My name is Cynthia. This story begins just after my 18th birthday. I was living in a small town about an hour and a half outside of Chicago where not much of anything happened. I'd lived there all my life.
I was a teenage pregnancy for my mom. I never knew my father. By all accounts he was a perfectly nice man who doesn't know he has me for a daughter. Mom has never said a bad word about him. He was just a random hook-up and she had no desire to compound her mistake by marrying a man she didn't love. Shortly after she got knocked-up she was sent away to live with her grandmother who lived in this little town. The two of them raised me.
My mother wasn't a religious person and great-grandma was only nominally religious. But in this little town there isn't much to do but get into trouble or go to church, so they got me connected with a church youth group. It was a bunch of goodie-two-shoes kids but they were pretty nice and they never made me feel like an outsider even though I was - my mom was the only parent of the group who didn't attend church regularly.
Mom is a good-looking woman and her bed is rarely lonely. She had a regular selection of recurring paramours none of whom were close enough to play any kind off fatherly role for me. I think that was intentional on her part. People talked. She ignored them. Life went on.
After her grandma passed, family was just her and me. It was around the time of the beginning of this story that she was finally getting serious with a man named Tony as I was fully grown but that is another story.
When I turned 18 I had a boyfriend named Jimmy. Mom had made sure I was on birth control. Even though the church preached abstinence she was a realist. She was right. I was so horny by then that it was me who convinced him to pop my cherry. We finally did the deed and all I wanted was more, but he took it all too seriously. Before I knew it he was talking about our future, marriage, kids and all that. I think that a part of him couldn't get away from the idea that sex equals love and marriage. I didn't know what I wanted but I knew I didn't want that.
Before he could pop the question I broke up with him. He couldn't quite accept it and he just kept trying to change my mind. Finally, he asked if there was someone else. I saw my escape so I said yes (even though it was untrue). Then he wanted to know who. I could tell he was getting angry like he wanted someone to confront. I panicked and blurted out a name.
Jake was the cousin of a friend of mine. He had grown up in the same small town until he was about 12 then moved to the west coast. He was three years older than me so I never really knew him when he had lived here as a kid. He had just moved back for the summer and come out with our church youth group a few times. All the girls wanted him and the boys saw him as a tough guy from somewhere mysterious (of course LA wasn't very mysterious but it was to us).
When Jimmy pressed me on who the other guy was Jake popped into my head because I wished he was and because I didn't think Jimmy would try to take him on. I was right. Poor Jimmy folded like a cheap tent. I felt bad about that, but it had to end - that was clear from the panic in my gut when I thought Jimmy was going to propose. For fuck sake I wanted to have sex, not get married. He was a good guy and I wanted to spend my last summer before university riding his dick. But neither of us got to enjoy that because he had been force fed the stupid ass idea that if you fuck someone you must marry them. So, every time you get off you are planning the rest of your life? That is frightening to me.
My next problem was what if Jake found out? I approached my friend, Jake's cousin, to tell her what had happened. She grew wide eyed and gave me a nervous laugh. She didn't really know how he would react but she was pretty sure he wouldn't like being put into the middle of that kind of thing. Jake wasn't scared of Jimmy and he had a bad boy reputation but that was mostly for drinking, smoking, swearing and that sort of thing - he knew how to take care of himself but he wasn't the kind of guy who went around beating people up. He'd be more likely to commiserate with Jimmy and confront me on my lie.
Happily, Jimmy never did anything and Jake hadn't come out to any more of the youth group events.
A couple weeks later I was walking home from a youth group meeting with my friend Melody. We weren't close friends. We were in the same youth group and she was nice enough, but I think she saw me as a charity case. It just so happened that we lived in the same direction from church, so we walked together. Her house was in the posh area of town and mine was a mile further beyond, literally and figuratively on the other side off the tracks. It was typical of the bubble she lived in that she somehow imagined the non-existent danger of our small town on the way to her house but had no regard to the next mile I walked to my house.
Anyway, one night Melody and I were making our usual walk when she blurted out of nowhere. "Cynthia, Jimmy asked me out on a date."
"That is great. You two seem like a good match." I said really feeling that way. These two were each good looking and seemingly very much in sync on all things religious and morals.
"Is that ok with you?"
"Yeah, sure." I said. I couldn't see getting back with Jimmy, but I still held a strong affection for him and I really did see them as a good fit. Besides, they were both a bit too posh for my liking.
It was dark and we could see a couple guys sitting on the bench ahead of us on our path. As we got closer we smelled the acrid smell of marijuana. This was the early 2000's so that wasn't terribly unusual. It didn't faze me. This had always been a small, safe town and I wasn't nearly as uptight as Melody.
As we got closer I said hello.
"Hi." Came back a warm response. I knew instantly that it was Jake. "Is that Cynthia and Melody?"
I froze for a moment.
"It's me Jake. Kelly's cousin. This is my buddy Gary."
"Hi." Said Melody nervously. "We are just passing through." I could tell she wanted to get out of there. The smell of pot and the presence of two boys in the dark was enough to scare her off. It was an instinctive part of her puritanical upbringing and she was one of those girls who rarely socialized with anyone outside the church.
Like I said, I am not like that. The church group had always been nice and I liked them, but I didn't buy into their narrow, sheltered view of the world. I had friends outside the church who smoked pot. And thanks to my mom I was used to being around strange men. I knew enough to be wary but I had good instincts. Jake might be trouble from the point of view of someone who saw every pleasure as a sin but he was no threat to my safety. Plus I was a horny young woman attracted to him in a very visceral way.
That said, I was self-conscious. I used to think that Melody was prettier than me. She was trim and delicate with shiny dark hair and big pretty eyes. I was thicker, with dirty blond hair down to my shoulders. I know I am pretty but I still felt plump. I had always struggled with my weight and had only recently grown into my womanly figure. In the past year I had grown 2" (to 5'6") and my tits had expanded by two cup sizes all while I had lost 20 pounds (I'd been hitting the gym especially since dumping Jimmy as I tried to work out my sexual frustration). Plus having been endowed with big tits for my age (now E cup) and hanging around a very judgemental church crowd I tended to wear baggy clothes. So even though I had blossomed into a svelte curvy young woman I imagined that the world still saw me as that plump insecure young girl.
In this moment I wished Melody wasn't there. I wanted to talk to Jake and I figured he would be more interested in Melody or that her prudishness would hurry us out of there. It felt like when I was dealing with Jimmy - she is nice and all but fuck enough already with that stuff.
"Hi Jake. Nice to meet you Gary. You aren't from here are you?" I said reaching out my hand to shake his and ignoring Melody's desire to flee.
"No, I am just here to visit my buddy and make sure he gets off to college at the end of the summer."
"So are you from LA as well."
"Ya."
By this time Jake had surreptitiously put out the joint he was smoking. He figured we wouldn't be into that sort of thing. Well, he knew Melody wouldn't and he probably assumed I wouldn't. I really wanted to tell him that was wrong, but that wasn't the time.
"Hey Cynthia, I hear that you and I are dating now." Joked Jake. My heart sank and my face flushed. I was glad it was dark so he couldn't see me turn beet red with embarrassment.
"Um, Uh...well I didn't mean..."
"Come walk with me for a minute." He said more seriously as he got up from the bench and took my hand. "Gary will be on his best behaviour Melody. We will be right back."
I could tell Melody was nervous but we were safe. Still, I was scared shitless. Or maybe embarrassed is a better word. Jake wasn't going to do anything to hurt me, but he was probably going to give me shit. Like I said I never got a threatening vibe off of Jake. In fact, he was very comfortable and made me feel comfortable. Maybe that is why all the girls were crushing on him.
"Listen, I am really sorry about what I said to Jimmy. I shouldn't pull you into this. I just...I just panicked."
"It is ok. Kelly told me what happened."
"You aren't mad?"
"No not really. I mean I am slightly perturbed because I don't want to be the bad guy but I don't think that is where it was coming from."
"I'm sorry."
