At the time, there wasn't a girl who would give me the time of day.

At least, that's what I thought at the time. Later on, I met Tina Graves, who had been Tina Bettina, Tina Graves of the five kids, and nothing good to say about Mr. Graves, who I had never known. Tina had called me because a friend of a friend of a friend had passed the word along that I'd been looking for a babysitter.

I know you don't have any money, she said. Your wife surely had a lot of medical bills. It's OK. I can watch six as easily as I can watch five. Or my oldest, Gina, she can watch Jasper. You need to get out.

Out, I said? I can't afford to go out. In that case, she said, Gina is watching Jasper, and I'm taking you out.

I Didn't Want A Pity Date

All of a sudden, I was pissed. Fuck you, I said, and I'm not a guy who uses profanity, not even to men, and not to women, sarcasm sure, but not the f-bomb. Free babysitting was a neighborly thing, but I wasn't a charity case, that I needed some babe to take me out on a date because she pitied me. You've been looking down your nose at me ever since the fifth grade, I asserted, when your folks move to town, and you sat behind me in Mrs. Samuels' class.

Hell, I said, through high school, there wasn't a single girl that would give me the time of day. Tina laughed in my face. She wasn't thinking in terms of a mercy date. You wouldn't talk to us, Tina said. There wasn't one of us that you thought smart enough to be worth talking to. We talked about you, wondered why you didn't even want to get laid.

And someday, I'll tell you the story about Tina Bettina, she of the daughter Gina, because from there, things headed up quite a bit. At a time when I was pretty low from losing my wife, Tina provided healing.

The Bulk Candy Girl

But I wanted to talk about Louise and Sarah. I was working in the dime store when I was in high school and Louise was working there as the candy girl. She must've been about 22 or so. All the other women in the dime store were 35, 40, or older. Cleaning out those bulk candy bins was hard to do, if you did it right, and if you didn't do it right, you'd end up with buggy candy.

You were going to end up with buggy candy anyway, but if you cleaned the bins properly, you got rid of all the eggs they laid, instead of throwing away ten pounds of chocolate covered peanuts only to have to do it all over again two weeks later when you had refilled the bin with fresh candy.

Taking Her Break

On her break, Louise would get a single-serving bag of chips and a bottle of Suncrest White Cream Soda and sit on the steps to the mezzanine, and talk to me. I was always working in the back room, it seemed. She'd complain to me about the nail she'd broken, or how she was mad at her boyfriend, or whatever. It was as if I was someone worth talking to even though I was pudgy, and she was slim and busty, and had a pretty face with sleek blonde hair and a million watt smile.

I caught myself staring at her once, and quickly turned away, and she caught me. "You like looking? It's OK. I like guys to look. See?" she said, and when I turned back, she was undoing a button, so that her bra was even more obvious. Before she went back onto the store floor, she had buttoned up again, but while we were talking, she left the button undone.

And Then She Disappeared

I thought that was nice of her. It was as if I wasn't abhorrent. And then, one day, she was gone, and Sarah was the candy girl. Sarah and Louise were sisters. I asked about Louise, and Sarah said that Louise had gone to Cincinnati to a business school to learn to be a secretary. Wow, I said, she never said a thing. Yeah, well, the scholarship came up suddenly.

Sarah was nice, too, but she had mousy brown hair, and smaller breasts, and she was a lot quieter. She took her breaks in the back room, too, but she didn't drink any Suncrest, and she didn't eat any chips, and she didn't talk. She just worked crossword puzzles, and mostly kept to herself. She wasn't rude or anything, and when she needed a case of Starlight Mints toted up to the candy counter, and I delivered them, she always gave me a smile and thanked me very much.

Her Sister Disappeared As Well

And then six months later, Sarah was gone as well, again without explanation or fairwells. Rae, the head cashier, minded the candy counter for the next couple of weeks, and then there was a new candy girl, but this one was probably 40. I said something to Rae, as I was emptying the trash behind the cash register, about it being odd that neither one of the girls had said a word before they left.

Ten years later, I was walking through a carnival in a small town near Cincinnati. It was rainy, so there weren't many people there, and although the merry-go-round didn't sound any different than when it was dry, the calliope's wheeze and flat tones seemed to be an especially mournful complaint. And there she was. Louise. I wasn't sure, of course, but she was walking through the carnival, alone, no destination in sight. I asked, "Louise?"

A Double-Take

She looked at me, did a double take, and said, "Nobody calls me that anymore. I changed my name to Susie when I left the dime store." There wasn't any ring on her finger. Where you secretary-ing, I asked her. Again a double-take. She thought everybody knew. She left town to have a baby, give it up for adoption. Her folks disowned her, and after her sister died, there wasn't any reason to go back home. Sarah died? They didn't tell you anything, did they? She didn't want her folks to disown her, so she had an illegal abortion, and she bled to death.

We'd been walking all this time, and we were at the end of the carnival, and in front of the bar where I'd intended to buy a meal. "Can I buy you a meal, or a drink?" I asked. She took my arm. We sat across from each other in the booth. She had a Schoenling, and I had a meatloaf sandwich and fries.

I Really Missed You

I really missed talking to you, I told her. She nodded. Remember when I unbuttoned for you, she asked? She undid one button of her plaid shirt. I smiled, but all I could think about was Sarah, and shortly after that, tears started to well up in my eyes, and then in Louise's eyes. We just sat there in silence, and the waitress had the decency to not intrude.

Eventually, the merry-go-round started up again, and the wheeze of the calliope trickled into the bar.

Other Bloggers On Related Topics:
abortion - bulk candy - calliope - dime store - merry-go-round - pity date - Schoenling beer - Suncrest - White Cream Soda