I was under strict orders by Yosefin not to search for any information regarding what a rave is. The only fact I knew about it was that it was some sort of a concert. I have never been to any form of one. The only experience I had where there was a large gathering where music played would be the high school prep rallies in the gym. Whatever she planned for me at the end of September, I had to wait in utter anticipation.
At the beginning of September, my physical education teacher offered early extra credit in the form of joining a soccer club to participate in playing a match. I signed up to take advantage of the credit system to use later down the line. Plus, I had prior experience in soccer when I was young, so playing soccer wouldn’t be too strenuous for my body.
Hours before the soccer game, the club members gave two teams clothing and gear. We got shinguards, soccer cleats, and a black jersey. The other team wore white. As everyone got into their uniforms and hit the field, I looked at our goalie. They were sitting on the ground with a soccer ball in front of them. I couldn’t believe my eyes when I realized it was Yosefin. She had her hair tied back into a loose ponytail.
“This is a surprise. When did you sign up for the club?” I said, walking over to her.
“After class when you left for home,” Yosefin said when she stood up. Before I exited the parking lot, I remembered seeing her walk toward the elevators in my review mirror. “You ready to ball?” She lightly kidded the soccer ball to me. I went to catch the ball under my foot, but she kicked it between my legs before I could touch it. “Slowpoke!”
“Whoa. Friendly fire, Yosefin.” We exchanged turns, trying to outwit each other to see who could keep the ball longer. When the ref blew the whistle to start match one, I had the ball in my possession. “Ha! I win.”
“Oh, screw you. I had it more times than you.”
“But you didn’t have it until the very end.” I kicked the ball to the center of the field for the ref to have.
“Whatever,” she said, giving me a light, slow shove. “I need a shiny knight in black armor to protect me.” At first, I was confused as to what she meant. Why did she need a knight? Then it hit me. I was supposed to take the defender’s spot. She saw me finally realize with a disappointing sigh before I could say I understood. “Oh, Josh. You slow turtle. If this were a medieval setting, I would be so embarrassed.”
“Be happy I at least got it.” She shook her head with a big fat smile on her face.
“Go forth, my champion. Protect thy queen,” she said in a perfect old-style British accent. It made me cringe at how I found amusement in her commanding me. Collin and his randomness ran to the field, screaming at the top of his lungs, telling everyone to protect our goalie. “Hell, yeah! That’s the spirit!” The hype between the two made me cringe more and laugh simultaneously.
I took my position on the field. The rules were that two defenders protected our goalie, Yosefin, while our midfielders went after the ball to score. My team wasn’t that good at keeping the ball away from the defenders. We worked our asses off to defend her. I was so exhausted that my chest burned like it was hovering over a stove. My movements began to slow down, and I missed one attempt to kick a ball away from my opponent. She went behind me to score. Yosefin moved away from the goal to get ready to block. The girl kicked the ball right into Yosefin’s crotch. She caught it and got on her knees, bending over it. I rushed over to her to check if she was okay.
“Are you good?” I asked, keeping my voice down.
“No,” Yosefin grunted with noticeable pain. “Don’t make a scene.” She got up to kick the ball far away. I could see on her face and body that she was in so much discomfort. Her face was red. She tried to make it seem like getting hit in the balls was nothing by keeping her body more upright instead of slouching over. “Josh, go back to your spot. I’m fine.”
“Okay, but I think you should sit this one out.”
“No,” she said as she grabbed the lower part of her stomach, where the pain radiated. “Go.” Despite my worry, I went back to play my role.
Yosefin played the entire game in full without switching out. I’m amazed at her resilience to carry on from suffering one of the most painful hits to the groin. After the match, I approached her from the sideline to give her an ice pack. She refused it because she worried it would look weird for a girl to stick something down her pants. I kept pushing her to take it to use it now. She would only use it if we were in my car and out of sight from everyone.
While she soothed her pain in the back seat of my car, she made me become a lookout. The fear of being spotted made me curious about how she felt about others’ opinions of her.
“Do you think people might not like what you are?” I asked. I glanced into the car to see what she was doing. Her back was to me, and I could see her shorts halfway off her butt. “Yosefin?”
“Sorry.” She looked over her shoulder to me, then pulled up her shorts to cover some of her right ass cheek. “Dude,” she giggled. I quickly looked away. She giggled into a pitched laugh. “What were you saying, Josh? I wasn’t paying attention.”
“Do you feel people might not like who you are because of how you are created?”
“Sometimes.”
“Is that one of the reasons why we’re out here?”
“I’m a walking contradiction that raises eyebrows. I’m afraid of other people knowing what I am.”
“You shouldn’t worry about what other people think,” I said, leaning down to see her.
“Would you find it strange that someone who looks like me, fiddling with their crotch?”
“I would think her pussy is itching.”
“Her what?!” She started laughing so hard it made her face turn red. “That’s what you would think?”
“Yes,” I laughed in an honest response. “Stop overthinking things, Yosefin.” Her laughter stopped then her smile shrunk to a barely noticeable one.
“It’s hard not to, Josh.” She adjusted the icepack to her right side and then flinched in pain. Her left hand rested slightly higher over the icepack. “This is the worst time for this to happen.”
“What’s going on?”
“I’m getting phantom cramps. I should’ve worn a fucking cap. Goddamnit!” My mind stumbled on the word cramping. She must’ve known what I was thinking because she explained it to me after watching my reaction.
“Phantom cramps?”
“I get them monthly like a... period. Minus,” she braced her face from the pain before saying, “the bleeding part!” My mind couldn’t comprehend what I heard. How was this even possible?
“How?” I said, unable to think of something elaborate to ask. “Just how?”
“Who the fuck knows,” she said through her teeth. “Not even my fucking doctor knows.” The look of defeat was on her face. She was sweating, in pain, and hiding in my car from prying eyes. “Fuck,” she whispered before letting out one aggressive painful groan. I hated seeing her in complete misery, so I turned on my car to give her some cold air. She smiled once I pointed the rear passenger vents toward her face. “Thanks.”
“Is there anything else I can do?”
“Fuck,” she grunted and opened her legs a bit.
“Easy there. A queen shouldn’t curse,” I said in the most broken British English.
“Don’t you ever do that again,” she groaned and laughed.
“Sorry,” I cringed at myself.
“But it was a cute attempt nonetheless.” When she called my voice cute, I blushed to the point I couldn’t look her in the face. “Thank you for taking care of me and keeping it a low profile.”
“Anytime.”
“Hey,” she said, exposing some of her right ass cheek to me. “Random question. Should I get a tattoo here or, nah? I’m thinking of putting a bird here.” My face got hot. I tried my best to look away to be respectful and not to stare.
“No?”
“You sound unsure. Can I ask why?”
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“Well, it wouldn’t look good... on you.” Something about that answer made her cover her ass without taking her eyes off me. Not once did she blink.
“Please, explain why it wouldn’t.”
“This is going to sound weird.”
“Try me.”
“Putting a tattoo there would be obscuring,” I said with several pauses.
“Uh-huh...”
“Do you know what I mean?”
“Nein (No).” I leaned on the rim of the door with my chin on top of the car, so I could think of what to say that’ll make sense. “Could you be more descriptive?”
“Let’s say I was staring at a naked woman. I wouldn’t want there to be a tattoo there.”
“Oh,” she gasped in a way she understood what I said. “So you’re saying you like to see a clean ass?”
“Yeah.” I felt disgusted at myself for revealing something like that to her.
“Where else do you not like tattoos at?”
“Why are you asking me this?”
“You’ve,” she said, coming closer to me without looking away. “You’ve made me curious.”
“Well, I’m not too fond of it being on the chest, but I’ll let it slide. Boobs, no.”
“Cause you wanna see their tits, eh?” I couldn’t say yes, so I nodded my head. “Don’t be embarrassed, Josh. I’m not going to judge you.” My mouth stayed shut, but I was glad she told me that. “So, do you like them on feet?” I shook my head to say I did. “Stomach?”
“Well,” I mumbled with a minor voice crack. “Nah. I don’t.”
“Same here. I hate when guys have tattoos on their stomachs. Like, I wanna see those abs.” When she said abs, she poked all of her fingers against my stomach. It made me jump and almost chuckle. “What about their back?”
“Yeah, that’s cool.”
“I got vines above my tailbone. Wanna check it out?”
“Uh, sure, I guess.”
“Yes or no, dude,” she snapped at me with an exaggerated frown.
“Yes.” Her frown went into a smile.
“Turn around.” I took a few steps back and turned around. “Okay, look before someone sees me.” Slowly, I checked over my shoulder, leading with my eyes before turning my head. She had her shorts down enough to see a portion of her buttcrack. It wasn’t needed because her tattoo hovered about where the shorts were imprinted on her skin. The tattoo was an intricate design of roses entwined in vines. It looked crazily detailed. She covered herself before I could get an in-depth look. “So,” she stopped to check behind me. “What do you think? Is that too obscure?”
“No, that’s perfect. I like the design you picked.”
“Thanks. I got an awesome artist that inscribed my crazy art on me,” she said while checking out her arms. The little enthusiast in me got excited from realizing everything on her was her idea.
“Wow, that’s cool! Do you have sketches of your work?”
“I do.”
“You should show me some someday.”
“Someday?” She smirked to the right side of her face. “How about today?”
“But... the match is still going on.”
“You still wanna play?”
“Yeah.”
“Fine,” she said, taking the icepack out of her shorts but keeping her hand down there. “Give me a moment.”
“How do they feel?”
“Swollen,” she said, coming out of my car. “I’m gonna need some serious pain meds when I get home. God, what a fucking day.”
“Are you sure you’re good?”
“Yes,” she answered in a soft voice and gentle smile. “If it gets worse, I’ll sit on the sideline, so don’t worry about me.”
We continued playing soccer without incident. Though Yosefin pushed through the pain, I couldn’t help being worried that she might ignore it. I could tell she wanted to be out here and be around me no matter what she felt. It was commendable, but I wished she didn’t push herself. She stayed around for all the other activities like kickball and crossbar. Kat came by but didn’t participate at all. I broke away from a second kickball match to let someone substitute for me so I could talk with her.
“Hey,” I said, a bit out of breath. “Do you wanna play?”
“Joshua... Really?” Kat said, smirking and nodding her head with her arms crossed. “I can’t believe you asked me that.”
“Did I say something bad?”
“No,” she giggled. Her smile confused me. “Why do you look so frightened?”
“I feel like I said something foul.”
“You didn’t,” she said with a soft hand grazing my sweaty forearm. “I’m fat. I can’t move like y’all can out there.” I turned around to sympathize with what she said. No one had her body size. Everyone was thin or athletic in the way they looked.
“Well, I wouldn’t call you... fat.”
“What would you call me, hmm?” She leaned forward, ready to hear my response.
“Y’know...” The way she kept smiling at me made it hard to tell her I found her size attractive.
“Let me guess. curvy or chubby. It’s one of those two.” In my silence, she knew my answer. “It’s nice to know a guy is into this.” When she said that, she waved her hands down her body to emphasize the size of her figure. “Most guys get frightened.” That statement left me scratching my head. What was scary about her size?
“Kat,” I said. scratching my cheek. Right before I was about to ask the question, Yosefin came out of the blue to jump-scare us. I jumped, but Kat didn’t.
“Yo!” Yosefin shouted before grunting in pain. Her knees buckled. She played the moment off by acting like she was out of breath. “Are you done? You look like you can play another game.”
“No. I’m done this time,” I said. “How about you?” I nodded slightly, hoping she would know my direct question about her problem.
“I’m done. I got my extra credit for the day.”
“Good. Wanna chill for a bit?”
“Well,” Kat said, clearing her throat. “I’ll see you around, Joshua.”
Kat headed back to campus. My day ended at around the same time my classes ended. The club let me keep my outfit for future events if I decided to come back. Before I took it off, I took a picture of myself and Yosefin to show our professor we participated. My high-grade camera showed every bit of deformity on our faces. We looked so beat, it was funny. I sent Yosefin the picture to personally have then I sent a normal picture to my student account for the credit.
Yosefin and I stayed together after school, replenishing our bodies with food and water in the cafeteria. She tried to convince me to watch a movie with her. I wanted to take her home to make her take some medicine, but she acted like everything was fine. My worry got under her skin to the point that she cussed me out in the simplest way possible.
She said this to me. “Josh. My good friend. Can you, pretty please, fuck off already?” Her voice didn’t rise an interval to show any anger. It sounded a bit flirtatious yet serious.
I gave in to her wanting to see a movie. While at the movies, I bought some food to eat while she took her seat. When I passed Yosefin to sit down, she wafted the air behind me while scrunching up her face.
“Dude,” she laughed. “You smell like balls.” I didn’t mind my stench because she smelled just the same.
“So do you,” I said with a mouth full of candy. She pressed her tongue into the bottom corner of her mouth to make a pouty face. “I guessed I struck a nerve.” Her mad look turned into a smile, then a quiet chuckle.
“Das ist wunderbar. (This is wonderful),” she said, looking forward.
“What?”
“Nothing.” She brought her knees up on her seat to get comfortable. The knee-high position reminded me of my sister sitting in her chair when she gamed. Painful and uncomfortable looking. Yosefin’s legs were so close together that I worried about her squeezing her groin. She flinched and glanced at me when her legs slightly fell to the right. I kept my mouth shut, but I told her with my eyes about my concern. She opened her stance to avoid pressing them together. “Ouchie,” she said in a high-pitched voice that sounded like she orgasmed.
“Yosefin, the fuck?”
“Sorry,” she snickered like a pig. It was pretty loud. No one near us turned their head to look at us.
“You’re lucky no one heard that,” I said before a few people came in to take their seats below us. The theatre lights began dimming after the last preview ended.
“Shush. The movie is starting.”
“I wasn’t talking—”
“Shush.” She could not keep a straight face when she shushed me. We both laughed and then the people two rows below shushed us. It only made us laugh even more.
The movie ended at dusk. This was the latest I’ve been out on a school day. It felt a bit liberating yet strange. I didn’t text my parents about my whereabouts nor text me where I was. Not even my sister asked where I was. The rest of my day got weirder when Yosefin sent me a full-body shot of herself. She wore a long green shirt that stopped at her thighs, and in her right hand, she had a bottle of high-strength pain medication. The caption on the picture said:
“Just so you can shut up and have ease of mind.”
I didn’t know why Yosefin sent me something like that. This was my first time seeing her visually in this manner. I couldn’t tell if she had on anything under that shirt, plus her bare legs and white tip toenails gave an undesirable boner just by looking at them. The picture stayed in my mind like a bothersome afterimage for a long while. I dreamed of it. It became animated as if I was in the room where she took it. She moved around within the frame of the image and kept teasing me by lifting her shirt. The dream ended when my alarm clock went off the moment I saw her left hip. My heart was pumping hard, and I had the biggest morning wood imaginable that day.
The next school week, my PE professor made our class undergo a physical check-up to see how in shape we were. She put us through a gauntlet of different workout machines to see if we could pass a certain weight limit. The last thing we did was a bench press. A juiced-up guy wearing short green shorts was our spotter.
“All right, y’all. Let’s get this done. You, the tall one,” the buff guy standing next to my professor said, pointing at me. I looked behind me, hoping there was someone taller. Sadly, I was the only six-foot-one guy in here. “Yeah, you. You’re going first.”
“Shit,” I mumbled under my breath as I headed over to the bench.
“All you got to do is press this once. It’s a forty-five-pound bar.”
“That looks heavy,” Kat whispered. I laid down with the bar over my nose. Behind my head, the buff guy stood over to spot me. His stupid short shorts showed the outline of his fucking dick. It was so gross. I had to close my eyes while doing the single press.
“Good job, kid. All right, you’re next punk rocker.” Yosefin was wearing black denim shorts, black high tops, and a tank top that was tucked in with a yellow logo of a band I never heard of. Her fingernails were painted black too. The eyeliner around her eyes was a bit thick too.
“All right,” Yosefin said. “So.” She helped me up off the bench. “Was it that heavy? Looked like you were straining there. You had your eyes closed.”
“It wasn’t, but you’ll see why I closed them,” I softly said in her ear. The moment she laid back on the bench, her eyes glued to that man’s crotch even after completing the set. She came to me with her hands over her mouth and hid her face against my chest.
“Oh... my... god,” she said, nearly laughing between her words. “I know it was flaccid, but did you see how huge it was?”
“Nope. Stop right there. I’m not going to think about that.”
“Just imagine if it was hard.”
“Stop.” She kept trying to bring up the dude’s dick during class like it was the greatest thing she’d ever seen. First, it was the size, and then it became about what it might look like. I got agitated. I had to tell her to knock it off. “Would you stop talking about the dude’s dick, Yosefin? It’s annoying.”
“Aw, come on. You can’t truly be annoyed with it.”
“It is disgusting!”
“Oh,” she said in a way she was shocked yet intrigued. “Okay, I’m done talking about it,” she chuckled. “I’m sorry for being extra.”
“Thank you,” I sighed.
“Bro!” Collin shouted from the bench. “Move your junk away from me, man!”
While most of our classes and Yosefin laughed at what Collin said, my annoyance towards her jokey behavior didn’t last long. It gave more insight into what she liked or found amusing. Our friendship hadn’t crossed into that part of getting to know what we liked sexually in unfiltered detail. I wasn’t going to ask her questions like that until she made the first move.
After the awkward workout, Yosefin and her uncontested persuasion convinced me to join her in downing fast food and milkshakes at the Twilight Castle to close the evening.