Amateur at Heart

By Jack Forge

In this bittersweet story of youth, lust, and life, Sonny Dennison catches the allure of Lela, a local temptress. Idolizing a local Don Juan named Dion, Sonny pursues Lela until she seduces him. Under the guidance of his cynical friend, Alfie, Sonny prepares for the loss of his virginity.

Following an hilarious attempt at a first sexual encounter, Sonny and Lela have a brief affair, until she rejects him for an old friend. Cast adrift, Sonny painfully feels the lack of fulfillment in sex for its own sake. After a bout of despondency, he begins to realize the worth of human relationships.

One bright summer day at the beach, Sonny finally awakens to meaning in his life.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Jack Forge
• Release date: Aug 23, 2011
• ISBN: 9781465779342

Jack Forge

Born John Stephen Rohde in Los Angeles, California, I focused my academic study on the liberal arts and I have striven to create worthy art most of my life.

Book preview

AMATEUR AT HEART

A Novel of Amorous Youth

by

Jack Forge

Smashwords Edition

Copyright 2011 John Stephen Rohde

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment. It may not be re-sold or given to others. If you want to share this book, please buy a copy for each recipient. If you are reading this book but did not buy it, please go to Smashwords.com and buy a copy. Thank you for respecting the author's work.

Chapters

Dreams and Idols

Autumn Idyll

Family, Feast, and Fantasy

Time of the Flower

Consummation and Confession

***

Dreams and Idols

1

Flying! Barely above the walnutreetops, he was soaring. After the flapping, groaning, straining to gain the high-blown air, now, windswept, his arms outstretched--he was gliding easily. Panting from the takeoff and struggling for altitude, but flying! His heart was beating like a dynamo; everything else silent--

below: shingled-roof, trees, driveway, lawn, bushes, patio, flowers--lay like a giant jigsaw puzzle upon a gently curving table. Gazing down upon the pieces of the pattern, he was gliding, flying--riding a breeze high over the crest of the roof. A long way down! He kept flapping to stay aloft. Airborne! Soaring. He looked down for his shadow. None? Whoa! Head up. Yeah! Gliding. The lawn grass was cool and green below--bright green to yellow brightening. The lawn melded into a patchwork of yards and pools and trees. The valley stretched in all directions from mountains to hillocks. The great blue sea spread beyond....

Click. A young female voice broke into the morning with song. A vision of luminous yellow flashing to white illumined the window glass, the light blurry but almost blinding. Lengthening rays of sunlight like centrifugal pulses from a great generator. The vision fluttered under his blinking eyes, vacillated between high and low key. Then the pulses slowed to match the rhythm of the song. And the window came into focus.

Shelves around the window framed books, plastic models, compact disks, bongo drums, tambourine, harmonica, and a pair of ceramic jungle dancers. A poster on the wall showed the U. S. presidents' faces and captioned summaries of their lives. Plastic airplane models hung as if firing down from the ceiling. On the wallpaper cowboys on horses galloped through bands of morning light. Drawings of fantastic faces and landscapes adorned the walls. On the floor lay an old rug woven with filigrees of grapevines. Desk and shelves beneath the luminescent window ever brighter: TV, stereo, computer, lamp, clock radio--7:00 AM.

Still in bed, Sonny Dennison lay cool and languid under a sheet that peaked like a pyramid in soft folds over his loins. His seagreen eyes reflected the window light. He lay inert until the song finished.

Popcycle, boys 'n' girls-- a male radiovoice broke into the melody and pattered rapidly at a high pitch to the last note of the song. A platinum Southland wake-up for all you babesindreamland--September leaves you hangin' twixt the books of science class and study hall. Yesoyowza! Time again to rack those sunburnt brains--and to help you on your way, here's--

After another musical introduction, a voice began singing like a strong man flexing his muscles. Sonny whipped the sheet off and jumped out of bed. His undershorts still stretching in front of his boy-man body, lean and tan, he yawned and stumbled into a bathroom across a small hallway.

He turned on the shower and stood still in the steaming stream like a penitent at prayer. The running water drowned out the music. He looked at his slackening penis and watched the water trickle off the end, fall to the tiled floor, and spiral down the drain. Clockwise. Why? Earthwise? True time passing? He hurried through the rest of his libations and stepped out of the shower. He stared at his pubescent face in the mirror. On the wall beside the mirror hung a picture of a young male movie star. While combing his hair, the boy glanced at the picture, their faces simultaneously reflected in the glass.

He heard water start running into the kitchen sink. And from there a canary began singing in a long warbling, lilting trill. Unable to get his hair right, the boy looked at the actor's picture and frowned. He combed harder and faster, whipping the strands until wisps of hair hung suspended in space, electrified.

Son-ny! a woman's sweet voice called from the kitchen.

He quickly whipped his unruly hair two or three more times and said, Coming, grana.

In turning, he glanced out the window and spied a boy and girl strolling along the street in front of his house. They were holding hands. Her auburn hair hung long down her back. The boy looked coarse and dirty. But she was radiant and....

Now, hurry up, Sonny. Come and eat your breakfast, the voice called again from the kitchen, before it gets cold. Hurry. You don't want to be late to school on your first day back.

An old man's deep voice chimed in: And turn off that damned radio! He added with quiet force. 'Nough to wake the god damned dead.

Sonny pulled away from the window with a last, lingering look at the sexy girl and her boyfriend, as they disappeared beyond an ivy-covered fence between the street and his yard. He ran into his room and grabbed some clothes. After slipping into tan cotton slacks and white short-sleeved shirt, he cinched his pants with a brown belt and stepped into chocolate suede shoes. After punching off the radio, he scooted into the kitchen.

At a plastic table with chrome legs, sat Grandfather Rinehart, an elderly man with a thick tuft of silvery hair and eyes like frozen water. His tanned muscular arms protruding from a white cotton shirt were working at his breakfast. He was absorbed in smearing sour cream onto a thin, crisp pancake. Sonny watched the knife in the old man's hand as it lightly scraped the toasty, webbed surface. His hair gleamed in sunlight shining through windows on adjacent sides of the table. Grandmother Rinehart, a cherubic little woman with dark wispy hair was standing at the stove in a flowered housedress protected by an apron. She turned another sizzling pancake onto a warm plate and handed it to Sonny.

Bopster, a golden canary in a cage suspended on a stand near the table, was singing like a suitor serenading his lover. Outside the kitchen, a mockingbird in a walnutree joined the song with a similar version combined with sparrow chirps and crow calls. Dimples forming beneath his red cheekbones, Grandfather looked up through his gold-rim glasses and beamed at the yellow bird in the cage. Grandmother cackled gleefully, her ample bosom and belly bouncing. Sonny secreted his amusement into spreading butter and strawberry jam onto his pancake.

That ol' mocker knows a good tune when he hears one, grandfather said as he sprinkled sugar onto his pancake. Then smiling from one cheek to the other, he glanced impishly over his spectacles at the boy.

Sonny looked at him and tried to contain himself, but an errant smile broke through his guard. The old man victoriously cut a long wedge of pancake, rolled it over once, twice, and shoved it into his mouth.

Candy! he said through a great grin.

Grandmother, still enjoying the bird duet, looked at her husband a moment with the hint of a smile, and then poured coffee into his cup. A little steam rose from the brew and disappeared into the sunlight above the table. The boy squinted at the sun and gobbled slice after slice of pancake. She laid another one in front of him and poured his milk. He buried his lips in white bubbles and slugged the cold liquid. After draining the glass, he sighed with pleasure and gobbled another wedge of pancake.

When grandfather finished eating he stirred sugar into his coffee in smooth circles, the spoon making light bell sounds against the sides of the cup. At the same time, he lifted his chin and eyed Sonny through the magnifiers in his glasses, looking closely around the boy's ears. He clucked like an old rooster and shook his head, You could've gotten the barber to trim it a little closer on the sides. Still looks ragged.

Sonny shot a look at him but said nothing while shoving food into his mouth.

Don't want you lookin' like a bum.

The boy wolfed his meal.

Grandmother sat down and started eating at the boy's ferocious pace. Then she stopped to catch her breath. Oh, fer heav'nsake don't eat so fast, Sonny. You'll make us both sick.

He paid no attention to her. But the old man shook his head and clucked again as he sipped his coffee. To avoid him the boy once more looked up at the glaring sunlight illumining the curtains and he squinted. He felt the heat on his face.

Gonna be hot today, he said. Then under his breath he added, Wish I's at the beach.

Grandfather continued to scrutinize him. After gorging another glass of milk, Sonny jumped from the table. His knee knocked the top and bumped the dishes up and down, rattling and clattering. Grandmother held the table steady and clucked like an old hen.

Grandfather raised his hands as if in a blessing and cried, God Almighty!

Sorry, the boy said as he hurried out of the kitchen.

Like a young bull in a china closet, grandmother muttered. And she shared with her husband a critical look that said, What an impossible child! Continuing her own breakfast, she covered another pancake with copious butter and syrup and dropped artificial sweetener into her coffee.

Grandfather glowered at her, but she mocked his look. Then, tisking and shaking his head as usual, he picked up a newspaper. Following one more patronizing look, he snapped it open and dived into it.

In his bathroom, Sonny checked and rechecked his hair. Then a horn sounded from the street. Here's my ride! he shouted as he glanced out the window.

Got yer lunch? grandmother hollered.

Yeah--bye. He dashed into the short hallway to a door that led into the garage. Jerking it open and bounding through, he slammed it on his grandparent's farewell.

The old man winced and started to shout at the boy, but his wife stopped him with a look, and he returned to his paper. A moment later, his cold blue eyes glanced over his glasses at her, and he asked, His mother call?

Not yet. She pitched into the remains of her breakfast.

He shook his head with more sadness than disdain and dropped his face once more into his reading. I don't know what in hell is the matter with that woman.

She shook her head too but continued drinking her coffee.

Now she's got another man, he said, I hope she ain't thinking she's gonna all of a sudden make a family for the boy.

She is his mother after all, father, the old woman said through a last large mouthful. And she's your daughter.

Well, I wish she'd act like a mother for a change. He shook the paper, and it crackled like a small brush fire. Damned shame, he grumbled behind the pages. God-damned shame.

Grandmother nodded sadly and chewed.

He went on. She insisted on marrying Nick when she was barely out of high school, gets herself pregnant with the boy--then they break up and Sonny is cast off like old clothes. God damned shame--that's what it is. No way to make a family. Well, she better not get any ideas about takin' him back just 'cause she's gettin' herself another husband. I'll be god damned if I let that happen to the boy. Gone through enough misery in his life. Only fifteen. Damned, damned shame!

Grandmother Rinehart nodded, licked her fork, and sipped her coffee with slow slurps. Grandfather looked at her, shook his head, and returned to his morning reading. Oblivious to the drama at the table, Bopster kept on singing a duet with the mockingbird.

2

The San Fernando Valley lies like a frying pan between the low, scrubby San Monica Mountains to the south and the high stony San Gabriel Mountains to the north. Seasonal rivers bisect the arid basin with water that surges during winter rains but merely trickles the rest of the year. Once free-flowing arroyos that absorbed countless flashfloods from rainstorms between the hills and mountains that frame the valley, they are now encased in concrete trimmed with barbed wire running along a freeway through interminable suburbs. Where avocado, olive, and citrus groves once decked the valley with a sea of green trees, fragrant blossoms, and fruit, now countless lawn-bordered houses fill the grid of streets that crisscross the vast basin.

The valley is a bastion of the United States of America bourgeoisie. Here the modern middle class lives in over-priced houses, drives over-sized vehicles, and wastes water stolen from lands hundreds of miles north and northeast of the county line. In this culture of backyard pools and polluted beaches, these people absorb more ultra-violet rays in a year than most people in other regions of the temperate zones get in a lifetime. They revel in two seasons: big summer and little summer. They get depressed when the sky clouds and they become suicidal when ten inches of rain per year fall on their heads. These paltry showers barely moisten the soil but flood the streets with dirty water. They who dwell in this semi-paradisal coastal vale exist to enjoy themselves despite the demands of job and living. For the denizens of this profane Eden, pleasure is a preoccupation among the demands of work and school.

Occupying one full block in the middle of this valley, stands Holy Virgin High School, a parochial institution of learning where courses in the time of our story were taught by Catholic brothers to classes of boys. The buildings made in the Spanish colonial style, the place looked like an old mission. At the front of the school on one busy corner, a lawn-trimmed brick path invited entrance to the campus. In the middle of the path stood a life-sized statue of Mary, the mythical mother of Jesus. Draped in matronly cloth, with her slender arms extended and her smile a tender greeting, she welcomed everyone who passed. Nearly all year blue and yellow flowers bloomed around her feet, and birds alighted on her shoulders. With her hands open, palms upward, she looked down compassionately at every sinner, her face always blissful like that of a Da Vinci Madonna. Intense sunlight dematerialized the smooth stone of her feminine form, so she often appeared transfigured by the dazzling light.

On this hot day in a September of the ever-cycling academic year, scores of adolescent boys were strolling up the brick path. They immediately joined others on the walkway, passed the statue, and headed towards a double flight of steps to the school buildings. Most of the boys were chatting and laughing exuberantly as boys do in their teen years. And some were waving and calling to others on the campus. However, many younger boys, child-like freshmen new to the school, remained quiet, scattered, and self-conscious amid the commotion. Cars pulled up to the corner, and more boys emerged. One of them was Sonny.

He sauntered up the walk, for now in his second year he was no longer afflicted by the curse of being new and unknown. His slacks and shirt making him appear more dapper than the crowd, he walked with his more casually dressed classmates, chatting happily. As he walked, he kept looking toward a main courtyard several steps above the entranceway that approached the gymnasium and the big classroom halls.

Among the thronging boys passing back and forth across the yard, strode a few adult men in long black cassocks that skirted the scuffed toes of their black shoes. Little squares of white starched collars that gleamed at their throats identified them as the religious brothers. They moved quickly through the students or stood as dark sentinels near the building entrances.

Sonny glanced at the face on the statue of Mary as he passed. She appeared to look him right in the eyes. He looked at her countenance, young and pretty with a loving smile. She seemed alive. He smiled slightly then finding himself looking at her too long, peeked around to see if anyone had caught his distraction. A sudden knot of apprehension twisted his stomach, but no one seemed to have noticed, so he hurried to the courtyard. Spotting a familiar figure at the top of the steps, he threw his hand into the air and shouted: Alfie!

A tall, thin boy atop the steps turned around, recognized Sonny, and smartly lifted his head in recognition. He was dressed similar to Sonny. But with his close-cropped hair and piercing eyes, he looked like an athlete on an academic scholarship. Grinning broadly, Sonny hurried to meet him. Alfred smiled, nodded, and said in his way, Sonnius! How're they hanging, man?

Big as ever, man. How in hell are yours?

Cool, man, cool.

Been gettin' any?

Always, Alfred said with a flourish to cover the truth, always.

As though synchronized they turned and walked across the yard to one of the halls. Sonny kept staring at his Alfred's butched head, and he responded to the attention by caressing his bristles and said. Just thought I'd try something new.

Sonny continued to stare in mock disdain. For a second I thought you had a disease.

Alfred punched him on the arm, and Sonny pretended to cry out in pain then laughed. They laughed together and walked in silence a few steps.

Didn't see you at mass yesterday, Sonny said.

Yeah, I went early because of a game in the park.

Sonny looked slighted.

I didn't know you were back from the Sierras, Alfred added hastily.

Sonny nodded and thought a moment. Dion there?

Yeah. And you know what? He was telling us about this passing contest they had at the coliseum. Said he threw the ol' 'lipsoid sixty yards! Can you believe that, man? Sixty god-damned yards!

I don't believe it.

Won a god-damned prize, he did!

A prize? No shit?

Alfred glanced around to locate any men in black who might not have appreciated the color of their language, then echoed him emphatically: I wouldn't shit you, man!

Sonny shook his head in admiration.

That guy's some kind of amazing jock, huh? Alfred said.

Sonny nodded solemnly. They were sharing silent adulation of their hero, when the bell rang. The clanging clatter at first mingled with the chatter of all the boys in the courtyard, and then seemed to silence them as it rang, its shrill noise reverberating among the buildings until dying away as melting in the heat of the day.

Sonny and Alfred entered one of the buildings among a sluggish crowd of noisy boys. Just inside a double doorway, one half of the crowd separated onto the ground floor, and the other half climbed the stairs, all of them continuing their chatter.

Silence! a bass voice boomed out from the top of the stairs. The voice paused effectively then added, All right, girls--quiet! This isn't Disneyland.

From the upward moving body of boys, an anonymous voice sounding like Alfred's whispered, No shit.

Above the boys, the source of the voice was hanging over a banister like a flesh and blood gargoyle in mourning. His black-marble eyes glowered at the boys, and his acne-scarred cheeks inflated as he bellowed: Come on, ladies, come on, come on--move it along!

Seeing him, Sonny caught his own response in his teeth and wisely swallowed it. Alfred never looked up from his shoes, finding them suddenly fascinating, as they stepped one after the other up the stairs. The boys kept their heads down as they ascended, but their shoulders were bouncing with suppressed laughter. As the students flowed over the top step, the two friends scurried past the frightening face.

Good morning, Brother Martin, Solo, a pale, thin boy said, smiling at the gargoyle.

So-lo, Brother Martin answered musically, accenting the last syllable with a lilt as he was eying Sonny and Alfred.

Shuffling shoes and rustling pants sounded like a landslide, as the wave of boys crested the staircase. Their faces still ruddy from summersun, and, yet unadapted to the regimen, they looked self-consciously poised between grimaces and grins. When Sonny and Alfred had passed the cleric, they stepped as quietly but as quickly as possible down the hallway to their lockers.

Looks like we got the Martian for religion again this year, Alfred said, glancing behind him at the black sentinel.

Oh, God, no--you're kiddin' me! Sonny nearly shouted.