Hal took a pair of fingernail clippers from his pocket and
snipped a hangnail. “What’re we doing tonight,
Billy?”
His cousin scratched his head. “Well, there’s the chores…”
“I don’t do chores.”
Hal stared ahead, fingering the clippers. “We have the maid to do that.”
“We could bike to the dollar cinema.”
Hal snorted. “Fifteen
miles? In the city, there’s a theater on
every block.”
Billy nodded. In the
city, Hal’s parents were in the process of a divorce; working out where Hal
would fit into their new lives. “You
want to get a hot dog?”
Hal wrinkled his nose.
Billy thought a moment before a whisper of an idea swirled
up and took hold in his mind. “You ever
hear of the Academy for Girls?”
“The one across the border?”
Hal pointed across the Ohio towards Cincinnati.
“Sure, that’s the one.”
“Of course I’ve heard of it.
Everyone has.”
“They say the wild girls leave their windows open at night;
wait for a handsome boy to climb the trellis of roses and take them out dancing.”
Hal smiled. “I think
we just got our plans figured out.”
* *
*
“Here’s where the girls stay,” Billy indicated a four story
building.
“Think that trellis’ll hold me?”
“You chicken?”
“Naw, I ain’t chicken.
In the city…”
“Up on the third floor.
See there?” Billy shone his light
on the open window of his piano teacher, Mr. Henry Clay.
“Yeah.” Hal began to
climb. Halfway up, he paused. “What do I say?”
“Ask her if she’d like to go dancing,” Billy said.
Hal disappeared into the window.
Billy giggled.
There came a shout. A
flurry of curse words chased Hal all the way down the trellis. “I don’t go dancing with anyone but my wife,
son. You clear on that?”
Hal’s feet hit the ground; he was off like a shot.
When they reached home, they sat in the barn until their laughter
wore off.
“Hey, Billy?”
“Yeah?”
“You think I can live here?”
Labels: fiction Trifecta Writing Challenge