And then she said, “Let’s go in the back seat.”
It was extremely awkward for him, releasing her and opening the door, helping her from the car and closing the door, opening the back door and helping her inside, sitting down on the seat beside her and closing the door again. And then when they were inside with their arms around each other, the kiss was something false and contrived, something more necessary than natural. The second time he kissed her was a little better.
Then he began to breathe faster and harder, hungry for her, and her sweater came off and her brassiere followed it. Her breasts were soft and smooth and very beautiful, and the nipples hardened under his touch. He kissed them, and when he did this she let out a little moan, and when he heard her he did not want to stop, ever, and he could not have stopped if he had wanted to.
He was clumsy. He was clumsy, and he knew he was being clumsy, and still there was nothing he could do about it. He was awkward as he removed the last of her clothing, awkward as he pushed her back on the seat. His caresses were hurried and inept and ineffectual. And then he took her.
She was a virgin.
She let out a sharp little cry that went through him like a knife. Suddenly, too soon, it was over.
He moved away from her and looked down at her. Again there was something in her eyes that he could not read, something different this time. She seemed to be waiting, waiting for something that she would never receive. There was a sadness which seemed to say that she had just become aware of a frightening truth.
He lit two cigarettes and handed one to her. They smoked them there before returning to the front seat. After she finished her cigarette and tossed it out the window she began to dress. She didn’t seem at all embarrassed; on the contrary, she appeared totally unaware of his presence, as if he did not exist at all, or as if it didn’t matter if he did. He turned uncomfortably in his seat and gazed out the window, lighting another cigarette from the butt of the first.
In the front seat she did not sit next to him but sat as far away as possible, almost cowering against the door.
“I’m sorry,” he said.
She didn’t answer.
It was a long ride. He drove too fast but it was still a long ride and the silence was unbearable.
He couldn’t understand it. For the first time in a long while he had been successful, and he felt as though he had failed. For the first time in his life he had made love to a girl whom he really desired, and all that he felt was an emptiness and a vague sense of loss, a loss of something which he had never managed to possess.
At last they reached her dormitory. He stopped the car, turned off the ignition and walked her to her door. They did not hold hands as they walked.
Everything was going wrong. It was not working out properly, and he wanted it to. It could be good, very good.
She turned to face him at the door, her face very solemn, and he started to kiss her but she dodged ever so slightly so that he missed her lips and just brushed her forehead. He looked at her, wanting to reach out for her and wanting to get back to his own room at the same time.
“Good night.”
“Good night.” She started to open the door.
“When can I see you again?”
She paused, considering, holding the door half open. Her mouth opened and closed, hesitantly, before any words came.
Then she said, “I don’t think we ought to see each other again.”
“Jan—”
He started to reach for her but she shook her head soundlessly and slipped through the door. She looked at him one last time, sadly, and then she was gone and the door was closing behind her.
He stood motionless for more than five minutes, staring at the closed door. Then he walked very slowly to his car and drove back to his dormitory.
He didn’t know how to feel. There was a momentary flush of pride at having seduced his first virgin, but this didn’t last long. It was replaced by a vague sense of wonder, a feeling that perhaps she had in fact seduced him. He forced the idea from his mind.
He wanted her. He wanted her for a whole night, warm and soft beside him in a double bed at a motel. He wanted to know her — it would be better then, better if there were something deeper and fuller between them, something that could give them a place to start.
He almost wanted to marry her.
When he called her on the phone the next day she would not talk to him or see him. She was almost apologetic, as though something were her fault.
He called again the next day, and the following day and the day after. A few days passed in which he forced himself to stay away from the phone, but finally he called again and got the same response as before.
Then he spent a night with a young prostitute in town and this helped to get her out of his mind.
He saw her several times on campus before graduation, walking alone with books under her arm or talking to a group of girls. He never stopped her, never tried to speak to her, and she never spoke to him.
In June he graduated. He never saw her again.
3
She woke up suddenly, coming out of a dream, but by the time she had pushed back the covers and sat up in bed, she could not remember what the dream had been about.
It was dark, darker than when she had gone to sleep. She stood up, savoring the feel of the cool air on her bare skin, and before switching on the light she took several deep breaths at the open window and rubbed the sleep from her eyes.
She put on her watch before anything else. It was ten-thirty. Then she dressed rapidly in a cool green blouse and black skirt.
She was hungry, and a little sleepy because of the lack of a transitional period between sleeping and waking. Outside, the moon was full and there was a light breeze scattering the pages of a discarded copy of the New York Post along the Barrow Street gutter. A few people were walking by, some in a great hurry and others very slowly, almost aimlessly.
She found the diner Ruthie had mentioned around the corner on Seventh Avenue. When she had finished her cheeseburger and swallowed half her coffee, she took a cigarette from her purse and lit it. I like this, she thought, blowing the smoke at the ceiling. I like this place. And I like getting up at 10:30 at night and getting dressed and going out.
She looked around at the people. They were a strange crowd — high school kids and truck drivers and old women and serious-looking girls with too much eye make-up and tired-looking Negroes with a vacant stare in their eyes. So many people, and no one that she knew.
She wasn’t used to this. She was used to knowing people, even if she didn’t speak to them, even if she knew no more about them than their names. She was used to familiar faces, and all of the faces in the diner were strange ones.
Part of her liked it. She could be alone, she could have as much privacy as she wanted, she could live by herself and for herself.
But I may be lonely, she thought. I may be very lonely.
She stubbed out her cigarette and finished her coffee. It was cold by this time, but she drained the cup anyway and paid her check, leaving a dime for the counterman. People tipped for counter service in New York, she knew, and that was another small thing that was different. Everything seemed to be different.
Back on the street she looked at everything. She walked north on Seventh Avenue to Sheridan Square, passing a theater and bookstores and restaurants and bars and a small nightclub. The whole city had a beat, a pulsing rhythm to it, and she was in time with the rhythm. She could hear it in all the noises and she could feel it in the air.