Page:Jay Little - Maybe—Tomorrow.pdf/122

 "I'll be all right. I'm just not hungry." He could have told, but why should he. After all, it was sort of embarrassing. He tried to smile, and said, "Do you want onions on your hamburger?"

"Please, I like onions. Gay, are you sure you're all right?"

"I'm fine."

He watched Rogers eat and drink. He was sure going after that hamburger. When he asked, "Want another one?" Rogers said, "Yes." He sat watching the face as though his life depended upon every flicker of expression, every movement of the head as Rogers looked from the hamburger up into his eyes. Rogers was enjoying his food and talked between mouthfuls. He spoke endlessly of various things. Gaylord sat listening and agreeing. The grin on the sunburned face was becoming.

Rogers felt the intent look and said, "I'll be glad when the rest of my forehead gets brown. This white mark is from wearing a hat all day."

"Why … I've never even noticed it."

"You haven't? I'm not going to wear a hat any more … you don't wear one, do you?"

"I don't even own one."

"I had to wear one on the farm. Boy, that sun really beats down."

Why couldn't everyone be like Glenn, Gaylord asked himself. Silently, he admired the good-looking boy with a drop of mustard on his lip. He looked so young and healthy. He caught himself looking down the legs and up again past the thighs, and blushed. He noticed the developed chest; how it made the buttonholes of the shirt stand open. He looked at the legs again, noticed the drawn trousers around the groin and wondered how the whole combination of all he saw looked naked. He had completely forgotten the pack of wolves in the car he had moved away from: Stud, whom he did not like; the brutish Jack with his skinny fingers ready to plunge into his troubled brain and bring forth an eyeball; the others, a bunch of rotten twigs on a bad limb of the family tree. He had forgotten them all and was now deeply engrossed in Glenn Rogers.

He wondered what Rogers would have done in the shower. Would he have kissed him? Would he have taken up for him the way Blake had done? This he couldn't answer for sure but he was almost 112