BELLY
This is actually happening, I keep telling myself. You aren't dreaming, this is REAL.
I had always imagined what my first time with Conrad would be like. The number of AP French class periods I spent during high school just daydreaming about us in the sand at Cousins, in my future dorm room, in his dorm room, or wherever else my cruel imagination took me is unreal.
When he proposed to me at Cousins, I thought I would be ready to lose my virginity. Yes, at the ripe old age of 25, I had still hadn't had sex. But even when I was in college, during my short-lived flings with guys from my classes or who lived near my dorm, no matter how close I thought we would get to...doing it, I think a part of me was always saving that experience in hopes that I would somehow, magically, get to share it with Conrad.
But even after I said yes on that perfect day and he carried me all the way back to the beach house, my legs wrapped around his waist, I knew in my heart that I still wasn't really ready to give such a big part of myself away. It wasn't that I didn't trust him, but that I didn't trust myself to be able to handle it if I did something wrong and he up and left again. I knew, deep in my heart, that if he left this time, I wouldn't have it in me to chase after him again.
He had laid me down on the couch in the living room and lowered himself on above me, kissing me deeply as he cradled my face in his hands. When his hand started to inch down my neck and ever-so-slowly even lower, reaching my chest, gradually traveling down to my stomach, I panicked. I pulled away—the overloading serotonins in my brain cussing me out while I did so—sat up, and crossed my arms across my chest self-consciously.
Conrad's eyebrows crunched together in both confusion and hurt. "What's wrong?" he asked, breathing slightly harder than he was five minutes ago.
My eyes started to tear up a little, because I had no idea how to tell him that I simply wasn't ready. If I did, he would ask why, and that was an explanation I did not want provide.
Wiping my eyes quickly as he rushed over next to me and held my face in his hands, he ran his concerned eyes all over my face. Slowly, he breathes, "Hey, hey, hey. What happened?" while brushing tendrils of hair off of my face.
I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, whispering, "I don't think I'm...I'm not ready yet."
A look of understanding flooded his face, and he smiled the smallest smile and leaned his forehead in to rest against mine, closing his eyes. Still taking ragged breaths, he whispered, "I know it's scary, Belly. And you know I would never force you to do something you don't want to. You know that, right?" he asked, his eyes awaiting an answer.
I nodded quickly. "Of course I know that, Con. It's not you," I paused, before continuing. "It's just...you know that I've never had...you know."
At this, he grinned. "Belly, sex isn't a bad word," he said, brushing his hair back. He took a pause to put his snotty doctor voice on and continued, "It's an essential process of reproduction for mammals that is the sole reason for our existence and the possibility of future generations." By now, I had begun to laugh and shove his arm, crinkling my nose in disgust. That was one of the many things I loved about him: how he was never ashamed to flaunt his brains, in a funny way or not, around me. He used to be, especially when it came to the various quirky hobbies he had as a kid, but he's learned by now that I love him for his quirks.
Leaning his head on his arm, which rested on the couch, he reached over and traced a finger over my cheekbone, his touch light as a feather. His voice grew more serious as he said, "Okay, but jokes aside, why did it make you so scared?"
I wiped the tear trails from my cheeks and took his hand from my cheek, running my thumb over his fingers as I started to explain. "The reason why I still haven't...lost my virginity is because, well," I paused to take a deep breath, mentally pushing myself to keep talking, "even though at some point I thought it was even more distant than the most distant of possibilities that you would ever see me the way I saw you, I could never really do it with anyone else and have it feel as...right. It's always felt to me like if losing my virginity was going to be the perfect, ethereal moment that all of my books always talked about, it would only ever be that with you."
Conrad didn't say anything for a minute, and simply looked at me. There was no specific emotion in his expression, and it was his signature, perfected poker face that I have come to both love and hate. After a few moments, he took my hand, closed his eyes as he planted a lingering kiss on it, and tugged it so that I would turn around and lay my head on his lap. When I did, he quietly said, "Close your eyes. I can't say what I'm about to say if you keep distracting me with your eyes."
I smiled, a bit nervously, and did as he asked. When I heard his voice from above me, he began to say, "I lost my virginity when I was seventeen. It was to this girl who worked at the restaurant I was waiting tables at for a year. Not," he said quickly as I opened my mouth to ask, "the restaurant from that summer. It was someplace else." I closed my eyes again, contented. For now. "The whole thing was honestly so stupidly cliché. I didn't know her that well at all, but at the time I liked how she was so ready to do anything. Like if I asked her if she was down go cliff diving that very moment, she would say yes. Now, I remember that and it seems so stupidly impulsive. But anyways, we had snuck into the back room of the kitchen, where nobody ever went because it always smelled like stale crackers. And it was really just a blur, if I'm being honest. It started and it ended, and she smiled, said she'd see me around, and left. I went home and asked myself what the fuck just happened, and then went to bed."
"But," he continued, "that was the first and last time I had done it with a girl. Because the next summer, I realized what a fucktard I was being by letting all of these other guys swoop in at the chance of being with you when that was all I really wanted. So, just like you, I haven't felt the, I don't know, the click that you feel when you know you're doing it with someone you love. Until about ten minutes ago," he added, "when I literally would not be able to remember my name if my life depended on it."
My mind was in two different places after he finished. A, he had just dropped the L-bomb and didn't really stop to acknowledge it. I saw his face when he brushed over it, though: he realized it, too. And B, I had no idea that he had practically been keeping celibate since his first time. The thought made me weirdly happy and warm inside.
I smiled, looked down, and said, "Say it again."
He smiled a small smile and tilted my chin up so I faced him before saying, "I love you, Belly. I really do." And I swear, I have never seen that man be more genuine in his life.
I leaned in and kissed him, long and deep. Pulling away, I whispered to him, "I love you, Conrad."
He closed his eyes and breathed in deep before softly saying, "I don't know how to do this. I don't know how to...love you the way you deserve." He paused as I got ready to object before adding quickly, "I knew you'd say something against it, but it's true, and you and I both know it. You're still scared that I'm gonna leave without telling anyone like I did that summer, and I don't blame you for it. But," he continued, taking a deep breath, "I promise you, I'm not going anywhere. I haven't earned that trust from you yet, but I will. I'll learn, we'll learn, together."
So now, when he rolls on top of me and starts tangling his hand in my hair while using his other hand to trace the side of my body, my heart rate started to speed up for reasons other than how...excited I was getting.
He looks down at me, breathing heavily, his eyes searching mine for permission. I nod frantically, not wanting him to stop doing whatever he was doing. He comes back down and kisses me deeply, as if he is trying to convey this message that was buried deep inside of him. And strangely enough, I understood exactly what he was trying to tell me. This man wasn't going to leave me.
When we connected, body and soul, it was perfect. And with each breath of each others' that we took, we gave each other a tiny piece of our hearts. Each perfect moment after the next reminded me that no matter what happened, I would always be here for Conrad, just willing to travel endlessly around those infinite curves for him.