The ROTC Boys and Me: Part IV

“You look nice.” Brendan said, not coquettishly, or even pleasantly. He said it as if stating a fact. Dispassionate.

“Thanks. You do, too.” I meant that. Brendan’s evident inability to dress properly heightened his sex appeal. That he obviously cared too little to own nice clothes that fit aroused me, and not sexually. Over the past few years, I’ve developed an unrefined taste, recoiling from people who prioritize their appearance. I assume they are either superficial or insincere. Stilted well-educated types, afflicted with both flaws, tend to wear expensive shoes and own accent furniture.

My Caulfieldesque insight did not dent my debilitating naiveté.

Brendan placed a record on the turntable, and it began to spin. “One morning I woke up, and I knew you were really gone.”

“CSNY. Good taste, although a bit downcast for a party, no?” The wine warmed my skin and my icy demeanor. I edged closer to him.

“I disagree. Music is downcast only when it invokes themes inaccessible to the listener. If music permits empathy, it’s not downcast.” Despite disagreeing, I indulged him.

“What’s inaccessible to you, listener?”

Brendan took a thoughtful sip from his glass. “Drugs. Sex. Freedom.”

He tipped the door open. According to the Riesling flowing through my bloodstream, if not my instinct, he did so intentionally. “You really believe those things are inaccessible?”

“Sometimes,” he muttered. Placing his now empty glass down on the coffee table, he asked, “Do you?”

The door was wide open. Don’t fuck this up, I exhorted myself. “I wouldn’t know.”

Shit. Digging my fingernails into my palms, a hidden punishment for my misplaced candor, I felt certain that I irreparably ruined my chance of having sex with Brendan and, consequently, convincing him to love me forever. My virginity, I believed, would immediately extinguish any attraction he may have felt.

I’m betraying my unawareness, at the time, of an entire genre of porn. Worry not, reader, I would later self-educate. My verdict: overrated.

Brendan looked at me sharply. “You wouldn’t know because you have no experience with any of those things?”

“I’ve had freedom, or at least a variation of it,” I replied, attempting to pontificate my way to the rescue. “Running is a fairly freeing activity.”

“Ah, that’s right, you’re on the cross country team.” His mouth curled into a smirk, for just a moment. “I think I’ve seen those girls evangelizing on the quad.”

“I’m not like them,” I countered quickly. Too quickly; I surely sounded desperate.

“Hm. How so?” He leaned forward, his head tilted slightly, curiously. Keenly aware of my dry mouth and accelerating heart rate, I wished I had water on hand. While I could have found some in the kitchen, or the dining room where the rest of the party transpired, I needed to stay tethered to the conversation. I recall feeling similarly as a preadolescent reader, approaching a novel’s climax. Nothing could detach me from my book, not even my mother’s concerns about my atrophying social development.

“I’m not really… pure.”

Without missing a beat, Brendan prompted, “So you’re impure?”

Uncomfortable situations expose a handicap — which some men find cute — wherein my eyes flit around my surroundings and my face discernibly reddens. When I feel especially embarrassed, I absentmindedly crack my knuckles and grind my teeth.

My conversation with Brendan bared all the above. Evidently, the wine effect subsided. I should have switched to hard liquor at an earlier opportunity, a habit I wouldn’t adopt for another few years.

“I am not impure. But my thoughts are. Sometimes.”

Then Brendan, for the first time, touched me. He grabbed my forearms and forced them apart. “Stop cracking your knuckles.” The physical contact, however brief, sent a wave of warmth up my arms, down my back, and, yes, to my loins. “What kind of impure thoughts do you have?” Undoubtedly, his tone transitioned from neutral to coy.

“You already know.” This is another habit I’ve developed over years — evasiveness masked as flirtation. When I do not want to answer a question, I feign the belief that the asker knows the answer. This tactic has proven particularly effective with men, with their insatiable egos. The illusion of omniscience seduces them.

My tactic, if not my nubility, certainly worked on Brendan. “Would you like to go upstairs, where we might talk more freely?”

My heart pounded, a sound so deafening to me that he must have heard it. I wanted this desperately; I had spent cumulative hours iterating through possible scenarios resulting in that very moment. My woeful unpreparedness, however, didn’t dawn on me until then. Sure, I knew what sex was; I had even watched people do it on a screen. But aside from a couple abysmal handjobs (to this day, I contend that handjobs should not exist), I lacked any consequential sexual experience.

One of the most apparent benefits of being a competitive distance runner is that you seldom face a challenge exceeding anything you have not already experienced. Executed properly, a race should hurt badly. The pain itself doesn’t render a race difficult; rather, the runner’s decision to push herself toward the pain does. Deliberately enduring that pain manifests not just masochism, but extreme personal discipline. If I could do that, I figured, surely I could do what billions of other people do regularly. Right?

“I would,” I almost whispered.

I followed Brendan up the stairs. As we ascended, the house’s condition deteriorated. The second floor appeared to belong to a different home than the pristine first. Dust caked the corners of the top stairs; assorted bulky military gear strewn across the hallway created a likely fire hazard. It smelled strongly of man, and not in a pleasant way.

Perhaps it surprises you that I noticed these things on such a momentous occasion. My attention to superfluous details, however, briefly calmed me.

Brendan led me through a bedroom doorway. “This is Chris’s room,” he explained, “he lets me hang out here sometimes.” Registering this as strange at the time, I immediately forgot about it. They were friends, after all; I’d watched them banter.

He closed the door behind me. “There’s something you need to know,” my mouth operated seemingly on autopilot, without my mind’s approval. “I’m a virgin.” I do not know why I blurted this out as we stood mere inches away from a perfectly comfortable, and, blessedly, neatly made bed. Maybe, overwhelmed by my unpreparedness, I endeavored to sabotage the evening. Maybe I was cleaving to my awkward innocence one last time.

Brendan nodded. “I figured that. We’ll only do what you’re comfortable with.” Normally effortlessly eloquent, he said this somewhat clumsily. He sounded as if reading a script for the first time.

But at least he said it. I deemed his words sufficient to step toward him.

He placed his lips on mine. He tasted like beer, which he must have consumed before the bourbon. Years later, the taste and smell of beer arouse me instantly. That my most abhorred beverage is also my most powerful aphrodisiac amuses many people, but not me.

The kiss dispelled my anxiety, fortunately. My heart raced not out of apprehension, but excitement. Sexual excitement. I did wish he would deploy his tongue less fervently. I’ve yet to understand the allure of darting tongues in kissing. Alas, I desired him no less.

He reached around my neck and fumbled with my zipper. After a few moments, I assisted. The dress’s zipper was less intuitive than a bra strap, which I did not wear that night.

I know what you’re thinking, reader. I assure you, not promiscuity, but my aversion to bras and the absence of any need for one, provoked my bralessness.

My chest was bare, then my whole body, bar my loins. Yes, reader, I wore underwear. Thankfully, I had decided on the only thong I owned at the time.

Still kissing me, Brendan steered us toward Chris’s bed, and sat us down the comforter. Detaching my lips from him, I addressed a growing source of consternation. “Can you remove some of your clothes, please?”

More so than lust, a sense of vulnerability precipitated my request. I couldn’t abide my partial nudity while he maintained several layers of clothing. This quirk, too, remains a fixture in my sex life.

Brendan obliged, shedding his blazer and unbuttoning his shirt. Noticing his hands shaking slightly, I assisted with the latter. Off went his belt and pants, leaving only a pair of light blue boxers subtly revealing the contours of his arousal.

He looked at me, my face, my torso, my legs. He did not fixate on my chest, I assumed, because of its flatness. You stupid girl.

Leaning in, he kissed my neck and slipped his hand under my thong.

I will not delve deeper here; this is not erotica. Suffice it to say, Brendan’s fingers lacked grace. Granted, my attempt at reciprocity probably didn’t wow him, either.

After a few minutes, Brendan mercifully stopped. My respite proved very temporary, as he asked, “Would you be interested in trying it… from behind?”

I recall forcing back laughter, reflexively reasoning that he was joking. He was not.

“Um, no.” I felt more certain about not losing my virginity doggy-style than my vaguely apologetic tone suggested.

And so, despite my earlier hubristic claims about purity, I lost my virginity in the missionary position. It hurt a bit, and several times, I needed to redirect him from what I assumed was inadvertent anal penetration.

I realized quickly that I did not enjoy it. But knowing for years that, “it will probably hurt the first time,” I reluctantly resigned myself to the thrusting. Luckily, the discomfort did not last very long. After a few minutes, Brendan abruptly — and rather painfully for me — withdrew.

Hoisting his body off mine, he moved to the edge of the bed. He sat upright, facing away from me. “I’m sorry,” he mumbled. “I just can’t.”

I gazed at his spine. Despite the room’s semidarkness, I could see his vertebrae.

I do not remember feeling anything but a dull pain between my legs, as I slipped back into my clothes. Rather than asking Brendan to assist me in zipping up my dress, I left my back half-exposed. I suppose I didn’t care.

Rejoice, rejoice, we have no choice but to carry on.