I’m 22, just having graduated by the skin of my teeth with a BA in English Literature from UC Berkeley, looking down the barrel of minimum wage jobs to get fired from, when Joseph texted me. He asked me to come to his 39th birthday party at his childhood home in Culver City; his parents were hosting. I said yes.

Joseph was my internship advisor at a public access TV station in Berkeley, which was known for screening uncensored shows like kids’ poetry mics and elderly orgies. He taught me editing, filmmaking, and not to leave an SD card on the floor. He was also the object of my obsession. At the time, nothing could happen. I was 22, he was 39. I was his intern, he was my boss.

But now, no longer at the station, fresh off graduation, I was ready for whatever was to come, or whoever. I drove to Culver City, an hour away from my mom’s house in Woodland Hills, where I was staying, and sat in traffic, repeatedly looking back at his birthday present: the 30x30 painting I made that took up the entire backseat. It looked like it had pinkeye. It was my best work.

When I entered the house, I was struck by the intimacy of the affair. It was me, him, his four 30-something friends, and his two older parents. We immediately sat down for dinner. I did not know there would be a sit-down dinner. I expected a loud party in which I could pretend to hear people talk while I violently nodded my head and slurped sizzurp. At dinner, I politely declined the brisket and mac and cheese because I was following a no-gluten, no-dairy, no-meat diet, which meant I ate the lettuce.

I ended up talking to his lady friend, who probably wondered who I was, this random 22-year-old college graduate with no bra, no job, and plenty of armpit hair, standing in the childhood home of her 39-year-old internship advisor. The lady friend was beautiful and independent, and I quickly assumed that she and Joseph had fucked previously, probably several times. I cursed her perky tits, perfect skin, and nonchalance. I, on the other hand, had Australian tits (down under), bad skin, and lots of chalance.

The whole night, everyone talked about getting in the hot tub. I hadn’t brought a bathing suit and told him so. He said it was fine; nobody had one. They were going to skinny dip. Despite all my sexual expressiveness, I was prudish about nudity. I couldn’t stand the thought of my misshapen pubes on display. After sitting alone for what seemed like two eons, I decided to take off my clothes once I was already in the hot tub so nobody could see me naked. I approached the tub and the couple inside it, straddled the lip with my crotch, and fell in. I proceeded to take off my clothes underwater, comprehending in real time that this was a terrible plan. The couple stared at me in horror.

“This hot tub is…hot,” I said, making conversation as I laid out my drenched clothes.

They immediately got out, mumbling something about getting more alcohol.

I felt dizzy from the mix of heat and drugs in my system. My stomach grumbled, but I couldn’t tell if it was hunger or the bubbles.

I eventually realized no one was coming to save me in this big, hot bucket of boiling water. I’d missed my turn to enter the tub and to leave it. I felt Joseph’s parents looking out their French doors, staring.

It was getting late, and all of Joseph’s friends sat around in a circle under the gazebo, passing a joint. I joined them, sitting across from him. As I sat surrounded by adults, almost twenty years my senior, I felt the gap between our ages evidenced by the shame in my chest and a hole in my stomach.

I waited around till everybody left the weed circle and Joseph walked them out. I almost left with the last person, but he motioned for me to stay. We talked for some time as I took much longer than necessary to put on slip-on shoes. After expressing how much I really enjoyed the lettuce, he asked if he could kiss me. I said yes. I hopped onto his lap like he was Santa Claus.

“Why didn’t you do this sooner?” I asked. 

“It wouldn’t have been appropriate,” he said.

My mind flashed back to when we worked together at the station, when it was just us in his car at midnight after a show we’d filmed, or when I grabbed my cell phone from his hand to get him to stop looking at a cringe video I’d just posted, ending up in his lap and staying there longer than necessary. I thought of when he’d linger outside the station after a shoot, me gathering up the courage to tell him I liked him as we unpacked equipment. I thought of the way he offered me snacks and conversation during my shift when we should have been working. I thought of the way he looked at me when I said a funny joke.

It wouldn’t have been appropriate.

Our mouths fit together like ice in a lukewarm glass of water. He grabbed my hand and asked me if I wanted to go inside. I said yes. He led me to the shower, a pit stop I was slightly offended by, given that we had both just rinsed off separately in a hot tub. He soaped my body, and I his, avoiding his penis out of respect. We dried off and went into his bedroom. I didn’t know if it was his childhood bedroom or his parents’ guest room, but I didn’t want to ask and kill the mood. In my estimation, the mood was already so dead it was on its second karmic reincarnation.

The sex was awkward at best. I went too fast, as fast as I could, as a 120-pound 5’7” woman, with a 39-year-old 6’1” man on top of me. I was like a jackhammer. It was as if I discovered water after being in the desert for days on end and could only get to the source with my crotch. I tried not to think about his parents in the other room, sleeping, or knowing them, listening.

It was odd to touch the body of a man who was almost twenty years older than me. His skin was not as taut as the boys I’d been with. It felt thin and weathered. His face was worn with time and bore wrinkles. He had grays. Of course, closer to his age now than I’ve ever been before, I see this as a diabolical observation. At the time, though, he might as well have been one year away from Viagra and dentures.

“Can we slow down?” he asked.

“I love you,” I said, bouncing on his dick.

 He looked at me in abject fear, like I’d just told him not only was his mother dead, but I ate her first. His mouth hung open. I wanted to reach my finger to the back of his throat and make him throw up. I needed some kind of reaction to temper my humiliation, even if it was his leftover brisket projected all over me. 

I don’t remember if he came. We slept naked. When we woke, I saw him in the morning light, and it felt like my life flashed before my eyes. The fantasy was shattered. He looked like he had aged three years. His eyes were underlined with bags and covered in boogers. I got out of bed and stood naked, my back to him, looking out at the window. I thought this was what one did after sex while they waited for their much older lover to take a piss. I stood there frozen and mute, even as he got up to go to the bathroom, even as he returned, my ass cheeks ready to greet him. He stood next to me and touched my back.

“Pretty, isn’t it?” he asked.

I looked up at him. “Beautiful,” I said, not knowing what we were talking about anymore.

He asked me if I wanted to stay for breakfast. I saw a vision of me sitting at a table with him and his parents, making small talk after just admitting my love to their unavailable son, while jumping on the penis they’d conceived. I quickly declined. I put on my clothes and went out into the hall. I said goodbye to his parents in the kitchen, who were kind enough to wave and smile at me. Standing at the threshold of Joseph’s door, in between his world and mine, I gave him a hug.

“Thank you for the painting,” he said. I nodded, now regretting having hobbies. I turned to walk toward my 2010 Volkswagen Jetta, a car my mother had bought for me. I looked back to see if he was watching. He wasn’t.

I never saw Joseph again after that night. Last I heard of him, he was teaching at a university film lab, educating women with dreams of telling stories for a living. Women just like me.