Maybe

Maybe because it was wrong. Or, like the church said, dirty. Or, like Jennifer said, because it was like a porno she once watched – 'kitties and titties all the way, Needy' – but she trusted her best friend, through thick and thin, and it was hard not to go along when your first kiss was so dull and sloppy.

Not at all like a movie, fade to black or super passion, just some boy with his eager tongue and a wet spot on the front of his pants.

Jennifer made it seem effortless, like the girl had been born locking lips with every single person in sight.

Jennifer made it seem important, like it was the biggest secret and only Needy got to hear it.

Jennifer made it feel like forever, pleasure suspended over the two of them like a guillotine.

And when it all came down, Jennifer made it feel like something special.

For half a second, Jennifer wasn't just some stand-in for a real boyfriend… she was everything Needy ever wanted in someone.

Beautiful and funny, hard to the world and, yet, tender in these bedsheets – flush with movement, body still rocking slowly against Needy's trapped hand – right then, Jennifer was the love of Needy's life.

And for half a second, Needy was all Jennifer wanted.

Maybe it was just sex, that thing both of them ached for and only one of them had a chance of getting.

Or maybe it was just practice, trying to master the art-form of fucking before the real thing came along.

Maybe, maybe, maybe…

But maybe it was right there in front of them, ahead of the dawn and too far gone to be called night, when Jennifer finally fell asleep – sticky sweet body pressed firmly to Needy's side and Jennifer's lips speaking so lazily… saying something that would never be repeated, not in school or in the woods. Not even at the moment Needy drives a box-cutter into Jennifer's chest.

"God, loving you will be the cross-out for me, Needy…"

*

END