Summer Corner

by

R.C. Davis

(First published by The Fourth River Magazine 2020)

In the summer we sat up on the corner, surrounded by the shops of the Midwestern affluent. An intersection. A crossroad at the midpoint of a small Iowa town. One blinking red light hanging at the center. It was the infamous ‘Square,’ and we were the sixteen year old boys who spent our days there.

We were Rock Stars. We were in love with summer, ourselves, the music, and—1972. We would make it our year. We wore bell-bottomed blue jeans, paisley button fronts, and tie-dyed T-shirts. Our hair was down our backs, peach fuzz was on our faces, and peace signs, in all sizes, shapes and colors, hung from our necks. Cigarettes occupied our fingers when the breath mints weren’t occupying our mouths. We wore cologne, earrings in our left ears, and sometimes—Ray-Bans, to shield our eyes from the brightness of the world.

We plucked Stratocasters, Gibsons, and Martins. We made them wail. We made them growl. We made them scream. We were Hendrix, Clapton, ZZ Top, and Jimmy Page. We beat drum kits and pounded keyboards. When we sang, we sang our hearts out—not a care—who cared. We did it in the village park. We did it in bedrooms and garages. We did it without consent and in the face of rage.

We acted rebellious. We acted rude. We acted like we didn’t have a care in the world, and that’s what attracted them… the girls. The unwanted. The inept. The uncool. The outcasts who sought acceptance and found it with The Rock Stars up on the corner. It was, ‘The One’s Outside’ ‘The Separate’—the ‘I am better than you’ crowd that had labeled them: The Teeny Boppers. The Groupies. The Bimbos. And worst of all, The Little Sluts. But those people didn’t know us. Together—The Girls and The Rock Stars were—The Troublemakers.

Before discovering us, The Girls had been somebody’s princess. Daddy’s little angels. Mommy’s little helpers. The model-children with the perfect report card. We were said to have corrupted them. Transformed them into something else. The undesirable. As if we wielded a magic wand and our single tap on their shoulder had changed them. They would never be the same again. But there was no doubt, they had made a choice. They felt courageous in their decision. They weren’t running away—they were running to. Freedom has its perils.

They danced beside us. They danced in front of us. They danced with us. And always in a way that captured us. They did it in the street. They did it on the sidewalk. They did it in groups in the corner of the room with the proverbial Boom Box booming. The Girls writhed, twisted, and swayed. They wore halter tops, low riding bell-bottoms, peasant blouses, and loose, ankle-length flowered skirts that caught the breeze in a way that sometimes brought a blush and a whistle. There were bare bellies, bare feet, and on the really hot days down at the hidden pond—bare everything. We were loud, and we were learning.

We were brash. We were brave. We were frightening to a world more used to the conventional. We kept track of every, “Get a job, freaks!” that they threw at us. But we didn’t want a job; being a freak was work enough.

In the coolness of the dark, we sat under the streetlight comparing scars, spitting for distance, telling bad jokes, and sometimes… complimenting The Girls on their qualities. Their fashion choices. Their beauty. We reminded them that someday their bodies would drive men mad. They only rolled their eyes, blushed, and giggled.

They didn’t care. Because when they weren’t dancing, they were busy playing Rock-Paper-Scissors, hand games, Tag, or just passing time contemplating celestial bodies.

We didn’t care what they did, and nothing in that sky could outshine The Rock Stars.

We shared everything. The food we bought. The cigarettes we stole. The flowers we’d pick from somebody’s cherished flower bed and the hash pipe that would appear and disappear just as quick. We shared our woes. We shared our misfortune and our heartache. We shared—our heartbreaks.

The Girls fawned over us. They petted us. They calmed us. They stole kisses. They ran errands for us, and guarded our stuff when we played the music. In their loyalty, they wouldn’t hesitate to raise a middle finger to any obnoxious passerby, and without us deeming it necessary. We never called them Teeny Boppers, Bimbos or Sluts, because, well… The Rock Stars knew better. You never scorn a goddess.