The Psychedelic Underpants

It is a late afternoon in August. I am fourteen and my friend Cindy will be seventeen next month. We are sitting on a grassy little incline, just a few feet from the edge of Lake Millecoquin. Just offshore are anchored the boats owned by Cindy’s family. We’re not talking much, just watching the waves and thinking about what we’ll be doing later on. It seems that we do a lot of that: thinking about what we’re going to do later on.

This week, Cindy’s cousin Nick is in town. Nick will be eighteen in December, the same age as Cindy’s brother, Brad. I keep track of everyone’s age because I feel so young when I’m with them. I’m constantly conducting silent calculations on how old everyone will be when I’m finally a certain age.

I notice Cindy surreptitiously looking behind where we’re sitting toward her cabin. I don’t think much of it. We’re waiting for one of her brothers to come and maybe give us a boat ride.

Out of the blue and much to my dismay, two thugs named Brad and Nick, are grabbing at my limbs.

“Ahhhhh!” I yell. (I don’t have a nice, high-pitched girlie scream in my arsenal. My “screams” are more of a monotone-ish groan.)

“Quit it!” I yell. I know their intent. They hope to throw me in the lake. I do not want to go in the lake. I am fully clothed, in white pants and a t-shirt. I am dressed for evening activities, having already changed from my shorts.

I am strong and I’m giving the brutes a run for their money. I’m pulling my arms back, straightening my body. (If you ever tried putting your friends into trances when you were younger, think “light as a feather, stiff as a board.”) I’m trying to make myself as heavy as I can. Eventually, one of the boys has a grip on my ankles and the other has a hold of my wrists. I am yanking and bending, throwing my hips in the air. I don’t think they were expecting such a fight out of me.

But I really don’t want to get wet. I know the water will be freezing. And I know that the only other pants I have with me at the cabin are two pairs of hip huggers that are drying on the clothesline. If the ones I’m wearing get wet, I have nothing to wear later on. Shorts are out of the question at night in northern Michigan, even in August.

Though it seems like thirty minutes of struggling, it is likely less than one. In the end, I am sitting on the bottom of the lake, water covering me up to my rib cage. (At least my hair didn’t get wet.) And though the water, as I suspected, is freezing, I myself am fuming.

Livid. Not at the boys, they’re always trying to do stuff like this. I’m angry at my good friend Cindy, who not only stood idly by as the struggle was happening – she wasn’t pulling at the boys’ arms to lessen their grips on me, for instance – she knew they were sneaking up behind me! For the entire forty-yard walk the boys took from Cindy’s cabin to where we were sitting, Cindy knew!

So, I get myself up out of the water, and march toward Cindy who is standing just about where we were sitting. I grab at her sweatshirt and tug. Tug, tug, tug, until I have gotten her into the lake herself. And the cat fight begins. I’m trying to knock her down, pulling on her arms while kicking water on her to get her as wet as possible. Of course, she’s doing the same back at me.

“Cindy! How could you not have warned me?! You saw them coming the whole time!”

“They told me not to say anything,” she explained. (On their walk down to the lake, Brad and Nick saw that Cindy had spotted them, and gave her the “Shhh” sign.)

“Oh, come on!” I complained. “I can’t believe you didn’t warn me!”

The boys are standing on the dock having a good laugh at the two of us. I stomp out of the lake, flash them a sneer, and begin my righteous march home in a huff.

I don’t get ten feet toward the road when I hear Brad and Nick hootin’ an’ hollerin’ at my back.

Peeved that they’ve ruined my dramatic exit, I turn and yell, “What?!”

They’re laughing so hard they can hardly contain themselves.

“What?!” I yell again.

One boy points and yells, “You have psychedelic underwear!”

The other boy points and yells, “Hippie underwear!”

I am fourteen, remember. The youngest of the group. Trying to fit in. And now I am absolutely mortified. I hadn’t planned on getting wet, so I thought my multicolored underwear had been a safe choice with my white pants.

I have nothing to cover up my wet rear end but my two hands. And I make a hasty retreat.