Shyness is nice, but shyness can stop you...

The funny thing about being a fourteen year old boy and becoming aware of the opposite sex, is that, as we are often told: girls mature faster than boys. So it's no surprise to find our early unsophisticated attempts at romance are all too easily brushed off by the inscrutable objects of our desire. They know what we wanted, and they know we had no idea how to get it. The girls our own age, that is.

So, there are many periods of adolescence in which a man is just a man. Or more accurately, a scruffy haired, fuzzy lipped teen is a scruffy haired fuzzy lipped teen. In other words, there are droughts. Extended periods of no love and attention from the ladies of our world. Times when our attention may be trained upon younger girls, who still fall for the corny lines of the "older man". Of course these girls all too often had older sisters who would warn them off our clumsy attempts at luring them to the movies. Or worse, they had brothers, whose methods of dissuasion were somewhat less subtle.

Having younger and older sisters put me in the unenviable position of having their friends surrounding me at this age. The older girls had the stigma of me being their friend's little brother, while the younger one's listened far too carefully to their older siblings for me to have any hope of getting them alone for five minutes, let alone out on a "date".

Not that I recall actually dating very often, certainly back then. Once only was it officially a date, and it was, indeed, the sister of a friend of my own sister who was the lucky contestant. We actually went to see the "delightful Julia Roberts" in Pretty Woman at the local cinema. Clearly it was Ladies Choice that night, as Julia has about as much appeal as a candidate in the holding yard at the local glue factory. So, we sat in the back row, eating popcorn, watching the film. Then the popcorn ran out, and I rested my hand on her knee.

She did nothing to prevent this, despite it being bare below the hemline of her short, retro-style a-line dress. I decided to try and slip it further up her thigh, but as I had left my hand in the same place for so long, it had become sweaty in the warm cinema, and sort of dragged in a jerky and completely unsexy manner along the top of her thigh. Until she quickly and firmly, but calmly placed her hand on my wrist to signify "No Entry".

Undeterred, I rearranged myself in my seat, and successfully deployed the world famous "yawn and stretch" routine, encircling her shoulders with my right arm. For some reason I had been given the impression by some over chivalrous male role model that the gentleman always sat closest to the aisle in a theatre or cinema, such advice is probably less useful nowadays, or may have been completely misleading, even then.

During the closing credits of the film, I somehow maneuvered myself into a position where I was able to kiss her on the lips, and even for a brief moment got my tongue into her mouth, which she seemed to feel was about as desirable as being force-fed raw eel meat. But didn't actually push me away. But she held my hand, meekly, as we walked back to her place. Her parents were, for some reason, not at home, and her older sister had obviously taken the opportunity to invite her boyfriend over for something more unsavoury than what I had experienced at the flicks.

And we sat, in the dimmed lights of her lounge room, for a couple of hours, speaking hardly a word, watching music videos on late night TV, until, about two o'clock, I made my excuses and left. The whole episode confused me at the time, but in retrospect, I think I made a big mistake.

I had mentioned her name to my brother, and said she was cute, or whatever it was I used to describe attractive girls in those days. And she was attractive, I had met her at a party a couple of weeks before our date, and was taken by her strawberry-blonde bob and washed out blue eyes. She had had very fair skin, and a light sprinkle of freckles, which I still find somehow charming and innocent. Then I got a phone call from her sister, asking if I wanted to go out with her. I think she did want to go out with me, as she did actually call me herself once I had confirmed, but at the same time I think her older sister had her own agenda.

And I think she pushed her sweet, shy, little sister into going on a date with me so she could have her boyfriend over. And over. With no interruption. Shame I didn't give her some more of my time. She really was cute.