Free The First Time by Joy Fielding

back,” he said casually. “There’s more room there.”
    Kim crawled into the backseat of the car and immediately tore into her lunch bag for her sandwich. “Tuna,” she said awkwardly, holding it out for his inspection. “I made it myself.” She started unwrapping it, stopped when she felt his breath against her cheek. She turned toward him, their noses colliding gently. “Sorry, I didn’t realize you were so close—” she began, but his lips stopped her. She heard a low moan, pulled back sharply when she realized it came from her.
    “What’s wrong?”
    “Nothing,” she said, facing directly ahead, as if she were at a drive-in movie, talking a mile a minute, the way she always did when she was nervous, when she wanted to regain control. It wasn’t that she didn’t
want
to kiss him. It was that she wanted to kiss him so badly, she could barely see straight. “I just think maybe we should eat. I’m in classes all afternoon, and then I promised my grandmother, my mother’s mother, Grandma Viv,” she explained, knowing that Teddy, whose hand was massaging the back of her neck, couldn’t have cared less about her Grandma Viv, “I told her that I’d come by after school. She had to have one of her dogs put to sleep yesterday. It was really sick and everything, and she said it was looking at her with those eyes, you know, those eyes that said it was time, but still, she’s really upset about it, so I said I’d drop by She’ll be okay in a few days, once one of her other dogs has its litter. Then she’ll have something to take her mind off Duke. That was the dog’s name. It was part collie, part cocker spaniel. Really smart. My grandmother says that mutts are much smarter than purebreds. Do you have a dog?”
    “A yellow Lab,” Teddy said, a sly smile spreading from his lips to his eyes as he lifted the tunafish sandwich from Kim’s hand and returned it to its bag. “Purebred.”
    Kim rolled her eyes, then closed them. “I’m sure it’s a really smart dog.”
    “He’s as dumb as dirt.” Teddy ran his fingers across the top of Kim’s lips. “Your grandmother was right.”
    “I don’t have a dog,” Kim said, eyes opening as the tips of Teddy’s fingers disappeared inside her mouth,making speaking all but impossible. “My mother hates dogs,” she persisted stubbornly, talking around them. “She says she’s allergic, but I don’t think she is. I just don’t think she likes them.”
    “What about you?” Teddy was asking, his voice husky, as he leaned forward to kiss the side of Kim’s mouth. “What do you like?”
    “What do I like?”
    “Do you like this?” He began kissing the side of her neck.
    Oh yes, Kim answered silently, holding her breath, aware of the growing tingle beneath her flesh.
    “What about this?” His lips moved toward her eyes, brushing against the lashes of her closed lids. “Or this?” He covered her mouth with his own. She felt his tongue gently prying her lips apart, as one hand caressed the nape of her neck and the other hand began its slow slide across the front of her sweater. Could anything feel more delicious? she wondered, her entire body vibrating. Except that the vibrations weren’t internal; they were coming from somewhere outside her body.
    “Oh, my God,” she said, her hand slapping the pocket of her jeans. “It’s my beeper.”
    “Ignore it,” Teddy said, trying to coax her back into his arms.
    “I can’t. I’m one of those compulsive personalities. I have to know who it is.” Kim extricated her beeper, pressed the button to see who was paging her, and watched the unfamiliar number flash across its face, followed by the numbers 911, indicating an emergency. “Something’s wrong,” she said. “I have to get to a phone.”

S IX
    O h, my God, get me out of here. Get me out of here.”
    “Try to stay calm, Mattie. It’s important for you to keep very still.”
    “Get me out of here. I can’t breathe. I can’t