On the whole, I am glad I waited for Pierre, who flirted before he seduced, and seduced before he groped, which is only polite.

The first part of me he saw naked was my left breast, which he peeked at by lifting the corner of my blouse. Being very pleased with my breasts, as I’ve explained, I allowed him.

“Now I can’t stand up,” he murmured, smiling faintly. “Everyone will see.”

I thought this rather complimentary, considering the vast number of tits he has seen in his career as a ladies’ man. We then progressed, after a great deal of impolite cuddling, to bed.

Having believed myself in possession of a perfect body for so long, it seemed a marvelous moment to finally show it off, in all its glory, for another human being’s appreciation. It was unwrapped by stages; it was rubbed first, through my clothes, through my bra, then under my bra, which was finally unhooked. I presented my naked tits to him for further attention, which he gave most obligingly. He then searched under my skirt, discovered perfectly ordinary white cotton panties and was extremely pleased.

This is not to say that I lay there like a blow-up doll. I had saved my virginity not out of a sense of sexual morality, but out of an abhorrence of waste; I didn’t want to waste that first, irretrievable experience on the male version of a blow-up doll. I therefore had no intention of being anything less than responsive. Being determined to leave my state of inexperience with a vengeance, I began with what would become my favourite beginning-a blow job.

Blow jobs interest me. I have a friend for whom sex has been a matter-of-fact affair since the age of fourteen. She has made love in all conceivable positions, licked, sucked, tickled and teased every easily accessible orifice of her longtime boyfriend’s body (and he hers), attempted interesting experiments with honey, wax, chocolate, whipped cream. Yet her imagination is not what one would call vast.