Oh dear, this is bad. I’m in torment, inflicted with embarrassment, and suffering the agonies of the damned, but what the hell! If I can’t be honest, then there’s not much point in doing this column. Here’s the sad, unvarnished truth – even experienced women can be sexually incompetent. Hello everybody, my name is Anne and I’m a sexual disaster area. Well, I was, just this once!
It all started innocently enough – James invited me for coffee. My friend, Sarah, a woman with a romantic streak a mile wide, was very excited about the idea. “Ooh, a date!” she squealed, gaily chucking rose-tinted glasses, stirring violins and heart-shaped chocolates over the impending event.
It wasn’t, I insisted, it was merely caffeinated beverages and conversation. As a get-together, coffee is an innocent diversion. There may be biscuits, possibly even cake, but a side order of unspoken desire sprinkled with coursing hormones, is not guaranteed. That’s more fun, of course, but it’s asking a lot of your local purveyor of lattes.
Perhaps it was his tight black tee-shirt – or maybe green tea is a lot more intoxicating than you might suppose, but at some point during the evening as James sprawled across his chair, I found myself admiring his long legs and strong arms with a lot more than aesthetic appreciation.
For a while, I’d thought James was attractive in a sort of “oh, I so would” kind of way – the way most women divide up the men of their acquaintance into the shaggable and untouchable – but without necessarily actively wishing to exchange bodily fluids. Now my feelings had changed, which was all very well, except that I had no idea if he was just being friendly or if he had any wicked ulterior motives.
Luckily he had, or at least managed to find some down the back of a couch. Not that I am without my charms, but we redheads don’t like to presume, you know.
Not so luckily, in the following week, privacy was in short supply. He has housemates and so do I. Mostly that’s fine, but discretion is better for the first time. You don’t want to have to contend with the slings and arrows of knowing grins and friendly innuendo: that sort of stuff can make you feel like a sexual comedy sideshow.
I finally understand why lust is one of the seven deadly sins – it makes you an unproductive member of society. For days my mind had been clouded by desire. I couldn’t work. I couldn’t sleep. I couldn’t think about anything other than sex – sex with James. On the bed; on the couch; against the wall; in the kitchen; and my personal favourite, on my office chair.
Eventually, having managed to clear the house of extraneous housemates I invited James around for dinner. Not that I wasn’t planning on feeding him, but dinner was a ruse, an excuse to get him over without inquiring if he’d be so kind as to come around and shag me.
When he arrived, I wanted to shimmy up him like a tree – he’s very tall – and rip his clothes off then and there, but being a polite, well-bred young lady, I offered him a drink. But it wasn’t long before all pretence had fled and my clothes had been shed like an unwanted second skin. It was all motoring along perfectly and then… catastrophe.
The first time you have sex with someone it can be lovely. But at other times, nerves can get the better of you. Well, get the better of me, in any case. Just then I felt awkward; in a haze of lust and nervous tension my body and mind had disconnected themselves from one another. It was like finding that I’d unexpectedly lost the ability to use my left leg. I experienced the female equivalent of erectile dysfunction. I dried up – literally, figuratively, metaphorically and technically.
Afterwards lying in bed, I felt miserable. Losing your mojo and a large chunk of your self-esteem isn’t likely to put a spring in your step and a song in your heart. It was no use telling myself that these things are bound to happen from time to time. That might be true, but it didn’t cheer me up. It’s all very well when they happen to other people, but not to me, thanks very much!
To make matters worse, I fancied him rotten but the chances of him wanting to have sex with me again seemed remote. What could I say? “Go, on, gis another go! I’m not that bad, honest!”
Instead I decided to make the promised dinner. At least if the poor man managed to get some proteins, the evening wouldn’t be a complete washout. James, obviously having decided to make the best of it, acted as if nothing had happened, while I tried to play the happy hostess despite my wretchedness.
An hour or so later, fed and watered, things didn’t look quite so bleak. James was smiling at me and running his hand up and down my arm. “C’mon, let’s go back to bed,” he suggested. Really? Perhaps he was determined, horny or even, perish the though, desperate. But what did it matter?
This time my inhibitions melted away along with my clothes. This was the way it was supposed to be – our bodies wrapped around each other; the taste and texture of skin and tongue; the sheets and bedclothes strewn around the room as we got to know one another, again and again.
My mother always said that the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach. I’m beginning to see what she might have been hinting at – that cooking and eating a good meal with your potential conquest can help you relax as well, before you get down to the important business! So I wonder… maybe it was the lemon chicken that did it.
Hmmm… short skirts, flirting and sexual techniques? In today’s sexually saturated society, maybe that’s a given. From now on, I’m going to cultivate my inner Nigella. Well, some of the time…