"We have a new assignment," Julia said.
She was talking about her creative writing class. Julia loved that class, and thought the instructor was fantastic. We were sitting across the table at our every-week Thursday breakfast in the dining hall.
"What's the assignment?" I asked.
"We're supposed to write a story about something we want to do and haven't done yet. Two thousand words. We're supposed to imagine what it would be like."
"That sounds like fun. What are you going to write about?" I asked.
"I have some ideas," she said. She was avoiding my eyes, as if she didn't want to tell me. Then we were both quiet. I ate my scrambled eggs and she stirred her yogurt, absent-mindedly, staring at the bowl.
Finally, she decided to tell me what she'd hesitated to say. "I've made an appointment at the health clinic for this morning," she said.
Oh, shit. "Are you ok," I asked. "What's wrong."
She looked up at me and we locked eyes. She paused for a second, then came out with it. "No, I'm ok. I'm going to get birth control. I thought I should tell you."
Hallelujah! I asked the obvious question. "Does this mean we're going to have sex?"
"Is it ok?" she asked. "Do you want to? We don't have to if you don't want to."
Looking into her eyes, I could tell she was worried. Was she actually thinking I might say no? I put down my fork, and took the spoon out of her hand and laid it on the table. Then I held both her hands in mine. "Of course it's ok," I said. "It's better than ok. I've been waiting for you to want to."
Her expression turned into a big smile. She took her right hand from mine, and slowly moved it to my nose, and gave me the softest, most romantic little beep. "Then we'll do it," she said. "I'll make a plan."
A plan? Well, this was, after all, Julia. Everything needed to be a plan.
But then a horrible question occurred to me. "Is that what you're going to write about? Having sex with me?" Was she going to write about that? Seriously?
"I was thinking of it," she said, "if you don't mind. I'd give you a fake name in the story."
Wasn't there a problem here? "You're going to write a porno for your writing class, and give it to your teacher, and maybe read it for the class?"
She thought about that. "I hadn't thought about reading it to the class. She wouldn't ask me to do that, would she? Maybe I should write something else." Then she added, "Sex isn't porn, you know."
I nodded. "Yeh, but it may be a little too much information for a class assignment."
"Maybe," she said, a little disappointed.
She picked up the spoon I had set down on the table and took a spoonful of yogurt, then a drink of juice."
"You remember," she asked, "Friday night when you gave me that fantastic orgasm after the movie?"
How could I forget? "I seem to remember something about that," I said. "Actually, I think you gave yourself the orgasm."
"Yeh, but I came really close to putting your dick inside me right then. I was so horny. And it was already hard and it was so close to my pussy already. I almost did it."
Interesting revelation. My dick had been absolutely hard. I remembered well. "You should have done it," I said.
"I couldn't," she said. "It was right in the middle of my cycle. I'd have gotten pregnant for sure."
"I know where Dave keeps his condoms. I could have gotten one."
She resumed stirring her yogurt and watching it swirling around, now not looking at me.
"Well," she said, "I didn't know that. And it didn't seem right. I mean, Dave was there and I thought we were trying to not wake him, and I didn't know if it was ok with you, and I didn't know what it would feel like. I guess I was afraid."
"Afraid of what?" I asked. "Waking Dave? He was already up anyway."
"No," she said, now looking at me, again locking her eyes to mine. "Afraid of what it would be like and doing it wrong. I've never done it before - you know, had sex." She was monitoring my face, desperate to see what my reaction would be.
Was she embarrassed that she'd never done it before? I needed to reassure her and show her it was a non-issue. "It's ok that you've never done it before. Everybody needs a first time", I said. "Lots of people don't have sex in high school." Then I smiled, as lovingly as I could. "You should try it. You'd like it."
She returned my smile. "Yeh, but that wasn't the right time for it, was it? With Dave there and no condom, and we couldn't talk because we had to be quiet. I'm glad we didn't do it then. I really wanted to though. I almost did it."
I understood. Her first time needed to be better than that. I, of all people, understood that.
"Can I ask you a question?" she said. "You don't have to answer."
I could guess what was coming, but I just nodded silently.
"Have you done it before?"
I nodded again.
"How many girls?" she asked. "Lots of times?"
That was a strange question for a girl to ask. I didn't know if she was hoping that I'd had lots of practice or if she was hoping that I wasn't somebody who played the field. It didn't matter what she was hoping, though. I just had to answer honestly, so I did. "Two girls," I said.
"Lots of times?" she asked.
"The first girl was just once. We didn't know each other very well and we were at a party and not completely sober, and we were terrible at it. We didn't know what we were doing. We were so embarrassed we couldn't even look at each other at school anymore."
Julia winced. Was she worried that might happen to us, that we'd do it so badly that we couldn't look at each other?
"What about the other girl?" she asked. "Just once with her?"
"No, that was a summer thing," I said. "Her parents were ok with it, so we could use her bedroom whenever we wanted. We did it a lot. We were only together a few weeks, though, before I had to go back home."
"So you know what you're doing?" Julia asked.
I smiled. "I know the basics," I said. "I'm not exactly a stud, but I'm ok."
Now it was her turn to reach across the table and take my hands in hers. "I'm glad," she said. She looked at my hands in hers. "Then I'll be in good hands. I can't wait."
"We don't have to wait," I said. "We could use condoms until the birth control kicks in."
"Yeh, I know," she said. "I thought about that. But I want to wait. I don't want to have you covered. I want it to be perfect the first time. All natural."
Disappointing. "Ok," I said. "It's only a couple of weeks. We can wait."
Then I changed the subject. "Are you going to write that story?" I asked.
"I really can't write something like that for class, can I? It would be too graphic. It probably really would be porn."
Then she thought of something funny. "Maybe I'll write about showing everybody my bottom half. That's something I want to do."
"Your bottom half?" I asked.
"Yeh, everybody in the world has already seen my boobs. It's time for something new. I have other things to show."
I looked for the right word. "You mean your private parts?"
Now she really laughed. "I never understood that term 'private parts.' I mean, it's the part of you that's most fun the share with other people, isn't it? It's the last thing you want to keep to yourself." She looked at me to make sure I understood. Then she clarified. "Conners, I'm talking about my ass and my pussy. It's time to make those treasurers available to the world."
What could I say? Julia was Julia. I fumbled for a response, but she didn't wait for me. "But I need some help. Come by when roomie is away this afternoon."
"What kind of help?" I asked.