Everybody has their first times. For most of my peers, it was with a girlfriend, or just some chick at a party. But for boys like me -- awkward, gawky, cute and complete buffoons -- first times are perhaps even better than a fumble in the back seat of a beat-up car past 11 on a school night.
I was a late bloomer. But by the summer of 1990, I had come into my own physically. Much of my chubbiness had disappeared into a taut physique. And for the first time in my life, I looked good in form fitting pants.
I was still shy -- a complete bumbling idiot in truth -- with girls my own age, even at eighteen. Sure, some started to pay attention to me, but my ego, after years of abuse and teasing, was so fragile that I'd never venture to pursue anyone. I was too used to being hurt.
I was young, rich with deviant fantasies and a sex drive pushing the limits of decency, but with no prospects beyond videos and magazines. Then came spring break, 1990. While most of my friends got opportunities to head out to orgiastic beach outings, I was stuck working at a local video store for extra pocket money.
It wasn't bad work, really. The store was locally owned, so the atmosphere was laid back and fun. Plus, being a movie buff, I got to shine with the customers, people who would specifically ask to see me for suggestions on their weekend rentals.
I particularly made a splash with a very nice couple in their late 40s who were regulars on Saturday nights just before closing. Martha and Manny were especially fond of the adult section -- the area of the store cloistered behind jutting walls and a small curtain that most of the hoity-toity customers in my town refused to be seen. But Martha and Manny were quite fond of xxx movies, and came to me regularly for advice.
Somehow, I fooled them, or so I thought, into thinking I was some kind of porn connoisseur. Nothing could probably be further from the truth. I had rented a few movies since I got the video store job. The owner gave a blind eye to my rental habits: Two popular, mainstream movies with a unidentified tape sandwiched between the two. As long as it was back by the next morning, the owner could have cared less.
Martha particularly stirred my teenage desires. She looked much younger than her video account stated, with sand-colored blond hair, hazel eyes and freckles. She wasn't thin by most standards, but certainly far from fat. Taller than most women I knew, Martha was robust and ample in all areas, and she was especially fond of wearing thin summer dresses that revealed her legs.
That spring break I was somewhat down. Pretty much everyone in town my age had taken off for the beach. And in a high school that counted no more than 500 kids, meaning Gannis Falls was practically deserted that week.
In consequence, the store was empty that Saturday night, and I spent most of the time watching movies and cleaning shelves. Then at nearly 10 p.m., Martha strolled in wearing my favorite blue flowered summer dress that allowed the generous swell of her cleavage to bunch up above the neck line.
"Hey sweetie. I'm so glad you're here," she said, her voice like honey pouring down my body in tingly waves.
"Hello Martha. Where's Manny tonight?" I asked. We had long since done away with the last name formalities.
"Oh, one of his jobs sent him on a week-long assignment to New York. It's just little old bored me."
"What can I do for you?" I said, glancing away from her eyes as nasty fantasies of Martha alone in her house naked and sweaty bounced into my head.
"Well, I'm needing some suggestions on a good movie," she said, her voice softening and her eyes twinkling. "Something loud and with lots of variations." Translation: A porno where the girls are screaming while getting fucked in strange positions. I giggled in my pretend-not-to-be-innocent way as my mental file went through some of the boxes I read from the night before. See, I don't go back there during business hours. Wouldn't be proper for the son of Marion Trent Harwood, Sr. and Lisa Corry Harwood, lifetime residents of Gannis Falls, to be seen gawking at porn videos.
Still, I managed a suggestion. A video of girls being pummeled by hydraulic machines fitted with dildos and phallus objects. No couple action, but I was always fond of watching girls have authentic orgasms on videos. Girls in traditional videos always seemed to act their enjoyment while the guys got to spill their pleasure. I was much more turned on by the exhibition of womanly pleasure.
She emerged from the back room a little later. By then, I had already locked the doors and began my closing duties, but let Martha browse undisturbed. She handed me a video box, a brunette on the cover sitting naked atop a saddle in obvious rapture, a dark circle censoring the space below her navel, leaving the rest to the imagination.
"Is this the one?" she said. I nodded, trying very hard to keep my crotch from swelling too much.
"There's no couple action in it though. All the girls are alone in it," I said. She laughed and said it would be perfect since she was as well.
"Is that going to be it for tonight?"
"No. Can you come with me in the back for a couple of other suggestions?" she said. Her voice belied no hint of teasing or flirtation. She seemed to ask with the air of a customer simply needing help. In hindsight, she had to know that an 18-year-old surrounded by rows of porn videos was about as sexually volatile as dynamite.
I followed, feeling my face flush in embarrassment. Sending Martha and Manny back to the adult section was one thing, joining one or the other physically there was completely out of my realm of possibilities.
We browsed the walls, with Martha picking up boxes here and there and asking me about the movies. I answered as truthfully and candidly as I could, all the while concentrating on the chilled air from the air conditioning to keep my penis at bay. The worst I could imagine was to spring a hard on in front of a customer. To make it worse, Martha moved closer to me every time she bent over to grab a tape, even bending in front of me once so the crack of her bottom nearly rubbed perfectly against my crotch.
My mind was too naive to translate these gestures as signs of any interest in me sexually. I thought there was no way, a married lady, a customer, especially with someone who just recently gained any sort of muscle and girth.
Eventually, she chose three more movies, and we went back to the front. As I checked them out, she asked something more with that same honey covered voice of hers.