Chapter 2: Henri

The incident with Brown was my first sexual one with anyone other than myself, and despite how poorly it had gone, it would certainly not be my last. My next though, was as much a surprise as my night with Brown, and I'll tell you now about how it came about.

The morning after my painful night with Brown, I struggled to stand. I was sore, muscles felt weak, I was dehydrated. My dark sweatpants had caught most of what blood leaked out of my bikini, and I slowly emerged from my tent, finding no one else awake in the early hours.

I used the early start to slip off the sweatpants and slide into the water to wash myself. My white and black bikini had large, dark red circles, stains. I'd bled a lot that night, and there was no hiding it. Even the dark sweats had darker spots from the blood. I felt terrified of anyone seeing me, so I wrapped the towel around my waist, grabbed my things, and took off down the road to the convenience store where I called my mom to pick me up.

She asked me questions I wouldn't answer honestly, and she knew it. She asked if there was a boy I liked there, and I lied. If I'd had a fun night, I lied again. If I was feeling ok, and I lied there too. She gave up at some point, dealing with teenagers was never her best skill. Mom meant well, but I was a surly teen girl with emotions you could pull out and roast over a fire.

At home, I put my bloody bottoms, sweats, and the towel in the corner of my room and collapsed, fell quickly asleep, and tried to forget everything from the night before.

The next week Brown avoided me, even when I said 'hi' he grunted his response and moved on. I felt so ashamed. I'd been a bad lay, a bloody mess, a torn little girl that wasn't worth the effort to repair. I avoided the rest of the campers, as well, seeing their eyes on me, odd glances, whispers. None seemed to care much that I wasn't talking to them or joining them at lunch.

Another week went by before I first heard the term 'loose girl.' I was passing by a group of sophomores and freshman, some of whom I knew, including Brown. A younger dark-haired girl, Jini, laughed and looked my way briefly, then turned back to the circle. " ... just a loose girl, we all know it..."

That's all I heard, and as any teen would, I knew they were talking about me. When the others laughed, I turned and tried my best not to cry. Later that day, my locker door featured a colorful drawing of what I assumed to be a stick figure me, with the bright green letters spelling out 'Loose Girl' over my head.

I had no idea who did it, still don't, almost didn't care. I was crushed deeply, so ashamed, so embarrassed. Everyone knew. Everyone knew that I'd had sex with Brown and that I'd been terrible. They all hated me, I could feel it. I hated them, too. All of them. I wanted to run away from everything, start again at some other school. I wanted to die.

I stayed home sick on Friday and locked myself in my room. My mom managed to coax me out for a meal a time or two, but otherwise, I kept to myself.

Sunday morning my Mom opened my door and woke me, sat on my bed, stroked my hair, asked, "Carrie, Sweetie ... you feeling ok? It's almost noon. Thought you'd be over whatever this is by now."

"Cramping." I lied, knew my mom was clueless about my cycle. "Not up to doing anything right now, Mom."

"Ok ... I'll fix you some tea, always makes my cramps feel better."

"K."

I'd had no calls from the few people I considered friends in days. Even Belle, the one I'd have considered my closest, had sent me nothing so much as a 'hello'. I left her a short message, just wanted to talk, got no reply.

I sunk deeper into my misery. My vagina had hurt for a couple of days after the night with Brown, but even after it had healed, I hadn't masturbated. Probably a record for me. I usually rubbed one out every day, if not several. I had no energy for it, no arousal. I felt numb sexually. Broken, out of sync. Nothing that had happened since that night felt exciting, nothing turned me on.

I was in a bad place when I went back to school. Depressed, sinking in my self-doubt, my shame, my isolation. I wanted desperately to take back what I did, to undo it, but life taught me very quickly that there were no do-overs.

Monday morning started with English, then followed with Spanish. Our normal instructor was away at a conference, and our substitute looked barely older than the students. Henri LaBlount was a short, medium-brown skinned man that was barely older than me. His light slacks and white, colored shirt played nicely with his flesh, and for the first time in many days, I felt a stirring in my genitals.

Other than a momentary glance at his cute face, or his tight, slacks-covered butt, there was nothing else that day, or the next, and it began to wear off as my misery continued. I was sullen, felt drawn out and thin, rote memory keeping me from appearing worse to others.

Friday morning arrived and when I slid into Spanish class our normal instructor was there. My moments of lift provided by dreaming of Henri's attention were gone, replaced by monotonous instruction in a language I could barely understand.

At lunch, I went to the bathroom, passing by the window-paned offices. I saw Henri, briefly, talking with someone at a desk. I slipped into the bathroom, urinated, and wiped before exiting. Henri had just come out of the office and smiled at me, said, "well, see you, Carrie. Was nice learning with you this week."

"Yeah ... uh ... yeah, thanks ... see ya."

He stared just a second too long into my eyes, and I found myself compelled to walk with him.

"I'll, uh ... uh ... I'll walk you down this way..."

"Don't you want to grab some lunch? Not much time left."

"Nah. Not hungry. Walking does me good when I need to think..."

"Alright." An awkward silence for several steps, then he rushed out with, "Say, do you know the term 'papi chulo?'

"Papi ch-chulo ... no, no."

"Means 'cute man' in Espanol. If you've got a boyfriend, that might make him smile."

Looking back, it was a bit creepy, in some sense, but at the time, it was just confirmation that he was a kind man. I latched on. "Papi chulo ... ok ... Henri es papi chulo, like that?"

He smiled, blushed even with his dark skin, looked ahead of him rather than at me. "Uh ... sure, yeah ... like that. So, do you have a boyfriend?"

I shook my head, looked and felt sad. "Never ... they all hate me."

"I doubt that. You seem nice to me. What's holding you back?"

I don't know why I told him, but I did. "They call me 'Loose Girl.' I'm not ... uh ... I mean ... it's not right. They won't stop and I hate it."

"Loose Girl ... uh, oh ... wow ... I'm sorry, Carrie, that's awful. Would you like me to go with you to talk to the principal?"

I was vehement. "No! No, please. No, I don't want this to get worse. I'll deal with it. Don't worry about me."