The Left Side of the Moon: The First Kiss

She can feel his eyes on her as she stands behind the cash register. As she looks up, he looks quickly away, as if he has been caught in a forbidden act. She watches him for a moment as he returns to his work behind the deli counter but he does not turn around to look at her again. He is tall and very thin, clean cut. He is not the sort of boy that would normally garner her attention, yet she pauses longer than she would have expected of herself.

She returns to stocking the cigarettes behind the counter. One plus of this job is that she will no longer have a problem being carded when she wants to buy cigarettes. She knows she shouldn't smoke, hell doesn't everyone know they shouldn't smoke. But sometimes she can't help it. It is the same reason she drinks and smokes pot. The anger and frustration sometimes makes her want to claw her own eyes out. It makes her desperate for something, anything to distract her from the inferno that begins to rage within.

A smile begins to play upon her lips. There are other ways she has also discovered that will deaden the feelings of chaos that eat away at her. How is it that she went from never being kissed to giving a blow job in one weeks time? And not with the same boy mind you, there were three in that one week when there had never been any before. If you were going to have a reputation you might as well make use of it, right? Her reputation had been borne out of nothing but a curvaceous body that no sixteen year-old had the right possessing. Not that the body had suddenly happened at sixteen. No, it had unfortunately started at twelve. It had made her popular with the boys at school only in the way that they taunted and teased her, wondering if her breasts were real or if she stuffed. Seriously, who stuffs to a D-cup at thirteen? But somewhere along the line the taunting had transfered to rumors that she was easy. She wondered how these rumors had proliferated all these years when she had never even kissed a boy. Who was it that she was supposedly fucking?

Well, now there were some factual stories to add to the good old rumor mill. She had never attempted asserting to her taunters that she was a virgin. Honestly, she'd rather they kept up with the rumors that she was a slut than know the embarrassing truth that she had her first kiss at fifteen. It had happened, oh about six months ago now, and like everything in her life, it was not what she had anticipated. She had had a crush on the boy for years, but was too shy to do more than flirt with him. He was a year older, in the band with her. It was not that he was particularly gorgeous, but the charisma that permeated from him. He was wild in so many ways that she wished she could be. In ways that she actually tried to behave, but afterward she always still managed to find herself grounded in reality and never completely able to let go. Even the times that she drank and and got high, she always knew to keep a level enough head to feign sobriety and make it home in time for her curfew. You couldn't completely lose yourself when you struggled to keep the facade of honor roll student and obedient daughter. And as long as she kept up the facade and flew under the radar, well the more she could manage to get away with.

They had been fighting again. Why was it that we're always fighting? But it felt good to fight with him. They fought over anything and nothing. They sat next to each other during band rehearsal, both playing the clarinet, and once for reasons she could not begin to fathom, he took out his lighter and set her jeans on fire. It was only a small singe, but while she put on act of indignance and irritation, she rather enjoyed the excitement of it, the quickening of the pulse, the slight panic in her chest. It was really only appropriate that he be her first kiss after all the times she had closed her eyes and thought of him. But she should have expected how it would really be with him. Why had she ever thought that he would be tender with her? There had never been any tenderness between them. Only teasing, and anger, and passion. His constant ribbing of her on one particular day had been maddening. He would stick his face in front of hers and make faces, talking in a particularly annoying sing-songy voice. She didn't even remember what he'd been saying, it didn't matter. She had warned him to stop, that today she was in no mood. And her mood was foul that day, her head was aching and there was a test looming before her the following period. She wanted to be left alone. She wanted quiet. But he was unrelenting. So she had grabbed hold of his testicles and squeezed as hard as she could. He had fallen to his knees in front of her, momentarily unable to breathe. She had turned and walked away and things had been rather quiet between them for several weeks after that.

She should have anticipated that the kiss would be what it was - another fight between them. There were words spoken with passion and hostility. There were always words between them and they were almost always spoken in anger. It was not so much the words that interested them, but the anger itself that they enjoyed. And then all at once he was on her and she was pinned to the wall. She was rather stunned that he had finally crossed the bridge that had always remained between them. He had her pinned firmly, roughly from head to foot so she could barely move, his hands around her wrists pinning them by her ears. She could feel his erection against her stomach as he forced his way into her mouth. She was not quite sure how to respond. She had wanted to kiss him, had day dreamed of this kiss on numerous occasions, but now she was pinned to a wall and wondering if perhaps she should bite his tongue. His mouth on hers was hard and his teeth knocked painfully against her lip. Then he enveloped her mouth completely with his own and the suction of it took her breath away, as his saliva dripped down her chin.

And then it was over and he was gone. She stood leaning against the wall, her hand tenderly touching her lips and then wiped spit from her face. Her heart was still beating fast but she was strangely calm. She knew now that whatever it had been between them was over. She walked out of the hallway and could feel that the anger had dissipated. She had had her first kiss and she smiled to herself because while it had not been what she had wanted, it had been what she had needed it to be.

"Miss? Can I get pack of Marlboro's and a Power ball Ticket?"

She licks her lips slowly as she is pulled back from her reverie. She rings the customer out and glances at the clock, nine-thirty, half-an-hour to go. She crosses from behind the counter and begins to wipe down the glass on the refrigerated cases with Windex. He is staring at her again. She can feel his eyes on her as she leans over the case. There is a knowing spark in her eyes as she thrusts her ass out more than is necessary while she continues cleaning the glass.