//WANTED: SWF FOR FRIENDSHIP FIRST//
(A WARNING TO PRUDISH TEXAS T-BONE READERS: This post contains explicit material suitable only for mature adults. Those under 17 must be accompanied by a legal parent or guardian. OK, it’s not that bad.)
It’s interesting what some people will do when they’re lonely.
Every Friday, the local newspaper published singles ads on the back page of the entertainment guide. I had been skimming the ads for weeks that women had placed seeking single white males between 18 and 25, which was me at the time.
Don’t know why I decided to call a few of them that particular night. Guess curiosity got the best of me.
“BLONDE AMBITION. SWF, 20, 5’9’’, seeks SWM, 18-29, for friendship, possible LTR.”
I dialed the number, listened to a message recorded by the ad’s author, then left a few details about myself. That was about 8 p.m.
At 2 a.m. the next morning, my phone rang. I didn’t pick up because I was enjoying my sleep and was hoping to recover it after the ringing stopped. The person didn’t leave a message, and when I checked my Caller ID the next morning it was an unfamiliar number.
The phone rang about midnight the next night. Same strange number as before. I picked up.
“Hi, this is Taylor,” a chipper, youthful female voice said. “You left a message responding to my ad?”
We talked a little about ourselves and arranged to meet at her parents’ house to watch a movie.
Taylor turned out to be a cute blonde girl, who by my best guess was barely 18. She was not nearly 5’9’’ either, but I’m not one to talk about height. One of her friends was there to render a second opinion about me. I guess I passed.
After a fun but uneventful evening, Taylor and I set up a date for the following Friday. It was around Christmastime, so we were going to have dinner and then go to a popular neighborhood nearby where the holiday light display was spectacular.
Upon picking Taylor up, she told me her real name was Sunni. The classified service told its clients to use fake names, just in case, she said. Well, becoming nameworthy gave me a dose of confidence.
Dinner was nice, the Christmas lights were reliably fantastic; then I drove her home. She invited me in and, figuring I was on a roll, I accepted.
Sunni went to her bedroom and emerged wearing loose-fitting khaki shorts and a black tee shirt. Her parents were home, but had already gone to bed. I was a bit timid about making out on the couch with her folks in such close proximity, but what the hell? They certainly wouldn’t be angry at a couple of kids kissing, would they?
We kept it PG for 30 minutes. Nibbled ears, kissed necks. exploring tongues. Then her hand slid suggestively over the front of my pants. We were in PG-13 territory until I lifted her shirt and caressed her breasts, first with my hands, then my mouth. Definitely becoming an R-rated night.
Sunni’s hand was now inside my pants.Mine found a gap beneath her shorts. Things were heating up fast. I pulled away slightly. “Your parents ...”
“Don’t worry,” she assured me, kissing me gently on the lips. “They won’t be up until tomorrow morning. Just don’t make too much noise.” She unzipped my pants, pulled back my underwear and ...
After a few minutes, I continued to protest (believe it or not). She stood up, leading me by the hand to the hall bathroom. We went in, I flipped on the light and she locked the door. Silence. Blaring lights above the vanity. A thankfully carpeted floor. She resumed ...
As we were having sex, I considered the fact the entire evening seemed rehearsed. Had she done this very thing before with some other guy? The thought didn’t really bother me; just wanted to know her motivation. The evening ended soon after we were through – post-coital bliss being hard to enjoy on the bathroom floor.
Her parents were sound sleepers.
Our time together always began innocently enough. Inevitably, we would end up naked, sweaty and tired. The encounters became easier while she was house-sitting for her older sister, who was out of town on business. No parents. No curfew. A large, comfortable bed.
But there was a turning point in our relationship. A point at which I learned Sunni’s motivation for finding someone a littlle older, ostensibly more mature and possibly able to provide for her: Sunni wanted out of her life.
She said almost as much one night by relating a story of how, when she was 8 years old, her father kicked her and told her she was worthless. I couldn’t imagine such an event being a one-time thing, so I surmised Sunni had faced abuse growing up. I was about to leave when she told me this, but she asked me to spend the night. It was the first time we shared a bed but kept our clothes on.
“You have the gentlest touch of any man I’ve ever known,” she told me that night as I caressed her cheek.
She’d probably grown accustomed to seeking male companionship for comfort to replace her distant father. And as she got older, sex became the lure for that companionship. She was trying to sex me into spiriting her away to ... what? Another city? Marriage? A new life? A different reason for living? I wasn’t looking for permanence then, and probably never from her.
I began to drift away. I let time and distance tell the story, but unfortunately, those components never say what should be said. Should have looked into her eyes and said, “You deserve more than this. You deserve to be loved. When you look for love, maybe you shouldn’t be so willing to offer your body as a sacrifice to appease the god of the male libido. It clouds things.”
The last time I saw her, I was fulfilling a previously established obligation to attend her cousin’s wedding. I met Sunni’s extended family. They commented on how better-looking I was than all of Sunni’s previous dates. A shower, shave and sportcoat-and-tie can do that for anyone, you know. I had to go to work right after the ceremony, so I bid her goodbye and was gone.
Don’t remember thinking “This is it” as I walked through the church parking lot to my car. Never really thought “I’m not going to call her, or take her calls after this moment.” It was just over. In the gymnastics of love, I’d certainly bungled the dismount. No excuses here. But it should not have been a surprise to her. I know she knew it was fleeting, temporary, a fling.
I never looked at the personals after that.
