First Time
by Nicholas Finch
I waited for Mike in the parking lot the entire time. Afterwards we drove off. The girl receded into a glare from the motel lights behind us. Soon those were gone too. I asked Mike how it was. He said it was strange. The room was small and smelt like smoke. She made him pay up front. He was on top at first but it felt wrong. Then she straddled him. Forrest Gump was playing on the TV in front of the bed. Mike was compelled to watch parts of it. She was thin, he said, very thin. They kissed for the first time after 15 minutes or so. He felt better for it, but could taste cigarettes. Mike likened her lips to smooth strips of rubber. She was into it, he thought. She might’ve said that she loved him, though that could have been something he heard from the TV. He couldn’t orgasm. It felt good but not in that way. Mike supposed he was more so just going through the motions. He said it was as though he was the only one there and she was just watching, or that she was there but somewhere else at the same time. She moaned, he said, but not in the way he thought someone would during sex. I asked what it sounded like. He said like garbled gasps for breath. I asked him if he was at all close. He hesitated before saying yes, once. And what happened? I asked. He replied: all I could think of was Lieutenant Dan, legless, floating in the ocean, keeping his head above the water, and what it would be like if all my friends died. Lieutenant Dan must’ve been lonely as hell in that ocean, he said, that’s how she must’ve felt in the room with me.
What was her name? I asked.
I don’t remember, he replied.
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The Molotov Cocktail 