Kiss Me Now!

She was too old to be wearing pigtails. Not that they dissuaded me from being fascinated with Hilda. Hilda had come of age early on in her life and was, to put it mildly, quite well endowed. I was thirteen and as such, terribly fascinated with the mysteries of all things feminine. So the pigtails were an accent to her endowments. One never knew quite where they would end up when Hilda shook her head. Two out or two in? Left or right orientation? I was no statistician at the time, but I kept a running tally going anyway, inveigling her to shake her head in the negative as often as I could.

You see, boys growing up in the 1950’s in this country had little to instruct them about the mystery that was womanhood. We did the best we could employing Macy’s and Sear’s catalogs to ogle at the bras, panties and garter belts. I suspect that men who like to dress up in women’s clothing (Mr. Guiliani, you look mahvelous!) spent an inordinate amount of time in the catalog development stage and became hopelessly stuck at that level.

When Hilda wandered into my life, she was far better equipped to advantage those fascinating pieces of apparel than the girls I’d had minor crushes on up to that time in my own class. I leaped forward out of the Macy’s catalog to a real life model.

Hilda was two years older than I, and was considered by the boys in her class as odd. She was rather attractive but frighteningly honest about everything. She dressed like the girl on the Swiss Miss cartons, while her female classmates were experimenting with tight sweaters and slinky skirts.

We’d met at the shooting range in the basement of the Junior-Senior High School we attended. Although I was quite the marksman by then, Hilda always outscored me. Our brief romantic fling, such as it was, lasted through the better part of June and July of that year.

Of course, being a desperate man, I quickly professed my great love for Hilda. She knew better and told me that such a pronouncement was not going to get me to the Promised Land (or words to that effect). Hilda lived some distance from my house, which provided a good buffer from my Mother, who was just returning from one of her many sojourns to the local psychiatric ward. I had to tell Hilda about my Mother to keep her from calling our house.

Hilda’s Mom and Dad were very nice people, though I think because of my age and, at that time rather jejune nature, dismissed me as nothing more than a “play friend” , calling me such each time I came to visit. At first I bristled at the comment until it occurred to me that this provided me good cover. There seemed to be no parental suspicions as to my motives. Hilda, of course, knew better. Nonetheless, all of the Macy’s catalog apparel was in place and with occasional errors in judgment, she provided me innocent glimpses at heaven and what must have been adolescent arrhythmias.

Once school was out, Hilda and I could enjoy the run of her house once her parents left for work. I got to like Hilda on many different levels. She was honest, funny and very unpredictable. On what would be our last afternoon home alone, Hilda decided to test my taste buds.

Clambering up a stepstool, she pulled tins of spices down from the top shelf. I decided to retie my shoe at that point, affording me another glimpse at heaven’s gate. Caught in the act, I froze and babbled out, “You should be more careful on that ladder! Watch where you’re stepping!”

“Watch where you’re staring!”

Hilda swung around, hiding the little Durkee tins from my view and proceeded to rub the contents of one on her lips. “Kiss me now,” she commanded. Hilda then grabbed my head and applied a brief hard smooch, with no desired body contact due to her exaggerated body dip backward. “How did I taste?”

“Spaghetti-ish.” I smelled the oregano before she’d even turned around.

Hilda wrinkled up her nose and swung around, wiping her lips frantically and applying another spice to her now puffy lips. “Kiss me now.”

I complied, though less enthusiastically. “Toast.” It was all I had to associate cinnamon with. I obviously did not strike the right tone as Hilda was now furious with me. Once again the secret containers were accessed and once again I was commanded to pucker up.

“Okay, what about that time?”

“My lips are burning. Can I wash them off?”

“You are hopeless.” With that, she swung around and opened the back door. “Go home.”

I saw Hilda again at the nearby shopping center the following day. She apologized for her behavior and mumbled something incomprehensible about the time of the month. I assumed she must be a bit crazy and having dealt with a crazy mother, figured I was at my limit. We did manage to enjoy each other’s company, as much as was possible considering I was still tallying the braid thing in my mind and fantasizing about what things looked like under the Macys equipment. With all that going on in my brain, I doubt I was very good company. Then again, she would always show up smelling a bit different each time, though careful not to ask for my opinion on that subject.

By the end of July, my parents announced that we were moving. My mother wore out her welcome quickly during those terrible years. Since Hilda was afraid to call the house and the move to the new home some twenty miles further east was effected rather quickly, I simply slipped out Hilda’s life. A month after we left, the old house was torn down and three new homes built in its place. I was gone.

I don’t know if I left much of a void in Hilda’s life that summer. But, oddly enough, she did leave a small hole in mine. Through Hilda and others I slowly discovered that we all are desperately searching for the right bridges to build to cement ourselves to others. I found that articles of clothing and those body parts beneath did not assure a healthy and satisfying relationship. I am sure that she found that a loving relationship could not be based on the flavor of her lips. She was not an island in the journey that has been my life, but a stepping stone.