Back to the Future (23 page)

Marty gasped. His mother? Not even his mother as a grown woman, but as a teenager! It was a bit more than he could accept.

“What are you doing with that?” he whispered.

“I’m opening it.”

“But…where did you get it?”

Lorraine giggled. “Oh, I swiped it from the old lady’s liquor cabinet.”

She put the top on the dashboard, tossed her head back and took a nip.

“Lorraine,” Marty muttered. “Is this the first time you’ve done this?”

“Done what?” she asked. “Sat in a car with a boy, had a slug of gin, or sat in a car with a boy and drank?”

“Drink,” he replied. “Are you doing this just…to show off or something?”

“No,” she said, looking insulted. “Certainly not. I do it because I like it.”

“But you shouldn’t drink,” Marty scolded, realizing even as he said the words how much he sounded like an old-fashioned parent.

“Why not?”

“Well, it’s just not healthy.”

“Don’t be so square, Marty,” she laughed. “Everybody who’s anybody does it.”

Marty sighed. He looked at his watch, saw that it was almost time to make his move.

Lorraine passed the bottle to him. He decided to take a swig to humor her.

As he was doing so, his mother pulled out a pack of cigarettes and lit one. Marty gagged on the gin, he was so shocked.

“Jesus!” he cried, his voice sounding terribly strident. “You smoke, too?”

Lorraine looked at him and rolled her eyes to the top of her head.

“I’m serious,” he said. “You shouldn’t do it. Cigarette smoking is danger—”

“Come on,” she said. “I sort of understand that it’s not exactly ladylike to drink, but smoking is nice. There’s nothing wrong with it.”

“Are you kidding? Everything’s wrong with it.”

“Like what?” she countered.

“It’s unhealthy.”

“Then why do doctors advertise it on TV?”

“Because the cigarette lobby’s too powerful—”

“Oh, bull,” she replied. “Everybody knows smoking’s good for your circulation. It also calms your nerves and soothes the heart.”

“Soothes the heart! My God, it’ll give you all sorts of heart problems. And lung cancer. Look! It says right here on the pack—”

He took the cigarette pack from her and looked for the Surgeon General’s warning. It was not there. Instead, there was a line, obviously written by the cigarette manufacturer, which read: “This fine blend of Turkish and domestic tobaccos calms the nerves, improves the circulation, gives you a sense of well-being.”

“Good God!” Marty whistled.

He handed the pack back. Somehow he’d avoided smoking all his life and he wasn’t about to start now.

Lorraine regarded him with an irritated glare. “You know, you sound just like my mother,” she said. “It’s really stupid the way parents don’t understand their kids and try to run their lives for them. When I have kids, I’m gonna let them do anything they want. Anything. And I’m not gonna lecture them or say how it was different back in the good old days when I was young. No, sir, they’re not gonna get any of that crap from me.”

“I’d sure like to have that promise in writing,” Marty smiled.

The remark went over Lorraine’s head.

They sat silently for a few moments, Lorraine occasionally sucking on the gin bottle while Marty continued to look at his watch or out the rear-view mirror. It was already past the appointed time. Where the hell was George?

“Are you looking for somebody?” Lorraine asked.

“Uh…yeah. Strickland. Just wanted to make sure he’s not out on patrol.”

“He’s got enough to worry about inside,” Lorraine smiled. Putting the bottle back in her purse, she slid closer to him. “So tell me what your parents are like? Are they as square as mine?”

“Lately,” Marty said softly. “I’ve come to the conclusion that I don’t know anything about them.”

“That’s a shame.”

George felt weak and cold and on the verge of fainting, like the time he’d stuck his finger in the gears of a portable cement mixer his father had rented and nearly severed the end of it. Fifteen minutes before the time he was due outside, his abdomen had been wracked with serious pain, causing him to rush to the men’s room twice. Now, as the hour of nine rapidly approached, he experienced a new wave of spasms too powerfully unrelenting to ignore. He knew it was a bad case of nerves, that his cowardly body and mind were collaborating to keep him inside, away from possible embarrassment or failure. Knowing this, however, did not lessen the pain. If anything, it intensified it. Bent nearly double, he stumbled toward the men’s room for the third time.

Inside, class prankster Mark Dixon and several other boys were sneaking a smoke and talking. Suddenly, the bathroom door slammed open so hard it seemed as if a raid were in progress.

“Jesus!” Dixon shouted, dropping his cigarette into the urinal.

Instead of Gerald Strickland, they saw only a white-faced George McFly. He grimaced at them and moved quickly to a stall.

The terror in Dixon’s eyes changed to annoyance and then amusement.

“That son of a bitch made me lose my last weed,” he said. “Look at that.”

He pointed to the cigarette floating and slowly disintegrating in the urinal. “He’s gonna have to pay for that,” Dixon said. “Comin’ in here like the riot squad.”

Motioning with his head, he ambled toward the stall in which George sat.

Acutely aware that there is a fine line during which a woman can be romanced successfully, Marty sat nervously in Doc Brown’s Packard, Lorraine’s hip firmly pressed against his. She was ready to be kissed and then touched, hopefully just enough to insult her, create fear and anger and the need for a new champion to rescue her. Marty’s dilemma was one of timing. If he went after her too soon, he would be forced to continue the assault until George came—and perhaps it would be over too soon. If, on the other hand, he continued sitting here like a genial lump, Lorraine might conclude that he was either retarded or that she had no appeal. In either case, her next logical move would be out of the car, back to the dance and out of his life, probably forever.

Where the hell is that chickenshit father of mine, Marty thought.

Lorraine noticed the veins in his neck standing out and his jaw twitching. “Marty, why are you so nervous?” she asked.

He took a deep breath. “Well, have you ever been in a situation,” he began, “where… well, you know you have to act a certain way, but when you get there, you don’t know if you can go through with it?”

“You mean like how you’re supposed to act with someone on the first date?”

“Uh…yeah.”

“Very polite and sweet and like that?”

Marty nodded.

“I don’t worry about that!” Lorraine gushed.

With that, she threw her arms around his neck, reached up and kissed him passionately.

“Come on, guys, let me outa here.”

George pushed as hard as he could against the door of the stall, but it was just too heavy to budge with three guys leaning against it.

“You’re gonna stay there and stew in your own stink,” Dixon said.

“Why? What did I do?”

“You made me lose a very valuable cigarette.”

“I’ll buy you a whole pack,” George promised. “Let me out.”

“Maybe,” Dixon smiled. “When can I have the pack?”

“Tomorrow.”

“No. I want them tonight.”

“But there’s no place at school I can buy them and most of the stores are closed.”

“Then the hell with you,” Dixon said. “You can stay in there all night.”

“Look, it’s silly for you to keep me prisoner like this,” George pleaded. “You got dates. They’re probably wondering where you are.”

“True,” Dixon conceded. “So two of us will hold you in while one goes out and gets reinforcements. We’ll set up a system of watches, ten-minute shifts, so that we can enjoy the dance and still keep you in here until it’s time to leave.”

“Why are you doing this to me?” George whined. “Come on, guys…”

“No,” Dixon vowed. “You’re a pain in the ass, McFly, and pains in the ass should stay just where you are.”

His pals hooted. George sighed, sat down, and looked at his watch. It was ten after nine.

Lorraine continued her passionate assault on Marty for perhaps a minute before realizing that something was wrong. Moving away from him, she looked at him closely.

“This isn’t right,” she said.

“Doing this?” he murmured.

“No. What’s wrong is we’re not doing it right. I don’t know what it is…but when I kiss you, something’s wrong…”

“With you or me?”

“I’m not sure. Something’s missing. It’s like…I’m kissing my father.”

Marty looked at her, his eyes wide.

“I guess that doesn’t make much sense, does it?” she said.

“Believe me. It makes perfect sense. Maybe you got it reversed, but the picture is right.”

“What do you think it is?”

“Uh…I don’t know.”

She dropped her hands into her lap. “Damn,” she muttered. “It seemed too good to be true.”

“Yeah…”

The sound of footsteps alarmed both of them, each for a different reason. Lorraine was afraid some faculty member had spotted the gin bottle and would tell her parents; Marty now had no idea what to do when George arrived. Should he make a quick grab at Lorraine now in a desperate attempt to give George a chance to rescue her? Somehow it didn’t seem appropriate. As Lorraine moved farther away from him on the seat, it didn’t even seem possible. Hoping to avoid the person who was approaching, she was practically out the passenger’s door.

Marty decided to make a lunge for her. As he did so, the driver’s door was opened and a hand reached in to grab his shoulder.

Marty turned to look and was surprised to hear himself gasp.

The face looking into his was not that of George, but Biff Tannen. Behind him stood 3-D, Skinhead, and Match, their faces wreathed in menacing smiles.

“You caused $300 damage to my car, you son of a bitch,” Biff rasped. “And I’m gonna take it outa your ass…Hold him, guys…”

Lifting Marty bodily out of the car, Biff spun him roughly into the arms of Skinhead, who grabbed one of Marty’s arms just as 3-D grabbed the other.

“Good work, guys,” Biff said. “Skinhead thought that was you, sneaking out to the parking lot. We might never have got you alone otherwise.”

He drew back his fist.

“Let go of him!” Lorraine yelled from inside the car, sliding over to the driver’s side. “Leave him alone, Biff! You’re drunk!”

Biff regarded her with a smile that was very close to a leer. “Well, lookee what we have here,” he said. “Maybe I’ll take part of it outa
your
ass.”

Marty slammed his foot down on Skinhead’s toe, causing him to shout with pain. Then, jack-knifing forward, he threw his elbow up and back, striking 3-D’s jaw solidly. Both boys released their holds but only briefly. Although struggling mightily, Marty was soon helpless in their grasp.

Biff, meanwhile, had leaped into the Packard and grabbed Lorraine.

“Let go of me!” she screamed.

“Oh, no, baby, you’re staying right here with me,” Biff laughed.

Marty pulled his tormentors nearly a foot forward as he tried to get at Biff. “Take your filthy hands off her, you bastard!” he ordered.

Biff smiled coolly at Marty, confident that he could make no trouble. “I’ll take care of you after I take care of her,” he said.

“You want us to start?” Skinhead asked.

“No, not yet,” Biff answered. “That’s one party I don’t want to start without me. Take him around back. I’ll be there in a minute.”

When 3-D and Skinhead pulled Marty only to the edge of the rear bumper, Biff whirled around and shouted at them. “This ain’t no peepshow! Get the hell outa sight while I…romance this lady.”

As they dragged Marty farther behind the car, Biff slammed the door and reached forward to kiss Lorraine. A moment later, all Marty could see and hear through the rear window was the struggling form of his mother accompanied by her muffled screams.

Inwardly, he cursed himself nearly as much as he cursed Biff and his friends. If it hadn’t been for Marty, Lorraine would be enjoying the dance instead of having to fight to avoid being raped.

There was also enough anger left over to direct at George. If that simpering chicken hadn’t reverted to form at the last moment—

But the time for recriminations was short. Dragging Marty bodily, 3-D and Skinhead noticed a Cadillac parked with its trunk open near the side of the school.

“Hey!” Skinhead suggested. “This guy’s more trouble than he’s worth. Let’s lock him in that trunk.”

“Good idea!” 3-D replied.

As he spoke, he reached down to grab Marty’s legs. It took the two young men nearly a minute to wrestle him to the side of the car, but finally they were able to push him into the trunk. Before he could start to scramble out, Skinhead slammed the lid shut.

The sound and jolt brought Bob Jordan back to earth with a bang. Seated behind the wheel of the Cadillac, the young black man was enjoying a marijuana cigarette while awaiting the rest of the band. As the drummer of the group, he had moved his gear out early while Marvin Berry did his familiar solo guitar closing. Halfway into the joint, he had grown sleepy and contented, so much so that he hadn’t heard the scuffling feet and voices until they were accompanied by the trunk lid slamming.

Leaping out of the car, he walked quickly over to the two white boys.

“Say, what you messin’ with my car for?” he demanded.

“Beat it, spook,” 3-D shot back. “This don’t concern you.”

“It sure does if you’re screwin’ around with my car trunk,” Jordan said in a firm, slightly raised voice. “And who you callin’ spook, peckerwood?”

Despite being outnumbered, he advanced toward 3-D and Skinhead, who took a step backwards. A moment later, Marvin Berry and the other three band members appeared from the back entrance of the gymnasium.

“What’s goin’ on?” Berry asked.

Skinhead and 3-D looked fearfully at the five black men.

“They called me spook,” Jordan said. “And I was about to ask them if they wanted a couple of new breathin’ holes in their faces.”

“Hey, I don’t want to mess with no reefer addicts,” Skinhead muttered.