The V-Word (16 page)

As if on cue, Mo yawned and said it was time for her and Ben to go to bed. She wrapped her arms around his bony waist and led him toward the bedroom. Panicked, I asked where I should sleep, and she said Steven would show me where to go. Before I realized that the only other bed in the house was in Steven's room, he led me to the kitchen.

“Mia,” he said. “Do you want something to drink? I noticed you haven't had anything since you've been here.”

The last thing I wanted was to break more rules so I stammered, “I'm fine. Thank you. I don't really drink. Um, alcohol that is.”

I added to the awkwardness by saying, “By the way, Mia is only what people I'm close to call me, you know like my best friends and my family. By the way, why do white people always want to shorten my name without permission? Jamia is phonetic. It's not that hard.”

Laughing nervously, Steven asked me if I was okay with him drinking, and when I said I was, he helped himself to some tequila. I was sure his interest in me would evaporate, but instead he set his glass down and said, “Well, I hope to become one of those people who earns the right to call you by your nickname someday.”

I feigned indifference. “Um . . . sure, do what you want. I mean, about the drinking, not the name.”

The next twenty minutes seemed like an hour of awkward small talk until we both realized how quiet the house had become. The music stopped playing. Raindrops pounded on the roof. Sheet lighting cut the sky.

In silence, we watched the storm swirl past the kitchen window. Steven drank his tequila, and I prepared mint tea that I'd brought in my purse.

I sat on the washing machine in the kitchen because it was the only clean surface left after the party. Steven pushed a discarded pizza box over to make room for himself beside me.

“I've been watching you,” he said. “I really like that you're kind of a hippie girl even though you don't really look the part. It's cute that you brought your own tea, Jamia. And please note, I'm no longer calling you Mia.”

Feeling like myself for the first time that night, I said, “Yep, mint tea is my thing. It reminds me of being in Saudi Arabia where I grew up. It's kind of my comfort zone.”

As I bent my head down to take another sip, he put his tequila down and grabbed my cup. Before I could protest, he removed it from my lips and placed it at his own.

I studied his face as he closed his eyes, took in the aroma and then allowed his face to be bathed by steam. He sipped my tea slowly and nodded with appreciation. His eyelashes were gorgeous and his lips were luscious. I realized that I'd just begun to see him clearly and wondered how he was seeing me.

He handed back my tea, apologizing for drinking so much of it. As I assured him that there was more than enough for us both, I leaned in to have another sip. Then he reached for my hair and tucked a loose curl behind my ear before it could fall into the hot water. As he stroked my face, I shivered and shifted in my seat, unsure how to deal with my increasing attraction.

Steven lifted my chin and gazed into my eyes until I blinked. I don't really remember exactly what happened next except that he slowly leaned in and kissed me behind my neck, and the tension that had been welling up inside me melted away. We kissed tenderly for what felt like hours. We knocked over the now-cold tea and soaked our clothes.

Steven asked if he could pour the rest of his tequila over me since we were already soaked from the tea. It was funny and, admittedly, somewhat awkward. It seemed so cliché, but I went with it as a rite of passage.

Steven poured the tequila slowly and proceeded to lick it off my neck and chest. My toes curled tightly as he trailed a salt-soaked finger down the sides of my neck and licked that off with a slow and sensuous pace. This set off a chain reaction of deep kissing and electrifying biting that left both of our necks looking like a red map of erogenous evidence.

Before this moment, I had been kissed twice, and once someone had touched my breast under my shirt for five seconds at a middle school party. This was a whole new frontier with fresh terrain to navigate and negotiate. I was testing my limits, and they felt and tasted like freedom.

I was far away from the daily ennui of study hall at the Virgin Vault. Always one to find a way back to my Protestant guilt, I shuddered a bit about what the chaplain and headmistress would say if my indiscretion got out and I prayed for forgiveness.

But while in the throes of passion. . . .

When Steven unbuttoned my jeans and took off my favorite purple shirt, my spine tingled. I wanted more and I chose to embrace it. Instead of showering myself in shame, I decided to give in to my desires despite my fear of punishment. I shoved away thoughts of the headmistress and turned down the volume of the voice of external authority in my head. I was in command now, and I sure as hell didn't want to stop.

Our make-out session progressed into the night, and our amorous movements accidentally turned on the washing machine. Laughing, we scrambled to turn it off before we woke up Mo and Ben. The kitchen really wasn't working for us.

Steven suggested that we head to his room. He must have seen the apprehension in my eyes because he said, “You're in charge of everything that happens in there. Nothing will happen that you don't want.”

Relieved that I could continue with our exploration without committing to going all the way, I retreated into his room with him. Before the door closed, I told him that I wasn't ready to have sex but that I wanted to explore each other's bodies completely.

He asked me what I wanted, and I said that I wished to be kissed all over from head-to-toe with no expectations of anything coming of it, unless of course, it did.

He was happy to comply. The entire next day we lay in bed discovering each other and, most of all, discovering ourselves. The tightrope between our distance and our closeness led to a vulnerability that set the stage for me to experience my first (and explosively remarkable) orgasm.

And my second.

And my third.

This was not how I imagined my first sexual experience would be or with whom I thought it would be. There's no way I could have anticipated that I'd end up sharing everything from scar stories to sweaty embraces with a dude-bro on a tiny twin bed, with trip-hop music on in the background, and the scent of patchouli and mint tea in the air.

For one of the first times in my overthinking life, I felt fully embodied. I had skin. I had a body. I was giving in to cravings and I was devouring the succulence of release.

Emboldened by the insistence of my own sexual energy, I felt powerful rather than fearful or sinful like I'd been conditioned to believe in church and school.

Mo and I never ended up going to the beach. We were too nervous we would be spotted by people from school who might report our whereabouts to the administration. But the heavens were in on our little conspiracy of desire because rain soaked the town for the entire weekend.

We were confined to a house with two cute guys and nothing but music, pizza, and hormones to focus on. So that's what we did. And we never got caught.

Steven and I went our separate ways a few months later. I cut him off after hearing that he'd had sex with a girl from my high school during another one of Mo's sleepovers. He continued to pursue me but I realized that I was no longer interested in a college dude that hooked up with high school girls in the first place.

What's more, I wasn't ready to go all the way yet and was perfectly content waiting to go full throttle with someone I could truly trust. Even though my friends didn't believe me when I said it, I wasn't that upset when it didn't work out between Steven and me. The experience was never about him, it was about me learning to embrace my sexuality without fear. It was about being present in my body and enjoying the delicious fire of my humanity, my femininity, and my spirituality all at once.

I read that Judy Blume was inspired to write
Forever
, a candid and controversial novel about teen sexuality, because she had heard from teen girls who wanted to read a book about two teens who have sex and nothing bad happens to them. Even though Steven and I didn't “seal the deal,” he will always be a part of my “Forever” story because I learned that I could express healthy sexuality without damnation or losing myself. I was grateful for his gentle touch, his affirmation of my idiosyncrasies, and for helping me to learn to receive pleasure without guilt—okay, with minimal guilt.

Years later, I studied abroad in Italy, and over cappuccinos in Campo Dei Fiori, I met a girl from Mo's small town. My mouth dropped open.

“Small world. Do you know Steven S—, by chance?” I inquired, innocently.

When she exclaimed that he was, in fact, her best friend from high school, I couldn't believe it. I tried to play it cool because I didn't want to risk her asking him about me.

As I contemplated what to say next, she said, “Oh, wait!
You're
Mia! Mia? Wow! I heard you had a special experience together. Weren't you also the one who wouldn't let him call you by your nickname?”

I flashed her a sly smile.

“Yes, that's right. That's me.”

Sex is not everything.

It's not a to-do list. There's no box for you to check, no V card to punch. You don't have to have sex, and if you do, it's just one part of the rest of your world. What I hope for you is that—when you're ready—sex and intimacy and closeness become a rich and wonderful part of your life.

So for now, don't worry about it.

Find your passions. Work hard. Take care of yourself. Play to your strengths. Be creative. Act according to your values. Surround yourself with good people. Be compassionate.

And above all—

Choose for yourself.

I
never envisioned myself having sex.

I never dated in high school, was never truly kissed. I'd masturbated and was familiar with my body, but sex with another person wasn't something I thought I'd have to make a choice about doing. I had no idea how it might look or taste or feel even though I'd thought about it.

It wasn't that the idea of sex scared me. The opportunity just hadn't come up. I didn't find myself sexually attracted to anyone, and I didn't think I was sexually attractive. I was a girl with less-than-perfect skin and big boobs that didn't come with a thin or good-looking body. Years of being told I was fat and ugly grew beneath my skin and became how I saw myself.

It was how I imagined other people saw me, too.

During high school, I grew close to a boy I'd never met. We'd talked online and by phone, sharing pieces of ourselves we didn't share with anyone else. There was something connecting us—warm and gentle and soft—but making a commitment to one another when we didn't know if our rhythms would sync didn't make sense. We agreed that if things were meant to be they would work out.

The transition from home to my small college was tough. I didn't get along with my roommate and disliked my studies. I was lonely, even though I was almost never alone. I stole quiet time when I could to go out to the train bridge across campus. The wooden bridge, built over railroad tracks, connected the far edge of campus to the most rural parts of town.

Despite the rocky start, I soon met people who would become my closest friends. A group of us hung out every night on the landing connecting the all-male and all-female dorms. We'd stay up until the early hours of the morning talking about classes, our peers, what we thought about news or politics.

And, inevitably, we talked a lot about sex: whether we'd had it or not, whether we wanted to have it, who we'd love to have it with, logistics and expectations of every flavor. Even though I was one of the only virgins, I kept a jar of condoms in my room in case a friend needed one. Less embarrassing than going to the nurse or the RA.

One night, after pouring my heart out about how much I hated anthropology and dreaded doing any classwork related to it, a friend made me an offer: study and do well on my upcoming test, and he'd come by and we'd have sex. No pressure or commitment other than to enjoy myself.

I knew and trusted him, even though—or maybe because—he was open about his extensive sexual experiences. If I was going to have sex, it should be with someone who was that eager about having sex with me. With him, I figured it would be fun for fun's sake. If I didn't take the chance, would I see it again?

I did well on the test.

Before he came to my room on an afternoon neither of us had class, I put a condom in easy reach of my bed and wore a tank and shorts to be comfortable. Shaved. Having a plan made me less nervous. This was what we were going to do.

He and I climbed into my tiny, too-springy bottom bunk, lying side by side and still fully clothed. He moved his hand up my legs, from my knee to my inner thigh. There was no kissing, no lips pressed this place or that. But it was gentle. Nice.

We shifted a bit so my back pressed against his torso. It didn't occur to me to think about whether he was hard or not as his hand kept skimming the length of my leg. There was nothing weird between us, nothing cold or contrived. It felt good and I felt good.

But there was also nothing more that I wanted.

Nothing in me craved his hands to do more, explore further, despite enjoying every second of being close to him. He didn't force more on me, either. I didn't anticipate how secure I would feel in my body and in this place.

We were so comfortable, we fell asleep together with our clothes on.

When we woke up, we didn't continue what never really started, and it wasn't disappointing. That time together was satisfying and intimate. We lay together for a while, talking, and he told me he respected me—and my still being a virgin—too much to have sex with me just because he could. That was why he didn't push me to do more than what we did. His first time was memorable and with a girl he'd never forget. He said I should have the same with my first partner.