I’m 17 years old and Melissa is pissing me off again. 

“You never want to talk about it,” she says, glaring at me. Her hair is untamed and gorgeous. 

I can barely sit on this stool, meanwhile she’s managed to squirm her skinny body into an orange plastic baby chair a few feet away from me. My body has got to be ten times as big as hers. 

“You’re a bit of a prude aren’t you,” she continues, smiling a big smug smile, as only she can. 

“I’m just not as comfortable as you are with that stuff.” We both take sips of our cheap corner store wine. I don’t know whose house we are in, probably some random guy she’s sleeping with. The living room stinks of musk-scented Axe body spray. 

“You don’t even masturbate,” she whispers, as if she suddenly cares that someone will hear her. At this point, her smile has exploded through her cheeks and is taking over the entire room. 

“Are you mad at me?” She asks, knowing the answer to her question full well. 

For some reason, my quiet rage makes her laugh uncontrollably. She puts her hair up into a perfectly messy bun. 

Quite honestly, I’d like to choke her. I understand that she’s been through a lot, like a lot a lot, and she is one of my best friends, but I’d nonetheless like to physically harm her. I’d like to take her by her luscious hair and smash her beautiful face into the kitchen counter until she’s barely recognizable and nothing but bloodied flesh and broken teeth remain. 

“Let’s just change the subject.” 

🩸

I’m 23 years old and I’m lying in bed staring out the window, wondering whether I should skip class. Trevor—one of my roommates who’s also my boyfriend—bought me a vibrator from the internet. That was very nice of him. It’s rechargeable too, which is convenient. 

I have been sexually active since I was 18 years old but have never orgasmed—that is, until now. This is perhaps a sad and unfortunate fact, but it is not uncommon, which I suppose makes it even more sad and unfortunate. Regardless, because of this newfound glory, I, normally a conscientious student, seem to be more interested in staying in bed than in going to class. As I lay there, the sun beams coat my body. I am bathing in the stillness of my jouissance. “This is awesome,” I say out loud to nobody.  

My ability to consistently give things a positive spin has me appreciating the fact that it’s taken me so long to discover my own sexuality. It’s like when you hold off for a few years before watching the TV show that everyone loved so much. While masturbation is not exactly like watching The Sopranos, I don’t think it’s an entirely misguided comparison. 

After several rounds of satisfying my urges, I decide to get up and eat something, but I’m halted by Eliza, another one of my roommates, in the hallway. 

“What are you doing home on a Wednesday afternoon?” 

“You know my schedule?” I reply.

“Apparently I do.” 

We smile; she’s stoned. “You want?” She passes me the tiny joint in her hand. “Thank you,” I reply and indulge. 

“He got me a vibrator,” I say enthusiastically. We are both leaning against the wall as if our bodies can barely hold themselves up. 

“Oh,” she responds, staring at me with her big eyes that sometimes freak me the fuck out. 

“Yeah, it’s awesome and it’s rechargeable!” I exclaim. 

“Well, it’s about time,” she replies. “But too bad he can’t do it himself.” 

I don’t know what I expected her to say, considering the layers of animosity that had been building between the two of us over the years. Did she hate me? Did she love me? She certainly did not like Trevor. 

“Well, it’s not that simple,” I remark. “It’s actually easier when he’s not around. Isn’t that crazy?” 

“No,” she says, without even looking at me. “It’s not crazy at all.” She zips up her knapsack and hands me the rest of the joint. “I’ve gotta run.” 

“OK, bye.” I wave. 

She gives me a sneaky smile and a big wink. I watch her as she runs down the stairs and out the door, past the gigantic and hideous bunny rabbit one of her ex-boyfriends spray painted in our stairwell. 

🩸

I’m 30 years old and sitting in a brand new university classroom. The walls are white, the technology is hidden and presumably state of the art, the desks are grey, and everything is cold. We, the grad students, sit in a large U-shape facing the professor, who stands off to the side behind the podium. They, like the rest of the room, are monochromatic and cold. I’d like to be just like them, but I know that’s an impossibility. There is something about me that refuses to fit in. I wish I could change that. If I could obey the rules, I think I’d have more money. Although, we can’t know that for sure. 

The professor is undeniably sexy, in an intellectual and fashionably androgynous kind of way. They’re inaccessible in their discourse and their demeanour. This is a common branding in academia, especially in the fields of feminism and queer media studies. I appreciate them because of the kinds of critical theory they expose us to. I think many resent them for the same thing, but that’s not my problem. This class is about the body—the  languages and maps of desire that shape it. 

A student raises her hand and says, “Yeah but what about someone who is interested in forced gangbangs and rape porn? How can someone be turned on by that kind of sexualized and gendered violence? It’s horrifying.” Her face is smeared with disgust. 

This student is one of those people who I simultaneously despise and envy. Despise, because I find their general approach to be naive and ignorant. Envy, because they seem completely void of the insecurities that prohibit me from speaking out. I would like to raise my hand and say, “Why do you feel the need to moralize people’s complex sexual fantasies and demonize them for simply feeling the way that they do in reaction to certain imagery? To deny women the sadomasochistic fantasy has always felt rude to me. Our society was founded on the subjugation and exploitation of female and gender non-conforming bodies, yet we turn around and get judgy when they just so happen to get off on the rather problematic role they’ve been placed in. It’s just such an obvious and unfair trap. Internalizing that dynamic and then getting turned on by it may be complicated and off-putting to some, but it’s certainly resourceful, psychologically speaking. Quit being such a stupid bitch.” 

I don’t say that though, because I am scared. I don’t want to accidentally say, “I watch that stuff sometimes. That horrifying stuff turns me on, and I’m a feminist. So what’s wrong with me?” Alas, I cannot bring myself to share that in our classroom setting, so I decide to stay safe by staying quiet. The debate will have to play out inside my own shadowy echo chamber of self judgement and shame.

My friend Carry is sitting next to me. She has a particular aversion to the impenetrability of much of the psychoanalytic theory we were parsing through in class, as well as to the ego that often goes along with it. In an effort to make friends with the quiet person who always sat next to us, she leans over to them and says, “God, I can’t wait for this day to end, this class is brutal.” To which our classmate responds, “I’m actually trying to exclude negativity from my life right now so I can’t respond to that at the moment, but I wish you the best.” They sort of  smile and then go back to remaining positive. Carry, on the other hand, really didn’t appreciate this feedback and spent the rest of the class scribbling rageful thoughts in her notebook. We all have our echo chambers.  

Back at home, I sit surrounded by my library. No shelves, just four teetering stacks, here to protect me. I intend to work really hard on the final assignment for this class because I want to impress my professor. There is something about the ivory tower that makes me feel dreadfully inadequate, and it is my hope that their approval will put an end to that. My final paper will explore the anti-futurity argument put forward by literary and queer theorist Lee Edelman in his book NO FUTURE: Queer Theory and The Death Drive (2004). I am taken by the book’s anti-social stance and its queer ambivalence, exemplified by its rejection of the romanticized image of Little Orphan Annie. For him, the image represents our undying investment in and attachment to the child as the promise of (her) consent to (re)produce the future. A never-ending, hopeful future—designed for Daddy Warbucks, of course. This is a future where you are never fully dressed without a smile, yet in its name, countless acts of horrific violence are perpetrated on a daily basis.

However excited I am by this radical reframe of my number one childhood icon (I am a redhead, after all), Edelman’s use of Lacanian theory paralyzes me. His work leaves me feeling deeply insecure and unable to form a closing argument. I am blocked. It is only after hours of increasingly abusive self-talk that a solution finally comes to me. I must masturbate. I have no choice but to release the build-up of tension and get in touch with my body in a last-ditch effort to overwhelm the Symbolic Order that I am trapped within. I get up from my laptop and immediately knock one of my towers of books to the ground. I am unfazed. I float to the bedroom as if carried by a force beyond my control. 

Ten minutes later, wearing no pants, and sitting on the cold wooden floor of my living room, I type with passion, Unlike male sperm which carries within its flow the “seeds” of tomorrow, female ejaculate does not contribute to any promise of a future. 

I reach for the fluffy blanket hanging off of my couch and wrap it around myself and then I stare at the wall in front of me for two solid minutes. Finally, I take a deep breath in and write, The power of her cum lies in its uselessness. 

I breathe out and realize that there are no lights on in the house. Gazing into the darkness, I wonder what the likelihood is that I could get murdered from a home invasion at this very moment. 

My phone dings—it’s a text from Carry. She writes, I’ve watched an entire season of The Mindy Project instead of writing my paper. How’re you doing? 

🩸

I am 40 years old and I am standing in front of the full-length mirror in my bedroom wearing a matching pyjama suit. Forest green. White trim. 

“You look too good to go to sleep,” I think to myself. 

Next to me on my dresser is the same vibrator bought for me by Trevor 17 years ago. It remains in excellent condition, although he’s long gone. Now I know that every year is a different year, especially every decade. We grow, we change, shit happens, or it doesn’t. But there is something about 40. Something that feels remarkably like death for me. 

“Is this the end?” I ask out loud. 

No one responds. 

I reach for my phone and text my friend Talya out of the blue. I ask, If you were going to summarize the role of masturbation in your life over the years—how would you do that? In like 1-3 sentences or even one word. She’s never going to write me back. 

I throw my phone onto the bed and take a deep sniff. The room reeks of lavender and lilies because I just went nuts with the linen spray my stepmom bought me. I find the aroma, floral yet woodsy, to be intoxicating. I continue staring into the mirror. 

“Now what? What happens next?” I ask myself. “What are we really doing here? After 40 years of flailing, just say it, what is it that you want from me?” I gaze into my own eyes for several long and drawn out moments, until— 

Come closer, she says, from the other side of the glass.  

“Oh,” I respond, startled. “Hey.” 

I’m less shocked that I’m actually responding to myself and more taken aback by how forward she’s being.  

Come closer, she repeats, this time in a much more commanding voice. 

“Okay, okay,” I say. I move forward so that my face is inches from itself. 

Closer! she screams. And take off your pants. 

“My pants?” I ask, hesitantly. Although, I’m surprisingly turned on by the version of myself who  knows exactly what they want. 

You heard me, she snipes. 

I watch her watching me as I fumble with the drawstring on my well-fitting loungewear. Hurry up, she demands. And pull your panties down.  

I manage to untie my pants and I drop them to my ankles. I put my hands on my hips and notice that I’m crooked. My right hip bone is about half an inch higher than my left, but my ass still looks good. I give my big butt a little tap and watch it jiggle. Then I touch my breasts and notice that my nipples are hard. I wonder whether she can tell, but quickly realize how stupid a thought that is. I pull my underwear down.

Good girl, she whispers. Now kiss me.  

I bite my lower lip and stare at my mouth, hungry and half open. Without hesitation, I smush my face into the glass, smearing my lips all over it, and lapping myself up like a puppy who’s just discovered I was coated in maple syrup. 

Enough, she says, abruptly. Now, I want you to touch me. 

“Ok,” I say, sweaty and fully in the palm of my own hand. 

I contemplate logistics for a half second and then I lean my entire body forward, wrapping my arms around the metal frame. I squeeze as tightly as I can and then I start writhing up and down. It’s cold at first but I soon lose myself in the slip and slide. 

“I’m wet,” I whisper. 

I know, she says. Now do it.  

I don’t know what comes over me but, like a squirrel in heat, I jump up onto myself, lifting my two feet off the ground and hooking them to the back of the mirror. I keep one arm wrapped around myself, for stability, and then I bring the other one down. The base begins to creak. 

Yes, she declares. Keep going. 

I glance over to my bureau and see the vibrator sitting there. An additional wave of excitement comes over me as I realize that we are getting off on our own. Although I can barely see myself through the smears and condensation, I know we’re enjoying it because my clit is engorged.  

Harder, she commands. Break me. 

“I don’t know, I don’t think this thing can handle mo-” 

Shut up! Break me, you coward. I dare you. 

Oh, you dare me, do you? A coward, am I? I clench my thighs as tightly as I can and I forcefully enter myself. I move in and out, in and out, with reckless abandon. The base creaks loudly, but the threat of collapse only makes things hotter. I feel the sharp pain of my grandmother’s beaded necklaces smacking me on the back of my hand as they swing violently from the hooks behind the mirror. As I climax, I fling my head forward, smashing my reflection. “Fuuuuuck!” I howl. She lets out a muffled whimper and we hang there together, pressed against each other in a precarious embrace. 

In the distance, my phone vibrates. 

“I should check that,” I say softly. She doesn’t respond. 

I taste the metallic tang of blood dripping into my mouth and my head begins to throb. I place my feet back on the ground and stand for a moment, taking in her fractured face. 

“Are you ok?” I ask. “Was that what you wanted?” She doesn’t respond. 

Pantsless and woozy, I limp over to my phone and see a text from Talya. It reads, I would say that it gets better with age. More connected to the ebbs and flows of sexual life rather than a thing you just do. Lol. The text is followed by a photo of her kid at the Lego museum. 

Lol TRUTH, I reply instantly, then I heart the photo of her beautiful child and pull a thin shard of glass out of my forehead. 

I put my underwear back on, then shut the lights and crawl into bed. I pull the covers up to my chin and stare at reflections of the shattered moon as it sings me softly to sleep.