At my undergrad, everyone is obliged to take a math class, which was the result of somewhat overzealous distribution requirements that were essentially a throwback to the Cold War. The thinking is like so: maybe if we make them take science and math, then instead of becoming resentful they will become physicists who will destroy Sputnik and we’ll win over the entirety of Communist Russia. Despite that lofty goal, the unfortunate truth is that there are many things that I am good at, but they don’t exactly extend to differential equations.

I do not remember the beginning of this story so well as I remember the middle and end of it.

Grant and I had come home from a day out, probably exploring the woods somewhere to the south of our fair city, and we showered and ate and wandered up to my room. We have made a habit of watching old episodes of Star Trek—from season 1, episode 1, on through the end, in sequential order, thank you SO much for that, Netflix—at night before bed. This night was no exception. We stripped to our skivvies and spooned while listening to the dulcet tones of a young William Shatner’s voice.

Grant is curious about the things that I write here.

The other evening, he and I had spent the day together in a smallish suburb of our fair city. We visited museums with surprisingly extensive collections for the middle of nowhere, shops that indulge our mutual interest in out-of-print books, and found a surprisingly great pub with a delicious, exclusive brew. We sat at the bar and ate mussels and drank lager and talked about the kinds of sex I want to have and the kinds of sex that I had previously enjoyed. He shared similar information.

It is New Year’s Eve and unseasonably warm, and I am out to begin celebrating with some close friends. My girlfriends and I, we are all grad students and we are all in that special hell that’s populated exclusively with the smart, the miserable, and the not particularly self-aware.

Grant is tall and has hazel eyes, which when we are alone he embellishes with glasses, but in public he uses contacts. He wears a beard to make me happy, and his hair is unruly and brown. He is the smartest person I’ve ever met, and also one of the most reserved. He holds my hand in public and nuzzles his face into my pillow when he sleeps. He likes to take me to museums, and we watch sci-fi from the 1960s and 70s on a semi-regular basis. He suffers my horrible schedule and obliges my need for human contact.

I am not on the pill. I used to be. My periods came like clockwork every three weeks, only on weekdays, and for five days at a time. My mood was even. My libido wasn’t dormant, but sex was a thing that I did to scratch other people’s itches. I

During my recent prolonged seclusion, I received a rather interesting email from a man I used to know. His name is Conrad. Conrad was a young man that I knew in my former life as an undergrad. He and I were acquaintances but not friends. We were curteous when we

In this story, I am 23. We are both young, my lover and I, and we do not get to see each other with any kind of frequency. I spend long bus trips traveling out to his apartment, my pussy getting wetter with anticipation and every passing mile. The town

I went to college at a small liberal arts college on the East Coast, and I graduated within the last 10 years. It’s a pretty obscure place, but I think that like most of those institutions, it was filled with young people who felt the tension and the urgency of

It is the summertime, and in my fair city the summer heat isn’t dry at all. It’s a sticky, wet, humid heat; it glues my clothes to my body and everyone smells a little bit earthier. Owing to the climate, I have a tendency in the summertime to eschew pants

My current lover’s name is Louis. He and I have an agreement-in writing, no less-that we are very interested in each other’s well-being, but that exclusivity and seriousness are not on the table. It’s perfect for both of us, as our professional lives have a terrible tendency to impinge on

myfaircity craigslist > personals > casual encounters a specific request – w4m – 26 (have bicycle, will travel) Date: 2011-06-18, 8:49AM EDT I have a very specific fantasy that I’ve decided I’d like to realize. I would like to meet a man between the ages of 22 and 40 (ish)

It’s May, 2008. I am working as the plankton of the scientific food chain, which while it did not afford me much in terms of upward mobility without the acquisition of another degree, it did provide me with a regular income, vacation days, and free evenings. I was taking advantage

Louis meets me at the southwest corner of the block where I am at a supreme-court-themed party (my friends are VERY specific people), because I insisted that he walk me home because my skirt is too short, it is too late, and I am too drunk. We walk arm in

In my day job, a working knowledge of anatomy and physiology is a requisite. My education provides me with this information in a variety of different iterations: there is microscopy, there is biochemistry, there is gross anatomy and the physical exam. There are infinite ways to view the body, and every

I have a crush on the gym. The gym at my school is windowless and a touch dank, with a variety of machines that are fully functional about 80% of the time. Because this is a gym associated with a grad school and it is not frequented by undergrads, most

I saw a lover today. I wore a dress with no panties. He picked me up and we went to his place, his hand stuffed under my skirt and expertly fondling my clit while driving through the city streets. I would start a sentence and not finish it when he

A huge component of this exercise in publicizing my sex life is finding words for nameless things. Sex is full of acts and feelings that words are totally insufficient to convey: the instant between when a lover is close enough to touch my body and when they actually do is

Two weeks is too long. It is February. We walked up the stairs to his one-bedroom, he cupped the fullness of my buttocks in his large chapped hands, squeezing me through my jeans. I had a weekend’s worth of clothing in a backpack, which I threw off as soon as

Simon and I were driving through fields in the rural area near where he used to live. It was July. We chattered away, a hand on each others’ thigh. I wore a short black wrap dress. Everything was new, and everything about Simon excited me: his tall, slim build; auburn