“The most beautiful people we have known are those who have known defeat, known suffering, known struggle, known loss, and have found their way out of the depths. These persons have an appreciation, a sensitivity, and an understanding of life that fills them with compassion, gentleness, and a deep loving concern. Beautiful people do not just happen.”

― Elisabeth Kubler-Ross

With nothing but all to lose,

she's got nothing but all to lose,

which is nothing at all to lose.

-Bender, Big D and the Kids Table

A car horn honked outside. Butterflies flitted around my stomach as I grabbed my duffel bag and squeezed my roommate in a quick good-bye hug before I bounded out the back door, down the interior apartment steps, and outside. Sonny and Thomas were standing at the back of Sonny’s little red Beretta with the trunk open. I threw my bag in beside two large backpacks that Thomas lifted slyly to show me a thirty-pack of beer and six large bottles in brown paper bags hidden underneath. I gave him a high-five, planted a kiss on Sonny’s lips and skipped around to get in the car. I was expecting to sit in the front seat, but as I waited for Thomas to climb into the back, Sonny looked at me from the driver's seat.

"Hon, it makes more sense for the people who will be smoking to sit up front. You don't mind the back, do you?" I did mind the back. I got car sick and I had really wanted to sit next to Sonny.

    “No, that’s fine,” I said.

Oh well, I thought as I climbed past the front seat, After all, I'm not even technically his girlfriend yet. We had been dating for about three months, since the beginning of the semester, but Sonny still didn't want to be exclusive.

As we pulled out of the parking lot of my apartment building Sonny and Thomas started talking about movies, plays, and music. I enjoyed these things but had learned better than to try to interject my opinions into Sonny-Thomas conversations. Before I dated Sonny, I always thought that I was pretty bright however, I had learned in the past three months that I really didn't have many interesting things to say. I sat quietly for the next hour and a half as we drove away from Middleville,through the canyon, on the way to our spring break destination. Sonny and Thomas smoked their cigarettes and talked, ignoring me except to ask that I pass the candy forward.

If only I was more interesting, I thought. Or maybe, if I smoked. That was the first time I actually considered taking up smoking.They were always offering me cigarettes, and even though they were only being polite, it had bothered me. Sitting in the car now though, I wished they would offer me one, like usual, just so I could have the chance to show them that I really could be part of the group. Although, now that I thought about it, it would be difficult to smoke out of the back seat of this little two-door car. There wasn’t a window for the smoke to escape through. I conceded to myself that it did make a lot more sense for Thomas to be sitting up front. I decided to just let it go and, instead, be grateful for the chance to listen to their conversation and store away facts about Sonny's interests that I could impress him with later. The whole ride we listened to a "Spring Break Mix” CD that Sonny had made. By halfway through the canyon, I had all the words to "Bender" by Big D and the Kid's Table memorized.

Once we arrived in Salt Lake City, we stopped at the mall to meet some other friends who were going up to the little town where we would be spending our break.Thomas’ family owned a cabin in a town nestled in the upper corner of Utah, seven miles from the Idaho border and about ten miles from Nevada: population 57.

When we pulled into the parking lot at the mall, Sally, Katrina, and Matt were already there.

"Hey ladies! What did you bring for us?" asked Sonny with that little hint of flirt that he automatically had whenever he talked to girls.

"Oh, you know," replied Sally,  "Two bottles of tequila and a thirty pack."

"That's my girl! We have some beer and two bottles each of Captain Jack, Malibu rum, and Vodka." He gave each of the girls a hug and I felt a stab of jealousy. I knew that he had slept with each of them about four months back at the end of last semester. But the jealousy disappeared as we walked in to the mall and Sonny took my hand. I felt my heart speed up. We were in public, in front of Sonny's friends, and he was holding my hand for everyone to see! This is a big step! I thought. We spent about twenty minutes in the mall. I was smiling like an idiot the whole time.

No one bought anything while we were there; we were just passing time until Mark, Sonny's friend from high school, was finished working. Then we would pick him up and head over to Phred's, another of Sonny's high school friends.

Our plans were delayed when Mark was an hour late getting off work at Arby's. We sat in front of the restaurant, everyone but me, smoking. We were all laughing and talking about how awesome our trip was going to be. I was having a good time, but I felt left out since I was the only one who didn't have a cigarette.

"Hey Sonny," I asked with as much flirt as I felt confident to convey, "Can I have a drag of your cigarette?" The sentence that I had heard all of them pronounce a hundred times felt strange coming from my lips, but I was thinking that if I showed Sonny I was cool enough to smoke, maybe he would want me to ride up front, next to him, for the rest of the way to the cabin.

"Really, babe?" He laughed. "Why don't I just light you one for yourself?"

"Uhm, okay..." I replied nervously. I hoped I could smoke it right so everyone would be impressed with me. Sonny pulled a cigarette from a box that said “Camel Menthol Lights” on it. He lit the new cigarette in his mouth and passed it to me. I held the cigarette between my index and middle finger like everyone else did, raised it to my lips, and sucked in as deeply as I could.

The next second I felt a burning in my mouth and throat and a painful sort of tickle. I ended up doubled over in an intense coughing fit. Everyone laughed. I laughed too but I didn't think it was funny.

Over the next 13 minutes, I continued puffing and coughing, trying to get the hang of smoking. I wasn't very good at it. Finally Mark came out the front door of Arby's.

"Let's go bitches!" he cried. Brief introductions were made,

“Everyone, this is Mark. Mark, everyone.” Sonny said, sweeping his arm around to gesture at his new college friends. We left Arby's, Thomas and me in the back, while Sonny and Mark sat up front catching up until we stopped at Phred's house. Phred's name was really Fillip. He said that he was so annoyed his parents had decided to spell Phillip with an F that he decided to go by Fred with a PH. Phred was a very short, ugly little man. He gave me the creeps when Sonny introduced us,

“This is Phred, the chillest fucker ever.”  Sonny said. For the sake of relating to Sonny I decided to ignore my initial impression. Our entire party was assembled and I took the opportunity to make a group assessment. Our group was pretty equally divided between ugly people and attractive people. Sonny was very good looking. Thomas was also fairly attractive, although, unfortunately for the girls at our community college, he was gay. Mark was cute as well, although unfortunately for Thomas, he was straight. Sally, Katrina, Matt, and Fillip were all unfortunate looking. I did not consider myself very pretty. In high school I had rarely felt self-conscious about my looks but Sonny  was very open about what kinds of girls he thought were most sexy; I was too heavy and too plain. Secretly, I knew that I was more attractive than Sally and Katrina though. I hoped that would be enough for Sonny to remain interested in me for the weekend.

I found out that it was irrelevant whether I was the prettiest girl there or not shortly after I was introduced to Phred, because Sonny sheepishly approached me.

"Babe," Sonny said, as he pulled me away from the others. "I haven't seen Phred or Mark for a long time. Is it okay if they ride in the Beretta with me?"

"Sure," I replied. "I don't mind squishing in the back." I smiled widely and leaned up to kiss him, but he pulled away.

"No, I mean, why don't you ride in Katrina's car with Sally and Matt?"

"Oh. Okay, yeah, that's fine," I said, trying to keep the rejection I felt out of my voice. I was crushed and uncomfortable with this idea. I didn't know Katrina, Sally, or Matt very well and I was shy but I climbed into the back seat of Katrina's car with Matt as Phred and Mark climbed into the back seat of Sonny's car behind Thomas.

After about a half hour of driving behind Sonny's car, Katrina started to act strange. She was leaning forward, squinting, and kept tailgating the Beretta. She seemed to be getting angry and suddenly burst out, "God! Sonny is such a fucking jerk! Look in the back window! Jenna, the reason he didn't want you in the car is because they are getting high. Look, you can see the lighter clicks and smoke in the back window. He knew you would be uncomfortable. What a prick." That first moment I was very mad. But I knew what happened when I got mad at Sonny. He would offer excuses and make a sad, apologetic face.

He'd say, ”Babe, don't be angry. You know how much I care about you, more than I've ever cared about anyone. I only did it because of <insert excuse here>. I was thinking of you, I promise. I'm sorry."

Then I would feel like a jerk since my anger was unfounded. Besides, it took too much energy to stay angry at Sonny all the time. I knew the drill so well from the three months we had been dating that I had started to unconsciously go through the process by myself so I wouldn't have to even bring it up with him. My mind started working on the justifications: Sonny knew that Thomas and Mark brought weed with them; he also knew that I didn't like how often he smoked pot and I didn't want to smoke it at all. So, he decided that the way to make the whole thing a little better was to just smoke in the car on the way there so I wouldn't have to deal with it when we got to the cabin.

I convinced myself that I felt better about this situation after my rationalizing and changed the subject in the car. We talked about make-up, theatre, movies, and our plans for the weekend. We also listened to "Bender" about 20 times the rest of the four hours to the cabin. We only made one stop at a little grocery store where we picked up a gallon of orange juice, about  20 Totino’s pizzas, and a bunch of other junk food to compliment the additional 2 thirty packs Thomas bought, since he was the only one of us who was 21. Sally, Katrina, Matt, and I were only 19 and Sonny, Mark, and Phred were 20.

When we finally got to the cabin, it was 2:30 AM. We unloaded our food and alcohol into the refrigerator. As I carried my bag of clothes and shower supplies into the house, I sang softly under my breath, "Going on a bender this weekend. I'm gonna get real drunk. I won’t be able to speak and I'll pass out on my floor. I won’t be able to answer the door."

When everything was unloaded, we convened in the living room.

"Alright Bitches!" exclaimed Thomas. "This is Spring Break 2008! There is only one rule for spring break, and it goes like this: For the next two nights and three days, you are either sleeping, drinking, or fucking. No exceptions. So either get your asses into bed, take off your pants, or get in line so I can make you a drink!" Sonny caught my gaze and winked at me. I smiled, although this seemed like a very impractical rule to me. I knew that more than one shot of anything put me on the severe side of tipsy, but everyone cheered wildly and got in line in front of Thomas, who was now holding a bottle of rum in one hand and a bottle of Coca-Cola in the other. Sonny took my hand and pulled me away from the line. He grabbed his bag and told me to get mine, then he led me down a hallway to a bedroom with one queen-sized bed in it.

"I thought we should pick out our room first so we didn't get stuck with a twin bed or sharing a room with someone else," he said with a mischievous smile. Then he put an arm around me, pulled me close to him, and kissed me. I kissed him back.

The times when I was kissing Sonny were some of the only ones where I felt like he really cared about me. There was no way someone could kiss another person the way Sonny kissed me without honestly feeling something powerful for them. We started to make out pretty heavily. He pulled my shirt over my head, pulled me closer to him, and then down on the bed. He rolled on top of me. Then there was a loud knock on the door,

"Sonny, Jenna, get your asses out here! Making out does not count as fucking. And since I happen to know that Jenna is a virgin and prefers to stay that way until marriage, I don't really think fucking is going to happen right now. That means that you two better get drinking!"

We laughed.

“Thomas was right. I will not be losing my virginity anytime soon.” I said firmly. I put my shirt back on and opened the door. Thomas was standing there grinning with two rum and coke concoctions held out to us.

We each took one. Then Thomas said, "As you both know, I was in a car accident two weeks ago and I lacerated my liver. I can't drink alcohol for another month. So my drunk will be high. I have an ounce of chronic left. Anyone is welcome to join me. I will smoke everyone out this weekend."

"Sweet!" replied Sonny, "I'm in!" Then he and Thomas ran off around the corner. I went into the living room where everyone else was still sitting. I had thought that Sonny wanted to get high in the car without me because he wasn’t going to smoke while I was here this weekend. I felt the familiar anger begin to swell up but, almost immediately started working on the justifications: Thomas can’t drink; he doesn’t want to be the only sober person here. Sonny doesn’t want him to feel alone and is just trying to be a good friend. I can’t be angry with him for being a good friend. I drank my rum and coke as fast as I could and then, even though it was disgusting, I poured myself another glass.

The first time I ever had a drink of alcohol had been almost three months earlier, on January 9th. I had had a one shot of some disgusting blue stuff on my friend’s birthday with my roommate and best friend, Aimee. I had only drank once since then, but until this moment I hadn’t ever drank anything so quickly. About twenty minutes passed and I started to feel pretty unsteady. I thought, again, that this constant drinking idea was impractical, but everyone else seemed to think it was the greatest thing ever. I assumed that I just hadn’t had enough experience with alcohol and let myself get swept up in everyone else’s excitement.

I was on my third glass of rum and coke when Sonny and Thomas returned.

"Hey hottie!" said Sonny as he grabbed me and pulled me to him. "What's up?"

"My throat and stomach feel all warm and tingly," I said half giggling.

"That's my girl! How much have you had to drink?"

I swallowed the remaining liquid in my glass and replied, "Three of these thingies."

"You are such a champ! I just love you!" My whole body tingled and not just from the alcohol.

"I love you too! Have a drink!" I got up and staggered around the corner into the kitchen. I opened the freezer where we had neatly stored all the liquor.

"Rum and coke?" I called into the living room.

"You know it!" Sonny replied. So I pulled the rum out of the freezer and the coke out of the fridge. As I was pouring something like 3 shots worth of rum into a plastic cup, Phred wandered into the kitchen.

He put an arm around me and said, "God, you're fucking hot! Are you gonna make me a drink too honey?"

I remembered, for a moment, a time when I would have been uncomfortable with someone I barely knew touching me and talking to me that way. But that was how Sonny had always talked to me, and all the guys at the college that I hung around with seemed to be pretty comfortable with touching. I lived off campus with my roommate and best friend, but during the winter we'd discovered that our heat did not work. So we had spent our nights in the dorms from November until February, and since Aimee and I didn't get along with other girls as a general rule, we almost always stayed in a guy's dorm. I guess I should not have been surprised about the reputation that began to follow us, even though after four months, I had only kissed 3 of the guys I'd spent the night with and still hadn't been past second base. But regardless of what really happened, everyone had their own ideas about me and I'd gotten used to getting pats on my ass as I walked around campus. It was a completely new world, but all the people who were nice to me treated me like that. I'd decided that it was normal and forced myself to become desensitized.

"I am definitely more drunk than you are Phred," I replied. "You are going to have to make your own drink."  I finished making Sonny his drink and poured myself a small one, then I went back to the living room and plopped down on the couch. Sonny came and sat next to me, took his drink, and gave me a smile. God, I lived for those smiles. Everyone, besides Thomas and Sonny, was very drunk by now. But the rule remained, so we all just sipped causally on our drinks while Sonny chugged two and Thomas sat in a large easy chair with a huge, stupid grin plastered on his face.

Around 4 a.m. I was ready for sleep and relieved when Thomas, who was apparently the official leader of our little group, stood up and said, "Alright kiddies, off to bed you go! We have a big day of drinking and smoking ahead of us!"

Sonny turned to me, "I'm going to go out for a cigarette before I come to bed. See you in a little bit."

"Well, can I come out with you? I'd like to give the smoking thing another try."

Sonny laughed,"Sure babe. I brought 3 packs for this weekend, so I don't see any harm in wasting a few cigarettes on you." Sally grabbed my arm as I started through the door after Sonny.

"Sweetie, you have to pull the smoke all the way down into your lungs, okay? Your problem before was that you were only pulling it into your throat." I didn't really understand what Sally meant by that, but I nodded.

The night was cold and dark. There was still snow on the ground, and I could hardly see anything at first. As my eyes adjusted, I saw Sonny light two cigarettes at once in his mouth. He took one out and handed it to me. I thought of what Sally had told me and tried to inhale all the way down to my lungs. It worked! It felt very strange, and still burned my throat, but I didn't cough.

"Whoa! Fast learner!" Sonny praised. He leaned in to me and kissed my cheek. I was so proud of myself! I loved it when Sonny noticed the things I did right. I probably would have been smiling like an idiot if I hadn’t needed to concentrate on my cigarette. I was  trying to get the drags just right every time. I coughed on my fourth drag, but Sonny didn't laugh so it was okay. By my sixth inhale, my whole body felt tingly. My head was swimming, even more than it already was from all the rum, and I was feeling a little bit nauseous.

"Sonny, I feel so funny." I heard my words slur on their way out of my mouth. Sonny laughed.

"Yeah, that is called a nicotine buzz babe."

“Oh.” I chuckled, “Is it okay for a princess to have a nicotine buzz?” I asked.

“What do you mean?” Sonny asked.

“Well, there are rules to being a princess.” I explained drunkenly, “If you don’t follow them you can’t be a princess.”

“So, are you a princess then?” Sonny laughed.

“I don’t know yet.” I slurred, “All girls can be princesses, but only if they format their lives to meet the Disney Princess Criteria, which is A: meet your true love between the ages of 16 and 21, and B: Marry him. A princess only falls in love once. Of course, you also can’t have sex with anyone who isn’t your true love and you have to conduct yourself in a princessy way.” I stumbled and almost dropped my cigarette. Sonny cracked up laughing, “At least, most of the time.” I laughed too.

“Well,” Sonny said, getting control over his laughter, “if you ever fall in love with me, let me know and I’ll do my best to make sure you stay a princess.” I beamed. Sonny flicked what was left of his cigarette, and it soared eight or nine feet to land in a snow bank. I still had almost half a cigarette left, but I thought that if I tried to smoke the rest of it I might throw up, so I flicked mine too. It went about six inches.

Sonny and I went inside and hung up our coats. Then he grabbed me, threw me over his shoulder, and carried me to the bedroom we had picked out, laughing all the way. When we got to the queen-sized bed, he set me down, closed the door, and then in one swift motion crossed to me and had me down on the bed. He kissed me deeply as he ground his lower body into mine. His hand rubbed my rib cage and slowly made it's way higher and higher until he was squeezing and massaging my left breast.

My mind was a crazy jumble. I couldn't think clearly anyway because of the large amount of alcohol I had consumed. But on top of that, my mind was waging a war: I liked this, this felt nice, and I knew that Sonny liked me more and spent less time with the other girl he was dating the farther we went. But I had been raised knowing that this was wrong, that I shouldn't have sex until I got married. I had told him this and had outlined exactly how far I was willing to go when he first attempted to cross the lines I had for myself, but he continued to try to push the boundaries.

I really cared about Sonny and had been more physical with him than with any other boy, but he still wasn't my boyfriend and it was important to me that he would be eventually so that I wouldn't feel so dirty about how physical I had been with him. But on the other hand, I thought that maybe if I let him do the things he wanted to, he would finally love me. These were unformed thoughts in my mind, more of a feeling that I left unnamed, but it had allowed a sort of pattern to form between us. Each time things started to get steamy between us, I would let him go just a little bit further than the last time before I asked him to stop.

So I didn't protest as Sonny unbuttoned my pants or when he unclasped my bra and flung it onto the ground. I let myself fall into a rhythm of grinding movements against his lower body as his mouth made its way down my throat and onto my collar bone.

It wasn't until he had pulled my pants down around my thighs and his mouth was hovering over my panties that I finally whispered, "Sonny, please don't. I need to stop." He sighed, rolled off of me, stood up, and walked out of the room.

He came back ten minutes later and laid down. I snuggled up to him, but he rolled over so his back was to me.

"Goodnight babe."

"Goodnight. I'm sorry... about..." I said.

"No big. It's whatever," He said dismissively.

When I woke up the next morning there was light pouring into the room and Sonny wasn't in the bed. I looked at my phone, which had no service, but still told the time; it was noon. I slid out of the bed, put on my clothes and shuffled into the kitchen. Thomas was sitting at the table, a piece of Totino's pizza in one hand, joint in the other.

"Good morning, sunshine!" he exclaimed. He took a puff of his joint, and continued.

"Sonny is out having his wake-up cigarette. There are two pizzas in the oven; they are probably done, but make yourself a screwdriver before you take them out. You mustn't break the rules!" I laughed and searched the freezer for one of the bottles of vodka. I mixed it in a cup with equal parts vodka and orange juice, then took a big gulp before going to the oven for the pizzas. I put them on the table, and by the time I had gotten the first one cut into four pieces, Sonny came through the door.

He already had a screwdriver and picked up a piece of pizza as he exclaimed, "Breakfast of champions!"

At that moment Phred, Matt, and Katrina made their way into the kitchen. More screwdrivers were poured, more pizzas were put in the oven.

"Where are Sally and Mark?" I asked

"I don't know. Let's go find them!" replied Sonny. We checked rooms systematically and finally found them in a little room on a twin bed, both of them were completely naked. Sonny laughed and smacked Mark on the back of the head.

"Wake up! It's time for more alcohol! You two can fuck some more later!" Mark woke up reluctantly and looked around, bewildered. A second later he realized where he was and in what condition.

"Sonny, get the fuck out of here! We'll be out in a second." By this time Sally had started to wake up, so we hurried from the room and back into the kitchen, giggling the whole time.

It only took until the bottom of my first screwdriver to start feeling tipsy again. I decided that I was going to take the drinking a little bit more slowly today since it had only taken me three drinks to start feeling nauseated the night before, and there were still several hours left of drinking today. I poured my second screwdriver and sipped it slowly. There wasn't a whole lot to do in this tiny cabin, besides drink, so Sonny and I decided to watch a movie. We put in "Joe Vs The Volcano" because it had Meg Ryan in it and looked funny. I loved it, but Sonny thought it was boring and kept leaving for ten minutes at a time to smoke pot with Thomas. At one point, when Sonny was gone, Phred came in and watched some of the movie, scooting closer and closer to me over the course of about five minutes. He got up and left to get high when Sonny came back into the room.

Even though I tried to nurse my drinks, I was more drunk than I had ever been by the time 5 o'clock rolled around, which was saying something after the last night. I had had three screwdrivers and five beers. Everyone was drunk, besides Thomas, who was high. We decided to play poker, so everyone gathered around the table. I was very good at poker. In fact, I had been earning my gas money by playing in weekly tournaments at the dorms for 4 months. No one seemed to be winning this game though; we were all so drunk that we kept forgetting what we were doing or showing people our cards. Eventually Matt suggested that we all go out for a smoke break to help us sober up a little bit and then play a drinking game. I asked Sally if I could "bum a smoke," which was another phrase that sounded strange coming out of my mouth. She gave me a cigarette from a carton labeled "Marlboro 100's."

"Be careful. They're a bit stronger than the pussy ones Sonny smokes," she told me. I lit my own cigarette this time, which was difficult, took three attempts, and resulted in another violent coughing fit. I then tried to look as relaxed and cool as everyone else did while concentrating furiously on not embarrassing myself.

It only took me about three puffs on Sally's Marlboro cigarette to realize that she had understated the strength of this brand. My head was already swimming with the nicotine overload, and I was starting to feel sick. By halfway through the cigarette, I was sure I was going to throw up. I took another drag and then announced to the group that I had to pee and ran inside, hurtled myself into the bathroom, and threw up what felt like several gallons of beer, vodka, orange juice, and pizza. Then I quickly brushed my teeth and went back to the living room.

Everyone had come inside from smoking and Mark was setting up some sort of drinking game. Katrina had pulled out the rum and coca cola and poured seven plastic cups full of the mixture. I took one and sat down. I was relieved that no one seemed to suspect that I'd just been sick. The next few hours flew by in a blur of junk food, alcohol, music, and laughter.

Around 9 o'clock, Thomas made dinner for everyone and then we broke out the tequila. Mark had brought limes and Thomas searched around in the cupboards until he found some salt. I was very excited to try some tequila shots because I'd never had them and the whole thing with the salt and limes seemed so glamorous.

"Okay, so how does this work?" I asked.

"Well," replied Sonny, "I think we should do body shots." A mischievous grin broke out across his face.

"I agree," yelled Phred, "and I nominate Jenna as the body!"

"I second!" cried Sally

"All in favor say ‘Aye!’" called Thomas.

"AYE!" came from Katrina, Matt, Mark, and Sonny.

"Uhm, okay then. How does that work?" I asked.

"Take off your shirt," said Thomas, matter-of-factly. I was just drunk enough that this directive did not seem strange and I complied. Thomas continued, "Now get up on the table and lay down." Everyone helped clear the table off, and then I climbed on top of it and positioned myself on my back along the edge.

"Me first!" said Sonny. He had been slicing limes for the last minute or so and placed a wedge in my mouth, rind-side down. Then he poured himself a shot of tequila, which he placed over my belly button. He dipped his finger in it and drew a line on my stomach just above my pelvis and poured a little bit of salt on it. He did all of this with his best "I am so sexy" look, and, I thought to myself, he was.

Then Sonny winked at me, licked the salt off my stomach, drank the shot of tequila, and bit the lime that was still in my mouth, kissing my lips sensually as he did so. There was cheering and laughter and someone whistled. I felt kind of awesome, but then I heard, "Me next!" from Sally, and then everyone formed a line.

Every single person went through the same process, although they all placed the salt in different places on my stomach and abdomen and no one else, besides Sally, actually kissed me. They just took the lime wedge from my mouth. Everyone was having so much fun that I decided I would not let it bother me that I felt more like the table I was lying on than an actual person.

After everyone had had a turn drinking tequila shots off of me I got up and had a few shots of the stuff myself to wash down my discomfort.

At 11 o'clock, I was so drunk that I could not walk on my own. I had never been that drunk before, I could barely think. I tried to tell Sonny that I was ready to go to bed, and although I couldn't talk properly, he understood.

"Okay babe, I'll come tuck you in," he said. He supported most of my weight as we made our way to the bedroom. Sonny closed the door behind him as I flopped myself onto the bed.

He came and laid beside me and said, "You're pretty hot when you’re drunk."

I leaned over and kissed him. We kissed for what felt like a long time before we started going through our pattern. I couldn't focus on anything and I felt like my body was just doing things without my mind controlling it. Everything felt so good even though all the movement was making me a bit nauseous. I realized, suddenly, that Sonny had just thrown my jeans onto the floor next to my shirt and bra, so I said, "Hey, let's not go too far, alright."

"K," said Sonny as he slid his fingers under the waistband of my panties to press against my butt. I tried to focus my eyesight and saw that he was in nothing but his boxer shorts.

"This is too far, Sonny." I said, and I stopped moving with him and laid still.

"I won’t do anything else. Just keep kissing me for a little while."

"Okay," I said reluctantly. I lifted my head up, bringing my lips to his, but the sensation of spinning overtook me and I had to let my head fall back against the mattress. Sonny's lips stayed connected to mine on the way down. All of my joints felt strange, like they were too loose. I tried to focus my eyes on Sonny’s face, but I could barely keep them open, let alone focus on a moving object. Moving? I wondered why he was moving so much. Kissing didn’t require that much movement. In fact, we weren’t even kissing anymore. My lips felt kind of numb, tingly, and felt strange against my teeth. It was getting more difficult to stay awake. I let my head flop down sideways so my cheek was resting against the mattress. I was half trying to see what Sonny was doing now that he wasn’t kissing me, but I had also realized that my head felt very heavy. I didn’t see Sonny so, with great effort, I lifted my head enough to look down my body to the edge of the bed. I looked just in time to see, a now naked, Sonny leaning toward me. The next thing I knew, I could feel his penis pressed against my inner thigh and his fingers pulling my underwear to the side. My nausea increased.

"Sonny, I don't want to," I whispered.

"Yes you do," he said sincerely. And then he was inside me.

"Please stop," I asked, although I knew it didn’t matter if he did now. My virginity was gone. He didn't answer me.

"No. Stop." I whispered, and kept whispering, although I knew he wouldn’t. My cheeks were wet. I realized that I was crying. Did he know that I was crying?

I should stop crying, I thought. No one liked a girl who cried after having sex, I knew that. A girl who cried during had to be even worse. I was suddenly aware of a rising feeling of terror. As soon as I had recognized it, it increased. I wanted to scream, to break something, to break Sonny maybe, but my arms wouldn’t move. My joints felt so strange.

Stop! I thought. I didn’t know if I was talking to my joints or to Sonny.

“Please stop,” I said, talking to Sonny now, mostly. It’s pointless anyway, I thought.

Then he did stop. He got up, put on his clothes and said, "I'm gonna go get high." Then he left the room.