Kerry Cohen - Loose Girl - A Memoir of Promiscuity

Friday Dad drives Amy and me to Riverdale. We step into the gymnasium, where people are scattered in the bleachers. The room smells like sweat and socks. It smells like boys. We take a seat near the front and I spot Paul with his teammates. Like the others, he wears one of those tight halter outfits wrestlers have to wear. They are watching a guy out on the mat who is struggling with a guy from the rival school. Paul’s expression is hard. He takes this seriously, that’s for sure. The whole scene is sort of silly to me—the outfit, the boys pushing and hugging on the mat, the seriousness. But I push these thoughts away. I want to like Paul. More, I want him to like me. And if becoming interested in wrestling is what I have to do, then so be it.

When it is Paul’s turn, he and the other guy thrash about for close to ten minutes, but in the end he pins his opponent. I clap loudly, hoping he’ll see me. When the match is over, the bleachers clear out and Amy and I wait, my eyes flicking nervously back to the lockerroom doors.

“Does he know you’re here?” Amy asks.

I shrug, my anxiety soaring. “He invited me.”

“That was back on Monday,” she says. She speaks nonchalantly, as though she’s not saying something that is making my heart race.

“Maybe he forgot.”

“He didn’t forget,” I say quietly.

Then, like an exhaled breath, the door to the locker room opens and a group of boys pushes through. One of them is Paul. He is freshly showered, wearing normal clothes again. He comes right over.

“What did you think?” he asks.

“You were great,” I tell him.

“I did OK,” he says. “Eight minutes to pinning. But I got him with a neck hold.”

I nod, wondering if it means anything that he didn’t kiss me hello.

“I brought Amy,” I say.

“That’s cool.” He smiles at her. “I’ll bring Davis.” He calls to one of his friends, a nice-looking boy with curly hair, and we agree to meet in the parking lot where his parents’ Porsche is parked.

Back at Paul’s apartment, he orders a pizza, and he and Davis eat the whole pie. We sit in the kitchen, and I keep my hands in my lap, afraid to dirty anything. Paul is friendly and kind. He refills my soda. I look up into his dark eyes, wanting him to touch me, to show me he still wants me. Only once does he put a hand on my back briefly as he passes, and the heat where his hand touched stays there the rest of the night until Amy and I leave. He hugs me at the door, a friendly hug, not the sort of hug you give a girlfriend. And I walk away, untouched and cold, like his apartment. I discuss this with Amy for the next few days.

“Just call him and ask him to do something again,” she says. “If he likes you, he’ll say yes. If he doesn’t, he won’t.”

She makes it sound so easy, but the possibility of his rejection is unbearable. I don’t want more evidence no one will ever like me. At the same time, the wondering is torture. So I call, and, surprising me, he says yes, and we make a plan for the following Saturday. I meet him at his apartment. This time I go alone. We head straight for his bedroom and fool around. My mind slips away, body taking over. This. This is what I want. My body in his hands, his face, his breath right there against my skin. It feels good, but not just sexually. His hands, his body, his mouth. He breathes me into being, making me real. I unzip his pants, wanting him to feel what I feel: beholden to me. I want him tied to the memory of me here in his bed. I want him to remember I made him feel this good. I kiss down his body as he stretches out, letting me do what I want. At his crotch I stop, thinking about how I can trap him. I had read in a Cosmopolitan in my dentist’s waiting room about tricks to drive a man wild. One was to challenge him to a sexual game. Every boy loves games.

“I’ll bet I can make you come in under two minutes,” I whisper, improvising.

“You’re on,” he says.

So I take his penis into my mouth, and I begin. I have never given a blow job before, so I run through everything I’ve read or heard about them. Some spot on the head is most sensitive. Some technique they tend to like best. But nothing seems to make a difference. He is not moaning wildly with ecstasy like in the movies. He is not moving at all. My jaw gets tired quickly. Spittle runs out of my mouth. I feel clumsy, amateur. From the corner of my eye I see the red numbers on his clock. The minute changes, and Paul smiles down at me.

“Ha,” he says. His voice is controlled. “I win.”

I keep going, knowing I have to finish what I started, and after another quick minute or so he comes into my mouth, the hot liquid surprising me. It is gross, but I squeeze my eyes shut and swallow it, suppressing a gag. I heard somewhere guys prefer that. He buttons his pants and gets us water from the kitchen. He remains kind, but a feeling nags at me, staying with me long after I leave. And it’s this: It doesn’t matter what I did to him. He can choose to remain detached, untouched by me. Something I can’t do back. I call him the next day, and we have a nice conversation. He can’t hang out, he says, because he has a lot of homework, but we can make a plan for the next weekend. In school that week I think of him constantly, twice going silent when called on because I haven’t heard the question. I refer to him as “my boyfriend” when I talk to Amy. I call him three more times, though we only talk once, as he’s out the other two. By the time Saturday comes I’m eager to see him, my anxiety high. I need to know he still wants me.

I arrive at his apartment and once again we get right down to business. I give him another blow job, but this time I feel angry while doing it, put out. Afterward, he buttons his pants and goes to the bathroom, leaving me on his bed. When he comes back, I won’t look at him.

“What?” he asks.

“You always do that.”

“I always do what?” He stands near the door, shock on his face.

“What could I possibly always do in the time I’ve known you?”

“Leave me in here.”

“I went to the bathroom.”

“Whatever,” I say. I start putting on my clothes.

“I don’t understand what the problem is.”

I yank my shirt over my head. A small voice in my head rises up, telling me to stop. I am acting like one of those girls, those needy, crazy girls. But I can’t seem to stop it. That feeling—he doesn’t need me, I can’t have what I want—bubbles up, and the words tumble out of my mouth. “The problem is, you don’t seem interested in doing anything for me.”

He laughs, a short burst. “What are you talking about?”

“Do you even want to be with me?” I ask.

“I’ve known you for, like, three weeks.”

“Forget it,” I say. I look down at my bare feet, tears pooling in my eyes.

“Maybe you should go,” he says. I look up at him. “The doorman can get you a cab.”

I put on my shoes, gather up the rest of my stuff. We say goodbye, and I can tell he is anxious for me to get out of there. I know I’ve blown it, exposed myself once again. On the ride home, my dad’s words echo in my head: Everything has to be your way. I look out the window at the lights that line the slopes of the bridge, clutching my purse to my chest.

If my dad is home weekend mornings, it means his girlfriend, Nora, is there too. They wake late and spend a long time making breakfast. They cross back and forth in the galley kitchen, opening and closing cupboards, passing knives to chop vegetables for omelets and cream cheese for the bagels. They grind coffee and beat eggs.

Sunlight angles in through the silvery blinds, exposing the dust on Dad’s granite table that only gets cleaned on Wednesdays when the cleaning lady comes. Usually Nora has a Mets game on the small kitchen TV. Or else it’s the Giants. She keeps her eye on the TV and whoops when her team scores. She’s the only woman I’ve ever known who likes sports as much as men. She also has a lot about her that’s girly, like the rhinestone clips she wears in her curly hair and the red wire-rimmed glasses she uses for reading. She keeps her nails long and polished, and on these weekend mornings she wears a floor-length, red silky robe she brought from her own apartment in Manhattan. Beneath it I’m pretty sure she’s naked. I come into the kitchen and take a fresh carton of orange juice from the refrigerator. Nora stops me.