O P I N I O N
By Keith Howard
Desire isn’t polite. It shows up early, misfires often, and makes a fool out of you long before it ever makes you human. These are the first sparks: a six year-old whispering into a two‑by‑four, a minnow drafted into romance, a flood in God’s living room. Not exactly a love story, but close enough to bruise.
. . .
Full Performance Script:
Part I: Remote Crushes (Kitty & Barbara)
(Step forward. Grin, self-deprecating tone.)
Crushes came easy to me as a boy. They arrived like bruises on a kid running too fast on hot asphalt—sudden, inevitable, and mostly one-sided.
But real girls? They weren’t interested.
So I aimed higher.
Much higher.
At age six, I fell for Kitty Carlisle—panelist on To Tell the Truth.
She was in her fifties. I was in first grade.
Kitty had cheekbones like temple carvings, hair lacquered into raven armor, and a voice like crystal glass tapped by silver.
I’d press a two-by-four from the backyard to my cheek like a telephone and whisper:
(soft, romantic) “Kitty… you are radiant. You are everything.”
(beat, grin)
Hard to believe no little girl wanted the boy who sweet-talked construction scraps.
Then came Barbara Walters.
Barbara wasn’t just beautiful—she was composed. Regal. Her voice floated across the living room like steam from a teacup.
She looked straight into the camera and—across America—straight into me.
Her eyes said: I see you.
Her mouth said: You matter.
I was hers. She was mine. The rest of the country could go scratch.
Never mind she was the same age as my mother.
(beat. grin, shrug)
By seventh grade, though, I had to face it:
Kitty wasn’t picking up my lumber calls.
Barbara wasn’t running off with a twelve-year-old in peanut-butter-stained T-shirts.
I needed someone real.
Someone accessible.
Someone who could actually turn me down in person.
Her name was Carol.
Part II: The Minnow’s Martyrdom
Carol wasn’t just a girl—she was an oracle in bell bottoms.
She moved like a feather duster in human form, smelling faintly of citrus shampoo and bubblegum.
Her laugh fizzed like soda.
I knew, with twelve-year-old certainty, that we were destined.
(beat, grin)
She knew, with the same certainty, that I was a walking misfire of a boy.
But that didn’t stop me.
So one afternoon in science class, I made my move.
The room smelled of chalk dust, gum wrappers, and aquarium funk.
I reached into the fish tank, scooped up a live minnow—
(cup hand, hold it up)
cold, slick, thrashing like a live wire.
Water dripped down my arm, splattering the floor in Morse code: S-O-S.
This wasn’t a fish anymore.
This was my wingman.
I turned to Carol.
She was sketching in her notebook, hair catching the light like a shampoo commercial.
“Carol,” I said, holding the fish inches from her cheek,
(mock-heroic)
“If you won’t go to the dance with me… this fish is a goner.”
(pause for laugh. hold fish-hand higher, look at audience like you’re waiting for applause)
She looked up.
Crossed her arms.
Her gaze said: Nope.
Seconds passed.
(twitch hand like it’s flopping)
The minnow gasped silently, opening and closing its mouth in frantic, aquatic pleas.
Carol didn’t blink.
And then…
(drop hand slowly, solemn)
the minnow didn’t make it.
Neither did my dignity.
(beat. soften voice)
I went to the dance alone, haunted by the ghost of that tiny fish, still damp on my palm.
Part III: Catechism Calamity
But was I finished making a fool of myself for Carol?
Of course not.
She was Catholic.
My best friend John was Catholic.
I was… not Catholic.
But I was willing to fake it for love.
(beat, grin at audience)
That’s romance, twelve-year-old style: lie to God.
One Thursday, I followed John to catechism at St. Thomas More.
The church air was thick with incense and candle smoke—a smell like burnt sugar and secrets.
Light spilled through stained glass in buttery reds and ocean blues.
It felt holy.
It felt expensive.
It felt like I was trespassing in God’s living room.
John dipped his fingers into the heavy stone basin of holy water and traced a cross on his forehead.
I hovered nearby, trying to look casual.
The water shimmered, trembling with reflected light.
(reach hand slowly out)
It looked holy. Electrified. Like touching it would set off alarms.
I reached forward.
My elbow caught the basin.
(mime the tip—freeze a moment)
The whole thing tipped.
(pause, then flood sound effect with arms)
Holy water cascaded across the marble floor, pooling under pews, soaking hymnals, baptizing my sneakers.
John turned pale. Whispered: “That water came from the Jordan River. That’s expensive. And a mortal sin.”
(beat. wide-eyed, whisper to audience)
I didn’t even know the Hail Mary.
I couldn’t be forgiven.
And then Carol turned.
Her hair caught the stained-glass light like wheat at harvest.
She looked at me ankle-deep in sacred runoff, hymnals floating like shipwrecks.
(beat. drop voice low)
She sighed.
The long, slow sigh of someone personally bearing the weight of human disappointment.
(pause. hold it. then mimic her flat voice)
“Go. Away.”
(beat. glance at audience, shrug)
And for once… I had nothing to say.
Final Button
Hard to believe no little girl developed a crush on the boy who killed a minnow and accidentally bankrupted the Church.
(pause. step back. let the laughter roll. Then move to next piece.)
Publisher’s Note: This is a new series of columns by Keith Howard – you know him from his Tiny White Box series, and as former Executive Director of The Liberty House and Hope for NH Recovery. You can read his previous column here. His new memoir, Unclaimed, But Loud: The Memoir of a Shy and Retiring Boy Who Was Neither, is available for purchase on Amazon.