This was part of a series on another site, but I reworked it into a stand-alone story. It's about two recent college graduates, Miranda (Mandy) Grossman and Paul D'Amato, who have only known each other for about a month.
In this chapter, she comes up with a new dating idea for her recently-acquired boyfriend. Woodlawn Cemetery is in the North Bronx, and the Jay Gould Mausoleum does exist as described here. This is taking place in September 1977.
The reference to the movie theater near the end is about his first meeting with her in August.
************
"Hey Paul, that stunt we talked about -- we should do it this week."
"You mean, let's call it -- a sexual stunt, right?"
Mandy said, "That's it, exactly. I thought I made that clear before."
I was very pleased with my new girlfriend so far. Miranda was a tall, zaftig girl with dark-blonde hair just down to her chin, which was a bit on the short side for that time. She was also very smart and funny, although she had a few eccentricities that I had noticed from the first day I had met her.
On that warm September afternoon, we were hanging out at a coffee shop on Broadway down the hill from her apartment in Kingsbridge Heights.
I said, "All right, what have you got for me?"
She took a deep breath and hesitated for a moment. "What I had thought of was -- we should have sex outdoors. I have a specific place in mind."
"What, just being in the car is not enough? Do you mean like in, say, a park, like Van Cortlandt?"
"No, I was thinking of Woodlawn Cemetery."
That was Mandy's wild and crazy side coming out again. I sat there for a moment, unable to reply. Before I could say anything else, she broke in, "Come on, at least hear me out."
"Okay, let me ask some questions first. Like, is this supposed to be at night?"
"No, I'm not superstitious, but it would be more than a bit creepy to be there after dark. Besides, I think they close the gates."
I didn't want to be there at night either, but I replied, "If this is in the daytime, it increases the chance of us getting caught, you do know that?"
"Well, that's part of the fun of it all, the risk we take. Except, we're not going to get caught."
"Yeah, and how can you guarantee that?"
"Have you ever heard of Jay Gould?"
I didn't know where this was going with that, but I played along with her. "He was one of the 19th Century robber barons, I think."
"That's him. At one point he owned a lot of railroads."
"All right, so what?"
She said, "You know how in the northern part of Woodlawn, there are all those old and really big mausoleums? Well, Gould has one there -- he died in 1892 -- and when you see this place, you'll know for sure that we can get away with fooling around in there." She continued, "You know what he said once? He said, 'I can hire one half of the working class to kill the other half.' "
"He was the one who said that? Sounds like he was a really charming kind of guy."
I sat back and thought about the situation. For some reason, that old song "The Wabash Cannonball" occurred to me, and I repeated two lines of it.
Mandy asked me, "What is that bit about traveling through 'the jungle?' "
"It refers to a hobo jungle or an encampment you could call it."
"I get it. Rain forests or whatever being rather scarce in, ah..."
"Indiana, most likely."
Mandy interrupted my reverie. "About the cemetery; at least have a look. We could drive over there on Thursday." She smiled, "I'll wear something special to motivate you."
"And what will that be?"
"You'll find out on Thursday." Another one of her surprises.
"Okay, my lovely Miranda, I'll have to see this for myself."
I remembered one other bout of outdoor sex I had experienced. That was back in 1975 with a plump but sexy little girl named Judy Weinberg. We had pulled off our tryst at City College, on the lawn behind Wagner Hall. But that had been quite late, around ten o'clock in the evening.
I considered telling Mandy about it, but I decided to hold off until I saw how this latest escapade went.
*******
Thursday was a warm but overcast day. Around 11:00 AM I drove my 1972 Cutlass through the Jerome Avenue gate and headed north. I noticed that Mandy had brought a big shopping bag with her, but I didn't ask about what was in it.
What most caught my attention were her clothes. She was wearing the same orange blouse and black skirt that she had on the day I had met her in August. This time, however, she had dark nylon stockings and black shoes instead of white sneakers and socks.
I asked her, "So how did you find out about this place?"
"Four years ago, when my Uncle Jeff was buried here, my family drove around afterwards. We were sort of sightseeing if looking at mausoleums could be considered sights to be seen."
"I've seen them myself."
"Do you have any relatives buried here?"
"Yeah, two actually. My grandma Louise, my mother's mom, she died of a heart attack when I was about three months old."
"Wow, she must have been on the young side."
"Fifty-two, I think. And her sister -- what would that be, my great-aunt, I think? -- died even younger. She got run over by a car on Queens Boulevard, around 1943. She's in another location around here." I thought about that. "I'm not sure I could find either gravesite right now. When people die before you remember them, they remain kind of abstract, you know what I mean?"
"I do get it."
This talk of death was strange considering our purpose in being there. But maybe that was the point. Our sexual coupling, if we could pull it off, would demonstrate that we were still very much alive. And also, at the age of twenty-two, one has no real concept of time yet. My own mortality seemed so far off in the future that it didn't register with me.
We entered the zone of the mausoleums, and I had forgotten how impressive many of them were. Even the smaller ones were like solid blocks of stone. The bigger ones were virtually buildings in themselves.
I commented, "At least these give jobs to stone masons, or they did at one time."
"It's amazing that people paid for these things. I mean, it's not like they're really here. All of this stone to hold -- what, some bones by this point probably?"
I said, "People's vanity, it has no limits. And the older ones, who even comes to visit them anymore? Once you're beyond anyone's living memory, as I said, you're really gone." I thought further, "You know Mandy, for this sexy adventure we're supposed to be having here, this is an extremely downbeat conversation."
Miranda was not the type to be apologetic about anything. "Well, I'm more interesting than some boring, vapid chick, right?"
I decided to tease her, "That's true, but you had better come up with something really good here today."
"Don't worry, you're going to like it, I'm sure of that. In fact, I'm going to like it too."
In a few moments we were stopped in front of Jay Gould's final resting place, and the size of the place was indeed impressive. The whole thing was the equivalent of two stories high, or close to that, and it was bigger than some bank buildings I had seen. It was designed like a Greek temple, with a colonnade around the entire structure enclosing an inner building.
This is just for one dead dude? You could easily entomb a hundred people in there.
I said, "I admit, it's pretty amazing."
"He obviously had a lot of money and the ego to go along with it. Drive around to the back."
Once we were there and I had turned off the engine, she moved closer and started talking to me in that quiet, confidential manner women have when discussing some sexual proposition.
"I already know how this is going to go. First, let me show you something."
She pulled her skirt up above her waist and said, "Ever see a garter before, with straps? I just got it and I know it's kind of retro, but I'm already loving it. I've got to get more of these things."
The garter encircled her waist and it had black straps holding up her stockings. The garter itself was orange with a black pattern on it,
I admitted, "No, actually I haven't seen one before." I tried to remember if one had ever appeared in
Penthouse
or
Hustler
magazines. "I noticed that it's sort of color-coordinated with your blouse."
"Have you noticed something else?"
"Am I supposed to?"
"Yeah, dummy, look at this." She splayed her legs apart. I could see that the garter was open from below, and I could look right up to her bare cunt.
My comment was pretty lame, "Oh, I see."
"Yeah, you can see indeed. It's sort of a garter-girdle combination, as opposed to being merely a belt. It almost covers my ass and pubic hair, but not quite! The point is, you can wear panties over it to cover the opening at the bottom. I obviously choose the option of not wearing them."
"A very good choice, I'd say."
Then she moved forward and started kissing me. She quietly said, "Now first, I want you to fondle my pussy and then you will go down on me. You will -- in fact, I expect it from you -- give me an orgasm. I'm sure you can do that because I've seen you do it before."