An Audience with the Guru

She sneaks into the boy's gym when by all accounts she should be asleep, Francine. It is 2200 hours on 29 October YSPDD and Francine, ONAN love her, has not only a question but one that really rankles. Rumor has it that the mythical being Lyle, who hovers over a towel dispenser like a 'copter over a helipad in the Interdependence Day weight room with no discernable supports in sight, is able to see into the essence of a soul and Francine, burdened as she is with a 12 year old's menstrual angst, is determined to avail herself of Lyle's secret wisdom. It was necessary to resort to subterfuge as she had already learned that girls were unallowed in that testosterone laden inner sanctum. The rare phenomenon of athletic girl sweat was utterly distracting to the guru, which sweat caused him, Lyle, to topple over onto one side and fondle his own personal unit so rigorously that he was left incapable, until lock and load had been achieved once again, from rendering any sort of guruish wisdom to the boys at ETA.

At this moment Francine, who had successfully dickied the physical door lock to the weight room with a used-up  Barbie/Ken gift card, hid herself behind a pile of smelly mats. She had gotten temporarily sidetracked by the sight of boys in towels, waiting their turn to enter the locked room and petition Lyle for an audience. They didn't notice her. Lyle was enduring the  piddly-assed concerns of the 10 year old LaMont Chu, who confided he was really and shamefully interested in one day going to 'the show', a euphemism for qualifying to play in the top tennis matches. Chu wanted celebrity. Francine figured, listening, that what she wanted would be easier to get than what Chu wanted. Biology was on her side, Francine's, no matter what Lyle or Chu or anybody else at ETA might think. The only snafu was that being a highly trained athlete, Francine's mammary development might be truncated or reapportioned, whatever, to other parts of her anatomy. It was a sad fact that her estrogen had recently kicked in and caught her unprepared. It was humiliating, a girl like Francine Zweig, to be unprepared, but that's life in the big city, she thought in her 12 year old triteness. Nothing to be done about that now...she was in the acursed bloody monthly cycle for the rest of her days, if Avril Incandenza and all the sex ed pamphlets were to be believed. Well, she was not about to let that stop her from getting what she really wanted, so she listened, snooping, to Lyle's breathy lecture, dispensing his sage advice to Chu who paid off Lyle with his personal stinky drippy sweat. When Lyle was done with a guy the guy did not even need a shower. He might land in his bed dry and clean but oddly aroused. Not Lyle's problem, anyhow, who knew beyond all doubt that the world is not only old but radically old and we are all but sweaty objects dwelling here temporarily.

Lyle is sucking on the inside of his left cheek, savoring the salty residue on his tongue, eyes fixed on the ceiling as Chu departs and closes the heavy door behind him.  Lost in blissful reverie, he does not notice Francine who scuttles over to the door and jams a chair under the knob with all the speed and grace only a young nymph can muster. He adjusts the spandex which has ridden up his butt crack as he awaits the next petitioner. They all want the same thing, Lyle knows. To be noticed, famous, appreciated, admired and envied. When they get what they want they no longer want it anymore and most of them would do anything to turn the clock back and return to their innocent pre-fame state of  affairs. He sighs heavily and almost lands with a thump on the surface of the towel dispenser when he is distracted by a blur and a clang, which is Francine locking the two of them in. The world is not all that old that Lyle has had time to comprehend what females are all about.  He draws in a deep breath. What on earth could this little waif want from him? How did she get in without him knowing?

Francine, amazingly not only uncowed but positively brazen in her female pulchritude, turns to Lyle and bows. Then she curtsies because she was brought up rich, and always properly polite. Lyle scowls and starts sucking on the inside of his right cheek, but all of Chu's salt has dissipated and how Lyle tastes only his own bitter bile.

'Excuse me for intruding, Sir Lyle,' she begins. Lyle looks down at her with a half lidded gaze. 'Just Lyle will do,' he replies, mistrustful and like really wary. She smells , well, different than Chu. Is that ...blood?
'May I approach?'
 'If you must.'
'There is something I really want to know.'
'Yes, I get that. You're anxious about your body,' he says, eyes rolled up into the inner space behind his lowered lids.
'Excuse me?'
'It is written all over you, your anxiety. You are so obsessed with the perceived vagaries of your personal anatomy, the imperfections of your general overall map, that you are unable to move on to more advanced anxieties,' he intones. 'Be assured, youn woman,  that the world is incredibly...'
'...old, yes, I know. I'm not a silly twit, Lyle. ' She summons every last drop of chutzpah, a family trait and legacy from pre-subsidized time ancestors. Holocaust survivors and like that.
Lyle peers at her.  'Trust me, the truth will set you free. But not until it is finished with you,' he recites  from memory. How often have we heard these words fall from his lips! (1)
'Just tell me this, Lyle, and I will be on my way. Will I ever.....'
'...get breasts? Of course you will, Fr.....'
'No, no....that's a given,' she says, a little exasperated and surprised at his perspicacity. 'I  got an A+ in biology ...' Francine, a nascent female master manipulator,  has on the spot decided why on earth should she admit that Lyle had intuited her one burning question so easily? Was it because the only girl on campus who had actually filled out was the U.S.S. Millicent?
'What then?'
'Well....will I ever make it to the Show?'
Lyle looks at her with not pity but perhaps relief mingled with disappointment. Apparently girl blood and sweat do not make for gender-specific  queries. He does not know if he could stand to lick this one and so his tongue is like really tied. She waits patiently for an answer, but when after a few minutes he offers nothing, she sighs and starts to move off toward the barred door.
'Wait...'
'Lyle, thank you for your time. I never really believed you could help me with my problems but, well, I just had to find out for myself. ' She struts her tight little bloody butt away, and removes the chair from under the knob.
'Girls,' he snorts, as Francine slips out the door and closes it gently behind her.
'What are YOU looking at, you fucking assholes?' she sneers, wresting towels off the slick bodies of the boys waiting in line, one by one.  They watch, mouths gaping.
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(1) IJ, page 389