I was a freshman. It was only a few weeks into the school year, and they sent everyone home early because there were tornado warnings. The sun was still shining, but to the west the sky was weird, kind of a greenish yellow, and the air smelled strange, like graham crackers or burnt gingerbread cookies. So I got on the bus and sat by the window not too far from the back, and then I wondered if sitting on the aisle would be safer, or maybe near the front, because I didn’t trust myself to work the emergency exit. I guess I’ve always been, or had been, a fearful sort of person. But I stayed where I was, because I’ve always had a lot of inertia. So the bus was about to start up—the doors closed and it started to move—but then it stopped and the doors opened, and Kerry got on. A senior, star football player. He’d never been on the bus before. Had football practice or something. Had a car. But then I remembered he’d been suspended. A fight or something. And someone said he’d wrecked his car. So he walks down the aisle, and somehow I knew he’d sit next to me. I prayed he wouldn’t. I prayed he would. Inside I was frozen and melting at the same time. “Is this seat saved?” he asked. I almost said yes, but that would have been ridiculous—the bus was already moving again. Before I could answer he said, “Saved for me? How nice of you.” And he sat down. I thought I should say something to him. Too bad about the suspension. About the car. Something. But those would have been stupid things to say, so I didn’t say anything. I pretended to look out the window, but the windows were so grungy they looked just like the greenish yellow sky. And then I panicked and blurted something about the air smelling like burnt gingerbread cookies. He said, “Nothing to worry about,” and he put his hand on my thigh.

It was warm. It was firm. It was gentle. I knew I should do something. Take a pencil out of my book bag and jam it into the back of his hand. But my book bag was under the seat, so I didn’t do anything. And his hand stayed there, warm and strong. But after a while it squeezed my thigh. His hand was so big, like it could almost hold my whole leg all the way around, and the squeezes were regular, not fast or slow. Like a heartbeat. Like breathing. Like making bread. Kneading me. Kneading me and kneading me. And his hand was right at the edge of my skirt, touching the edge of my skirt, and then it was under, but just a little bit, and still squeezing, a regular heartbeat sort of squeeze, and I could feel myself melting, opening, and he kept squeezing and squeezing, and I opened more and more, and I melted more and more. I’d touched myself before, more than a few times, at night in bed, under the covers, but I’d never been able to get all the way there—I always stopped before ... or when I didn’t stop nothing happened, but he didn’t stop, he squeezed and squeezed, and I was sort of squeezing too. And part of me wanted his hand to move more, to move all the way to where I was melting, opening, but it stayed where it was, at the edge of my skirt, just under, squeezing and squeezing, and suddenly it happened. It was like an explosion or implosion, all compressed and impossibly tight. Like a silent boom. No noise. Just shock. Pure profound shock. And then again. And again. Boom! Boom! Boom! Five or six of them. Maybe my thighs clamped together. When it was over I unclenched. His hand was still there, but not squeezing. And then one last squeeze, and he got up, went up the aisle, and the door opened and he got off.

He was never on the bus after that day. I’d see him on the football field for home games, and on the basketball court, and after graduation he went to Iraq and didn’t come back. Meanwhile I had boyfriends and orgasms, sometimes at my own hand, and sometimes during sex, but I could never come without thinking of him, of his hand on my thigh on that bus ride.

I’m married now, a mostly happy marriage. And when I get horny, I make a batch of gingerbread men, and I bake them until they’re just a tad overdone, and then I take them out of the oven and I take my man into the bedroom and fuck his brains out.