When the oldest Jones boy, Randall, came over to help with the chores, there was this profound sadness in his face. He moved hay with all the gusto a skinny kid just barely able to drive a car could muster, but I could tell something was wrong.
It was one of those orange sky, black tree silhouette evenings when we’re glad to be alive and looking for new stars, but Randall Jones was on his own world somewhere, and it was easy to see things weren’t too good on that planet.
“You feeling okay, Randy?”
He looked at me and seemed to see me for the first time. He shrugged and gave a sickly smile.
“Girls,” he said.
“How many?”
“What? Oh, just one.”
“Marcia Fleming.”
He nodded.
“I thought you were going to ask her to the Halloween Dance … what do they call it this year? Goblin Frolic or something?”
“Goblin Serenade.” He sighed. “Well, I did ask her and she said yes, too. Had it all planned.”
“And …?”
“Well, sir, you remember how we were talking a couple of weeks ago and you told me that girls like a guy who is confident? Knows what he’s doing? You remember that, right?”
“Sure.”
“Truth is,” Randall said, “I haven’t dated much. In fact … well, I’ve never kissed a girl. At all.”
I nodded. “We all have to start sometime.”
“Sure. Well, I didn’t want to do it wrong, so I’ve been practicing by kissing my horse.”
I let that image sink in. “Okay,” I said. “So what went wrong?”
“When I told her about it … you know … so she’d know I was confident, she said she'd changed her mind. Now she’s going with Arthur from down at the grocery store.”
I just nodded. Sounds pretty dumb, like something I might’ve done.
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