My Summer of Firsts

Chapter 11 - Humiliation Reciprocation

As I was rinsing the last of the soap suds away under the shower head, Elian knocked. I heard a soft squeak. It was the same sound the hinges made when I closed the bathroom door. "Elian?"

"Sorry. I didn't open this on purpose, I swear. Um, you just didn't close the door hard enough. You have to kind of shove it until it clicks."

"Okay." I wiped the excess water off my face. "Can you just leave the clothes on the sink?"

"Aren't you worried I might catch a peek?" he asked with a bit of a sultry tone, though I could tell he was joking. He didn't have to pretend or adopt a persona when he wanted to be alluring. He just was.

"Not really," I said, raising my voice so he could hear me through the curtain and over the rushing water. Other than my perpetual paleness and my thick thighs, I'd never had many significant body image issues.

"Confidence." Elian clicked his tongue. "That's very sexy."

I rolled my eyes. "Confidence was never my problem. Lack of interested parties has been my tragic downfall."

"You know, you're not at all how I thought you were when we first met."

I turned off the water and reached my arm out to grab the towel I'd hung on the rack beside the tub. "What did you think I was?"

"You seemed kind of shy and jittery."

I laughed as I rubbed the towel over my wet hair. "You know you don't have to be shy to get anxious. Especially when you're trying to play it cool around someone you're attracted to."

"I guess that's true."

Sufficiently dried off, I wrapped the towel around my waist. I pulled the curtain back. He leaned against the doorframe with his arms crossed over his chest, making his biceps look twice their size.

His eyes went wide. "I'm sorry." He quickly averted his gaze to stare at the floor, his cheeks turning pink.

I gripped the tuck of the towel as I stepped out of the tub. "It's not like I didn't know you were there."

He nodded. "True."

"Also, I was kinda trying to prove a point."

"Do tell." He stared directly into my eyes and nowhere else.

"Well, you're a very confident guy, as far as I've seen. But you got nervous when you saw me just now, right?"

"I guess so. Yeah," he said with a chuckle. "Point taken."

"Now could you maybe go so I can get dressed?"

He bit his lip, glancing down to give me a once-over before he pulled the door shut.

As I examined the clothes—sweatpants, a t-shirt, and a pair of boxer briefs—there was another knock. "Hey," Elian said, his voice muffled by the door between us.

"Yeah?"

"I was gonna mention, the underwear might be a bit snug, but it's all I have."

I could tell by looking at them they wouldn't fit. I had a thicker waist than him, not to mention my thunder thighs. They'd probably cut off circulation to my legs, among other areas. And as much as I might want those areas to receive less blood flow, in order to avoid a repeat of earlier, I'd actually had the unfortunate experience of wearing ill-fitting underwear once.

At fourteen, Derek and I, in a daze of boredom, made the brilliant decision to dive into his pool fully clothed. His mom found us ten minutes later and demanded we get out. Because I had no other dry clothes, Mrs. Hill made me wear some of Derek's. Unfortunately, Derek was a beanpole who wore tighty-whities back then. I had a wedgie for the next three hours while I waited for my mother to get off work and pick me up. Mrs. Hill didn't offer to dry my clothes. She simply handed me a trash bag to put them in so they didn't drip on their carpets.