California Girl Read Free Page A

It was almost Thanksgiving, sunny and warm.
    “I’ll come by after work if you want. We can go to Oscar’s.”
    “Okay,” said Meredith.
    “After that, there’s a meteor shower,” said Andy. “We can watch it from our spot.”
    “Sounds fun.”
    Andy downshifted and made the left onto Skyline. Meredith had removed her hand from his leg but he could still feel it there, warm and soft and a little damp. He was preposterously aroused now, as he was every time he drove her home. Every time he sat in a car with her.Held her hand. Thought about her. Dreamed about her. Smelled the sweater she had let him borrow—Heaven Sent perfume mixed with Meredith. She was sweet and bright and the most beautiful girl Andy had ever seen.
    Lemon Heights was where the rich people lived. The heights were rolling foothills with eucalyptus and avocado and sycamores, even a few lemon trees from the old days. The houses were big and each one was different, not like the tracts expanding below, where two or three floor plans repeated themselves up one street and down the next. Some had swimming pools and tennis courts. There were horse stables and garages big enough for two cars. A color television set in every house, and Andy had heard that the Boardmans had two.
    He pulled into the Thorntons’ driveway. It was a large semicircle lined with sycamore trees that were just starting to turn yellow with fall. The house was brick, low and large, with white trim and the window glass darkened for the Southern California sun. The driveway circled around a knoll of deep green dichondra. In the center stood a thirty-foot flagpole. Dr. Thornton flew the stars and stripes every day except when it rained.
    “No one’s home,” she said. “Would you like to come in?”
    They stood in the cool shadowed kitchen and kissed. The swimming pool threw wobbling crescents of light through the sliding glass door to the walls.
    He grasped her wrist and tried to pull her hand down but she broke it loose with a soft laugh and put her arm back around his neck.
    “No,” she said. “I more than like you but I’m not ready.”
    “I know. I understand.”
    Andy did understand, and the decision was hers. They kissed for a few more minutes. She pulled her lips away from him just as the warm slick issued into his briefs.
    “I have to use the bathroom,” he said.
     
    THE TUSTIN TIMES office was back across town, by the high school. Andy sat at the editor’s desk and used the big black Royal to write the obits for the week.
    Joe Cannon, Former Engineer and School District Trustee Dead at 77
    Early Tustin Needlepoint Artist Remembered—Lacemaker Commissioned by Eleanor Roosevelt
    Dr. Richard Riley Healed Congolese Every Easter
    Beth Stevens sat at the Arts and Culture editor’s desk across from Andy. She stared at the paper in her machine, tapping her fingers on the keys but not hard enough to engage them. Like him, she was a high school senior hired for eight hours a week, after school was out. She was tall and freckled and moved quickly.
    “What’s another word for blue?” she asked.
    “What shade?” he asked back.
    “No, blue as in unhappy.”
    “Melancholy.”
    “I already thought of that.”
    “Sad,” he said.
    “I already thought of that, too.”
    “I’m trying to write, Beth.”
    “But all you can think about is Meredith .”
    He looked up. Beth’s unpredictable and direct assaults always caught him off guard.
    “I don’t care if you don’t like her,” he said.
    “Name one intelligent thing she ever said.”
    The Linotype roared into action in the basement. Andy felt the vibrations and heard the rattle of the Royal’s ribbon spool.
    “She read Les Misérables in French and wrote a paper on it.”
    “And the paper was in French , too?”
    “Yes. It was good.”
    Beth was quiet for a while. She typed furiously, stopped, then typed furiously again. Andy was always amazed at how fast she could type with hardly any strikeovers.
    Beth ripped