May 11th
Today Marco finally asked me to prom! I pulled up to my driveway today and tried my best to act surprised to find him standing there grinning holding a Pokémon board game, balloons decorated as poke balls and a big sign with “I choose YOU as my prom date” scrawled across it in his cute scraggly handwriting. Amy gave me the heads up text a couple days ago that Marco had asked her for help planning the whole thing. He even had already came up with the idea on his own which is SO cute, and Amy had the low down on when and where he’d ask me so I was sure to come home from soccer practice today freshly showered and in an outfit cute enough to post Instagram pictures in, but not TOO cute, know what I mean? Anyways, I’ve been running through the whole day, planning out each step, each moment, picture, laugh, smile, kiss and hopefully – HOPEFULLY – I’ll end my fairytale with finally losing the big V. That is, if Marco is down for it, but that’s the biggest problem. The thing is he seems to think that we’re pretty much friends now. When we met back in middle school at Amy’s birthday party he made it clear to me he kinda dug me. He followed me around (though he didn’t think I noticed), laughed his cute little lopsided laugh when he found out my favorite snack is ice cubes, and mustered up the courage to ask me if he could message me on Facebook as his light brown face blushed dark maroon. He’d been after me for a while, and I always turned him down. We’d flirt here and there, but the butterflies that would take over my stomach when he’d call me pretty or say I was just adorable as Pikachu – my favorite of Pokémon – made me nauseous to be honest, so I always avoided indulging those conversations; I didn’t want to get his hopes up, I liked the guy. As a friend. That is until I started to notice that the butterflies were being replaced by this tingling sensation that would start at my inner thighs and rise through my hips into my lower stomach. Last summer we went to the pool with our group of friends and I happened to catch a glimpse of his back rippling with muscles as he bent over to take his shirt off. Amy nudged me, smiling and said, “Girl, don’t get yourself in trouble,” with a sly grin. After that I couldn’t resist my obvious attraction to him. I’d flip my hair when he asked me “what’s up?” in the hallway as he passed by, his finely cut arms protruding from the “EAST HIGH” football jersey he’d sport every Friday before game day. I’d flitter my eyes, bite my lip and say stuff like, “If we weren’t friends I’d say that jersey makes you look kinda sexy.” One day he smiled and replied, “Well if we weren’t friends I’d think you were hitting on me.” We’ve been flirting ever since but lightly you know like friends do when they’ve known each other for so long. I knew he didn’t have a lead on a prom date so I started dropping hints that I was looking for one too, and here we are now! We haven’t even made out yet, so I’m kinda behind in my plans but Amy and I think if the cards are played just right I can hit the one-night-homerun on prom night, so fingers crossed! May 27th Prom was a disaster. Well, maybe I’m being a little dramatic. It was cute and everything. My dress was a sequin rainbow kinda thing that Marco picked out. It was covered in cool colors – blue, purple, green and deep magenta – and had a black sash across the waist and Marco chose a sharp light blue tie with a purple vest for his black tux. We got countless compliments all night, our pictures got hundreds of likes, dinner was great, the dance was even better. Marco seemed like he had a great time. We got home and immediately we both instinctively knew to head to the bedroom. He and I had been exchanging passionate eye contact all night. I tried to send telepathic messages to him throughout the night and hoped he’d get the gist. Anyways, we started making out, he picked me up and put me on the dresser and pulled my dress off. I started to unbutton his tux. In my head I imagined myself slowing working my way down the buttons teasing him and showing him how sexy I could be. But like most things I plan my own affinity for awkwardness ruined that. Instead I ended up ripping his tux open like a cavewoman and trying to pull his vest over his head. He laughed and told me it had to be unbuttoned too. I’d have felt embarrassed if I wasn’t getting so wet. Before I knew it we were both on the bed in our underwear. He reached in my panties and my mind began to race: what if I wasn’t wet enough? What if he thinks my vagina is ugly? What if he thinks I smell? What if I’m not good enough at it? What if he’s too big? What if he’s too small? What if it hurts too much? Do I moan? Do I talk dirty to him? What do I say? Then his voice snapped me back to reality; “Uhh Rita, I’m not an expert but I think you need to relax a little bit.” “Huh?” The words hopped out of my mouth before I could think of something more coherent. “You’re closed shut. Like, really tight. I can’t get my fingers in…” Blood rushed to my head so fast I thought I might faint. He said I didn’t look too good and then said we should probably get ready for after prom. I told him that was a good idea and tried to hide my shame as we pulled on the clothes we’d packed for the lock-in at the highschool. The after prom was cool, he seemed to not care about our little episode earlier, won me a prize at one of the carnival games and kissed me on the cheek goodnight when he dropped me off. But I can’t shake the feeling of shame. Is something wrong with me? June 10th I’m starting to think Marco doesn’t wanna have sex with me after all. We picked up fine after the prom incident. He said we should take things slower. We made out a couple times in his car, last week he gave me head for the first time and I returned the favor. He said I was pretty damn good and I have to say I didn’t mind it. But he didn’t finish so I started to get worried he might not be enjoying it. I asked him if it was good and he said yes but he has a hard time when he gets nervous. But when I started again he just got soft so I started to think he was lying. Today he came over and we watched this Indian Soap Opera. It’s kinda cute that he watches it with me even though he doesn’t speak a lick of Sanskrit and has to ask every 5 minutes what’s going on. I’m starting to think he might only be doing that to get in my pants though. Anyways we started making out on the couch after some time. We went through the motions of taking our clothes off, feeling each other up, giving and getting head. I felt the best I ever had and was ready to finally get the monkey on my back. Finally he kinda just pulled away from me when the kissing died down. I looked at him for a moment to see what was going on before I finally asked, “Well?” “I didn’t bring a condom,” he coolly replied looking me in my eyes. “Why would you do all that and not bring a condom?!” I didn’t mean for the words to come out as a shout but they did anyway. He seemed kinda taken aback. “I just didn’t know you were ready is all…” I would have maybe gotten madder – I mean we were doing everything BUT that – but he seemed genuinely hurt because his eyes lowered away from mine and he started to put his clothes back on. I told him it was okay and offered him some bread and hummus, his favorite. I don’t know why, but it seems like things are starting to go downhill fast. June 18th It finally happened but at this point I have no idea what to think. At least it’s over I guess. We were watching Netflix in the basement again, this time it was House of Cards, one of his favorites. We were on the third episode of the night, and HoC is one of those 40 minute per episode shows so I was getting kinda drowsy and quite frankly bored. We were snuggled up under a blanket on the couch again and I could feel him getting hard on my lower back for a while. I didn’t think he was going to act on it. He surprised me though, maybe he’d been waiting the whole time for me because usually I’m the one who acts first, but I think he just got bored. He started kissing on my neck. As disgruntled as I’ve been I can’t turn off my own biology. His kisses made my blood begin to rush and I immediately began to snap out of my drowsiness. I turned over and I don’t know, everything kinda happened so perfectly and so fast… Before I knew it he was putting a condom on. At this point I was relaxed, ready, but not as excited as I imagined I’d be. When he put it in though my eyes rolled into the back of my head. I can’t describe the feeling, it was so…foreign. After the initial pain I began to understand why everybody seemed to love sex so much. I felt like I was flying. I think at one point I grinned my big ass goofy grin at him and he kinda half laughed, half bit his lip. Everything was going fine, then he pulled out and asked me to turn over. I don’t know what it was about that, but it made me nervous. He must have seen it on my face, “Is that a problem?” He asked me. “No. No it’s just that…Things were just going so well.” “Well we don’t have to switch if you don’t- “No, it’s okay.” I turned over for him. We started back again and he started really going to town. The sensation became so strong that I squeezed my eyes shut and bit the couch arm. He started pushing me over the edge of the couch and my head began to lightly bang on the wall the couch was next to. If I could have said words at the moment I’d have asked him to stop but there wasn’t any stopping once we’d started. I heard him let out a huge groan, like something was slowly, agonizingly being pulled out of his body. He stopped, I heard him panting behind me. I kept my eyes closed as I tried to catch my breath and process everything. I felt him kiss the back of my neck and when I turned around he was already on his way to the bathroom. I rolled over to my back and felt something dripping from my legs onto the couch. I looked down to find blood trickling down. Then it hit me; I really just lost my virginity. This time it wasn’t thoughts that rushed to me but raw feelings, and all of them at once. Joy, confusion, excitement, but most of all, fear. He came back out of the bathroom with his pants back on and something about that bothered me. “You’re not going to just leave are you?” I barked at him. “Of course not,” there was that soft, insulted look again. “Unless you want me to.” I couldn’t hold it in any longer. The waterworks were rushing to my eyes faster than I could fight them back. I started sobbing. “My cherry popped,” I managed squeeze the words out. He looked at me and I could see all the emotions hit him too. Especially the confusion, maybe a little concern, and definitely fear as well. His face scrunched up for a moment as he processed everything, peering into my eyes. “Well it’s okay right? You’re okay?” Why was he asking me this? Of course I was okay. That’s what happens when you lose your virginity, right? Then why was I crying? I couldn’t answer him in time. “I can stay the night with you if you want,” the words were convincing, as if he’d kinda figured out what was going on and how to deal with it. “Only if you want,” I’d stopped crying but the words still lacked any kind of strength. He came back to the couch, climbed under the blanket and said, “Cool cause this nigga Frank Underwood raw as hell and I don’t have Netflix.” He laughed, probably thinking the joke might make me feel better. That’s how he always dealt with stuff like this. Normally I’d think that was cute, this time it felt, I don’t know, childish. I thought it’d be more special. That we’d spend time talking about how long we’d known each other, liked each other. All the memories, the feelings, the thoughts and events leading up to now, I thought we’d go through it all together. I didn’t know how to tell him how disappointed I was, how afraid I am that I’ve just thrown a piece of myself away forever. And for what?
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How could you be so dumb David? I began to squirm in my two-foot-wide greyhound bus seat. The most uncomfortable feeling in all the world is perhaps the dreadful moments, minutes or hours of agony as one sits in the messy diaper of his own mistake, unable to change the already set in motion course of action. The city of Chicago has always called to me; it is the birthplace of Donald Thomas, deadbeat father of David Redd. My father left me very little other than his hazel-green eyes which shine like glistening cataracts when filled with hysteria, a blanket with a doe on it gazing out into the snow covered forest, and the idea of his home city. I was never even so much as humored with a picture of him, and as for all the things he did leave me I am left with only the trust that my mother would not lie to me about his eyes, my blanket, or his hometown. Even that left the grinding feeling of doubt in a young David’s mind, after all, did she not lie to me when she let me call another man “dad” for seven years? Nevertheless I clung onto those things as if they were really my own. Peered with blank pride through the bathroom mirror into my hazel eyes every morning searching for his soul. Never let the blanket leave my side, even when I moved out (that is until I burned a hole into the corner of it one night smoking weed). And that city, I loved it from afar as if I walked its very streets. I’d spend summer afternoon after summer afternoon in my living room with the tv turned to WGN as the cubs struggled to play baseball with better teams. I’d run around with a sock and back-scratcher in hand, pretending not to be Sammy Sosa or Starlin Castro, but David Redd, his own baseball rock star (I’d later learn my dad was a Sox fan). I listened to Kanye, to Lupe, to Common and later to Chance, to Vic Mensa, Alex Wiley, Mick Jenkins, Kembe X and the likes. I would pick up on the subtle draw and vernacular of my Chicago friends I’d met in college. I didn’t ever tell them I secretly envied them, even sought to be like them, though I’m sure they knew anyways. For the longest time I wanted to be that baseball player, so one day he could look up at a billboard, see my face, and go through the lengths to find me as I had done for him. But David Redd was small, skinny, and he let people tell him that – despite league championships and all-star awards – small skinny kids didn’t play pro ball. I went to college, I wanted to make money, and I wanted my name to be known. I studied political science; someday I’d travel to Chicago’s southside and lead a movement. I’d knock on doors day in and day out handing out pamphlets and fighting the man until one day I’d knock on his door and he’d cry at the joy that his creation had become. I could have been either of those things perhaps, but I would not have found myself. So when my fraternity brother’s debut album came out and his release concert was announced of course I was head over heels to head to Chicago to see him. I love my brother of course, though I had barely spent any time with him, but really David was just looking for an excuse to finally lay eyes on the canvas where the idea of himself had begun to take shape. “I’ll be on the bus tomorrow,” I eagerly told him. 4 hours into a miserable ride on a bus with three babies, one bathroom (which I had to set right next to), dreary gray seats of which not one was empty, I get a message from him. He’s partying tonight. He won’t be responsible and doesn’t think it wise for him to be responsible for me. He’s trying to see a girl he likes and honestly, I’ll be a burden to him while I’m here. That’s fine. I reply. It’s my fault for being such a cluck. For getting my hopes up so high. How could David be so dumb, to head to Chicago impromptu with no confirmation. Idiot. David you idiot. I’m not sure how this story ends. I’m sure I will find a friend to stay with. I’m sure I will still see the concert and have a great time. I’m sure this will be something I look back on and smile. I am sure when my mom finds out she will flip. Perhaps she won’t because she knows in my heart how long I’ve been trying to come, that I’ve been so eager I’d let David the little boy make decisions instead of my adult self. I’m sure I’ll forgive myself someday. But what I’m most sure of is that I won’t find my father. Not today. Not ever. The alleyways tucked between the crevices of concrete that make up Des Moines are sanctuaries for hidden life. There’s an alley just off E. 14th ave, which connects east to South, crammed between an old Barbershop with Supreme Cuts splashed across the top in funky, white and blue cursive and a new Thai restaurant which nobody – or at least nobody in the neighborhood – seems to eat at. Two blocks away from the high school, four blocks away from the old brick-caste junior high school, this alley was among the East side’s most trafficked sanctuaries; it was the shady pasture adjacent the watering hole. The dark pass way teemed with the comings of goings of life; pushers clad in busted jeans and a wife beat, skinny itchy fiends would come dressed the same way, hoodlums cloaked in reds and blues and blacks and greens came from far and near to battle over territories, painters came armed with can in hand and plastered their souls onto walls in ghetto cursive, and the laughter of children at play seemed to rise above all the other sounds of this urban Serengeti.
The summer sun stood tall in the sky, beating down on the city with a heat that would be multiplied time and time over again by the unforgiving black concrete. The air in the alley was damp with the smell of wet trash wafting by, and chilled by the near constant shade it was subjected to. From the end of the alley came an innocent shriek which pierced the stagnant mid-day air. A little girl darted into the alley, her gait was pigeon toed and as she covered her hair with her arms her little pink Dora tank top rose above her belly button. Behind her a menacing boy, perhaps her elder by a year or two, came bearing down on her in full sprint brandishing a bright green water gun. “Nick!” She screamed, stopping to turn and face her torturer. “Mama said not to get my hair wet!” The boy, still holding the water gun to the top of her head, let a smile befit for the Grinch creep across his dirty brown face. The girls lip quivered, the angst had become obvious in her face. She was relieved to have a break from the humiliating stream of water he had been dousing her with and yet she knew the relief was to be short lived. That stare down must have lasted two eternities. The girls eyes watering with annoyance as she ran her fingers through her tangled hair, the boy’s face glowing with the power he held in his hand. Finally, the boy broke the tension, “Well you better run then nigga!” He half laughed, half shouted. The water began again. The girl began to wail as tears streamed down her eyes. Her foot caught on a stray two by four on the alley floor and now the boy stood over her, triumphant in his raucous laughter. “Hey!” I yelled. The boy froze in his tracks. He did not lift the water gun. His eyes fixed on my own trying to assess this new, unanticipated challenge. The girl rose to her feet, vengeance painted in a snarl across her face, and raised her two hands in a closed fist above his head. She brought down with all her might and rage a clubbing blow onto the boys head. It was his turn to fall to the ground in a pitiful wailing heap. She stood over him for only a moment, “Just wait till I tell momma!” She cried and darted out the alleyway as quickly as she had come. |
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October 2018
Matt BruceViva DSM!! |