Iam seeing the band in concert for the first time after hearing an advance tape of their new album, which I like a lot. Alex is wearing a white, rather sheer blouse and tattered jeans. The shirt hangs loosely around his hips. He has dark spectacles on. He doesn't sing; he growls. He reminds me of Jim Morrison.
A friend of his is in the audience. Alex introduces him and pulls him on the stage. Big Joe here is going to be a big star, he promises. Come on Joe, show us your rock star collagen smile.
I think it is clever of Alex to modify "smile" with "collagen." He must be pretty bright, I think.
Next, he reaches out to the audience and does a high five with a tall blond guy with dreadlocks and a red bandanna who looks a little like Alex. He is actually better looking than Alex, his features sharp, his skin smooth and clear. Alex minus the damage.
This is my little brother, he says as he pulls the lanky blond boy toward the stage. My fucking little brother. I guess he's not so little, he's got at least four inches on me. Height-wise, that is. I don't know about his pecker. Is there anyone here who's done a comparison?
Backstage after the show, Alex is sitting and drinking beer with some skinny frail-looking blonde woman-child at his side. At various intervals, she gets up and crosses the room to retrieve him more bottles of Bud. She is pretty, even natural-looking, surprising because most groupies aren't.
I bend over to talk to him. Can I catch you later? he asks. I kind of want to chill out after the concert.
I feel like an invasion. I realize that I am one. I am a journalist. I am not a groupie. I suddenly wish I could give up my job, except then I realize that I would never have met Alex if it hadn't been for my job. Besides, Kent is waiting outside. I should go.
Alex says, Look, I'll call you next week.
Will you really? I want to know.
I promise.
His hands are now under my skirt again. He touches me, fingers me over and over again, and I realize I am so wet. There is no way to explain how this happened. His idea of foreplay is taking his clothes off. And actually, neither one of us has any of our clothing off. He has hardly done anything to merit any sort of reaction from me besides a voice in my head that is saying, Don't do this. But my body is acting on its own and I am wondering what is it inside me, where is this mysterious place, this crazy hidden female thing that wants him so badly that I am wet without his doing anything. My body is begging for it.
At least it won't hurt.
My skirt is straight and tight. He pushes it inside-out up around my hips. He presses my thighs to the bed and I remember what all those years of ballet were for. He pulls the drawstring open and the sweats slip down on his hips and I almost gasp at the sight of him.
Alex, you don't want me to get pregnant, do you? I ask. I realize this is a very prosaic concern.
You won't get pregnant, he says, and I'm sure he is right.
So he fucks me. No matter how deep inside me he is, there seems to be inches more of him that still haven't penetrated. This doesn't feel particularly good, but it doesn't feel bad either. There is a spot, a small and sensitive spot that he bangs against as he moves back and forth and these incredible noises just come out of my mouth every time he hits it. It's not because it feels good. It's just because it feels at all. I don't know where I am on the pleasure-pain continuum.
He is sitting up on my hips the whole time. He never lies on top of me. I realize that one of the great joys of sex is the feeling of being pressed so close to the flesh that what separates me from him kind of disappears. The one reason I have always thought homosexuality is not natural is that women and men fit together, like a complicated jigsaw puzzle, when they have sex. Where you jut out, I recede, and so on. But right now I am being deprived of the part of sex I love the most because my shirt, my skirt, even my boots are still on and I cannot feel Alex tight against me.
It's hard to move in this skirt, l say.
You don't have to move, he answers.
He keeps pumping away, and after about a half-hour, it begins to hurt. My membrane has been stretched as far as it will go, and it's about to split like Saran Wrap on a jagged edge. I wish he would come already so that we could stop. But he doesn't.
Eventually, he pulls out of me without any warning and I am relieved. This is when the pain really starts because the accompanying pleasure stops and I am left with a womb too small and too tight for all it has been filled with and emptied of. Alex falls on his back on the bed. His head strikes the pillow like a match and he curls up to go to sleep.
better looking than Alex, his features sharp, his skin smooth and clear. Alex minus the damage.
this mysterious place, this crazy hidden female thing that wants him so badly that I am wet without his doing anything. My body is begging for it.
