He held her fingers as they walked through the kitchen and past the parlor down the hall to his bedroom. She went straight to the window. The woods were getting dark, but Leo could still see some of the river down between the trees. Allie stood there real quiet, not even glancing around like he figured she would. He could feel his pulse beating between his ears. He stood beside her and kissed her forehead and temple. Her eyes were shiny, the green in them almost blue. He moved to kiss her lips but she stepped away and closed the door. She leaned against it and slid out of her sandals, looking right into his face. Leo thought he should say something. He wanted to look away, so he went to the bed and sat down instead. When she joined him there things went really fast, and Leo knew later, when she’d been gone for hours and Jim was back from the Elks asleep in his room across the hall, that that was the only way tonight could have gone, that the way to have changed things was to talk when he had the chance-for him and Allie both to talk-but when neither of them did, when they just looked across the room at each other, then lay on the bed side by side, not kissing, just looking, their breathing short and shallow and quick, when Allie reached over, unzipped his pants and held his erection, her hand warmer than his warmth, Leo knew this was the conversation they were having.

He ran his fingers under her skirt along her smooth thigh to her hip and underpants. With her other hand Allie unsnapped his jeans, tugged at them, then she turned on her back and lifted up enough for Leo to pull her panties down over her knees, past her shins and off her feet. At the foot of the bed Leo got rid of his pants. While he unbuttoned his shirt and dropped it to the floor, Allie pulled the hem of her skirt up to her blouse and lay there with her blonde hair spread out on the pillow. The hair between her legs was some shade of brown, maybe honey, but Leo couldn’t tell for sure because he didn’t look at it, just felt its dark tug as he moved himself up between the thighs she spread for him, as she raised up her knees, squeezed his butt with both hands and pulled him into that soft opening of something so clutchingly warm and damp it was over very quickly.

After a while Leo put on his underwear and sat on the edge of the bed. Allie leaned up on one elbow and ran her fingers along his sunburned back. It stung his skin, but he didn’t move. The room had gotten darker, the corners the darkest. She pointed to the black and white poster above his chest of drawers. “Who’s that?”