LITMIR.BIZ

      Rick Laredo hadn’t finished high school and was roaming the streets with other losers, selling drugs to little kids, stealing crap, and hanging around the Park at lunchtime to see his old classmates from Berkeley High and, if the opportunity arose, dealing. Although he’d never have admitted it, he wanted to get back into the school gang, after being expelled for putting the barrel of his pistol in Mr. Harper’s ear. It has to be said: the teacher behaved too well, he even intervened to prevent the expulsion; but Laredo dug his own grave when he insulted the principal and the members of the board.

      Rick Laredo took a lot of care over his appearance, with his spotless brand-name white sneakers, a tank top to show off his muscles and tattoos, hair gelled up like a porcupine, and so many chains and wristbands that he could have been dragged away by a large magnet. His jeans were enormous and fell down lower than his hips, so he walked like a chimpanzee. He was such a nonentity that not even the police or Mike O’Kelly were interested in him.

      When I decided to solve the problem of my virginity, I made a date with Laredo, without giving him any explanation, in the empty parking lot of a cinema, at a dead time, before the first showing. From the distance I watched him going around in circles with his provocative swagger, holding up his pants, so baggy it looked like he was wearing diapers, with one hand and a cigarette in his other hand, excited and nervous, but when I approached, he feigned the indifference required by that kind of macho guy. He looked me up and down with a mocking sneer. “Hurry up, I have to catch the bus in ten minutes,” I told him, as I took my pants off. His superior smile vanished; maybe he’d been expecting some preamble. “I’ve always liked you, Maya Vidal,” he said. At least this cretin knows my name, I thought.

      Laredo flicked his cigarette away, grabbed me by the arm, and tried to kiss me, but I turned my face away: that wasn’t part of my plan, and Laredo’s breath stank. He waited till I got my pants off, and then he crushed me against the pavement and exerted himself for a minute or two, stabbing me in the chest with his chains and medallions, not even imagining he was doing it with a novice, then collapsed on top of me like a dead animal. I pushed him off me furiously, cleaned myself with my underwear, which I threw on the ground in the parking lot and left there, pulled on my jeans, grabbed my backpack, and ran away. On the bus I noticed the dark stain between my legs and tears soaking into the front of my shirt.

      The next day Rick Laredo was standing in the Park with a rap CD and a little bag of marijuana for “his chick.” I felt sorry for the poor guy and couldn’t get rid of him with ridicule, as a proper vampire should. I snuck out of Sarah and Debbie’s sight, invited him for ice cream, and bought us each a three-scoop cone, pistachio, vanilla, and rum’n’raisin. While we licked our ice cream cones, I thanked him for his interest in me and for the favor he’d done me in the parking lot, and tried to explain that there’d be no second opportunity, but the message didn’t get through his primate skull. I couldn’t get rid of Rick Laredo for months, until an unexpected accident swept him out of my life.