Brylcreem Summer

Rex fell in love with me the summer I was ten.
His attention made Mum awful mad.
Every evening after the milking was done and
the cows put out to pasture
Rex rode his bike down the road to our place.
He’d take the front steps two at a time,
pound on the screen door
then bravely walk into the kitchen and make himself at home.
He’d plunk in the straight-back chair by the door.
Is Jade B. Green home he’d ask,
knowing full well I was home.
Knowing full well, too,
how much Mum hated the fancy name
I had given myself that summer.
She’d ask wouldn’t he rather wait outside
on the porch where it was cool.

Sharon’s little brother, her protector!

He’d say he didn’t mind the heat.
Then he’d tilt his greasy head back
on Mum’s wallpaper with the chickens on it
and grind his head into them.
I wasn’t the only one Rex fell in love with that summer.
Brylcreem was his second love.
He made sure his thick straight blond hair
was well-plastered with it.
I’d walk into the kitchen and watch Mum watching him
ruining her Rhode Island Reds and
Leghorns and
Plymouth Rocks,
burying them in patches of grease.
When I was ready, he’d escort me outside
where the other kids were waiting.
It was time for our nightly game.
By summer’s end Mum’s new wallpaper was a greasy mess.
After Labor Day she moved the chair by the door.
Never again did a boy grind his Brylcreem hair into her chickens
while he sat on the straight-back chair by the door
waiting for me so our ball game could begin.
Why?
Because never again did a boy come calling.
Rex had warned any potential suitor:
Beware of the chair by the door, the Mum, and especially
the girl who calls herself Jade B. Green.