Free Always by Timmothy B. Mccann Page A

would let me see America any way I wanted to or go to any school in the country to study for the summer. Not exactly Europe, but if you knew my father, you would be very satisfied to get that. So I did the 4.0 and decided not to go to school that summer. I had a friend who wanted to visit a few schools on the East Coast to decide which one she would attend the following spring. Her list was Temple, Brown, the University of Rhode Island, and Florida State. Well, I was all for it when she said Temple, because that was just a hop, skip, and jump from New York City.
    At this time I was twenty years old and she was nineteen,and believe it or not, for some reason we decided to drive across country for this adventure.
    Two days later we arrived, checked into the hotel, showered, then she slept for about an hour before heading off to see the campus. I don’t know where she got all that energy. When she left, I went for a swim and I saw this guy who worked at the hotel watching me. He was pretty easy on the eyes, but I could not see myself dating a maintenance man. So I finished my swim and went back to the room and I got this call from the really cute and sexy guy at the front desk. He was kinda stocky, but he wore this bush (which is what we called them before Afros), sorta like Haywood’s now that I think about it. I think he was a student at one of the universities in town. So this guy was making his supposed courtesy call. And I played along because he talked kinda cute. He had that Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia thing going in his voice, and it sounded sexy for some reason. It wasn’t hillbilly twangy sounding. Just made him sound sincere and earnest or something. Anyway, he finished his call and I got a book to read. I had been waiting to read John Updike’s Couples for some time, but I fell asleep after the first chapter.
    The next morning we went for breakfast and everyone in the restaurant knew we were not from out of state when my friend Veronica asked the waitress to show her a grit. When we returned, there was a single rose on my pillow. I thought, Now, I know this is the South and they are supposed to be hospitable, but this is a little too much . Veronica, who was a Valley girl before there was such a phrase, put her hands on her hips and said, “So, like . . . where is mine?” In ’73 Valley girls were just considered plain old stuck-up rich girls.
    â€œI don’t know,” I said, still puzzled, and then it occurred to me why slick at the counter was smiling so much when we returned from breakfast. I didn’t tell her anything as I sat down to inhale the flower’s scent and noticed he’d squirted a little cologne on it. Although the smell mixed with the aroma of the rose, it was sensual. The cologne was airy and I couldn’t place it. It was an intensely masculinesmell with not a hint of sweetness to it, which I have always hated on men. As I enjoyed the fragrance, Ms. Veronica watched, and if my memory serves me correctly, steam was actually coming from the back of her neck and ears.
    â€œAha, yes, front desk? . . . Aha, yes, can you, like, help me? . . . Aha, we just, like, returned to our room? . . . Yes, 213? . . . Yes, and, aha, we only received, like, one fla’war?”
    Now, I know I should have stopped her. I know I should have told her I had a good idea who had left this, but I think you can see why I did not. She had her hand on her narrow hips and was moving that index finger in a tight circle as if they were speaking face-to-face. Although her dad was a physician, when she wanted it, the Inglewood in her would come out in a flash.
    â€œAha, like, excuse me? . . . So, like, how did this fla’war get in here? . . . Aha, excuse me, Jed.” And then she looked at me, and said, “I got Jed Clampett on the phone, you wanna talk to him? Listen, Jethro, stop wrestling with Elly May and answer my question. If