Forever for a Year

by B. T. Gottfred

  “I’ll love you forever.”

  “I’ll love you forever.”

  “I…” I started, but then I could feel my penis slip inside so I couldn’t talk. More than just the tip. It was more than just more than the tip. It was like my whole body went inside her and she was this huge warm lake and I was swimming. That’s so dumb. But it felt true. Like this is exactly where my penis should be. It knew it should be. It wanted to be just like this, in Carolina, forever.

  “Ah,” Carolina said. I had forgotten about her. Not forgotten. I mean, I was having sex with her. But I’d forgotten to ask how it felt for her. Goddamn, I screwed up.

  “Does it feel okay?”

  “Yeah,” she said. But she was lying.

  “Do you want me to stop?” Please don’t tell me to stop. Please don’t tell me to stop. Please don’t tell me to stop.

  67

  Carolina …

  “No,” I said. And I meant it. I didn’t want to stop. I wanted to have sex. I was having sex.

  Wait a minute.

  Wait. A. Minute.

  I was having sex. SEX.

  It didn’t hurt.

  Everyone on the internet said it would hurt.

  It didn’t.

  It didn’t feel good. I mean, it felt great to share this moment with Trevor but physically it didn’t feel good. It didn’t hurt either. There wasn’t, like, real pain. It just, you know, felt like it didn’t belong. So weird. Like he was a round peg and I was a square hole except, I guess, he would really be a square peg and I would be a round hole. I don’t even know what I’m saying.

  His face was so happy. So happy. That felt nice. It felt so nice to have Trevor so happy. I thought we were going to break up, but now we were having sex and I was making him so happy we would never break up. I really hope we don’t get pregnant. I want to spend forever with him, but I don’t want to have a baby or an abortion. What would I do? Oh my gosh, I should tell him to stop. To get a condom. But I don’t want to ruin our first time. This is so important.

  Except this is not as great as I thought it would be. I mean, it’s important. But it’s just … not amazing. I shouldn’t say that! It’s great. It’s great! It’s just not a big deal. It’s a HUGE deal because it’s my first time and he’s my soul mate. I’m just saying the feeling, the actual feeling of having a penis inside is … kind of boring. Oh my gosh, I just said it was boring. I don’t mean that. I mean that I thought it would be this earth-shattering thing, like jumping out of an airplane in space or something, but instead it’s just … what it is.

  Trevor said, “This is the greatest feeling I’ve ever had.”

  Oh gosh, I smiled so big. I even forgot how it felt awkward and boring for a second. And for that second, our eyes were so close and so deep and our bodies were so, so, so together and it was like, if we could stay just like this forever, then everything between us would always be okay.

  But then, you know, he came.

  Part Four

  FIGHTERS FOR A SEMESTER

  68

  Trevor knows how technology works

  After we finished having sex, and I pulled out, I realized I wasn’t wearing a condom. The thought might have crossed my mind before we started, but I ignored it. I just wanted to do it so badly I didn’t think. I’m such an idiot. I can’t believe how out of control I was. Everything was supposed to be perfect, but I couldn’t even put on a condom.

  But it felt so good. So f-ing good I don’t know how people do anything but have sex if they are adults and don’t have school or parents. Wouldn’t Carolina and I just do it all day, every day? Maybe eat. Of course eat. And sleep. But not much. Just have sex. Feel what I just felt. It was literally, literally like I was transported into another world where your whole body can fly through a beautiful, soft, tingling cloud. Crap. I suck at describing stuff. I mean, it was the most awesome fucking thing ever, okay? It just was.

  A half hour later, after we had told each other how much we loved each other over and over, I wanted to have sex again. Carolina said okay if we could wear a condom. Of course. So I got the condom box that my mom gave me from my room and we had sex again.

  It didn’t feel as good. But it was still great. Still incredible. And Carolina was more comfortable, and she even moaned I think. Which made me feel like I was good at sex. Which is the most important thing. I only want to have sex with Carolina if it feels good for her. If she orgasmed right now, while we were having sex the second time, I think it would be a sign that our love was more powerful and important than even I could fathom.

  But she didn’t. I came again. Then I threw the condom into the toilet and flushed.

  * * *

  She texted her dad at midnight to come get her because my mom hadn’t come home yet. He didn’t respond, so she called him ten minutes later. He didn’t pick up. So I called my mom. She didn’t pick up either. Then her dad texted:

  CAROLINA’S DAD ON HER PHONE

  Be there in thirty

  “You live two minutes away,” I said.

  “He was probably sleeping,” Carolina said. And then I realized I shouldn’t say anything. I knew I shouldn’t even before I got a text from my mom that said:

  MY MOM ON MY PHONE

  on my way home

  “That from your mom?” Carolina asked.

  “Yeah,” I said.

  “What did she say?”

  “She’s still downtown with her friend.”

  * * *

  I kissed Carolina every second that we waited for her dad to arrive. I loved her so much I didn’t know how to talk anymore. I wished we were the only two people in the world. Or at least the only two people in our families.

  When her dad arrived, she ran out to his car. I watched from the front door. It hurt so much to watch her leave I couldn’t move. Not even twenty seconds after they drove out of sight my mom pulled down the street and opened the garage. Adults think they are so smart. Adults think we don’t see things. Think we don’t know things. But we know everything. Everything. Man, I wish we didn’t. I wish I didn’t. But I do. I know fucking everything, and it’s going to be impossible to be happy if I know fucking everything.

  I sat in the kitchen on a stool facing the door to the garage. My mom walked in. She looked worn. Tired. Stressed. I fucking hated her.

  “Why are you still up?”

  But I didn’t say anything.

  “Sorry I’m so late. Katie and I lost track of time,” she said. Just talking, talking, talking her crap. Like she could fool me by talking her crap, crap, crap. Like she could fool the world with it.

  Me? I just kept staring at her. Hating her. Letting her know I knew everything.

  “What’s wrong? You’re being weird, Trevor. Go to bed.”

  Still didn’t say a word.

  “Good night, Trevor,” she said, and walked past me, not looking at me. Not looking at me because I could see right into her rotten, selfish soul and she didn’t want to see me seeing it.

  * * *

  The next day, I stayed locked in my room. Lily knocked and asked how I was. I said I was tired. Which was true. Tired of all of existence. My mom knocked too, but I just ignored her.

  She said, “You open this door right now and talk to me!”

  Ha. Adults think they can lecture you, order you around, when they are twice as irresponsible and twice as childish as any kid. Ha. HA! She left. She knew. She knew I knew. And she didn’t want to be around me any more than I wanted to be around her.

  Lily said Mom was taking her to a movie. I said have fun. No way was I going. Carolina and I texted a bit, but it was just talking love stuff. She was clueless. I couldn’t tell her what I knew. Not ever. Carolina wouldn’t be able to handle it. She would hate me. I hate me. I hate my mom because she makes me hate me.

  * * *

  After Lily and my mom left, I went to my parents’ bedroom and found my mom’s iPad. I opened up the Messages app. See, if you have an iPhone and an iPad like my mom, mes
sages go to both unless you disconnect them. My mom probably doesn’t even remember this. Because adults are dumb when they are being pathetic.

  It was there. Right at the top. Right at the goddamn top. “Midnight Dog,” it said his name was. I could feel this wild black rat eating my insides one big bite at a time. I opened the messages and … aw, crap … crap, crap, crap, crap, crap, crap, crap … I can’t look at this.

  No kid should have to look at this. Ever.

  There was sex talk and pictures—pictures of my mom! of my mom!—and I just threw it on the ground and almost stepped on it. To smash it. To make it all go away. But I just stumbled back. I was so weak. I couldn’t stand. My head was so fuzzy. I looked down and moved fast, back to my room. I ran into the doorjamb because I couldn’t look up and then I slammed my door and locked it even though I was home alone.

  I flung myself face-first onto my bed and screamed into the pillow. Screamed so loud I thought I’d put a hole in it. Aw, man, what was I supposed to do now? Aw, aw, aw, this hurt so much I wanted to take the whole world in my hands and squeeze it into nothingness so no one would feel this helpless and horrible ever again.

  69

  Carolina goes to a motel

  Trevor acted weird on Saturday. He was so happy with me during sex and after and then he was different. That’s what happens in movies. Girls finally have sex with their boyfriends and then the boys become jerks. But Trevor wasn’t that way. He couldn’t be. He was my Prince Charming. He couldn’t be a jerk from the movies.

  He didn’t ask if we were hanging out Saturday night all day, which he always does, so finally around two p.m., I asked if he was mad at me. He texted:

  TREVOR

  You are my soul mate and I would

  die for you.

  That was intense, even more intense than we usually get. So I asked:

  ME

  Are you okay?

  TREVOR

  I’m going to walk over to your house

  and then just want to walk around

  and we can eat and do anything and

  go anywhere but let’s be by

  ourselves, k?

  I said okay even though it was really scary.

  * * *

  But when Trevor knocked on my door, he looked amazing and so in love with me I thought I could float off the ground. Trevor didn’t want to come into the house to say hi to my dad, so I yelled good-bye and he took my hand and we started walking.

  We didn’t talk much at first. It was cold. Really cold, but neither of us wore gloves or hats. It was snowing for the first time all season. It was very pretty but also like we were not in real life. Like the snow was in our minds.

  As we walked, Trevor would squeeze my hand whenever he looked at me, which was like him saying he loved me without words, which made me realize how happy I was that we had sex. Because you read all these stories about a girl’s first time with a boy she doesn’t care about or who doesn’t care about her, but Trevor and I were the most-in-love first love ever. If something happened between us and we broke up—nothing would, but just if—then I’d still be happy he was my first.

  Eventually, Trevor started talking and he seemed like he just needed to talk so I listened. Girls did this lots, but I’d never seen a boy need to just talk. To, you know, vent. But he was saying how the world is filled with craziness and that if you don’t see how crazy it is, you’ll be swept whichever way the craziness tells you to go, and if you do realize how crazy it is, you’ll be so sad that none of it makes sense and you won’t know how you can live.

  He was being so deep and interesting and it was something I had never seen in him. I liked it. I did. I had worried he was boring. That’s not true. I guess I started to think we had talked about everything we could ever talk about and WE had become boring. But now I realized there was so much more inside both of us and that we could go on forever finding out what was there.

  But it was also sort of scary. I was afraid he couldn’t keep breathing and walking and talking at the same time. Like he would just fall down and pass out at any second because all the ideas that were inside him were sucking his life away.

  So I stopped him, and I hugged him, and I said, “I love you more than ever,” and it felt different to say it today. Like not only that I meant it, but that I meant it in a way that I understood for the first time. I think Trevor could tell because he stopped talking and hugged me back and we held each other a long, long time and it felt perfect.

  Then he got hard and we started kissing and we decided we could go to the golf course, which was closed because it was winter, but would have trees we could hide in. So we got there and he took off his jacket and I lay on it and took off my pants and he pulled down his and we had sex even though we didn’t have a condom. I was sore, but it felt better than yesterday. I just loved him so much and, today, our bodies felt like they loved each other as much as our hearts.

  “Don’t go inside me,” I said, and he nodded and then, as if me saying it sped him up, he pulled out and went on my stomach. It was gross but it was better than getting pregnant.

  * * *

  We were both freezing now so we walked to Roth’s Diner and ordered hot chocolate, french fries, and soup. We sat next to each other in the booth instead of across, and I didn’t notice anyone else in the restaurant even though it was filled with old people for the early bird dinners.

  After Roth’s, we walked to the movies and watched a horror movie that made me sick to my stomach. So I closed my eyes and went to sleep. After the movie was over, Trevor said, “Want to go to a hotel?”

  “What about our parents?” I asked.

  “I don’t care about my parents.”

  “Yes, you do.”

  “No, I don’t,” he said, and I could tell he meant it.

  “My parents would never let me.”

  “Why should our parents be able to tell us what to do?” he asked.

  “Because they’re our parents.” I felt like such a kid saying that, but it was true even if Trevor’s answer sounded cooler.

  “Just because they made us doesn’t mean they know what’s best any more than we do.”

  “We can’t, Trevor. Someday. But we can’t. Why don’t we go to your house?”

  “No. How about we go to a hotel but don’t spend the night?”

  “But that’s so much money.”

  “I don’t care. I have my parents’ credit card.”

  “They’ll get mad.”

  “I don’t care,” he said. Gosh, he was different. It was so intense, but sexy. Yeah, sexy. Maybe I knew what sexy meant now.

  “Okay,” I said.

  * * *

  So we went to a Best Western, but they wouldn’t rent to us because we weren’t old enough. So we went to this local motel by the Home Depot. Trevor paid cash so they didn’t ask for his ID. We went into the hotel, which smelled like the oxygen had died and rotted, and we both went to the bathroom, got naked, and got into bed. It was the first time we had been naked in a bed.

  “You’re my soul mate, Trevor,” I said just before we had sex again.

  “You’re my everything,” he said.

  I forgot to tell him to pull out.

  70

  Trevor gives a gift card

  I will never feel closer to Carolina or anyone than I felt with her in the motel Saturday night. Never. You can tell me I don’t know what I’m talking about. But you don’t know and I do. My whole existence will never live up to that moment. It’s crappy to know that, but I still know it.

  My dad got home Sunday. I didn’t tell him about my mom’s affair. What the hell could I say? He was clueless. I think he liked being clueless. But him being home made it possible for me to be in the house without wanting to kill my mom. It’s like I knew she was someone else’s problem again.

  * * *

  Finals sucked. I’m sure I failed every class. Carolina was stressed out. She said she didn’t study nearly as much as she planned. I felt bad bu
t she’s so smart I was sure she’d get straight As.

  I had three dozen roses—pink, white, and red—sent to Carolina’s house Wednesday morning for her birthday. Maybe that was too much, but it didn’t feel like enough so then I left a voice mail where I sang “Happy Birthday” when I knew her phone would be off. I also told her I’d have a special present that weekend. I didn’t know what it would be, but it gave me a few more days to think of something.

  * * *

  All I wanted was to be with Carolina, so I didn’t care about basketball but I couldn’t quit. I should have quit. But I didn’t. I had to play a tournament all night Friday after finals and all day Saturday and all I could think about was Carolina and having sex again.

  That Saturday night, she came over and my parents were in the living room, which was torture. Carolina talked to them and I wanted to throw my mom outside into the snow and lock the door but I just went into the basement and let Carolina listen to their bullshit.

  We had sex right away, with a condom since I had stuffed them under the couch cushion. Carolina kept saying, “This feels good,” which was good, I think, but maybe that meant it didn’t feel that good before. It doesn’t matter. It felt good now. It turned me on her saying that and I came.

  After that, I gave her a gift card to Banana Republic as her last birthday present. I didn’t even know if she shopped there, but it was next to the Apple Store at the mall so I knew where it was. I probably should have drawn her something again. She liked that gift so much. I’ll do it for Valentine’s Day.

  I wanted to have sex again later, but she was tired so we just cuddled and fell asleep. My dad woke us up at midnight by pounding on the basement door. I wish Carolina and I lived together and didn’t have to be apart ever.

  * * *

  The second semester started, and it wasn’t until I was walking to health class that I realized I didn’t have health class anymore, I had Architectural Design as the elective now. And then when I walked into the new class, I realized Carolina wasn’t there. She had another elective. We never even discussed it. Strange, right? We wouldn’t finish the school day together anymore.