SAMANTHA’S SECRET

This story contains adult material. If this is illegal where you reside or if you are underage where you reside, begone.

SAMANTHA’S SECRET

By Frank Downey

It was at the beginning of my junior year in high school when I met her.

I’m Pete—Pete Gilliam. I live in Amesbury, MA, a small city on the NH border. It’s a nice place.

I’m an average high school guy. I’ll be seventeen shortly. I get good grades but I’m not the class brain. I have a number of good friends that I hang out with but I’m not Mr. Popularity. You know, I’m just average. But I have a good life. I like my friends, I like school, my parents are cool, and my younger brother and sister don’t annoy me too much.

I guess there was something missing, but I didn’t really realize it. Oh, I realized it a little bit, as my two best friends, Mickey and Sean, both have had girlfriends since last year. And, they started just as I was breaking up with my one-and-only; and, yeah, I was a little jealous. But not that much. I really didn’t dwell on it.

Until I met her.

It was first day of school, in my pre-calc class, when she came in.

She was gorgeous. Long curly dark brown hair, huge soulful brown eyes. She had a little button nose. She was 5’6” or so, and built. She was just perfect. The teacher introduced her as Samantha Andrews, a new student.

Right after pre-calc was lunch, so, in the hall, I caught up with her.

“Hi, I’m Peter. Peter Gilliam. You’re Samantha.”

“Hi,” she said quietly.

“Welcome to Amesbury. Where did you move from?”

“Pembroke. Down on the South Shore. My father got a new job.”

“Ah. Well, I can imagine it would be tough to move in the middle of high school, but you’ll like it here. It’s a nice place.”

“I hope so,” she said wistfully.

We had reached the cafeteria by then. “It’s a good school. Well, the food sucks, but I think that’s universal.” She giggled at that. It was light and musical. We got our food, and I said, “Hey, would you like to come eat with me and my friends?”

“Uh, well, no thank you,” she stammered. “I, uh, already got asked.”

“Fine,” I smiled. “Maybe some other time.” She smiled back, and I headed to where my buddies were. However, it was strange—I managed to see her halfway through lunch, and she was all alone.

--TWO—

This went on the whole week. I’d talk to her after pre-calc, and she’d try to go into a shell, but then I’d say something to make her laugh or smile at me. She’d try to keep quiet, but then she’d say something funny or interesting. And I asked her a couple of times if she had someone to eat with, she said, “Yes,” but then I’d catch her eating alone.

A week afterwards, I decided to take matters into my own hands. She went to find her lonely table at lunch, and I followed her. After she got settled, I just plopped down in front of her with a jaunty, “Hi!”

She looked at me in shock. “What are you doing here?”

“Thought you might want some company.”

She looked at me uncomfortably. “Why are you doing this?”

“Samantha, I’d just like to get to know you. That’s all. I’m not an ogre.”

“I know,” she sighed. “OK. Fine. You can eat with me.” I’d like to say it was pleasant, and there were moments—I said something that made her smile, and her smile, I had discovered, was one of the most beautiful things I’d ever seen. But it mostly wasn’t pleasant. She let me stay there under duress and out of politeness. She didn’t want me there.

It would’ve been easier to explain if I thought she was just shy. But I didn’t. It didn’t seem like shyness to me. I don’t know how to describe it—it almost seemed like she was behind a door, and she was deliberately holding that door shut tightly, and every so often it’d fly out of her hand, giving me a glimpse. By watching her, I also realized it wasn’t me—she did this to everyone.

After that, though, I didn’t eat with her again. I’d talk to her after class, but only briefly. I didn’t want to stalk her or anything, you know? But it made me sad—she was deliberately isolating herself, she did not at all look happy, and I didn’t know why.

--THREE—

About a month into school, I noticed something else about her—she was having trouble in that pre-calc class we shared. Now, I’m no math genius, but I hold my own. This time, I did say something to her.

“You’re not getting this class, are you?” I said, as we walked out of it.

“No!” she said, exasperated. “I’m not getting it at all!”

“I’m doing OK,” I told her. “Why don’t we study together?”

I expected a no, I really did. I expected her to shoot down the idea without a thought. But I saw an internal battle flicker across her face. Then, finally, she said, “Do you think you can help?”

“Yes, I do.”

“OK, then,” she said with a smile, to my utter shock. She must really be worried about this grade. “We have a test in a week, though, so it has to be soon.”

“That’s fine. Today, if you’d like.”

“OK,” she agreed, and gave me directions to her house. I’d meet her there after school.

I absolutely went there to help her study. I wasn’t just making the offer to get closer to her. That was a fringe benefit. I was worried that she was worried about the class. This was an innocent study session, nothing more.

I pulled up in front of her house, and knocked. She let me in, and took me over into the living room, suggesting we set up on the couch, using the coffee table as a desk. We were in the process of doing just that when a woman entered the room.

Obviously, Samantha’s mother. We were introduced. And this was another worrying sign. I swear, the woman looked at me like I was sent down from Evil Male Central with the express purpose of molesting her daughter. I could just sense the waves of hostility coming from this woman. I didn’t get it! I mean, I felt like I wanted to put a sign on my forehead saying “Hey, I really am a nice guy!”

The mother called Samantha into the kitchen. There was some heavy duty whispering going on, and none of it sounded pleasant. I didn’t hear much, but I did here the mother say something like, “Bringing classmates here, do you know how dangerous that is?” I also heard Samantha hiss something like, “But I need the help in this class!”

Finally, Samantha came back out, un-accompanied by the mother, and gave me a feeble smile. We settled down to study. I did my best, and I do think I helped her, but my mind wasn’t completely on it. What was so dangerous about me being here? ME? I mean, come on—I’m harmless.

Anyhow, we studied. The mother kept coming out and looking daggers at me. I just didn’t get it. And, every time she came out, Samantha looked more and more agitated. There was something here I just wasn’t getting. And Samantha was getting upset—partially at her mother, it seemed like, partially at her inability to grasp some of the schoolwork—and partially, I think, at my presence.

What I didn’t know yet was what happened to Samantha when she got stressed. I quickly found out. I was hunched over the textbook, pointing something out to her, and I noticed she stopped talking mid-sentence. I looked over at her, and she was slumped on the couch, like she had no muscle control. Her eyes were wide open, but unfocused—glassy. Her jaw was slack, and drool was seeping out of it. Her right hand was making this strange repetitive pulling motion. Her left foot was tapping up a storm.

I admit it—I panicked. “Samantha? Are you all right? Samantha? Hey, HELP!” Her mother came flying into the room at that, looked at her—and then looked at me with an expression that mixed resignation with disgust.

“She’s having a seizure.”

“A seizure?”

“Samantha has epilepsy.”

“Oh,” I said. I’d heard of epilepsy, of course, but I didn’t know much about it. “Is she going to be OK?”

“She’ll be fine. They last a few minutes, then pass.”

Just then, the front door slammed. “I’m home!” a masculine voice announced, then a guy walked into the living room where we all were. Samantha’s father, I guessed—who walked in to me and her mother staring at her as she had a seizure.

“Damn,” he said softly.

Just then, Samantha straightened up. The odd movements of her hand and leg ceased, and she blinked her eyes rapidly. She came back to—well, consciousness, I guess—and looked at me with those huge brown eyes. Then she looked at her mother.

“Did I just…?”

“Yes,” her mother said.

With that, she looked back at me—with a look of complete despair. And there were big huge fat tears rolling down her cheeks!

“Are you OK?” I said, rather stupidly. She didn’t say anything, just looked at me, crying.

“Peter, I think you need to leave now,” the mother said quietly.

“But….”

“She’ll be fine. It’s best that you leave.”

I wasn’t going to win this one. I gathered up my books—with her staring at me and silently crying all the while—and headed for the door. As I stepped out the front door, completely upset at what had just happened, and not understanding a lot of it, I felt a hand on my shoulder.

“Peter, is it?” It was her father.

“Yes. You’re Samantha’s father?”

“Yes. Are you a friend of hers from school?”

“I try to be. She’s very closed off. But we were studying, she’s having trouble in a class we share.”

“Ah. Do you understand what happened in there? Did anyone tell you?”

“Mrs. Andrews said that Samantha has epilepsy.”

“Right. Do you know anything about it?”

“Not much,” I admitted.

“It’s a neurological disorder. It has to do with the chemicals in the brain. They misfire, and she gets seizures.”

“This isn’t, like, life-threatening or anything, is it?” I said, holding my breath.

“Not at all. Even the seizures are somewhat controllable, by medication. That was the first she’d had in a few months.” He sat on the front steps, and motioned me to sit next to him. “The big problem with epilepsy is the stigma.”

“Stigma?”

“Look, you saw her have the seizure.” I nodded. “What did it look like? Pretty strange, right?”

“Yeah, I suppose. More scary that strange, actually.”

“Yeah, but to a lot of people it’s strange. Kids can be cruel. Samantha was pretty well ostracized at her old school. Now, part of that was that we lived in Pembroke our whole lives, so she went to school with some of the same kids every year, and she had her first seizure in school in second grade. Second grade kids can be really cruel—but it followed her. For quite a few years, her nickname was Spazzy Sammi.”

“Jesus,” I hissed.

“So,” he continued, “Sammi’s pretty used to having it be stigmatized. When we moved here, she was bound and determined that no one would know about her epilepsy.”

“And I just blew that all to hell,” I sighed.

“Well, I thought it was doomed to failure to begin with. I mean, she’s not making friends.”

“As I said, she closes herself off.”

“Yes,” he agreed, “which isn’t any healthier than being ostracized, in my book. But she was convinced she should keep it a secret, damn the cost. And her mother, who can be very overprotective, backed her.”

“Well,” I sighed, “at least now I understand her reaction. The crying, I mean. She was crying because I ‘caught’ her.”

“Exactly.” He looked at me. “Peter? Do you like my daughter?”

I thought about that for a minute. “I like what I’ve been allowed to see. Every so often, she slips, if you know what I mean.” He nodded. And then I said, not really realizing I was saying it out loud, “And her smile is gorgeous.”

He chuckled, and I turned bright red. Then he looked at me seriously. “Peter, you’re going to have to be stubborn as a mule. And, you also have to realize that she will be ostracized by some people. What if she has a seizure, with you, in a public place? You might have to deal with being ostracized by proxy.”

“Anyone that’d do that isn’t anyone I care about.”

“Good,” he said, clapping me on the shoulder again. “Samantha’s a good kid, Peter. She could use a friend. Just remember what I said.”

“I will,” I said. He smiled and headed into the house. I headed to my car and drove off. I had a lot to think about

--FOUR—

The first thing I did when I got home was look up epilepsy on the internet. There was a lot of good information. A lot of it was just elaborating on what Mr. Andrews told me. It does affect people’s lives—there’s some medications that you can’t take, Samantha might have trouble getting a driver’s license—but a lot of things affect people’s lives. A lot of the particular problem with epilepsy specifically was the stigma.

Well, she wasn’t going to be getting any stigma from me. So, I should be able to get past that part of it, right? Yeah—wishful thinking. When I went back to school the next day, she wouldn’t even talk to me. In fact, when she saw me coming, she gave me that look of despair—then ran the other way.

I understood. Really, I did—I had heard what her father said to me. But, I have to say, after a couple days of being treated like a leper—it started to get to me. I mean, I wasn’t the one that picked on her! I wasn’t the one that called her Spazzy Sammi! Why was I getting the backlash?

Look, I am not perfect. I know I have said and done things to hurt people. Mostly inadvertently, but occasionally on purpose. Not a lot, but enough to make me ashamed once or twice. Hey, I just turned 17, and no kid is perfect. But I like to think, basically, I’m a decent person. I like to think I’m nice. And that’s to everybody—much less to someone I was interested in, and wanted to get to know better.

So, I started to get a little peeved. What it did was make me do something very uncharacteristic. I’m no shrinking wallflower, but I’m not overly aggressive either, not by any means. When I start getting the negative signals, I usually stop pursuit—and I probably over-emphasize any negative signals in my mind. But I didn’t, this time. Why? Because I thought I was getting negative signals for reasons that had nothing to do with me—and, as I said, it rankled.

So, after a week of getting the complete cold shoulder, I did that uncharacteristic thing—I showed up at her doorstep at five o’clock on Friday.

Her father answered the door. “Peter?”

“Yes, hello, sir, is Samantha in?”

“Yes, she is.” He stepped out on the porch and closed the door behind him. “Is she expecting you? I’d be kind of surprised if she was.”

“No, sir, she’s not. I, well…” I took a breath. “She’s been avoiding me in school. I mean, turning and running if she sees me coming. I can’t corner her there.”

“Ah,” he said, with a wide smile, surprising me.

“I was going to try to get her to go to dinner with me—that is, if I wouldn’t be interfering with any family dinner plans.”

“Not at all,” he said, still smiling, “we had nothing planned—in fact, we were all just discussing it. Come in.” He opened back up the door and led me into the living room. “Samantha! You have a visitor.”

“I do?” she said, emerging from the kitchen, the mother in tow. They both stopped short when they saw me. “Peter? What are you doing here?” she said, that despairing look on her face again

I screwed on my courage. “I’m here to take you to dinner. Ever been to the Sylvan Street Grill over in Salisbury? The food’s great. Get your coat.”

She looked at me like I had four heads. “Peter? I mean…I can’t…”

“Sure you can.”

“Why are you doing this?” she pleaded.

“Because I like you, and I’d like to get to know you better. Look. If you really don’t think you’d have a good time on a date with me, if you really don’t like me—then say so, and I’ll go. But if you’re going to say no because you’re scared; if you’re going to try to avoid me like you have all week because you’re scared—well, no, I’m not going to accept that.”

“But you saw it,” she whispered.

“That’s right. Which means we got it over with.” She had been standing a few feet away from me. I walked right over to her, grabbed her shoulders, and looked into her eyes. “Samantha. It doesn’t make a difference. Get it? It doesn’t make a difference.”

She just stared at me. “What if she has a seizure in the restaurant?” her mother said from behind her.

“Well, I’m just supposed to let it pass, right?” Her mother nodded. “I don’t have to hold down her tongue so she doesn’t swallow it?”

Samantha actually grinned at that. “No, that’s a myth.”

“Just let it pass,” her father said. “If it goes longer than five minutes or if she has one right on top of the other, you need to call 911—but that’s just a precaution, that’s never happened to her. Oh, and if she’s walking, or not supported, you might have to grab her. Don’t restrain her, but make sure she isn’t in a position where she could fall and hurt herself—her muscles go completely slack so she can’t stand up.”

“OK,” I said.

“And what if she has a seizure in the restaurant and everybody starts staring—at her and you?” her mother said.

“It doesn’t matter,” I said, and meant it. “They can all mind their own fucking business.” Samantha gave an embarrassed giggle at that—probably because I dropped an F-bomb in front of her parents!

“It’s not that simple,” the mother said, relentless to the last.

I looked at her. “I have a little brother, Jimmy. He’s 12. He has asthma—I mean bad asthma. It restricts a lot of things he can do, he has to carry around a puffer all the time, he can’t keep up with the other kids much. He gets teased about it. And he has vicious attacks. A couple years ago, I was 15, he was 10—I was babysitting him and my sister, who was like 8 at the time. He went into an attack like you wouldn’t believe. There I was, dialing 911 and frantically trying to get my little brother to start breathing again. You wanna talk about scary?”

Samantha looked at me. She blinked twice. And then looked at me some more. And then her face unfolded into a 100-megawatt smile. “OK,” she said, and went over to the coat rack and grabbed a jacket.

“Samantha. This is a mistake,” her mother said.

“Mildred!” her father hissed.

“No, ma’am, it’s not,” I told her mother. “It’s not a mistake at all.” Samantha smiled at me again, and I led her out the door, to my car.

As we got in and I started driving, she turned to me, apprehensive again. “Who have you told?”

“Not a soul,” I said. “Well, that’s not exactly true. I told my mother. She knew I was preoccupied with something, so she asked me what was up. I told her the whole story. Don’t worry, Mom’s cool.”

She nodded, and then said, “Your friends haven’t noticed that something was up?”

“Yeah, they did, but I parried it. They know I like you, and they know you weren’t responding, but they don’t know why.”

“They must think you’ve been stalking me,” she giggled.

“Actually, Cindy—she’s one of my friends, she’s my best friend Mickey’s girlfriend—said exactly that. I told her that, yes, I was definitely stalking you.”

She giggled again, and then said, “Are you really this sweet?”

“Only some of the time, as my little sister would be happy to tell you.” She giggled again.

We got to the restaurant and got seated. She’d never been to the Sylvan Street Grill but agreed to go on my enthusiastic recommendation. We ordered, and started chatting while we waited. We talked about each other for a bit, and, when she wasn’t being scared, she really was delightful.

The food came, and we started eating. She said I was right, the food was great. We ate a bit, and then, suddenly, she said, “This is my first date, you know.”

“Well, I’m not shocked,” I said. She looked at me. “When I was leaving your house on Monday, your dad came out with me. He pulled me aside and told me some of the problems you had at your old school.”

“Oh,” she said glumly.

“Hey, I’m glad he did. I was so confused. I couldn’t figure out why you were crying, and I was deathly afraid I had inadvertently done something. At least your Dad cleared that up.”

“I just couldn’t stop.” She looked down and her voiced dropped. “Look, Peter, I liked you from the start. But I was so scared, and when you saw me……” she trailed off.

“You really got shit,” I said.

“Oh, they called me Spazzy Sammi, they’d walk by and make faces at me, and motions with their hands—it wasn’t pleasant. Not everybody, but enough—and nobody else would make friends with me because then they’d be a target, you know? I was so glad when we moved, you have no idea.” She gave me a wry grin. “Of course, I thought I could keep it a secret.”

“But then you’d still be isolated.”

“Yeah,” she admitted, “though that’s not fun, it’s better than being teased.” She looked up and grinned at me. “And I got lucky, the first one that finds out is one of the good guys.”

“At your service, ma’am,” I quipped. “You want me to go out and buy a white hat?”

“Nah,” she giggled.

“I’m not going to be the last to know, though. The odds are against it.”

“Probably not,” she said sadly.

“I’ll back you up, though.” She absolutely beamed at that! “So, is it just the stigma?”

“That’s a lot of it. There’s more. Hey, it’s kind of scary. I’ve gotten more used to it, of course, but—I mean, how would you like it if you had little holes in your life? I don’t remember the seizures, you know—and then I’m fuzzy afterwards for about a half hour. Hey, there are worse things—I’d rather have this than the asthma your brother has.”

“Yeah. Having seen both, and now knowing that a seizure won’t kill you or anything,” I agreed. “Jimmy’s asthma could.”

“Right. So there are worse things. But there’s things I can’t do. I can’t take certain medications, because they interact with my anti-seizure stuff.” She grinned at me. “It’s a good thing I’ve never dated—I can’t go on the pill.”

I almost choked at that one, but regained my composure. “That’s what condoms are for,” I parried.

“True,” she grinned. “There are other things. I can’t drive. I might be able to someday—but the state of Massachusetts requires epileptics to go six months without a seizure to get a license, and I’ve never managed that. Three or four, usually, but not six.”

“Wouldn’t driving be scary anyway?” I asked.

“Well, a bit, but I get a warning. I know when a seizure is coming, is what I mean. You ever have your foot ‘fall asleep’? You know, that tingling?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, I get that all over, for a few minutes, right before a seizure. If I were driving, I’d have time to pull over.” She got a look on her face. “Of course, half the time I get that feeling and try to make the seizure go away. Which never works.”

“Monday,” I said.

“Oh, you betcha,” she agreed. “Ah, well—all’s well that ends well.”

We finished our meal and chatted, then I took her home. When I pulled up in front of her house, I pulled out my cell phone. “Listen, I was wondering—could I have your phone number?”

“Of course,” she smiled. We ended up swapping everything—regular phone numbers, cell phone numbers, e-mail addresses, IM screen names. Ah, the age of technology. Then I walked her to her door. Damn, I wanted to kiss her—but I thought it’d be pushing it. So I just said good night.

I’m not sure if she was disappointed or relieved.

--FIVE—

I woke up the next morning feeling strange.

I got up, got some breakfast, chatted to the folks. I puttered about a bit, wanting to call her, but—again—not wanting to push it. At about 11 AM, I went to my room to fool around on my computer. A minute after I fired everything up, she popped up on IM.

“Oh thank GOODNESS you’re there! I felt strange about calling so soon, but I was about to out of sheer desperation,” she typed.

“Hi, Sam, what’s up?”

“We have a test in pre-calc on Monday, I’m trying to study, and I’m just not getting it!”

“I’ll be right over,” I typed.

“YOU’RE THE BEST!!!”

I laughed, shut down the computer, and told my folks where I was headed. I got to Sam’s house and she opened the door—delighted (and relieved!). Wasn’t that nice to see!

We got quickly to work, and she was far more relaxed than she had been the last time we tried to study together—so it went a lot better.

Unfortunately, there was still a problem, and I found out about it an hour after I had gotten there, when Sam excused herself to go to the bathroom. Before I knew it, the mother was looming over me.

“How dare you!” she hissed.

“Excuse me?”

“Giving her false hope! You don’t care, you don’t have to live with it! She does! Are you going to be there if she has a seizure in public?”

“Yes,” I said firmly. That one took her aback a bit, so I seized the advantage. “You’re talking like you think she can’t live a normal life.”

“She can’t!”

“You know what? As long as she believes that—she never will.”

“What do you know about it?” she almost roared.

“I told you. My brother. And asthma’s worse, in terms of health. Jimmy can’t really lead a normal life—but he gets very close, because my parents encourage that. You live every day with a little boy who could stop breathing at a moment’s notice—and Samantha looks pretty normal.”

The mother didn’t know what to say to that—and didn’t have a chance, as Samantha came back into the room. The mother shot me a look, then headed upstairs.

Sam looked at me quizzically, then said, “Hey, come here.” She led me into the kitchen. “It’s 12:30, let’s see what we can scare up for lunch.”

“OK.”

She made some sandwiches, and we ate them at the kitchen table. After a few minutes, she quietly said, “She was giving you shit.”

“Yeah,” I admitted.

“Look, I love her, and I know she loves and wants the best for me—but she’s overprotective.”

“I noticed,” I grinned.

She grinned back, and said, “She got the brunt of it. Whenever I’d get picked on or shunned, she was the shoulder I cried on, you know? I think she was more horrified than I was. So, that’s why.”

“I figured as much,” I said, and then looked right at her. “Look, I can handle it, OK?”

“OK,” she smiled.

“If she thinks she’s going to scare me off, she’s got another thing coming.”

“Good!” Sam laughed.

A bit later, we’d got done studying, and were just chatting.

“I told you that last night was my first date,” she said. I nodded. “It wasn’t yours, though.”

“No,” I said. “I’ve had a girlfriend. Started towards the end of Freshman year, went midway through Sophomore. So, it ended, what, about 10 months ago. I’ve had a date or two since then, nothing much.”

“What happened with your girlfriend?”

I sighed. “I don’t know. What I don’t know is if she changed while we were going out, or if I was blind. But, by the end, I pretty much hated her. She treated people like shit. I broke up with her after she verbally attacked one of my best friends, and for no reason.”

“Who was it?”

“Linda Garriveaux.”

“Oh, Jesus,” Sam snorted. “That’s one girl I steer clear of.”

“Good choice. You know, I don’t really think she was like that when we first started going out. I don’t know what happened.”

Sam looked at me. “She walked all over you, didn’t she?”

Damn. “Well, I guess, to a point…..” I said sheepishly.

“You’re too sweet. I knew it the minute you told me who it was, that she walked on you. Did you sleep together?” My eyes went right open at that, and my jaw dropped. “Thought so,” she giggled. “And I’d bet any money that the first few times were great—and after that she used sex as a negotiating tool.”

“Damn,” I said. “Sam, I don’t mean this to offend—but how does an isolated girl who had her first date yesterday—how does she figure all that out so quick?”

“Keen powers of observation,” she grinned. “Nobody talks to me, so I learned to watch, just to keep from being bored. Besides which, you’re as easy to read as an open book, has anyone ever told you that?”

“Not that I recall,” I said.

“Well, you are,” she giggled. “It’s very handy.”

“Oh, thanks,” I grinned.

--SIX—

We finished studying, and I went home for supper. Sunday, the next day, we spent a couple hours on the phone.

When we got into pre-calc on Monday, she shot me a huge smile on the way to her seat. Afterwards, she met me outside the class.

“How’d you do?” I asked her.

“I actually think I did OK,” she smiled. “Thanks.”

“You’re welcome.” We got to the lunchroom, and I asked her if she wanted to eat with me and my friends.

“Uhm, well, I…..”

“You’re not ready for that.”

“No. I’m comfortable around you, but…”

“That’s fine, then it’ll just be the two of us.”

“You should eat with your friends,” she said.

“I am, one of them, aren’t I?” She smiled at that, and we found a seat in the corner.

After school, Sean and Mickey caught up to me.

“Hey,” Mickey said, “where were you at lunch?”

“With Samantha,” I said.

“What’s going on?” Sean asked. I told them about the date, and the studying session.

“Sounds good,” Mickey said, “but, you know, you can bring her over to eat lunch with us. We don’t bite.”

“She’s not ready for that,” I told them. They shot me a look. “Look, guys, this is kind of complicated, and there’s things that I can’t talk about. Suffice it to say that Samantha’s nervous around people. I got through it but it took a lot. Don’t ask me why because I can’t talk out of school on this one. But, don’t worry—she’ll come around. She needs time. Right now she’s comfortable with me and I’m happy with that. Don’t think I’m stiffing you guys or anything.”

“Ah,” Sean said. “She seems awfully shy.” Well, I suppose that’s the way she’d look, so I let that one go. “You know, whatever. We would like to meet her someday, though—since you look like a guy with a serious case of like going on.”

“No doubt,” I agreed. “Don’t worry.”

Samantha and I ate lunch every day that week. Friday night, we went out to the movies. Saturday, we spent the day at the mall, and then went out to dinner. I put my arm around her at the movies—she snuggled happily into me—and I held her hand as we walked through the mall, but that was it. I didn’t want to scare her off. But, damn, I wanted to kiss her!

We ate again the next Monday. Monday afternoon, I saw her running out of the school building, a little late. She looked around, and got a very depressed look on her face.

“Hey,” I called, walking over to her. “What’s wrong?”

“I missed the bus,” she said.

“You take the bus? You poor girl.” She giggled at that. “Come on, I’ll give you a ride.” On the way home, I asked her if she wanted to start riding to and from school with me every day. She happily agreed. So, I got to see her every morning and every afternoon, too. It was happening very gradually, but we were acting like boyfriend and girlfriend, without ever really thinking about it.

--SEVEN—

That Friday, I guess I dropped one on her. “What are we doing tonight?” she asked.

“Well, I thought maybe we could go to the football game. It’s a big one, we’re playing Pentucket. We’re both having good seasons. It should be fun.”

I knew I was asking quite a bit from her, so I watched her out of the corner of my eye. She took a couple deep breaths, and then said, “Yeah. Sounds good. Should be fun,” very nonchalantly.

Good for Sam!

I picked her up that evening and we headed to the game. It was apparent immediately that the stands were filling up, so finding a quiet corner wasn’t going to be an option—so I went for broke. I found my friends, and found a seat right in front of them.

“Hey,” I said.

“Hey, dude,” Sean said.

“Guys,” I said, “I want you to meet Samantha. Sam, this is Mickey and Cindy, and that’s Sean and Rachel.” They all said hi, and she said hi back, looking a lot more comfortable than I would have guessed. “So, now you met my posse,” I grinned.

“ Your posse?” Sean said. “I thought you were my posse.”

“A pussy don’t get no posse,” Mickey said.

“Well, unless it’s a pussy posse,” Sean retorted.

“I think that’s Rachel and I, the pussy posse,” Cindy giggled.

“More like the posse’s pussy,” Rachel laughed. Those two can get crude in a hurry. I was laughing, then remembered who I was with. I looked over to her—and she was cracking up! Rach realized it too, turned to Sam, and said, “Oops, I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be,” Sam laughed.

“We’re very comfortable with one another, so we don’t watch what we say much,” Cindy said sheepishly.

“I am not at all easily offended,” Sam giggled.

The night went on from there, and it was great. The girls—and Sean and Mickey—kept up their usual banter, and Sam didn’t mind at all. I was beginning to think my assumptions of this girl’s naivete were way overstated. And I’d gone three dates without even trying to kiss her! Dummy me. Anyhow, we all talked, the game was great, and we were having a good time.

Until the beginning of the second half. We were sitting there, watching the game, she was holding my hand—when, suddenly, she squeezed my hand and moaned, “Oh, shit.”

“Does that mean what I think it means?” I asked.

“Yes. Dammit. Why here?” she moaned. The first thing I thought of was where we were sitting—in bleachers. Nothing to support her. She could fall right through. So I immediately swung her around, so that she was straddling the bleachers. I did the same—that way, I could cuddle her from behind with my arms around her waist and hold her up. I managed this maneuver just in time—I felt her go slack as soon as I got my arms around her. And I did have to hold her up. It’s a good thing she was fairly light, because it was all dead weight.

Of course, the gang noticed. “What’s up with her?” Sean asked.

“She’s having a seizure,” I said quietly.

“A seizure?” Rachel asked.

“Sam has epilepsy.”

“Is she going to be OK?” Mickey asked.

“Yes. They pass. She’ll be fine.” I took a breath. “Except she’s going to be a basket case. She got shunned and teased because of this in her old school, called Spazzy Sammi and shit like that. She’s been trying to hide it. I saw it a few weeks ago. But she’s going to be mortified it happened here.”

“That’s why she avoids people,” Cindy said.

“Right.”

“Why do you have her like that?” Rachel asked.

“Because her muscles go slack, and she can’t hold herself up, and I didn’t want her to fall through the bleachers.”

Just then, she came to, and looked around. “Oh, shit,” she said.

“Are you OK?” Rachel asked.

“Yeah,” she said. “I’ll be fuzzy for a little while, but I’m OK.” She looked down at herself. “So why am I sitting like this?” she asked.

“Didn’t want you to fall through the bleachers,” I said.

“Good thinking,” she giggled—and snuggled back into me! She stayed that way for a bit, then said, “Unfortunately, I can’t see the game like this,” so we straightened out. She cuddled into my shoulder, though.

“Did he tell you?” she asked the crew behind me.

“Yeah,” Rachel said. Then she started talking to Sam about something else, bless her. The rest of the day went fine, and the gang just treated her like normal. I knew they would, but I think she was relieved.

It wasn’t until we were on the way home that it hit her. “Oh, damn,” she moaned.

“What?”

“Everybody saw it. Those stands were full. Everybody saw it! It’s going to be all over school by Monday!”

“Sam. It’s going to be all right.”

By this time, we were at her house. I walked around and let her out of the car, and she was still freaking as we walked up the path to her door. “Peter! It’s not going to be all right!”

“You saw how my friends acted.”

“They were your friends, Peter. I’m not surprised they were cool. It’s everybody else! Everybody saw it! Damn, I’m going to be ruined, everybody’s going to know, and I’m going to get picked on, and I won’t be able to hide anymore, and….”

She was freaking. Don’t ask me what made me do what I did—it was just an impulse. But she was standing there, freaking out, and I just grabbed her around the shoulders, and kissed her. Right in mid-freakout. She stiffened—in shock, no doubt—but then she absolutely melted. She threw her arms around my shoulders as mine slipped down around her waist. My lips pressed hard into hers, and I felt her moan into my mouth. After close to a minute, we broke the kiss. Her eyes flew open, she stared at me in shock for a couple of seconds—then her face unfolded into her heart-breaking smile. “Oh my WOW!” she blurted.

I grinned back at her. “Well, at least now I know how to shut you up.”

“Shut me up?” she grinned. “Bastard.”

“Never. Not me.”

“Prove it. Kiss me again!” That, I was more than happy to do. This time, her lips opened slightly, and I gently snaked my tongue in between them. She devoured it. It came upon my addled brain, rather dimly, that she had been waiting for this. And I was trying to be a non-pushy gentleman type. There are times when I’m an idiot.

We might still be there, grinding our mouths into one another, our bodies plastered together—if it weren’t for the quite distinctive throat-clearing we heard coming from the front door. We looked up and it was her father. I think the poor guy was trying to look stern and parental. He was failing miserably. The corners of his mouth kept wanting to creep upwards. Didn’t stop Samantha from blushing bright red at being caught, however.

“You two are a little conspicuous out in the middle of the yard like that,” he said, manfully fighting off the impending grin.

“Oops,” Sam said, still blushing. “Sorry, Daddy,” she said, not sorry at all. She unwrapped herself from our embrace, and grabbed my hand. “Come on in for a bit. I’m going to need backup when I tell them what happened tonight.”

“OK,” I agreed, and followed her in. She stripped off her coat and took mine. We sat on the couch, her parents were in chairs opposite us.

“I had a seizure at the game. Right in the middle of the stadium,” she started.

Her mother looked aghast. Her Dad said, “Honey, that’s two in, what, three weeks? I think I want you to see the doctor again, to see if your meds need adjusting.”

“That’s fine.”

“Who saw?” her mother hissed.

“Well, Peter’s four best friends were right behind us. They saw everything. But they reacted the way Peter did. ‘Oh, epilepsy? Are you going to be OK? Good.’ They were cool about it.” She sighed. “We don’t know who else saw, though. The stadium was crowded. And the position Peter maneuvered me into made it kind of conspicuous.”

“When she told me she had one coming on, I spun her around so that she was straddling the bench of the bleachers, and I put myself the same way, behind her, so I could get my arms around her waist. I didn't want her to fall out of the bleachers when her muscles went slack, since there’s no support in a bleacher.”

“Good thinking,” her Dad said.

“I was fine for the rest of the game,” Samantha went on, “but I kind of freaked on the way home. I really freaked out in the front yard.”

“You seem calm now,” her mother said, obviously wondering why.

I wondered what Sam was going to say to that. Obviously, Sam didn’t care. “I’m calm now because instead of listening to me babble, Peter kissed me senseless!” I thought her mother was going to burst a blood vessel at that! Her dad was still trying to hold back that grin, though. Sam giggled. “That’ll be something to tell my kids—the first time I ever got kissed was to shut me up!”

“Well, no—that was the timing, not the reason,” I told her.

“Oh,” she beamed at me.

“What’s going to happen Monday?” her mother said, relentlessly. “What are you going to do when everyone knows? Samantha, we’re going to be right back to the same old thing! I mean, what made you think you could just blithely go along like it didn’t exist?”

I was getting tired of this. “I suppose I’ll just have to keep kissing her,” I said, impishly.

“What a GREAT idea!” Sam laughed.

Her mother pointed her finger at me and roared, “You are not helping!”

“Oh, yes I am,” I countered. “Look, what happened to her in Pembroke started early, correct? She was young, I mean, right?” The mother just glared at me—but the father nodded agreement, as did Sam. “So, she grew up with it—to the point where she probably couldn’t figure out who was doing it. It was just general. She couldn’t tell the bad guys from the good guys, because she was surrounded by it. That’s not the case here. She’s got good guys on her side, starting with me. And my friends are loyal to a fault. We’re going to cover her back, you know—anyone wants to get to her has to go through me. Jeez, Mrs. Andrews, I’m crazy about your daughter—you think I’m going to let her go through that alone with no help?”

As I finished that diatribe, I noticed two things. The first was that the mother was completely taken aback. The second was that Samantha’s eyes had gone nice and wide at the “crazy about your daughter” comment.

“I think it’s time we went to bed, dear,” Mr. Andrews said to his wife.

“But….”

“We need to talk,” Sam said, referring to the two of us.

“I figured as much. Not too long, OK?” Mr. Andrews said. Somehow he got his wife, sputtering, out of the room and up the stairs.

“You’re really going to watch out for me at school?” Sam started after her parents had left.

“Of course. Now, tell me, what happened outside? I almost expected to get slapped! I mean, are you the same girl that was avoiding me like the plague a couple weeks ago?”

“Yeah,” she said, looking down. “Look, I was avoiding you because I was scared what you would do if you found out, you know that. But, with you, it was worse.” She took a breath. “Peter, I liked you from the start. You’re sweet. I like talking to you. I have a good time when I’m with you. You’re even cute as hell.” I think I blushed at that! “Peter, I was attracted to you from the start. And I was so afraid that you’d freak if you saw me have a seizure.

“Then you saw it. And I panicked, waiting for the crap I knew I was going to get. But you didn’t. When you ever showed up here that Friday night, told me it didn’t matter, and demanded I go out with you—well, I don’t know if I can put into words what that meant to me.

“But you kept coming around, here and in school, but you were so much of a gentleman I wasn’t quite sure what to think. I couldn’t tell if it was just friendship. Until you kissed me.”

“I meant what I said to your mother,” I told her. “I’m nuts about you.”

“Now, I know that,” she beamed. “Before tonight, I didn’t. By the way, I’m just as crazy about you. However, that’s part of the reason why I reacted the way I did when you kissed me. I was just so happy you did it.

“Plus, well—“she blushed again, “I know I’m inexperienced, but that’s circumstance. I’m no prude. I’m glad you’re a gentleman because I am inexperienced, and I know I shouldn’t rush into anything, but trust me—I’m not naïve nor am I a prude.” She shook her head, and grinned. “And I think that kiss opened up some serious floodgates.”

“You call the shots,” I told her firmly.

“I know, and thank you. Just, well, promise me you won’t take advantage of a moment of weakness, OK?” I just looked at her. “When you kissed me, well, it wouldn’t have taken much to have me naked and waiting, right there in the middle of the lawn.”

“WHAT?” I gasped.

“You heard me. In fact, if you kiss me good night before you leave—and you’d better—well, after you go, I have no doubt that I’ll be running upstairs to, uh, take care of myself.”

Oh my GOD! The minute she said that, I felt myself getting hard at just the thought. “Jesus, Sam, what a mental image!”

“Told you I was no prude,” she grinned.

She had been sitting next to me on the couch, and I reached over and pulled her toward me. She squeaked. “Don’t worry, I’m still a gentleman,” I told her.

“I know.”

I lowered my mouth to her ear. “However,” I whispered, “someday soon, I’m going to ask if I can watch!”

“Oooooooo!!”

Then I leaned in and kissed her again. We spent quite a few minutes, sprawled all over her couch, kissing. Damn, it was great!

And the definite promise of things to come, I admit, had my mind reeling.

--EIGHT—

It started gradually. I noticed it a bit when we went back to school Monday, but Sam didn’t say anything until Wednesday. We were at lunch—now that the gang knew she wasn’t shy about eating with all of us—and she said something.

“It’s starting,” she said depressedly.

“What?” I asked.

“The staring. The finger-pointing. The whispering behind my back. It’s all starting.”

“Yeah, I heard some of it today,” Rachel said.

“You did?” I asked.

“Yeah. Two of the A-list bimbos. Sam walked by this morning, and one said to the other, ‘That’s the girl that freaked out at the football game.’” Rach looked a little sheepish. “I hope you don’t mind what I did.”

“What did you do?” Sam asked.

“I marched up to them and said, ‘She didn’t freak out. She has epilepsy, she had a seizure. And she’s a sweet kid so lay off her ass!’ I hope that was OK.”

Sam looked completely flabbergasted. “Uhm, yeah, that was OK. Thank you.”

“Any time,” Rach said.

As we were walking away from the lunchroom, Sam said, “I can’t believe Rachel did that!”

“Rach is good people. And she’s pretty well-respected. She’s the Junior Class President, and an editor for the school paper. What Rachel says tends to carry some weight around here.”

“Wow.”

Of course, it wasn’t that easy. I’m sure some people listened to Rachel—but not all. There were still some whispers behind Sam’s back. Believe me, if I heard something, I said something, but I couldn’t always.

The surprising thing was that Sam dealt with it better than I thought she would. Well, until the next Sunday.

My parents hadn’t yet met Samantha. So, they decided to have Sam, and her parents, over for Sunday dinner. I tried to get them to make it just Sam—the idea of her mother going head-to-head with me in front of my parents didn’t thrill me. But Mom and Dad insisted—they wanted to meet Sam’s parents, too. So, I could only hope they’d refuse. No such luck—her Dad, of course, insisted they accept the invitation.

It didn’t start well. They arrived at noon, we’d eat between one and one thirty. Which gave us the opportunity to get to know one another. Not a good thing, really. Well, my Dad and Sam’s Dad got along well from the start, which was cool. And my 10-year-old sister, Shelly, launched into some serious heroine-worship of Sam right away, which flattered and pleased Sam no end.

Nope, the problem was The Mothers. Sam’s was standoffish, which made mine bristle. And it got worse—my Mother said something innocuous, and Sam’s mother said, pointing to the two of us, “Well, I was never in favor of this relationship to begin with. Sam is fragile.”

Big sigh from Sam. “It would be nice if you wouldn’t talk about me like I wasn’t here!”

It got better from there. A nasty comment from Sam’s mom, returned by mine declaring, “I don’t know why you seem to think my son is an ogre. He’s a good boy, and I resent the implications.” And on it went. It stressed everyone else out.

Most especially Sam. And we know what can happen when Sam gets stressed. Yup, she had a seizure, right there on the couch. It took a bit for the Dueling Parents to notice, but notice they did. I was rubbing her back through it, muttering “oh, shit,” to myself. She was going to be upset when she came out of it. I was right about that—she came to, realized what had happened, and collapsed into my arms, crying. The collected parental units looked on in dismay.

And my little brother Jimmy, who really should know better, piped up with, “Hey, that was freaky!”

I looked at him and said, “Almost as freaky as you gasping for breath and turning blue and sucking on your puffer!”

“HEY!” my Dad shouted.

“Just making a point,” I said mildly.

“Well, I can’t help it!” Jimmy blurted.

“Neither can Samantha. Why can’t you help it?”

“Because I have asthma,” Jimmy said, “you know that.”

“Yes. Now, what’s asthma?” I knew Jimmy knew this, it had been explained to him.

He didn’t let me down. “Well, sometimes my lungs don’t work like they’re supposed to. And I get an asthma attack.”

“Right,” I agreed. “What happens with Samantha is that sometimes the chemicals in her brain don’t work like they’re supposed to. It’s called epilepsy. Just like you get your asthma attacks, she gets a seizure. The chemicals don’t work the way they’re supposed to, and part of her brain freezes up. And it’s no more something to make fun of than your asthma is.”

“Oh,” Jimmy said. “Can she, you know, get really sick?”

“Not really,” I smiled. “She gets the seizures and they go away. It’s actually less dangerous than your asthma. But people tease her because of it.”

“Oh,” Jimmy said, and then turned to Sam. “I’m really sorry.”

“That’s OK,” Sam said, smiling. Any further discussion was interrupted by my mother’s announcement that dinner was ready.

The meal went OK, and we gathered back in the living room afterwards. Sam was still shaky, and I didn’t know what her mother was going to do. Thank Goodness for Shelly—she barely took note of Sam’s seizure. She’d decided that Sam was great, and that’s all there was to it. Sam basked in the attention. The next time my little sister drives me up the wall, I’m going to remember what she did today, I swear.

Her Dad spoke up first after dinner. “Sammi, I definitely think we need to make an appointment to get your medication checked. Three in less than two months, that’s too many.”

“Yes,” Sam said, “but, remember—I get them from stress,” she said, throwing a pointed look at her mother.

“I think the whole situation is stressful,” my Mom said. “I’m sorry, I thought this would be a good idea.”

“Sam, I worry about you,” her mother sighed.

“Yes. Too much.”

“I have reason.” She described to my parents some of the stuff that had happened to Sam in her old school.

“Mom, I know,” Sam said, “but what you don’t understand is what the real problem is. I didn’t understand it until it changed. But the problem was that I was a pariah.”

“And you’re becoming one again!” her Mom said.

“No, I’m not. I have friends. I have a boyfriend. Do you see what he just did, with his brother? And it’s not just him.” She told them about what Rachel had done earlier in the week. Her Dad whistled in admiration. “This is what I didn’t have in Pembroke. You can’t be a pariah if you have friends, if you have people sticking up for you. That’s what I was missing. It wasn’t the teasing and the finger-pointing—it’s that that’s all there was. Having Peter, and his friends, has made all the difference. And, Mom, I don’t blame you for not understanding—I’m not sure I would have if it hadn’t happened.” She looked at me. “And I almost scared you away. I shudder to think. Good thing you’re stubborn!”

“And the funny thing is, I’m not usually,” I said with a grin. “You were just too damn wonderful.”

“Awww,” she smiled.

--NINE—

I guess her mother eased off some after that. The rest of that day went fine, and Sam said that her mother had stopped making disparaging remarks about our relationship.

School? Well, it seemed better—some of the offhand whispers and stares seemed to have died down. But some people just have an axe to grind.

That following Friday, we were confronted by a knot of people—and the ringleader was Linda Garriveaux, my ex. As I said, she’d metamorphosed into the school bitch. I’d been a target since I broke up with her, but I just let it roll off my back. However, now Linda had a new target—Sam. Obviously she’d figured out Sam and I were together, and she’d heard about the seizures. That put Sam right in her line of fire.

“Hey, Peter,” she said, “how’s life with the spaz?”

“Better than life with a bitch,” I retorted.

Linda snorted, and then started flapping her arm about, in a bad imitation of Sam’s seizures. Her cronies all chortled at that. “So, tell me, Peter, does she flop around like a dying walrus during sex, too?”

I was about to say something, but Sam beat me to it. “No, I don’t. I’m too busy orgasming, since he’s so damn good.” I almost swallowed my tongue at that! “Then again, you’d know all about that, wouldn’t you?” Sam continued. “OK, so maybe you wouldn’t, since some people are just frigid. But I’m not, so I don’t have to worry about having a seizure, not when I’m cumming up a storm.” She smiled sweetly—though with venom behind it—and turned on her heel, walking away. I quickly caught up to her.

“I don’t believe you!” I said in admiration.

She looked up and grinned at me. “You have no idea how good that felt. I never had the guts to tell anyone to, basically, go fuck themselves, before. It felt great!”

“I understand that part of it, but, well….I don’t know if you realize this or not, but you basically just told the whole school we’re having sex. Linda’s friend Tina isn’t known for keeping her mouth shut.”

“Who cares?” she said cheerfully.

“You don’t care that everyone’s going to think we’re having sex when we’re not,” I said, completely dumbfounded. “Are you sure you’re not a guy?”

“Nope, I’m all girl. As you will find out when we make reality match the rumors.” HUH? Did she just say what I thought she said? “Anyhow, it was worth it to see the look on that bitch’s face, believe me.”

“I agree, that was a sight,” I laughed.

That night, we got some food, then headed to yet another football game. As we approached my friends, they obviously had heard what had happened—because they all started yelling and applauding.

“You go, girl!” Cindy told her. “Linda needs a few verbal slaps.”

“You should’ve seen her face,” I grinned.

“I can imagine,” Rachel said. “But, I didn’t know you guys were, you know….”

“We’re not,” I said.

“Yet,” Sam added pointedly. Boy, was I getting enough hints, or what? “But Linda doesn’t need to know that, does she?” she said, grinning evilly.

After the game, Samantha looked at me as I started the car, and said, “Peter? Do you know a place where, well, we could go parking?”

“Uh, yeah, I know a place,” I said, practically holding my breath.

“Good. Let’s go there,” she said. I put the car in gear and headed out. “Look, I don’t want my first time to be in the back seat of a car. But I thought we could, you know, fool around some.”

“That sounds just fine. You are horny,” I said with a grin.

“And how,” she agreed, matching my grin. “But, you know, it’s more.” She took a deep breath. “Peter, I’m in love with you.”

“Good,” I said, “because I’m in love with you, too, sweetie.”

We quickly got to the parking place, and quickly got into the back seat. The clothes came off a bit more gradually—but the activity after the clothes came off heated up in a hurry. Which was a good thing, since body heat was all we had with the car turned off, and it was November, in Massachusetts.

Sam was amazing. She was completely inexperienced, but willing to try most anything, as long as it wasn’t ‘all the way’. That was fine with me. I was more experienced than she, but not by much, since Linda was never a sexual dynamo. Sam, despite her inexperience, was.

And, as an added bonus, Sam naked was a wonder to behold. She wasn’t at all overweight, but she was curvy. Especially in those particular areas where curves are essential. Her breasts were a marvel—nice and big, but firm as can be. I couldn’t keep my hands off of them—and Sam, judging by the happy noises she was making, didn’t want me to.

After some heavy-duty kissing and fondling naked bodies, I asked her what she wanted to do.

She blushed, and gulped. “Well, since you asked…uhm…I’d always heard that it’s really great, well…..” She blushed deeper. “Well, it’s supposed to be really good for a girl if a guy, well, you know—with his mouth.”

I almost laughed at that stuttering mess of a request, but then realized what she was asking. “You want me to go down on you?”

“Yeah,” she said, blushing bright pink.

“I’ve never done that before.”

“OH! Well, then, you don’t have to….”

“I didn’t say I wouldn’t,” I smiled, and positioned her on the seat so I could get down between her legs. “I just said I never have. So if it’s not as good as you’ve heard….”

“I’m not worried about that,” she grinned. I grinned back, and dove in between her legs. As I said, I hadn’t ever done this before, but I knew where all the parts were. I started with a gentle lick right up the length of her, which made her shudder. Then I dipped my tongue into her opening, which produced a nice squeak. I did that for a while, alternating long licks up her labia with plunges into her opening, as she squeaked and moaned above me. After a bit of that, on one of my upstrokes, I dragged my tongue over her clit.

“AAAAHHHH!!!” she gasped.. “Oh GOD!” I did that for a bit, listening to the moans and gasps every time I hit her clit—then I zeroed in, sucking it between my lips. Her reaction was explosive. She thrust her hips into my face, her ass coming right off the seat of the car, and her thighs practically squashed my head. I didn’t mind—and I could still hear the otherworldly sounds coming out of her mouth. After a few minutes, she started to breathe again, and pushed my head away. I climbed up on the seat beside her, stroking her arm as she came back down.

“Oh Peter!” she hissed. “I can’t believe how good that was!” She looked at me, and let out a mix between a gasp and a giggle. “Shit, I think your bottom lip is bleeding.”

“Is it?” I laughed. “I guess you smashed it into my teeth with your pussy.”

“Oops, I’m sorry,” she said, but couldn’t quite stifle the grin.

“Jesus. Nobody told me that pussy eating was so hazardous to your health.”

“Damn. Now I won’t get you to do it again.”

“Are you kidding? I’ll take the fat lip. You have no idea what a turn-on that was.”

“Really? Why?” she asked.

“Well, the taste is intoxicating. Must be pheromones or something. But mostly it’s a turn-on because of what it does to you.”

“And how,” she laughed. “I wonder if it works in reverse?” she said, then leaned over so that she was lowering her face to my crotch.

“Sam, you know, you don’t have---“ I was going to say she didn’t have to. She obviously wasn’t listening to me, because my dick was in her mouth before I could even get the words out. “Oh, Jesus, Sam!” I hissed as she slurped up half my dick on the first pass. Then she ran her tongue along the underside. That had me walking the edge. Then she cupped her mouth into an o and slid up and down on the end of my dick. She was only taking a few inches in her mouth—she had a hand wrapped around the base—but who cared? “Sam, if you keep that up….” I warned.

“Mmmmmmmmmm,” was all she said—which was quite enough! You ever have a girl hum when she’s got your dick in her mouth? That’s all I could take. I barely got out a “look out, Sam!” before I started cumming. And Sam, to my utter shock, ignored my warning and swallowed. Every drop.

As I came down from the orgasm of my life, Sam straightened up out of my lap and sat next to me, with a very self-satisfied grin on her face.

“You’ve never done that before?” I managed to gasp.

“Nope,” she grinned. “Boy, it was fun, though. Now I know what you mean about getting someone else off being a turn-on. Next time I’ll have to do you first.”

“Sam, you’re amazing,” I said. “I know you’ve been dropping hints, but I still never suspected.”

“Told you I was no prude,” she grinned—then she got serious. “Look, I told you. I love you.” She turned away from me, and stared straight ahead, nervously fiddling with her fingers. “I’ve told you about observing other people. I’d hear girls talking about their boyfriends, what they did, how good it felt. I heard them talking about falling in love. And, God, I wanted that so bad.” She took a shuddering breath. “What was worse was, listening to some of them, and what they did to their boyfriends. Oh, yeah, some of the guys were assholes—but I’m talking about the other side. Girls that teased, or used sex to get something else, or stuff like that. I never got the point. I’d get so jealous. And I’d wonder what they had that I didn’t. Of course, I knew the answer to that. They weren’t Spazzy Sammi.

“I used to go home and dream about it. I dreamed about having a boyfriend, someone I could love, who loved me back, seizures and all. And sex was always a part of it. I knew I had to be in love first, but sex was always a part of it. And I never got what I dreamed of. Until now.” Her voice dropped. “One of these days you’re going to figure out exactly how much you mean to me. And I can only hope it doesn’t scare you too much.”

“I know,” I said softly. “After Linda raking me over the coals—and after watching that foursome I hang around with rapidly descend into Hallmark Card lovey-dovey territory—I was looking for the same things you were. You’re as much an answer to my dreams as the other way around.” I turned to look at her. “And I’m not scared one little bit.”

“You’re not?”

“Sam, sweetie, remember what you did the week after I saw that first seizure. If that didn’t scare me off…”

She collapsed wordlessly into my arms. We cuddled for a while, not saying much, until her curfew was imminent and I had to take her home.

--TEN—

It just got better from there. And, no, I’m not just talking about sex. Sam made everything great. We fit together like adjoining pieces of a jigsaw puzzle. Sex was just part of it—a great part, mind you, but just a part. It was everything. We could talk for hours. We could cuddle together, watching TV, and not talking. She put up with my pre-coffee incoherence when I picked her up in the morning.

But the sex was definitely there, and it became increasingly difficult for Sam to stick to her ‘not in the back of the car’ edict. I, actually, agreed with her—but we both wanted it.

It took a little over a month from that first time. It was the Saturday before Christmas, and we went out Christmas shopping. We left at about noon, and got back to her house shortly after three. Little did I know she had this all planned.

“Where are your folks?” I asked as we got back in the house.

“Gone. Dad’s company Christmas party. And it’s in Boston. They must have just left, but they’re going to be gone until after midnight.” She gave me a huge grin, then reached into one of the shopping bags and pulled out something that she must have bought when we separated for a while—a box of condoms. “Look what I got!”

“You planned this,” I grinned.

“You bet your ass. From the minute I knew they weren’t going to be here today. Come on, Santa, I want my Christmas present,” and she led me up to her room.

We collapsed on the bed, working at each others’ clothing. We were quickly naked, and had our hands all over one another. Then our mouths. She gave me a blowjob; then, while I recovered, I went down on her.

Then, it was time. “This will probably hurt,” I told her. “I’ll try to be gentle.”

“Yeah,” she agreed, “but it won’t hurt as much. I don’t have a hymen. I lost it somewhere along the way, a bike or something, I don’t know. But you don’t have to worry about that.”

“Good,” I said. “Ready?”

“You betcha,” she grinned. I rolled on one of the condoms. Then, I positioned myself in between her legs, grabbed my dick, and aimed it at her pussy. She gasped as it made contact. I pushed, slowly, until the head parted her entrance.

“OOOOOOOFFF!” she gasped.

“OK?” I asked.

“God, yes! More!” she blurted.

I kept going, slowly but surely. I felt her opening up beneath me. She moaned, low and long, every time I moved. “You tell me if you want me to stop for a minute,” I said.

“Don’t you dare!” she wheezed. I laughed, and kept going. Before long, I was in all the way. Our public bones met—which made contact with her clit, making her yelp.

“You’re in. All the way,” she said in a tone of wonder. “Hold there for a minute, OK?”

“Sure,” I said, looking down at her. “You’re so beautiful.”

She beamed, and then grinned. “I bet you say that to all the girls you make love to.”

“Yup. All one of them.”

She giggled, groaned at what that did to her full pussy, then said, “I’m ready now. Go for it.”

I did, slowly at first, moving myself in and out of her tight wetness. Thank goodness she had given me a blowjob, I wanted this to last more than twenty seconds.

Especially because I wanted to watch her. She was great. Her eyes kept opening and closing. She wheezed every time I withdrew, groaned every time I re-entered, and yelped every time I bottomed out. As she started to get wilder, I picked up the pace. Her eyes flew open, and she gasped, “Oh, Peter!”

Her arms wrapped around my shoulders, and I felt her legs go up behind my ass. Her hips came off the bed, meeting me with every thrust. I was trying to hold out, but it wasn’t easy. Suddenly, she hissed, “Oh, God, I’m cummmmming!” and I felt her pussy clench repeatedly around my dick. I was on the edge anyway, and that pushed me right over.

Afterwards, cuddled up in my arms, she sighed into my chest and said, “My God, Peter. That was unbelievable. Just unbelievable.”

“Ditto,” I said. “You’re a wild woman.”

“Yup, and you loved it.”

“You bet your ass I did.”

“Well,” she said, smiling impishly, “It’s only four-thirty. We have about eight more hours.”

“Hmm. I think I can recover by then. A few times.”

“Goody!”

I looked down at her, and said, “How the hell did I get so lucky?”

“You were a sweetheart, and everything I ever wanted, that’s how. Plus you were stubborn,” she giggled. “I love you.”

“Love you, too.”

--ELEVEN—

It’s a year later, now, and we’re still together, getting ready to celebrate our second Christmas together. We’re looking in to colleges, and our first choices are both in Boston, so we’ll be in the same city, which is what we want. I want to go to BC, she’s deciding between BU and Tufts.

Her mother has really come around. New Year’s Eve did it—we asked if we could have a little party at her house, and her parents consented. Just a few people—the two of us, Mickey and Cindy, Sean and Rachel, and one other couple. Sam had made a friend, a girl named Krista who admired her ‘gutsiness’ in dealing with the epilepsy. Krista, and her boyfriend John, had joined our little circle.

That’s what turned her Mom around—seeing her there, with the bunch of us, cuddled with me on the couch but still laughing and joking with our friends—in other words, being a normal teenager. At one point, I went in the kitchen to grab more refreshments, and her Mom pulled me aside. “Peter? I owe you an apology. I was wrong. She’s so happy—it’s good to see.”

Her approval of our relationship got even more overt—which was a good thing, because, in the spring, she figured out Sam and I were sleeping together. That created a few anxious moments, but all she said to Sam was, “You’re protecting yourself, correct?” We, of course, were—Sam had even been fitted for a diaphragm because we didn’t trust condoms alone. And we were having sex a lot at that point. That ‘no back seats of cars’ stuff only held true for Sam’s first time—knowing we’d not often have an empty house, and neither of us willing to go without, the back seat got a hell of a workout there for a while. Her mother’s discovery of our activities, however, opened her bedroom back up as an option—much to our surprise, but delight. I was even permitted to sleep over on a weekend occasionally. Who would have ever guessed that would happen when we first started dating!

And school turned out fine. Linda never bothered us again. The stares and stuff died out. And Sam was insulated by the cocoon of me and our friends, so she didn’t care much even when she did get stared at.

It turned out to be kind of a moot point, however, at least for now—the last seizure she has had was that one at my house in front of all our families. That’s right, over a year without a seizure, the longest she’s ever gone. She even was able to get her driver’s license, though she prefers only to drive if someone else is in the car. But she’s thrilled she’s not getting seizures. And, no, her medication was never adjusted—they tested her, and said she should be fine, that the three seizures in a month and a half were just a fluke. They turned out to be right. Of course, Sam pointed out that she hasn’t had a seizure since she started having sex. She’s convinced sex cured her. A mere coincidence, I say—as do the doctors. Sam’s response was, “But my stress level has gone way down since we started sleeping together.” I’ll let her think anything she wants on that score!

However, she’ll always have epilepsy—we both know that. She could have a seizure at any time. The thing is—she’s stopped caring about it. And I never did.

--THE END—