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The Secrets Best Kept
By
Lindy Wheatley, Jan 10, 2009
They lay naked together in the silence following soft moans and strained exhalations. His arm wrapped around her
shoulders while she used his chest as a pillow. She toyed with his blunt fingers where they lay on his stomach.
“Tell me a secret,” she said. His mind raced through all of them.
Seeing his mother step naked and wet from the shower on the morning of his grandfather’s funeral. Her eyes were
swollen and red from crying.
Finding the yellow, dog-eared paperbacks his father kept hidden in the farthest corner of the basement. The
strange words inside: cock, pussy, fuck.
Kissing the freckled blonde girl underneath the stairs of the house by the sea. The taste of Juicy Fruit on her
tongue lingered long in his mouth.
Drinking so much after a school dance that he did not remember losing his virginity. His friends gave him a
detailed play-by-play of the event.
Stealing money from his mother’s purse for the little white pills that made his heart race. He did not care if
she caught him.
Cheating on a college girlfriend with his lab partner after the Biology final. Later that night he had sex with
the girlfriend, too.
Driving another girlfriend home from the clinic after the abortion. The wounded look in her eyes caused words to
die in his throat.
Crashing his car into a bridge embankment. He lied when he told everyone it had been an accident.
She wasn’t ready for any of them. He wasn’t ready to tell her.
“I don’t have any secrets,” he replied, then covered her mouth with his own and made her forget that she’d asked.
Lindy Wheatley lives in Champaign, IL, which is two hours south of Chicago if you were to drive 75 mph. This is
her first published work of fiction.
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