First Boyfriend, First Kiss

In Catholic school, I had earned the nickname "Medusa" for my wildly curly red hair. Some genius in my class pulled one of my bouncy locks one day and commented, "Your hair is like snakes. Medusa!" The nickname stuck, and didn't do a whole lot for my self-image.

Then I transferred to public school, where nobody knew my nickname. I was "the new kid", and it was great. Everyone but me had a boyfriend or girlfriend, so I picked a kid who would be handsome when he finished growing up, and we began dating. For 5 months, we held hands on the bus ride home. That was it. We held hands.
His stop was before my own, so I really only held hands for half the bus ride. Then I'd switch seats and sit in front of my friend Ben. He was a lot more fun than my boyfriend, but he wasn't good eye candy. My boyfriend was cute but clueless. I'd spend half the bus ride listening to stupid jokes, laughing and trying to look interested. The only thing I was truly interested in was getting kissed. I wanted this kid to give me my first kiss. I wasted 5 months of my youth waiting for a kiss that never came. Eventually I asked him if he wanted to kiss me. He said, "No." So I said, "Then I'm going to break up with you." He said, "Good." And that was that.

After the break up, I spent all of the bus ride leaning over the seat and talking to Ben. He didn't tell stupid jokes, he talked about interesting stuff. His world was so different from my own, although we lived less than a mile from each other.

First of all, he had both parents. Secondly, his parents let him do stuff that my mom would never let me do. Like playing D&D or owning weapons. He had a bb gun, knives, nunchucks and throwing stars.

We would yack during the ride and continue the conversation at the ice cream place. The ice cream place was only open in the summer, so we would sit on the picnic bench outside and not be disturbed. We would talk for about half an hour, then Ben would ask me for a kiss. Every day I would scream, "Ew! No!" And every day he would steal my purse and say, "I'm not giving your purse back until you kiss me." I would then kick him in the shin, grab my purse and leave in a huff.
There was no way this guy was going to be my first kiss! He was too skinny. His hair was too dark. And he sniffed all the time because he had allergies. My first kiss was supposed to come from Prince Charming, not some sickly little boy.
Except that sickly little boy began to grow on me. I had so much fun hanging out with him, and the walk home became a very lonely walk indeed. One day Ben snatched my purse and made his request, and I thought, "Why not? You've got to kiss somebody."

So I kissed him.

I thought of soap operas, and tried to kiss like it looked like they kissed on the shows. It was an open mouth, no tongue kiss; and it was no big deal.
I waited more than a year before telling Ben that he was my first kiss.

I suppose persistence pays off.