Getting Down at Brown

Then I remembered: she actually had said "No" once before, to the dork to took her to prom. I guess that made her more experienced that me!

Eventually we broke apart, to get ready for bed. Sheila grabbed her PJs and headed for the bathroom, but when she came out, I was stunned: instead of her PJs, she was wearing just a t-shirt and panties.

"Oh, my God, Sheila!" I guess that wasn't cool, but I wasn't at all prepared for this. I was already in my pajama bottoms and a t-shirt, and I wished that I hadn't gotten ready for bed so fast. Of course, if I'd had boxers, that might look pretty cool, but all of my underwear was tighty-whiteys.

"Is this too much?" she asked me?

"Oh, Lord, no, you look perfect," I replied, and I meant it. To me, she was the most wonderful sight ever, the most beautiful girl I'd ever known. Too bad I didn't have the first clue as to what to do next.

Well, maybe I didn't, but Sheila wasn't clueless. She picked up a pillow from her bed, put it on mine, and then slid under the covers. "I know we can't make love," she whispered, "but I'd really love it if I could sleep in your arms tonight."

I couldn't tell you what I dreamed that night, and I'm not even sure what I was thinking, but I knew full well what was happening: Sheila was making sure that the first time we did make love, it would be making love, and not just screwing. The twin beds in our dorm room weren't exactly made for two people, and I sure wasn't used to sharing a bed with anyone, but I was as happy as I could be, cuddled up with Sheila.

The sky was just barely getting light when I opened my eyes; Sheila had awakened before I had, and she was just looking at me, smiling. "Good morning," she said, giving me a quick, closed mouth kiss. Turning away, she got out of bed and headed for the bathroom, excusing herself with "Got to brush my teeth."

Well, yeah, I understood that, and other things as well, as she was in the BR longer than just tooth brushing time. When she emerged, she was brushing out her still-wet hair, but instead of being dressed for class, she was still in the t-shirt and panties. I had to do the same things, and took my turn.

When I emerged, Sheila still wasn't dressed, but was sitting on the edge of her bed, this time in just a bra and panties. Her clothes for today were ready, on her bed, and she'd had plenty of time to get dressed, but it was clear: she wanted me to see her getting dressed. Her underwear wasn't see-through at all, so she wasn't showing off as much as she could have, but still, this was a big step for her, and for me. She pulled on a pair of wool socks, and then her jeans, before finally pulling a heavy sweater on over her head; it was a wet, raw day outside.

I knew she expected me to dress in front of her, but I had to warn her. "Sheila, I'm not wearing underwear under my pajama bottoms." If she'd wanted to turn around, she could, but instead she just smiled and said, "Good."

With that, I got my clothes out, pulled off my pajama bottoms and t-shirt, and started getting dressed. I guess that if I knew how to show off, I would have, but kind of kept things normal. "That was nice to watch," she said, as I was finally pulling on my shoes.

Yeah, this morning sure had been different, but once we were out of the dorm room, it was back to our normal routine, heading to breakfast together. Yeah, it was Sunday, no classes, but we still always got up early.

Well, not quite normal, because we were holding hands part of the time. That made the rotten weather a whole lot more bearable!

Breakfast was punctuated mostly by small talk, but it was small talk with bigger smiles than usual. When we were finished, and putting up our dirty dishes and trays, she mentioned, almost in passing, that she needed to head over to Student Health Monday afternoon. I know that I had a quizzical look on my face, before it dawned on me: she was going to get birth control!

To me, that was huge! It meant that yes, Sheila had decided that we were going to be making love. In my heart, I had already known that, but my lack of success with women before now still had me on edge, worrying that we'd never make love, worrying that somehow I'd screw this up. My roommate had just told me, subtly, that no, I hadn't messed up, and all of a sudden, I was not only happy, I was proud of myself, thinking that I was just as much of a man as Jeff or any of the other guys who were all so successful with women.

Then the negative thoughts came into my mind. No, I wasn't as much of a man as Jeff and the other alpha-dogs, because they wouldn't have just watched Sheila get dressed, but pushed her down on the bed, pulled off her underwear, and taken her. Was that what she secretly wanted, or would that just be rape? Given that we didn't have any condoms available, there's no way she could have secretly wanted to just be taken, right?

Damn it, I wish that I knew more about what the Hell we're doing! Are we getting things right, or am I about to just fucking blow it?

Normally, our Sundays were spent studying and getting homework done, but we hadn't been joined at the hip on weekends; we usually went our separate ways at some point, and I don't know, maybe Sheila wanted to turn down the heat or something, but after breakfast she blew me an air kiss, and said that she'd be back later, but she had some stuff to do. I worked on some papers I had coming due in the morning, then decided that I'd head to the Aquatics Center; the pool is open for recreational swimming between one and five. I had a fantasy about Sheila and I changing together in the same locker room, but that's all it was, a fantasy; the locker rooms are not coed.

Of course, before Sheila and I started getting closer, going swimming also meant getting to check out the coeds at the pool, but somehow I wasn't quite as interested anymore.

Swimming was my primary exercise, and even then, I didn't do it often enough. I told you that I look average in almost every respect, and I do: too skinny, no real muscle definition, and, in the middle of February, just about the whitest white guy in town. I tan pretty deeply during the summer, and I used to spend a lot of my summers at the community pool before being graduated from high school, but I always got super-pale in the winter.

I finished playing around - I did some laps, but I wouldn't want you to think I was just a lap swimmer - I got dressed again, but instead of heading back to the dorm, I decided to take a walk around campus. Brown is a beautiful place, full of old architecture, and even though it wasn't the best day, I still enjoyed it. Naturally, I kept thinking about what we were doing, and whether I was doing things right, or was about to mess up. Sheila had already hinted that she was going to be getting on the pill, but I knew that took some time before pills took effect, and maybe I ought to take some responsibility here. I ventured off campus, to a convenience store on Power Street, determined to buy some condoms.

Holy crap, that made me nervous. I don't know why, because condoms are a frequent purchase for college students, but I was embarrassed as Hell. Then double holy crap, because just in Trojans, the only brand I'd ever heard of, there were like five different selections. I looked for a few seconds, and then got so uncomfortable having other people watching me that I just grabbed a box called Double Ecstasy, and tried to look a lot cooler than I felt.

I'm sure that my heart was beating 140 times a minute, and my blood pressure was probably 200 over 160. I just knew that the clerk was going to laugh her ass off that a geek like me was buying rubbers, like I'd never, ever get a chance to use them. Naturally, I was going to use cash, rather than my debit card, so she couldn't see my name.

Yet, when I got to the counter, the clerk processed my sale just as matter-of-factly as could be. No special smile, no giggling, no rolling of her eyes, just another purchase, no different than if I had picked up toothpaste. She put my purchase in a small plastic bag, which at least kept passers-by from seeing what I had bought.

Why the heck was I so nervous, anyway? Sex was a normal part of life, even if it hadn't been a part of my life yet.

I started thinking, or maybe overthinking, about this on the way back to our dorm. I remembered, and had taken to heart, MaryEllen's advice that guys should learn how to hold off rather than masturbating to a quick orgasm, and I had both read up on techniques and tried my best to practice them. Still, as Sheila and I had gotten closer, and started spending more time together, my opportunities to masturbate had become far less frequent, and it had been a couple of weeks now. If Sheila saw what I had purchased, who knows, maybe she'd be ready tonight, but the problem was that I didn't know if I'd be ready tonight, not ready enough to be good for her.

Maybe she wouldn't be in the room when I got back! I could go into the bathroom and take care of my backed-up balls, and then have more confidence that I could do a decent job for her. Or, if she was there, just keep my purchase hidden from her until after I did have an opportunity.

Somehow, things were really weird when I got up to the dorm room floor. A couple of girls smiled at me, like they had some big secret. What the heck, maybe Sheila had been talking about me, not that she spent much time with any of the other girls on the floor. Then I passed Jeff, and he smiled, too, and high-fived me for some odd reason. What the heck was going on?

I know that I was shaking my head as I put the key in my dorm room door. I opened it up, saw Sheila smiling at me, and, holy cow, our beds had been pushed together, and there was a single, king-sized sheet holding the mattresses together.