The Very First Time

THE VERY FIRST TIME

by

Albert Woods

Helen never imagined it would be like this. In her fantasies, there were silk sheets, a balmy breeze tickling the pure white lace curtains, a romantic mist giving fuzzy edges to everything. And there was warmth; sufficient comfort for her to be able to give herself without the distraction of cold draughts. In her dreams, only the act mattered; nothing untoward ever encroached.

But reality was very different in the back of the station wagon. It was bitterly cold outside, and not much better in. The cabin reeked of stale cigarette stubs from the overflowing ashtrays, the condensation from rapid breath clung to the windows, the silk turned out to be grease-stained seat fabric, smudged from the tools that were hastily swept onto the floor, impregnated with faint hints of petrol and brake fluid. Still, it was the very first time; and Helen was willing to forgo the trimmings in pursuit of what she had craved for so long.

Her man - who was not the Adonis of earlier adolescent imaginings -  wheezed and laboured awkwardly above her, his trousers at his ankles, the jagged contents of his inside jacket pocket pressing cruelly against her bare chest. He had wasted little time in courtship; two large brandy and cokes in the bar where they'd met, and a rough hand on her knee during the lift home that had taken them three miles off course to the car park by the council tip.

Helen wished it could be better, but was grateful nevertheless. At last, after years of waiting, she was having real love; what all the other girls had talked of so much; what she had lied about so as not to appear green. She lay back, as best she could, with her feet flat against the roof lining, and submitted to the ham-fisted exploration that preceded the surrender of her virginity; an almost brutal initiation that, to Helen, was bliss - even if it hurt, and far from what it might have been.

She watched her lover's grey hair occasionally catching the moonlight, and felt his spectacles sliding down onto her shoulder. His breathing grew more intense, and she felt him go inside her, long before she was ready. It hurt, yet she forgave him; there was a sense of power to be had from this, having the mature male bucking in a frenzy to her tune. How he would love her when it was over, how he would repent his savage animal passion by promising to worship her forever. He was half-crazed now; hammering at her like a piston.

Then she felt the first stroke of pleasure within herself. Her mouth began to dry, her goose pimples of cold giving way to shivers of longing. A slight adjustment of position had the stroke repeated, once, twice then every time. It was as good as she had hoped; no, better. Her legs clamped around his back and she tensed with him. The ultimate pleasure must be no more than seconds away, she felt. It was coming, it was coming...

Then he stopped. Helen kept moving her body against him, but there was insufficient room to get it right. She pushed on his shoulders with rhythmic motions to indicate her need. She kissed the mouth that was open beside hers, lapping the tongue, biting his lips. "Keep going," she urged when he failed to respond. "Don't stop!"

The spasm was dying before it could properly develop. But as she went to push him off, it returned, and Helen pulled him in and out of herself in one long glorious climax that relieved the compounded frustration of all those dry years. She almost wept with sheer joy as it ended, hugging him and whispering her gratitude in his ear. And when she finally let go to extricate her aching limbs from the tangle, he slumped down on the seat beside her with his eyes open, and a tortured rictus grin on the blueing mouth that, minutes earlier, had ceased to draw in air.

* *  * *

In the pearl light of the sanatorium, Helen counted the moths. This summer had brought a plague of them. She wondered how they got into the room; and why they should prefer the clinical atmosphere of the white cell to the freshness of the outdoors. They never said anything, though neither did she. Her voice had been left in the car along with the corpse all that time ago. But she thought a lot; usually about the shirt factory where she used to work, or her mother and sister, Janet, who had long since given up their monthly visits. She knew who they were all right. They were the ones who'd put her where she was; offered no objection when the doctors signed the papers to have her taken away. They should be here, not her.

Mother always said it was a sin to do ‘it’. If that were true, then why hadn't she complained when Janet got married, and did it? Wasn't that a sin too? "You mustn't let dirty-minded men do things like that to you," Mother used to say. "You'll go to hell if you do."

So why did her sister let Keith do it? He must be dirty-minded, surely. Helen knew she had because they had a baby. Why wasn't she punished? Why was she rewarded with a marriage and a nice new house on the Grover Estate? No; Helen had ceased to acknowledge Mum and Janet when they came visiting. Served them right!

Then there was Colin - the maintenance man. He was different. Nice, Colin was. He always smiled when they passed in the corridor, and sometimes he would drop in just before lights-out to see if she was OK. That was the only good thing about taking a bath - if Colin was around. Strictly speaking, he shouldn't be anywhere near the women's wing after six, but Helen knew he often was. And if she saw him lurking, she'd smile, and wink, like he did at her, and deliberately leave the door open so he could see in. To tease him, she'd take her time getting out of her smock, certain he was watching.

Matron caught her once, crouching nude on the bathmat, posing like a sex kitten. "You silly girl!" she scolded. "Get on and get yourself clean." Miserable old bag! Anyway, why shouldn't she be allowed a boyfriend? Lots of the girls had boyfriends from the men’s side. Helen saw them walking hand in hand through the grounds and, once, she'd seen a couple behind a bush and the man had his thingy out, and the girl was playing with it. Helen had wanted to join in, but the girl shouted, and she was locked up again.

Now, they only let her go outside with a nurse, so it was impossible to get near the bushes. It was only Colin who was a friend: almost a boyfriend really. He'd seen enough of her after all, only they hadn't had the chance to be alone, when he could ‘do’ her.

It was bath night tonight. Maybe, this time, she'd get Colin into the bathroom along with her. He had a set of keys, so he could lock them in, and then they could do it. She prayed he'd be by the boiler room when she passed by. He was, and he acknowledged her.

Helen stood naked for some time before plucking up the courage to open the door fully. Good; there was no sign of Matron; but damn! there was no sign of Colin either. She looked up and down the corridor, took a deep breath and ran. Matron seemed to emerge from nowhere. Helen ducked into an alcove and waited until the woman had passed. Then she went down to the boiler room.

Matron stared in disbelief at the steaming bath that contained nothing more than hot clean water. She rushed to the wall phone and alerted the director. Two minutes later, she was in his office, out of breath and explaining the lapse in her vigilance, lying that she’d been called away to deal with some incident.

The director's immediate concern was Helen’s whereabouts. A resourceful girl, she had twice, previously, escaped from the place. They could not afford the embarrassment of a third occasion. Her case file revealed a pattern. First she would break into a local house and steal clothes. She'd make for a village or town, and wait to be picked up in a pub then, once she'd gone off in a car, heaven only knew how far she'd go.

Matron had not been able to give Colin what he wanted tonight. It was her bad time of the month. Helen, arriving when she did, and as naked as she did, caused his better judgement to desert him. The creature was simply too ripe to refuse; and he knew Matron daren't give him away. "Won't they miss you?" he asked Helen, locking the door behind her.

"No," she said, her first word in over two years, and a lie. "I got permission to go to chapel."

Again there were no silk sheets, there was no feather bed. Helen prostrated herself across a workbench and closed her eyes while Colin prepared to take her. He knew he had to be quick, but couldn't resist feeling her all over first. Like the driver's, his hands were callused, and the sensation of them touching her inner thigh triggered wonderful memories, enhanced by the evocative smells from the oily tools scattered all around.

Even in the warm summer evenings, the great gas fired boiler worked on remorselessly, heating the bath water and pumping to satisfy the kitchens. The thermostat clicked, and the burners roared into life. Colin eased himself into Helen, and they ceased to be distracted by the noise.

When the panic was over, Matron demanded that Helen tell her where she had been. It came as no surprise to get no answer. Helen simply smiled, a particularly self-satisfied smile, Matron noticed. "Down you go!" she commanded, pushing the girl's head under the water. "If you can't be trusted to do it yourself, I'll just have to do it for you."

It was a rough scrubbing, such as exasperated parents might give a misbehaving child; and Matron meant to do the drying as well, using the coarsest towel she could find. Only, when Helen stood with the water draining off her, Matron noticed the redness on her thighs and abdomen, and the love bites around her loins. "Who gave you these?" she gagged, again forgetting the dumb insolence for which Helen was known.

To the nurse’s dismay, the girl actually answered. "Colin," she said. "Colin did them before he did me."

"I don't believe you," Matron stammered. "You're a bloody little liar." Her hand came up, instinctively, and laid a pattern of finger marks across the gloating face.

"It's true," Helen insisted. "He took my virgin thing; like the others did - once I put him right."

Matron stepped backwards, unable to form words; incapable of releasing the scream that her throat wouldn't generate. “Oh God,” she mouthed, in the realisation that, yet again, Helen had heeded her mother's warning, and resisted a man with a dirty mind. The insane creature would only give herself, fully, once she’d cracked his skull open with a handy hammer - or monkey wrench - and cleaned it for him.

* *  * *  * *

Copyright Albert Woods (2012)