The Best She Ever Had

    I asked Jeff to tell me more about Carrie. The wind carried voices from the cafe brunchers onto our beach spot, but I could pull another towel over my head and listen only to him.
    “Well, she said a lot of nice things about me— she’s... complimentary.”
    “Like what?” I imagined what she might say— “Mister, you have a very nice cock.” That’s what I would say to Jeff if I’d just had a one night stand with him: nice cock, beautiful hair.
    “She said... okay, this is embarrassing— she said, I was the best lover she’d ever had!”
    “You’re kidding!“
    “Yeah, incredible as it may seem...”
    “You know I don’t mean— ”
    We both buried our heads in the beach towel and laughed.
    “Yeah, I know what you mean,” he said, and nudged my crotch with his toe.
    I sat up in the sand so I could see him better. We were both struggling with  our straw hats in the wind.
     I decided to speculate. “Maybe what our friend said about her being so sexually inexperienced is true.”
    “But she’s thirty-two!”
    “Thirty-two-year-old sex today is what sixteen-year-old sex was in our day— just creeping out of their egg.”
    “Is it really that bad?”
    “Yeah, well think about it— if she was holding out through high school, and then ‘playing it safe’ in college, that doesn’t leave a lot of time for sodomy and wasted nights.”
    “That’s a shame... but then what about all those blow jobs she talked about? I guess it fits  though, doesn’t it?— She’s afraid of everything else.
    “Tell me that part again, about her first boyfriend.” I dug my toes into the sand until they hit the wet part.
    “She said she just broke up with her first real boyfriend, and that when they got together, she promised him a thousand blow jobs. She got up to seven hundred and forty-nine in three years.”
    “Seven hundred and forty-nine!" 
    "Yes!"
    "Now that seems like a magic number. Like, we'll never forget it now, and we've only heard it once. But I don’t see how she managed to keep track... I mean, I tried to do that, when I was first fucking, but every time I went to bed with someone new, I’d change my idea about what good sex was, or what love was, and then my old system didn’t make any sense.”
    “Well, maybe it’s easier with blow jobs, if that’s all you’re doing.”
    “But she didn’t come, going down on you, did she?”
    “No, of course not! It was hard for her to come, she kept trying to block me. She couldn’t believe I wouldn’t try to fuck her, trick her, and afterward she said she didn’t want to do that— and then when I went down on her, she didn’t think I really wanted to eat her— and she kept not believing, not believing, and all that made her orgasm  remote.”
    “I bet the women who actually get off giving head don't count the number... If you want to swallow cock all the time, if that makes you come, you aren’t competitive about it, you’re just hungry, right? I mean, who keeps track of how many times they eat their favorite meal?”
    Jeff dropped his voice. “She was kind of rare, you know— she swallowed everything, every drop.”
    “Oh god— that makes me feel like such an asshole— Jeff, that’s not so rare, I’ve just brainwashed you. I’m terrible.”
    “Is that so? You're the only one who's not swallowing? You should repent, then.”
    “I can’t, it’s too late. You know I don’t give a shit about blow jobs. But don’t you remember, when we were first together, I did the whole deep-throat number, sucked it all down, blah blah blah. That’s part of the BJ-macha thing, to show a guy what you’re made of."
    “I don’t remember any of that!”
    “See? I told you I was mediocre at it. Well, I didn't do it for that long, ‘cause we got so comfortable, and if you really only wanted blow jobs from me, the whole thing would have fallen apart after two dates.”
    “What did I want from you?” Jeff turned around and started tracing a circle in the small of my back.
    “You wanted me to be a good girl and come really hard for you!”
    “You’re such a good girl, then— ”
    “And you like to show me,  don’t you?
    “Is that rare?”
    “No! No! It’s not, it’s what practically everyone feels, and if they weren’t so insecure and doing their stupid little dance maneuvers, everybody would just take it for granted."
    I pulled off my sunhat and ducked my head against his chest. I didn't know if he could hear me talking into his heart. "When you fuck me, you know I feel it, and I know you feel me giving it up to you, and that’s what it’s all about; it’s not so complicated!”
    He lifted my head up. “Do you want to stamp your foot now?”
    “I’m going to stamp it real hard!”
    “You don’t have to get mad at Carrie— ”
    “I’m not, I’m practically praying for her, it’s just the whole thing that makes me mad—all these BJ queens who can’t come, won’t come. One day they’ll wanna have a baby, and after that, all their competition and affection will go to their children and they’ll never wanna have sex again. The blow-job queen of today is the celibate of tomorrow. You better teach Carrie something about her sexual self-interest before it’s too late.”
    “You could teach her, too— ”
    “She’s not attracted to me!”
    “You don't  know that— ”
    “Oh c’mon! Yes I do, she’s not the least bit queer. And if she ever does anything with a girl, it’s going to be with another little flower like herself, not some predatory old bag.”
    Jeff leaned over and bit my ass cheek.
    “Ouch! Fuck you! You know what I’m talking about. I am not convincing some squeamish straight girl into accepting my ministrations. Talk about humiliating.”
    “You’re making an awful lot of assumptions.”
    “Yeah, well, tell her I want the, uh, two hundred... and fifty-one blow jobs she forgot to give her ex. I’ll strap on my biggest tool.”
    “But I wanna do that part.”
    “You’re a greedy little pig. What I wanna know is, when are you going to see her next?”
    “I don’t know, I can’t see her this week, and she can’t see me next week, and I don't even know what week it is after that, but she really wants to get together.”
     “That's so crippled! When I found anyone who qualified as the ‘best lover I ever had,’ I was driving all night to see them after a twelve-hour shift, I was hitching rides, telling lies, Jesus Christ! If she’s telling the truth, you’re in for it.”
    “That’s right, you used to drive to Nevada from San Francisco to see me.”
    “Every week, then every three days— ”
    “Every day you weren’t working.”
    Well, that’s what I mean, why can’t she just come up and see you for one fucking night? She only lives an hour away, and you’re the one who has a kid and a day job. Is she afraid of meeting me?”
    “That’s probably part of it.”
    “Have you told her we lead the life of polyamorous luxury?”
    “I think this openness is sort of new to her. She asked what it would be like.”
    “And what did you say?”
    “I said she might get devoured like a little bunny.”
    “Oh my god, did that make her scream?”
    “Yes!”
    “You shouldn’t do that— ”
    “But it’s her not-so-secret secret fear!”
    “Well, I prefer to play hard to get. I prefer to demonstrate that I don’t give a shit! You should really tell her it’s like having a friend over that you spend some time alone with.”
    “Well, that is what it’s like, exactly, but I can’t just convince her of that by saying it, she has to be here for a few minutes and see for herself.”
    “Christ, I feel like the Addams family sometimes... 'Good evening, we’re non-monogamous... Can Pugsly get you a drink'?”
    I pushed my glasses up my nose; they kept slipping. “I’m getting burnt— we have to find some shade.”
    “You can have my shirt.”
    “Baby...”
    Jeff covered me in a white surfer competition T-shirt that said Stand Tall, Be Proud.
    “I'm embarrassed to be seen with this kind of propaganda on my chest. I wanna replace this slogan with something like, Lay Down, Seek Humility.”
    “How about Lay Down, Deliver 749 Blow Jobs?”
    “I can’t get over what a magic number that is! It’s because it ends in nine, I think; it sounds like something unfinished.” I pulled the sweatshirt hood over my face.
    “Maybe seven hundred and forty-nine is just approximate.”
    “I don't think so— I think she has a feeling for numbers, and for signs, and even when she has more sexual experiences, she’ll still have an intuition about the cycles of things, the beauty of repetition.
    "Jeff, when you were in your twenties, who would you say was ‘the best lover you ever had’?”
    “Why my twenties?”
    “Because I’m not trying to be coy, and that was before I met you. I want you to think back to that point; what would you have said?”
    “The best lover... that’s really hard.”
    I poked a hole in the sand with my finger until I hit the a piece of glass. It was hard to think about. I flipped through my own memories like a fan of cards that I couldn’t pick from.
    Jeff said something first. “You know, even though Marie was my first lover, in junior high, and we didn’t have intercourse, she was really into sex, and we had a lot of it.”
    “I know, I can't believe the things you guys did under the guise of protecting her virginity.”
    “Everyone was Polish Catholic, you know why. We were so in love, and it was so intense, I didn’t even go out with another girl for the rest of high school after she dumped me.”
    “You know what?" I held up the piece of  green glass like evidence. "I think that when you’re young, the first time you have sex, when it doesn't hurt, and you actually come— which is more of a girl thing, I know— and there isn't some awful black cloud hanging over you— that sex automatically becomes ‘the best sex’— ‘the best lover’ you ever had. The fact that it’s even reasonably good is incredible when you’ve never known that feelings before. When you get older— especially as you get older—  the memory just gets more golden.”
    “That’s what I’m saying, that even though I had a lot of deep experiences, and more variety, later— ”
    “Exactly, but it’s not the same then, you’re not thinking, ‘Oh, this is the best,’ because  you’re in the moment, and it’s unique, and it's not fair to make comparisons anymore.
    "I remember when I first had two boyfriends at the same time, and they both blew my mind, and I felt so guilty at the time, because I couldn't decide who was the ‘best.’ They both were my mentors; I loved them— I couldn't give either of them up.”
    “Are you talking about Sam?”
    “And Cary, both of them... I was seventeen! When I met Sam, he was the one who said, ‘Go ahead, play with your clit'— and of course I came really hard, and then I asked him, ‘Are you mad at me?’ and he laughed, like the kind of laugh with tears in your eyes, because it must have been so endearing. That was my first inkling that my lover would get off because I was hot, not because I was making him hot. Sam was the ‘set your chickens free!’ type. He'd say, ‘Oh, stop shaving your legs, Susie,’ and sometimes he’d even get annoyed with me, like ‘Hey, you’re seventeen-year-old cherrycake, everyone wants to fuck you no matter what you look like.'”
    “He was jealous of you, then.”
    “You’re right, he was, because he used to hustle himself, and he was so matter-of-fact about what men are looking for, and he felt like he was already past his prime at twenty. Men are so much harder on other men, when it comes to sex. Like, they’d fuck any old girl, but another man has to be perfect.”
    “Maybe women are already perfect.”
    “Yeah, right, we all bathe in seven-hundred-and-forty-nine-like luminescence. It wasn't like that. My other lover, Cary, was so different— he didn’t say a lot, but he just ate me up with a look. He seemed to read my cunt, or maybe I just didn’t realize that all my secrets weren’t so unusual.”
    “What secrets?”
    “You already know them, too, it’s just knowing what happens when a woman gets aroused, when you can torture her... just starting to push your cock in, and then pull it back, and feel her with your fingers, how she’s getting puffier and puffier.”
    “Like a little catcher’s mitt—”
    “Yeah, and then her clit head starts to disappear up her pussy lips, and the cream is just getting creamier—”
    “And then you nail her.”
    “Finally, yeah. God, just talking about it, my cunt is spreading rings— no, no, don't check me, trust me, I wanna finish telling you this, because I’m just figuring it out now.     "I didn't realize that Cary had learned from a lot of women; I thought it was all about me and him. Because he said so little, I thought he’d made up my whole orgasm all by himself, whereas Sam made me talk to him, which shamed me but kind of liberated me in the next five minutes, if you know what I mean.”
    “So did you ever give one of them up ?”
    “No, I didn’t, because at that time, everyone was non-monogamous, and we were all fucking other people, and we were all fomenting a revolution, and I just thought we’d always keep coming back together. When Cary didn't follow me to Pittsburgh, and Sam moved to Seattle and got on his high horse about a new girlfriend, I was really shocked. And I had such bad sex in back East, I started to wonder if everyone was a lost cause past Barstow.
    "My heart just broke one day, and I think that was the moment—that was it—that was the first time I ever said to myself, ‘That was the best sex I ever had.’ I cried my heart out. I only said it because it was gone, it was over, and I was just left a wreck. Maybe the 'best lover you ever; had is the first one who makes you wanna die.”
    “Like Marie with me.” Jeff looked kind of crinkly.
    “Oh, baby, don’t... I bet she’s the one crying now.”
    “I wouldn’t want her to cry, she’s had such hard time.”
    “Well, now she’s a Born-Again.”
    “I wish you could meet her.”
    “I wish I could meet Sam and Cary again. I did see Sam a few years ago, at a wedding, and it kind of freaked me out. He acted scandalized by me, like I was some kind of freak, and it took all I could do to bite my tongue and not spoil that little reception by saying, ‘Hey Sam, do you ever miss your old days whoring on Dupont Circle?’ Damn it, I thought he'd always know more about sex than me.”
    “But you grew up ...”
    “Yeah—Into an old bag that knows more than he does!”
    "Shut up!"
    “An old bag with juicy fruit inside?”
    “Let me taste it.”
    “It’s got sand in it now.”
    “You’re fussy.”
    “You’re a slut. Call Carrie; tell her time waits for no blow-job queen!”
    “Are you going to be jealous, after all this?”
    "Maybe I will— just for the hell of it, just to see if it still has some bite.”
    “Sometimes your jealousy gets you in trouble.”
    “That’s the reckless thrill of it, but I haven't been swept out to sea yet.”
    “You know you are the best lover I’ve ever had.”
    The tide was coming in.
    “You don’t have to say that!”
    “But it’s true, you are.”
    “I love you—”
    “Shhhh... pick up the blankets.”
    “I do, you’re the something I’ll always have, I’ll always feel you inside of me, like nine million, nine thousand, ninety-nine, nine to infinity.”
    We kissed with our mouths open, and the sunblock on our faces stuck together. The water came up fast and pooled up around my ankles; I coudn't see if the towels were floating away. Jeff pushed aside my shirt and sucked one of my nipples like a caramel. I stared up at the sun and felt the whole bag of everything go pop— and disappear up, all the way up, into the sky.

Adapted from Mommy’s Little Girl, Thunder’s Mouth Press.