The First Kiss

Butterflies and Cigarette Smoke

Once, after an evening spent over bottles of port wine, a friend of mine was swept up in a wave of nostalgic romance. She told me the story of her first kiss, her voice tinged with the kind of wistful affection only time can add.

She was at a camp at that time. The summer was almost over, and the barely noticeable scent of fall had begun to seep into the air. It was a quiet hour, and they had sneaked onto the roof. Two girls lay side by side, gazing at the towering pines that seemed to pierce the sky. The world around them felt suspended in the kind of stillness only nature can create, with distant branches swaying like the slow hands of some celestial clock.

It was then, in the midst of that serene moment, that her friend turned to her and asked, softly but with a mischievous glint in her eye, "Do you know how to kiss?"

It was her first kiss. And it was with someone she truly cared for, someone who woke up the butterflies sleeping in her soul. She would carry that taste for the rest of her life. The closeness, the softness of the kiss, trembling clumsy touches that was her memory, forever etched in her heart.

As she recounted the story, she sighed, her gaze drifting toward the half-open window, as if the trees outside the window brought her back to that pine forest day. The soft light of the evening painting her face in shades of nostalgia. Her eyes grew distant, as if she were reliving the moment. Then, with a smile, she turned to me and asked, "Do you remember your first kiss?"

I answered “honestly”, though with a touch of hesitation. I said no. I didn’t want to disrupt the tender mood she had created. But the truth was, I did have a story of my own, one I carry through life.

It was also a romantic and serene picture, except we were sitting on an old faded bench behind the garbage bins, staring at the brick wall of the garages.

Her name was Olya. She smelled of tobacco and sunflower seeds, and in her sixteen-year-old eyes lived the full weight of all her past reincarnations. I was not very picky then, and, having gathered up a courage that came from who knows where, I put my stiffened almost wooden arm around her, waited for the moment between exhalations of cigarette smoke, and pressed my lips to hers.

And after her exclamation, "Well, fuck me, who the fuck kisses like that?" something beautiful happened.