Ten Years Ago

Ludacris bumps over the speakers, red cups littering every surface and a random smoke machine pouring out over the makeshift dance floor.

I’d given myself an irregular night out, my best friend and roommate, Chelsea, convincing me that I couldn’t spend another Friday in our dorm room watching The West Wing on my DVD player.

Surprisingly, I was having a good time. That could be the four Jell-O shots swimming around in my stomach, but my body felt like it was floating, and I felt the rhythm of the music move me.

My eyes land across the dance floor, to where a group of people crowd around someone I can’t quite make out. I dance closer, straying from my group of friends who dance in a semi-circle, some of them grinding on guys and some just doing their own thing.

As I make my way over, some of the people disperse, and he stands up from where he was lounging on one of the massive speakers blasting music through the house.

Well over a foot taller than I am, with unruly blond hair tucked behind his ears, dark denim covering his long legs, and a white V-neck T-shirt barely containing the mass of muscles that constitute his arms. A diamond stud winks from one earlobe, and it’s cheesy but also screams bad boy.

I’ve never gone for the bad boy.

And yet … there is something about this guy that draws me toward him until I’m practically sitting in his lap. Maybe it’s the drinks making me bold, or maybe it’s the need to do something so out of character that my heart screams for it.

But I find myself initiating conversation with the hottest guy I’ve ever laid eyes on.

“Hey.” I put a little flirt into my game, planting a hand on my hip and leaning into him, surprising myself even if it was just one word.

His eyes, bright green even in the dark light of the house party, scan me up and down. I feel naked, undressed for him. It’s thrilling and dirty, and I want more.

“Hi, there. What’s your name?” His voice is deep and rich, like smooth syrup.

In the most shocking move I’ve ever made, I take the beer bottle out of his hand and drink from it, never breaking eye contact. “Demi. And you are?”

I see the spark in his expression as he watches my lips wrap around the neck of the bottle. “You don’t know who I am?”

“Should I?”

A grin spreads across his full lips. “I’m only the best athlete at this school, the football player who won you and everyone else a national championship last year.”

Typically, I would think bragging like that is a turn off, a gross ego-builder. But this guy has me hypnotized, and I can see a bit of humor underneath his oversized sense of pride. And I genuinely don’t know who he is, not being that into sports, and I think he gets off on that a little bit.

“Okay, best athlete, what’s your name?”

His grin is even more cocky as he reaches out his hand. “Paxton Shaw, at your service.”

The song changes and my body moves of its own accord. I grasp Paxton’s hand, and I’m simultaneously shaking it and also pulling him up to dance with me.

That big body envelops me, his strong arms wrapping around my waist as his hands direct me in which way to sway. Our bodies mold together, the wrongness of how sexual I’m being feeling so right in this moment. I’ve never allowed myself to give in to something like this, to want this.

Paxton’s mouth comes down on my neck as the next song thumps along the floor, and I gasp, not expecting the hot kiss on my skin. My legs become rubbery, my spine heats like wood melting under the flames. He’s right there to hold me up, to continue his perusal of my collarbone as I feel the wetness pool between my thighs.

“Let’s go upstairs,” he whispers in my ear.

I’ve never been that kind of girl, have only seen this kind of scene in the movies. But I want it so badly, unlike I’ve ever wanted someone to touch me before. Almost like if he doesn’t, I will die on the spot.

With our hands latched to each other, he leads me to the second floor of the house. I don’t even know whose house this is, and yet two minutes later, I’m underneath a strange boy on a strange bed.

And loving every second of it.

The alcohol makes my brain fuzzy, and it seems like minutes pass that I don’t remember. But I do remember the laughing, his hot mouth on my own lips, the way I ground into him, our clothes coming off.

Sex, for the two times I’d had it before, had always seemed like an act that a woman wouldn’t enjoy but had to tolerate for a man.

Oh, how wrong I’d been.

The moment that Paxton had made me come, his hips thrusting into mine, I finally got it. I understood why men would do anything to get this, why women felt empowered and sexual and alive in the act of being intimate with another.

When he rolled off of me, both of us breathing heavy, I smiled up at the ceiling. Maybe, those times I’d given myself to other boys, it just hadn’t been right. Maybe, it just needed to be with the right person. And at last, two years into this crazy life that college brought, I’d found the person I was meant to feel pleasure with.

The sound of a buckling belt had me stirring, sitting up on my elbows.

On the other side of the room, Paxton was fully dressed, and I felt a frown mark my lips. Where was he going? Surely, we could take a few more minutes to feel each other’s skin, explore the dips and crevices of our bodies.

“I’ll see you around, doll.”

He winked at me, and then walked out the door, shutting it behind him.

Confusion and loneliness swept in. He hadn’t kissed me, hadn’t waited for me to dress and walked me back down. Hadn’t even asked for my phone number.

It was the first time I’d ever acted on an impulse, went to bed with a stranger. And now I was faced with the cold, harsh truth that just like all the rest, he was a pig who wanted nothing more than to fuck me.

What a shame that every time I saw him after that night, amnesia set in where those feelings of abandonment were concerned.