Arrogant men, pushy friends, childish games, and being asked "who's better?"; OR, My First Kiss.

Let's start slow on this Valentine's Day junk.  It's not you, baby, it's me.  How about we begin with a little ridiculousness, like an ice breaker?  This is the story of My First Kiss.

Well, first kissES, really.

Or, how I went to inexperienced to a little slutty in one night.

Too much?  Maybe.  Truth?  Yes.

It was during that oh-so-alluded-to first-year of college.  One of my best friends from Italy who I hadn't seen since I was 12 was visiting me, which meant the inevitable accelerated discussion of catching up on 6 years of life in the span of a couple days.  Naturally, the subject of boys and relationships came up, and it was discovered that I had never been kissed.

It's true.  The first 18 years of life, plenty of guy friends, sort-of boyfriends, high school pseudo-romances and broken hearts, but no real kiss.

The thing is, this fact doesn't bother me.  I don't feel as though I missed out on something, I don't feel as though I was underdeveloped or misinformed or anything of that sort.  The fact of the matter was, no one I wanted to kiss had wanted to kiss me back, and I wasn't about to do it for the sake of catching up to where I was "supposed" to be.  If I wanted that, I would have had a lot of catching up to do.

I digress.  So, my friend and my roommate (Mon) both found out of my liplock-less years.  They were definitely surprised, especially since I was constantly with guys and having weird, movie-like moments of almost-intimacy.

I should have known something was up when I found myself in my dorm room with my friend, Mon, and two of our best guy friend, and the girls suggested a game of Truth or Dare.  In retrospect, I kind of appreciate that they suggested this when Peter (Mon's best guy friend in the dorm) and Michael (my best guy friend in the dorm) were the only others in the room, since I was comfortable in the end.  It was a tactical maneuver of theirs, but I appreciate it nonetheless.

Now, when Truth or Dare happens, I am a huge cop out and always choose Truth.  I've never been a daring person, and I really didn't feel like having the obligation of streaking around my dormitory (which had already happened several times over by the boys on the third floor) or having to come onto the creepy dude in room 201S who spent all his time playing World of Warcraft when not making strange, provocative insinuations at me.  I have no qualms about being honest (really, try me), which usually does nicely.

Naturally, all four of them came to the agreement that one Dare had to be done by everyone one night.  I was, of course, against this, but I was overruled and in a rare moment of peer pressure, I went with it.  Only after having them promise my dare would not involve any nudity, whether it was my own or someone else's.

Again, how fast the agreement was really should have tipped me off.

As can be figured out, my first question of Truth was who my first kiss was, even when the girls knew it didn't exist.  How clever of them, to get me to admit it to the boys myself rather than be accused of telling them. The boys were just as surprised, and a little bit disbelieving.  They themselves had many a conquests to talk about, so I guess I can see why they didn't believe it.  I guess coming across so many easy girls made them believe no one above the age of 15 couldn't be.

Predictably, my next turn was a Dare.  And of course, the Dare was...to kiss Peter.

Just to explain, I've never thought a first kiss was a big deal.  I know plenty who have had theirs at age 10, age 15, or still haven't had theirs at the age of 22 or 25.  I see no judgment for or against it.  I don't expect it to be after the candle-lit dinner, with the full moon shining above us on my front porch when he takes me home after sweeping me off my feet.  Would I like it to be in the middle of a packed-full baseball stadium at the pitcher's mound with a hot man after baring my soul in a newspaper in a romantic gesture for the sake of love after the clock counts down 3 minutes and he arrives late because it took him forever to get there, which he meant only as traffic was shit but I'll take it to mean some metaphorical meaning of life?

Sure.  But it doesn't have to be.  It's one of those things that will happen when it happens.

Apparently, it was time for it to happen.

I was reluctant.  I had figured out at this time that the entire Truth or Dare game had been some grand plot for me to kiss someone, and that bothered me.  Had it come up naturally in some random game, I don't think I'd have cared as much.  But I hated feeling schemed against.  Heavy protests ensued, many a retort and rebuttal, lots of reasoning and bickering.  I don't know why it was so important to them that I have my first kiss, or why they were so fixated on it.  Michael eventually said, "How about if you kiss Peter, I'll kiss you, too?"  And yeah, he's arrogant enough to think that that would be some sort of prize at the end of the tunnel.

Eventually, I was worn down.  One thing you'll learn about me is that I don't often argue.  I just don't care to.  Our moments are so few, I don't see the need to turn even the littlest things into arguments.  Of course there are the few topics that get me, but something as trivial as a first kiss is definitely not one.

And I finally agreed.  And it happened.  I was sitting up in my bed, tucked in, and Peter leaned in and gave me a quick peck on the lips.  Then Michael came, sat on the bed, smiled at me, and gave me a kiss.  Not like Peter's, who I can only attest to the kind of greeting kiss you'd give your gay best friend.  Michael's was a kiss...nothing movie like, nothing like a bit of tongue slipped in.  But a sweet, Disney-like kiss.  You can read into it, but I know he only did it so he could say he was better than Peter.  There were no fireworks, I felt no different after, except feeling a bit used and a lot slutty. I mean, I'd just kissed two separate boys in one night, not even a minute apart--how would you feel?  It takes a lot for a moment I had zero anticipation for to be anti-climactic, but it was.

And that's the story of my first kiss(es).  I was conned into it, plotted by a scheme, and it somehow mutated into an alpha-male competition.  And yeah, they even asked who was better after.

But you know what?  Jokes on them all, because I don't consider myself having had my first kiss.  And guess what?  It still doesn't bother me.

How about you, what was your first kiss like?  Ridiculous?  Embarrassing? After the candle-lit dinner?