You know, I was twenty years old then. And that's a lot younger than people think it is. At least in those days it was. I suppose in some ways I was younger, so to speak, than most kids my age, since I'd spent so much of my life with my nose in a book. But when I actually remember those days in college, I don't think most of my classmates were much more sophisticated than I was.

Anyway, I'd never had much interaction with people Virginia's age. Not interaction as equals, I mean, as opposed to the sorts of interactions I had with my parents, or my parents' friends, or my professors, or other authority figures. Virginia was very definitely an Older Woman. And although I knew from fiction, and movies, and television, that older adults could be just as mixed up as I myself was, I'd never had experience of that myself.

Hell, I'm not explaining this very well. I don't mean that I was like a twelve-year old who is automatically deferential to his elders. And I don't mean that I didn't think that adults in their thirties and forties have problems. But I guess that... I guess the best way to explain it is that I thought of them as inhabiting a different world from me.

The thing is... When I write things down up to this point, what will naturally come into your head is sex. Certainly when I write it now, the possibility of sex is just blatantly obvious. And so it's hard for me to explain that at the time, I didn't think of that at all. But I didn't. Okay, so just believe it. Think that I was stupid, if you like. In a lot of ways, I sure was in those days.

What I felt for the most part when Virginia stepped out from that doorway and asked me why I hadn't followed her to the bathroom was apologetic. She was an adult and I'd let her down when she'd asked me to do something for her important and... Hell, I still can't explain it. I can remember what I felt like, but I can't explain.

But what I really remember is that when I started apologizing and trying to explain, she understood what I was feeling completely and she thought it was really amusing. And I in turn instantly understood that and this brought me out of the apologetic state.

And this all happened in an instant, although it's taking me forever to explain it now. Everything happened very quickly, because we needed to disappear instantly, before Al came looking for us. She didn't explain all that at that moment, she just said, ``Don't just stand there, we have to get away from here quick.''

There wasn't a lot of explanation. She just led the way and I followed. We'd started out on 22nd St, then went two blocks down Valencia and then turned on 24th. Virginia held up her hand for a cab and said to me, ``I hope you've got some money.''

``Some,'' I said. Not enough, I thought. I wasn't used to riding around in taxis. We rode up to Market and 16th. When the cab stopped I learned forward and studied the taxi meter and thinking about whether I needed to tip, when Virginia just took the wallet out of my hand, pulled out some bills and paid the driver. After we got out of the cab, I figured out that she'd tipped him more than a dollar, which seemed like a lot to me. (In those days, it was.)

It was only then, as we stood on the sidewalk on Market Street, that she finally told me her name. What she said, in fact, was, ``I'm Virginia. I give good head.''

She paused for a beat to check my reaction which was, I'm pretty sure, more or less a blank stare.

``I just thought you might want to know that,'' she added.

``I'm Sean,'' I said, not knowing how else to respond.

``Good. Can you buy me lunch?''

Before we went in a little Chinese restaurant on Market Street, she asked me, ``Do you know what that means, to give head?''

I told her that yes, I knew. I didn't feel it necessary to add that I'd never actually experienced oral sex and wasn't even 100% sure how it worked. (This was just before the days when porno films were popular. And even if they had been, I wouldn't have seen one. I was still trying to get up my courage to go into one of the sleazy Market Street theatres to see on of the ``split-beaver'' films which were the wildest thing then available.)

Look, I don't want to overemphasize this thing of being an innocent. Certainly I knew the facts of life and certainly I knew that the situation I was in was bizarre. And I knew that there was a possibility that it might be dangerous. I definitely had a strong urge to just escape from the whole situation. In particular, the mention of sex scared me a lot more than it attracted me.

A day or two afterwards, the whole experience would seem like a great adventure. But while it was happening, I wasn't thinking of it that way at all.

When I tell it, the thing that really stands out is that I didn't ask any questions at the time. But this wasn't because I really wanted the adventure and didn't have any apprehensions. Quite the contrary. At the time, I found what was happening quite scary and had a strong urge to find a way to escape from it. (I wasn't brave enough to just turn my back on Virginia and walk away.) In particular, the mention of sex scared me a lot more than it attracted me. I don't think the word ``molest'' actually came to mind, but that was pretty much what was going through my mind.

And it didn't even occur to me that I was getting into an adventure, until a day or two later.

When I try now and put myself back in that situation, I think the main reason I didn't ask any questions was simply that I didn't want to seem naive.

Okay, this is just wheel-spinning. We've got to figure out what's going to happen.

Raymond Carver: ``I like it when there is some feeling of threat or sense of menace in short stories. There has to be a tension, a sense that something is imminent, that certain things are in relentless motion, or else, most often, there simply won't be a story.''

The narrator doesn't have to feel that sense of menace, but the reader definitely has to. That sense of ``Don't go up into that dark attic/down into that dark basement, honey!''

There need to be little clues that this woman is dangerous. And instead of the narrator talking so much about his innocence, we need him to drop little clues about it.

What's interesting is the fact that there are two different interactions happening here simultaneously. On the one hand, there's the sort of conversation that takes place between an adult and an older child: ``You're going to college? What are you studying? How many credits do you take? That sounds hard.'' And then there's the conversation between two people who are making the preliminary moves toward a sexual encounter.

And what can be especially interesting, and rather menacing, is if the conversation slips back and forth between these two modes very quickly in a rather schizoid way.

``What courses are you taking? That sounds really hard. You must be very smart. I give very good head, by the way. I just thought you'd like to know.''

One thing is that there's too little pressure on the narrator here. If he's just spending the afternoon idly with nothing special to do, there's not much tension in the story.

If he just has an exam coming up the next day he has to study for, that could be enough. Especially if it's an important course for him and he's only doing marginally well.

Or to add more stress, suppose he has an appointment later on that afternoon. With his girlfriend. Hm.... But it has to be an important appointment. Because he's about to break up with her. No, she's about to break up with him. It's got to be that direction. So it's a crisis situation.

Okay, so at the beginning of the story he's in the coffee house, trying to cope with the stress of the upcoming meeting with his girlfriend.

Now how come he & his girlfriend are so formal: he has an appointment to see her. Don't they see each other all the time?

Okay, they don't see each other that often. Their dates are fairly well planned things. Because she's not a student at San Francisco State. Maybe she's going to Berkeley and lives in Berkeley. Is she smarter than him, or somehow has more status?

Even if she's in Berkeley, why don't they discuss things over the telephone?

What makes this date tonight so important?

Maybe the situation is tricky. He can't deal with it over the telephone. Okay, they're on the verge of breaking up. He did something that really pissed her off and they haven't seen each other for two/three weeks. Now she's agreed to have a date with him tonight, which may well turn out to be their last. It's his last chance to try and fix things.

Okay, this makes things interesting. Here he has been all concerned to try and make things right with his girlfriend again, and then along comes this woman Virginia who talks about sex, and who is exotic but way outside his parameters of sexual attractiveness, and who seems crazy in a dangerous way, and whose sexuality seems in some vague way menacing. So his strongest urge is to escape, but then she keeps seeming to offer things that seem attractively adventurous. And then there's the other factor, that she seems to need his help, seems to need rescuing, and he's afraid to abandon her.

Especially as the story gets toward the end. Yes, okay, right. That's how things end. She is totally losing it, drunk, crazy, whatever. Yeah, and she's done something really dangerous: shoplifting, almost getting into a fight at a bar, a really close call whatever it is. He can see that it would be unacceptably dangerous to just walk off and leave her.

And his deadline for his date with his girlfriend is coming up. In fact, he barely has time to make it at all, no time now to go change clothes and get ready.

Virginia has told him a story about being in danger from Al. At this point, he no longer knows whether to believe what she says or not, but he doesn't dare to try and contact Al.

Virginia has told him about some friends who he can leave her with. So he meets these friends, but they manage to waste some more of his time. Then after taking up a bunch of his time, they tell him they have to go somewhere and they can't take Virginia off his hands.

Okay, right. Virginia gives him the number of her friends and he calls them up, tells them that Virginia is in a bad state and he needs to bring her over. So they say fine, bring her over. Another cab ride, more money. More time. So he arrives at their apartment with Virginia.

These are very interesting friends. Unconventional, bohemian, they have a very artsy apartment and he's fascinated by them. But they blame him for Virginia's state. He wants to just leave and try to make it to his date, but they insist on knowing what happened, the whole story. They keep blaming him for things, and he tries to defend himself, and all this takes time.

The wife tells him that Virginia is in no danger from Al. They try and contact Al, leave a message on his answering machine. (1972? Not many answering machines.)

Then the wife says, ``Look, we want to hear the rest of this. But we don't have time now, we were just about to go to wherever when you arrived and we're already late. You can just put her in the spare bedroom. But don't leave her alone. The best thing would be for you to just spend the night here. Would that be a problem for you?''

And he just spreads his hands out hopelessly. His whole life has fallen apart at this point, he's beyond being able to say whether something would be a problem for him or not.

And then he's in the apartment all alone. The friends have left and Virginia is virtually unconscious, and he has to manage to get her into the bedroom all by himself.

And at the end of the story he looks down at her collapsed body on the bed and says out loud, ``I hope it really is true that you give good head.''