Being 14 in the 60's was pretty rough for Geoffrey. Especially when your older sister is the "popular" girl clique leader. As if being covered in acne, with absolutely no shot at losing his virginity any time soon was not bad enough, he was tormented daily by visions of his sister's hippie friends. Trooping up and down the steps after school, smoking pot in Vicki's room before his mom came home, they were pretending to flirt with him to make each other laugh. He wasn't stupid. Geoff knew when people were laughing at him. It happened a lot.
Geoff liked comics. He wore glasses with big chunky black frames. His brown jeans didn't match his light blue polyester button down short sleeve shirt with the big collar and metal snaps, and his hair was greasy and long. He had one friend, Joey. Joey was a nerd too.
After the girls had finished make him blush and perspire, he wandered down the driveway to get the mail. It had come. The package had arrived. He didn't recognize it at first, as he had ordered them almost 2 months ago, but his pulse quickened as he realized what he held.
Walking back into the house, he noticed the silence, but his focus was on the small brown cardboard box. Rummaging for a knife from the kitchen drawer, he listened for the missing noise of his sister and her friends giggling. But, after he had the box open, he forgot all about them for the moment.
Xray Gogs. Oh, man. How cool is this? And they looked almost exactly like his own glasses. He would be able to wear them anytime and not get busted with them.
These thoughts whistled through his mind as he raised the glasses to his head. he kept his eyes closed until they were seated firmly in place. Wanted to see it all at once. Eyes open, and......
Crestfallen, he realized that he couldn't focus without his own glasses, and he couldn't very well wear two pairs. Why hadn't he thought of that? He sat down at the table with his chin propped on the heel of his hand. on a whim, he popped the lenses out of his regular glasses, and fastened them inside the xray lenses with some electrical tape that was left on the table from his last minute adjustments to the science project he had taken in to school that morning.
Gingerly, he put the gogs on. It was like looking into a well. The edges of his vision were obscured by constantly shifting rainbow swirls and black patches that moved as he looked in different areas. It gave him a queasy sensation almost immediatley, but if he held his eyes still and moved his head, he found that the effect was minimal. He looked down at the table, and realized he was seeing the metal legs of the formica table arcing above his own leg bones. In color.
"Holy Shit, they work!" he cried. Taking them off, he ran to the phone to call Joey. No answer. Christ. He never expected them to actually work....it was fun to imagine peeping on vicki's friends when they slept over, or seeing Mrs. Stevens in her underwear teaching class, but the actual fulfillment of these fantasies seemed unreal.
A little experimentation taught him that they had a range of about 2 1/2 feet. only metal or bone would register inside that distance, and if there were 2 "layers" of metal, he would just see the one in front. So, they couldn't see through metal. big deal. and he wouldnt see mrs Stevens' underwear unless he peeked through a wood door in the ladeis room. he didnt want to risk seeing her pee, though, so he put that out of his mind. He could still peek through vicki's door, though. Up the stairs on cat feet, he went.
Putting the glasses back on ( walking with them had quickly turned his stomach sour) he peered into the tunnel the glasses created. Vicki was lying on the bed with her two friends and they were kissing! He almost swallowed his tongue. Choking, he stifled himself as the girls heads turned towards the door.
"It's locked, right?" he heard Wanda whisper.
"I checked it myself," said Vicki, "C'mon, it's my turn today. Get down there!"
It was gonna be a good year.