A giggle, the single condom changing hands in the fumbling dark. Clothes are removed with a feign of preparation, but nerves and anxiousness and our giddy stomachs don't allow us to dwell too long on matters of foreplay or forethought.
The dark and unfamiliarity of this bedroom add to the dizzy drunkenness, half on grocery-store vodka, and half on what evil indulgence we are about to partake in.
I don't remember the sloppy attempts at gentleness, but they must have existed. There is only the drowning pain and instant adrenaline, panic. He was trying his best to afford me comfort, to make me stop regretting, but the dark and the blood and the pain choked me until i pushed him off in haste, struggling to make it end.
I found the light switch and ended the terror. He sat on the navy sheets, pale and thin with fear of what horrors he had caused me, and I stood before him, stark and naked, but forgiving.
The next day, when the darkness and the alcohol had worn off, I felt like the foolish little girl that I was, and it would not be until several months after that he and I were able to abort our initial impressions of sex.
| 
