Lately I have been sifting through all of my old photos from high school in order to come up with social media content for the ‘gram and all the rest of the shit you have to vomit-out into the universe to support the things you would rather be doing ALL the time, in my case: writing and performing. But this is the business my partner and I have chosen. We chose to jump off the cliff of creativity and not look down and thus…social media. But I digress.
Folded-up in an old year book, I found a photo that made me literally laugh out loud at the fact that, 33 years later, I began my Substack memoir writing/podcast journey scratching out my ex’s face from my wedding photos and writing about it, and realized that I was doing the same exact thing to my boyfriend’s picture at age sixteen. I am still an immature child making fun of my tragedies. So naturally, I got the bright idea to write about my first love: Michael McMurtry. It’s my coming-of-age, loss-of-innocence story and if I could set the tone of the time, it would be as if John Hughes directed his own personal version of Mommy Dearest…and I got the part over Molly Ringwald as the daughter.
Michael McMurtry and I met the first day of school in 6th grade. I walked past his desk and couldn’t help but lose my breath over his jet-black hair and his piercing blue eyes. The kid looked like fucking Brian Bloom and I couldn’t concentrate in English, much less speak it. I was dumbfounded. What were these feelings? I mean, I had crushes on boys in the past. Even a girl in third grade. But THIS? This was the one. The only. The greatest love that would ever be. Of course we were studying Romeo and Juliet in class that year…and I would be living the shit out of that storyline…minus the double suicide part.
The middle school love story blossomed into a note-passing, he said she said he/she likes you hand-holding between classes and ultimately our first brace-faced kiss next to the Dunkin’ Donuts dumpster. Not exactly romantic, but hey, you had to grab them when you could get them while the parents weren’t looking.
We dated on and off throughout middle school when high school roared-in with a vengeance. Michael and I always kinda’ knew that we would end up together no matter who we “went out with” in between. In fact, we both seemed to view the going-out-with-others part as a pre-requisite to a long-lasting marriage someday. In fact, I wanted so badly for Michael to be my someday husband that I begged my mom to take me to a psychic to prove it. This was the family psychic who predicted my grandpa’s cancer and knew exactly where it was in his body before the doctors did so of course, she would be right. Well, that session ended-up being more about how I’m an “old soul” and my mom was a “very, very, very young soul” and she didn’t really give me a straight answer on Michael. But I didn’t need her to confirm what I knew in my heart was true as much as Juliet didn’t need her father’s approval…until Michael broke my heart for the first time when I found out he had lost his virginity in 8th grade…to someone else.
Gut punch.
It was a week before we were going into ninth grade and even though he didn’t cheat, and we were best friends, and best friends tell each other everything, I really wished he had kept that truth to himself. Isn’t it funny when you look back at your teenage years and see how raw and un-evolved you really were as opposed to what you thought you were like and acted like when you were living it?
Michael and I plodded through freshman year, our romance roller-coastering up and down and loop-de-looping as teenage romances do. I fantasized about giving him my virginity even though he lost his to someone else. I actually grew to find relief in that fact. I mean, I didn’t know what the hell to do other than what I saw in movies and on tv and now he did. I mean, one of us had to know what to do and where to put things right??!
Sophomore year came and gone and we had the same experience with each other: on again and off again. But during the last week of school it seemed that we happened to be “on” still and that’s when I decided that I wanted to do the damn thing. It was enough already. Some girls were already getting pregnant at my school, not that I wanted THAT, buuuuuuuut…it did ring the alarm as the clock was ticking and you didn’t want to be viewed as a “prude” or a “tease” or even worse…”damaged.”
On a sunny, beautiful, late afternoon, just after my 16th birthday, I called Michael to come over. He borrowed his brother’s car that needed a screwdriver to start it instead of a key, and pitter-pattered his way over to my house while my mom was at work. We had exactly two hours. Little did I know the whole thing would take four minutes, but still, one has to prepare for every scenario. He gently guided me back on the couch in the living room, opened the condom wrapper, slipped it on, and then slipped it in and it felt…full. No fireworks. No pain. No bleeding really. Just…over.
I made Michael leave as soon as it was done and remember sitting in the bathtub and crying. All that expectation was released. And then all the thoughts of what my mother told me flooded in: “You need to wait until you are married. Boys don’t love girls who have sex with them. Girls who have sex in high school are nasty girls. God is watching. As soon as a guy gets what he wants, he’s done.” The list goes on and on but you get the gist.
And that was that. I kept that secret from my mother. Of course, the whole school knew that we did it but the whole school fully expected Michael and Lisa to do it because Michael and Lisa had been together on and off since 6th grade.
Junior year was more of the same for Michael and I: hot and cold, on and off, blah blah fucking blah. He had sex with some other girls, I didn’t have sex with any other guys. Okay, maybe one. I was playing Aldonza in Man of La Mancha and was now able to draw from personal experience on what it felt like to actually give yourself sexually to someone else and not have to pretend to know what it’s like while singing a song with lyrics like:
For a lady has modest and maidenly airs
And a virtue I somehow suspect that I lack
It's hard to remember these maidenly airs
In a stable laid flat on your back
It had been a whole year since the deed was done and the wounds of loss weren’t as fresh. Until…I came home from school before opening night to find my mother standing there with her “face” on. I knew that face. That was the face that launched a thousand arguments that culminated in frequent door-slamming, sometimes smacking but always with a make-up sesh over a Haas German chocolate cake. This time was different for some reason. The frown was deeper. The lips pursed tighter. The anger more palpable.
“I found THIS in between the couch cushions”, she seethed as she held up an empty condom wrapper. My heart started racing and I could feel the blood shooting to my face, maybe even out of my eyeballs. That’s what I assumed because I couldn’t see straight. What do I do? What do I do? LIE. That’s what I will do! “Whoa. What’s that?”, I replied. “It’s a fucking condom wrapper. Is it yours?”, she clapped back. “Absolutely not!”, I said without missing a beat. It’s important to not miss a beat when you are lying through your teeth. “Then whose is it?!”, she demanded. Think, Lisa, think!!!!! “Why don’t you ask your boyfriend?”, I said coolly. Her boyfriend was a pathological liar and a cheater. This was going to be a no-brainer. Let’s throw that motherfucker under the bus and be done with this conversation so I can get into hair and makeup please and thank you.
“Oh my god. Do you think this was his?”, she asked in actual earnest. “It must be. Mom, you know how many times he’s cheated.”, I responded…also in actual earnest. (I was really getting a handle this “acting” thing.) But she called him. And he reminded her that he never uses a condom because he shoots blanks, nevermind the fact that he could still get stds, but that was enough to ignite the rage at me again and it was ON! She came at me hard with the venom and accusations. I caved. Told her everything that happened between Michael and I on that couch a year before. She called Michael’s house. His father answered and I cried and cringed at the monologue that pierced through the phone line from my kitchen to his.: “Your son is just like you. A womanizing piece of shit who took advantage of my daughter.” There was more but that was the gist.
Then, like a scene from Terminator, she hung up the phone and coldly set her sights on the next kill: me.
“You are a whore. How could you do this Lisa?!!! Behind my back when I was at work? Get the fuck out of my house.” Again, there was more, but that was the gist. So, I packed a bag and walked to my grandma’s house where my dad lived. My dad asked what was wrong. I couldn’t bear to tell my father that I was no longer a virgin so I just said that mom was raging again. He bought it. Dads buy whatever it is they need to to not have to think about the problems between mothers and daughters.
But the show must go on. He drove his mess of a daughter to the high school auditorium and the entire school community watched the most dynamic, real-ass, in-your-face performance of Aldonza The Whore. Standing ovation. Massive love. And another dysfunctional wanna-be star was born.
Of course my mother calmed down. Of course we made up over a Haas German chocolate cake. Of course this was a thread in the fabric of my life. (I can’t not hear “The touch, the feel of cotton, the fabric of our lives,” sung by Aaron Neville after typing that. IYKYK.)
At the time of the crime, Michael and I were in an “off” stage and that call to his father changed the “fabric” of our relationship forever. But, I often wonder about those burn-bright relationships like Romeo and Juliet. What if their parents weren’t asshats? What if they had the chance to develop a long-lasting relationship? Would they grow apart, do unforgivable things to each other and have ended up like 50% of the couples in America who get divorced despite that white-hot passion they had from the jump. We’ll never know.
In Laughter,
LStL
p.s. I found the commercial! Ironically, it came out the same year the above story took place: 1992. Ahhhhh…commercials in the 80’s and 90’s. Dysfunction was glorified.
Hi, I’m Lisa St. Lou. I hope you’ve been enjoying Laughing Matters. While nearly all of my posts will be free to read and share, please consider upgrading to a paid subscription if you are able. It’s a meaningful way to sustain my work as an independent writer, gets you a few subscribers-only perks, and help keep this space ad-free. I’m grateful for your time, trust, and support. - LStL