Karen Musial’s father came home unexpectedly while she and Toby Dodson, illuminated by the silent flat screen TV a few feet away, were making out under a blanket on the carpeted living room floor. Toby was on top of her, kissing her neck. Karen’s back was slightly arched and her head twisted, facing the entrance foyer. She would have seen the door swing if her eyes had been open; she might have heard the thwick of the deadbolt withdrawing, the scraping of the strike plate, or the squeak of the hinges as the door swung free, if she had not been breathing so hard. But she opened her eyes only when the door slammed shut, in time to see her father’s feet at the step-down to the living room, still and pointed in her direction, then twisting and disappearing down the hallway to the bedroom section of their split-level. Beneath the blanket her legs unwrapped from the small of Toby’s back; her left hand—the one that had been squeezing Toby’s back—was instantly re-assigned to push away his right hand—the one that had been roaming under her sweatshirt; her right hand—the one daringly close to his zipper—she used to withdraw his left hand—the one that had been slowly and consistently moving down her spine and underneath her jeans.
It didn’t matter that they were fully clothed. The sounds they made as they dry humped, and the fact that only their heads were visible outside the blanket, created the illusion that they had actually been fucking. This, of course was part of the delight for Toby. He’d never fucked a girl. He didn’t know any other 15 year-old boys who had. Only after Karen had thrown off the blanket and sat up, too late for her father to see that they were both fully clothed, did she explain to Toby the reason for her abrupt termination.
“It’s my father,” she said, between breaths.
Having already fantasized that their movements—with Karen so energetic and passionate, pressing up against his erection, fingers pressed into his flesh, kissing hard enough to grind teeth—would have passed for fucking if his friends had been watching, he easily imagined that Karen’s father might have thought the same.
“I thought your dad was away for the weekend,” said Toby as he moved from the floor to the couch, for the moment holding out hope that Mr. Musial had rushed by without getting a good view. Toby started to raise the volume on the TV, but Karen snatched the remote from him and shut it off instead. She sat on the couch near—but not next—to him, hands refastening the bra underneath her sweatshirt, head cocked to one side, peering down the hallway. When her hands were free and visible, she held one finger up to her lips—and waited.
Karen had a sweet face with blue-green eyes, full lips, and long, straight blonde hair. Unspectacular—except for her shape. She had been blessed—or cursed—with a full figure that boys at school ogled, and most girls resented. She thwarted the more obvious, lustful urges of the older boys—and tempered the mean-spirited envy of girls—by dressing in drab, loose clothing.
Toby was thin and wiry, but muscular, with deep-set brown eyes that suggested an empathetic nature—perhaps that was what she had sensed when he had asked her out.
As true as that was in general, regarding Karen he had entertained lustful urges, just like all the other boys he knew. Before asking her out, he had spent considerable time in the lunchroom, in study halls, on the school bus they shared, asking her questions—at first about how she felt about certain teachers, did she like sports, what movies she’d seen, what music she liked, then later about herself, her family. She seemed accessible and open except about her family. She mentioned that her mother had left five years ago without contesting the divorce or custody, and that she lived alone with her father—beyond that nothing. He didn’t press. When he asked her out—a movie and perhaps Starbucks after—she had immediately said yes to the movie, but suggested they go to her house after, to watch music videos and just “be together.” “Be together” immediately triggered his imagination; might he get to see her naked, at least from the waist up?
Seated in the back row of the movie theater, they had talked during the previews. She told him he was the first freshman to ask her out. She was used to being asked out by the older boys, boys with “experience,” who swore they didn’t believe the rumors about her, and they were just looking for a normal date. In the beginning she had said yes if they were good looking, but every time—“every single time” she emphasized—that she had allowed a boy to kiss her, they had wasted no time trying to go all the way, which she was not going to do, “just so we are clear, in case that’s what you are looking for.” But she also said she had a good feeling about him from the way he behaved in school.
When the feature began, she had taken his left hand and guided it behind her neck to her left shoulder. Later she had leaned her head against his. Halfway through the movie, her forehead touching his cheek, she had twisted her face so her lips brushed next to his. It took only the slightest movement on his part to initiate the kiss. She stayed with the kiss, eyes closed, ignoring the movie, until she pulled away, saying, “You kiss nice. You’re gentle.”
Convinced that she was not going to let him do anything more than kiss her, he had relaxed for the rest of the movies, content to feel her lips gliding and roving over his, as they took turns being the aggressor, she initiating the tongue, he happy to comply.
But at her house, she had allowed Toby to discover her hidden voluptuousness; his response—as they lay together on her living room floor—was to be aggressively thrilled and silently thankful for the opportunity, his erection unaffected by her insistence that they stay clothed. He hoped that, after a few minutes’ hiatus due to her father’s entrance, she would announce that they could continue—if they were quiet and kept the music soft.
“You should know,” she cautioned him in a loud whisper. “My dad is ex-Army.”
His erection still awkwardly positioned in his jeans, Toby sighed and sat back into a pile of soft cushions. She hadn’t mentioned that before. “So your dad was a soldier,” he said casually. “What’s he gonna do? Shoot me?”
“He keeps guns in the house,” she said curtly. “Don’t joke about shooting.”
“Have the young man meet me in the kitchen!” came a booming voice from down the hall. Her disconcerting reprimand combined with her father’s directive to end all hope Toby had of he and Karen returning to the floor. Huddled together on the couch, Karen