took a drag of her cigarette that put a twinkle in my eye and a bulge in my trousers. That rare combination of sexy voice, gorgeous face, swinging sweater puppets, and a somewhat morally casual attitude had my heart racing when we found ourselves somehow alone in Sue Kootz’s room. I believe she could sense my innocence as she began questioning me in a very suggestive way.
“Have you ever had sex before?” she purred.
“No,” I quickly gulped, “have you?”
She smiled as she sexily replied, “Lots of times.” Her questioning wasn’t over yet. “How about oral sex-has a woman ever done that to you?”
She was smiling seductively as I squirmed on Sue’s bed. I’d heard my friends talk about it, and I’d seen Kay Parker perform it, and from all indications, I felt it was something that I wanted to be a part of. “No,” I replied, “how about you, have you ever done it to a man?”
“Oh yeah,” came her sex kitten answer.
I pressed further, sensing what she was interested in. Yeah, I could smell what this chick was cooking. “Do you like it?” I had the nerve to say, with my right eye squinted like the Clint Eastwood poster I had hanging on my dormitory wall.
“Love it,” she simply said, as she snuggled up next to me, with a hand on my thigh and her blouse dropping down at the neck so that I was afforded a view of what looked to be paradise. Her next words were ones that I’d thought I’d never hear-“Can I kiss you?”
Man, this was too good to be true. I really felt that this could be my one way ticket out of the “V-Club” which, along with Chris Walker and John Ambria, I’d been a card-carrying member of for all my life. No doubt about it, this was the moment of truth. I leaned in and proceeded to give her the worst kiss in the history of Cortland, maybe even in all of the seven valley region. It was a kiss all right, but a kiss with no parted lips, no probing tongue-not even any real pressure behind it. Foreign soccer players kissed each other with more passion after scoring a goal. I’d blown it-underneath all the amusing anecdotes and leftover summer tan and (at that time) perfect smile, I was really just a dork, and she’d seen right through me. In a matter of moments, she too was gone, gone, all gone.
Actually, Amy would go on to be responsible for some of my finest passionate moments-it’s too bad that she wasn’t present while they were happening.
Kathy was different, though. I didn’t judge her by the stretching in my slacks, but rather how much fun I had talking to her. Her eyes would light up, and she would literally beam when I talked to her. It didn’t matter to me that she was my friend Kevin’s former girlfriend, and that he’d dropped her like a bad habit-I would be there to pick her up. She was too good for Kevin anyway. I could talk to her for hours, and I did so on that fateful evening. It also didn’t matter that she was slightly intoxicated and that the intoxication made walking quite difficult for her. I was there for that too. “Lean on me,” I told her, “when you’re not strong, I’ll be your friend, I’ll help you carry on. Just call on me, Kathy, and I’ll lend a hand.” Well, maybe those weren’t my words exactly, but I’m sure they were pretty damn romantic.
The downtown area in Cortland was at the bottom of a hill that led to the campus. Kathy’s dorm was directly at the top of the hill, and I accompanied her on the walk home, while flurries of snow fell softly. Without warning, her cold little hand was in mine, and despite the winter chill, I started to sweat, because, believe it or not, I’d never been that far before. But Kathy’s presence calmed me down, because, after all, this wasn’t the same girl I was clumsily going to grope at the end of our stroll-she was my Kathy, dammit, and she was all I’d ever wanted in a girl.
When we got to her dorm, we talked for a few more minutes. I wasn’t about to weasel my way into her room,