GRAPES/Young was a boy scout: trustworthy, loyal, helpful, friendly, courteous, kind, obedient, cheerful, thrifty, brave, clean, and reverent, by hell. Little buddy here never even went to the big graduation celebration. No date. Little buddy here could have been saved, however, if she could have accepted her scholarship to Stanford, but sixteen year old girls just don't run off to the big wicked college alone, so here little buddy landed at Epworth City College in Epworth, Iowa, in the year of our Lord nineteen...ohhh, forget it. True to my get-ahead form, I started college summer quarter. I began the quarter in a modest little dress and shoes and ended the quarter in cut-offs, middy blouse, and bare feet. I began the quarter watching boys watch girls and I ended the quarter watching boys watch girls. Maybe I expected to be married by the end of my freshman year or something. Whatever I expected was too much, because here it is the end of my freshman year and I haven't even had a date. But damn it to hell, if I don't have a whole bunch of new buddies. I bet you think that to be a buddy is to be sexless, well, it isn't. Even though I'm thin, I can lie on my back on the floor and not lose my bosom. In fact, my dad sees me in sweaters and asks, "Is that all you?" And when I'm in the mood I can really move. This one night, for example, I was really hot, oh boy, I was ready for attack. I told the girls in the dressing room in back of the college theater that I was going to give the first attractive boy I saw a big sexy kiss. What I really meant was that I was going up to the light booth and really lay out Joe Keyes, who was my best big buddy in high school and the sexiest guy I have ever met. It would stun him and when he recovered, he'd probably attack me and that was all right with me. I rotated my pelvis and moved. In the hall I vamped past Wes who put his arm around me, inhaled, and kissed me on the cheek. He would have kissed me on the mouth, but since I had never been kissed before I didn't let him. I left Wes panting. Oh, boy. Slowly with my whole body, I went up the stairs toward the light booth. Kent, who was coming down the stairs, stopped and advised me to watch the way I moved. I rolled my round, innocent eyes and growled. I went into the light booth. Joe stood there in his snug levis, his T-shirt stretched across his broad flat chest. I moved toward him. He moved toward me. I knew my face was flushed. My heart was beating in the oddest place. He raised one strong arm. My lips parted. "Hi, Sharky, he said, grabbing my shoulder in his vice-like grip. "You look sick." Plop. I turned around and went downstairs. I wouldn't have known how to lay him out anyway. Needless to say, I went back to watching boys watch girls. Scientifically, I observed focus and studied reactions. I found out that Mr. Simmons watches rear ends, he likes the big ones that curve out from the spine and tuck in toward the legs. He likes to watch them wave from side to side sort of like water in a dishpan you're trying to carry. Ray likes the side view of bosoms that are too large. He gets little beads of sweat when Judy goes by in a sweater. I can't stand it myself. I have this urge to say, "Jud, your boo..." Never mind. Mr. Morgan likes long hair whiplashed by the wind against a skinny neck. It looks like a plague of snakes to me and I wish Medusas would comb their hair. I couldn't ever throw my body around to impress men like Mr. Simmons and Ray. Frankly, I don't have that much to throw. My hair doesn't look good long and, well, I believe in combing hair. Actually, I look best in something like my green dress. The scooped neckline and satin bow at the waist made even little buddy here look like a real girl. I love to wear it, especially to places like the ballet the other night. When I walked down the hall during intermission, I really felt like I looked good. The pale green crystals of my necklace bobble-thumped against my throat, my bell skirt swished against the back of my knees, my heels clicked an even empty echo, the way all high heels do when you know how to walk in them. For some reason, when I got to the end of the hall, I turned around. A boy from the ballet company was standing there looking at me, and this gawkiest little girl just stood there and stared at him. 32 OLD TIME RELIGION/Teri Stark My short brown hair curled in damp ringlets about my face and my cotton dress clutched my body, as I prepared to attend the country chapel where my new husband, Max, had been Sunday-schooled, baptized and churched as a boy. Though the day was humid, no rain had fallen for weeks, and the car left a trail of rising dust as it bounced over the country road. Even the trees looked thirsty as we rattled along disturbing the tranquility of the back woods. We rounded a final bend and there, tucked among the long-needled pine trees, stood a small white frame structure with a wood shingled roof. It was of cracker-box design, studded with windows along its lengthwise sides and had a single front door which stood ajar. A handpainted sign over the entrance announced a welcome to "Lewis Chapel." Cars arrived, one by one, and surrounded the building. They were not the late model chariots of shining gloss and chrome that shouted status on Sunday morning, but time-worn vehicles blending into the rural atmosphere. All the people emerging from the cars appeared to have come from the same cut-out book. The women, gathering on one side of the yard to hug, squeeze and kiss all their neighbors and kin, wore their hair bunned in the back. There was no make-up or jewelry, and their modest dresses were ill-fitting and subdued in color. I joined this circle, coaxed on by my new mother-in-law. Across the green, on a patch of drought-burned grass, the men folk, dressed in starched cotton khaki trousers and white shirts, assembled together as if in a football huddle. They stood back on their heels with their hands in their pockets. Occasionally, a smile would break on one man's face, and it would start a chain reaction around the circle. "So this is Max's young wife," another cheerful and abundant matron gushed, as she hugged me violently. I tried to think of something appropriate to say, but all I could do was smile pleasantly, I hoped, and prayed that she'd think I was bashful. I was not being unfriendly; I just felt lost in this world of different people and customs. My mouth felt dry, and I excused mystelf to go in search of water. I'd been told there was a well behind the building. As I approached the old stone well, I found a number of children, collectively pulling on the rope, lifting the galvanized bucket which carried the water to the surface, all scrambling (continued on next page) 33