To The Boy I Had Sex With: I Pretended I Wasn’t Mad, But I’m A Little Mad

I’m going to structure this like a grocery list because I want you to think you were just one item on my To-Do list, and also because I can’t think of anything more clever.

One, I was a virgin and a half, I wish you’d called.

Two, seriously, the no-text cliché got me. We’d messaged for a week (fourish days), which is like going steady in this millennial age, and then we had sex and then radio silence. Honestly, we both could have been more original.

Three, how dare you be funny on top of everything else.

Four, this has been haunting me, for months: why did you try to get away without a condom, especially if you were never going to see me again? Please riddle me this, did you think about the likelihood of getting me pregnant? Could you, with all your intelligence and wealth and beauty, have been able to pull off baby daddy without ever speaking to me again?

Five, I messaged once after, I think you responded in one word.

Six, I’m just saying, this is why I never go after beautiful men.

Seven, I spent months hoping to run into you and then when I did, I rarely looked at you.

Eight, I do not have a healthy relationship with sex and let me tell you this did not help.

Nine, did I bleed in your bed?

Ten, I wish you hadn’t had such a nice body because I’d already felt like a crescent roll, naked, waiting in bed for the next set of directions while you peeled off the condom, hopefully full of cum but maybe not.

Eleven, your six-pack was straight up offensive.

Twelve, I’m sorry I didn’t know how to be on top. I kept moving too far and you’d have to re-insert and I couldn’t laugh at myself. I was not drunk enough and too self-conscious and I was not good enough. I knew this. That’s a tricky thing to know when you’re on top, boobs hanging at a weird angle, stomach folded in neatly piled rolls.

Thirteen, I bet you think this is about you, but it’s not. You were just a dick.

Fourteen, and I was a hole.

Fifteen, that was a pretty good defense.

Sixteen, I truly believe things would be different if I’d giggled a bit.

Seventeen, who the fuck cares if things could have been different? But the thing is I’d already created,

Eighteen, narratives in which you miraculously discovered how much you loved me and I allowed it and then brought you home to show off to my American friends and family.

Nineteen, even in my wildest dreams, you were just my eye candy and I hope this hurts you.

Twenty, I do apologize for being petty.

Twenty-one, I didn’t even ask you your age. Or what your mom was like, how you were raised, if you had siblings and were you jealous or protective of them? You could be both. I wanted to ask if you knew you were beautiful, if the arrogance was just an act, what you thought that first time we kissed and I literally ran away. I still wonder, at times, often when I’m half asleep during long car rides.

Twenty-two, I always remembered you as taller and I want to know why.

Twenty-three, I think it was ‘no.’