When I was about eleven, I splashed up to my mother while swimming in our local swimming pool and asked her if touching myself was wrong. She said yes. Therefore, I never quite managed to ask my other question - is it wrong to touch myself while thinking of boys?

Yeah. Never got around to that one. Not that she would have answered, anyway.

No matter. By the time I was thirteen, I was well aware that no, touching myself wasn't wrong, and (at least according to my peers) touching myself and thinking of a boy was disgusting and twisted. At least I think those are the words my sex ed teacher used after I asked him.

--

When I was thirteen - seventh grade and extremely naive - I met the Carrion Queen. Christin Bocelli, otherwise known as Carrion Queen (or Carrion for short), dressed in black and smoking in the girl's room. She ground the cig under her heel and strode up to me. "Are you gay?" she snapped. Shook her finger at my ear-length hair.

"Um," I said. "I don't know."

She burst into laughter, then stifled it and her face grew still. Cold. "I like to think about fucking girls," she said.

"Oh."

"Yeah."

"Um...good job?" She grinned. She said "Thanks." She scared me. She still does.

--

In eighth grade, my jerking off grew to epic proportions. Sometimes I'd look at the boys in my class and get all sweaty; my voice would crack and I'd have to look away. (Often, of course, I couldn't. Or wouldn't.) And then I realized that girls - especially Carrion - were just as pretty as the boys, perhaps more so.

And now. Ninth grade? Fifteen years old. And I'm not gay.

Or at least that's what I thought until Sylvester Phillipe LaFae strolled into my life.


a/n: yes, i know. a bit boring. the only tiniest hint of romance comes at the very end. but don't worry, the rest will be better!