This picture reminds me of Once when I was Young. 15, maybe. And I had a very pretty boyfriend with whom I was learning the beginnings of desire, and sex. And we had a friend, his friend first, Tony. Tony and I got on very well. He was kind, he was sweet, his father was an alcoholic, I think. He didn't talk about it much, but I think he needed a lot. I wish I'd been older, then, maybe, more for him. But. Oh well. Once we kissed a little, me and Tony, played around a little in my basement bedroom before he had to run for the last bus out of the little rural village I lived in. We'd run around town that day, seen a favoured band busking outside the indie record shop, held hands, there was something about the Violent Femmes but I can't remember what.

He came home with me and my boyfriend went home with someone else, and it was the beginning of the end of our eight week weenie love affair, sadly.

But, before all that, before, before, there was this one time that we were all out, hanging about in the sun, obnoxious and young and full of ourselves, us teenagers. Sitting against the wall at the bus stop, in a row. I walked up to Tony, where he sat, with his long legs stretched out, and planted my feet on either side of his spread thighs with a bounce. Stomp, stomp, with my ... hmm, docs, it must still have been, with flowery scarves for laces. And there I stood in front of him with my crotch more or less at face height. And he leaned forward, and kissed me. Right on the zip of my jeans, warm and sweet on my mons, no lower. And I shrieked, and leapt and ran, laughing, all of us laughing, with the kiss branded onto me. It must still be, somehow.