A ^{Proper Stud Attitude by R.A. Rubin}

Ace Shafer had thick black hair that started an inch above his brow. Some of the girls thought he was cute. He had kissed Betsy Dunkin in Carnegie Middle School in the schoolyard behind the juniper bushes where the precocious went for lunchtime kisses and an occasional cheap feel. Ace knew girls were somewhat robotic about the circumstances pertaining to the removal of their panties. Every porn magazine he had ever scarfed up from some of the older boys said the obvious, girls were happy to spread their legs for a suave dude if that dude said the sweet magic words, caressed the approved crevice or org, and maintained the proper stud attitude. Already he had traversed his schoolyard days with cheap feel honors. Various young things still giggled as he passed them in high school corridors.

"How you ladies doin cause Im doin fine."

Ace got to the big one junior year. He slid into home and more on a Saturday night. He had borrowed the old mans rusty Buick, maybe the only car still made with bench seats, and after Scary Movie 2 at Coal Town Mall, he drove up to Perkiomen Heights where the kids took their hooked up babe to a hot starry sky. Fifteen cars would line up, each in its own dark love nest. A catacomb of coalmine shafts crisscrossed thousands of feet below their yearnings. Lorrie Hughes, a fine majorette, unzipped his jean fly and laid back to show Ace some magic. It took a whole pack of Lorries Kleenex to clean up the mess.

"God," exclaimed Lorrie. I hope we got it all. It would be so nasty if your dad slid right off the seat.

"Yeah, yeah," Ace said with a patronizing, semi-cracked voice. Lorrie's IQ was highly suspect, but even smart girls might say something goofy after an exchange of spit and stuff.

Now Ace was a senior. He had a fine 91 Chevy Malibu that Uncle Harry had left him. His uncle had been a bent-over miner with black lung and he got stomped to death by a betting cartel at Breeders Park. He was supposed to bet it up, but he took the pools money and took a poke at a horse called Liver and Onions. Ace understood completely. Put a little ketchup on a meal like that and youre in heaven, baby! The horse got locked up with a nag and practically broke in half: the innards and skeleton of the large animal filleted on the inside rail for all to see.

On a Saturday night just a week before Ace would go to Paris Island to kick ass with the Marines, he rolled his Chevy down Coke Avenue in Coaltown. After ten, Aces pal, Chubs Townsend, got out at the Dairy Queen, but Ace wanted to prowl a little on the other side of town at the IHOP. Billy didnt mind. He was going to have the banana triple with coconut and raspberries.

The IHOP waitress nametag read: Stephanie. Ace ordered a burger and fries. He observed the uniformed petite chick. The girl filled it out like a woman, but her face looked like the little Olsen twins.

"You must be new," said Ace, cause I know everybody around this dump and Ive seen every pretty girl around here.

"Is that right," said Stephanie. Well, were new, my daddy and me. Moved into a place on 9th Street.

"Did you say 9th?"

"Yeah."

"No shit!" said Ace. Thats where I live, on 9th. You gotta be the folks that moved into the Wertes.

The Werte family had some troubles with a son that murdered a little girl and her mother in the dressing room of The Little Tyke Shop at the mall. The State Police arrived with about fifty squad cars to take the fat pervert away. All the neighbors stood in the street or on the lawn to curse Willy Werte. Willys mother cried and then fainted in the driveway. Mr. Werte never came outside to see Willy get spit at from the kids in the neighborhood. Ace spit a good lunger in the kids eye and the troopers laughed. Willy fried the next year at Graterford.

"Small world, dude," said Stephanie.

"Yeah, no mom?" asked Ace.

"No, died in a motorcycle accident a long time ago," said Stephanie. Her face flushed red and her little silver earrings dangled. "Mom was cheatin with a Warthog. My dad aint crazy about what happened even now. Makes it hard. He hates any boy that looks at me." Stephanie grinned and Ace knew he had been dared.

The Warthogs rode their bikes in central Pennsylvania. Ace was both impressed and disgusted when they thundered through town. He'd rather be a Marine.

"No mom for me either," said Ace. "Moved to California when I was eight. Guess we're neighbors. So what time do ya get off?"

Ace drove the main drag fifty times and never joined up with Chubs. He was killing time till he would pick up the fine little chick. At midnight a bunch of waitresses came out from the back of the IHOP and lit cigarettes in unison. Primping boyfriends gave the girls a lift, and Stephanie waved for Ace.

"I told my dad I got a ride with one of the girls. Gotta be back by one though."

"That's only an hour," said Ace. "Ya can't hardly go up to the Heights and back in one hour."

"So that's how it is," said Stephanie. She squirmed in her seat to adjust her skirt and the girl let her legs splay in unlady-like fashion. Her dress covered to the middle of her white thighs. So lets drive around.

Ace tooled down the main drag like he had done for a year-and-a-half since he turned sixteen. He got his license after flunking the stupid test three times: twice the written and once he knocked over a barrier.

They passed the McDonalds and the Burger King. The parking lots were full of high school kids weeks after graduation with nothing to do but drink beer, smoke weed, and get laid. These were the finest days.

"I'm gone in the Marines next week."

"The Marines are tough," said Stephanie. "I had a Uncle that was in the war. He walked around on stumps. Then his wife made him get back on the wheel chair because she said he was scarin' me. I was real little."

"Damn," Ace said. "That'd scare a kid seeing a stump man walking towards ya all upper torso and all, practically eye ta eye."

Stephanie put a hand on his thigh and the big motor feathered. "This is so cool. I never met a boy with a car as rad. No way."

"Yeah," said Ace. "It'll get to a hundred and fifty for sure."

"Let's see," said Stephanie. "I've never been to a hundred and fifty."

Ace looked around. Traffic cruised Coke Avenue. Mostly there were kids from his high school and a drunk or two coming from some of the bars like The Coal Miner. When he timed the lights right, it was possible to nail it, but he needed some space. Then Ralph Jeffries from Rocktown, rival Rocktown High, he pulled up in a 95 Ford Mustang 5.0 with bafflers.

"Now what do ya think you're doin Ace," said Jeffries. "Guess you think that Chevy is hot."

"Nah, I don't think that," said Ace. "I know my Chevy is hot, but I don't say that."

The light had already turned green, but the boys stayed where they were till they could get in enough taunts and brags.

"My boyfriend is going to whoop your ass," shouted Stephanie at Ralph through Aces ear.

Ace slapped the side of his head and grinned at the girl. It was all happening kinda fast.

"Where'd ya dig up that chick, Ace? More than you can handle. Maybe ya better come over here for the best drive, honey."

Traffic had jammed behind the two cars, and kids got the idea that thered be a drag race, so punks and chicks jumped out of the cars and egged the boys on. Ace smiled in the spotlight, and he saw that Stephanie was looking at him like he was one cool cock with a free pass to paradise.

The boys revved their big block engines and the kids crowded the sidewalks. Ralph and Ace floored it when the light turned green. The tires laid down rubber, the front-end lifted, and Stephanie squealed: This is so fuckin great. Ace had other things on his mind like watching the tachometer without driving of the road or into Jeffries car to his left. They hurtled to eighty miles an hour past the dark McDonalds. The quarter-mile mark was Burkes Mobil. Then theyd have to jam the brakes and stop before the light at Route 83. Jeffries Vette was pulling a car length ahead.

"Get him Ace. Get him!" shrieked Stephanie, and Ace figured she never had so much fun.

Ace slammed the brakes. Officer Willow had pulled out of an alley by Muellers Jewelry and Gifts. Ralph Jeffries kept going and Ace turned the wheel for Howard Street. The back end fishtailed, so Ace wigged and got it back. Then he floored it again. The wind blew their hair in front of their eyes. Behind them they heard sirens. Red lights lit the sky. The unmistakable crunch of metal and glass gave Ace a sick feeling in his stomach.

"That was so rad," said Stephanie.

Ace drove a mile past the railroad yards. A freight train was roaring parallel to the road. The freight rolled to power plants on the Green River.

"Ya better get me home now." Stephanie sounded regretful.

Ace lit cigarettes for them and leisurely drove to 9th Street. The houses were worn two-story, post-war pre fabs, each with a short driveway and a paint peeled garage door. He pulled into the chicks drive behind her old mans rusted Buick Cutlass. He got out of the Chevy and went around to Stephanies side. He gripped her hand and pulled her to the driveway. He grabbed her up in the dark and laid a kiss on her that she wouldn't soon forget.

"Get in the back seat girl."

Stephanie hesitated and looked back into the car and then up at Ace. Ace could swear he saw two answers in her eyes, oh yeah and oh no!

"My daddy stays up sometimes," whispered Stephanie.

"Just for a little while."
Ace pulled back the seat and she sat back. They steamed the windows and couldnt see outside. He unbuttoned Stephanies little waitress outfit to her waist and unhooked her bra as he had practiced before. That was a mans job. Ya couldn't ask a self-respecting chick to unhook her own bra. That wouldn't be right.

Ace paused in appreciation of the twin honeys. They were so soft and quivery. Every time she breathed, they surged back and forth, the nipples taunted.

"Why do guys like boobs so much?"

"Cause they're so hot," said Ace. He fondled the twin lovelies and then licked round and round. His face wallowed in the valley of plenty when the drivers side door flew wide open.

"You little whore!"

"No, daddy," screamed Stephanie.

Her old man grabbed her arm and she literally popped into the driveway. Ace was sure her socket got torn. She ran into the house and wailed like a banshee.

"I'm gonna cut your balls off!" Stephanies old man pulled a bowie knife, a regular collectors item, out of a sheath on his wide belt.

Ace cowered on the passenger side of the back seat with his knees up. Many thoughts occurred to Ace in those desperate seconds. He remembered his mom in a sundress on his grandmother's back porch. He had vomited a barbecued frankfurter and the women rushed about to clean his face and shirt.

"Now, you've been a good boy, son. Your good for nothin' daddy is over there playin horseshoes. If only he could make two nickels." She smacked Ace hard on the jaw. "Remember, don't be like him. She gritted her teeth and bellowed to the men: "He's a clinker."

Then Ace saw the bags being loaded in the back of the old Firebird when he was a big boy, maybe eight-years old. The old man was in the mines and she was dumping her cat, Squirrel, in the back seat on top of a microwave oven and a nineteen-inch RCA color TV.

This is a goodbye, son. She gave him an absent squeeze and gently shoved his torso a step back. Tell your old man I don't ever want to see his ass again.

"What'd you say you son-of-a-bitch," asked knife-wielding daddy. The big man couldn't jam himself over the folded forward seat, so his knife flashed in front of Aces balls.

"I said 'go fuck yourself.'" Ace took a chance and grabbed the mans wrist. Then he leaned forward and sunk his teeth into the hairy forearm.

The man screamed and the knife fell to the floor. Ace jumped at the man's head and pushed daddy onto the driveway. Then he socked the man's face while he gripped dad's neck with a forearm. Stephanies old man stunk from perspiration and shit. The screaming and grunting must have been loud because windows were going up and doors were slamming. Ace kicked Stephanie's daddy in the ribs one more time. Ace was scared, so he jumped in his car and drove to the end of the block where he rushed into his house and grabbed his already packed suitcase. He burned rubber for Paris Island a week early.

In week eight of boot camp Ace felt very lonely, so he called his old man. His father answered and Ace could hear a rerun of The Roseanne Show in the background.

"Jesus Ace, its you," said the old man sleepily. Ace had woken him up. There was probably a TV dinner on a folding tray in front of his chair. "Was wonderin' if ya got out of town sort of like your ma."

"Not like her," said Ace. "I'm in the Marines now. You signed the form in the winter, remember?" His old man was only half there anymore.

"Good, good. Go get them towel-heads. That Saddam fella has it comin'. Do us proud son."

"Yeah, yeah. The newspapers say were gonna get a zillion casualties, but I ain't afraid."

"Say," said Aces father, "that new fella down the other end of the block where the Wertes were, he caught some kid messin' with his daughter. He got the shit kicked out of him in his own driveway. The girl's only thirteen. They had the cops out here. Chief O'Brien himself talked to the TV cameras.

"That right."

"Yeah, but he can't remember anything and the girl won't say or can't remember either. Somebody has friends in this town because nobody knows nothin'."

"How bout that," said Ace.

Ace got a ten day leave after boot and his car was still in the lot on government property where he had left it. He needed a jump to turn it over. He slept on the sand at Myrtle Beach that night with a bottle of Old Granddad.

In the morning he looked for a carton of cigarettes in his duffle bag on his backseat when he saw a shiny object sticking out from under the passenger-side seat. He held the blade up to the morning sun. Nobody was ever going to fuck with him. His outfit was going to Texas for more training. Some thirteen-years olds of the female kind could deceive with their bodies, but a man was allowed his mistakes, and he must maintain his proper stud-attitude.