I could see Jagger Jonze thought he was being laughed at, and disbelieved, and whatever mask he’d been wearing came off and he was suddenly a hard-ass street rat. He wasn’t who he appeared to be. Not at all.
“Feliza,” he said, “stand here.”
Fee did as he asked.
“Turn away from me.”
She did.
“Bend down. No. Not like that. Not like a whore.” The way he said it. “A little. Just bend a little.”
Fee did as she was told.
We were silent, our eyes locked on the zipper of his jeans, wondering when he was gonna whip it out. But he didn’t.
Then he told Fee to bend just a little more, and she did, and the merest glimpse of her white satin panties peeking out from under her tartan skirt triggered Jagger Jonze’s lump to swell.
We girls didn’t look at each other. No one called foul. No one said we shouldn’t be doing this and what the fuck’s happening here anyway? We wanted to see what would happen. Even if it was weird and gross. It felt something like our collective obsession with pimple-popping vids. We just had to see.
We watched Jagger, the slackening of his jaw, the loosening of his lips and the stiffening under his tight Cavalli jeans as he studied our friend. To be honest, I checked his hand to see if he had some pumping device because of the way he grew so big so fast, and the way it moved around—like a ferret under a denim blanket.
He concentrated on Fee’s sliver of white pantie, as we concentrated on the crotch of his pants, and then Fee turned, because she was missing the whole thing, and when she saw the bulge, she looked pretty surprised.
Then, without touching himself or grinding against his jeans, or moving a muscle, he let out a long, low moan, and a wet spot appeared and spread—like a miracle—on his jeans. He shuddered. And so did we.
When it was done, he didn’t look euphoric, or relieved of his load. His face went hard. He didn’t meet Fee’s eyes. He didn’t look at any of us. He got up from the couch and went straight into the nearest bathroom.
We sat there in stunned silence. Frozen, the way people act after cataclysmic events. You see it all the time on TV—people sitting in the smoky aftermath of hurricanes and exploding bombs. And weird sex. Cock-shocked. That’s what we must have looked like. Not because of what had been done to us. It was that, but we also felt shaken and confused by what we’d done to him.
Shame—that’s what it was—ingrained by centuries of religion and patriarchy? Epigenetics again? Maybe shame resides in the DNA of all females? Maybe, even for all of our intellectualizing and marching and certainty, we haven’t found a way to release the idea that we’re responsible for a man’s sexual responses. Or maybe the shame comes because we secretly desire that power?
We were waiting for Jagger to come back, forming apologies for challenging him, and for tempting him, when Jinny came home without her brother, who she said was at an all-night garage dealing with his car. Okay. Well, that didn’t sound right, but after bringing Reverend Jagger Jonze to his humiliating climax, the fact that Jinny’s story didn’t track was just another drop in the bucket of what-the-fuckedness.
When we told Jinny that Jagger was in the bathroom, she knocked on the door. He didn’t answer and he didn’t come out. She didn’t seem to find that odd, which was odd. She called through the door, “The girls are leaving now. Thanks for everything.”
“Thanks, Reverend Jagger,” we shouted in the direction of the bathroom, as Jinny escorted us to the front door. Just. Weird.
Weird also? She didn’t ask what we’d talked about while she was gone. Didn’t ask why Jagger was in the bathroom. She just said she was really tired and going to bed.
We girls left the Hutsalls’ together, although fled is the better word. I wanted the Hive to come back to my house and do a postmortem on the bizarre episode. So much to analyze. What he said. What he did. What we said. What we did. The pond in his pants. Ugh. But Brook said she felt sick, and Delaney was really tired, and Zara’s cheeks were pink with shame, or arousal, and she just wanted to go home too.
We hugged good night, and Delaney and Brook and Zee split off toward their houses, but Fee hung back. Thank God,