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Mitchie,” tucking her knee beneath her leg again, making sure that, minimally, as much of her bare thigh showed as it did earlier, “can I ask ya somethin’ without’j’ya getting’ mad at me?”

Staring at the flesh of her bare thigh again, “Sure…” Having a bit of an idea of what she was about to ask, fortifying himself for the circumcision question with another gulp of Porky Pig, “…I think.”

“Mitchie, is it true you, uh that Jews got…” Hesitating, Gina asked, “Uh, is it true that Jews got tails?”

“Huh? Tails?” Choking, turning his head to keep from spraying her with wine, “Where’d’ya hear Jews got tails?”

“In school, uh, not from the nuns! Well, not from all of ’em. But mostly it’s kids that say that their parents told ’em that Jews got tails…” hesitating again, “like the devil.”

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Chicago, Illinois

June 18, 1949

Mitchell’s mouth dropped open. He blinked his eyes and shook his head and, not sure he’d heard right, looking at the near empty glass in his hand, thinking, Maybe this stuff’s caused me not to hear so good, “Tails?” he repeated. “No! Jews don’t got tails!”

“Bullshit! I get so sick’n’tired of hearin’ this bullshit!” Frank said. “No, Gina, ya dumb shit, Jews don’t got tails an’ I ought’a know ’cause I seen Mitch in the shower lots’a times an’ I looked to see if he’s got a tail an’ he don’t! He’s just like the rest of us… Almost.”

“Sorry, Frankie.” Strangely, Gina apologized to Frank rather than Mitchell.

“Now, don’t go gettin’ mad all over again,” she said to Frank, “but I got somethin’ else I wanna ask Mitch.” She waited a moment or two to see if Frank was going to stop her, but knowing what she was going to ask, this time, Frank said nothing.

“Mitchie, I heard…”

“In school?”

“Nah, from the kids… Mitch, I heard that when Jews are babies, they take a knife an’…” stopping, trying to think of a delicate way to put it.

Frank watched as Gina’s complexion turned from white to deep red. Although he knew it was coming, he was amused at the question and wanted to see Mitchell’s reaction when she figured a way to say it.

As interested as Frank and Gina, Lisa was also.

“Cut a piece’a their, uh…” Thinking a long moment, then another, after careful consideration, arriving at a delicate way to put it, “Cut a piece’a their pricks off.”

Thinking this question might well come up, still, when she asked it, it did embarrass him, but Mitchell remembered all the times, right up to that very moment, that he’d thought of girls and wondered what they have between their thighs, So, he thought, why shouldn’t girls wonder about what I have between my thighs? So, “Frankie,” he said, “bein’ my pal, you know Jews ain’t supposed to eat pig, an’, I’d guess, Jews ain’t supposed to drink pig either,” holding his glass up, “but this little piggy’s about empty.”

Lifting the milk bottle, Frank refilled his friend’s glass.

Taking three noisy gulps, putting the glass down, Mitchell looked at Gina, and, “Wow, you got bee-U-tiful eyes!”

Taken back by this, “Uh, yeah, you, too, Mitchie.” Gina said.

“Yeah, thanks.”

He giggled. “It’s true ! Frank’s got a tip. All goy guys got tips!” Thinking he’d said something very funny, all goy guys got tips, holding his head in his hands, Mitchell began to laugh.

Unaware of the joke, or even if there was a joke, Gina and Frank stared at him.

Lisa looked at Frank. Truly loving him, Frank was the only boy she’d ever had sex with, although discreet, and well knew how much he loved to be stroked “there,” and when she stroked it, she most always thought: It’s kind’a cute, the way Frank’s smooth, pink glans popped in and out of the foreskin with each stroke.

Lisa’s best friend, Gina, though, had had not-so-discreet sex with any number of boys and mostly she’d judge the boy by his looks, and by the size of his penis and how much of his foreskin she could pinch between her fingers… and more often than not, her teeth.

Catching his breath, “When we’re a couple’a days old,” taking another drink of wine, “they put us on a blanket or a sheet on a table an’ a special Rabbi—A Rabbi’s a teacher an’ like a, uh, priest—he gives us some wine, so’s we…”

“Boy!” Frank interrupted. “S’no wonder you’re able to put it away so good. They start you Jews off even sooner’n’us wops.”

“Nah, we just suck a couple’a drops off’a piece’a cloth or somethin’. Anyway…” Speaking softly, Frank and the girls had to lean forward in order to hear what he was saying. “… this Rabbi gives us some wine so’s we won’t feel it, then…” Pausing dramatically, he looked from face to face. “…he takes our little ‘things’…” Moving his left hand to the left, he raised his right hand, fist clenched, as if holding the handle of an ax. “…an’ he stretches ‘it’ waaay out…” Mouths agape, the three sat staring. “…an’ whacks it off. Wam!” Slapping his hand onto the coffee table, Mitchell caused the milk bottle, the glasses, and Frank, Lisa and Gina to jump. Looking at them, he fell backward on the sofa, laughing.

Shaken, “Uh, how much do they cut off?” Lisa asked.

“Yeah! An’ how do ya pee after?” Gina questioned.

“Yeah, Lipensky,” Frank said, “an’ what’d they do with what they cut off?”

“Some stuff’s a secret, Rizzo. An’ if you wanna know so damn much ’bout bein’ circumcised, then maybe you ought’a convert an’ become Jewish an’ have ’em do it to you.”

Protectively grabbing his crotch, “No, thank you!”

Drinking more wine, not sure if either girl had ever really seen a penis, Mitchell looked from Gina to Lisa. Sure, he knew what Frank had told him, But, he’d thought, sometimes guys lie.

“Well,” slurring his words badly, “I d’know if you girls know what I’m talkin’ ’bout, but the best I can figure is Jews get circumcised and guys that ain’t Jewish—I seen ’em in the shower at Baylor… I wasn’t tryin’ to look!” he said defensively. “I just kind’a, you know, I just kind’a saw ’em… Well, anyways, guys that ain’t Jewish got this funny, ugly piece’a droopy, dangly skin that kind’a hangs down off’a their…”

Feeling the effects of the wine, too, “Funny? Ugly? Droopy? Dangly?” Putting her arms around his neck, Lisa pushed Frank to the floor. “Don’t you listen to ’im, Frankie! It ain’t ugly, baby! I think it’s beautiful!”

Off balance, forced onto his back, Frank could only laugh.

Leaning over him with her buttocks in the air, falling upward, her skirt bunching around her hips, Mitchell could see a patch of white skin through a quarter-sized hole in the seat of Lisa’s pink, cotton underpants.

Pushing Mitchell against the arm of the sofa, “Hey, she’s right!” Gina motioned to Frank and Lisa, who were lying face to face with their mouths locked together, with both of Frank’s hands beneath Lisa’s underpants, clasping her bare buttocks. “That piece’a droopy, dangly skin’s just great!”

So what Frank had told Mitchell about Gina was true . Also, considering what she’d said and where Frank had his hands, most probably what he’d said about Lisa was true also.

“Yeah, Mitch! It’s real pretty, ain’t it? Mmffmm!” Frank said from around Lisa’s mouth.

Putting her mouth over his again, “Mmffmm!” Lisa answered back.

On he hands and knees, “Yeah!” Gina was leaning over Mitchell with her shoulders hunched forward…

So that he was able to look down her gaping Immaculate Heart blouse and, oh, yeah, he surely did see within the inverted triangle of Gina’s blouse, and even though her breasts were encased within a formless—no doubt Immaculate Heart-issue—cotton brassiere, he was well able to see the ridges of her ribs and the wide valley formed by the flesh of her hanging breasts, and he knew that all he had to do was to reach forward and…

All Mitchell had to do was to reach forward to touch a real girl’s, real live tits!

He’d waited so long for this! And had wanted, so badly, to be in a position such as this with a real girl, but now that he was, Mitchell felt as though he were in a foggy dream.

Trying to sort it out, the intoxicated smile faded from his face because, as though all of Gina’s negative aspects: dirty neck, unbrushed teeth, brown earwax, and being skinny and ugly were all weighed on one arm of a scale, and the counterweight that tilted the opposite arm of the scale downward was merely the thought that…

His eyes focused on the valley, Screw dirty neck, unbrushed teeth, brown earwax and being skinny and ugly… Screw it! And…

She’s a girl, ain’t she! And…

At that time Mitchell Lipensky wanted nothing more than to pull that—no doubt Immaculate Heart-issue—brassiere down and to look at and to touch and to suckle on those real live tits.

“You wanna see ’em?” Recognizing the look on his face, for the first time since meeting Mitchell knowing that she was in control, “You wanna touch ’em, don’t’j’ya?” Gina whispered.

Swallowing, taking his eyes from her hanging breasts, he forced himself to look at her face.

“Hey!” Sitting up, their legs extended beneath the coffee table, Frank and Lisa’s hands, hidden by the coffee table, high up on each other’s thighs, “You know what?” Frank said. “Ol’ Mitch here’s got one’a them ol’ Captain Midnight rings. You know, the kind that shows shootin’ stars’n’stuff. Ain’t’ch’ya, Mitch?”

“Yeah.” Reaching into his pocket, feeling around, Why do I do that, he thought, put everything in one pocket? Finding the ring beneath his key chain and change, he fished it out. “Yeah, here it is.” he said, handing the ring to Frank.

“Okay, how’s it work?”

“I told’j’ya, it don’t work so good.”

“Yeah, sure it does! It’ll work just fine! What’d’ya do, hold it up to the light?” Holding the ring towards the window a moment, “There!” Handing it back, “You do wanna see shootin’ stars’n’stuff, don’t’j’ya, Gina?”

“Yeah, sure, Frankie.” She smiled. “Mitchie, I’ve been waitin’ all my life to see a real Captain Midnight ring!”

“Yeah, I knew that! So why don’t’j’ya take Mitch into Lisa’s room, an’ he’ll show you how it works.” Frank winked at Mitchell. “Won’t’j’ya, Mitch?”

“Yeah! Come on, Mitch!” Standing, grabbing his arm, Gina helped to pull him onto his feet. “I wanna see shootin’ stars’n’stuff!”

On his feet…Wobbling on his feet, Mitchell knew that he was really about to be alone with Gina. That he was really about to be alone with a real live girl, with real live tits! Part of him, the brain in his penis part that had told him to hold her close and to rub his body against her body, the brain in his penis part that, just a minute or so ago had wanted him to look at and to touch and to suckle on those real live tits… That part of his body said, Yeah! But the other part of his body, the brain in his head part, once again reminded Mitchell what Gina looked like: the grime that ringed her face, the brown wax in her ears, her green tinged teeth and unappealing face and body… Body? Body! Yeah! Body seemed to be the key word and, Yeah, you bet Mitchell Lipensky allowed himself to be…

Pulling him forward, leading him into a bedroom, Gina closed the door.

Dark!

Holding the ring to approximately where he thought their eyes should be, “See,” he said. “I told Frankie the ring’s no good an’ you can’t see nothin’… Why’s it so dark in this room?”

“Lisa likes it dark when she sleeps, so they never took the blackout curtains down after the war… Screw the ring!”

Standing just inside the room, Mitchell was leaning against the door.

Standing close enough to feel his breath on her face, but not actually touching, Gina hoped that he’d make the first move… But he didn’t, so, snuggling against him, putting her arms about his waist, “So bashful!” she said. “But you don’t gotta be with me, baby, ’cause I like you, a lot!”

Feeling her body pressing warmly against his, instantly inflating, Mitchell’s penis shifted from neutral to third.

Purposefully rubbing her body against his, Gina held him even tighter and, getting the response she’d expected, she felt the push of his penis against her Immaculate Heart skirt. “Mmmm, baby,” flattered by his immediate response, “you get a boner so fast!”

Holding her waist a moment, his hands found their way through the back of her skirt and beneath the elastic band of her high-waisted—no doubt Immaculate Heart-issue—cotton underpants, where, Oh, God, he thought, holding a warm, naked buttock in each hand. So smooth! Moving a hand around, to her front, finding Gina’s navel, hesitating a moment, he was about to move his hand downward, when…

Gina’s warm breath was on his face, and Gina’s mouth was on his mouth…

Tongue!

He felt the tip of Gina’s tongue push against his lips and, Green teeth! he clenched his mouth tightly.

“Mmmm, Mitchie, baby, ain’t you never Frenched before?”

Actually, no, and though her breath kind’a tickled and kind’a felt nice, his mouth remained closed against “green teeth contamination.”

“Mmmm, so bashful,” she whispered onto his mouth as, reaching downward, caressing the bulge of his penis…

“Ummm!” His mouth loosened slightly, and the tip of her tongue went just a bit deeper than it had a moment ago, and…