Day Thirty Nine: Spin the Bottle

We are all mortal until the first kiss and the second glass of wine.--Eduardo Galeano

The first kiss I had was the most disgusting thing in my life. The girl injected about a pound of saliva into my mouth, and when I walked away I had to spit it all out--Leonardo DiCaprio

I had to have my first kiss in front of, like, a hundred people. I didn't know what to do. So my sisters told me to, like, practice on a pillow, you know? But it didn't kiss me back so I didn't know what to expect--Lacey Chabert

This prompt is taken from the Write Brain Workbook by Bonnie Neubauer.

Finish the story. Start with:
At my first boy-girl party...

At my first boy-girl party I was fourteen which was practically elderly.It took me that long to get invited, but finally, miraculously  a group of semi-populars had given me their stamp of approval. 

Boy/girl parties were not on the list of events I had attended. My list looked like this:

                Monday

Read

                Tuesday

Read

Church Youth Group

                Wednesday

Read

                Thursday

Read

Babysit Twins

Watch Little House on the Prairie

Friday

 Babysit Rodgers Kids

Read

Saturday

 Babysit Smith kids

Watch Sanford and Sons followed by

Chico and The Man

Sunday

 Church

Family Day

Watch The Wonderful World of Disney

                My new friends were old pros at Boy/Girl parties. Even the biggest nerd in the bunch, Rhonda Meyers, assured me that making out with a guy was ‘Not a biggie.’

                “Everyone always fights over Bill Rogers. He’s the best kisser by a mile.”

                I couldn’t imagine kissing anyone, much less everyone, but rules were rules.

                “You have to kiss whoever the bottle points to, but you don’t have to kiss them for a long time. You can do like a peck, or you can do thirty seconds in heaven.”

                Thirty Seconds in Heaven was ducking into a closet with a boy and kissing him while everyone outside the closet counted to thirty.

                The day of the party we took the bus to PW Super and made a beeline for the cosmetics. Bonnie Bell had just come out with something called ‘Kissing Potion’. It was shiny and sticky and flavored. I bought peppermint. Rhonda bought strawberry. On the way home we took the glass vials out of their boxes and rolled the stuff on. 

                  Mine tasted like envelopes.

                “This should do the trick,” Rhonda said. I could see my reflection in her lips. I didn’t know what ‘the trick’ was that the potion should do, but I hoped it did it for me too.

                The lights were dim and bean bag chairs were scattered throughout the room.  The Captain and Tennille were singing about love keeping us together and the air smelled like popcorn and dime store cosmetics.

                “Come on guys, it’s time!” Stephanie Simms gathered all twelve of us into a boy/girl circle and put a coke bottle in the center. I managed a stealth swipe of potion and sat down next to Bob Stephens who looked like Woody Allen.

                The bottle pointed at me a total of one times. It was Bill Rogers’ spin. My underarms prickled and my face burned when he got on his knees and leaned across the circle with his lips aimed at me. I kept my eyes open for the kiss which lasted a total of zero point three seconds. Zero point one second shorter than a kiss from my great-Uncle Flip.

                There would be no thirty seconds in heaven with Bill Rogers. Not for me. Not ever.

                Everyone paired off and headed to various make-out spots. Everyone but Bob Stephens and me.  I avoided eye contact until he pegged me in the head with a few unpopped kernels.

                “Hey! Are you going to keep being lame or what?"

                “I’m not making out with you,” I said.

                “I’m not asking,” he said. “Gross.”

                “Good because if you did ask the answer would be a big, fat, 'negativo'."

    “Wanna see what’s on TV?”

     "McMillian and Wife, Duh!" I said. 

     "Better than just sitting here."

     He turned on the TV.

     "Popcorn?" He offered me the last of the bowl. 

      We sat side-by-side with a bean bag chair between us. 

      Rock Hudson and Susan St. James were in the middle of busting a woman for putting cyanide in her husband's coffee when Bob leaned over.

      "You smell like stamps," he said. "Don't take this the wrong way, but I happen to be a collector."