Page:Jay Little - Maybe—Tomorrow.pdf/231

 "Here?" He looked at his watch … "Oh, my gosh. It's two-thirty … Mother will be worried sick. I promised I wouldn't stay out late." He started to get up.

"Stay a little longer," Paul whispered. He bent down and kissed him. Gaylord trembled and sank back onto the fur.

"I should go … I can't stay too long … maybe they're asleep."

"Should we call?"

"No … I don't think so …"

Two arms like doric columns pressed the sides of his waist, his own arms still stretched beyond them. Now, he placed them on the columns. A faint smile played on his lips; a violent pounding hit within his chest. He felt no strangeness, no sense of contrast or of vanished time … and yet …

"I'll take you home … don't worry," Paul murmured.

"I'm not worried."

"You're awfully sweet."

The columns broke and went around his neck. A gear seemed to shift in his mind. He spoke hurriedly. "You are too." His arms patted the shoulders over him. "You're very nice, Paul. I had a wonderful time tonight … thanks to you." He smiled a childlike grin. "That was some party, wasn't it? First time I've ever been to one like that."

"It is?" Paul asked with surprise.

"Funny, Gene didn't have any girls there … isn't it?"

"It all depends on the way you look at it." Paul grinned and patted Gaylord's checks. He saw him watching him with an awed expression. "All those boys should have been girls, Gay. Nature just played a dirty trick on them. Funny … it is funny … Boys that should have been girls and girls that should have been boys." His expression changed, became serious. "Just a bunch of innocent sheep, that's what we are; trying to find happiness in our own little way, being whipped, cursed and slaughtered by the noble ones who think we are trying to corrupt their evil sexual selves. Throwing young and innocent kids in jail unless they can pay off to some shyster lawyer, cop or judge. They're the ones who should be locked up. Those that bleed the young minds that fall in the dirty filthy traps they set. Instead of helping … they destroy." He shook his head as if in great 221