‘Loose Morals’ by Melissa Ann Chadburn
From Guernica:
“Did you know that more people jack off than pick their nose while driving?” Allie was running a flattened hanger through the side of a car window. It was a silver Volvo. It was dark. I held the flashlight pointed at the window but flashed it at Allie’s face momentarily.
He was concentrating, he stuck his tongue out the corner of his mouth, and he paused and blew air up to swoosh his brown curly bangs out of his eyes.
“Shut up, you don’t know that.”
“Yeah man when I was riding in my dad’s truck I saw it all the time.” He had the hanger inside and he was sliding it back and forth along the door. Allie’s dad was really Italian. It was hard for me to picture him driving a truck or doing anything other than saying, “Here eat this: it’s good for you,” as he slipped a clove of garlic in my mouth and then pulled me close to slow dance to no music at all. I walked over to the driver’s side of the car and pointed the flashlight through the window to the passenger door handle.
“That’s gross, guys are so nasty. You’re almost there.”
“I know. Shut up.”
“What?”
“What what?”
“What do you know that guys are nasty or that you’re almost there?”
The curved portion of the hanger was perched around the handle he tugged gently and as if on cue the lock popped up. Allie winked.
“Both.”
