by A. Mills
(11/12/03)

I don't think Elena Westly could have told you anything about me but my name and the fact that I'm a swimmer. This is true even though I lived next to her for nineteen years and we went to all the same schools. I used to notice every detail of her style, from her purple eye shadow to her studded belts and the shirts that clung to her pointy breasts. I wished I had been born with her wavy brown hair.

In high school she had aced classes even though she barely showed up -- she and her sweet sissy boyfriend, Matt, were always smoking in the park. She ignored the cliques, and the preppie girls called her a slut. Two of them claimed to have caught her naked with Matt and another guy at the same time at a party. I was never sure whether to believe that or not.

Elena started at State college a year ahead of me as a theater major, but I always had a sense of what she was up to. I knew what classes she took, where she hung out, and what her status was with Matt. I was always aware of her, even in the middle of stressing about my major and swim team and hanging out at my friend Lucy's, eating Oreos and crying about Evan, my ex-boyfriend.

The summer before my sophomore year, Evan went to work at a summer camp and met somebody. Evan was the best kisser -- he made me feel like a princess. We never had sex even though he pinned me down and kissed me and kissed me and I could feel him under his jeans. He said we should wait because it should be "meaningful." Which I guessed meant he wasn't in love with me. We just touched each other with our hands, again and again. When he met this girl at camp, he called me the same night to break up. Bastard. Lucy thought I would make myself sick from crying. The hot summer suddenly looked empty.

I was babysitting for Elena's brother Aaron a lot since I only had one summer class. Her mom had to recruit me because Elena refused to help even though she still lived at home, like I did. I showed up three afternoons a week and stayed till midnight so her mom could work the evening shift. Elena was usually out rehearsing or reading at an open mic.

One night, after I had already put Aaron to bed, she and Matt came back to make sandwiches. It seemed like they'd been smoking pot because they couldn't stop giggling. They futzed around the kitchen while I watched Dirty Dancing for the hundredth time. All of a sudden there was silence and then more silence. Then a gasp. I turned my head, and there was Elena at the foot of the stairs, visible from where I sat. Matt had pulled down the neck of her velvet shirt and pulled out her breast. He was pinching her nipple, which was dark and pink. He leaned in and caught her lip in his mouth.

I must have made a noise, because he let go and Elena fumbled with her bra and tucked in her breast. I heard her whisper, "Matt, will you go say something?" She slipped into the bathroom, and Matt came around and sat on the arm of the couch, far from me. He glanced over. I noticed his eyes were green.

"Hey, uh, we didn't mean to make you uncomfortable, you know." I didn't say anything. On TV, this older married woman was trying to get Patrick Swayze to come back to her room. Matt glanced at me again, and it seemed like he was considering something. Elena called from the kitchen. He stood up. "Sorry about that. See ya, Catherine." He shuffled off. I heard the back door close and lock.

I sat there for a long time thinking what an innocent I must seem. Quiet, good grades, sports, didn't show much skin. I was nineteen and hadn't had intercourse. Still, I was by no means ignorant and I didn't feel like a virgin. In my mind, at least, I was less of a prude than some girls who had sex every day. Lucy and I had borrowed all the books from her brother's stash of erotica and porn one at a time. I kept The Delta of Venus by Anaïs Nin for weeks, then bought my own copy. Sometimes that book was disgusting, full of prostitutes and abuse and knives. Most of the time, though, it was fascinating. One man used a dildo that was the exact mold of his penis to penetrate women. A count had his friends over for dinner and let them watch while he shaved his mistress's pubic hair. She clamped her legs, but he nudged them apart until his friends could see that she was wet. I touched myself in my bed every night, and bit my arm to stop the noise.

After Elena and Matt left, I got restless. I wandered back and tried the door of Elena's room, just to see what she had in there. I knew it would be locked. It was.

I began a ritual that would last the rest of the summer. Every night when I finished putting Aaron to bed, I would test it.

One night in mid-August, long after the incident in the living room, the doorknob turned in my hand. I stood there for thirty seconds before I actually pushed it open.

The smell of sage hung like a cloud. A black lace curtain circled her bed. Maybe she had sewn it herself. Clothes lay over the chair and dresser and desk -- a black satin bra, a leather skirt laid out on the bed, tank tops that had slithered to the floor. I wondered if all of her clothes were black. Maybe she had just one bright red thing. Her top dresser drawer was open -- all black. I inspected one pair of underwear that was a web of lace, totally see-through.

Then I did something strange. I slipped off my jeans and cotton panties and slipped on the lace. I took off my shirt and bra and stood in front of the mirror and blushed. You could see my hair through the lace. I had never noticed how pretty my breasts were, with wide, light brown nipples. On impulse, I reached for a vest I had seen Elena wearing and laced it up around my chest. I wondered if Elena wore it for Matt. I wondered whether she was always pressuring him to have sex or he was pressuring her.

While I was thinking, my hand moved down my belly. My finger slipped inside the lace. I had never done this outside my own room and I don't know what possessed me to try. Soon I was lying on Elena's bed, and Elena's lace was wet. I imagined I was Elena and I could feel Matt's tongue through the lace. He would tear a hole in the lace and then look up at me with those eyes. He'd say You smell so good I want to lick you. I was rubbing my nipple through the vest when I heard laughter.

Oh, that a black hole would open up below me. Oh, Jesus. This was more humiliation than anything I thought possible in any solar system.

"Look at that. Oh, Matt." It was Elena, speaking in a low voice like the queen of the universe. Behind her was Matt, with his long blond hair in a ponytail, his chest wide under an old faded T-shirt.

"Matt, we have something here. I guess Catherine likes to play." She sounded pleased at my disgusting idiocy. I was desperately frozen, trying to think where my clothes were. Then she giggled. "Hey, I think you forgot something. Maybe you didn't know where I keep it."

Elena walked over to the nightstand a few inches from my face, which stayed pressed into the pillow. She pulled something out of the drawer.

"See?" I looked up to see her cradling this thing that looked like a small club or a microphone. "My bestest friend." I just stared. "Come on -- don't tell me you don't have a vibrator? Well, you might consider it since obviously you're inclined?"

Maybe she noticed I wasn't breathing, because she looked over at Matt and sighed.

"Sorry, Catherine, I'm such a loudmouth. Look, it's okay. I'm not a gossip." She whispered something to Matt while I lay there, too confused to even think. Then she turned back.

"Let's make a deal, sweetie. Stay awhile and hang out and we won't tell anyone. Just hang out with us. It's not a big deal. But if you just run away," she added, "I'm not a mean person, but imagine if someone on the swim team found out."

What a smile she had. Her red mouth and white teeth.

"This girl is catatonic," Elena announced. "I'd better relax her." I could smell her perfume, apricot. I closed my eyes. Her cool hands rubbed my shoulders. Slowly, I began to breathe.

"Don't worry -- if you don't want to do something you don't have to. Matt and I are just giving you an open invitation." She ran her hands over my arms, through my hair and over the vest -- her vest. Her hands felt like honey, soothing and warm.

I was embarrassed because I could smell myself. My fingers were still wet and, in spite of being freaked out, I just wanted to put them back inside me. Matt was leaning against the wall, watching.

"Now, we want to play, Catherine," Elena continued, "This is your chance to leave. Do you want to?"

Slowly, I shook my head no.

Silence fell while she pressed into my shoulder with her thumbs. I almost felt sleepy for a second, as if I were just waking up and not sure what was going on. After a long time, something different started. Elena's fingers brushed my neck and began to unlace the vest. She peeled one side away. Two fingers closed on my nipple. I stiffened. Then she let go and flicked her finger lightly and back and forth, back and forth. Matt leaned against the wall with his hands in his jeans. He didn't look away.

A warm wetness consumed my nipple. Waves of Elena's hair in front of my nose, smelling like dry grass. My mouth opened: "Please."

"What do you want, Catherine?"

"Please? I want, well, if you want to, maybe..." My hand lay on my belly, drifting lower.

"Not yet." She sat me up to slip off the vest, then resumed pressing her thumbs and knuckles into the tight spots in my back. "Have you ever played with a guy?" she asked, then whispered over her shoulder, "I think she hasn't." I rolled my eyes and shook my head, "Of course." I had held Evan's penis dozens of times. I liked it, the smoothness and the veins and ridges.

"Oh good," Elena smiled. "But I think you're still a virgin. Do you want to hold one again?" I gave half a nod. She beckoned Matt and he walked over to the bed. She stood up, drawing her hands along his chest. Then they were kissing and she put her hands in his back pockets. I could see the outline of her bra under her tank top and a hint of it under her arm, black with green and blue shiny thread. Her small, sharp breasts rose and fell. Matt kept his arms at his sides. It was strange to see him standing there, making no move to hold her.

She stepped away and put her hand on the rise in his jeans. I wondered if she would unzip him, and she did -- first the button, then the zipper, then reaching into the hole in the boxers. She pulled his penis right out. The second one I had seen so close. Small and blond and straight, growing out of his curly hair.

"So nice, so nice," Elena was crooning, running her fingers over the head. I forgot to breathe again as she knelt and looked up into his eyes, still holding it. Then she took it in her mouth. Matt shuddered and raised his hands to his head and started twisting his hair. He tried to pull her to him more, but she jerked back and stared him down.

"Uh-uh, Mattie boy. That's not what you promised. I guess you'll have to wait." Elena drew back her head. "It's time for Catherine to explore."

She picked up my hand, which was nearly limp, and laid it on Matt. His dick was hard and red now and the head was slippery from Elena's mouth. I wanted to play with it. With one hand I slipped all over the head, pressing and tracing the edge. My other hand went around the shaft and began to pull. I pressed my thumb into the head and felt it yield a little. I looked up at Matt and he was breathing hard, his eyes on my hands.

"What a lovely penis -- I bet it's nicer than your first," Elena purred, and then she sat behind me and slipped her legs around and started kissing my shoulder. I smelled apricot again. Something brushed my back -- her nipple? Her fingers started to play around the outside of the lace underwear. I thought I would die when she slipped her fingers inside me.

"Oh my God. She's so wet, Matt. Do you know where your g-spot is, Catherine?" Elena began to tug at me deep inside. I wanted more. My hand slowed to a stop on Matt's penis and I began to moan again. Abruptly, she withdrew her hand and play-slapped my thigh.

"Don't stop! Don't leave Mattie like that. Just for that I want to see you take him in your mouth. Wait a sec." She began rummaging in her bed and pulled out a condom. She unwrapped it and kissed the tip of his dick a few times and then rolled the condom over him. She gave me a gentle push until I was kneeling on the floor. I looked up. "Do you want me to?"

Matt squeezed his eyes closed and nodded. "Uh huh, please."

I started to lick at the head, the latex like an alien in my mouth. I ran my tongue over the ridges to make sure I could feel the same ones. Then I just started to suck in and out, as far as I could go until his hair tickled my face. Maybe I was too slow, because he put his hands on my shoulder and drew me up. His tongue went deep into my mouth.

"Stop! That's not part of the deal." I looked up to see Elena reaching behind her to unhook her bra. Then she wiggled out of her black pants. She moved Matt aside and sat me down again. Her lips pressed into my mouth. I wondered if her lipstick would make my lips red. She was playing with my breasts again, twisting the nipples. Then she took hold of my hand and guided it towards her. She was wet and open inside, wider than I was. Slippery and delicious. I could fit three fingers up inside her.

"Deeper," she whispered, and I thrust as if I could find something there, at the end of her tightness. I felt like I was on drugs and the world was swirling. What was the taste of that wetness?

"What next?" she asked and lifted a hand from my nipple to run it through my hair. I dropped my eyes to my hand still inside her. I bent my head a little towards it. I wanted to lick at the curling brown hairs, push my tongue between the folds of her lips, dart everywhere. I had read about this, but obviously I had never done it.

Her eyes widened and she poked Matt. "Mattie, we've got a dyke here." I flinched. "Did you know that, Catherine?" Matt was lying on his side now with his jeans off but his boxers still on. He gave me a grin, so I flushed even more. I realized I must have entered an alternate universe when I walked into her room that night -- that was the only thing that could explain everything that was happening to me. And now they thought I was gross, a freak.

"I should go," I muttered, and tried to break away, thinking to grab my clothes and lock myself in the bathroom, clean up, and get out of there. I could leave a note that I suddenly got the stomach flu, so I could go and let Elena take over the babysitting.

"No you don't, pussycat," Elena said as she grabbed my wrist. "Come on, I'd love you to be a dyke, that would be precious, but I don't really care, I just want you to go down on me." She lay on the pillow, arching her back to offer her breasts up like a mermaid and spreading her legs so I could see a rose color where my fingers had been.

"Kiss her." Matt's voice made me jump. It was the first time he had spoken since I'd had him in my mouth and -- now his eyes bored into me. I put my hands on Elena's thighs, then my head began to sink. She smelled salty and pungent. I brushed aside her hair and began to lick.

"My clit," she muttered, cupping my head and pulling me closer. Her clit was hard, demanding. I began to lick and circle the point. My hands ran up and down her sides. This was Elena's naked body! I began to flick at her with my tongue, fast. She gave little cries and twisted, squeezing her thighs. With a stroke of genius, I pushed my three fingers into her again as deeply as I could while still licking. Then I let my teeth graze across her clit.

"Don't stop," Matt growled and I plunged again and again. He put his hand over her mouth as she began to shake. Then he was pulling me out of her. I rested my head on her belly.

Matt's penis looked out at me from his boxers when I opened my eyes. It was pretty. Then I realized it was still hard.

"Matt's turn," Elena murmured. The head of his penis was inches from my leg. I reached over and began to knead it. Matt groaned and did not move. I turned on my side and began to run my hands all over his body. I cupped his small, muscular butt beneath his underwear and pulled him close so I could feel his penis pressing against my belly. He gasped. I don't want virginity, I don't want it a voice chanted inside my head. I wanted this penis inside. "Wait a minute." Elena threw a fresh condom at Matt. He stripped down and obediently put it on. He began to kiss me, his tongue whirling around my mouth. His dick brushed my belly, then my thigh, then my wetness, and I arched up. He brushed me, then pulled away. I arched higher and higher, making noises like a kitten. I had never made noises like that, I was thinking, when I felt his penis pressing, slipping, pushing in. Slowly. It hurt a little.

Elena's breath blew over my ear and neck and I felt her bend over, letting her hair fall over my face. She kissed my forehead and my ears with small wet nips. "Relax, Catherine, just keep breathing and open." I gritted my teeth with embarrassment, but she was queen or a witch. Her voice like apricot, like the taste of fruit. When she ran her hands over me gently, I melted and softened. I felt Matt thrusting and I cried out. Stiff and rough, filling me. Then Elena's finger on my clit, circling. The world spun and shook faster and faster until nothing existed. "Please, please, please," I stammered, and let go.

We sorted ourselves out and lay gazing at the wall. Elena nudged me. "You can take a shower if you want. My mom won't be back for an hour."

I did, snagging a fluffy towel from the closet and lingering under the water, massaging my scalp. Not thinking. Then thinking, Oh my God, Oh my God. When I went back to the bedroom, she and Matt were huddled under the blankets, talking.

"Catherine, you're a little goddess. Come here." She raised her head from her prone position to smooch me on the lips. "Matt and I had the time of our lives."

I nodded. "Thanks," I muttered. "Me too." My life had just begun.

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