Being Kalli(14)

At nineteen I’ve grown from that, or maybe not. I just listen in on people better. Suppose I’ve grown up how an adult is meant to, appearing like I think my childhood habits are silly. I’m not sure when this started but it’s still a habit I have.

The very first time I fucked a guy I counted the patterns on the peeling wallpaper in front of me.

Mum was pregnant with the twins, and between her and Chester’s happiness over starting their lives together I was in a permanent state of flux. I’ve never known who my dad is and I had no siblings at the time. I didn’t speak to any other family at the time, either. I had Scout and Nate and other random friends but it was at night when I had no one.

That night I was staring at my phone again. I didn’t have enough credit to call Scout and Nate, and at ten-thirty I was thought to be in bed reading, left undisturbed. I couldn’t use the house phone because Chester was all over Mum, rubbing her tummy in the main living area where it was kept. So I opened my window and climbed down the side of the apartment using the lattice and piping since we were only on the first level up, and snuck in again to the hallways.

I met a neighbour there in the dim hallway with one of the fluorescent lights buzzing and flashing on and off, and the scent of smoke lingering on the walls. His form hung long shadows, and something about that allured me, my heart hammering with fear.

I didn’t know his name and I haven’t seen him since. I don’t know what it was about me, but he asked if I was okay, and I felt good for saying I needed space because my parents were being assholes. I even remember feeling good because I sounded so nonchalant using a word I wasn’t meant to say. My heart paid me back for the lie because he kept talking and all I could do was cope with the heavy feeling in my chest that made it hard to concentrate on what he was saying.

I was mad at Mum for years of abandoning me, and now she’d just decided to ignore me while she made up this perfect life with her kind and rich husband.

This stranger was talking about how much he hated year twelve back when he was in high school the year before, and I talked about how I was worried for that next year, though that was a lie. My final year wasn’t for a while yet. I also told him sorry that my nipples were poking out, and they were doing so because I had no bra on and it was cold.

If he thought I was weird, he didn’t say anything. He kindly brought his hands under my tank top and warmed up my nipples, first with his rubbing fingers and hands, and then with his mouth after he pulled down the front of my top. As he did that, I undid his drawstring pants. He went along with the whole thing like we were intimate lovers.

I wasn’t sure what to do after I undid his pants, but my action said what I was asking. He understood and flopped his dick out. His eyes told me what he wanted me to do and I pretended I was a slut who did this thing all the time.

We were in the hallway when my first consenting time happened and unable to grasp onto anything real, this stranger was it. Not even being somewhere so exposed bothered me above my desolation.

That’s when the counting began. The pain was raw and deep and made me spasm when he started teasing my entrance. I counted the swirls and repeating rectangles of shapes within my line of sight. My chin was over the back of his shoulder, my legs hiked up and wrapped around his hips and back.

It happened so perfectly. My spasms of pain threatening to unleash the scream begging behind my lips timed with his movements, and this egged him on.

That time I was fucked by a man, which should have been my first, set up the later times. Up against the wall with my legs wrapped around a stranger’s body, ordering the sex gave me a sense of power I hadn’t felt since I was a kid. I told him how fast to go, I told him to give me more and I told him when he could blow.

I was fifteen when I understood why the fuss about sex existed. Like it was for everyone else, it was my stress release and an erotic pleasure that gave me a powerful edge.

I came back to my room, sweaty and freezing at the same time, and put my violin case under my sheets, threw my leg over the hard shell and woke up wrapped around it.

That was the last time I slept with my violin in its case. I realised I didn’t need that as my go-to anymore.

Now as Nate approaches I run up from behind and koala his back, arms secured over his shoulders and legs wrapped around his hips and linked between his legs.



• • •



We sit at the popular café on the grounds. It’s bustling with waitresses doing laps with desserts and drinks, and always has the hum of a radio station, and for me, the more crowd, the more noise, the easier it is to talk-talk. Quiet can be so loud. Nate, however, is quieter with the bustle of loud obnoxious students.