I pulled up to her apartment building in the January afternoon sun. The heavy blanket of snow reflected the sun and gave everything a soft look. Her building was brown and rundown. I checked the note I had scribbled down at the University Library after I called her. I was to go to number 3. I looked at the building and saw the door marked 3 on the second floor. I climbed the stairs through the section cleared by foot traffic.

At 3 I stood there. I took a deep nervous breath unsure of what I was really doing there.

I was 18, nearly 19, in January of 2002. I had long shaggy hair, a short scruffy goatee, and I was the only person who had ever touched my penis with the intention of getting me off. I’d graduated High School seven months earlier. I’d had one girlfriend. One pseudo-girlfriend I’d been a needy weirdo over. One girl who had been interested in me until I stood her up and then tried to make up for it by stalking her. And one relationship that lasted about 10 hours that crumbled two days later under the weight of her past experience and my over-excitement. In all of that I’d only ever even made out with the girlfriend and that was awkward.

Put simply, I was 18, scruffy, and had zero sexual experience beyond porn. That is, if you count porn. I would really like to count porn for the sake of my own ego.

The encounter had started back in November as one of those jokes you don’t mean unless the other person is up for it. This time I didn’t make the joke. She did.

She was the woman who worked in the comic book shop. I’d been visiting it for years, through multiple locations. We’d known each other for several years and chatted several times. She liked heavy metal and could talk comics and had the sort of “I’m cool but don’t you dare fuck with me” attitude that is appealing to a nerd hiding under long hair and a biker jacket. She also wore sunglasses all the time. There were several explanations for the glasses that I never entirely believed. It added a little bit of mystery. I had masturbated while thinking about her a few times.

Then, she made the joke.

We’d been talking and she lead me over to the part of the counter where they kept the adult anime under glass. “It’s hilarious. He’s got this giant pre-hensile cock.” She told me pointing at the video under the glass.

I didn’t care much for anime and feigned interest, “yeah, that’s fucked up.”

“You should come by and watch it with me some time.” She said.

Pause, did she just ask me to watch porn with her? “Yeah, I guess. That would be fun.”

The conversation diverted a bit from there and I pondered the prospect for the next month and a half. I kept going in and she was a bit more forward and I asked myself if I wanted to go forward with it.

She’d known me since I was 13. I knew her two kids. She was the comic book shop woman. She was 11 years older than me. I was a virgin. I over-thought all of this.

Then, one of our conversations in the shop turned again to the prospect of hooking up. “I’m not looking for a boyfriend.”

“I’m not interested in a girlfriend.” I replied, which wasn’t true, I just wasn’t interested in a girlfriend with two kids. Plus my romantic sights were still set on Tara, that unattainable girl from High School I had invested so many young silly romantic notions in who I had become rather good friends with recently. As a side note for the romantically inclined: that never amounted to anything.

She gave me her phone number and told me she had Thursday off. That worked for me as I had no Thursday classes. I took the phone number with me when I went to the College library to do research on Thursday. I didn’t have a cellphone back then and I felt uncomfortable calling her from my parents’ house, where I was living at the time.

I called her and we arranged to get together at 1. Her kids were supposed to be home from school by 3 and I needed to pick up my brother after 2. We would have a little more than an hour.

At 1 I stood in front of her door, number 3. I took a nervous breath and rang the bell. The door cracked open carefully and when she saw it was me she opened it wider. She had a colorful thin robe on. She had a cigarette in one hand and she squinted in the sunlight. This was the first time I’d seen her without her glasses. She had an attractive face but there was something odd.

I wasn’t entirely sure what it was about her face at first. Something was missing. Something minor.

I stepped inside. The curtains were drawn, letting only a little light in, she shut the door behind me and gave me a peck to welcome me. She showed me her place and I noticed three things.

First, I noticed that the robe was the only thing she was wearing. Second, I noticed that she had no eyebrows. That was what was missing from her face. No eyebrows. Third, I noticed that she had a hole in one of her teeth. I can’t recall ever noticing this before but she had a hole, like someone had taken a hole puncher—the kind you use for paper—and punched a hole through her tooth. I have no idea how that can happen to a tooth.

I got over it and we started to get to what I was there for. We kissed. She tasted like an ashtray. I did my best to ignore this as I opened her robe and fondled her.

Her bed was right there in the living room. She’d given the two rooms of the apartment to her kids. I put the whole geography out of my mind as she put out her cigarette and we made our way to the bed.

“I just wanted to tell you that, I’ve never, you know …” I said quietly and not without some shame. In my head I knew there was nothing really to be ashamed of but we are all slaves to the cultural programming.

“It’s okay, honey, I figured…” She pulled me down and we spent some time with her naked and me still clothed on the bed. This started as kissing and then I moved down her body. There was one thing I was absolutely determined to do that day, other than standard penis-in-vagina sex, and that was eat her out.

I’d had this idea, this plan in my head, that that was the optimal way a good sensitive guy would start out sex. So, I went for it. I made my way from her mouth, down her breasts, to her pussy and I tasted it.

It tasted better than her mouth. I stayed there awhile and she got very very wet. I’d like to think that was not entirely my saliva but that I was having an effect. She bucked a bit and after awhile insisted that I get naked and fuck her.

I stripped down and got to it. She was tiny and feisty and I shifted her up and down and tried a couple of different angles but maintained a mostly missionary position. She tried to get on top and I turned over for her. It was interesting but at the time I just was not into what she was doing. So, I flipped her back onto her back.

After awhile I noticed I wasn’t getting anywhere near climaxing. I knew what it felt like when I was near. I’d jerked off enough times to know. There was nothing coming. It was odd. I was hard as a rock and enjoying the wet, warm, enveloping sensation of her pussy around my dick but I was nowhere near a climax. I kept at it.

I started noticing the lack of eyebrows again. Her features would soften with moans and there would be that odd empty space between her eye sockets and hairline. I tried not to think about it but I did find myself wondering how someone would find themselves with no eyebrows.

After awhile we were both tired. She smiled and complimented me. I looked at the time and realized that it being 2:15 I was going to be late picking up my brother from school.

As I got dressed she smiled, she giggled a bit, and she made a joke or two about not telling her boss, the comic shop owner. She then suggested that her boys would probably be staying with her sister Saturday night and I should call her. I said that that would be cool and left.

I walked around the next few days with a proud swagger followed by an ashamed “I hope no one can tell” voice in the back of my head. I did go see her that Saturday Night. That night lasted longer but I still didn’t climax or even get particularly close to it. I saw her again a few more times at the comic shop and thought about calling her again a few times.

Eventually, I was too busy to go the comic shop and fell mostly out of touch. When I did see her again a few years later I felt awkward and I think it showed. I don’t think she cared. We’d both gotten what we’d wanted out of the encounters.

I didn’t climax with someone else until I was back with that one girlfriend I’d had during high school. I’d like to think that that has something to do with her being special. I think that there’s probably a less romantic and more biological reason behind that. Perhaps more psychological.

That Saturday, a few hours before I went to see her again, I cut off my long hair. I’d been growing my hair for about 4 years. I’d had some trouble getting work  and I decided that that was a weekend for some changes. I took some direction with my life for the rest of that year and 2002 and most of 2003 were good years. That Thursday wasn’t by any means the cause of any of it but it was definitely part of it and part of the beginning of it.