The three of them hung out in the garage, looking at Samson’s new bike and making small talk. Girl teased him about disappearing at that dance years ago, and he asked her to go to a meeting with him on the bike the next weekend. He seemed dorky, overly confident, and not all that bright. The shine had worn off for Girl. She was a college kid now, and she dated college kids, not factory workers with ring-around-the-head hairstyles, but she still said yes. Girl figured that maybe she would learn something about Wrong Chevy. Surely Right Chevy wasn’t interested in her since she had dated his brother. Girl decided that it couldn’t possibly be a date.
“You should totally go out with Sammy!” Wrong Chevy said on the drive home.
“Oh my God, I would never!” Girl answered.
“Why not?” he asked.
“He’s a blue-collar worker!”
Girl’s parents wouldn’t have cared if she brought home a woman, an Asian- or African-American, a Hindu, a Muslim, or a Catholic, but no way would they approve of her dating “Johnny Lunch Bucket,” as Stepmother called factory workers. She was expected to go to college and marry a boy (or girl) with a college degree.
Still, Girl was looking forward to their maybe a date/maybe not a date that Friday. She and Sharon discussed what Girl should wear, and decided she shouldn’t look like she was trying too hard, just in case. Girl chose jeans, a muted green polo, and sneakers, her chin-length hair smooth and curled under. She didn’t want to look like she thought it was a date if he didn’t think it was a date, regardless of whether Girl had decided if she wanted it to be a date. Girl told her parents, and they begged her not to go anywhere with some strange man on a Harley.
“Girl, if you seriously want to remain friends with Wrong Chevy, you can’t date his brother,” Mother said.
“He wants me to,” Girl said.
“He may say that now, but trust me, dating your ex-boyfriend’s family never works out well.” Mother replied.
Girl blew off her parents’ concern. After all, Stepmother had two motorcycles and used to take Girl and Brother on rides around the neighborhood all the time—it’s wasn’t like they really thought bikes were dangerous. Even though Girl had had her share of boyfriends, she hadn’t been on many dates—they had all been more the hang-out-in-the-living-room types, not the kind where you go to dinner or a movie or something, and she had never been on the back of a real Harley. Who cared if it was raining?
Stepmother called Girl at work Friday afternoon to try once more to talk her out of it.
“Girl, you have to cancel tonight. It’s raining.”
“It’s supposed to stop,” Girl said.
“At least promise me you won’t go on I-90,” she begged.
“Fine, whatever,” Girl said, just to get off the phone. There was no way Girl could tell her maybe date that she wasn’t allowed to go on the expressway. She was almost nineteen, and Chevy was going to be twenty-eight in a month’s time. He was a man. He owned his own home. He wouldn’t respect a girl whose mother wouldn’t let her go on the highway in the rain.
Girl drove herself over to Right Chevy’s house to get suited up in a leather jacket, helmet, and oilskin raincoat, though the rain had stopped. It turned out he thought it was a date.
“I wasn’t sure if you were pretty or not,” he confessed. “I’ve never dated a girl with short hair. But Tina thought you were pretty, so I looked at you again and decided she was right. I think you grow on people. Like algae.”
“Algae?” Girl repeated, offended.
“You are a diamond in the rough—just like me. That’s what my mother always said about me—I was her diamond in the rough.”
It wasn’t exactly flattering, though algae sounded better than mold. Chevy explained that his girlfriend had moved out that month. He hadn’t known until the morning of their ride that she had dated his brother, but he wasn’t concerned. There had been a lot of overlap in the three Chevy brothers’ lists of ex-girlfriends. It was no big deal, he said.
They met up with Sharon and some friends to play cards, and Samson was loud and dorky and irritating. Every time he started to lose, he cheated, but so obviously that everyone called him on it and the hand had to be re-dealt. He laughed too loudly and rubbed his hands together like he was trying to start a fire, or thumped the person sitting next to him on the back so hard they cringed. But when the rain started on the ride home, he covered her hands with one of his to protect her from the needlelike drops of water, and that made up for all of his shortcomings.
The next weekend they rode to the locks on the Erie Canal, and Samson put his arms around Girl and rocked back and forth as they talked—he was a man who could not stay still, and she was a girl who had longed to be held and swayed. “I’m sorry,” he said, “I rock when I’m happy.” The night was dark. She could just barely see the water glimmering in the moonlight. Samson smelled of oiled leather and warm skin. Later, he picked Girl up and carried her over his shoulder without a grunt or change in breath. It was the first time she had ever felt dainty.
A few days later, Samson took Girl to Red Lobster and bought her a yellow rose wrapped in fragile cellophane. So far in life, the most romance Girl had received was dining in at Pizza Hut and
