B ut I have had the opportunity.

Rural South. Eleventh grade. A guy in my class from a Republican Southern Baptist family asked me for a ride home from school. I'd grown up with him. Sure thing, "Ox."

During the first two miles of the five-mile drive to his house, we chitted and chatted in the normal way. By the third mile, conversation was patchy. My eyes were on the road because that's the way I drive. In mile four, he was saying nothing, but I could feel some weird energy rising. Heard a couple of curious sounds. I looked over to see Ox's jeans unzipped and his dick sticking straight up rigid—and it was truly and absolutely purple. This was not the kind of horror show I fancied. I looked at his face. It was red and looked pained.

He said, "Stroke it." All Billy Squier–like.

I said, "No."

He began to plead, "Come on, just stroke it. Please."

I was already going 75 miles an hour, but now I gunned it. When we reached his house, I stopped in the road without pulling into the driveway and told Mr. Stiff-purple-red-faced-and-pleading to get out.

"Come on into the house. Nobody's home right now."

"No way."

He opened the car door but sat there and continued his pitch.

"Come on in."

"Get out."

No one wore seat belts in those days. With both hands, I shoved him out the door and onto the highway, still unzipped, stiff, and purple. I burned rubber speeding away, passenger door flapping open, Ox in my rearview mirror rolling on his back in the highway, his purple erection looking like a royal monument on a road-killed armadillo.

Oh, yeah—I'm a lesbian. Some might wonder if this little episode had anything to do with it. I'd say probably not. But all experiences add up to who you are.

Ox is now a mortician.

O. K. jones is a pseudonym.