Bus Story

I nodded curiously.

"She's on the softball team, and she absolutely has to attend any AND every sporting event for the school that's on campus and root HER team on."

"Caroline," I said.

She nodded, surprised.

"You're Caroline's roommate," I said, as I felt many things falling into place.

"You know her?" she asked me.

I nodded carefully.

"Well, her boyfriend hates going to sports stuff so Caroline had to go alone, but I made that deal. She leaves me alone and I go to everything with her."

I nodded again.

"It's worked out so far."

I sat quietly staring out the window at the passing countryside. The sky was beginning to turn gray and we seemed to be heading towards even darker cloud cover.

"She knows everything about you, you know," she said, interrupting my thinking of nothing.

"Really?" I said curiously, wondering where she was going with it.

"Yeah, she said that we were lucky to have you wrestling for our school; just about any program would love to have you. That you are really too good to be wrestling for such a small school. Yadda yadda yadda."

She looked as if she was building up courage to ask something.

"Wouldyouposeforme?" she got it out really fast.

"Would I what?" I asked, confused at the sudden change in subject.

"Would you pose for me? You know, as in for a sculpture?" her voice strengthened as she gained confidence.

"Why?" I asked.

"Cause you're like this god athlete or something," she said angrily.

"No, I'm not. I wrestle. That's it," I said beginning to get pissed at her attitude about me.

"Why'd you come here anyway? Caroline says you could have gone to any school." She was trying to change the subject again.

"My mom," I said, looking out the window.

"Your mom?"

"Yeah."

"Come on. You are not leaving it there. I mean, you could've gone to some really good schools."

I sighed. "I would have had to cut a lot of weight, because I'm so short."

"What weight?" she said, looking at me up and down.

"For wrestling. I would have had to drop a couple of weight divisions but my doctor my senior year in high school said I'm a very late bloomer and was still gaining natural body weight. If I went to a big program I would have had to cut an unhealthy amount of weight."

She nodded.

"My mom 'talked' to the coach here. He agreed to let me wrestle at the weight my doctor felt was healthiest. My mom kinda went ballistic when she heard what weight the bigger programs wanted me to wrestle at, so this became our only option."

"Kinda?" she asked.

"I think there were several somethings in there about 'over her dead body.'"

"So you settled for here?" she asked.

"No. We chose here. I get to do it my way," I replied, maybe still trying to convince myself.

"Why does the weight thing matter?" she asked me quietly.

"I'm really short for my weight class. I am not growing any taller but I'm still gaining bulk. By my senior year I should be up another 24 pounds in natural growth."

She nodded for me to continue.

"I'm shorter already than just about anybody in my weight division. I am going to be moving up into divisions where I will be the shortest guy in the country in that division. It is always a question of who is the first to get used to me being that short. Me, wrestling a guy with reach and usually better leverage? Or him, awkwardly wrestling someone smaller with much better balance?"

"You seemed to do well enough," she said.

I looked at her. "Been to a few home matches?" I asked.

"Caroline," she explained.

"Yeah, I do okay right now. But as I go up in weight if I keep wrestling at a comfortable weight I have to hope the competition can't handle my size or else I will have to find another sport. At least, I am stronger than they are so that is another advantage. Plus I'm more comfortable with my wrestling weight because it's closer to my normal weight."

"So are you going to pose for me?" she asked suddenly.

"Why do you want me to pose?" I asked her seriously.

"'Cause you're a lot different than what we get in our classes, or when we put in ads." Her voice was starting to drift dreamily, "I mean, how can I make this beautiful sculpture of a human body without a beautiful body to work with?"

"A beautiful body," I said, raising my eyebrows.

"You know what I mean. The beauty of Michelangelo's David is David's beauty. Part of it is that you capture this body so close to perfection and you freeze it in that perfection for as long as the statue lasts."

I sat listening to her. I did not really have anything in my life except my mom that I could talk about with the love she seemed to have for her art.

"I watched you wrestle in the first home tournament, and I went to every one after." I leaned back against the window. "I took the school buses to the events," she said to me pointedly. "I took rides. I mean you move great but every now and then you would stand still and ..."

She looked at me as if she was trying to reach something inside me.

"You would stand on the mat not moving except for, like, this little shake you did occasionally. But it's not a physical loosening. It was as if you were trying to bounce doubt off you. I could feel my hands molding the clay to capture the way the muscles on your neck looked when you did that half-motion shake of your head."

"God, if I had you posing I could work in anything. I would not be nervous about it. I would just work. You know what I mean?"

I nodded.

"You don't, do you?"

I shook my head.

She sighed. "Would you just pose for me?"

"Nude?"

She blushed but nodded seriously.

"How about in my wrestling gear?" I asked, trying to lighten the mood.

She smiled at me but was still watching me closely.

I looked out the window.

"If you make something I can give my mom as a wedding present, I'll pose for you anytime you want."

"Your mom is getting married?"

I nodded with an annoyed pucker on my lips.

"You're not happy."

I sat up uncomfortably. "Nah! I'm just jealous."

She started laughing. "You admit that?"

"Hell, yeah. I've had her all to myself for 15 years. And now she wants to get married and they are talking a new baby or maybe an adoption. I'm happy for her 'cause I'm not there, but I'm still jealous." I said it all really fast, and then crossed my arms on my chest.

She laughed, and I joined her in the laughter eventually.

"When's the wedding?" she asked.

"The fourth week of August. I'll get home from my summer job and be thrown into wedding preparations."

She smiled at me.

"I'll be giving away the bride," I said proudly.

The smile warmed.

We watched the beginning of a lightning storm outside the window. She got closer to be able to look outside until she was leaning over me. We watched as lightning bolts colored the sky from time to time.

She turned all of a sudden. We were face to face. I watched her, knowing that I had promised not to do anything. She was prettier than my first cookie cutter impression. Her eyes were a plain blue from a distance, but from up close I could see all the different blues that molded into plainness. Film clips started running through my head. I wondered if she would have to touch me to know exactly how the clay would have to feel as she molded it.

I started to harden.

She did not move. We just sat there looking at each other.

"How come they went unused?" she asked.

"What?" I asked, trying to concentrate on her words instead of exactly how close to me her lips were at that moment.

"The condoms. Why did they go unused? I mean you are a big fish in a little pond." As she said it she moved away so that she wasn't leaning over me but was still very close to me.

I shrugged.

"Come on. I told you why I stayed alone. The artsy-fartsy guys."

"All right!"

I was staring out the window again trying to figure out how to put many jumbled emotions into words.

"I guess because of my mom. She was my best friend. A lot of the time she was my only friend, because I was so obsessed with wrestling. I was probably her only friend for a long time, too. I can't disappoint her after driving 500 miles to a wrestling tournament or coming to school at even the slightest sign of trouble. She would like me to have more with a woman than the physical stuff, and somewhere along there she taught me just sex wasn't enough."

I looked at her. She was studying me again.

"It's all right for the physical act to be just sex, but that doesn't mean it can't be with someone I like. You know?"

"But then it wouldn't be just sex."

"Hmm, it's sex with someone you like, respect, and care about."

"That's not just sex."

"Sure it is."

"No, it's not!"

"Why not?"

"Just sex, is, you know. You don't care about them; you want one thing, and if you get it, you're fine with that; and if they get something good out of it, good for them."

"No, that's fucking."

"What?" she asked, surprised.

"Yeah, there's fucking, having sex, and making love. Fucking, it's like you want a piece and if you never see them again, oh well. Having sex is you want them to come back so you make damn sure they have as much or more fun than you do, but it's still a little selfish. Depending on the person you're with, it's either really selfish or not so selfish."

I watched one crisp lightning bolt flash across the sky only to reach up and hug another cloud.

"What about making love?" she asked.

"I don't know. But it has to be more than anything I've ever done."

I watched a car pass us.

"Or at least I hope it's more."

We sat quietly for a while, each in our own little world.

I noticed that she was shivering and rubbing her arms up and down. "Want a blanket?" I asked her.

"A blanket?"

"Hey, three bus trips so far. I know what the necessities are."

She smiled at me and nodded.

I stood up, turned around, and reached for my backpack in the overhead. I started to slip. I felt her hands on my thighs catch me and aid with my balance. I managed to retrieve it, but as I brought it down I saw her holding me by my thighs, staring at my crotch. I started to immediately embarrass myself. I put the backpack down on the seat and sat down.

I looked at her. She was staring at me almost blankly. I opened the backpack and got my blanket out. I stood again and felt her hands on my legs, to balance me. I did not look down this time, but I got harder than I already was. I took my time putting the backpack back. I felt her hands squeeze my thighs and move upward. I did not really have an excuse to stay standing but I did it anyway. Her hands started moving up and down my thighs, molding. Finally, she took her hands away and started to wrap the blanket around herself. I sat down, at a loss for what to say.

We sat through a long spell of silence.

When I looked over at her, she was fast asleep. It did not seem like a bad idea so I positioned myself a little more comfortably, tilted my head back, and tried to sleep.

I woke up with her mostly on top of me. I was lying on both the seats with my feet out in the aisle. She was lying on her stomach on top of me. The blanket covered us both.

She woke up about a minute after I did. It took her a little longer to realize what we had managed to do in our sleep.

At least, I thought we had managed to do it, even though I could not figure out how we could have possibly ended up like that.

She steepled her hands on my chest and just stared at me. I got more than a little nervous, but at the same time, a part of my body was waking up and it liked her weight on top of me a lot.

A whole hell of a lot.

I waited to see what she would do, but she just lay on top of me staring at me. I got harder.

I felt her moving her hips on top of me. I had no clue what to say.

A different type of pressure made itself known.

I tried to get up; she got off me and sat down. I moved past her and entered the bathroom. It took a lot longer than it should have because I had to wait for my hard-on to go away.

I got done, walked outside, and sat down by the window again.

I looked at my watch. We had been on the bus for about 10 hours, so we should be stopping soon. I was still tired but did not want to fall asleep again as I wanted to at least try to get some sleep through the night. I still had 14 hours to go and I wanted to be wide-awake on the other side.

The bus started to slow down after awhile. I saw the rest stop by the side of the highway.

"Where are you getting off?" she asked as she pushed the blanket off her and stood up in the aisle.

The bus started to pull into the rest stop. I stood up and started to stretch out the kinks in my legs and back. "The last stop in Maine," I answered.

The bus stopped and the driver said something about a 45-minute dinner break. We filed out of the bus. I looked around and grimaced at the choices. All fast food and all bad fast food places.

"Yeah, my thought exactly," she told me as she looked around. "And I don't think there's anywhere to run for a sub, either."

"Maybe they have a salad bar," I said hopefully. She looked at me out of the corner of her eye and smirked.

We started following the crowd inside the nearest place. The people behind the counter dealt with us quickly. I found a few things I considered edible. She ordered some of the same stuff.

We ate in silence.

"What are you going to Maine for?" she asked. "It's kinda obvious you don't live there?"

"I got a job in a summer camp through my coach. The guy needed some extra work done. Plus, it was free room and board. The coach arranged for a cheap membership to a gym in town. It should be the perfect summer job."

She was smiling widely by now.

We finished eating and started talking about school and our friends. I did not have any close friends so I talked about the other guys on the team.

"How come you got that funny look on your face when I said that Caroline was my roommate?" she asked innocently while playing with a piece of lettuce.

"Nothing," I said, barely able to contain a smile.

"Oh, no!" she exclaimed. "Come on, I told you I was your groupie, following you around on tournaments. The least you can do is tell me." She pointed the lettuce threateningly so I decided it would not hurt anything to tell her.

"Caroline wanted to hook us up," I said leaning back in the chair, making it obvious I was waiting for her reaction.

She did not give me one. She just nodded and watched me right back.

I smiled. She smiled back.

We finished our meals in silence and got back on the bus.

We did not talk while on the bus. She pulled a book out of her backpack and I stared out the window. I had been through this part of the country on my three bus rides to school, but I still thought it was beautiful.

We sat without talking until the sun faded away.

There was another stop to pick up and drop off passengers. I put on a thick sweatshirt, and spent the rest stop doing what I could as a workout.

Jessica sat on the step up to the station watching me.

It was just a heavier version of my warm-ups before a wrestling match. I did not want to sweat too much. I tried to focus mostly on stretching. After about 20 minutes, I grabbed a towel out of my bag and went into the station bathroom. I used the sink to wash and towel to clean up a bit before returning to the bus.

We got back on the bus. She put her book away and seemed to want to talk. I saw a few people turn on their personal lights and I figured they wanted to read.

"Did you live in the wrestling house?" she asked me.

My eyes widened as I answered, "Oh, no! Never that. I knew better than that without being told."

"Yeah, I've been there. But it is better than the softball house. I went to a party there. It's disgusting." She wrinkled her nose at the last part.

I nodded in agreement. I had been to a party at one of the sports houses and decided against going to any other.

"You don't hang out with the rest of the jocks do you?" I shook my head.

"You don't want to talk do you?"

"Not about this kinda stuff."

"Well, then what kinda stuff do you want to talk about?"

I thought about it for a minute. "Fuck, I wish I knew."

"How about back to question and answer?"

"Only if you have to answer the same question, and vice versa?"

"Okay. You go first."

I thought about it and decided I might as well stick my hand in the fire. "Did you leave anybody behind when you went away to college?"

She shook her head no. "And you?"

"Nope. Your turn." I sat up knowing it would eventually get interesting.

I was wrong. It got interesting immediately.

"What's the one thing you wish you could have done, but didn't get to do?" she asked.

"Sex!"

She slapped my arm.

"Let me think."

I started laughing at the first thing that entered my mind.

"What?"

"All right, when I was a kid I saw this college movie. It was one of the first times I ever saw a naked woman, too."

She rolled her eyes.

"You asked."

She motioned me to continue.

"Anyway, the first nude scene was when the people in the movie were playing strip poker."

She looked like she wanted to laugh.

"So I wish I had played some college strip poker."

She looked at me and waited.

I tried to wait her out, but it was not going to happen.

I stood up and reached into the front pouch of my backpack. I pulled out a deck of cards. She took it out of my hands. It was clearly marked with black marker labeling it "The Official College Strip Poker Deck."

She held it up and looked at me.

"They're marked," I admitted.

She giggled, "But everybody bets the same thing in strip poker. It's winner take all. There is no betting or bluffing. Knowing what cards they have won't help."

"I didn't know that then," I hissed.

She laughed.

She opened the deck, pulled the cards out, and started shuffling them. She was studying me as she played the cards. I was absorbed with her eyes, the cards, and her hands manipulating the cards.

"Okay."

"Okay, what?" I said cautiously.

"Grades aren't official for another two days, right?" she asked.

"Umm, yeah," I answered in extreme confusion.

"So our freshman year isn't over, right?"

"Technically, no. It's not over until we get the official credit."

"Okay. New game."

I tensed up expecting a big one.

"I fulfill one unlived freshman fantasy, and you help me fulfill one of mine."

My heart stopped. "What fantasy?"

"Oh, no!" she shook the deck at me. "Trust. I trust you in the card game and you trust me there. Fair trade."

"How far does the game go?" I said. I tried to shift my lower body to remove the discomfort in my groin.

"Until there's a winner."

"And yours?"

"Until there's a winner."

I did not know where it was going but I knew I wanted to be along for the ride. "Okay"

"Not poker, though. Too complicated and uncomfortable to play."

"You do realize we're on a bus," I said.

"We have a blanket," she said calmly, "plus, I'm wearing a sports bra. It will just look like I'm getting comfortable at that point."

"You could be naked."

"So one of us needs the blanket and the other doesn't. What's the big deal?"

I nodded, still wary. I stuck my head over the chairs to look around. For the most part, everyone seemed to be asleep. I turned off her personal light and pointed mine towards the window. We would be somewhat shadowed at least.

"Blackjack is going to have to be the game," she informed me in a professional tone. "But first we have to even out the number of games each person can lose."

I nodded.

"Okay, shorts are one."

I nodded.

"Panties for me, briefs or shorts for you," she looked at me.

"Tighty-whiteys," I said.

She smiled and continued, "Bra, t-shirt."

"Okay, t-shirt for me, so you get to keep one sock. One sock for me, and you get to keep the other sock. That makes it an even five items to lose. At most we have to play nine games before one of us is nekkid."