Her name was Alina. To me she was just Allie. We met on the first day of grade 7. It was the best moment of my life. She stumbled down a flight of stairs. She hit her head on a step and she was bleeding. Tears welled in her eyes. Everyone just froze. I just rushed to her. I didn't even know who she was and I didn't care. She was crying and I just wanted to hit something so bad. I told my friend Ron to go get something cold and to tell a teacher. I ripped the sleeve off my shirt and wrapped it around her forehead. I remember her looking up at me through wet lashes. I told her it will be okay, not to be embarrassed. She was mortified – certainly not the best way to make friends...showing how much of a ditz you are. Ron came back with an ice pack and I pressed it to her forehead. I didn't leave her side, even when class started. By the time a vice principal came to take her to the office, I realized that I didn't even know her name and she didn't know mine. She looked back at me from down the hall as they helped her. I could swear that she wanted me to go with her but I didn't.
A week later I was playing ball and there she was. She said her name was Alina. She was the smallest thing in the world. 5'4", puny Asian girl. She spoke almost no English – fresh from the Hunan province in China with some diplomat parents. She had long brown-black hair and a small nose, big bright cheeks that you just knew would explode into an awesome smile if given the chance. Thin as a rail. Only now, looking back, does it occur to me that we probably would have never spoken, never been friends, were it not for her fall. I was tall for my age already, probably 5'11''. I stood there at the side of the court and she thanked me and said in her very sweet and very broken English that she was sorry I had ripped my shirt for her. I said I wasn't. I told her I was glad that she was okay. Then I did something that I thought was so stupid. I asked her if she had a cool scar under her bandage.
She looked at me for a moment and then it happened. It was like in slow motion. Her eyes lit up and her cheeks moved higher and higher, pulling her lips wide, her teeth gleaming as she smiled. I almost passed out. I was staring so hard – she was the most beautiful thing I'd ever seen. She said that she hadn't needed stitches so it probably wouldn't give her any scar at all. Then she grabbed the ball from my hand and ran onto the court and shot it. It went off the backboard and in. She jumped up for joy and then ran off.
***
That was four years ago and Allie and I have been best friends ever since. I thought that her being a 90 pound Asian girl and me being a 190 pound black dude would cause us to drift apart but every time we'd go a few days without talking, there her number would be on my cellphone, usually a few moments before I was about to call her. I taught her how to play ball and she'd help with math and such – some of the classes that she could ace in her sleep. She was so smart, what they say about Asians – there's something to it. Her English was better after only two years of speaking, than mine was. She was book smart sure, but she also understood ball so quickly. Layup, jumpshot. Dribbling with your head up. She was sharp. She picked things up the first time. She made the ball team in grade 8; by grade 9 she was captain. But more than anything, playing ball or studying, it was like we could talk about anything. Well, almost anything.
The thing with Allie was, you never knew what to expect. She could be quiet as a mouse, the demur Chinese girl, but then if she thought someone was getting screwed, the knives came out. My temper was rubbing off on her big time. She'd see me yell at someone on a court and see how they'd respond and she internalized it. Everyday I knew her after the day we met she just kept getting more confident and bashful...more likely to speak her mind. It was cool to see – and I was glad that I got to play a part.
She kissed me for the first time on my 16th birthday. I joked that I'd never really kissed a girl. She looked at me for a moment then sat me down in a chair. She sat on my lap and her lips just kinda melted over mine. Just when I thought it couldn't get any better, her tongue pushed its way into me, into my heart. Before I could even comprehend what was happening it was over. Happy birthday, she said.
***
"I want my first time to be with you," she said simply. No lead up, no awkwardness. No warning. I couldn't believe my ears. It was two weeks before her 18th birthday. I'd tease her about what to get her, but we were never steady, boyfriend/girlfriend or anything like that. Though she was very good at chasing other girls off me: she could be a real bitch when she wanted to be.
I told her that we aren't steady, that her folks liked me but they didn't like me that much. They wanted her to end up with some Chinese dude, for sure. But I played it smart with her folks – all respectful and distant and polite. I never gave the parents any impression other than I thought of Allie as a tutor or little sister, even though the thought of her made me rock hard for the last four grades.
"I don't care about that," she said, looking away. "I don't even care if you like me or not. I'm going to have sex with someone for the first time and I want it to be you. Whether it's good or whether it sucks, I don't care."
God only knows how much I wanted it. But it wasn't possible.
I lied to her for the first time when I said I'd think about it.
***
I did everything in my power to avoid her. For the first time since we'd met we went an entire week without talking. It was excruciating. Jesus, I missed her. I couldn't believe how much. I spent an hour one day just looking at her picture and number in my phone. It was a week to her birthday when she cornered me coming out of the changeroom for gym. She was hiding in some corner so I couldn't bolt back into the boys' room.
Her eyes were red and shiny, and she was biting her lip, holding her books against her. "You're fucking avoiding me?" she whispered, shuffling from one foot to the other nervously. "You've really been avoiding me. What the fuck is wrong with you?"
Never been so ashamed in my life looking down at this little woman, looking up at me with pain and confusion on her face. I didn't know what to say. I didn't know what to do. I just kept looking down at my kicks like an idiot.
"You're really going to make me do this here..." she muttered under her breath. "Okay, so we never, like, talked about this. But I like you. I like you so much." She blew out and held her breath, trying not to cry. "I thought you..."
I told her that I liked her just as much, maybe even more.
"Then why? What the fuck? Why?" she whispered quickly.
I tried to move past her and she blocked my path. She could tell something was really wrong but she couldn't understand.
I'd hurt you, I stammered. I can't be your first. I'm fucked up.
She tried to grab hold of me. "What do you mean? How?"
It doesn't matter. Just leave me alone, I said pushing past her. If I moved any faster, she would have seen me for the pussy that I was.
***
One week to her birthday she was at my door. It was our normal Friday tutoring session, but I knew it would be anything but normal. I tried to get out of it – Mom wasn't hearing that. We sat at the dining table and quietly got out our books. My mom set a glass of orange juice in front of her and thanked her for trying to put some school sense inside my head. She smiled and grabbed her purse and said to study hard, that she'd needed to run some errands and she'd be back. The door closed and Allie closed her book.
We didn't say anything for a long time until she said in the quietest voice I ever heard, "Please talk to me." She was sitting next to me as always and I could tell that her eyes were closed because she was trying not to cry.
"I can't be your first time."
She turned to me. "Why?"
"I just can't."
"Can't or won't?"
"Can't."
She sighed. "Please, at least tell me why."
I sighed. "Because...because..." I couldn't find the words. I could feel the dread fill me, I could feel my blood growing cold. Goddamn, I was so afraid. I just didn't want to... scare her off...lose her. I wanted to be her first more than anything in the world. But I could never hurt her. And it would hurt her.
I grabbed her hand between mine and looked into her eyes, real serious like. Then I looked away from her and guided her hand under the table onto my thigh. And then finally I led her hand up the inside of my thigh to my crotch.
We'd touched each other now and then, hug a little longer than we had to. But we'd never done anything like this. I ran her hand back and forth over my bulge so that I wouldn't have to explain it to her.
When I finally opened my eyes to look at her, the expression of curiosity, shock and worry that I expected to see was there, written on her face. She looked cautiously into my eyes, before her eyes darted left and right, as her brain tried to comprehend what she was feeling through my track pants that she couldn't see. Her small hand went back and forth tracing the outline of me, my width and length. Her eyes were wide, her mouth fell partway open and she finally understood.
My heart was hurting. I was crestfallen. Her hand felt so good, but I was certain, more than ever, that this was the most that I'd ever feel with her. I could feel myself stiffening in my pants and when she felt the same, her hand went up to her mouth. Whether it was to stifle a gasp or a cry for help I didn't know.
"So, there – that's why. I'm a fucking freak and we wouldn't fit together." My eyes and mouth felt dry.
Her hand still moved absentmindedly against me. She was tracing me – still trying to picture how big I was in her mind's eye and see if it was as bad as she thought.
It totally was.
From the moment I turned twelve, it was clear that it was a problem. Sitting, adjusting, preventing bulges, uncomfortable underwear. Erections at the wrong time, getting undressed. These were my nightmares, especially before I started to fill out with some actual muscle on my bones. I'd look at myself in the mirror and ask myself: why me? I looked like I was misshapen or something, like I had some sort of deformity. But even though I knew exactly how over-endowed I was, I measured myself all the same the moment I got home after Allie said she wanted to be my first, in the fleeting hope that I had suddenly become more normal.
The tape measure didn't lie. 9" from the tip to my pubes and 6.5" around.
If it was 7" or even 8", I'd give it a shot. I'd be as patient as I could and as slow as possible with her. But...whenever I look at the thing dangling down there and think of Allie...I couldn't bring myself to...I'd just see her as she was the day that we first met. Tears in her eyes.
I read all sorts of things online about how great it was being big and hung. Porn – heh, porn makes it out to be the best thing in the world. But it's just simple math. Some women – a far lower amount than most women – are dug deeper and can take it comfortably. Women in porn do it so often they become accustomed and even if they didn't, they'd probably still enjoy it more than a normal chick – that usually helps them to get into sex with strangers in the first place.
Neither of those things worked in my favor. I don't want some women, I want Allie. And Allie isn't a pornstar.