The Complete Collection. William Wharton

his hands on the handlebars while he’s hanging out sideways on that wooden wall. He has tremendous deltoids and forearms with tattoos all over them. He looks like he’d be one hell of a tough nut to pin.

      Nights, Birdy and I ride the rides. Birdy chooses all the rides that throw you against the sky. There’s one where they start you spinning so you go faster and faster till you’re upside down, with nothing to hold you in your seat. Everybody screams except Birdy. He sits there with a big grin on his face. I do that once, that’s enough.

      Another time I’m trying my strength on one of those things where you swing a sledgehammer and try to ring the bell. I ring it three times in a row and win a little Teddy bear. There are a couple cutee girls watching us and I give it to one of them. We get to talking. They’re from Lansdowne. Birdy stands around but he’s bored. I talk them into going on the roller coaster with us. One has red hair and nice beginning tits pushing out her sweater. The other is quieter, more the type for Birdy, if there is any type of girl for Birdy.

      On the roller coaster, I hold her hand in her lap, tucked sort of between her legs. I can feel the slippery flesh under her dress.

      I put my arm over her shoulder and she leans her head against me. While the car is clickety-clicking up for the downhill run, I look back at Birdy and his girl. He’s leaning over the edge looking down and she’s looking straight ahead, holding her own hand in her lap. She smiles at me; Birdy doesn’t notice. He could even be thinking of climbing out of the car and jumping. I wouldn’t put it past him.

      After that, I talk them into going for a walk along the beach, and we walk over to where we have our nest. We get out the blankets and spread them. The girls are getting nervous. They’re here with their parents and have to be home by ten o’clock. I ask Birdy what time it is; he looks up and says it’s about nine-fifteen. I’ve never known Birdy to be wrong about the time. Birdy’s girl is more nervous than mine. She wants to take off right away. My girl, whose name is Shirley, says maybe Birdy and Claire, that’s the other girl, ought to take a walk down to the clock at the parking lot to see what time it really is. She looks at me. Now, I’m getting nervous myself. I’ve got a hard-on, and here it is coming right at me.

      As soon as they’re gone, we get down on the blanket and start kissing. She opens her mouth and sticks her tongue between my lips. I begin feeling her up and then, bango, I come off. I try not to let on but she must know. We keep kissing, but it’s not the same. She lifts her sweater and puts my hand under. I touch her bra and can feel her little nipple, hard, under it. She looks around, reaches back, and undoes the bra. I put my hand over her whole tit. Jesus, my hard is coming on again. Just then, we hear Birdy and Claire. Shirley pushes away and hooks herself up. She brushes back her hair and stands up. I get up, too.

      ‘It’s almost nine-thirty, Shirley. We’d better get home.’

      Claire stays out from under the boardwalk. Birdy stretches himself on the blanket where Shirley and I just were.

      ‘OK, party pooper. Good-bye, Al. See you, Birdy. Maybe tomorrow night about eight, near the merry-go-round, OK?’

      I say OK and they leave. I’m still shaking, and the inside of my jockey shorts are slimy with jit. I go down toward the ocean as if I’m going to take a piss. I wipe myself off. I never knew any girl like that before.

      We meet a couple more times before they leave. Birdy’s bored with the whole thing and Claire’s bored with Birdy, but Shirley and I are going hot and heavy. One night, we’re down on the blanket and I get my finger under her panties. I can feel her little hole and I slip my finger in. That’s getting close. But she pushes me away, and that’s it.

      When the girls leave I’m ready to go, too, but Birdy’s still wrapped up with his swimming. I swim some myself, but Birdy’s in all day long. He keeps going without stopping till he’s pooped, and blue with cold. Then he’ll come out and lie face down in the sand till he gets his wind back, then out he’ll go again. It doesn’t look to me as if he’s having any fun, but he has a big ear-to-ear grin on his face all the time. He’s only swimming, but he’s talking about ‘flying’. That’s typical Birdy.

      Well, after a few weeks, we run out of money and decide to sell the bikes. This is our big mistake. We go into a bike shop, and while we’re trying to sell them I noticed the lady go into the back and phone but I don’t think much of it. The guy keeps us in front dickering over price, and we’re about ready to walk out when two cops come in the door.

      They take us down to the station house, leaving the bikes at the bike store. First, they accuse us of stealing the bikes, want us to show some papers to prove we own them. Who the hell has bike-ownership papers? Then they find us on the run-away list. Birdy’s old lady’s turned us in. We’d both written saying we were all right and we’d be back in time for school. What a bitch.

      Well it all comes out that they ship us home on a train first-class with a stupid bald-headed cop. He goes all the way, eating in the dining car and everything. They stick our parents for a ninety-two dollar bill and we never see the bikes again.

      My old man beats the living bejesus out of me. He chases me around the cellar with his big leather belt, hitting me with it or punching, kicking, whatever he can get me with. The old lady’s standing at the top of the cellar steps yelling, ‘Vittorio, VITTORIO! BASTA VITTORIO!’ Nothing’s going to be enough for old Vittorio except to kill me. Finally, there’s nothing for it but to roll up in a bundle on the floor and pretend I’m dead. I just about am. I swear, there on the floor nobody’s ever going to get me so they can beat me up like that again. Somehow, I’ll get so I can beat the crap out of Vittorio, too. I’ll do it before he’s too old to appreciate it, if it kills me. I’m curled up on the floor with my hands over my eyes and ears, and he’s swinging away at me and that’s what I’m thinking. What a lot of shit!!

      I’m in bed for a week. I look like I’ve fallen off three gas tanks. I’m black-and-blue, sore all over. Mostly I’m sore inside. The old lady won’t let me out of the house till the worst swelling is down on my face. Old Vittorio’s a strong son-of-a-bitch. You wipe big joints and cut six-inch steel pipe all day and you get strong. I pin the bastard on my sixteenth birthday.

      She is so beautiful; she’s everything I’ve imagined, everything I want to be. It’s impossible she’s mine, not really mine, just with me. If she doesn’t care to stay, I’ll let her go. I want her to love me. I want us to be close, as close as living things can be to each other. How close can we come?

      When Al and I finally paid back the money, my father said I could have a bird in my room as long as I do my schoolwork and help around the house with chores. I can’t keep a pigeon indoors, so I decide on a canary.

      First, I read everything I can about canaries. I find out that the original canaries came from Africa and were shipwrecked on the Canary Islands. They were dark green. The canary is valued because it can sing. However, only the male canary sings. The female looks exactly like the male but cannot sing. She is kept in cages for breeding purposes only. It seems unfair to the females.

      I like canaries because of the way they fly. The canary has an undulating flight. It flies up into an almost stall, then loops down, then up to a stall and down. It’s like Tarzan swinging through the trees but without vines. It’s the way I’d like to fly. A few finches hang around down by the Cosgrove barn. I’ve watched them with my binoculars; they fly that way.

      I could never keep a wild bird in a cage. If a bird already knows how to fly against the sky, I could never cage it. I know I have to buy a bird born in a cage, a bird whose parents, grandparents, ancestors had lived only in cages.

      There are many types of canaries. Some are called choppers and sing a loud song; their beaks open, ending each note by closing the beak. Others are called rollers. They sing with beaks closed and deep in the throat. There are different kinds of rollers and choppers and there are contests for singing. There are also various shapes and sizes of canaries; some are so peculiarly shaped they can scarcely fly.

      I decide to buy a young female because they’re less expensive. I’m interested in flying, not singing. I buy a bird magazine that comes