by Jack Weyland
“See, I’m not so dumb.”
“I never thought you were. It’s just we both have different areas we’re smart in.”
“Right—what else?”
“Neutrons and protons are themselves made up of quarks, and quarks are tied together with gluons.”
“Like Elmer’s Glue?” she asked.
“No, not exactly.”
“Elmer’s sticks so well. My mother broke a tea cup once and—”
“Quarks have properties like color, charm, and flavor.”
She laughed. “You’re such a tease.”
“I’m serious.”
“It sounded as though you were talking about Life Savers. Oh, Paul, I love to hear you explain things. You know everything.”
“Not everything, but all I know I want to share with you. I care about you—very much.”
She sighed, then became very serious. “Paul, there’s something I need to talk to you about.”
“If it’s about changing the rules of chess, I don’t think that’s practical.”
“It’s not that—I should’ve told you this the first time we met. Paul, I’m waiting for a missionary.”
There was a long pause as all the confidence she had built in him drained out. His voice cracked as he asked, “You are?”
“I met him last year before he left on his mission.”
“Is he an athlete?”
“He played freshman football.”
“A football player,” he moaned, utterly demolished. “Sure—it figures. I should’ve known someone like you would be taken. Just my luck, isn’t it. When I was five, I was the only kid who didn’t find any Easter eggs. I guess you want me to quit seeing you, don’t you.”
“Just like that?” she asked, sounding very surprised.
“In life some people find the Easter eggs and some don’t.”
“I’m not an Easter egg,” she said, sounding irritated with him.
“And I’m not a winner—but that must’ve been obvious from the beginning. What was I, Julie, an extra credit project? Well, anyway, thanks for showing me how to walk.”
They sat in silence. Paul folded up the chess set.
“What on earth do they teach you in physics?” she suddenly roared. “You don’t know beans!”
“Like what?”
“Like the saying, ‘When the going gets tough, the tough get going!’”
“Is that so? Did your jock boyfriend tell you that?” Paul exploded.
“No, but he could have. Believe me, he’d never give up just because a girl told him she was waiting for a missionary! No, sir! Especially if he cared about her. That’d only make him more determined to win her love. He’d never quit!”
A long pause, followed by Paul timidly asking, “He wouldn’t?”
“No—not him. He’s a guy who never gives up. Fourth down, twenty yards to go—he tries to run it. That’s his style.”
“What would he do?”
“He’d take me in his arms and tell me he loves me.”
Paul gasped. “He would?”
“Sure—that’s the kind of guy he is.”
A few seconds later, Paul said, “Julie, I love you.”
My hat was over my head so I couldn’t see, but a few seconds later I heard Paul ask, “Is this okay the way I’m holding you?”
“Not so much around my neck—I can’t breathe.”
“Like that?”
“That’s fine.”
“Julie, I love you. How’s that?”
“Then he’d kiss me.”
I nudged my hat a little to see what was happening. Paul kissed her lightly, then broke away and burst out, “Wow! He sounds like a wonderful guy!”
He kissed her again.
“What’s that saying again?” he asked after they separated.
“When the going gets tough, the tough get going.”
The next kiss was even longer. I felt guilty for spying on them and turned to look at Lara. She was also faking sleep, but I could see a mischievous grin on her face.
A minute later, Paul enthusiastically cried out, “You know, we need to support our missionaries! Let’s bake him some chocolate chip cookies!”
They kissed again.
My guilt ranneth over, and I sat up and rattled around, but they didn’t seem to hear. Finally I picked up a tackle box and dropped it on the floor of the boat. They broke away. Paul’s face turned a crimson red.
“Julie was just telling me about the missionary she’s waiting for.”
“I see.”
“We’re going to bake him some chocolate chip cookies.”
“The way you two were going, you won’t need an oven.”
Paul laughed with delight. “Well, you know what they say—when the going gets tough, the tough get going.”
* * * * *
We had a picnic supper on the boat, and then around eight o’clock we went to shore. While Lara and Julie went off on some errand, Paul and I cleaned our fish.
“Okay, Paul, you put the knife here and slice until you get to the gills,” I said, trying to teach him how to clean a fish.
“Kissing is a lot of fun, isn’t it,” he said, still in a daze.
“Did you see how I did that?” I asked.
“You know what, I never kissed before today. In high school, the only girl friend I had was Martha Swartz. We had calculus together. She was really into biology—her hands smelled of formaldehyde. I never kissed her—I was afraid I’d pass out from the formaldehyde and she’d add me to her bug collection.”
“Paul, watch how I pull out the insides.”
“Then there was the girl who sat next to me in band. She had the lowest body temperature of any person I’ve ever met. The guys in the trombone section, they were the rowdy ones, they used to come up and shake hands with her just to see how cold her fingers were.”
“Now you take your thumb and run it up the spinal column to get rid of all the blood. Watch me, Paul.”
“Actually,” Paul continued, “except for a cousin in the ninth grade, Julie is the first real girl I’ve kissed. Not that I’ve kissed any fake girls. Once I almost kissed a girl on the cover of the New Era, but that doesn’t count.”
I sighed. “Paul, do you want to clean a fish?”
“No, you go ahead. It’d make my hands smell. I need to keep my hands smelling good—that’s one thing I learned from Martha Swartz.”
I put the knife down. Paul was looking at the lake and daydreaming. “Okay, Paul, you’ve discovered kissing. But look, you can’t kiss all the time or it’ll lead to trouble.”
“Trouble?”
“Yes, trouble,” I answered ominously..
He looked at me as though he didn’t know what I was talking about.
“You have to be careful.”
“Gosh, Sam, I’m Phi Beta Kappa. Besides, I just want to kiss her.”
“For how long?”
“Forever. It’s a lot of fun. Do you know that?”
“I know.”
“Do you ever kiss Lara?”
“No.”
“Why not? It’s fun.”
“It’s more complicated than that.”
“What’s complicated? Just reach over with your lips and kiss.”
“It’s not physically complicated. I still feel married to my first wife. I’m not ready yet for any kind of deep emotional commitment.”
“Then just kiss her and forget about commitments.”
“I wish I could.”
“If you want, I’ll drive us home, and you and Lara can sit in the backseat and kiss.”
“No, I’ll drive.”
“Okay—then Julie and I’ll sit in the backseat.”
“Paul, I’m your home teacher. You’re new at this, so I want to give you a few rules my priests quorum adviser gave me a long time ago. The first rule is—you should never be alone in a room with Julie. Okay?”
“How about in an elevator? Is that okay?”
“I guess so
. Rule number two is— don’t go parking in some secluded spot. That could lead to trouble.”
“I agree—it could lead to a lot of trouble.”
“You understand what I’m saying, then?” I asked hopefully.
“Sure—I don’t even own a car. If I stole one to go park with Julie, that’d lead to big trouble.”
I sighed and then continued. “Rule number three—when temptation comes, run two miles a day.”
Sudden insight flooded into Paul’s mind. “So that’s why so many guys jog!”
“Rule number four—when you’re tempted, start singing a hymn and that’ll help you through. Okay, will you follow those rules?”
“Sure, they sound easy enough.”
“Oh, one other thing—sometimes a cold shower will help.”
“You know,” Paul reflected as we walked back to the car, “in high school, I could never figure out why my bishop kept warning us about things like this. But it was easy for me. I wasn’t dating, and the only girl I liked would’ve frozen my lips if I’d tried to kiss her.”
We put the fish in the ice chest and waited for Julie and Lara.
“Besides,” he said, “I had calculus. You know, Sam, calculus should be part of the rules, too.”
* * * * *
We drove to town and dropped Julie off at her dorm and Paul at his aunt’s house.
A few minutes later I pulled in front of Lara’s house and parked. After watching Julie and Paul kiss outside the dorm a few minutes before, I was in the mood for romance.
“Did you give the fish to Paul?” Lara asked.
“Sure—why?”
“It still smells fishy around here.”
Inconspicuously I sniffed my hands and realized I was the source of the smell. I casually dangled my left hand out the car window and buried my right hand in my pants picket. It looked a little ridiculous.
“You know,” I said with a grin, “I was talking to a Paul today about the dangers of kissing too much and how it can lead to other things. He asked if I’d ever kissed you. He said I should try it. I told him it was more complicated than that, but he said it wasn’t complicated—that you just reach over with your lips and kiss. Isn’t that funny?”
“Oh, yes,” she said, laughing more than I would have preferred.
“I told him it’s taken me time to adjust to losing Charly. That’s why I haven’t even tried—up to now, I mean.”
I slid closer to her, my left hand still sticking out the window.
“And I respect you for that, too,” she said. “I think it’s best for a couple to become good friends first.”
“Lara, I consider you a good friend—a very good friend.”
I couldn’t slide any closer and still keep my left hand out the window in the breeze, so I just leaned toward her. She looked strangely at my position. I must have looked like a monkey at a zoo.
Never mind the smell, I thought, I need arms for this. I’m going to kiss her tonight. How long it’s been since I felt this way! Wow, her face is nice. And her neck—I must kiss her neck.
“Lara,” I said, sliding next to her, “Lately I’ve thought about holding you close and kissing you.”
“I’ve thought about that, too,” she said.
Terrific! I thought.
“But we both have very high standards, don’t we?”
“Standards? What have standards got to do with it? I’m talking about your basic goodnight kiss.”
“We’re not going to give into the temptation to kiss, are we?”
“We aren’t?”
“You know,” she continued cheerfully, “when I was just a young girl, I decided to save my kisses for the man I was going to marry. And I think maybe you’ve set those same high standards, haven’t you?”
She smiled warmly at me, while I stared at her in shock.
“You’ve got to be kidding!”
“Sam?” she asked, sensing something very wrong.
“You won’t even kiss me unless I agree to marry you?”
“Sam!”
“Lara, so help me, I’ve tried. I’ve overlooked your weird eating habits. Why can’t you eat sugar? I think it’s stupid not to eat sugar! Sugar is as American as—as apple pie! And I’ve tried to ignore your photographic memory. But this—not kissing! Do you know how many dates we’ve had? Okay, at first I wasn’t ready to kiss—but now I am. For crying out loud, who can put up with all your nonsense? You’re just driving me away, you know that? I’ve really tried. But this time you’ve gone too far!
I jumped out of the car, slammed the door, escorted her to the porch, and escaped as fast as I could.
* * * * *
Chapter Ten
Lara, this is silly. Why wouldn’t you let me apologize on the phone? Why’d we have to come here?”
“Because this is where we started.”
“All right, but did you clear using the room?”
“Of course. You go first—careful, don’t bump your head.”
I crawled under the high council table and she followed, dragging a picnic basket after her.
“What’s in the basket?”
“Later. First of all, you’ve got a lot of explaining to do about what you’ve been doing.”
“It’s only been a week.”
“But a busy week for you!” she accused. “Sam, how do you think I felt when people told me about the things you were doing? For a while I was getting a phone call every fifteen minutes. I thought you’d gone berserk.”
“Who told you?”
“Relatives, friends, single adults. I wrote it all down. Shall we go through it now?”
“I don’t see how that will—”
“Sam, we’re going through this!” she said coolly as she opened a small notebook. “Let’s see,” she said, reading from her notes, “you called up the Deseret Gym and asked for a list of single women who play racquetball. How many did you take out?”
“Just one.”
“And?”
“She beat me—terrific backhand.”
“So?”
“I never want to see her again in my life.”
She glanced at her notebook. “Here’s one I find difficult to believe. You hung around an LDS bookstore, watching girls who buy books about temple marriage.”
“I needed something to do during my lunch hours.”
“Let’s see,” she said, flipping to another page. “You took out all five check-out girls at a Safeway store. Is that right?”
“Well, not all at once, of course.”
“This next one really surprises me. You took out a girl who’s still in high school.”
“I did?”
“To refresh your memory of the details, she was the one who worked at McDonald’s.”
“It wasn’t a date—she’s taking her driver’s exam next week and she wanted to practice driving a car with a manual shift. Her father came with us.”
“I can’t read my writing on the next one. It looks like ‘ground beef girl.’”
“She puts it into the little plastic boxes and seals it.”
“You mean another one from Safeway?”
“Well, you know their motto, ‘Since we’re neighbors, let’s be friends.’”
“How did Hamburger Patty work out?”
“I made the mistake of asking about goals. She said someday she hopes she can move up to steaks.”
“Is that all you dated?”
“Well, there was a women’s stake softball tournament.”
“You dated one of the players?”
“Sort of,” I said vaguely.
“More? You mean the entire team?”
“I took them out for banana splits and told stories about my mission. They all said it was more inspiring than the Old Testament.”
“Why’d you even bother to call me last night? I mean, there were still hardware stores, banks, drugstores, libraries. Why bother to get back to me?”
“After all the others, I finally decided . . .
I’m not sure, but it’s entirely possible that I may be falling in love with you.”
“It is?”
“Indications point that way at the present time.”
“When will you be sure?”
“I don’t know.”
“But indications actually are pointing? Good grief, Sam, this sounds like a weather report. You’re saying you might be in love with me?”
“You’ve got it, Ace. I’m as surprised as you are.”
“Why?”
“Remember the first time we were under this table, It was such a crazy night—for a split second I thought you were Charly. She was always doing wild things, and I’d never been under the table with a girl before.”
“Me neither.”
“But one thing’s sure—you’re not Charly. So why am I falling in love with you?”
“That’s a good question, but I’ve got a better one. Why’d it take three busloads of girls to figure that out?”
“I tried the others—on a high moral plain, you understand—but I came back to you. Why’s that so hard to understand? They do it all the time on TV with deodorants.”
“Talk slower, Sam,” she said, writing in her notebook. “I want to get this all down for my journal.”
“Okay, so I ran away and dated a couple of dozen girls last week. There was another reason. You have one drawback.”
“Just one?”
“You’re overqualified—too smart, too spiritual, too much initiative. For all I know, you make more money than I do. Last week, when I was still mad at you, I pictured us married and people coming up to us, slapping you on the back, and asking, ‘How’s the little man?’”
“Okay, I agree—I’m a monster.”
“Cute though.”
“Oh, thanks! Last week I decided most of all I wanted to be cute. You know, it hasn’t been an easy week for me, either. I kept asking myself, where did I go wrong? I finally decided it was when my bishop interviewed me about goals when I was twelve years old. He told me I could achieve anything I put my mind to, and I believed him. He was right, but he didn’t tell me that if I was too successful I’d scare all the boys away. You’re not the first, you know. In my senior year in college, I was solely responsible for ten freshman girls getting married. A guy’d start to date me, get intimidated, and run out and propose to the first eighteen-year-old girl he met.
She opened the picnic basket and pulled out a book and gave it to me.