by Suki
The moment before you have sex is awkward. When both of you are side by side, fingers almost touching, a bad movie is playing, and then, all of a sudden, you have the urge to turn your head sideways to find you are facing each other. You feel your heart pulsing in a way that is scary and comforting like you had known all along this was going to happen but were too naïve to believe yourself. This is your first time. Yet, trust me, it will always feel this way.
At sixteen, you fantasised your first time would take place in a candle-lit room with rose petals scattered across the floor. Now, in this moment, you have come to know this would not happen. Instead, it would take place with a stranger you met on the internet an hour ago and last shorter than the time taken to shave every inch of your body in preparation for your deflowering.
You begin kissing this stranger. Their tongue curls inside your mouth and buries itself underneath the wetness. Every so often, your teeth clash against theirs and both of you let out a quiet giggle. You feel your tongue being sucked gently as a hand climbs into your shirt. Your face starts to turn red, and you wonder if they realise it’s your first time. You already know what to say if they ask. No. Their other hand moves to the space between your thighs and feels for the sign of excitement. From friends, you heard dryness can make sex hurt, like two sticks rubbing together to start a fire. You hope your body does not betray you now. But like a tourist lost in a big city, your body has been foreign to you. So, a fire is bound to erupt.
To you, sex is an enemy hiding in plain sight. Your only experiences can be summarised by the following: 1) using your phone’s ringtone as a vibrator because you are too embarrassed to enter a sex shop 2) an early introduction to pornography from Tumblr and finally 3) painfully hearing your parents’ moans in the room next to yours.
You are in your bra and underwear. A matching red set. The night before you had tweezed, waxed, shaved, bleached, washed, exfoliated, and moisturised everywhere. The night before you had practiced different facial expressions in the mirror. You had practiced several moans – the different pitches you could make. You decided the best kind should be breathy and short. You want your first time to be perfect. But perfect for who?
The stranger removes your underwear. They slowly push their toy inside of you, and you let out one of the moans you had practiced. They grin. You think, people are so easy to fool. They continue to push their toy in and out, and you imagine this is how a cork being pushed into a wine bottle must feel. As you switch positions, you catch a reflection of yourself in a window near-by. Your legs straddling their body, your arched back, your hands running up and down their chest. They moan. You smile in the hope you might be doing something right; in the hope you and sex are no longer enemies. But just like that, it is over. They ask you, did you come too? In an effort to be polite, you lie. Yes. After all, you did want it to be perfect.
After sex, they put their clothes back on, kiss you on the lips, and leave in a hurry as though they left the gas on at home. You begin to wonder perhaps in another world you would have told them it was your first time, maybe then they would have stayed and hugged you through the night. You say to yourself, I will tell them the next time I see them, but that time never comes. Yet, trust me, it won’t always feel this way. One day, you will smile at someone and know they too, had the same first time as you.