Chapter 2
“I CAN GET IT UP JUST FINE”
I never had a student of mine come ask me about sex, and I would never had imagined that it ever would, but the kid sat in front of me now.
The bell had rung and I had watched the students filter out of the class and into the hall. I turned away from the door, erased the board of today’s lesson, and packed my things quickly, ready to ditch this place and go to Johnson’s with Frank and watch the Cardinals game.
I put the last folder into my leather bag when I heard my name being called.
“Mr. Brendan?” he asked.
It was William Lane, the last person I expected to ask me about sex, just because he didn’t seem like the person who would have sex until he was twenty-five or something. He was overweight and wore some band t-shirt, his dark hair hanging over his eyes and his glasses slipping off of his nose. I could picture my mother in her favorite pink dress yelling at this boy to push them up.
I couldn’t just tell the kid to fuck off - it isn’t the teacher thing to do - so I sat him down in a desk across from my own.
“What is it, Will?”
“William,” he corrected me.
“Please make it fast, William. I have somewhere to go.”
Sometimes I really questioned being a teacher. You always had to put up with obnoxious kids who cared nothing for what you were desperately passionate for. All they cared about was getting laid or high at the next big football game.
He looked down, ashamed of what he was going to ask me. He didn’t speak for some moments, so I got up from my seat, which popped out his question. “What’s sex like?” he asked.
“I don’t think this is very appropriate. You should ask your parents or friends about this, not your teachers or me for that matter.”
“I don’t have any parents or friends. And… ”, he began but stopped once more as if he were afraid to admit the truth. “You seem nice and you’re my favorite teacher. You're honest, I mean.”
Truthfully, it did make me a little warm inside to be the one that he came to.
I sat back down. What was I going to do? What was I going to say? I wish I wasn’t in this situation. But if he wanted the truth, then I’d give it to him.
“Well, sex is like anything really. The first time is the worse, but it’s also the best because it’s real. It’s the first time you’re experiencing it. You’re still innocent and vulnerable during this time. It’s something of a fairytale really. Do you understand what I mean?” I asked.
He shook his head.
“There’s not really a simple way to put it.” I said.
“How has yours been?” He asked.
I didn’t know how to respond to that. “Have you seen porn?” He nodded. “Like that but ten notches lower. Not as sexy as it may appear. And that’s how all sex is really. Porn makes sex look amazing, and trust me it is. But in porn sex is dramatized as something that should be done with whoever and whenever, like when a girl orders pizza from delivery guy.” He smiled as if that were one of his favorites.
Then I said, “In porn the moans are louder and the people are sexier and the privates are bigger. In real life sex is good, but porn over does it.
