Then Came You - Jennifer Weiner [59]
Kimmie nodded. I took a deep breath, stretching out my legs, positioning my hands the way I normally did, the left one pressed against my belly (for some reason, I liked the feeling of pressure there), the fingers of my right hand resting against my cleft. I took a quick peek and saw Kimmie sitting back on her heels, watching intently as I started stroking myself with my index finger. I closed my eyes, wanting to squirm away from her scrutiny, wishing I’d shaved. “It’s kind of like this,” I said. “But I don’t know how helpful this is. Probably it’s different for everyone.”
I opened my eyes, enough to see her make an impatient gesture—keep going. I turned my head to the side, concentrating on the sensation, trying to ignore the strangeness of doing this with someone watching. Kimmie was so close that I could feel her breath on my belly. For a minute, I thought that nothing would happen, but it had been a little while, and maybe I was hornier than I thought, or maybe it was the wine, but I was already wet, the muscles in my belly and inner thighs fluttering in the anticipation of release. I wriggled around, getting comfortable, and arranged my fingers the way I normally did, my index finger tapping, lightly and rapidly, then nibbling more firmly against my clitoris. I couldn’t keep from sighing, and Kimmie sighed, too, in approval, I thought, a little cooing noise.
“Ooh,” she whispered. The futon shifted as she leaned closer. I could feel her breath on my belly, her long hair trailing against my thigh, and suddenly this went from being an academic exercise to the most exciting thing I’d ever done. I felt like a porn star, or the way I imagined porn stars must feel, desirable, sexy, controlling their audience even as they lost control themselves. I spread my legs slightly, strumming my finger faster. My voice was strangled as I said, “Watch . . . I’m close . . .” My back arched. My toes curled. I felt Kimmie’s breath against my face, then her lips against mine, and her tongue slipped into my mouth as I came.
When I could breathe again, I opened my eyes. She was looking at me, a pleased smile on her face.
“Oh my God,” I said, feeling stunned and dizzy, my nerve endings still jangling with pleasure. “What was that?”
“An orgasm,” Kimmie answered promptly, like the excellent student she’d been all her life.
I sat up, reaching for the light down comforter Kimmie kept folded in a basket next to the futon, and pulled it up over my legs. Then I flopped back, feeling delighted, but with a new fear dimming my afterglow. Did this mean I was gay? I’d never even considered it. I’d never looked at a woman with anything resembling desire, just evaluation, and envy of specific body parts—this one’s breasts, that one’s legs. Besides Kimmie, I’d never even considered kissing a girl . . . but now, I found, I was very interested in kissing Kimmie again.
I rolled onto my elbow. She was still dressed, in her jeans and her button-front Henley tee shirt. “Let’s see if you got it,” I said, and reached out, brushing her hair behind her ears. She gave me her trickster’s grin, wriggling out of her clothes. Her body, I discovered, wasn’t so boyish after all . . . and when I took her in my arms and kissed her, first her forehead, then her faintly freckled nose, then her lips, it felt like I’d been waiting my whole life to end up with her in my arms.
After Kimmie fell asleep, I lay there, sated and content, at ease in my own body in a way I hadn’t been since I was a little girl, wrapped in a towel and warmed by the sun after a morning bodysurfing in the ocean with my dad. Physically, I was at peace, but my mind raced, looking for labels, asking questions about what had just happened, how it would work and whether it could last. Finally, I tried to turn my thoughts to where they usually went at night: to the eggs I’d sold.
They’d warned me about this at the fertility center. The material they’d given me included the number for a counselor to call if I found myself “dwelling” on my donation, and had mentioned that some donors