Charlie

5 "Leif"

Leif's mom was Pakistani. She and her family lived in the city of Kalam, near the border of India. Her dad was a businessman who frequently traveled to India and sometimes brought his daughter with him. That is where she met Leif's dad, who was Indian. Their families were against their romance from the start. They always had to meet in secret, in cars parked in remote country fields, in the dead of night, or where they could be lost in a crowd. But they loved each other passionately. They were both educated and frequently discussed the differences between the histories they were being taught. They lied constantly to their families about where they had been, who they had been with, what they had been doing. When they married in secret and finally confessed this to their families, their respective families shunned them, disowned them. They fled to the only place they knew would accept such a couple, a place that wouldn't look twice at their love, a place too stupid to even know the difference between an Indian and a Pakistani. They fled to the US. Leif was born six months later and, like any child of immigrant parents, had instilled in him a very strong but very unique and specific belief structure. Leif's parents had given up their Hindu and Muslim beliefs, but their new values represented a hybrid of those old beliefs and the new ones they found in their new home. They pressed this value system harshly upon their son and no matter how he rebelled, he still turned out like his parents in the end. It was important to them, and to their son, to always respect women. It was important to them to respect differences, in religion, in appearances, in anything. It was important to them to do unto others as you would have them do unto you. Leif's name was a symbol of their newfound freedom. They wanted most for their son to be "better." Better than the atrocities of fighting and rejection back home and better than the hedonistic, misogynistic culture to which they moved.

For a long time it was just Leif and his parents moving around, from state to state, wherever Leif's father's highly lucrative import export business required them to be. This was usually along the east coast. Another thing Leif's parents believed in was education, so wherever they moved he always went to the best schools, received the best education, was pushed harshly academically as both his parents were highly educated and remained well read throughout Leif's life. They turned their backs on the inaccuracies and lies they were taught in their respective schools and sought the "truth." They taught their son about the structure of a good argument, how to find flaws in another's reasoning, how to detect falsities in what he was reading. They read fiercely with near paranoia and were able to instill in their son at least a casual sense of critical thinking. But with so much moving around it was difficult for Leif to make long term friends. And while Leif was certainly educated, without long term friends it was difficult for him to develop an identity of his own. His parents never saw this, they never saw past their own belief structure to see that their son needed something more. He needed stability. He had no personality of his own, only that which was imposed upon him by his parents, even though the very thing his parents were trying to teach him was to embrace differences, for him to be himrself against all odds. Leif didn't know who he was.

When Leif was in the seventh grade he was invited to a party. It was a swimming pool party. He wasn't sure why he was invited. He wasn't considered one of the "cool" kids. He spent a great deal of time selecting his swim trunks. He spent a great deal of time in the bathroom at the party putting them on and making sure they were just so before he came out and made his appearance. His crush, a blond girl, was sitting in the Jacuzzi and he summoned the courage to step into the Jacuzzi with her and some other kids. They all floated about, enjoying their buoyancy, aware of their sexuality on a superficial level, aware of the burning sensations in their loins but unsure what to do about it. But there was no doubt in Leif's mind, he liked Sandra. He paid close attention to her in that water tub. And she seemed to notice him too. His hopes were high. They shared a brief conversational exchanged. He was excited that she'd talked to him. This was going to go somewhere, he thought. Later on he heard from another classmate that Sandra had said Leif was hot but had no personality. Leif moved after that school year.

When Leif was in eighth grade he moved to New Hampshire, to a port town. This is where his parents eventually settled. He went to a school for the highly gifted and talented. There were a number of crowds at the school. There were the cool kids. There were the nerdy kids. There were the leftover kids that didn't fit into either of the crowds. The leftover kids stuck together despite their vast differences. All of the kids in this crowd, this leftover crowd, had to assert some sort of persona, some sort of identity or role to set themselves apart from the nerds and the cool kids to make themselves better, at least in their own little microcosm. It was in this microcosm that Leif developed the persona of a hippy. At first it was just the clothes and the wall hangings and pot smoking. But when he moved again to a new neighborhood and entered high school he found more friends that were of his sensibilities and he discovered political interests that went along with his persona. Leif blossomed into the character he constructed for himself.

After high school he decided to take two years off from his studies to travel. This infuriated his parents, as education was part of his parents' rigid belief structure and it went against their principles for him to neglect his studies. But for Leif, travels were part of his education. He went back to his home countries against his parents' wishes to visit his families. He visited southern Europe. He walked along a part of the Great Wall of China. He went to Amsterdam. He took a full two years between high school and college. Neither Leif nor his parents realized it but his rebellion was completely following in his parents' footsteps, leaving his home country and seeking the "truth."

It was in Amsterdam that Leif met Amalia. Amalia was an architecture student at the University of Amsterdam. Her parents were from the Netherlands and they wanted her to go to school there. Little did they know, she was taking all her classes in English. Over several cups of coffee she and Leif discovered they had much in common, as they were both the children of immigrant parents, and Amalia invited Leif back to her dorm room. She shared it with two other girls, who were home. Amalia pulled Leif into her bottom bunk bed and began kissing him. The two other girls looked at each other and giggled. Leif felt he'd be too self conscious to perform, but Amalia kept kissing him. She found a spot on his chin that made him quiver, and bestowed upon this spot especially tender and moist kisses. She opened each button of Leif's shirt, her legs spread kneeling across his lap, and kissed the spots where the buttons had been. She gave sufficient time in between each kiss so as to instill in Leif a sense of longing, overpowering, so that the next kiss made him feel as though he were going to explode.

Amalia finally reached the final button, the one on Leif's pants. She smiled, she batted her eyelashes, she unbuttoned the button and unzipped the zipper. This was going to be the kiss to end all kisses, Leif thought. Amalia reached into Leif's pants and pulling out his cock she panicked at its massive circumference and length, she jumped out of his lap and flapped her hands in front of her face as if to fan herself. The other two girls noticed this and came running to her aid. One girl asked her what the matter was. Amalia pointed at Leif's cock, still hanging out of his pants, still semi-hard. He quickly tried to put it away. The girls made noises of disgust and kicked Leif out on Amalia's behalf. Somehow, Leif maintained a sense of self confidence after that, but always remembered he was bigger than most men and most women needed a bit of a warning.