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One Bad Thing

Bob Strother

    I felt the big press winding up. It was in the lowest level of the building, but when it reached full speed, even the third floor vibrated under my feet like a tuning fork. For the past two weeks, the sound and feel of the basement behemoth—running three thousand feet of newsprint per minute—had given me cold chills. Today, however, I was more focused on the paycheck clutched tightly in my fist: eighty-eight dollars and sixty-four cents. After taxes, I was clearing just over a buck an hour, which meant I could pay the rent on my apartment in Athens, provided I lived like a monk for the entire summer. Off-campus housing at the University of Georgia was hard to come by. It had taken me almost two years to find the place, and if I wanted it for the next year of classes, I had to keep it over the summer.
    The problem started with my roommate and frat brother, Simon, who waited until finals week to tell me he was no longer a viable part of the Class of ’68 and wouldn’t be returning for the semester beginning in September. It was too late to find a summer sublet, and I was left holding the lease and the proverbial bag. I’d thought it a very un-Christian-like act on Simon’s part, considering we’d both been members of the Young Baptists’ Fellowship and attended Athens’ Trinity Baptist on a regular basis. I couldn’t help harboring a somewhat unforgiving attitude myself—if Simon had either studied more or prayed harder, I wouldn’t be in this situation.
    Fortunately, my parents had helped. A friend from church knew someone who knew Roy Chambers, owner and publisher of the Chattanooga Post, where I was now employed while home for the summer. The work wasn’t hard, and the pressroom was thrilling. If only it paid more, I could keep my apartment and have some fun, too.
    On my way back from the paymaster, I had to pass by Mr. Chambers’ office. Through the open door, I spied a devil sitting in one of the visitors’ chairs. That’s what my pastor—and probably my mom— would’ve said, anyway. The girl sat with her legs crossed, mini-skirt showing more thigh than I’d seen in a while, platinum-blonde hair cascading over her shoulders. When I paused, she turned to stare at me with luminous, emerald-green eyes—eyes that looked as if they could reach right into me and latch onto something vital. Then she gave me a wry smile and winked.
    I swallowed hard and hurried down the corridor to the mat room, where my supervisor, Jimmy, stood waiting.
    “I saw you stop by Chambers’ office,” he said. “See anything?”
    My mouth worked but no words came out.
    Jimmy laughed. “That’s Chambers’ granddaughter, Tibby. She’s home for the summer from Brigham Young University. You ever see a Mormon who looked like that?”
    “I’ve never seen anyone who looked like that.”
    “Well, better get used to it. She’s working here until school starts back.”
    I nodded. It was a test, I thought—a test of my beliefs, of me being able to control my conscious thoughts and subconscious urges. I’d done well so far with the vow of abstinence my girlfriend, Della, and I had taken at the behest of the church. Not that we hadn’t fooled around a little, but so far we were both still chaste. It would simply be a case of mind over matter. Besides, I spent most of my time buried in a warren of stacks and cubbyholes housing advertising mats for the paper’s commercial clients. I’d probably never even see Chambers’ granddaughter again.

.....

    Tibby showed up at one end of the cubbyholes later that day with a tear sheet in one hand and a Pepsi in the other. I was down on one knee, trying to find a Western Auto ad that had run the previous week. Sweat beads had formed on my forehead, and my hands were covered in dust from the cardboard mats.
    “I need the Miller Brothers’ ad from Tuesday,” she said. “Jimmy said you could help me.”
    Jimmy, I thought, the devil’s henchman. I got up from the floor and wiped my hands on my jeans.
    Tibby came over and stood close to me. “Didn’t I see you outside my grandfather’s office? She took a sip of the Pepsi. “I’m Tibby Chambers. What’s your name?”
    “It’s Ray. Ray Boyd.”
    She held the Pepsi out to me. Rivulets of condensation ran down the sides of the bottle and onto her slender fingers. “Want a drink?”
    I nodded, taking the bottle, aware of her fingers touching mine as I did. The Pepsi burned my throat. “Thanks,” I said as I returned the bottle.
    She looked up at me and blinked. “Want to see if you can find that mat for me?”
    I found the mat and watched her as she walked away. Everything about her called out to me in a way I was at once thrilled about and yet afraid of. She stopped at the end of the row of cubbyholes.
    “See you later, Ray,” she said as she disappeared. I still had the taste of her Pepsi in my mouth. Stay strong, I thought. Stay grounded.
    At five o’clock, I rode down in one of the building’s two elevators and pushed through the doors and out into the parking lot. I had just unlocked the door to my car when I heard her voice again behind me.
    “Wow, Ray, I go for your program.”
    I turned. “Huh?”
    She gestured to my car, a Chevy Impala Super Sport. It was white with a black vinyl top and less than a year old. Della’s father, a manager at the GM plant in Atlanta, got the car at a special price and sold it to me for even less after I’d voiced my intentions of purchasing a small, foreign sports car.
    “Your car, Ray, it’s a real kick in the head.”
    I smiled, unsure if this was a good thing or not.
    She bent down to inspect the interior, then straightened and grabbed my arm, pressing her small breast into my bicep. “Maybe we could go out sometime, catch a movie or something.” She leaned in closer. “But we can’t let anyone here know. My grandfather doesn’t like me dating his employees.”
    Tibby gave my arm a final squeeze and flounced away, leaving me standing there staring after her, more than a little dazed by the exchange. At least I hadn’t actually asked her to go out. That was me, staying grounded.

.....

    That evening, I called Della in Atlanta, hoping for a bit of relationship reaffirmation. A man answered. When Della came on the line, I asked, “Who was that?”
    “Oh, that’s Snake,” she said. “He’s up here from Saint Mary’s with my roommate’s boyfriend. They work together on a shrimp boat down there.”
    After we hung up, I kept thinking Snake? What kind of a name is that?

.....

    I ended up parked at the art museum with Tibby Chambers, watching the Walnut Street Bridge lights sparkle like tiny stars on the rippling waters of the Tennessee River below.
    We’d gone to the Capitol theater to see The Graduate. Afterward, Tibby suggested the art museum parking lot. I’d done nothing to dissuade her. My resolve was slowly eroding, and it seemed I was powerless to stop it.
    “You know,” Tibby said, “the only problem with your car is the console. It’s kind of in the way, don’t you think?”
    “In the way?” I asked.
    She popped the door on her side. “Why don’t you come over here and sit? That way, the steering wheel won’t bother us.” Her eyes were sparkling like the bridge lights.
    I got out of the car, thinking, Snake probably has a tattoo, then wondering where it was and if Della had seen it, had maybe run her finger along its edges. I slipped into the passenger seat, and Tibby eased in after me, straddling me, her skirt riding up over her thighs.
    I made one feeble attempt at retaining my purity. “I’m not sure we should—”
    “Shhh,” she said.
    She cupped my face in her hands and kissed me, softly at first, then harder. I felt her fingers fumbling at my pants, felt her hands drawing me out, and then her exquisite, warm silkiness sliding down onto me. I gasped.
    “Don’t talk,” she said, moving slowly on top of me. “Don’t say a word.”
    When it was over, she leaned her head against mine, the sweat from our brows commingling in the faint breeze rising up from the river. After a moment, she pulled back and let her hands rest on my chest. “I want you to do something for me.”
    Just then, I would probably have killed for her.
    “I want you to tell me one bad thing you’ve done.”
    “What do you mean?” I asked.
    “Anything, anytime in your life—one bad thing you’ve done. I want you to share it with me.”
    I gave it some thought. I’d been raised in the church, became a born-again Christian when I was fourteen, was respectful of my parents and elders, graduated high school with honors, and gone to college. Up until tonight, I had more or less believed I was living my life according to God’s plan for me. In the past few minutes, I had betrayed my beliefs, my vow of abstinence, and my girlfriend—at least I thought she was still my girlfriend.
    “I should have mentioned it earlier,” I said, “but I have a girlfriend.”
    “That’s it?” she asked. “You cheated on your girlfriend? That’s the only thing you can think of?”
    I nodded.
    “You are so cute.” Tibby leaned back against the dash, the bridge lights forming a golden halo around her hair. “I like to steal things. I went to a fraternity party the other night, and you know how girls always stash their purses in a bedroom somewhere? Well, I slipped in and took all their cash. It was beautiful—all that luscious green.”
    Oh, my God, I thought. I’ve just been seduced by a thief.
    Then Tibby did a little thing with her hips, and I felt myself growing again.
    “I’d like it if you’d go with me next time,” she said. “We can do this again afterward.”
    Shortly after that, I lost all conscious thought.

.....

    Over the next two months, Tibby and I descended on dozens of fraternity parties, pool parties, and pre- and post-cotillion soirees. Her family came from money, and while attending the Girls’ Preparatory School, Tibby had dated a legion of boys from the city’s finest military prep institutions. She was the consummate insider, always welcome and forever privy to the social goings-on of Chattanooga’s elite.
    On a typical evening, I would wait in my car while Tibby made the rounds of her friends, kissed a few cheeks, rifled purses and, with me as willing accomplice, made her getaway. Waiting, I whiled away the minutes pondering my current standing in the religious hierarchy of things. Usually, I managed to convince myself I was only backsliding—caught in a kind of satanic summer romance from which I would recover fully upon my return to the university. Then Tibby and I would find a secluded parking spot, and she would strip yet another layer of righteousness from whatever sanctity I had left.
    On the few occasions I was honest with myself, I knew that while I was addicted to sex with Tibby, the money didn’t hurt either. We split the take fifty-fifty. She didn’t need the cash anyway, and I was bringing in enough to buy gas and make the rent payments on my apartment.

.....

     The week before my classes were to resume, I went to work on Monday morning as usual. Jimmy was waiting for me.
    “Did you hear about Tibby Chambers?” he asked.
    My heart did a little thump. “What about her?”
    “The house mother at the Delta house saw her taking cash from some girl’s purse last Friday. She called the cops, but Tibby was already gone when they arrived. The police arrested her at home on Saturday.”
    Every ounce of breath left my body. “She’s in jail?”
    “Nah,” Jimmy replied. “Her old man’s got money and clout. She was released on recognizance, but from what I hear, he’s got her bottled up tighter than a can of sardines. Strange, isn’t it—them being Mormons and all? You’d think she’d be above doing something like that.”
    I’d been above it, too, at the beginning of the summer. Now where was I?
    I spent the rest of the day glancing over my shoulder, expecting a contingent of blue-clad, grim-faced officers to show up, slip the cuffs on my wrists, and haul me away. But they didn’t—not that day or the next—and by the end of the week, I figured I was in the clear. Tibby might be a lot of things, but a snitch wasn’t one of them.
    I used those last few days promising God I’d learned my lesson—that I’d spend the rest of my life toeing the line and following the straight and narrow. I looked forward to getting back to school, back to Trinity Baptist, and back to Della. So what if she’d perhaps been unfaithful to me? I was full of forgiveness. I’d been there, too, and had found my way back.
    After church that Sunday and a tearful goodbye from my folks, I threw my belongings in the trunk of the Impala and headed down Interstate 75 toward Atlanta. In three hours, I’d be back in my apartment in Athens. Maybe I’d be able to find a new roommate. I knew lots of guys in the Baptist Fellowship, and there were always guys at the Kappa house looking to share off-campus lodging.
    It started raining below Dalton, but I was feeling pretty upbeat as I neared the exits for Cartersville. That’s when I spotted the girl standing beside the road with a battered suitcase and her thumb out. I almost sped right on past, but then I slowed. She was soaked to the skin and wore a baleful expression. What would the Good Samaritan do? I pulled to the shoulder and waited as she ran to catch up to me.
    “Thanks a lot.” She tossed her suitcase onto the back seat and pulled the door shut behind her.
    I moved the gearshift lever into Park and took a moment to look her over. She looked like a scalded dog—mousey brown hair pasted to her face, eyeliner running in crooked rivulets over her cheeks, and eyeglasses that had slid to the end of her nose. “Where are you going?” I asked.
    She turned to face me. “Atlanta, I guess.” I noticed her eyes were green—not the luminous, emerald-green that had lighted my road to hell, but green nonetheless.
    “How old are you?” I asked, wondering why a young girl might be out thumbing in the pouring rain.
    She pushed the glasses back up on her nose. “I’m old enough, if that’s what you’re wondering about, and I’m not running away from home, I’m just leaving home.”
    I nodded. “Okay.”
    The rain began a new assault, hammering the hood of the Impala and sending torrents of water down over the windshield.
    The girl sighed. “Look, are you giving me a ride or not? I really don’t want to go back out there.” A different look came into her eyes. “I can ... make it worth your while, if you know what I mean.”
    I could feel the blood running in my veins, the pulse at my temple, the devil calling. The car windows began to fog. “You’d make it worth my while?”
    She nodded, reached across the console, and placed her hand on my thigh. The heat from it crawled up my leg and into my belly. I felt my breath becoming shallow and heard a noise in my head. It might have been a truck passing on the highway. It might have been the rain. More likely, it was all my fresh resolutions toppling like a row of Dominoes.
    “I’ll give you the ride,” I finally said, “and all I want you to do is tell me one bad thing you’ve done—anything, anytime in your life.”
    She removed her hand and returned it primly to her lap. “I slept with a guy for money,” she said. “An older man I met in a bar. I didn’t ask for the money, but I sure as hell didn’t mind getting it. Anyway, my dad found the cash and accused me of being a whore. I told him if I was going to be a whore, I figured I could make more in Atlanta than in Cartersville. So, I left.” She tilted her head and gave me a defiant look. “Okay, I told you. Now, you tell me.”
    I went through a quick inventory of my recent transgressions. All of them were right there on the tip of my tongue; I could recite a litany. But I decided to be vague. “I’m a sinner.”
    “Good,” she said. “How about you get me a room for the night in Atlanta, and we engage in a sinful act together?”
    I studied her again—a closer scrutiny this time. Her body was okay. The soggy jeans and t-shirt revealed that much. She was pretty in a cheap sort of way. Blonde highlights would fix her hair, and color contacts would take care of the glasses and bring out those eyes. She might even bear a slight resemblance to Tibby. I also thought about my friends in the Baptist Fellowship, and wondered how many of those poor souls were secretly searching for corruption. My fraternity brothers I didn’t have to think about—most of them were already dancing on the precipice of eternal damnation.
    And I still needed a roommate.
    “Instead of Atlanta,” I said, “how about this?”
    It took less than five minutes for us to come to terms. She’d share my apartment, and I’d line up her “dates.” I’d take a small percentage of her income as an administrative fee. We’d split the rent, cooking, and housekeeping duties. Just like a respectable two-income family.
    As I pulled back out onto the highway, she extended her hand. “My name is Cindy, by the way. What’s yours?”
    I took her hand. It was smooth and firm. “It’s Ray. Ray Boyd.”
    A few minutes later, she said, “I know it’s a business arrangement and all, but we can still fuck if you want to.”
    I smiled. “Sure we can.” Might as well, I thought. Hell, I was way past redemption.

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