come with me friday, don't say maybe....

Not two months after writing that last little cry from the heart, life changed a little bit for the 19 year-old me. Well, it didn't really change much at all, but it felt like it had: I had a bit of a kiss and a cuddle with a friend's younger sister when she came up to visit for the weekend. It wasn't quite famine to feast, but it was a start. She was only a couple of years younger than us, and she was pretty cool (a whole lot cooler than her brother anyway), but when you're nineteen years old, two years feels like an awfully big age-gap. We got on from the very beginning, mainly by forming an alliance against her brother who (once he had taken her down the pub to meet his mates) seemed determined to play the part of the surrogate father, and frowned at every drink she had and every cigarette that she smoked. We got on like a house on fire. After closing time, we all went back to another friend's place where we all ended up crashed out. As I remember it, the kissing all happened whilst we were zonked out on the same bed as her brother. As you can imagine, nothing much happened, and I'm fairly sure that the thought of doing anything else never even crossed my mind. To be honest, I probably couldn't believe my luck. When I woke up, I remember feeling nothing so much as really elated. I had no expectations of it going anywhere, but what had happened seemed like enough.

A couple of days later, I wrote down how I was feeling.... and here it is, fifteen years later in all its horrible, inarticulate clumsiness.

---
Tuesday 30th November 1993

c.12:00am

"On the day that your mentality tries to catch up with your biology"

Strange weekend, what do you make of it? Who can you tell here? No one. Drop hints like you want to - but that would be no use - especially living with someone like Roger and the perhaps dubious circumstances in which it took place. It raises the question though: am I living a lie? all this 'no experience' thing that dominates all my conversations and reaction against this last week shagging fest. Yes and no. Yes in that I haven't actually done it yet, but, well, let's just say I have finally had a first taste in a drunken fumble.

How do I feel? Well a little unsure of what actually happened and how she feels about it (if she can remember). What do I do when I next see her? Well, I know what I will do: either I will be all brash and confident, or all coy (depends on the situation).

Not exactly perfect, I suppose. In a way, it doesn't really matter. Nice now that it's happened. Just a harmless snog after all, but hey, can't even brag about it or face up to it like everyone else has to do.

On a physical level, full marks, I think. [I'm sorry about this, but this is actually what I've written here, and I'm not editing....] Wow - schwing - but did you take a child and make her old? [*cringe*. Step away from the Morrissey... he's done you enough damage already, I think] Don't think so and don't even say so... not as bad as perhaps it seems. Power trip? big bad student / man of the world [!!]. Well, she knew my history and perhaps that was kind of endearing. (He says).

I really feel like shouting it out, but although it doesn't feel sordid, in a way it does. Dirty old man takes advantage shocker. How the fuck would I tell HIM [meaning my friend and her elder brother] ? No way - anyone else and it would be all "nudge-nudge, wink-wink. Well-done-mate-better-late-than-never-it-means-nothing". But HER? Uh-oh. Different story altogether - perhaps she'll tell him, but perhaps not judging by the whole extra parent vibe and 'hoho mum, she was in a trolley" thang. Too heavy.

On the bright side though, that she really enjoyed it and wants to come back might tell me something. Maybe she knows!

Well, one for the record books anyway. I loosened up sufficiently for it to happen and that bodes well for the future - I mean, I'm getting on really well with Nicky and I didn't think that would ever really happen again after last year. God, what happened then? [answer: nothing much] At least I must have relaxed since then - something university has done for me!

Thought I'd write this all down for future reference - or perhaps for discovery! Unlike the last piece, less likely to show it to Leon though! Free love sex machine shocker!!

---

Behind that garbled outpouring, I can still detect some relief and some genuine optimism for the future.... It might not have been much in the grand scheme of things.... but I felt as though I had finally crossed a little mental rubicon. I'd proved something to myself. Perhaps I wasn't really a complete freak after all. I took a little more time and a lot of luck before I got any further than this, but one step at a time, eh?

Although, goodness me, I was still clearly very much in need of a slap and someone telling me to get over myself.

Her brother actually didn't find out about this little tryst until after we had both finished our finals, some 18 months later. It was a complete surprise to him, but he bluffed that he knew all about it... until he realised it was me that we were talking about and not someone else he knew called Tim.

Anyway.

I'm a whole lot wiser and articulate about these things nowadays. Obviously.

*cough*.

Let's hope there are no more manuscripts out there waiting to be discovered, eh? There's only so much of my teenage self quoting Morrissey that I can ask anyone to bear....