Previous Challenge Entry (Level 3 - Advanced)
Topic: Write something in the YOUNG ADULT or TEEN genre (06/07/07)
-
TITLE: Teen Town | Previous Challenge Entry
By Virginia Lee Bliss
06/14/07 -
LEAVE COMMENT ON ARTICLE
SEND A PRIVATE COMMENT
ADD TO MY FAVORITES
Shops lined the plaza on either side. Clothing shops featured the latest teen fashions. TV and radio stores, record shops, and hair stylists abounded.
She went into a five-and-ten. Pancake makeup, hairspray, nail polish, brightly colored headbands and the like occupied five aisles. Two aisles were devoted to candy and snack food. One aisle contained aspirin, band aids, acne medication, feminine hygiene products, and some strange balloon-like rubbery things.
She kept walking.
She was being followed.
Turning around she saw a hunky guy.
“Hiya chick! You’re Marylou!”
“And you’re----?”
“Tony. Doin’ anything tonight?”
“I—have to baby sit.”
“There ain’t no baby sittin’ here. Let’s go to a movie.”
They turned down a walkway to a colossal movie theatre.
Hot Teens was playing tonight. Girls sauntered around the beach in skimpy bikinis, which they soon discarded. Boys pranced around in their birthday suits. The characters mostly just danced or made out, switching partners at intervals.
Marylou turned and saw that all the couples in the movie theatre were making out.
“I’m for a double cheese burger and a chocolate malt,” said Tony.
Stalls sold ice cream, hamburgers, pizza, submarines, pastrami sandwiches, and fudge brownies. Tony and Marylou selected their food and took it to an adjacent common dining area.
Instead of water, Coke or Pepsi flowed freely from drinking fountains. Much better than those stingy six ounce bottles.
“Let’s cut out to the lounge,” said Tony. “You dig?”
The lounge was filled with couples making out.
Every day breakfast, lunch, supper, and evening snacks consisted of jelly doughnuts, milkshakes, pizza, meatball subs, Coke, and potato chips.
When they were not eating they strolled around the various shops buying new clothes, makeup, records, or steamy teen comics. They never worried about money; they bought everything with a small plastic card. Tony bought her a transistor so she could always hold a radio to her ear. Life was one big round of television, movies, shopping, pinochle, and sock hops.
They danced to the Beach Boys, the Four Seasons, the Shirelles, the Ronettes, Dion, the Angels, and Bobby Vinton. Dances were held in an immense gymnasium with highly polished floors.
Everyone was between the ages of fourteen and eighteen. No pesky kid brothers and sisters, no condescending older brothers and sisters, no disapproving parents or teachers. No priests, ministers, or rabbis, so no churches or synagogues.
A few of the boys tried to start a basketball team but with no schools or community centers, organizing games was difficult. Girls dressed up in cheerleaders’ uniforms and practiced a few half-hearted cheers.
Tony showed her the enormous garage that housed shiny new Corvettes, Ford Galaxies, Face1 Vegas, and motorcycles. Car and motorcycle races took place on an indoor track.
Their only other exercise consisted of lolling around the indoor pool and----occasionally----swimming.
Instead of rolling up their skirts under their sweaters the girls just took up the hems. They wore pants and sweaters two sizes too small. They pierced their ears and wore two-inch dangling earrings. No mothers to object.
Boys slopped around in oversized jeans, baggy sweatshirts, hooded jackets, and sneakers or noisy shoes.
Fifties teens displayed some semblance of responsibility. Late sixties teens had a social conscious. But the teens of 1963 lived for no one but themselves.
How do I know that? thought Marylou.
One day she cried, “I’m sick to death of listening to ‘My Boyfriend’s Back’ and eating pizza! I want vegetables!”
A horrified silence.
“You scuzz! Flake off!” She was pelted with candy bars, jumbo rollers, and tubes of lipstick.
She ran as fast as she could, out of that place, screaming, screaming…..
She woke up.
Aarrghgh! What a nightmare!
She glanced at her desk. Her laptop, cell phone, and iPod, were right where they should be. It was 2007, not 1963. Her name was Amber, not Marylou. And her boyfriend was Brandon, not Tony.
Wait a minute! Marylou was Grams’ name. And in 1963 she would have been…..sixteen.
Amber picked up her cell phone. It was 8 a.m. and Grams would be awake.
“Grams? I had the weirdest dream. I dreamt I was you and……….” She told Grams about her dream.
“Amber dear, that’s just what we used to dream of.”
“Well, thank God it never came true.”
“Are you sure it didn’t come true, dear? Take a look around the mall.”
******************************************************************************
REFERENCE: http://www.cougartown.com/slang.html
A dictionary of early ‘60s slang
The opinions expressed by authors may not necessarily reflect the opinion of FaithWriters.com.
Accept Jesus as Your Lord and Savior Right Now - CLICK HERE
JOIN US at FaithWriters for Free. Grow as a Writer and Spread the Gospel.
Good story!