Lion and Magic Boy

My first kiss came from a boy whose name I no longer remember, someone at the roller rink my friend Paula and I used to frequent on Friday nights in the 7th grade. She’d wear her embroidered jeans and we’d skate round and round in our laced-up white boots to the sound of “Benny and the Jets”, already an oldie but very new to my tender ears that were raised on alternating silence and the booming bass of the cannons in the “1812 Overture”.

It was clear what Paula and I were there for: the skating was secondary, but here was a place to meet boys! Lots of boys! Mostly we knew none of them, for the rink was far enough away from home that our anonymity was secure. In short, I could be anybody here, and no one knew, for instance, that I was a year younger than all my classmates and the last to wear a bra. So I’d throw on my tight knit purple sweater, the hippest thing in my wardrobe (which could not compete with those embroidered jeans), and hope for the best while bidding one of our parents goodbye in the parking lot.

On many occasions Paula and I were approached by a group of boys who made it clear that they wished to hang out with us. Usually this would consist of skating in the general vicinity of the boy or boys, while Paula and I hung together and whispered a lot. Sometimes we’d join in a game of crack-the-whip, which would up the ante considerably in that hand-holding would be involved.

We knew that once it got to hand holding, this was serious stuff and we’d have to hold back on the whispering.

A couple of times a night, the management would take a break from the usual counter-clockwise circle or the Hokey-Pokey, and dim the lights, throw on a disco ball, and call it a “couple’s skate.”

This, of course, was the ultimate. Just you and The Boy, out there holding hands, skating together. There might even be some conversation involved, but usually I was concentrating too hard on not falling.

One night, a particular boy and his entourage tailed us all night, and when the lights were dimmed I had the sinking feeling that it was me who would be chosen to skate with him. Yep.

So round and round we went, my hand in his sweaty one, feeling on display, knowing that everyone in the rink was watching me, judging me by who I was skating next to.

Did I mention that he was shorter than me?

So the song is about to end, and the poor guy leans over for a chaste kiss on my cheek.

My first kiss. Ever.

Just then, the wheels of our skates lock together, I go down, and he goes zooming across the rink.

I did score a phone number, though, the number that Paula used to taunt me with for years afterward: 876-9191. (Or was that 867-5309? No, that was Jenny’s number.)

I still remember the number, just not his name.

Life is like that, I guess.