chuck and Shelly in the rear of the van. “Sure, why not?” said Vera, taking it.
Shelly couldn’t take his eyes off her. Those shorts were so tight, they looked as if she had been poured into them and she was sitting with her legs spread . . . and her blouse was unbuttoned enough that if she leaned back, he could see . . .
When Vera turned and caught him staring down her blouse, Shelly quickly looked away. Now she probably really thinks I’m a jerk, he thought, angry with himself. He could never seem to do anything right. Hell, he thought, can you blame a guy for staring when a girl’s dressed like that? How can you not stare at anybody who’s so incredibly gorgeous? And she was supposed to be his date, too! A blind date, but still, he’d never had a date with anyone who looked like her. And he probably never would again, he thought miserably.
“Hey, let’s share the wealth with those less fortunate up front, huh?” said Andy.
Vera passed the joint and sat back down beside Shelly. Her gaze fell on the small black case where he kept his props and makeup. She looked up at him with curiosity. “What’ve you got in there?” she said.
“My whole world,” he said mysteriously.
“In that little thing?” said Vera, amused.
