My sister and I live on adjoining one-acre lots in a sparsely populated development way out in the country. Between our houses is an area with a picnic table, an old fashioned swing hanging from a huge oak tree, a couple of barbecue pits and off just a little way from the rest, a trampoline. All of our kids are young adults now so the trampoline seldom gets used for anything other than a place for a private conversation or a place to lay out and catch some sun. But one night last summer it became a place of unexpected pleasure for me.
Most of my family had come out to one of the local watering holes to listen to me and my band. It had been a great gig with a loud, appreciative crowd that danced all night and tipped well. I was in a great mood when we finally wrapped up and got everything loaded and when I got home I was pleased to see that my nephew and a gal he'd brought home from the club and my oldest niece and her best friend were still up and laying around on the trampoline talking and drinking. I grabbed a cold beer out of the ice chest sitting on the ground and jumped up and joined them.
I don't drink when I perform so I had to do a little catching up and as I opened my third beer I began to realize that Sherry, my niece's friend was royally pissed about something. This really wasn't an unusual occurrence. Sherry had been a bit of a drama queen the whole time that I'd known her. She's a sweet gal but just never seems to fully grasp the concept of happiness. She's always having boy trouble or parent trouble or work trouble and quite frankly, we've all just learned how to tune her out when she's ranting about some real or perceived problem.
Well, this evening's problem revolved around what an asshole some boy was and how one night he was all lovey-dovey and wanting to hang out and make out and get into her britches and how the next night the same boy wouldn't pay any attention to her and how she didn't understand why boys treated her that way. I made some soothing comment or another and she quieted down for a while. At about the same time my niece Christy said that she had to get up early, told everyone goodnight and left.
When Christy left Sherry scooted over next to me and put her arm through mine and sort of snuggled up to me. Now, I may be in my fifties but having a pretty girl grab my arm and push a very nice, very firm twenty one year old breast under my arm is just as much fun now as it was when I was eighteen. She said, "You know what I want to do? I want to get real drunk."
I said, "Well, all right. Do you want another beer?"
She answered, "No, what else is there?" I thought for a second and told her that I had a nearly full bottle of Parrot Bay Rum in the freezer but that I didn't think I had any cokes to mix it with. She said, "No problem. We'll just drink it right from the bottle." Seemed like as good an idea as any I could come up with so I told her that I'd be right back and left to get the rum.
When I got back to the trampoline the girls were gone and it was just my nephew sitting there. He sorta chuckled and said, "You know why she's pissed don't you?" I didn't and told him so. "I boned her last night and now she's mad because I'm not with her tonight. I told her before we left for the club that we weren't going to be together. She just wasn't listening."
My nephew is twenty-four, three years older than Sherry and they've all known each other since grade school. Sherry's always had a big crush on Michael but I didn't realize that they'd ever gone to bed together until then. It did explain her attitude that night. "Well," I asked, "where'd the girls go?" He said that they had gone to go pee and get some blankets. This was an August night in South Texas so I wasn't real sure why we'd need blankets but I learned a long time ago not to question why women do certain things.
When they got back and settled down Sherry and I started taking long pulls on the bottle and before long we both had a pretty good buzz runnin'. Michael and his lady were on the opposite side of the trampoline under their blanket and it was obvious that they were making out pretty heavily. I had been sitting cross-legged for quite a while and was starting to get uncomfortable so I unfolded, made a couple of old man noises and stretched out laying on my back and checking out the millions of stars that you can only see when you live out in the country away from the city lights.
Sherry stretched out beside me and our combined weight sort of pushed us together. It was very comfortable and nice having a young lady lying next to me and making contact from shoulder to foot. I put both hands behind my head and just as natural as you please Sherry laid her head up on my chest and snuggled even closer.
In a voice so low that I could barely understand her Sherry asked, "Why do guys treat me like they do? It's like they don't respect me at all and they just walk all over me and I get so tired of it."
Her question really made me think. We have a saying in our family: "Don't ask if you really don't want to know." If she really wanted to know I'd tell her but I'd have to choose my words carefully.
Sherry hadn't had much of a family life while she was growing up. Her dad was a successful contractor with a real fondness for booze and coke. Her mother was a controlling little harpy with the same bad habits and a quick temper. I don't think they ever did one single thing to make her feel good about herself. Quite often when she was in her mid-teens she would come home from school and find a note taped to the front door telling her that her folks had gone to Vegas for a few days and that they'd see her when they got back. Subsequently she spent a lot of time at my sister's house and more or less became a real part of our family.
