Early Brush with a Perv

 

Early Brush with a Perv

 

          Nancy and I are at Bull Creek, a construction site with woods and this great stream to play around. I’m eight and she’s five.

         Over near a clearing there’s a Triumph Spitfire and I love those; I’ve got a Matchbox car back at home just like it. On the bumper is an Infantry Airborne sticker like the one on my dad’s work fatigues so I knew whoever drives it is a good guy.  He’s sitting on a log when we come around the corner, and I say, “Hi.” He’s a grown up but not old, with a buzz cut, Levis and a white t-shirt and he's looking at a magazine in his lap.

           He says hi and we start talking. Nancy is picking out pretty rocks on the creek bank.
           He says, “You live around here?”
            I babble on like kids do. Yeah. Not too far.
           He says, “Look. Have you ever seen anything like this?” and shows me a picture in his magazine. It’s two naked guys, one black and one white, lying down with their hands on each others penises. Penii?
          I lie, “Oh, lots of times!”
          He says, “They’re making each other feel real good, huh?”
          I say, “My sister is just little and she’s not allowed to see stuff like this. And she’s coming, so…”

        Nancy walks over and he hides the magazine. She says, “Are you an army man? My daddy’s an army man.”
        He says, “Well, I got to be going,” and I say, “Us, too. Bye!” and we start home.
      
         We walk home and I’m feeling tingly, nasty and not sure what to do with what just happened so I say nothing to Nancy.  We eat dinner, do chores and then I go find Ann in her bedroom. She’s twelve and smart. I say, “I got a secret but you got to swear you won’t tell Mom. O.K?   Swear?”   She’s never kept one of my secrets in her life.
        She says, “I swear. What is it?”
        I tell her and her eyes get all wide and she yells, “Mom!” and runs off to tell. I haul ass downstairs and Mom is starting to say, “Oh, my God, oh, my God” over and she’s pacing around in a circle.  She sits me down and gets extra calm but Ann is in the background wailing like she’s stabbed and the whole thing is confusing.

          Mom says, “What did he look like, Janie?” and “Did he try to lift up your skirt?”
          I say, “I had on shorts.”
         “Did he touch you? What about Nancy? Was he making strange sounds? What about his car? What did he say, exactly?”
       
        I say all I know and now I’m quiet because it’s serious business and she’s calling her best friends, Liza Cox and Sarah Beard and I hear her say, “You need to come over later.” On a school night!   We’re supposed to be in bed when they come, except Ann, who gets to stay up later.

       Dad is in Viet Nam, some place so far away that he goes to sleep when we wake up; a whole world away.  I hear, I think, Mom crying and those cooing sounds coming from her friends, the ones you use to calm, soothe. The next day, Mom seems quiet, and I feel so bad and hope she’s normal again by the time school gets out. She is, so we don't talk about it again.


      But that weekend, Mom takes me to Miller’s Department Store and buys me a 10 inch Bowie knife with a sheath and loop to wear on my belt in plain sight. She says it’s a present from Daddy and I almost never take it off from then on.

      I’m the only armed eight year old in the neighborhood, but no one ever messes with me again.