That was a bad time to be taking a sip of water, because I choke in surprise. “Condoms?” I ask, aghast at the suggestion.
“Pepper spray. Brass knuckles. A rape whistle.” Matilda lists off all these items easily, like they’re everyday things she carries around in her purse—and come to think of it, knowing Matilda, that’s probably very well the case. “Although I find it very suspicious that your mind would go immediately to condoms. You’re not thinking of sleeping with this man, are you?”
I consider the question. I am not going on this trip to try to sleep with Thad, nor do I think that’s a possibility anymore, frankly. We are way too different. I get that. I’ve accepted it. The mystique of the Red Unicorn has been well and truly dissolved. So I’m notactivelythinking about sleeping with him…
But in a nonactive, unintentional way…sure. Yes. Of course. I’vethoughtabout having sex with Thad, not because I plan on doing it, but because he’s still objectively handsome. And smells good. Just stating the facts. Sure, when he touches me I feel like I lose control of my motor functions. When his hand was on my thigh earlier in the evening, I fantasized about what would happen if he just kept moving it up, up, up… When I was straddling him in the car, our bodies pressed together, his hot breath on my skin, I was so aroused that it was physically uncomfortable.
But I’m not going to have sex with him. I got the memo. It’s not in the cards.
“This is not that kind of trip,” I say primly. “We are traveling together to find Dean, and that’s all. I’m not Thad’s type, and frankly, he’s not mine anymore, either. It’s all going to be strictly professional.”
Silence. Then Matilda groans. “Oh, God. You’re totally going to sleep with him. Well, at least you’ll get it out of your system, I suppose. I’ll drop some condoms off with you in the morning…”
She hangs up before I can deter her from this line of action. “We are not going to have sex,” I say aloud anyway, just to be clear to the universe or the CIA or whoever else might be listening that I know the score.
It would probably be a good idea to go to bed early, but I’m still waiting to hear back from some of my coworkers and want to try to get as much sorted tonight as possible. Plus I still need to pack more clothes after my load of washing finishes.
I guess I could always… No.
As soon as the thought enters my mind, I shut it down. Dr. Sandra and I have talked about this before—the irrational, knee-jerk flight response whenever I consider the possibility of…pleasuring myself.Masturbation. I even have a hard time allowing myself to think of the word, much less to contemplate the action. My body breaks out in a reflexive cold sweat, and I begin pacing the room just to get out some nervous energy.
The way I see it, the problem is this: I grew up my whole life knowing that my mother made a deal with God and I was supposed to be a nun when I got older. So all the normal shame I might be expected to feel about sex just from growing up in a strict religious household was amplified. If I were to let a boy kiss me, experiment with the bathtub faucet, or do anything even approaching acknowledgment of myself as a sexual being, I wasn’t just taking something from myself, I was taking something fromGod. That’s a lot of pressure for a teenage girl who was just experiencing totally natural urges.
And the issue is even worse now with pleasur—withmasturbation, because the rhetoric I heard growing up about sex itself has some loopholes: sex outside of marriage is taboo, but sex within marriage is fine and healthy and normal, so sex in and of itself isn’t inherentlybad.
Nowhere, anywhere, in all of my time in church was masturbation (there! I did it!) talked about as anything other than evil incarnate. Masturbation, according to everything I heard in Sunday school, was evil and self-indulgent andwrong. So even though I no longer believe I’ll go to hell for wanting to have sex, the taboo around touching myself has been harder to shake.
As I undress and get ready for bed, I try to talk it through with myself, like Dr. Sandra suggested in the past, even offering me a helpful metaphor: “Watching movies with your friends is a lot of fun, but your friends aren’t always available to watch a movie every time you feel like it. So what’re you supposed to do, just never watch a movie unless your friends can watch with you?”
Even though some time has passed since my earlier encounter with Thad, I still feel ramped up, energized, and—okay, I’ll use my big-girl words: horny. I’m horny.
Of course, being a thirty-one-year-old virgin, I’ve gotten pretty good at deflecting these feelings. If the possibility of sex is never on the table, you develop some tactics for channeling that energy elsewhere. In the past, I might’ve exercised, or done some baking or knitting. More recently I’ve been putting all my untapped horniness into my romance novel.
But I realize all at once, I don’t want to deflect. I don’t want to suppress these feelings. I want to feel sexy and desirable. I want to feelsatisfied.
I catch a glimpse of myself in the full-length mirror and do a double take. I’m halfway through getting out of my dinner clothes and into my pajamas, so I’m standing in the loose-fitting white tank that I like to sleep in and my underwear. My hair is still curled, my makeup still done.
With all my efforts to hide away my body, I haven’t allowed myself to really look at myself wearing so little clothing in a long time, and I’m surprised at how good I feel. Maybe it’s leftover endorphins from being so close to Thad in the car, after pretending to be his girlfriend and hearing my mom tell me she can seehe’s only after one thing—but looking at myself now, I feel…dare I say it…?
Sexy.
I know something that would make it even better. Moving to my bureau, I open the top drawer and find the item I had wrapped up and tucked away in the back: the red lace panties. Yes, I waited until I was sure Thad left the mall and went back to buy them. Yes, part of why I wanted them was knowing that he’d seen them and imagining that maybe he liked to imaginemewearing them. Yes, I am a repressed weirdo. Let’s move on.
I put on the red panties and apply some red lipstick that I’ve never been brave enough to wear out of the house, then check myself out in the mirror. Dr. Sandra has always encouraged me to try positive affirmations, so I give myself some now. Hot. Sexy. Desirable. Goddess.
And you know what? It works.
I am digging myself in a way that I haven’t done…ever. Why have I been hiding this sex goddess away under baggy clothes and no makeup? I feel the sudden reckless urge to share this hotness with the entire world.
…I’m not really going to, of course. I’m into myself, but I’m not an exhibitionist. Still, a fantasy is taking over, helping me lower some of my inhibitions, so I just kind of go with it. Pulling out my phone, I snap some pictures of myself, trying to look as enticing as possible. Some in the mirror, some on the bed. I pose, I pout, I make myself laugh at my own ridiculousness, but I also make myself feel good.
So here’s the fantasy: This version of me is much more sexy and confident, and Thad is someone I’m actually dating, not just someone who’s forced to keep me around. (And sure, I could substitute in someone else, but it’s easier to imagine Thad since I just saw him. There’s no other significance to him starring in my fantasy. Really.) I introduced him tonight to my parents as my actual boyfriend, and in the car we were making out, not wrestling over a phone with details about my brother’s credit card purchases.
Much sexier scenario so far, no? Thad and I haven’t had sex yet, and he’s trying to take it slow with me, so he makes himself go home, even though I tell him I’m ready, I want him, I need him. He’s left me all hot and bothered, so I decide to show him what he’s missing by sending him these pictures.
Of course that sends Thad running over, and when he shows up at my apartment, I convince him that we don’t need to wait anymore.
In reality, I’m lying on my bed now, eyes closed, thinking about Thad’s hand on my leg under the table, then our bodies pressed together in the car, his big, broad body flush against mine, with the same desperation and want… I’m running my hands over my body—my throat, my collarbone, then down over my tank top, cupping my breasts. My breath hitches as my hand—his hand—finds my nipple and teases it through the thin material. His other hand traces down my side, over my thighs, as I explore the sensation of each place, learning what I like best. Then he touches that urgent, aching place at my center, testing it—gliding, pinching, stroking.“You like that, don’t you, bad girl?” he rasps into my ear, breath hot, voice ragged with need, and?—
