Julie Halpern - The F- It List

CJ unscrewed the jar lid and a tangy smell tickled my nose. “You don’t have any cuts on your fingers, do you?” I examined my hands and shook my head no. “Good.” He carefully pinched his thumb and forefinger around a bright green pepper and pulled it out of the jar. He slid the jar over to me, and I did the same. Juice dripped off the pepper onto the kitchen table, and I half expected a hole to sizzle into the wood.

“On the count of three?” I asked. CJ nodded. “One. Two. Three.” I closed my eyes and bit the pepper from its stem. It didn’t immediately hurt, but a slow sting emanated throughout my mouth. My eyes watered, and so did my nose. My lips felt about six sizes bigger than usual. When I finally managed to swallow, I coughed and sneezed simultaneously.

“Water!” I choked and chugged my entire glass. That didn’t help. AJ and CJ were in hysterics, leaning on each other for support. “You didn’t eat it, did you?” I guessed.

“No. But thanks for the kind offer,” CJ said.

I rubbed tears from my eyes. “No problem. And Chuckie can’t wait to see you.”

“No! I’ll eat it! Watch!” He stuffed it into his gaping mouth.

“Too late.” I poured myself a second glass of water, not waiting to see CJ’s reaction before I walked up the stairs to my room.

“I ate it! Al, I ate it!” He sputtered after me.

“Chuckie can’t hear you anymore,” I cackled, and shut my bedroom door.

While my computer revved up, I crossed off number 7. “Only for you, Becca,” I said to the paper. A hot pepper, as painful as it was, was still an easy item. If I were to accomplish any of the big-ticket numbers, like Take a bath in someone else’s house, that would take some planning. Same with number 10: Hop a train like a hobo. I laughed out loud at that one, not only because the word “hobo” was hilarious, but that Becca would consider such an act worthy of a life-defining list. And what about the last item on the list, number 23: Have sex with someone I’m in love with and who’s in love with me. It’s not something I’d ever accomplished before, so how easy could it be now that it was with a time limit? I’d only actually had sex with one person, but I didn’t even believe I was in love with him at the time. His name was Aleks, pronounced the same as my name and short for Aleksander, an exchange student from Norway who stayed with our next-door neighbors. It was last fall, after Thanksgiving but before winter break. There were fifteen Norwegians in total imported to our school, and Aleks didn’t look much different from the rest of them: tall, sandy blond hair, solid, round head. They traveled in packs, laughed loudly, and spoke a language that sounded both fluid and funny. Before I had a car, I took the bus to school. So did Aleks, along with Katie Cartwright, the neighbor he stayed with who was a grade younger and a zombie cheerleader. Katie and Aleks never sat near each other on the bus, nor did I ever see them exchange words. Aleks sat by himself near the front, until the other Norwegians boarded a few stops later. Then he lit up and became animated. I liked to watch them, imagining someday that I might become an exchange student or live in another country. It was a dream that I tried not to hang on to anymore for fear that an unrealized dream would make me realize just how stranded I was now that my dad was dead.

One afternoon, when Aleks and I got off the bus alone, Katie at a game or something, he asked in a lightly clipped accent, “Want to come over?”

I had no reason to say no, and I was curious. “Sure.” I shrugged. We ended up hanging out in his adopted room, not talking much but watching The Big Bang Theory reruns from his bed. Nothing happened the first day, but I sensed he wanted it to.

A week later, sans Katie, he invited me over again. I went more as a spy for Becca, who seemed to think that Norwegians were the sexiest human beings alive and vowed to catch at least a glimpse of one of their uncircumcised penises. Besides, Aleks smelled nice. I had never been one for perfume or cologne and felt downright revulsion for Axe body spray, but Aleks smelled like he cared about his appearance. It was a little salty and minty, as I imagined the water around Norway smelled.

As we lay on his bed, again watching The Big Bang Theory, I asked him to teach me some swears in Norwegian.

“Dritsak,” he explained, meant “sack of shit.” “Hestekuk” meant “horsecock.” I laughed that he would think to teach me “horsecock” as a swear, and I swooned a little at the cultural difference. Yes, I swooned at “horsecock.”

I wore a button-down shirt that day, and after we laughed about horsecock, Aleks began to unbutton it. We hadn’t yet kissed, but he was already taking off my shirt. I let him, curious what this Norwegian would do next. He watched my expression, maybe waiting to see if what he was doing was okay. I assisted him with the many buttons, letting him know it was. When my shirt was completely undone, he kissed me, a little too wet and tonguey. I guided his face down to my chest, and he lightly kissed above, then under my bra. He worked off my shirt, and I sat up enough for him to unhook the back of my bra, which he did adeptly. I guess bra hooks are international. I tugged his gray sweater over his head and ran my fingers up his torso and chest. He was lean and not very muscular. His chest was bare of hair. I remember kissing on the lips very little. He kept his mouth on my breasts most of the time, and I didn’t mind. His strong jaw tickled me as he nibbled.

That was as far as it went that day. Katie’s pom-poms charged up the stairs about a half hour after we started, and I got dressed and left. Becca was disappointed I hadn’t seen his penis yet and handed me a condom the next time I saw her.

Two days later, armed with the Trojan, I followed Aleks back to his house once again. This time the TV stayed off and we immediately began removing each other’s clothes when we entered his room. He was qualified at clothing removal but not as much with finger placement. I had to fish his pokey fingers out of my undies twice before he got the hint to give that up.

Me in my underwear, him in his blue boxers, we moved over to the bed. “Wait—” I told him, the first word spoken that afternoon. I found Becca’s condom in my backpack and brought it up to the bed. He yanked off his underwear in an overly excited manner, then got on his knees to help me work off mine. I looked at his penis, studying it to get the details for Becca before he slapped on the condom. I lay down on the bed, and he lay on top of me. The initial pain wasn’t excruciating, although I never got much pleasure out of it. It was over quickly, and Aleks rolled off me and promptly fell asleep. Hestekuk.

I got dressed and immediately called Becca from my cell on the way out of the house. “His penis was wearing a saggy hat,” I reported.

“Really? That’s so depressing. Did it at least feel good?”

“It felt fine.” I shrugged to the phone.

“Well, that’s not how sex should feel. Go back in there and do it again!”

“Um, no thank you. Not today at least.”

“They go back to Norway next week, you know.”

“Well, then we better hurry and have as much bad sex as we can before he leaves.”

“Was it really bad?” She pouted over the phone.

“No. Don’t worry. It just wasn’t really good. I’ll try again, maybe. Just for you.”

“You’re the best.”

“Tell that to my vagina.”

“You’re the best, Alex’s vagina.”

“My vagina thanks you.”

Aleks and I had sex once more before he flew back to Norway. It was better the second time around, with some added foreplay and a near climax. But near isn’t the same as the real deal, which was why I wasn’t in a hurry to try again when I started dating Davis.

Would the Fuck-It List magically help me fall in love and have sex in a way that I couldn’t before Becca got cancer? Was it fair for either of us to live or die with that kind of pressure?

No email from Becca waited on my computer. Her mom sent another report:

The news (not in order of importance):

We will be home Saturday.

Becca will have seven days of chemo in a row, then a two and a half week break, then three to five more treatments followed by a short radiation treatment to zap any remaining tumor cells.

Morphine seems to be working for pain management, and Becca is able to sleep a little, thank God.

After God, she thanked everyone else for being so supportive, but I skimmed that part. It sounded like Becca was in hell, and would be in hell, for a very long time.

I typed Becca an email:

You will be happy to learn that masturbating wasn’t the only thing I did on your list. I ate a hot pepper for you. You’re welcome. You can thank my burning butt tomorrow morning.

Leo stopped by Cellar. We kissed again. I have no idea what’s going on, but he’s a really good kisser. Far better than that Norwegian.

Sweet, circumcised dreams, my friend.

JENNA BROWN CAUGHT MY EYE during the morning hallway rush and gave me a sympathetic actorly smile. I threw up a middle finger and scratched my cheek with it, but she was already off and running with her audience. At lunch I decided to join the living and ate with some of my old stage-crew friends. Damien West had shoulder-length black hair and was a practicing Wiccan. He had been hospitalized for depression three times since I’d known him. I think he was just too smart for his parents, and they had no idea what to do with him. His girlfriend, Eliza Klise, was wafer thin and white-out pale with light blond hair she dyed in various colors as it washed out. Currently it was a pukey shade of green. Not her best. Lastly was Brandon Hathaway, tall and thin, with olive skin and rich brown eyes. I was madly in love with him freshman year, even kissed him once, until he came out. I was pissed at him for a while, going far enough to kiss me, but he said he did it because he felt bad for me. Apparently I really looked like I wanted him to kiss me. I wish someone would take a picture of that face so I’d stop making it. Once I got over the humiliation, he was still fun to be around. And he was an excellent judge of character. He advised me heavily against dating Davis, but I didn’t listen. Obviously.