Linger by M. E. Kerr

full of surprises,” I said.
    Dave opened the door and said, “You guys ready to go home? Laura has an eleven o’clock curfew.” He stank of Old Spice.
    Sloan said she had to be in by then, too. She’d taken off one of her gloves and put her hand in mine.
    When I left her at the door, I said, “How about this Saturday? Do you want to see The Grifters ?”
    “Okay.”
    “Okay?” I laughed and we kissed, a quickie.
    I went down her front walk feeling I’d left the snake with the flicking tongue behind me.
    Maybe I’d even left Lynn Dunlinger behind me.
    Something had definitely happened to me that night.
    “Like what?” Dave said when I told him something had.
    “She didn’t rattle me,” I said.
    I was laughing to myself: thinking rattlesnake.
    “What’s that grin for? Hey, Gary, did you make out?”
    “I’m not going to tell you. I’d only lie.”
    Dave gave me a punch. “I thought you’d get a lecture on disarmament. I bet Laura, and she said no, it’d be on Planned Parenthood.”
    “What about you?” I said.
    “She doesn’t light my fire, Gary. I’m going for Lolly Newman this weekend.”
    “Easy does it,” I said.
    I was in a good mood when I got home.
    I figured I’d get a Coke and go up and listen to some music in my room. I had the new Vanilla Ice album, To the Extreme. I might listen to Depeche Mode’s World in My Eyes, too.
    When I got inside the house, I could hear CNN blaring in the living room. It was all that was ever on anymore. What happened to Johnny Carson and Jay Leno?
    I was going to sneak up to my room when Dad called out, “Come on in here, Gary We’re celebrating.”
    They had a bottle of Korbel champagne opened, and Mom raised her glass and grinned. “The war’s over, Gary!”

25
    A BOUT YOUR PEN PAL , Lynn Dunlinger , I wrote Bobby. Today I saw her coming back from Lingering Pines with this guy in the snow, and something about the two of them was so different it’s hard to describe, but if I were you I wouldn’t count on her, Bobby, if you know what I mean.
    It was Friday afternoon around four, and the sun was setting, so there was a sort of blue haze over them. They were walking close together: Mr. Raleigh going along in that awkward up-and-down way he walked. She was looking up at him, laughing, and just for a minute he stopped and looked down at her, even though it was snowing hard. Their coats were covered with it. He must have said something, who knows what? But they just stood there facing each other, and I think anyone could tell what was with them.
    Then he lurched back, picked up some snow in his gloves; and she saw he was making a snowball, so she did, too.
    There wasn’t any more to it than that: this big snowball fight began, and they were running toward Linger, laughing, she was chasing him, and it was hard for him in the snow, that was all.
    But I never saw a moment frozen like that, one that said it all, except maybe in the movies, with violins swelling in the background, some kind of passionate symphony tipping off the stupid public that in case they didn’t get it, this was something hot going on with these two.
    I was watching out the kitchen window, my hands in soapy water, doing the pans because the cook wouldn’t do cleanup and the guy that usually did was a no-show that day. He had a brother in Desert Storm and he’d been celebrating since the cease-fire.
    Lynn had just gotten in from Faith Academy. I’d seen the taxi pull up some time ago. Her suitcase was still out in the hall near the wishing well.
    The Dunlingers weren’t there yet. They’d gone to the Peace Celebration down at Holy Trinity.
    What I didn’t know, until dinner, was that my father had seen them too.
    “Bobby’s got some competition, is my bet,” he said. “I saw Lynn Dunlinger frolicking in the snow with Jules Raleigh this afternoon, and they looked very much like a couple.”
    “A couple of what?” my mother asked.
    “They looked like they were enjoying