Advanced Comp, PE, Journalism, Poli Sci, they all went by extremely slowly for me because I was so focused on seeing Leah (Li-hua). "Leah" was an adopted name because my high school had maybe a total of about six Asians combined in it and thus asking the students or teachers in that area to pronounce Chinese names correctly was a non-starter. She took that appellation, actually, in elementary school because of those issues.

Finally, lunch rolled around. I hurriedly walked out to the area I remember Li-hua and her friends Tina, Maria and Liz hung out while they ate. Maria was actually dating one of the newer male teachers, but she was 18 and a senior and it wasn't the kind of era of perpetual panic like it is now, so nobody gave a shit because she was an adult and was capable of making her own decisions. Maria was a totally nice, decent girl, btw.

Anyway, I sat on the brick planter and it wasn't long before they showed up. I greeted each one but showed special enthusiasm, of course, for Li-hua. She was 5'2" or thereabouts. I have no idea what her weight was. Maybe 100 pounds? She was a tad hippy with just a hint of a soft belly, long beautiful, curly black hair that she usually wore in a pony tail and maybe B cups. Maybe. Her skin was on the dark end of the scale for a Chinese and she had a small mouth that often turned up into the cutest little smile. "So how is everybody's first day of school going?' I asked. They all gave rather bland answers, as I did. Then I asked them how they spent their summers. I remember spending mine either playing pickup games of basketball or baseball or going to the beach. Li-hua's family had somehow escaped China during the revolution in 1949 and eventually made their way to the U.S., where they opened a well regarded Chinese restaurant. Li-hua revealed that she had spent a lot of her vacation toiling, like she did during the school year, too, at that business. I admired her family for their gumption, but I'm sure they expected a lot of her. AFAIK, Li-hua never had any boyfriends during her three years of high school (this was before middle schools became the rage), which I always thought was weird because she was just such a great girl. Maybe she just wasn't given enough time to date.

I was on pins and needles waiting for an opening to ask Li-hua out. The lunch ending bell rang and the four girls went their separate ways. I went with Li-hua. "Hey Li-hua, let's go to dinner Friday night," I proposed. "Sorry Ricky, I can't. I have to work at my family's restaurant." "Well, when aren't you working?" "We're closed Monday," she revealed. "Cool! How about we go out then?" "I'll ask my father and see what he says," she promised. "Hey listen Li-hua, I think you're really great. You know me. It's not like I'm going to do anything bad with you." "I know, Ricky. But my dad is pretty conservative when it comes to that stuff." "Yeah, I can understand how he would want to protect his beautiful daughter." That last line made her blush briefly. We got to her classroom and I had to turn and go to my British Lit class. "Well, see you tomorrow Li-hua!" "Bye Ricky!" she offered sweetly.

Now keep in mind this was before cellphones and the internet, so barring her calling me via a landline rotary phone, and I hadn't given her my number, I would have to wait until I saw her at school the next day for a yes or no. I didn't know if she was blowing me off by lying to me or what. THAT was a long ass night and first four periods of school that Tuesday. It also didn't help that it was fucking hot, as it usually is in Southern California in September, and our school didn't have air conditioning. That made the wait for lunch even WORSE.

So during lunch, here comes Li-hua. "My dad wants to know where we'll be going and how long we'll be gone." "Jesus Christ, Li-hua, your dad is strict!" "Tell me about it," she giggled. I told her I was going to take her to a restaurant that I'm not going to name here near the mall not far from school and that we probably wouldn't be gone anymore than two, two and a half hours. She replied she would relay that to her dad. I wrote my number on a piece of paper and gave it to her and told her to call me and tell me yes or no.  She said she would.

She took the bus home, so I knew that I had at least a couple hours to kill after school. I went to a chain guitar store one city over from the one I was living in and bought a Gibson Les Paul, a Fender Strat, a Gibson Explorer, a Gibson Flying V and a Marshall 100 watt half stack plus guitar stands and cables for them. After I took them home, I went to a local record shop and purchased about 20 albums I wanted to nick tunes off of plus a better stereo system than what my brother and I had at the time. Listening to those albums and then getting them down on guitar helped pass the time. This was an era before anyone had cable tv, so all you had was the three big networks and a bunch of independent stations that played all reruns and that nobody watched plus a couple PBS stations. So your choices were EXTREMELY limited and even for the time the programming quality sucked hard.

I heard the phone ring and dashed like a bat out of hell down the stairs (yes, we only had one phone for the entire household! Imagine that!) to get it. My heart was pounding like a motherfucker. "Hi Ricky, it's Leah." "Hi Li-hua. So what did your dad say?" "He said we can be out for the two and a half hours, but that's all." "Great! I enthused. "So how are you doing tonight? Are you busy?" "Yeah, kinda. It's off and on." "It's rather a long day for you, huh?" "Yeah. It's a lot of work." "Well, I better let you get back to it, then. Take care Li-hua." "Bye Ricky."

Now the question was what would her dad think of my long hair, which at the time was down to the middle of my back? I know I wouldn't have given a fuck and I shouldn't have. I thought her dad would have preferred me to get her home earlier, so I told Li-hua I would pick her up at 6:30. She gave me directions to her house and now it was just a matter of waiting until Monday.

I bought a bunch of new clothes because I needed to, as well as new shoes. I also asked Li-hua how I could get on her dad's good side. She didn't give me much of an answer other than giggling that I should learn Mandarin Chinese. I would have had no objection to that, but at that time they taught that only on the university level and not high school like today. Also, the bookstores back then were pretty sucky and all they would have had would have been tourist Chinese kind of guides and it would have been for Hong Kong or Taiwan anyway, which have their own dialects.

Monday finally came and I drove up to Li-hua's house, which looked like any other ranch style home in that area, a few minutes early. I nervously knocked on the door and she answered. Both of her parents were at work, so I guess I didn't have to meet them yet, but I did have to drop her off at their restaurant. We got into my car and off we went to the restaurant near school, which was basically a glorified steakhouse. I hated having to hurry through my meal, but I asked Li-hua to tell me about her family and then I told her about mine while we ate and, just as I thought, she had never had a boyfriend before. I couldn't understand it.

I did manage to get her to her folks' restaurant in time. I didn't want to just leave her in the parking lot, so I walked her to the door and said hello to her parents, but that was about it. Tuesday, when I saw her at lunch, I asked her what her parents said about me when I stuck my head in. Not much, apparently other than they were glad I kept my promise to get her back in the allotted time. I then asked if she wanted to go to the zoo Saturday. She thought that would be doable. Her parents gave the okay as long as I had her back by 6 p.m. before the evening dinner rush. That was going to be tough. I love zoos and would have liked to spend a leisurely day rather than a forced march because we were going all the way down to San Diego, but oh well. I wondered if her folks were testing me. They and I were definitely battling for Li-hua's time.

The day at the zoo with her was pretty mellow. I finally went for it and held her hand as we walked from exhibit to exhibit, I  guess you could call them. We sat down to have lunch just after noon  and I asked her if her parents would ever give us enough time to really do it right when it came to dating. She smiled shyly and said that she didn't know. Then she asked me, "so how come you didn't ask me out two years ago?". During the time she alluded to, I had just transferred into that high school from another one I hated and she was seated across the room from me in my English Lit class. So I guess she definitely knew I was interested. I did catch her eyes quite a few times and she would smile back at me. I answered that I really wasn't ready yet for a real relationship (which was the truth) and couldn't take her anywhere due to not having a car or money.  And, to be frank, I didn't think I was good enough for her.

We finished eating and I wrapped my left arm around her and pulled her into me as we stood up and kissed her. It was just a short series of pecks on her lips. I knew she wasn't the type who was going to get into major tongue tussling in public, but it really broke the ice and we both relaxed after that. Of course, being a 50 year old man in a 17 year old's body, I knew how to talk to women much better than when I was an actual teenager, so the date went a lot smoother than it would have back in the day.

We left the zoo at four and I got her to her family's restaurant with about 15 minutes to spare. Her parents came out to greet us and then her father sat down and asked what my intentions with her daughter were and what I was going to do with my future. I responded that I was dating Li-hua with every intention of one day marrying her and I was going to go to college when I graduated high school. I also promised that I would never hurt her and take care of her because she was such a great girl. I said all this very intently because I meant it and he seemed to pick up on that. Then I pulled out the trump card and said I would like to make dinner for her and her family one of these days. "Well, we're already here, why don't you do it for us now?" he insisted. "Okay Mr. Cheng, let me call my parents and tell them I won't be home for dinner and then we can get started," I advocated.

An hour later, the four of us finished off the meal I cooked in the back of the restaurant. "This is really good!" Mr. Cheng praised. "You want a job here?" "Thanks for the kind offer, Mr. Cheng, but my parents want me to focus on my studies," I lied. Li-hua knew that was a fib and needled me about it at school the next day. Nonetheless, I was in like Flynn (kids, ask your grandparents what that means!) with her folks now. Mr. Cheng asked me how I learned to cook Chinese food like that and I lied again, saying that cooking was a hobby of mine. The other thing that helped was even at that age I was pretty well spoken, a product of all the reading I had done in my life as well as the discussions I had over the dinner table with my parents on a whole panoply of subjects. I wasn't just some inarticulate clodhopper as most teenage guys are.

What worked for Li-hua was that as often snarky and difficult as I was in the classroom or with people on campus, she saw the kindness in my nature and knew that she would always be safe with me and liked that I had a brain. So that date was very productive and her parents began to slacken up on the amount of rope they doled out to Li-hua.

That Monday, and for the first time ever, I began arriving at school early to meet her bus. My pattern had been to get there barely before the five minute warning bell preceding first period. I took her hand and we went out to the amphitheater, had a seat and I put her on my lap and hugged her tightly, exchanging more short kisses. "Hey babe, let's go back to your place right after school. You can change into your bathing suit and we can hit the beach for a while, change and then go have dinner. How about it?" "I don't own a bathing suit," she giggled. "You will," I laughed.

We stopped off at my place, where I changed into swim shorts and a t-shirt, tossed my regular clothes and a couple of towels into a bag, snagged my acoustic guitar and brought the whole mess out to the car before making a quick stop at the supermarket for charcoal, lighter fluid and some matches. Then it was on to her house so she could tell her folks where we were going. About 40 minutes later, we were at the beach. I took her to a  surfwear shop and bought her a yellow bikini and cajoled her into wearing it out. We left her regular clothes in the car, from which I also picked up the grilling supplies and my six string. Except I wasn't going to grill anything. We went out to a fire pit, I emptied the entire contents of the charcoal bag and a good portion of the lighter fluid into it and ignited, soon giving us a nice warm fire.

I tuned the guitar up and started singing the Eagles' "Best of My Love" to her and then Jim Croce's "Time in a Bottle" and Crosby, Stills and Nash's "Suite: Judy Blue Eyes." "So what other talents do you have I don't know about?" she wondered. ""Wouldn't you like to know?" I archly rejoindered, causing her to giggle. Fuck, that smile of hers was just slaying me! On the serenade went. The Jefferson Airplane's "Come Up the Years," "Uncle John's Band" by the Grateful Dead, "Thunder Road" by Bruce Springsteen and Aerosmith's "Dream On."

I put the guitar down and we had a nice snuggle and snog. "I hope this doesn't sound lame, Li-hua, but you're a flat out fox. You're so bitchin'" I enthused, trying to maintain era appropriate teenspeak. She giggled and the making out became rather passionate, the firelight putting a radiant glow to her cute little face.

By that time, the marine layer was coming in off the ocean and the temperature was dropping rapidly. We returned to my car and she pulled her clothes on over her bikini and I slid my shorts off real quick and threw my pants on plus some shoes and socks and drove to a nearby funky little fish restaurant, where we ate before I took her home. "That was fun. We  need to do that again," I told her. "I had a lot of fun, too, Ricky. It's nice actually getting out once in a while." "Isn't it though? Especially when the company is someone like you, Li-hua." I kissed her good night and she went inside.

I wasn't going to turn 18, though, until almost a year later, so we couldn't do much beyond the usual teenage stuff. I definitely wasn't going to take her virginity in my car. That would have been crass. On our next date, though, I did undo her blouse and bra, feel her up and suck on her little nipples for a bit in the backseat in a dark corner of a park parking lot near where I resided with my family. Unfortunately, I was tagged out at third, I guess you could say. So I have no idea if what I was doing was making her wet. If she was moaning while I suckled her milk ducts she suppressed them quite well. It didn't matter, though. I just loved being with her. She was really sensible and a good governor on some of my more mercurial impulses.