The day after my 18th birthday Robbie licked me. I was sitting on the toilet drying myself after taking a shower. The lock on the door was broken and he barged right in. The sweat from my morning run was washed away, and I smelled of Dial soap. I pulled the towel up to cover my breasts. He stared at the hair between my legs.
"Robbieeee," I complained.
He started to close the door, held it halfway open for a second, and opened it wider.
"Let me see your, you know, lower the towel for just a second."
"There's not that much to see," I said.
I dropped the towel to my knees. He stared. I should have demanded that he get out of there, yet I didn't. I had dreamed about such a moment soon after my mother and I moved in with him and his dad, Mister Nolan, two years before.
I smiled, put the towel over as much of my body as it would cover and said, "All right, Robbie. Now you've seen everything. Let me finish drying and get dressed."
My voice betrayed me, revealing how nervous and excited I was. I started to stand. He pushed me back down on the seat and pulled the towel from my grasp. He kneeled before me, pulled my crotch toward him, and tried to spread my knees. I resisted, I'm sure I did, but he was so strong.
I shouldn't have been surprised at his strength. I'd watch his muscles glisten with sweat often enough as he lifted weights in the basement. At first he ran me off, but in the last year he seemed to like to have me there so he could show off. I was fascinated by the black hair on his chest and couldn't help wondering if it was that black every where. He usually wore shorts and a jockey strap. I could see part of it from under his shorts when he did leg exercises.
My mother cried when she told me of her efforts to find a decent man to be my stepfather after my real father left when I was six. We had lived with seven different men before she met Robbie's dad, Ralph Nolan.
He was nice. So much nicer than the others. He never shouted at or hit my mother and me. We had moved in the day before he left on a two-week trucking trip. He drove for Consolidated Moving and was gone much of the time.
Mother worked as a waitress at the Downtown Diner. She worked days mostly but sometimes worked nights too. She made almost enough for us to get by on our own. But it was always a struggle to pay the rent, keep me in school clothes, all that stuff. So, whenever she got the chance, she let some guy help support us. They always seemed to disappear after a few weeks.
I was sixteen when mom and I moved in with Robbie and his dad. The house included two small bedrooms, right next to each other. I was used to sleeping with my mother but Robbie complained at first because his dad moved around a lot when he was asleep.
When Robbie's dad went on that first trip and my mother worked a couple of nights we were each in our separate bedroom alone. I stayed awake wondering if Robbie was awake too. Was he thinking about what would happen if he came into my bedroom? Was I hoping he would?
The house was small, but it was a house. Much better than the dinky apartments we had existed in. Robbie and I could walk to school. He was a month older than me and a grade ahead. But it wasn't long before he treated me like a real sister.
When Robbie's dad returned from one of his trips he always opened up all the windows, no matter what the weather, to air out the house.
"Ruth Ann, you know you smoke too much. The house smells like hell. This air will kill these kids," he would say.
The funny thing was, Robbie's dad smoked too. But not as much as my mother. I'll never forget the day I was notified she was in the hospital. I was in gym class feeling good because I was accepted as part of a team playing volleyball. I had just made a good pass to Gloria Tallman who spiked the ball and won a point for our team. The gym teacher, Miss Vincent, stopped the game and took me aside.
"Your mother is in the hospital. Get dressed and I'll drive you there," she said.
I could hardly button my blouse as I hurried to get dressed. Miss Vincent helped me and said, "I understand your mother had a coughing spell and spit up blood at work. Has she ever done that before?"
"She coughs a lot," I said, "but I don't think she ever spit up blood."
At the hospital I was told to wait in the patient area of the third floor. The sign on the wall when I got off the elevator said "Cancer unit."
Miss Vincent apologized because she had to go back to school.
"I'll be all right," I assured her even though I was scared.
I waited by myself for an hour. I thought of my mother, how mad I got at her for smoking, for trying to pretend she was younger than she was with makeup and a childlike voice she turned on whenever what she thought of as an attractive man was around.
She was a good waitress, I guess. And there were times when she was a good mother. She took me places, hugged me a lot and always assured me things would get better.
Finally a doctor came and told me I could visit her in room 305. She looked small and frail as she lay flat on her back. Her face was as white as the sheets. Her hair was stringy, her forehead wet with sweat and tubes were attached to her arm. I managed to keep her from seeing me cry.
"Hi baby," she said. Her voice was weak. "They say I have lung cancer."
She said it as though it was something she had been expecting.
"I don't know what my chances are," she said, "but that wouldn't matter so much if I could be sure you'll be all right. God, I wish Ralph was here."
"Don't worry about me, Mom, please. I'll be okay. And besides, you'll be okay, too. You'll see."
We both were crying when a nurse said my mother needed rest and I should return to the waiting room. It was afternoon, after school let out, before Robbie got there. I was trying to concentrate on a woman's magazine when he rushed in.
I sat with her most of the time for a week. Before she got too weak we talked.
One of the things she said I'll never forget.
"I'm so glad I didn't have an abortion. I was thinking of it when your father disappeared as soon as he found out I was pregnant. You have been the joy of my life. If I'd had an abortion I never would have got to know you."
Of course I cried. We both cried a lot. She died a week later, a day after Robbie's dad got there.
Robbie held my hand all through the funeral. Some of the waitresses from the Downtown Diner attended.
Robbie's dad waited for a few days, until I had stopped crying, before he asked me if there were any relatives he could contact about taking me in.
"There aren't any that I know of," I wailed. "Mom's parents are dead, I know, and she didn't have any sisters or brothers. I don't know of anyone."
"Well, we won't worry about it for now. You can stay here. Robbie and you just keep on going to school while I'm gone. He's taken care of himself before so he knows what to do. I'll leave money for groceries and whatever. We'll figure out something when I get back."
Robbie took me shopping, we did the laundry together, cleaned house and that stuff. When I wasn't grieving over my mother and worrying about what was going to happen to me I noticed how handsome he was with his black hair and expressive eyes. He'd even started shaving.
When I saw him talking to Madeline Hagan at school I felt like scratching her eyes out. She was known as Mad Madeline and the story was that she did it with lots of guys. And she had big tits. Guys seemed to be fascinated by big tits and mine were just big enough to require a brassiere.
I remember every detail of the small bathroom in that house. There was a shower stall over a bath tub, a sink with a towel rack beside it, and of course, the toilet. The floor was covered with dark blue carpet that had worn spots in front of the stool. Robbie spread my knees in spite of my resistance. Maybe I gave up on purpose. I didn't know what he was going to do, but whatever it was, I didn't think he would hurt me. It had been raining but it must have stopped because I heard boys playing baseball in the street in front of our house.
Robbie kissed the inside of my thighs. I heard a dog bark.
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