Some Minor Adjustments

I knew I had to be careful. Ken was not a guy to be trifled with. Purposeful and direct, I knew that this journey into the City of Bridgetown was not going to be a shopping spree – more like Behind-Enemy-Lines-in-and-out-search-and-rescue-mission. You get the picture. We would be going into the slum area to visit Marsha, her six children, and a drunken father named Peter Odle. We had discussed all week our strategy for approaching them via the Community Services & Welfare Department and to encourage them into better standard of life and health.

I had never known Ken to be anything but practical, pious – and by all appearances – asexual. Proverbially dark and handsome, many girls found him attractive but unresponsive to their feminine wiles. I didn’t even dare try. Not that I was vampish or desperate, or even flirtatious, but an attractive, single, Christian male was irresistibly compelling on even such superficial fronts. But Ken was not to be sidetracked. Definitely asexual. Or homosexual. Or so I assumed. And you know what they say about assumptions....

He and Don-the-Ape are sitting in the car about ten minutes before I hop in. As the Youth Leader for our church, Ken had the leadership penchant for being patiently impatient, and was half way out of his side to open the door for me when I motion him not to bother. “Sorry to have kept you all,” I smile. “No problem,” he lies genteelly.

Don, his perverted best friend, who also doubled as his unofficial matchmaker, is the grinning ape with whom I would have the dubious pleasure of sharing his company. I never understood how seemingly perfectly sensible people (a.k.a. Ken) always manage to gather these "appendages" to them, (a.k.a. Ape) but maybe it was another credit to his sparkling humility and Christ-like nature. You know I'm being sarcastic here: they say great minds think alike, so what does that really say about my Boy Blue....?

So, an amoeba and an ape: can't get much worse that this, right...? Right.....

Being a female and a dodo, swinging one bare leg - recently shaved, I add proudly -  into his little sports car requires a slight adjustment to the hem-line of my cerise skirt suit which I misjudge to be both non-threatening and a quick work. It is still “adjusted” when I close the door three seconds later, and a quick glance tells me it is not un-noted. Translated: Don grinning like a roasted monkey. I smooth my hem down and give him a withering look. Ken gets back into the driver’s seat. Don's eyebrows jiggle up and down in coy acknowledgment.

Sitting in the backseat of a sports car affords you quite a bit of observation and introspection, mainly because you are not the driver. You can stare at things as long as you like. Not so the driver. We hope. So, to have the driver looking at you in the rear view mirror – often – requires quite a superhuman effort – literally. Physical fitness (swerving the chicken and her brood), a good prayer life (preparing to meet God if we overtake that trailer), great self-control (If he swerves like that again, I’m outta here!) gets thrown into the mix quite naturally. With Ken driving at 80 mph these factors are essential. Don grins like he has mad cow disease....Me? Not so much....

I am never so happy to see a red light in all my life, and I keep very still. Ken’s eyes follow mine. I can hear the blood racing in my ears and it’s not the flush of feminine modesty. I glance outside and pray that the lights stick at red. He glances out into the side mirrors. I look down at my hands, only to meet his on the way back up.

“Oh, my manners!” the Grinning Ape gasps, “Kenneth, meet Avril.  Avril, this is Kenneth.”  I smile shyly. He smiles slyly. Whoever said he is asexual is probably trying too hard. The light turns green. Don whoops like he's on LSD. We do 100 mph instantly.

We stop at the automart to pick up Mrs. Crawford, our Community services coordinator. So I have to move over. Over the hump in the middle of the car, mind you. Some more “adjustments”. Ken leans on the steering wheel, chin on hand, dark eyes laughing. And then he looks back.

If I were a different girl, a different species even, instead of an alien, I guess I’d be flattered. What I was initially was appalled. After all, he’s supposed to be asexual, amoeba, whatever. On further reflection, I am embarrassed: there is no decent way to get over that hump. And if you had met Ken’s incredibly sexy eyes at that moment you would know how pathetic I really was. The idiot who said he was….oh, what the heck…

"Watch out for that hump, Mrs. Crawford," Ape smiles, "I could never forgive myself if you hurt yourself."

Mrs. Crawford is already appalled at the cramped conditions, and uncomfortable hump, over which she is also "adjusted". But she smiles - pained. You can imagine there were no sexy looks back here for a while. I continue to glare at Don  as he consumes a slurpy - noisily - that we pick up on the way.

Did I say he has no sense of propriety whatsover? Ape......

We babble on, meet Marsha, promise to return. Drop off Mrs. Crawford by the automart.

“So, say,” the full-fledged gorilla next to Ken drawls, ”I hear there’s a social over at Avril’s church Saturday night!”

“Really?” Ken asks in a low, steady voice. Really...?! I echo mentally.

“Everyone’s invited. Starts at 8:00 p.m.” Now I look like the grinning gorilla.

“Can I pick you up?” Ken asks slyly. I stare like I have mad cow. “Me and Don that is,” he continues coyly. I nod stupidly.

“Great!” The Bigmouth next to Ken interjects, “I’ll show him where you live!”

Too fast. What just happened? Not my greatest moment, at all. I feel briefly as if I’ve just been picked up by a serial killer. But, what the heck, at least he’s a cute serial killer.…