My First Kiss

My first ‘kiss’ for Harlequin comes out in time for Valentines Day next year. It got me thinking about first kisses...

I had two first kisses. The true first doesn’t count because I wasn’t a particularly willing participant and it wasn’t much of a kiss, frankly. It was more of an initiation and the kiss-er didn’t seem much more enthused about the task than the 13 year old kiss-ee.

So scratch that one. Instead, I’d like to share with you the story of my first real kiss. One that counts. Nearly a quarter-century ago now (oh, boy, that hurts).

New Year's Eve 1985. I was 16 years old and, whilst other girls my age worked in fast-food joints or grocery stores for a first job, I was lucky enough to be the coat-check girl at our city’s only under-18s nightclub. Short hours and great pay were nothing compared to the pleasure I took from being the un-coolest girl in my class with the coolest job going.

I may not have been one of the beautiful people—tragically aloof teens with big hair and shoulder pads paid to dance on the giant speakers in the club—but I got to meet a lot of boys around my age as they swapped one dollar for a coat-check token and handed their jackets to me over the low, timber barrier. There were cute guys and unpleasant guys and rich guys and nerd guys and...him....

Corduroy Coat Guy.

He was older; almost too old to keep coming to an under-18 venue, and our weekly interactions had been limited to me accepting his tan corduroy jacket and him smiling gently at me as he slid one dollar over the counter. Invariably, I would inhale the clean, soapy scent of his coat and sigh as he loped off with his mates into the club.

Ten minutes to midnight. I started preparing the coatroom for the onslaught of closing-time. Seven hundred kids were getting excited as the countdown approached, streaming into the main dancehall to welcome in 1986. A group of older boys—virtually men to my 16-year-old eyes—came down from upstairs.

He was with them.

He paused at the door to the hall, murmured briefly to his friends and then left them to enter without him. He turned in my direction and jogged down the couple of steps into my corner of the foyer, fishing his token out of his pocket.

Like I needed that to find his coat.

"In case it gets too busy later," he said, sliding the token across to me with a smile in his brown eyes. It was the first time I’d heard his voice and it was as warm and textured as his brown corduroy jacket.

I spun away to hook the coat carefully from its hanger and turned back. Whether he'd jumped the counter or sneaked the door open or simply materialised there, he'd done it fast because—there he was—in the coat-check booth with me.

Strictly against the rules, of course, and I sucked in my sixteen year old breath at his daring.

"In case it gets too busy later," he repeated, nudging me back into the privacy of the suspended coats with just the intensity of that melted-chocolate gaze.

Time—and my heart—stopped as I stared up at him. He lowered his head and kissed me. Properly. Like a girl should be kissed for the rest of her life.

Everything vanished around us. All the coats formed a fragrant, comfy pillow as he pressed me into them. The doof-doof of the dance music warped in my mind and seemed to merge with the pulse of my suddenly thrumming blood.

Corduroy Coat Guy’s expert kiss lasted for eternity and then, in slow motion, he lifted his head, smiled and was gone. I grabbed at the counter for strength and sagged down onto my seat and stared after him as he disappeared into the darkened hall.

It wasn't rough or inappropriate or any other of a dozen things it would become as soon as we were both older. It was impulsive and forbidden… and utterly unforgettable.

I never spoke to him—before or since—nor knew his name. Nearly twenty years later, it remains the most breath-stealing kiss I've ever received.

Why do our first kisses remain with us for so long - for better or for worse? What was your first kiss experience?

Nikki Logan's first Harlequin kiss "Lights, Camera...Kiss the Boss" hits shelves in the US/UK in February, just in time for Valentines Day.

www.nikkilogan.com.au - A Romance with Nature
"Lights, Camera...Kiss the Boss" - Harlequin Romance - February 2010