Didn’t Kiss Me? Your Loss!

There are probably plenty of people I haven’t kissed that I would have if the chance had arisen. If I was shown images of every person I’ve ever encountered and asked ‘would I have kissed them if the situation allowed’ I think the yes lost would be very long. There aren’t many people that I can instantly name as ‘kisses that never were’ though, but I’m going to tell you about two of them. 

When I was 15 and doing my work experience in a book shop I met a guy, let’s call him Theo,  who was 18. We got to talking because he asked if I knew his sister, I did, and after that we just chatted constantly for the entire two weeks I was there. We exchanged phone numbers and remained friends once I’d finished my work experience.

I wasn’t very good at talking to boys as a teenager. I went to an all girls school and boys felt like a completely different species to me. I was a massive giggler, especially when confronted with someone I thought was cute and teenage boys didn’t find that endearing. With Theo though I didn’t feel silly and giggly, I just felt like myself, even though he was definitely cute and smelt so good it made me tingle. 

Back at school his sister made it very clear she knew we were chatting. We were in the same class but not friends, but also not enemies. She was, however, definitely someone who enjoyed gossiping and being involved in drama. 

Weeks went by and myself and Theo spoke every day. He would call me before he started work, or would sometimes ask me to call him to wake him up. Knowing everything I know about relationships now, I 100% think we were moving out of friendship territory. I wasn’t pushing for it and our whole friendship felt so easy and natural I just assumed things would happen in their own time. I definitely wanted to kiss him and I think left to our devices it would have happened eventually 

Unfortunately his sister had other ideas. She decided to tell him that I’d told everyone at school that we’d already kissed. Which we absolutely hadn’t. I tried to explain it to him, but he saw me trying to explain the actual way of things, as slagging off his sister, which wasn’t my intention. He basically cut me off there and then, no listening to reason, no having another chat with his sister, just stopped. One day we were friends the next we weren’t. 

The strangest part of the whole thing was that she seemed shocked he’d stopped speaking to me. I genuinely don’t think that was her intention and the realisation that you couldn’t just say stuff and expect it not have consequences seemed to absolutely baffle her. 

The second missed kiss was with a woman I will call Sammie. I was 17 when I met her and she was in her mid-twenties to late twenties. She regularly wore jeans with a white vest top and I just turned to mush every time I looked at her. We flirted a lot, danced in a way that told me she absolutely felt the same and strangely enough it wasn’t the age gap that prevented us from kissing. 

I met Sammie through my girlfriend at the time. Who became my girlfriend because we went on a date together, that ended up in bed and the next day we were practically betrothed. I was inexperienced and crap at communicating any of my wants and needs so I just went along with it. I did fancy her and it was exciting to have also inherited her group of friends who were all active in the local LGBTQ scene. I was a baby queer and I loved being surrounded by like minded people and getting to go to clubs and bars where everyone was being their gayest of selves. 

Truthfully though I wanted to be far more slutty than I was. I met so many sexy women in the two years I was with her and I would have kissed them all had I been single. Sadly after about 4-6 months she wasn’t interested in sex and our entire relationship had become a lot more effort than I was up for at 18. So I spent a long time being very up for sexy fun but getting no action at all. 

With the benefit of hindsight I would have handled both situations very differently, but if I’d known at 18 what I know now at 38 my life would look completely different and who’s to say that different would be any better. Besides they’re the ones who missed out really because I’m an excellent kisser.

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