Drizzly rain and first kisses

A cocky South African boy called Nick was my first love. We were fifteen when we met. He would walk past and stare at me with my mod bob, my vintage hounds tooth pencil skirts, black tights and pinkle wicker pointy shoes. I’d look him up and down in his Harrington jacket, Ben Sherman shirts, rolled up Levis and shiny brogue shoes. I held his gaze for long moments. I flirted more easily then.

 

He had moved to Sydney from a country town. I had to say goodbye to him shortly after meeting him. He went to live in Japan on exchange for a year and I felt my first heart ache.

 

The year passed and I was at a party one night when he walked through the door. My heart stopped. He walked straight up to me and took my hand and led me away from the crowd. We talked for a while and he said, “I hear you had a boyfriend while I was away?” and I replied as secretively as I could act, “Not really.”

 

Our first date was at the cinema. When the lights dimmed I could feel that held breath, ‘will I, won’t I?’ tension from him. It felt exquisite. He moved his hand close to mine and it edged its way onto my knee. It was the first time I had been touched like that. He tentatively stroked my hand with his finger tips as he held onto my hand. It was the first time I had any sense of a sexual feeling towards a boy. I could feel my pulse.

 

Later in the month, we walked down tambourine bay road together and sat in a park on the swings. As it began to rain, neither of us moved. He leant over and kissed me. We sat on the swings and kissed for hours in the drizzly rain. From that moment, I loved the rain.

 

"I asked him with my eyes to ask again yes and then he asked me would I yes to say yes. my mountain flower and first I put my arms around him yes and drew him down to me so he could feel my breasts all perfume yes and his heart was going like mad and yes I said yes I will Yes."

James Joyce

 

I asked him to come and stay with me one night when my mother was away. He was from a middle class family with a lot of pretty polly and I was from the wrong side of the tracks. I had never invited a friend to my house before this. That I overcame my intense shame about the way we lived was a testament to the strength of my sexual desire.

 

I lost my virginity to him that night. In the background played The Doors, “Riders on the Storm”. I have no regrets about being so young, it was tender and it was fun. We were inseparable that year.

I lived with him. His parents must have been demented by my constant presence.

 

We read a Clockwork Orange together and then he became infatuated with ‘idea’ of crime. “O my brother” Nick and his droogs would plan and talk about their horror show petty crime and dodging the Millicent’s.

 

We went to parties, danced to Ska music, and drank together. In a way, I think that by slumming it with me was a way to him to rebel. In turn, I tried to fit into his world.

 

He had the attic bedroom and we would go upstairs at night to smoke hashish and explore every facet of one another. Neither of us had a shred of inhibition. I was fanatically in love with him and he was obsessively in lust with me. He had learnt about lubbilubbing from his broadminded Jewish parents, his mother’s copy of the Karma Sutra and his father’s Hustler magazines.

<span

style=”FONT-SIZE: 14pt; LAYOUT-GRID-MODE: line; FONT-FAMILY: "Trebuchet MS"”> 

Then something started to shift. I remember one day us sitting down to play a game of chess together for the first time and I won the game. He asked me for a second game and I won again. I could tell that he was livid. So I told him I didn’t want to play any more. He kicked the chess board across the room and went out. Then, he noticed that I was doing well at school. With every test or homework result he would want to know my score and I had consistently outperformed him.

 

Then, I turned seventeen and it was announced to the skolliwoll that I had been elected the school captain.

 

Nick broke up with me soon after that. I was heartbroken. He had told me that he would love me forever and as all teenaged girls do, I had believed him.

It is raining tonight and I can hear the drizzle hit the street beneath my window.