Casual Sex?

“Is this whole casual sex thing working for you?”

I’m having a salad lunch with a girlfriend at Lemonade.  I don’t really know how to answer this question.

“Because I was trying to find a casual sex partner for awhile and it just never worked out.”

I think back on my recent experiences.  Coffee Shop Guy was casual, but I deflected his numerous follow-up attempts, not really interested in making it a regular thing with him.  Gaffer Guy was obviously a really bad choice for a fuck buddy.  And ex-boyfriend could not by any stretch be considered casual.

“Yeah, I guess it hasn’t been that successful so far.  But I’m holding out hope.”

My friend shared that she doesn’t sleep with guys right away anymore.  She likes to get to know them first, to build up the sexual tension, and then when they do have sex it’s powerful.

“Hmm, maybe I should try that.”

Probably the best casual sex I ever had was when I was backpacking in Central America.  I met these two Israeli guys in the van ride on the way from Belize City to Flores, Guatemala.  We made friends on the four hour ride and ended up staying at the same hotel overlooking the water in Flores.  It’s incredible meeting people when you’re traveling, especially alone, because everyone is so in the moment and present that you make fast friends and people you know for days you feel you’ve known for years.  It was like that with these two guys.  Within hours, we were bickering and bantering like we’d been friends all our lives.

One night, I was hanging out in their hotel room smoking this really weak Guatemalan weed they’d bought off this guy working at the restaurant where we’d had grilled chicken and beans for dinner.  It was weak, but one of my new friends (the skinny one) just kept rolling joints, so we were getting pretty stoned.  And bonding over sex and drug stories.  I was sitting on the other one’s bed (the chubbier one), and we were kind of playing footsy in this noncommittal way.  These guys were fresh out of the Israeli military, 23 years old, traveling for six months across Central and South America.

At some point, I got tired and excused myself to go to bed.  I brushed my teeth with bottled water and washed my face in the bathroom that had vines growing through the gaping hole in the shower wall.  I turned on the fan full blast and lay down on the thin, creaky mattress, on top of the sheets because I swear I felt bed bugs the night before.  I had just closed my eyes when there was a knock on the door.  I had an inkling of who it might be but I was still surprised to find my chubby friend standing there.

“He’s asleep.  Do you want to do some stuff?”

I was really on the fence about this one, I have to say.  I knew he had a girlfriend, but that wasn’t the problem.  He had told me if he wanted to sleep with someone on this trip, he was going to – and as you know, I don’t take responsibility for these decisions.

The truth is I just wasn’t that into him physically, and I didn’t have that urge to pounce on him that usually guides my sexual decision-making.  I liked him, we were friends, we had talked and gotten to know each other a little bit, and I had fun bickering and bantering with him.  But, not to be a shallow asshole, he was just not really my type physically – quite short, very soft body, and extremely hairy, like hair inside the tops of his ears hairy.  But he did have a very nice smile and beautiful eyes, and I liked him.  So I let him in and sat down on my bed, trying to make up my mind.

He was clearly waiting for a cue from me. 

“Will it get weird between us if we do this?  And with the other guy.”

“Look, do you want me to go?”

I didn’t.  I wanted to give this a shot.  We had good chemistry, and I didn’t want to write him off because of his hobbit-like qualities.  I decided the ear-hair was Wolverine-esque, and lay back on the creaking mattress.

“Come here.”

He was gentle with me.  His kisses were soft, his skin even softer.  The words “baby fat” came into my mind, and I pushed them aside. 

He went down on me and it felt good.  I wanted to have sex, and he resisted a little.  I insisted, and he stopped and looked at me.

“We can’t have sex.”

“What?!”
I was very confused and disappointed and worried and a little frustrated.  Once again I find myself asking, then what are you doing here?

“I have a problem.”

Oh no.  Here it goes.  What is it?  AIDS?  Herpes?  HPV?  What is it?

“I have a cyst on my balls.”

Oh my god.  Cancer.  I can’t believe it.  He’s so young!

“Are you okay?”

“Yeah, it’s benign.”  Phew.

“How did that happen?”

“I was working security in Gaza and we got into a fight and I got the butt of a machine gun jabbed into my balls.”

I couldn’t believe this story.  This was a different reality from my own. 

“So you can’t have sex?”

“It hurts.  A lot.”

So, that was that.  We kept kissing.  He wanted to make me come by going down on me.  I still wanted to have sex.  At some point, he was really hard and said “fuck it” and took a condom out of his pocket. 

We started to have careful sex.  But not too careful.  We moved around, switching positions.  From time to time I would ask if it hurt.  He took a couple pain breaks.  But for the most part, he seemed to be enjoying himself.  And I have to say the slow and steady approach was definitely an improvement from the jack rabbit pounding favored by a lot of guys who don’t have cysts on their balls.

And I came!  From sex.  With a relative stranger.  After only one go!  It was incredible.  And then he came!  Even with his cyst and everything.  He said afterwards it usually hurts with his girlfriend, but it didn’t really hurt this time. 

The next day, it wasn’t weird between us.  Actually, it was kind of fun.  On the seven hour van ride to Semuc Champey, I would strategically position myself in the seat in front of him so that he could fondle my breasts (casually) from the seat behind.  If our other friend knew what was going on, he made no indication.

That night, he tried to coerce me into sleeping in his bed in a one-room hostel full of a bunch of other male backpackers.  I declined, not wanting to be that girl.  He was a little offended, accusing me of thinking all he wanted from me was sex.  This baffling argument again.  We tried to have sex again but it was too painful for him.

The following day, they went on to Antigua, and I went back to Belize City to catch my flight home.

That was probably the best casual sex I’ve ever had.  Probably because I got to know him a little first, we had chemistry and some nice tension build up before we did the deed.  But it’s also interesting to me that often the guys I’m most physically attracted to (in that catnip kinda way) are the most disappointing in bed.  This guy was so not my type to the point that I almost didn’t even consider having sex with him, and he was actually much better than most I’ve been with.

The best casual sex partner I ever had, and it only lasted two days.  Even if we had kept traveling together, it was really over when it was over.  And what was the future in it anyway?  Maybe my friend has a point.  Maybe I’m bad at casual sex because I ultimately want more.  Or, if I meet someone that is everything I want in a casual sex partner, I’ll probably fall in love with them. 

My mom was really disturbed by my last blog post.

“Can’t you get to know people a little first before you have sex with them?”

This surprised me somewhat coming from her.  I know for a fact my mom was a big ol’ slut in her 20s in New York.  But I know it disturbs her to think of me having sex with people I barely know, only to discover they are sociopathic (aka Gaffer Guy).

There is something creepy about this, I will give her that.  With Gaffer Guy, I completely take responsibility because I knew the guy was crazy from the moment I met him and yet I kept putting my hand in the fire knowing full well it was going to burn me every time.  

I guess if I could totally remove my emotions from sex, Gaffer Guy’s craziness wouldn’t have affected me so much.  If I viewed sex as a purely physical act, I wouldn’t care.  But the truth is that I was hurt, and I did feel the loss of something.

So, maybe I’m bad at having casual sex.  Not to say I’m putting my slutty days behind me.  Because I’m not ready to do that yet.  But it’s good to know, along the path of discovering what I want, that I ultimately do want more from a relationship (even a casual one) than just sex.

Sticky, Sweaty, Salty, Sour: Sex and Marriage on Caye Caulker

I count the turns as I ride into town – 2^nd left, 3^rd right – watching for the telltale signs that guide my way.  Lazy Iguana B&B, Cocoplum… there are no street signs and the locals won’t give me a map.  They say I couldn’t possibly get lost on an island as small as Caye Caulker.  Try me. 

“Hey baby, where you going?” The friendly and leering Belizean boys reach out their arms to catch me as I pass.  I avoid them and the potholes in the white sand road as I try to keep my skirt from flying up.  I just showered and I’m already sticky from sweat, my skin burning after 6 hours spent in the relentless sun.  I feel good, clean and alive, and ready for anything.

My ex-boyfriend Henry told me before I left on my solo adventure to Central America that I was going to “fall in love with some Belizean guy.”  This is part of our relationship now – we tell each other the stories of our sexcapades and laugh at each other’s sluttiness.  I would classify him as a fellow Slutty Feminist.  We broke up when things were still good between us, just because we wanted to explore ourselves and other people.  We still have sex and spend whole days together.  No one understands that we’re no longer “in a relationship”; we seem more in love than a lot of couples I know.

“I’m gonna get you drunk tonight,” James beams, placing another grapefruit rum cocktail down in front of me.  He’s a local.  This is his place, his nickname’s on the wall.

Anita, his Norwegian wife, smiles coolly and looks away.  James’s expression hardens as he turns to her.

“You want something?”

Anita points to my drink. “Yeah, I’ll take one of those.”  Instantly, the energy shifts.

“What the fuck?”  James is pissed.

I turn my attention to the local woman working the grill.  The smell of fresh charred lobster pours over me in a smoky wave.

“Well, you didn’t ask me before so…” Anita laughs it off, biting her lip.  I shouldn’t be here, I think.  The third wheel to their marital spat.

I had a relationship like this once.  The hateful little jabs, the undercurrent of sarcasm and frustration, the inability to keep a lid on it even in public.  I ended up cheating on that boyfriend.  And then I broke up with him, albeit months and possibly years after I should have.  And I had thought about marrying him.  I thought we were soul mates and would have a baby and be together forever, even though a lot of the time I wasn’t happy. 

                                                   

It seems like all the local guys on Caye Caulker cheat on their wives.  At least that’s what one of them told me.  By day, they are tour guides taking American and European tourists out on fishing/snorkeling/diving trips; by night, they fuck white women.  And their local wives stay South of the island in the ramshackle huts where tourists don’t go, and take care of their children.  It seems like a pretty shitty arrangement to me and it makes me ask myself once again the question I’m constantly asking myself: why are these people married?  Because I understand very well the human impulse to fuck different people, but I don’t understand at all the impulse to commit to fucking the same person for the rest of your life.  I don’t actually believe this is a human impulse; I think it’s an antiquated tradition that has no place in the ever-changing world of today.

Take Anita for example.  Anita is this cool, independent woman who used to work some serious, business-y job in Norway before one day finding herself in Caye Caulker where she fell in love with local man James and decided to completely change her life.  Now she spends her days cleaning the rooms they rent to tourists, hanging out with their two dogs, and turning the other cheek when her husband hits on 20-something white women.  But Anita is clearly not meant for this lifestyle.  She’s tall and serious and strong and smart.  She’s intellectual, and now that the honeymoon’s over, I can see that she’s fucking bored.  I don’t blame her.  In fact, I feel a certain kindred connection with Anita – a mutual strong woman/ tall-blondeness that makes us inherently understand one another, and we talk freely.  Except about the one thing I’m really curious about: her marriage.  This is the subject we don’t broach.  Because she and James are not happy together and James obviously wants to fuck me.

Anita and James close down the restaurant and we head to the karaoke bar, the only joint still serving booze after midnight.  At the bar I stand uncomfortably sandwiched between the unhappy couple.  James keeps buying me drinks and I wonder what his plan is – take me back to their place and tell Anita to wait outside while we have sex?  I’m acutely aware of the awkward symmetry in the situation.  I’m the 20 years younger version of his 40-something wife, and James, in the primal tradition of men everywhere, wants to feel young again by fucking me.  I also don’t know how to diffuse the energy because I’m really bad at not flirting.

This is why I’m down on marriage.  Because I constantly find myself in the position of the Other Woman.  And it’s true, I don’t always diffuse the tension and, to be honest, I have no qualms about sleeping with a married/unavailable man because I don’t think it’s my responsibility to save his relationship and, if he wants to cheat, he’s going to cheat whether he does it with me or not.  Also, it shouldn’t be discounted that sexually I have very little self control – when I want it, I want it, and no one can stand in my way. 

But it just so happens that I don’t want James, and I really like Anita, so I choose to walk away.  Literally.  We are standing there in the bar and, without saying a word, I walk over to this cute local guy wearing a cap that says LA.  He’s been eyeing me all night.  This is the same guy that later tells me about how all the local men like to fuck white women.  I can feel James watching me as we talk, his disappointment is palpable.  Man, your wife is standing right there – why don’t you try to fuck her for a change?  It’s so totally depressing I can hardly stand it.

LA Cap Guy speaks Creole, Garifuna, and broken English.  I ask him to say something in Creole, a language that sounds a lot like English but is virtually impossible for me to understand.  He says he will if we can walk out to the end of the pier.  I know this is a ploy but at this point I’m into it, and I’d like to escape James’ penetrating gaze.  The pier is overpopulated with couples looking for privacy so we head back and walk along the dark shore.  I suggest a night swim.  He says it’s going to be cold but, thinking he might get laid, starts to take off his shoes.  I pull my dress over my head and wade in.  He’s right, it is cold, and shallow and mucky.  We sit in the muck and he pulls me into his lap – I can feel his huge erection poking into my back.  He kisses my neck and paws at my breasts and asks if I’m “enjoying” myself.  I know this is his hospitality training and I wonder if he asks the same during sex.  I decide I don’t want to find out.  I pull away and head for shore. 

“I’m cold.”  I actually am.  My teeth are chattering, I’m ready to go home.

After he’s done meticulously getting dressed, he pulls me in close and asks if he’s the only local boy I’ve ever “dated.”  I explain that we’re not dating, that I’m single.

“Why are you single?”

“Uh, because I want to be.”

He can’t believe this.  Actually, no one here can believe that I’m single by choice. 

His dream is to marry a white woman and move to LA.  I hope this isn’t a hint-hint.  He admits he’s got a bet on me with one of the other locals.  $30 Belize ($15 US) he’ll fuck me.  I tell him he shouldn’t have told me that, but I also find it hilarious that he did.

“I bet your lips are sweet.”

“They’re not,” I tell him.

He laughs and asks for a kiss.  I let him because his boxers are wet underneath his jeans and that can’t be comfortable.  His tongue tastes like sand paper and cigarettes.  His lips are squishy and sucking on mine.

I retrieve my bike and ride beside him as he walks back to the hotel room he keeps next to the dive shop where he works.  He talks about how he’s a dive master and a “boss” because they gave him his own hotel room.  He’s proud, he loves his life, he’s not married and he gets to fuck white women.  Don’t move to LA, I pray for him.  He wants another kiss.

“I really love you,” he says.

I hope this is a language barrier thing.

“Goodnight!” I shout, and scoot off.

The next morning, I run into James in the street.  For some reason, I find myself expecting to be scolded by him.  For running off with another guy.  Why I feel I owe him anything is totally beyond me.  But he seems cool and gives me a high-five.

He had said he’d come by the cabana to take me out on his boat this morning, but he never showed.  I ask him why. 

“Oh, I didn’t know if you’d still want to.”  I feel like we’re in high school.

I was actually totally relieved when he didn’t show up this morning.  I realize now if I find myself alone on a boat with him, it’s anyone’s guess what he’ll do, and I don’t want to make the situation any more awkward and depressing by rejecting him.

But as I watch him now coolly surveying the spill of tourists walking along the road, I realize that I’m just another blonde woman from the States to him, and there will be another boatload of us coming in by noon.  I feel better, because I didn’t really hurt his feelings.  He won’t miss me when I’m gone.  I’ll just be another white woman he didn’t get to fuck.