Dan’s penis is bigger than Mama’s friend’s was. It’s real big, and it looks angry. I tell him so, and he smiles and says it’s not angry, it’s happy ‘cause of me.
Then we kiss some more, and he touches me a lot. And when he touches me between my legs I can’t help but wiggle against him. My tummy is turning in that good way again, and my privates are all tingly.
And then he lays on top of me and tells me to relax, but I don’t know why ‘cause I’m already relaxed.
But then there’s pain and burning and tearing between my legs, in my privates, and I scream out, “It hurts! It hurts! Make it stop!”
He talks real quiet in my ear. His voice still sounds like he’s eating the best chocolate crème pie he’s ever had. “Shh. It’s okay, Jane. Sex only hurts the first time for a few minutes and then it will feel really, really good. I promise.”
I try not to think about the pain. Like that one time when Mama drank too much beer and held her hot curling iron against my arm. It burned for a real long time, but I tried not to think about it ‘cause I know she didn’t mean to hurt me. She told me so afterward.
And after a while, it doesn’t hurt as bad, just like Dan said. And then his hips start moving faster, and he keeps telling me that I’m beautiful in his chocolate crème pie voice. And then he’s grunting like an animal and his hips are pressing hard against mine, and my privates hurt way up inside my belly like it’s too much. And then he says, “Fuck,” and instead of feeling like too much, it feels kinda warm.
And then he pushes up off me, and I feel his penis pull out ‘cause it feels like my privates just shriveled back up to normal. “You should go to the bathroom. And clean yourself up.”
I don’t know why he said that until I stand up, and two things happen. I see spots of blood on my sheets, and when I start walking toward the bathroom in the hall, I feel something wet running down the inside of my thighs. They both scare me.
After I use the bathroom and get dressed Dan leaves. He says not to tell no one what we been doing. He says he could get in a lot of trouble ‘cause people wouldn’t understand how special I am to him.
I like it that he called me special.
I won’t tell.
I don’t talk to no one except Mama anyhow.
*****
Every Wednesday Dan walks me home.
Every Wednesday we kiss and have sex on my bed.
It don’t hurt no more.
Sometimes he puts this covering on his penis, he calls it a rubber. Sometimes he don’t, ‘cause he says it feels better without it.
He calls me his girlfriend.
It’s a secret.
Just like our special time together.
*****
I been real sick all week, throwing up a lot. Mama don’t make me go to school. She lets me stay home while she goes to work. I sleep on the bathroom floor, so I don’t have to keep coming in to get sick. I don’t feel like eating nothing.
Dan comes to my house Wednesday afternoon. He leaves when he sees I’m sick.
*****
Mama brought me to the doctor ‘cause I been so sick. They stick a needle in my arm and fill up a glass tube with my blood. I don’t like it. It hurts. They also make me pee in a plastic cup. I don’t like that either, too messy.
The nurse takes my temperature and asks me some questions, and then she leaves.
Mama and me wait for a long time for the doctor to come in. When he does, he don’t look nice, and I don’t like him.
He looks in my ears and throat and listens to my heartbeat and asks me the same questions the nurse asked me.
And then someone knocks on the door, and a lady hands him some papers. She looks nice, and I want her to stay and him to go. He looks at the papers, and there’s a lot of writing on ‘em, but he reads ‘em real fast.
That’s when he looks at my mama and says, “She’s pregnant.” And I wonder who he’s talking about. Only grownups get pregnant, Mama told me so when I asked where babies came from. She said, “When you grow up you’ll get married and have babies.” But I’m not a grown up yet. Or married.
Mama’s looking at me, and I see a lightning storm flashing in her eyes. It scares me. “You been having sex, Jane?” It’s loud and embarrassing. Sex is supposed to be my secret with Dan. She ain’t supposed to know, and now she’s telling the doctor about it too.
I shake my head real fast. I know I’m not supposed to lie. Lying is a sin, Mama always says so.
“Lying is a sin, Jane. Don’t lie, the Lord will strike you down.”
I just sit here quiet and don’t move. I’m waiting for the wrath of God or Mama, I don’t want either one.
The doctor says, “I’ll need to perform a vaginal exam. Would you prefer to stay or go?” He’s talking to Mama again.