Corky and Billie Ch. 01

Corky suggested Lum Fung's, one of the few restaurants he had patronized before, and Billie happily agreed. They ordered two different combo dinners which Billie spotted and recommended from their menu.

"Too bad restaurants don't have braille menus," Billie commented.

"Some do, but not many. Sometimes when I'm feeling ornery I make the waiter read me the whole menu, and then before you know it, they get braille menus for blind folks to use."

Billie laughed, and could easily imagine their panic at having to read an entire Chinese restaurant menu in that delightful "Chinglish" they all seemed to speak.

"Have you been blind all your life?" Billie asked innocently.

"Not yet," Corky replied.

"Smart ass. You know what I mean." but she was amused at his levity.

So Corky related the story of his injury years before, and some of the subsequent challenges and responses. Billie touched his hand across the table as he told of these things, and seemed quite moved.

"How about you? What did you do before starting at the hospital?" Corky asked.

"Oh, the usual, I guess. High school, things like that. Oh, and I spent the last several summers on Uncle Dexter's ranch in Montana."

"So you ride?"

"Every chance I get. In fact I have two beautiful horses back East here, Peggy and Jesabel, but Jesabel is blind and I have to be a little careful riding her."

"You mean you ride a blind horse? That's amazing."

"Well, it's really just for old time's sake, since she loves it so, but it's nothing like riding Peggy. She flies, she really flies. I wish you could see her some day ... Oh Corky, I'm so sorry."

"Hey, no problem, I wish I could too. Please don't worry about stuff like that, okay? I'd like us to be able to just say things and not worry about how it might be taken, okay?"

"Sure, that would be really cool, if you are sure about that."

Their dinner arrived and they enjoyed it greatly. The ice had been broken, and each seemed more comfortable with the other than either had ever been before.

"Corky," Billie cautiously ventured, "can I ask you something sort of personal?"

"Sure, shoot," he replied.

"What are your eyes like?"

"My eyes?" he replied, a little startled.

"Yes. I mean you wear those dark glasses all the time. I've never even seen your eyes. Are your eyes scarred from the injury, or what? I wish I could see your eyes, that's all. Is that too weird?"

Corky did not reply, but removed his glasses and looked in her direction, blinking slowly. His ruptured optic nerves blocked even the most rudimentary light perception.

After what seemed an endless silence, Billie said, "They're blue. They're beautiful, too, but you can tell they're not focused. Does the light hurt them? Sometimes light hurts some people's eyes, I mean like when they have something wrong with their eyes."

"No, light doesn't matter. I'm not sure why I wear these things. I guess it's just a kind of badge or something, so people know right away I am probably a blind person."

"Would you leave them off for me? I already know you're blind." she said.

"Sure, if you want me too, and won't freak out."

"Freak out? That's silly. I enjoy looking at you, that's all, and now I can look at your whole face if I want to."

"You are one up on me, Billie. I wish to hell I could look at you, too. But it won't help even if you take your own glasses off." he said with evident emotion.

"I don't wear glasses anyway," replied Billie, with tears beginning to form, "and maybe you're better off not looking at me after all. I'm pretty ordinary, you know. But I bet your Norman already told you that, right?"

"Believe it or not I never asked him, and I've hardly seen him since that night. Norman is not a particularly close friend, I just hitched a walk with him. Most people hitch rides, I hitched a walk."

They laughed a little and grew silent, but continued to hold each other's hands across the cluttered table. Billie was in turmoil. She thought to herself, "Damn it! What a bitch! I wish he could see me and tell me if I'm ordinary or ugly or pretty or whatever. It doesn't matter what he would tell me, I just wish he could look at me like I look at him. Damn it to hell anyway!" And suddenly a plan began to take shape in her mind.

"Hey," she said, "there's something I been meaning to ask you."

"What's that?" Corky asked with some trepidation.

"Well, you see, I have this really really good friend Marianne. She was always a year behind me in school, so now she's a senior. Her senior class is putting on a musical performance and Marianne is singing solo in it. She has a beautiful beautiful soprano voice, you would love to hear her."

"That's wonderful. You going to go?"

"I have to. I promised her. And what I was wondering was, would you go with me so you can hear her? I'd love for you to meet Marianne and hear her sing."

"Wow! I'd love to do that. Where and when is this musical coming off?"

"It's in our home town," she named the town, "about an hour and a half by bus from here, and it's two weeks from Saturday. If I could get an overnight that weekend, we could go by bus, and my parents would be happy to put up with us. I mean, put us up. We could hear Marianne, and I could show you Peggy and Jesabel, too."

"Billie, I'd love to do that, that would be terrific," Corky replied with genuine gratitude.

Much later, but in time for the all important curfew, they said their good-nights again on the porch of the nurse's residence, where other couples were also saying their good-nights and sharing certain personal intimacies. There she was again, up close and on tiptoe, sharing her perfume. And poor Corky, once again overwhelmed by his self-consciousness, continued to small talk. Billie, who was not listening to him, finally said, "Corky, do you like me just a little bit?"

Startled, Corky replied, "Yes, I do. You know I do. I like you a lot, actually.""

"Then it's okay to kiss me goodnight." Billie prompted. It was their first kiss, and for Corky it was his first kiss ever. He was elated, and Billie began to wish she had more free time to spend with this very special person.

On the Saturday of the high school program, the bus took them to Billie's home town, where there were gracious introductions and a pleasant family dinner to be shared. Billie's parents had four tickets to the operetta, two for Saturday night and two for Sunday afternoon. She persuaded her folks to use the evening tickets, saying that she and Corky would go on Sunday. She argued that they had both worked really really hard all week right up to the moment they left for the bus, and needed to relax some and just hang out at home for the evening. They would make some popcorn and listen to some nice relaxing music.

When Billie's parents got to their car, her mother said, "William, do you think the children will be all right alone tonight?"

"Now Polly," he replied, "we went through all that a long time ago. Billie is a good girl, and after all, the poor boy is blind. No need to worry, trust me on that."

"if you say so," Polly replied, and they went on their way.