First Kiss

There really is nothing like one, is there? I vividly remember my very first kiss. I was 15 years old, and desperately in love with K. I don’t even know why; he wasn’t that good looking, and though he was fairly popular and talented, it’s not like he had girls falling all over him. But I had met him, locked in on him, and said to myself “He’s the one.” I couldn’t help myself, I was in a hopeless puddle whenever I was around him, and it soon became obvious.



Here’s the thing – when I was 15, I was hawt. And it was the first time I had been. I was a pudgy kid, but that summer, I lost weight, grew a few inches, spent my summer money on an expensive haircut…and really. I looked head-turning good, and I enjoyed it. I had one guy follow me out of the grocery store, get my tag #, and send me flowers a few hours later. Strangers used to stop me to tell me how pretty I was. It used to piss my friends off. I say this not to brag, but to establish my hotness at the time. Because K. refused to fall in love with me.



And did I mention how pretty I was? He didn’t deny that. He liked me. He was attracted to me, thought I was beautiful. But he didn’t love me.



He was my first kiss. It was during a football game my sophomore year in high school. I remember it was cold. We were holding hands, and we walked out to his parents’ car, borrowed for the night. We sat in the car, waiting for the heat to kick in and listening to the radio. It was on an AM country music station, because that’s where he worked after school as a DJ, but I hated the music. I didn’t say anything, though. I didn’t want to say anything bad, anything that might irritate him. It seemed like I was always irritating him. We had been holding hands as we walked, and I can still remember the smell of the cologne he must have splashed on earlier, clinging to my hands. I have no idea what the scent was, but to this day I think of him when I smell it.



We were quiet for a few minutes, and I could tell that was irritating him. So I think I nervously tried to make small talk, and I remember him asking me what I thought would happen when I got in the car with him. He reached out and pulled me to him, and I was trembling so hard he was startled, he thought something was wrong with me. I convinced him no, there wasn’t, I was just a little nervous, and he kissed me. Lips only at first, then adding his tongue.



I was lost.



I swear, I think my heart stopped beating. That, that feeling right there, at that instant, with that first kiss, with him….is the most aroused I’ve ever been. Ever. I loved him and wanted him with all my heart. With every fiber of my being. I would eventually give him my virginity. He was my first everything. My first kiss, my first lover, my first love. I was crazy in love with him. And my innocent, teenage, romance novel reading heart really thought he was just being stubborn, and would one day admit how much he loved me, and we would live happily ever after.



But he didn’t love me, and he never would. And though we would continue to stay in touch, and sleep together occasionally, and even joke about having a baby together, for the next 20 years, one day he called to tell me he was getting married, and we would no longer be friends. I hear he and his wife have a baby boy now, and I’m happy for him, but it still gives me a twinge, I can’t lie.



I wouldn’t trade any of it. The memory of that first kiss is priceless to me, and never fails to make me smile.Every first kiss I’ve had since then has been measured against it, and none have matched up. I keep hoping, though. I want that intensity, the rubbery feeling in my body, that heat, my heart beating through my chest, barely able to breathe…yeah. I want that first kiss feeling again, and I know it’s out there somewhere.