Cemetery Street by John Zunski (free ebook reader for ipad .txt) 📕

was over; I released inside of Jenny. I bit my lip to keep from crying: “Shannie.” Jenny would have mistaken my head for a basketball and bounced it off the floor.
“That’s it?” Jenny cried. “I’ve sat at stop signs longer! I waited five years for this? You’re horrible! You’re terrible! You suck!” She pinned my shoulders to the floor.
“Fuck you Jenny,” I croaked trying to lift her thick hips off me.
“Is that what you call it, Mr. teeny weenie. Mr. Two Stroke wonder. Goddamn you!” she punched the floor next to my head. “I knew I should have gone bowling. At least that’s an all nighter.”
“Up yours!” I barked. Then stupidly: “Get off me lard ass.”
“What did you call me?” Her spittle soaked my face. Her hands grabbed my neck. I grabbed her wrists and bucked my hips. She landed with a thump. Outside a dog howled. I gained my knees and backed across the kitchen floor. Jenny sat against the kitchen cabinets, disheveled hair hiding her stare. “Steve Lucas is a better fuck!”
“Call him, he wouldn’t mind sloppy seconds!”
Her lips quivered. “I’m not in love with Steve Lucas.” Outside, a drunken voice yelled at the howling dog. There was a thump and a yelp.
“Don’t go there.”
“Why not? I love you James.” Outside the mongrel kept silent - the drama inside the Wade’s capturing its floppy ears.
“What’s the matter, afraid to love someone who loves you back?” Her words landed like a Muhammad Ali jab. I gained my feet and slipped out the backdoor.
“I bet that blonde cunt never let you get this far,” Jenny cried. “Happy New Years you fuck!” she yelled. I slammed the door. Cold air slapped my face where Jenny’s words left off. The dog howled again.
Streetlights and starlight accompanied me home. Laying on the couch, I hoped the nineties would be better than the eighties. They had to be, I thought. I was wrong.

In the lexicon of teenagedom, the two most terrifying words are: “I’m pregnant!” Believe me, I know. About the time Shannie and I took our first jump course, Jenny said the magic words. She cornered me at the seven-eleven across from the high school.
“What?” I leaned against the front of the store.
“Did I stutter?”
“Maybe it’s not mine. Did you ask Lucas?” I clenched tightly so I wouldn’t piss my pants. I imagined Shannie’s smile, more unattainable than ever.
“I’m not a slut,” Jenny cried, shoving me into a garbage can. “I don’t sleep around.” A crowd gathered.
“Really, You had me, Stevie boy, Yerrington,” Yerrington was a lie, but who’s counting.
“I did not!” Jenny barked.
“You told me yourself.” I felt the approval of the gathering crowd.
“You’re full of it. I won’t let that geek fuck me with your puny prick.” Hoots of approval encouraged Jenny.
“How do you know it’s not Stevie boy’s?”
“I didn’t fuck him!” Jenny crooned “Recently!” she mumbled.
“You didn’t fuck me recently either,” I countered.
“If fucking’s what you call it! Mr. Peter Puny Prick!” More laughter. “New Years wasn’t that long ago.”
Snickers and smirks teased me.
“You better think of something faster than your dick, Mr. less-than-a-minute-man,” Jenny warned. Her hot, humid breath pruned my skin. “I ain’t holding the bag on this one.”
I wished Count was home. He’d know what to do. I could try calling him. But, I didn’t know the number. I could write, that would take too long. I couldn’t talk to my father; Diane and Shannie were out of the question! Steve Lucas - I do better talking to a wall. So I did what most teenagers do: I avoided Jenny, I avoided thinking about her and hoped it went away.
“At least Jenny Slut doesn’t have AIDS,” Steve Lucas said. Jenny Slut was Steve’s new nickname for my favorite New Year’s date.
“Thanks for the sentiments, ass wipe.”
“What are friends for?” Steve Lucas slapped my back. “Look at it this way. The bun’s in her oven. She’s the one with the problem. I wouldn’t worry.”
I stared at Steve. “You really don’t get it,” I said.
“What’s the worst that can happen? She has the kid - you’re a daddy. You wouldn’t be the first to ride that ride.”
“How many fingers am I holding up?” I questioned. We stood on the sidewalk in front of the funeral parlor.
“Two,” Steve answered. “Why?”
“I want to know if you’re as stupid as you sound.”
“Listen,” Steve placed an arm around my shoulder. “She’s not going to have the kid. She’s going to get an abortion. She’ll hit you up for three - four hundred bucks. Take it to the bank.” Steve wore a stupid smile. “Hey, I made a funny. Get it? Cover the costs; take it to the bank.”
“You’re a regular George Carlin.” I rolled my eyes. “Tell me Kreshkin, how the fuck do you figure she'll get an abortion?”
“Ain’t it obvious? And you call me stupid. You my friend need to extract your head from your ass.”
“Enlighten me,” I said.
“If Jenny Slut’s parents found out, they’d kill her – away goes your problem. Right? Wrong! ‘Cause when her old man finishes with her, he’ll track you down and slaughter you like the pig you are. You’re not Jenny Slut’s problem, self-preservation is. She has to get rid of your little nightmare. There is no way in hell she’ll keep it.”
“How do you know?” I asked.
“I have it on good sources,” Steve said.
I looked at Steve blankly.
“How many fingers am I holding up?” Steve questioned.
“One,” I answered. “Why?”
“I’m just seeing if you’re as stupid as you look,” the future undertaker mocked. “Marcy told me you asshole. Cough up three hundred bucks and you’re out of Jenny Slut jail.”
“How does Marcy know? And where the fuck can I get three hundred bucks?”
“Jenny Slut cried on her shoulder. I’m telling you lover boy, the bargain keeps getting better for you.”
“Shit,” I mumbled. “If Marcy knows, Shannie knows. And if Shannie knows, I’m…”
“You’re what?” Steve interrupted.
“I’m screwed. I’ll lose her for sure.”
“Like you ever had her,” Steve said. “Don’t go looking for the cloud on a sunny day. Cleaning up this mess is more important than what little Ms Ortolan thinks.”
The next day Jenny Wade confirmed Steve Lucas’s prediction. She cornered me in the high school’s lobby. “Listen, I figured a way out of this mess. You cough up three hundred bucks and all is forgotten.”
“Where am I going to get three hundred bucks?” I averted her gaze.
“That’s not my problem. I need it by next Friday, capisce?”
I stared at my shuffling feet. “I don’t have it.”
“Listen dick wad,” She mimed through a stiff upper lip. She grabbed my shirt and shoved me against the wall. “I don’t care how you get it, I need three hundred bucks next Friday!”
The beginning of a moustache sprouted above her chapped lips. I thought of crabgrass in a cracked sidewalk. She is going to have a hella thick rug. “But, I…”
“Rob a bank or something.” Jenny’s mousy voice was deceptive. “Ask your little bitch girlfriend,” she sneered. “When this nightmare is over, remind me to tell you what a dead-end that bitch is; she’s going to break your heart, and stomp on the pieces.”
I was silent. Around us the lobby bustled. To a passing eye we looked like a couple eking a moment’s privacy. “Three Hundred Bucks! Next Friday!” she released my shirt. The glimmer in her eyes vanished. She turned away, disappearing into the tidal flow of bodies flowing down the halls.
As the days dwindled, Steve Lucas assumed the role of my conscious. “Man, don’t fuck this up. She’s leaving you off easy. You don’t want her old man finding out. You’ll be run out of town like your predecessor at 907 Cemetery Street.”
“How did you know about that?” I cried.
“Nothing happens in this town that I don’t know about,” Steve Lucas boasted. “Anyway, don’t worry about my snooping ass. Don’t fuck this up,” Steve warned - his expression serious.
That evening, around the Ortolan’s kitchen table, Diane asked: “What’s wrong James?” I considered telling them. The words were forming on my lips when I changed my mind. Shannie studied me. She sighed and returned to sketching. Her work, a self-portrait, would eventually appear as the goddess Venus on a feminist jeweler’s website – an unknown entity in nineteen-ninety.
Later, sitting in my perch, I pondered my problem. My father and the Ortolans were out. So were the Millers. It was too late to ask Count. Bear and Flossy probably would help, if they had money to spare. Which left me with old man Lucas - the Detroit Lions had a better chance of winning the Super Bowl than I had of getting a nickel out of that corpse creamer. Bingo - the little twat himself – Steve Lucas, he saved every penny he ever made. So sure that my friend would bail me out that I fell into a deep dreamless sleep.
“You out of your gourd?” Steve Lucas barked the next morning. “What makes you think I have three hundred bucks?”
“Come on ass wipe. You have every last penny anyone ever gave you.”
“And I’m telling you I don’t have it!” He spit on the ground in front of my feet.
“Don’t bullshit a bullshitter.” I shoved him before spitting in front of his feet.
“Let’s say I have three hundred bucks, why should I give it to you?”
“Loan me,” I corrected.
“Yeah right! I’d have a better chance of getting my money back if I threw it into the Schuylkill.”
“Douche bag,” I snapped.
“What’s your point?”
“You’re a Jew, that’s my point!” I exclaimed.
“No, Katzenmoyer is a Jew; I’m a smart business man,” Steve Lucas said.
“I’d loan you the money in a heart-f'ing-beat.” We stood behind each other’s luggies, staring each other down.
Steve shook his head: “I wouldn’t get into this kind of mess. What you’re saying is total monkey shit.”
“You’re total monkey shit!” I hissed. “You suck the big one. Don’t lend me the money dickhead, see if I ever lift a finger to help your sorry ass. When I croak, Katzenmoyer will handle the arrangements. Cheap Prick!” I cracked Steve across the side of his head, sending him to the ground. I stormed away yelling next time I’d beat his ass till he shit nickels.
When I stepped into the lobby Jenny ambushed me. “Got the money?”
“Is it Friday? NOT!”
“You better have it,” Jenny warned.
“I have it,” I hissed. “Why would I give it to you a day early?”
She stared me down. Her moustache grew thicker overnight, I thought, “Meet me in front of the Jr. High tomorrow morning, 7:45 sharp. Don’t diss me; you do, you’ll have hell to pay.” She used to be such a timid little mouse, I thought watching her saddlebags waddle into the crowd.
Standing against the lobby wall I considered bank robbery. I imagined walking into Beyford First National Bank armed with a note and my hand in my jacket pocket, only to be laughed out of the bank by elderly tellers. “Hey Myrtle, get a load of this: Peter Puny Prick demands quality quantities quick - ha, maybe if he didn’t have such a dime store dick he wouldn’t be in such a fix.” I can’t even rob a bank in my imagination, I thought.
The homeroom bell rang. I waited for the hallways to clear and slipped through the front doors. Shannie sped by as I walked down Bainbridge Street. I dropped my head hoping she won’t recognize me. The GTI downshifted. I glanced over my shoulder, Shannie was turning around.
“Where you going?” she asked driving at my pace.