2010

Kaipo read somewhere once that the average age of most Americans to lose their virginity was sixteen. (We weren't Americans—not by choice, anyway—but it was the only statistic we could go off of.) Since he had this weird aversion to becoming part of a statistic, he asked me one day if I wanted to, well, do it. Just to get it over with.

I said yes because I had nothing better to do.

Turns out he must have misremembered it because according to the internet, it was closer to seventeen, but there was also a lot of conflicting information so I didn't blame him. And regardless, it wasn't like I regretted it. Media painted a particular image of the construct of virginity I had never necessarily agreed with. Sex wasn't something to take lightly, especially as a teenager—STDs and pregnancy, among other things—but it also wasn't this precious gift to be lost. Having sex didn't rob me of my innocence or brand a scarlet letter on my chest.

That didn't mean it wasn't a brand new and vulnerable thing I was about to do, and doing it with someone I trusted, someone who was my closest friend, meant I knew I was in good hands (literally) and that he was as well. Because that was important to me. Kaipo might not have said outright that he was nervous, but I felt it, as easily as I felt my own nerves under any sort of pressure. As soon as I agreed, I realized how happy I was that he asked in the first place.

When we first talked about it, he asked me what I knew.

"I don't know," I shrugged. "I've read about it in books. Kanani told me it hurt her first time. That's it."

"Really?" He went quiet. "I've only... watched stuff. Not, like, porn. Just... what they put in movies."

"Yeah, let's not do that." We quickly both agreed. As little as we knew, that would be certain.

We both wanted to learn as much as we could, but asking somebody else was out of the question. So was doing any sort of research online for obvious reasons, the biggest of all being that leaving behind that kind of search history was a big no. Kaipo also wasn't about to sit through reading any of the books I had read before just for one night. Yeah, it felt a little nerdy at the time, wanting to research sex as if we were about to write a paper on it, but we didn't want to make any monumental mistakes.

When Kanani told me about her first time, it was because I asked her about it out of curiosity, but she didn't seem surprised by the question and she was more than willing to tell me anything I had wanted to hear, which I was grateful for. I had a good relationship with both of my parents and knew they wouldn't be upset or weirded out if I asked them anything, like when they knew they were ready, but I felt better asking my sister than one of them. Part of me probably wanted to pick her brain for whenever I experienced it myself. She didn't tell me any extreme details as that was hardly relevant nor wanted, but she explained it in a way that didn't make either of us squirm. It was one of those moments I was glad to have an older sibling; she threw herself headfirst into the world and all of its terrifying experiences and I got to learn from any of her mistakes as cautionary tales for my own life.

My sister also didn't place any particular significance on having sex for the first time, hence why she ended up losing it at a party. Something that wasn't at all planned intentionally but something she figured could happen that night. Although she had no interest in it in the first place, it pretty much eliminated any possibility of romance when she was acutely aware of just how many people were downstairs with only a few thin walls and too-loud music acting as a barrier between them. She had met the guy a couple of months prior, someone who went to a different school than us. Kanani stated it was by no means enjoyable at any point and it definitely hurt more than she thought it would—"a pinch, but, like, a strange pinch that takes a hold of your entire insides and it doesn't really go away for a while."—but it was also kind of weirdly liberating. She said she had never been more aware of her entire body before—the way she breathed and how rapidly her chest rose and fell, how sensitive the back of her knees were, the way her body could react separately from her mind—particularly with another person. There was a lot of bleeding and it took forever to scrub it out of the stark white sheets that looked like they belonged in a hospital. But she thought it was all worth it. Everything felt comfortable, despite the pain, and she felt safe.

Even though that wasn't the setting in which I wanted to have my first time, I wanted to feel as comfortable as she did. That was why I agreed to Kaipo's proposition. I knew that was exactly what I would get. Every (probable) messy misstep and embarrassing moment would be shared with someone who wouldn't judge me.

We skipped school so we could sneak back into his house when his parents had gone to work. Our rationalization for why this was okay was that we had already taken all of our finals for the semester, so the next week was more or less just teachers and students bullshitting their way around school. Nobody wanted to be there anyway. We weren't going to be missed.

The two of us stood in front of his front door staring blankly at it. Kaipo held his house keys in his hands, but they didn't move to unlock the door yet. It was the first moment that I realized yeah, maybe having sex for the first time didn't have to be that but it could still be that.

Turning to each other, we nodded once.

"We got this."

"Open the damn door, Kaips."

I tried to imagine the next time I would come over to his house. Having to stare his parents in the eyes knowing what I had done with their son and whether they would somehow know. Approximately three seconds passed before I forbade myself from thinking about it longer.

There was some attempt at foreplay but it didn't really do anything for us, probably because this was purely an exercise in trying something new, an experiment for lack of a better word, and not something organic between us. While Kaipo went into his bathroom to find the condoms he had hidden a week earlier—for safekeeping, he had told me, as if his parents ever looked through his room—I tried doing that thing I had attempted to do myself a few times before, but it wasn't working either so I gave up. Luckily, Kaipo had the foresight to pick up lube beforehand so it wasn't totally necessary, even though I knew it would have been nice to let loose some of the nerves. Now that we were actually here, it felt more real. Up until then, it was just an idea we had planned.

"Got it." He held up the condom. A hideous neon green wrapper that looked toxic. I didn't need the image of a toxic penis in my head, so I slapped it onto the nightstand, where it belly-flopped onto the carpet. "I'm not not wearing that. You know that, right?"

I shook my head. "I just... don't want to look at it right now. The package will be secured before delivery."

"You did not just say that."

Scrunching my nose, I suppressed the urge to vomit. "I can't believe I did either. Forget I said that."

"Okay." He nodded, too. A bit robotic. God, this was either going straight downhill or I was going to sink this ship all on my own. "You sure you want to do this?"

"Yeah. You?"

"I think so."

"You think so?" I groaned. "Kaipo, if you're not ready, say some—"

"No," he interrupted. "I am. I am. I'm just..."

I swallowed. "Nervous?"

"Lil' bit."

"We'll be fine." Wouldn't we? We would. "Do you trust me?"

Without hesitation, he replied, "Yes."

"Okay. Good. I trust you too."

"Good."

And then, like a bunch of weirdos, we high-fived. What kind of losers did that?

(Us.)

...

It was a mess. The kind of mess that only those involved understood, like knowing that random spot on the floor in your room where you dropped a paperclip two years ago. Who knew? Maybe you would need it in a few weeks' time. Best to keep the mess right where it was so you knew exactly where to go.

Our long limbs somehow got tangled at some point, Kaipo accidentally stabbed himself in the eye while he was grabbing the condom off the floor, and I made a noise I had never heard before. (Down there.) (Ugh.) It was kind of embarrassing. But then I laughed at myself and Kaipo joined me. I thought then that I had no idea how many times I would have sex in my life, nor how many partners with which I would have, but I hoped there were more instances of us laughing.

For one, I had never been that naked in front of another person who wasn't family before. I wasn't even used to existing around other people in my body while clothed. I held purses and backpacks on my lap. Tugged at already baggy shirts. Sat with my legs up on the balls of my feet. Avoided looking at mirrors that looked like they came out of a carnival funhouse. Being that exposed was much more terrifying than I had anticipated, even if we had seen each other countless times in our swimsuits at the beach. He could see every stretch mark and every foul tan line. Even the self-inflicted scars—brand new ones and remnants from my childhood. But, like Kaipo was always so good at, he neither fixated nor shied away from them. They were just another part of me that he lived with because he cared for me.

Kaipo had to stop a few times beforehand. I asked him each time if he still wanted to do this and he said yes, but that he hadn't expected this kind of internal response. I told him it was okay.

It was neither a good nor bad feeling. The pinch Kanani told me about was accurate. There was some blood too, but Kaipo brushed me off when I offered to take care of it. After all, I had experience cleaning blood out of sheets. (Shout out to my shedding uterus.) Kaipo felt bad that I couldn't finish, but I wasn't expecting it in the first place. I sat there after we were done, while he was outside by the washing machine, and felt a strange sense of calmness ripple through me.

When he returned, the thudding of the washer pulsing in the background like a broken record reminder of what we had just done, we played Super Smash Bros. Brawl. It wasn't at all like the movies made it seem. That was more than okay with me.

...

A week later, I approached my dad while he was hanging laundry on the clothesline outside.

Not that I had any excuse to complain either way since I was rarely made to do laundry myself, but I used to hate that they hung it outside instead of using the perfectly functioning dryer. If we were in a rush and needed to take it down before it was fully dry, it would have patchy damp spots in some areas. And it always had the distinct smell of salt on it, which was fine in theory but was sometimes just not wanted.

Once Kanani told me they stopped using the dryer to save on the cost of electricity, I shut up and learned to like the smell.

Sliding out one of the rattan chairs placed under the shade, I pulled my legs up and rested my chin on my arm. Dad worked silently, for the most part, humming an old Hawaiian song he used to sing to me when I had trouble sleeping at night.

"Something on your mind?" he asked without turning around.

"No." That was a lie, and also not. It always felt like I had a million things going through my mind and nothing all at once. "Sort of. Maybe. I don't know."

"That's alright." He hung up Leimomi's purple one-piece. "But you look like you want to talk about it. Whatever it is. So, I'm here to listen if you want. Or I'm here to be quiet."

"You were out here first. You don't have to do anything for me."

This time, he looked back. "Everything I do is for you, Hokulani."

Under his steady gaze, I wrapped my arms tighter around my body. "I, um—I had sex."

God, blurting it out like that wasn't part of the plan. I didn't have a plan, but if I did it wasn't that. There had to be a million better ways to have dropped that bomb on him. But I wasn't sure it even mattered. Like only my dad was capable of, he didn't visibly react right away except to turn back to the laundry.

"Yeah?"

"Yeah."

"And?"

I shrugged knowing he couldn't see it. "I don't know. Just felt like saying it."

Only twisting the knot further in my stomach, my dad laughed. "And you felt like saying it to me? You're so funny sometimes."

"Please don't laugh at me."

After hanging the final piece of clothing, my dad walked back over to me, taking a seat on the grass beside my chair. Up close it was easier to see his smile lines. "I'm not laughing at you."

"Feels like it sometimes."

"I'm laughing 'cause you make me so damn happy," he corrected.

Proving to be the most inopportune time to remember the toxic green condom, I ducked my head. "How does me admitting I had sex make you happy?"

"It doesn't. You feeling comfortable enough to talk to me about it when there's something on your mind means I did something right with this whole parenting thing." He waved his hand around.

When I walked out here, I had no plan in mind. I just found myself moving in his direction as if he would somehow be able to figure me out just by looking at me. After all, it was like staring in a mirror. He gave me his face—the color of his eyes, his crooked smile, his love for the ocean that made them shine like diamonds.

"I don't—I know it doesn't have to mean that much, and I don't think that it does, but it feels different. I feel different."

"And this feeling isn't regret?"

I shook my head.

"Then I think you're just processing it. You're right. Sex doesn't have to be this big, life-changing. But it's okay if it is. Or almost is. It's also okay if you don't know how you feel about it either."

"Do you think I did it too young?"

He shrugged. "Younger than I was but my opinion only matters so much if it's not my body."

"But your opinion matters to me."

"Regardless of my opinion, would it matter anymore? It already happened. No use in holding yourself to some standard that was presented to you after." I stayed quiet. "If you felt like it was the right time, I'm okay with that."

"Aren't you going to ask who it was?"

"I wasn't going to," he replied.

"It was Kaipo." As if I ever talked to anyone else.

Dad grimaced.

"Is this the part where you go to his house and tell him to never touch me again?"

"As much as I wish it was someone else, I don't decide what you do with your body or who you do it with," he answered truthfully.

"Most dads would do it."

He scoffed. "Many dads don't understand bodily autonomy. That's their problem."

"He was... I'm glad it was him. I don't think I would've been okay with anyone else. And we were safe about it."

"That's good. I'm glad you were safe and that it was with someone you care for."

I laughed, tapping his leg with the side of my foot. "I thought you didn't like him?"

"I think I've seen him eat way too many boogers as a kid to expect him to be normal."

Rolling my eyes, I replied, "I think every kid eats boogers at some point. Definitely babies."

"You're underestimating just how many I've seen him eat. Buggah probably pooped green as a kid."

It was probably the worst thing he could have said after the whole toxic green penis fiasco, but I found myself laughing until tears fell from my eyes. When I looked back at him, Dad was just smiling at me. Maybe some of the best conversations weren't the best because they were grand by nature. Maybe their greatness was the result of smiling when you least expected to.