Virgin (23 page)

“Because it’s better to be honest?”

“Um, because it will hurt less if he knows,” I cried out. “But, yes, also that.”

He sighed. “I know, and I really want to. But what if he rejects me?”

I leaned against the doorpost to think. If I was in Paul’s position I would be terrified to tell Vladi for exactly the same reasons, but deep down I knew the brave option was the right option. If Paul wanted it to work with Vladi, he had to be up-front from the start.

“If he rejects you he is a wanker and you can give your virginity to someone else,” I announced confidently.

“Is that what you’d do if you were me?”

“Definitely,” I lied. “Now get out of the bathroom and go and tell him.”

“Walk-in wardrobe, actually. But okay, thanks for this.”

“You gay guys . . . Anyway, let me know how it goes, Paul. Good luck!”

“Thanks, Ellie,” he said nervously, and hung up.

I let out my breath slowly. Thank God Jack had figured out I was a virgin without me having to tell him. I couldn’t have handled a denouement like that. My virginal kissing clearly had its benefits.

We stayed chatting and drinking at the party until my vision started to blur and the voices around me sounded like distant hums. I realized it was time for me to go home. With Jack.

“Lara,” I said as nonchalantly as I could manage, “do you need to go to the loo?”

“What?” she said, and I realized I’d interrupted her mid-speech. “No, I’m fine, thanks.”

I gave her a death look.

“Actually, maybe I do,” she said, and we both turned and walked from the kitchen to the bathroom. The second we got in there, I locked the door.

“Okay, emergency meeting,” I announced. “I am officially drunk and am not going to last much longer. I need to leave. So, are you going to get off with Luke, or go and find Jez? Because I’m going to need my bed.”

She rolled her eyes. “Jeez, is this how it’s going to be all summer?”

I felt a pang of guilt. “No, I promise. Normally I wouldn’t mind going back to his. But tonight I think I may vomit at some point and I’d rather vomit in my loo than his and get yelled at by scary Moon Cup Cat.”

“What’s a mooncupcat?” she asked. “Oh, never mind. I’m going to text Jez so he can come and get me. Or at least pay for my cab to his place.” She paused. “Wow, I’m basically a voluntary call girl.” She shrugged her shoulders and started tapping out a message on her phone.

“Okay,” I said. “I’m going to leave you here so I can get Jack on his own and explain we need to go now.”

She grunted at me in response and I walked back out to find Jack. He was chatting to Emma while Luke and Sergio laughed hysterically over something on Luke’s phone. Emma and I exchanged a look so silent and subtle that the CIA would have hired us on the spot if they’d seen it. She gave me a tiny nod in comprehension and slipped away.

I grinned at Jack, realizing it was the first time during the whole night that we’d been left alone. “Hey,” I said.

He smiled. “How’s it going?” he asked.

“Meh, I’m feeling a bit tired now,” I said. “Shall we go?”

He looked startled. “Go? Um, what do you mean?”

“You know. Let’s go. We can go back to my place. I only live a couple of tube stops away. Oh wait, the tube’s closed. Well, there’s definitely a bus,” I said.

A look of something I didn’t understand flashed across his face. Did he not want to come home with me? “Um, okay,” he said. I breathed a sigh of relief.

Emma winked at me as we left and I managed to wave bye to Lara before Jack and I walked out into the cold.

“Wow, it’s freezing,” I said as I tucked my arm into his so we could walk close together. He didn’t say anything in response as we walked in silence.

We walked a bit more and then I tried again. “So, did you enjoy your night?” I asked finally.

“Yeah, it was good, thanks,” he said amiably, but then fell silent again. This was definitely weird. Something was wrong. I slipped my arm out from under his and tucked my hands into my pockets. I started to feel cold but this time it was a deep chill that had nothing to do with the weather.

I wanted to ask if something was wrong, but I felt too nervous. What if he didn’t really want to come home with me? I shook the thought from my mind as we reached the bus stop. The silence was killing me. I braced my nerves and asked him, “Jack, is something wrong?”

“No, everything’s fine,” he said quietly, and my drunkenness died. Nothing was fine. It was the opposite of fine.

Oh my God. He didn’t want to go home with me. The thought flashed across my head and I realized it was true. I hadn’t given him a choice. We hadn’t even kissed tonight. I’d completely assumed he wanted to be with me—without asking him. Oh my God. Now he was on his way back to my place and
he didn’t want to be there.

I was still trying to understand this when my bus pulled up. “Isn’t this the bus?” he asked.

I stood in silence as the urgency of the situation hit me.

“Let’s miss this one,” I said finally. I turned to face him. I took a deep breath. I needed to be a grown-up. I needed to ask him straight out. “Jack . . . do you not want to come home with me? Because you really don’t have to,” I blurted out.

He let out a short, abrupt laugh even though nothing was funny. He ran his hand through his hair awkwardly. “No, of course I do.”

“Seriously, Jack,” I said.
“
Honestly. I can get the bus alone right here, right now and you can walk back to the party. It will just be nice of you to have walked me to the bus stop. It’s fine, honestly. Please,” I said desperately. I didn’t even know what I was desperate for. I just wanted this to end.

He paused. Then a look of relief came over his face. “Really? Are you sure, Ellie? I’m just . . . I’m just not feeling up to it tonight.”

I felt sick. The bile was climbing up my throat. I swallowed and put on the bravest face I could. “Jack, seriously, don’t worry,” I trilled. “I’m tired; I want to go home. Just go back to the party.”

He sighed in relief. Oh God, he’d genuinely felt like I’d forced him into leaving with me. I wanted to cry. Instead I grinned and gave him a hug and smiled extra brightly at him. Then I turned around and pretended to read the bus stop sign while tears started to swim in my eyes.

“Hey,” he called out in a voice laced with guilt. “Ellie, no. Don’t . . . don’t be like that.”

I took a deep gulp, wiped the space under my eyes with my fingers and forced my face into another bright smile before I whirled round to face him again. “Like what?” I asked innocently.

“Like . . . upset, or pissed off. It’s not, I don’t . . . It’s complicated. I just . . . I have a lot going on. Seriously, it’s not you—it’s me.”

My mouth dropped open in disbelief at his clichéd line.

He carried on. “Sorry. I just . . . I’m going through a lot at the moment.”

Maybe his parents were dying? My face softened. “What’s going on, Jack? You can talk to me.”

He fidgeted and ran his hands through his hair again. “It’s so complicated; I just can’t talk about it. Honestly, you’re really great, Ellie. It’s just that I can’t go back with you tonight. It’s because I didn’t expect it. I just came here hoping to see you because you’re one of the only people I know in this crowd, and obviously I like spending time with you, but I didn’t think you’d want me to go back with you.”

Tears were stinging my eyelids. How could I have gotten it so wrong?

“The thing is, Ellie,” he said, getting swept up in the emotion of his speech, “I just don’t feel like I can go back with you tonight. I can’t have sex with you tonight. I’m just going through too much.”

His parents had to be ill. “But we don’t have to have sex. We can . . .”
I can’t say cuddle
.
I won’t.
“. . . hang out,” I finished lamely.

He sighed. “I just . . . I don’t feel psychologically prepared for it tonight.”

My mouth dropped down. Now I was too shocked to want to cry. I had nothing to say in response.

“Anyway,” he said. “Let me wait here with you until your bus comes.”

“No!” I cried out hoarsely. “Seriously,” I continued, trying to make my voice come out calmly. “I’m fine; the bus will be here in a second and I just . . . Please. Honestly, just go.”

“Are you sure?” he asked, concern sweeping over his face.

“I’m fine,” I snapped. “I’m a twenty-one-year-old woman. I think I can handle myself. I’m fine.”

He looked taken aback. “Okay.” He shrugged. “I’ll call you tomorrow. If you’re free, maybe we could get dinner.”

“Sure, fine, whatever,” I said, and froze while he hugged me. Then he turned around and walked back to the party. I held my breath until he was out of sight. Then I let out the pent-up tears. I sobbed and sobbed. I picked up my phone and dialed Lara’s number. “Lara,” I wept the second she answered.

“Where are you?” she asked automatically.

“Bus stop. By Old Street station. The one next to . . . Starbucks,” I gulped out between tears.

“Don’t move,” she said, and hung up.

I cried harder.
I don’t feel psychologically prepared for it tonight
, he’d said. Psychologically prepared. The words swam around in my head. I sat down on the bench. The other drunken people who had been sitting on it stood up and quietly walked away, leaving me to sob alone. Even the hobos didn’t want to be around me.

My body jolted to life. The digital clock on my bedside table said seven a.m. Lara was fast asleep next to me. Everything flooded back. Jack rejecting me on the streets of Shoreditch. Me, sobbing on a street corner, sitting alone at the bus stop. Lara taking me home in a taxi. Crying all the way home. Getting home and being sick. Drinking loads of apple juice. Oh God, apple juice. The thought of the golden liquid made my stomach turn.

My head was banging. Wincing in pain, I crept out of the bed quietly, trying not to disturb Lara.

I tiptoed into the bathroom. I felt disgusting. I took my clothes off and crawled into the bathtub without bothering to look at myself. Everything hurt. I remembered everything. I wished I didn’t, but I did. I felt sick. I turned the shower on but I didn’t stand up. I sat still in the bath, clasping my knees to my chest while the water sprayed me. I didn’t have enough strength to stand up. I put the plug in so the bath would fill up while the water washed over me.

When it was full, I leaned back and closed my eyes. The rejection was so awful. I’d never propositioned a guy before, except when I’d asked James Martell to take my V-plates and he said no. It was like a double whammy. It was even kind of ironic. I’d been rejected by the guy who refused to take my virginity, and now I was being rejected by the guy who actually
took
my virginity.

Then it hit me—I had become that girl. The idiot who threw her virginity away on the first guy who showed some interest, and then fell for him harder and harder while he looked at her in pity and wandered off in whichever direction his libidinous dick took him.

I smiled drily at the thought of him running around, pointing his pallid penis at a bunch of girls. The smile helped. It made me remember that it was okay. I was just another girl who got fucked over by a shit guy, and I would get over it. I would never see him again. I had Lara, I had Emma, and I would be okay with the fact that I’d given my virginity to someone who wasn’t
psychologically prepared
to sleep with me again. Had I really been that bad? I sank into the bath and tried to ignore the throbbing of my head and the sick feeling in my tummy.

I grabbed my phone to distract myself. Oh God, there were so many messages from Jack. I couldn’t deal with those right now. I scrolled past them and found one from Paul.

He said he thought it was amazing I was still a V and then we did it! Minimal pain. Thanks for the advice, P.

I smiled to myself. At least not all men were un-pyschologically-prepared bastards.

Lara sat on the lid of the loo and looked at me, a worried expression on her face. “Ellie, are you sure you don’t want me to read them to you?” she asked.

“For the millionth time, Lara, I don’t want you to read Jack’s messages. He rejected me. He infiltrated my private lotus and then he refused to go back there even when I invited him. And quite frankly, I don’t want to
know
what he has to say.” I spoke calmly. All this talk of lotuses was making me feel very Zen.

She sighed in frustration. “Okay,” she said after a pause. “What if I read them, and then if it’s an incredible apology that explains everything, I’ll tell you, and if it’s just more bollocks, we delete them and vow never to mention his name again?”

“Ugh, no,” I said, wrinkling my nose. “Have you not read
Harry Potter
? By calling him you-know-who, you give him power. You’ve got to call him Voldemort.”

“Fine,” she said, rolling her eyes. “So am I allowed to read Voldemort’s text?”

She really wasn’t getting my metaphor. “Okay,” I said grudgingly. “You can read
Jack’s
text. But not out loud.”

“Oh thank God,” she said. “Because I already read it earlier. It’s good and you need to hear it.”

“What?” I cried as I leaned forward and bath bubbles frothed up into the air. “You read it without my permission?”

“You would have done the same,” she said without looking up from my phone. “So, he hopes you feel better, he wants to take you out for dinner tonight, and he really hopes you’ll say yes. He’s buying.”

I lay back into the bath, mulling this over.

“So, shall I respond with a yes?” she asked.

I didn’t reply, still trying to figure out what my instincts were telling me. I closed my eyes and tried to meditate.

“Ellie?” she asked cautiously. “You’ve been in the bath for, like, four hours. I really don’t recommend you spend the whole day there. You look pruney.”

I sighed, opening my left eye. “No,” I said firmly. “Don’t reply. That’s not an apology or an explanation. Besides, how dare he assume I can drop everything and do dinner with him? You and Emma and I already have dinner plans.”

“I don’t care if you cancel, and I doubt Emma will either,” she said.

“That’s not the point!” I said indignantly. “He didn’t come over when I asked last night, so why should I be at his beck and call?”

She sighed. “I guess you’re right. It’s just . . . it
is
all kind of weird. I feel like there must be some explanation and you need to see him to figure it out. You know?”

The thought of his dying parents popped back into my brain. Maybe Lara was right.

“Well,” I said, “I suppose it would be good to get to the bottom of it.”

Lara’s face lit up and I saw her slide open my phone, ready to type out a message to Jack.

“Wait!” I called out, holding up my right hand. She stopped moving and there was silence. “If I see him, it’s on
my
terms. I have dinner plans with you guys and I want to keep them. So, tell him he can see me for a coffee if he wants. At . . . at three p.m. Somewhere I feel comfortable. At Planet Organic. So I can get hangover juice.”

Lara nodded fervently and tapped away on the phone. “Done!” she announced triumphantly. Within seconds the phone beeped again.

“Oh my God, he’s replied already,” she said, her eyes quickly scanning the screen. “Okay, you’re going to meet him at three p.m. outside PO. He says he’s looking forward to it.”

I sat at a small metal table, waiting for Jack to pay for my Ginger Zinger smoothie. I felt numb and quietly determined. My head was still throbbing but I had hidden the bags under my eyes with concealer, layered mascara over last night’s leftovers and forced myself out of the bath and into my favorite jeans. I now resembled a human being.

“Okay, two Ginger Zingers,” Jack announced as he slumped down onto the seat next to me.

I took the plastic cup from him and sipped it thirstily. It was like medicine. The bits of carrot, orange, honey and ginger soothed my throat and I could already feel the oxy-things working their magic on my battered immune system.

“This is fucking good,” he said, slurping his drink.

I smiled tightly at him. “Yeah, they’re really good.”

“I’ve never been here before,” he admitted. “In fact, I had to Google this place to know what you were talking about.”

“That’s me,” I said lightly, “always in the know about the best places for hangover juice.”

“Well, you’ve now officially won my trust. I’ll go wherever you suggest.” He laughed.

There was a brief silence while I remembered how last night he had done everything
except
go where I suggested. He went quiet as well, and I knew he was thinking the same thing. I stared at him expectantly, waiting for him to break the silence. I wasn’t in the mood for all this small talk. I needed to hear the truth.

He took the hint. “Um, Ellie, I guess . . . I guess we need to talk,” he said.

“Please, talk away,” I said, spreading my hands out.

“Last night . . . things got weird. I really didn’t mean for things to come out the way they did.”

“Okay, then explain to me how you meant them to come out.”

“I mean, I just . . . Look, we’re fine, right?” he asked quickly. “We’re fine, we’re hanging out. We don’t need to go over all this, do we?”

I sat back in my chair and looked at him coolly. “Jack,” I said, “we
do
need to go over this—this is exactly why I’m sitting here. To hear what you have to say. I want to hear all of it.”

He still looked uncertain as he fidgeted with the straw of his Ginger Zinger.

“You
owe
it to me,” I added.

He shifted on his chair and took a deep breath. “Yeah. You’re right. I’m . . . I’m going to explain it all to you, right now.”

I crossed my arms.

“Right, okay. Let me just start at the beginning.”

“A very good place to start,” I said. Bugger.
The Sound of Music
lyrics had a habit of popping into my head when I least expected them to.

“Right. So . . . I’ve dated a few girls in my time . . .” he started.

I raised an eyebrow and crossed my arms more tightly, wishing it were someone else’s arms holding me safe.

“Anyway, yeah, I’ve dated people and I’ve never really met anyone I truly liked. Obviously they’ve all been great, but somehow, I haven’t . . . I haven’t really connected with anyone. I just, I never believed in true love. Do you . . . do you believe in it?” he asked. He looked worried.

“Uh, I . . . I guess. I don’t know.”

“Okay,” he said, his eyes piercing straight into me. “Well, I didn’t. But then it all changed.”

My heart started to lift.

“With all the other girls, the way I felt about them was just a bit . . . a bit average. A bit nothing. It was no wonder I didn’t believe in true love, because these girls were all the same in a way.”

He paused for a while and I stared at him, transfixed. My heart was so hopeful that I couldn’t even think. I was totally absorbed. Every cell and particle inside me was hooked on his words.

He carried on. “Then one day, in a way that was totally unexpected, I went to a party and I met a girl who was completely different. A girl who took my breath away and made me see the world with different eyes. Someone who changed my life with the first word she said to me.”

I felt my knees go weak. I couldn’t even remember the first word I’d said to him. It must have been profound.

His voice was full of passion as he kept talking. “For the first time in my life, I had a totally deep, intense connection with someone. It wasn’t just how beautiful she was; it was the way she made me feel. She challenged me, but she liked the same things as me, she made me laugh but she also made me cry. From the second I saw her I felt a connection with her. Do you know what I mean?” He stared into my eyes.

“Yes,” I whispered softly.

“I’m glad,” he said gently. “Because I never expected to find that. And it’s really thrown me off. I’m a different person from how I used to be, and it’s making things really complicated for me. It’s why I’ve been a bit weird and a bit . . . I guess it might have come across as though I’ve been a bit hot and cold with you lately and sending you mixed signals.”

I nodded understandingly. I got it now. He was just scared. He had never expected to fall for me. He was a boy. Boys hated commitment—everyone knew that. And now he’d found me. He really liked me, and it was scaring him.

“It’s just this . . . this connection was so powerful, Ellie. It changed me, totally,” he added.

I felt little vibrations of ecstasy running through my body. He was inadvertently telling me he loved me. I had
changed
him. I, Ellie Kolstakis, was capable of making someone change his life. How could I ever have doubted him? He was just terrified that
I
would reject
him.
I felt like laughing at the irony of it all. He really liked me. I wanted to punch the air triumphantly. It took all my self-control to not jump up and kiss his worried-looking face.