Betty was nine years old the first time she saw the film.  Soccer practice was rained out and she found herself home after school.  Her parents were still at work, and rather than starting her homework she ventured into the sitting room where her grandmother was watching a worn-out VHS tape on her sixteen-inch television.  She sat at the old woman’s feet, wishing she could watch Nickelodeon instead.  But once she saw Bogart she was smitten.  And once she saw Bacall, she wanted to be her.

It was her grandmother’s favorite movie, and Lauren Bacall was her favorite movie star.  In time, Betty came to love her as well, but To Have and Have Not remained her favorite film of Bacall’s entire body of work.  When she was twelve years old she had her first kiss, with a boy she imagined was Bogart’s tough, sardonic Harry Morgan.  Trying to appear worldly and mature beyond her years, she gave him Bacall’s iconic line but he just laughed in her face.  He still kissed her, of course, but his cold dismissal really turned her off.  A week later she had moved on to another boy, and then another, all in search of her leading man.

She met him in a bar in the theater district.  They sat in a darkened booth, talking over gin.  She spent the first ten minutes of their chat bringing to Rick’s attention the fact that he had the same name as Humphrey Bogart’s character in Casablanca and what’s more, that they had met at the Café Paris was obviously a sign because Bogart’s Rick owned the Café Américain.  Of course, she was quick to point out that Casablanca was only her fourth-favorite Bogart film after The African Queen, The Treasure of the Sierra Madre, and of course, To Have and Have Not.

After another round, he asked Betty if she wanted to leave with him.  They had barely left the bar before her lips found his, and as their mouths pressed together she silently rebuked herself for not trying out the line on him.    His hands found her breasts, barely hidden within a silk blouse, and caressed them for all he was worth.  She reciprocated by dragging the heel of her hand down his chest to where his legs met.  He was aroused – so was she, of course, but his arousal was much more obvious – and she began to fumble at his belt.

They ducked into an alley where she opened his jeans.  His cock sprang free, thick and heavy in her grasp, and though she couldn’t see much of it in the darkness she imagined that it was beautiful.

“You know what to do,” he said as she sank to her knes.  “Just put your lips together and whistle.”

Her mouth enveloped his cock and she felt the head at the back of her throat.  As she began to suck, she realized that while she’d long heard the word “whistle” and thought “blow”, she’d never heard the word “blowjob” and thought “whistle”.