Asa

 

As I recovered from one of the most intense orgasms of my life, I pulled back from Corinne and saw the tears glistening in her eyes. At first I wondered if I had hurt her, but we had been going for a long while, and there had been no sign of that before. Then, all of a sudden, a whole lot of things seemed to fall into place in my mind. I had been so attracted to Corinne, so eager for this to happen, even while acknowledging that it probably shouldn't, that I hadn't really been thinking clearly. The things she had been saying and the way she had been behaving, throwing herself at me in such an obvious way, weren't the acts of an experienced girl. They were the acts of a girl who wanted to seem experienced. How tentative she had been at first. How tight she had been when I entered her. And now the tears. A horrible realization came over me.

 

"Corinne?"

 

She looked up at me, wiping tears from her face. "I cry after sex sometimes. Don't know why."

 

"Was this your first time?"

 

She looked down for a moment. It was hard to say if she was embarrassed, upset, or what. But when she looked up again, it was with a big grin on her face. "Yeah. Sorry if I misled you a bit, but," the grin widened, "that was incredible! I can't imagine a better way to ..."

 

"You silly little girl." I pulled out of her and began to get dressed again.

 

"What?" The look on her face suddenly seemed insecure. "Wasn't it good for you? I mean for me it was ... I just assumed."

 

"It was fine." I shrugged. It had been a great deal better than fine. It had been sex of an intensity and intimacy that I had never shared with another person, but I wasn't about to tell her that. "It was sex."

 

"Then ..."

 

"A girl like you. .." I fought for words. "This isn't how it should happen. You get that moment once in your life, and it shouldn't be with a guy like me in the storage closet of a dive bar!"

 

"Why not?" Corinne asked, hotly flushed. "I wanted it to be with you, and I don't care where it happened."

 

"You wanted it to be with me?" I scoffed sarcastically.

 

"I like you. You're cool. You don't care what people think."

 

I picked her clothes up off the floor and threw them at her. "You see what you want to see. You see a bad boy. Which is just the fantasy of a little brat who doesn't know shit about the real world."

 

"I know more than you ..."

 

"Do you know what I was doing at your father's?"

 

Corinne said nothing, clutching her clothes to her chest like a shield.

 

"I was going to break in."

 

"No."

 

She knew it was true, but didn't want to admit it. That was the trouble with girls like that. They wanted a 'bad boy,' but only to a limited value of 'bad.’ "Yes. He raided a tattoo parlor where I hang out and got hold of a book with my client list in it."

 

"Client list?"

 

"People I sell hooch to. People who pay my gang for protection. You know what happens to them if they don't pay?" Corinne wouldn't meet my gaze. "That's right. They regret it. That's who you just gave your virginity to."

 

Corinne looked pouty and defiant. "I still don't regret it."

 

"That's because you're a dumb kid."

 

"No, that's because it was amazing."

 

"Everyone thinks their first time is amazing." That was a lie you could only get away with telling someone as inexperienced as Corinne. No one thought their first time was amazing. It was usually a horrifying, clumsy mess that neither party much enjoyed. For all that it had been a mistake, I was actually a little proud that I had made Corinne's first time a bit special. The truth was, she was right. It had been amazing. A virgin had no right to be that good or that natural. But I guess the two of us just fit.

 

"You don't have to be this, you know," said Corinne quietly.

 

"What?"

 

"I mean, there are jobs you could get. Then maybe you and I could ..."

 

I laughed out loud. "You think there are employers lining up for ex-gang members? Besides, who says I want to change?"

 

"But you ..."

 

"I like what I do."

 

Corinne wasn't giving up yet. "Well, I suppose we could still find a way to ..."

 

"Even if I didn't like what I do," I interrupted her, "I wouldn't be changing it for you."

 

Corinne looked hurt. Which was good. She needed to hear this.

 

"I'm sure this was deep and meaningful for you, because it always is the first time. But it's not my first time, and for me, it was just sex. I'm not saying it wasn't fun, but no more than that. I'm sorry, and if I'd known it was your first, I wouldn't have let you go through with it, but that's the way it is. You're a pretty girl, with a kick-ass body, and, yeah, I might have let myself get a bit carried away because I was hot for you. Put it down to lust. Nothing wrong with lust—as I think we can both testify—but it doesn't last. It burns out. Get your clothes on."

 

Corinne listened to all this blank-faced and then, without a word, began to get dressed, pulling her top back over her head and wiggling her little ass back into her panties.

 

I watched a lot more closely than I should have. The girl really was incredibly sexy. It was not just that she was pretty, hot, or young. There was something else about her—an indefinable quality of sexuality that made me want to throw her to the ground and start again.

 

But then, even when we were having sex, there had been something more. I had no idea how many women I'd been with. The great thing about casual sex was that you could have a different partner every night of the week and no one worried. It was like how city-types played squash. But, in all those women, I’de never felt anything remotely comparable to what I felt with Corinne. I didn't think the sex itself was any better than with most girls, but there was something else between us, something that went beyond the physical. I didn't even think that sex could go beyond the physical, but it turned out it could, and when it did, it made the sex like nothing you'd ever known. It was like there was a whole other layer of sex above what I'd been having all these years that I'd never even known about. But you needed the right person to unlock it.

 

What might it be like to be in a relationship with someone like Corinne? For all that I liked to keep it casual, I'd had a few serious partners (call them girlfriends) over the years, but all of them came from my world. Corinne had no place there. And yet, while she didn't fit into my world, she strangely did fit me. It wasn't just her physical attributes that attracted me so strongly, I found myself actually rather liking her. She was sharp, and she was funny. God knew she had courage. She stood up to me and to her father. She saw what she wanted, she went after it, and she got it. She might be a kid, but she was a strong one. What might it be like?

 

Brief. That was what it would be like. She was still Corinne Dugas, and even if she left her family behind, I would still be dragging this decent girl down into my world. It would destroy her. Given the start I'd had in life, I was always going to end up here. But Corinne had a chance at a real life, if she could just get past her silly little rebel phase. I wasn't going to rob her of that. Even if a part of me wanted her more than I had ever wanted anything.

 

Corinne pushed her skirt down from around her hips where I had pulled it up earlier and smoothed it down into something almost presentable.

 

"It wasn't just lust, you know."

 

"Maybe not for you, but ..."

 

"Not for you either." She looked at me defiantly. "You say what you like, but I know ..."

 

"It was your first time. You don't know shit."

 

Corinne met my gaze. "I may not be sexually experienced, but I am a very experienced liar. You can't fool me, Mr. Covert. Shall we go?"