This is a story about a girl in Brooklyn.

This girl I know, when she was a freshman in high school, she didn’t go to prom because she thought she’d have had to sex with whoever it was that she went with. That was enough to stop her. She had no idea about sex, or what she was supposed to do, or any sense of her own body or that her body might enjoy it. She had no curiosity about it whatsoever, or so she thought, she recognized only a strong desire to avoid. Once, in sophomore year, when she refused a boy, telling him her parents wouldn’t let her go to prom, which was not at all true, he got hold of her sandal and threw it on the roof.

It was worth it, she thought, on her way home, her foot pressing the down the clutch, as she shifted into second gear, shoeless.

And when her first boyfriend, age 16 just like her— a redheaded boy who drove a pristine 1966 Red Mustang, who played on the football and soccer teams, who she liked well enough — asked to meet her after school, she was sure it was because he’d changed his mind since the day before. She dreaded it all day, but met him in the school parking lot at 3:05 pm, and then drove home feeling ridiculous, having found out her jock boyfriend just wanted see her and say hi before practice, not, as she had thought, break up with her. Why would he want to break up with her? He just asked her to go steady 12 hours ago.

Why would he want to break up with her? He just asked her to go steady 12 hours ago.

She let him feel her up out in one of the pecan orchards his family owned, blanket sprawled across the Mustang’s hood, a full sky of stars visible between branches and leaves. Girls were supposed to do this with boyfriends. She doesn’t remember pleasure or joy or excitement or desire or curiosity. Was it like that for other girls? she wondered. From what she could tell, it seemed other girls felt excited to go about it. Curious and playful. Giggly. Interested. Why weren’t they afraid?

In college, this girl never seemed to have a boyfriend during the school year. She remembered winter nights alone at the kitchen table, books sprawled out, the house dark and quiet, blanket over her lap. It felt like magic, the girl thought, looking back, how each spring or summer she’d find herself out somewhere in the evening with a boyfriend; the next winter back with her books and blanket, alone, dark and quiet house. Did she want it that way? She must have. It was too perfectly timed. She was focused on the Personality Psychology Research Ph.D. program at Toronto University. On whatever would get her there.

It felt like magic, the girl thought, looking back, how each spring or summer she’d find herself out somewhere in the evening with a boyfriend; the next winter back at the table with her books and blanket, alone in the dark and quiet house. Did she want it that way? She must have. It was too perfectly timed. She was focused on the Psychology Ph.D. program at Toronto University. On whatever would get her there.

Which was interesting in retrospect because this girl was a poor researcher in regard to so many human things: sex and men and dating. And in regard to her friend’s experiences, which would have been useful to know for reference. She rarely asked or confided. And of course, by extension, in regard to herself. Overwhelmed by thoughts and questions. Uncertain how to address them. Unable to conceive of the state of knowing, and certainly more comfortable without possibility of mistake or rejection.

It was true this girl’s first boyfriend in college, the older boy next door, who saw her studying at the kitchen table on weekend nights, yelled through his own kitchen window that she ought to be getting out until finally she let him take her — that boy dumped her in large part for her apparent lack of sexual curiosity. Fear of it. It must have been strange for him, already graduated from college, to encounter her. Naive, young and staid, from a small town with no buses, now enrolled in one of the most liberal universities, full of Birkenstocks and drugs of all sorts and gays and lesbians and third world feminist courses.

The girl’s most embarrassing moment remains the fact that at age 18 she brought her childhood retainers to his house the first night she slept over. She recalls laying next to him staring at the ceiling after making out with him, debating whether it was time to put them on, trying to predict, based on no data whatsoever, whether they’d be kissing more later that night. It was, after all, her first sleepover with a male. Did people kiss later, too?

Looking back, she was thankful she didn’t have childhood head-gear. It could have been worse.