Christina sat at the dressing table
to brush her hair, the hairbrush
her aunt had given her, in her hand.
She was still in her nightgown,
her school uniform
was on a chair by the bed,
the bed still unmade.
She looked at her features,
her hair a mess, her eyes
still had sleep in them.
She brushed her hair slowly,
a hundred times, her mother said,
does it best. She dragged the brush
through, pulling through the knots
at the ends. She thought on Benedict,
her friend's brother, the boy she
had become smitten by. She wondered
if she'd see him today; unless she
waited by the school fence and peered
through when his school bus arrived
and he descended and went by the fence
into his playground, she might not.
Maybe if it was fine and they were
permitted to go out on the sports field
she would. They'd met the first time there,
after his sister had told him that
Christina liked him. Thinking about
him now, made her feel excited, made
her insides turn over, not nastily, but
weirdly, as if fingers stirred inside of her.
She had dreamed of him the night before,
dreamed he had sat at the end of her bed,
and she had wanted him to enter, but
he just sat there talking. She stopped
brushing her hair and put the brush down
on the dressing table. They had kissed.
Hard to find a place at school where
they could be alone. They had found
a few moments in the gym during recess
a week ago, just them, the smell of
sweating bodies, gym shoes and feet.
They had their ears pricked for any
sounds, but then kissed. Lips on lips.
His tongue met hers, touched, strange
sensation that, she murmured to herself
sitting gazing at her reflection in the mirror,
as if she'd touched a live wire, it tingled,
rather made her feel open, wide open as
if someone had pressed something within.
She daren't tell or ask her mother even
if her mother wasn't in one of her low moods.
Only when she menstruated the first time
did she mention to her mother about her body.
Oh you'll get use to it, her mother said,
the curse women have to put up with.
Sometimes in bed or when she got out
of the bath, she would put her arms about
her body and pretend it was Benedict,
imagined it was he doing the caressing
and holding and touching. Time to get
ready for school, she thought, taking out
of the photo of Benedict out of the drawer
and kissing it. He gave it to her after she
had given him one of herself. Not a good one,
she had to sneak one out of the photo box
her parents wouldn't miss. Benedict liked it,
said he kept it somewhere safe. His was
good, her damp lips had left an impression.
She wiped it off and held it against her *******.
She sighed. At night she kept the photo under
her pillow and took it out to kiss before
going off to sleep. She put the photo away
again and stood up. Time to get dress
and get down for breakfast before her
mother bawled out up the stairs to her.
Out of the window she could see blue
skies, a sun was rising. Might see
Benedict after all, she said, taking
off her nightgown, and letting it slip
to the floor. Oh to see him always,
and see him more and more and more.