All I thought about was sex. Eleven years later, it's difficult to describe how completely consumed I was by my libido at that age. I'm embarrassed to think about all the things I did and said in pursuit of sex in high school. One of my most shameful memories is of the way I treated my friend Anna.

Anna and I had been fairly good friends in junior high. We sat next to each other in band class (we played the trombone). She was overweight and I was shy and effeminate. We were... not popular. In the transition to high school, Anna lost about fifteen pounds and her natural beauty caught the eye of a kid who was quickly becoming infamous at our school. Anna quickly shed her good-girl gawkiness and, by becoming Warren's girlfriend, took on a new position as First Lady of the Freaks.

Warren was the school's iconoclast. He and his friends liked to test the proverbial waters, and their various stunts nearly drove our assistant principal to distraction. On one occasion the administration had to remind the student body that it was "not permissible to wear clothing to school which was meant for the opposite gender." That dictate was incredible in the way it avoided using the phrase "cross-dressing," which I'm sure Assistant Principal Whittier would have considered a victory for Warren and his buddies.

Anna and I drifted apart during the first couple years of high school. I concentrated on my schoolwork while she experimented with drugs and sex. In the eleventh grade, I started offering her a ride home after school. I knew she was very open about sex and I was curious about her relationship with Warren. My own virginity (and countless Saturday nights spent watching The Golden Girls with my grandparents) was starting to overwhelm me. I'm sure I was anything but subtle about my motives. Any conversation she started with me I would quickly drive straight into the gutter. One day, as she was getting out of my car she looked at me meaningfully and said, "Boys only care about getting laid. Every boy I know." I was so embarrassed and ashamed that I had treated her like that. I think that at the time I honestly thought I wanted to have sex with her.

Now, of course, I realize that it wasn't her I was after.

(To be continued)