WHAT I ACTUALLY AM
It was our first date and he suggested we go swimming. I was wearing matte lipstick and a fuck-ton of eyeliner. I also had my period. I said, Fuck it, why not? We took the long way to the lake, his hand on my knee the whole time. I thought that was a brave move, the hand on my knee. Like he knew things that I didn’t. Like I would never know anything, me, the daughter of an office administrator, with my bad haircut and my full tampon and my nonexistent sexual past. It was about to rain, but that didn’t stop him from doing a cannonball off the dock. I was wearing white shorts and a long-sleeved shirt. I didn’t want to turn around for fear I had leaked on the drive. Actually, I knew I had leaked on the drive. There was a dot the size of a dime on the seat, and it was red. He said, Are you coming in or what?
On the way home he told me that he’s always had a crush on me. Since grade school, he said. I did that eye roll thing that over-confident girls do, a way to make them look relaxed, unconcerned. He asked if I wanted to go back to his house. To dry off, he said. There were towels in the backseat but I knew what he meant. It was the first time a guy wanted to fuck me, so I said, Sure.
In his room I took off my shorts and pulled out my tampon, wrapped it in computer paper from his printer and stuffed it in the trash. He was in the bathroom, probably trimming his pubes. He didn’t offer me anything—no water, no snack, not even a pair of his basketball shorts to wear while my stained ones dried. I think he knew I had my period, but he didn’t seem to care. I thought that was brave, too. A sixteen-year-old boy unafraid of the thick, slimy red mucus flowing from between my legs. Maybe, maybe he was a keeper. I wiped myself up with an old sock, and tucked it in the trash beneath the tampon. I figured he would be back any minute, and thought I should sprawl out on his bed, or maybe stand against his closet door looking playful, the way I’ve seen other girls do it the locker room, reimagining their Saturday nights. I decided lying across his bed worked better for me, and would help stop the bleeding. I waited a long time, thinking about things I’d seen in magazines, on TV, that would make me wet, my fingers dialing my clit. I was worried I wouldn’t be wet enough for him to slide in. Charlene, this girl on my field hockey team, told me sometimes that happens, and that it’s really embarrassing. I did this for so long, what felt like hours, that I eventually fell asleep.
His dad woke me up. His dad opened the door, and, startled by the sight of me, tossed the kitchen towel he was wiping his hands with at my crotch. He cleared his throat and said, Um, I think it’s time for you to go. I was coming out a dream where I didn’t have my period, where I was older, hotter, more sure of myself. The sheets saturated beneath me, I, not really understanding what was happening, makeup stained in patches on my face from the lake, said, Baby come to bed, the way I’d heard it said in a thousand fictionalized scenarios. There was a second, just a second, where I think he thought about it. There was a second where I thought about it, too. What it would be like with a dad. That fantasy everyone always talks about. There was a second where we were the only two people in the world, and it felt good, it felt right. I wanted it to last forever. But he shut the door.
I told Charlene this story, and she told everyone else. I became the girl that fucked Danny Stewart’s dad. Danny told all his friends that I was so boring, so ugly, that he forgot he left me in his room. That he only took me swimming because he wanted to see what I looked like with no makeup on, and that I was just as nasty as he expected. Two years later, at graduation, when I asked people to sign my yearbook, they wrote DAD-FUCKER, and SLUT, instead of, hope you have a good summer, or, I’m going to miss you! The worst part of all of this is that I didn’t even fuck him. That I’m still a virgin. That I regret it. That I’d rather be what everyone wants me to be, than what I actually am.