Dean shakes his head.
‘No, we haven’t been together for a long time. Just friends.’
Meg comes in with three glasses and a bottle of white wine. I am turning things over in my head. Dean and Meg are exes? I wonder what Dean means by ‘a long time’? Why has Meg never mentioned it? I take a glass of wine from Meg and decide not to bring it up right now. I can’t be jealous yet – nothing has even happened between us.
‘Where’s the gear?’ Meg asks Dean.
‘You know where it is. It’s where it always is.’ She goes over to a little wooden box on the mantelpiece and gets out a big bag of weed.
Dean’s flat is small. It’s nice, though – the few things he has are interesting. A glass coffee table that has thick, hand-made wooden legs. A deep-green sofa, loads and loads of books on shelves around the room and tons of VHS along the skirting boards. There are photos of him and various people all over the walls – it is very obvious that he is well travelled.
‘You live on your own?’ I ask him.
‘Essentially, yes,’ he answers. ‘Come on, I’ll show you around.’ We leave Meg skinning up on the sofa; she doesn’t even look up when we leave the room. Down a short corridor he shows me his bathroom and then leads me into his bedroom. The bed is very low, a wooden frame that slightly elevates a double mattress from the floor, but not by much. It smells of essential oils, cedar and neroli, I think. I recognise them from the selections Flo has given me as birthday and Christmas presents. She gets a good staff discount from Smellies.
‘Here, sit here,’ says Dean, sitting down on his bed and patting the spot next to him. I feel slightly odd about the fact we left Meg in the living room, but she looked pretty happy, just her and her weed. I sit down next to him. I feel inexplicably horny. He is so fit. Dark hair, nice deep-brown eyes, big eyebrows, a good nose, thick lips, strong jaw. Handsome. Interesting. Arty. Writery. He oozes experience and knowledge. He makes me want to know stuff, about everything.
‘I’d like to see those later,’ he says, pointing at my breasts. From anyone else this would have sounded like the sleaziest line of all time. Somehow from him, it just sounds sexy.
‘What about now?’ I catch myself saying in a whisper. I don’t want him to see me as too young. I am eighteen – I am an adult. I need to act like one now.
The light is off in the bedroom, but the hall light gives enough that my skin will look nice.
‘What about Meg?’ I say as I start to take off my top.
‘Don’t worry about her. Meg’s happy sitting in there for hours just smoking and reading my books. She’s fine.’
My jumper is now on my lap. Dean wets his lips.
‘I knew they’d be good,’ he says, stroking my left boob with his hand. Then he leans forward and licks my nipple. The lick turns into a suck, and then his teeth gently nibble it. Then he nibbles a bit too hard and I jump from the pain.
‘Gently, please,’ I say, and he goes to lick the other one.
It’s hard to tell guys when they do something you don’t like, but I have learned that you have to. Or they just don’t know. Imagine a world full of men who have never been told by women about the things we don’t like? It would be awful. So we have to tell them – it’s our duty. It feels good that I am grown-up enough to say it to someone like Dean.
‘Dean?’ comes Meg’s voice from the living room. ‘Dean, do you want some of this?’
‘Yes babe,’ he shouts back, then whispers to me, ‘Stay here tonight,’ before he gets up and heads back into the living room, leaving me on the bed.
I pull my jumper back on and take the opportunity to use his bathroom, which is right opposite the bedroom in the narrow hall. It’s pretty clean, for a guy’s bathroom. There are quite a few products – shaving foam, aftershave, a selection of deodorants. His toothbrush is in its holder and the lid of the toothpaste is on. I open a little cupboard to the right of the sink, just to see what else he likes to spray himself with, but amongst an impressive selection of aftershaves is a bottle of women’s deodorant, some mascara and a box of tampons.
Meg’s? Who else’s could they be?
‘He isn’t your boyfriend, Renée,’ I say at my reflection. ‘Stay calm.’
I have a wee, and head back into the living room.
‘What the fuck?’ are my first words when I see their faces up against each other’s. Kissing. So blatantly. How was I so … And then I see the jet of smoke shooting from Meg’s mouth. She’s giving him a blow back. I feel like a total fool. ‘Sorry, I thought you were … ’
‘Come and sit here,’ says Dean, patting the sofa next to him. It’s obvious that he and Meg are both so stoned they haven’t even noticed what I said. He passes me the spliff.
I take it, but I know it’s probably a bad idea. I haven’t smoked much pot but when I have I’ve spun out, felt sick, had what I have come to know as a ‘whitey’. It’s when the world stops spinning and you spin instead, and then everything stops, and you can’t even move. So I do that, then I go into a coma. It’s nothing dangerous, just a heavy drug-induced sleep, but I am always really jealous of the people who smoke loads and get the giggles, or do what Meg seems to do and get cleverer and cleverer the more she smokes. Regardless of my experience, I take the spliff. After one drag, I know it was a bad idea. Everything goes hazy. I pass out.
My eyelids can barely block the light of the morning. It feels like a torch is being shone right into my face. Before I open my eyes I assess myself. I am lying down, I am under a cover. I don’t have socks on. As I move I feel that the duvet is directly on my skin. My hands reveal I have my bra and knickers on but nothing else. My eyes ping open. Where am I?
I’m in Dean’s bedroom, in his bed, and he is asleep next to me. His back is facing me. It’s a nice back, smooth. There is a tattoo on his left shoulder – it looks like a Chinese symbol or something like that. His boxer shorts are Calvin Klein. He looks nice, but this is so weird. I have been in bed with boys I don’t know before, but at least I remembered getting into bed with them. I don’t even know if we had sex or not, but I have my pants on so I presume not. I try to get out of bed quietly. I don’t want to wake him and I really need the loo.
‘Good morning, sleepy head,’ he says, turning over.
Damn it!
‘Morning,’ I say, sitting on the edge of his bed. ‘It goes without saying I can’t remember anything.’
He laughs. ‘Don’t worry, you were perfectly dignified. You just fell asleep after about four drags. It’s Meg’s fault, she packs so much in when she skins up. I carried you to bed at about midnight. I took off your clothes, but I didn’t think you would appreciate me stripping you naked.’
I try not to dwell on the thought of being carried. I hope I wasn’t too heavy.
‘Thank you,’ I say, meaning it. A lot of boys wouldn’t have missed an opportunity like that. I feel a little less ashamed knowing that I wasn’t spreadeagled in front of him.
‘I’m just going to pop to the loo,’ I say, getting up and slipping on his T-shirt.
‘Don’t be long. I am not such a good boy when the girl I fancy is awake.’
In the bathroom I feel very aware that he is still lying only feet away from where the toilet is and that the flat is silent. I am desperate for a poo. I run the cold tap, lay a few sheets of loo roll in the toilet and sit down, leaning forward so I can reach the running water. I flap my hand under the tap so it sounds like I am washing my hands and hope to God I manage to do this without any embarrassing noises.
I get through it and feel oddly proud of myself. I have never actually spent the night at a boy’s house before. An entirely plop-free poo was surprisingly easy to achieve. It’s a skill I feel glad I have acquired. After a quick spray of the women’s deodorant I found in the cupboard last night, I think I dealt with that really well. When I come back into the bedroom, Meg is sitting on his bed. I’m relieved to see that she’s wearing a big dressing gown that comes down to her ankles. It must b
e Dean’s, but at least she’s not naked.
‘Morning,’ she says, as if her being there is completely normal. Then she runs into the bathroom with a towel and I take it upon myself to close the bedroom door.
‘Meg stayed, then?’ I ask him, trying not to sound jealous.
‘Yeah, she stays a lot. Freshened up?’ he asks, moving the conversation on too quickly.
‘Yup,’ I say as I get back into bed and under the covers. I shiver a little as my body gets back to the temperature it was more happy with. Dean’s hands are on me straight away.
‘I can have you now that you are awake,’ he says, laughing. He lifts up my T-shirt and I wriggle out of it, even though the daylight is so bright, and his curtains are thin. I tell myself to be grown-up about my body, and not insecure. But I don’t like my white flesh in raw daylight, the way all of my imperfections glow.
‘I love stretch marks,’ he says, running his hand over my hip. I want to scream and tell him to get off. I hate them so much. But here we are, and I have no choice but for him to see them. I can either get all insecure about it, or take what he says as what he means.
‘What do you like about them?’ I ask, uncomfortably.
‘What they do to the skin. How they make it feel so soft and delicate. A symbol of how you have grown. Like the rings of a tree. Your own private markings, unique to you. Nature’s own tattoo.’
‘Anyone’d know you were a writer,’ I tell him, unable to keep the wariness out of my voice. ‘That was pretty convincing.’
Come on, Renée, I think to myself. Your body could be worse. Relax.
‘Renée. I have seen you around for so long, and I always thought how sexy you are,’ he says. ‘I came into The Ship once and you were wearing this low-cut black top and your jeans. Every time you turned around I would look at your bum. You didn’t even know I was watching you.’
‘I knew,’ I say. ‘I always knew. I was watching you too.’
‘Can I make love to you?’ he says softly, even though he is tugging at my knickers. Relaxed as I have convinced myself to feel, it takes every shred of will power I have not to burst out laughing. No one has ever said ‘make love’ to me before. Do people really say that? I thought it was just in the movies. I guess this is what happens when you sleep with people in their twenties. I embrace it, it’s kind of sexy, once you get over the shock of it. So I tell him he can.
We start slowly. Instantly I realise how unsensual the sex I have had before has been. Dean takes his time, he seems to understand every part of me already. Like he’s seen it before. He asks me what I want, and I am brave enough to tell him, even though it feels embarrassing to ask for it out loud. He tells me what he likes too – he likes to be in my mouth. He makes noises that make me feel good about what I’m doing. He is firm with me but not rough. His penis tastes faintly of soap.
‘Wow,’ I say when we are done. ‘Just. Wow.’
‘You liked that?’
‘Liked it? I, I … ’ I try not to sound too experienced. Even though I have slept with a few people now, I realise I have certainly never ‘made love’.
‘I loved it,’ is all I can think of to say.
‘Plenty more where that came from,’ he tells me. ‘Open the window there, will you? It’s got a bit stuffy in here.’
‘Sure,’ I say, throwing aside the covers. I don’t even think about the fact that I am naked and that I have to stand up in front of him, I just do it, I stand up, and with that comes a fart noise so loud that I fall to my knees on the floor.
‘IT WAS MY VAGINA, NOT MY BUM!’ are the first words that fly from my lips. Then I grab a pillow and put it over my face as I press my head into the floor. ‘I don’t know where that came from. I’m so sorry.’
I am so mortified. A fanny fart? That has never happened to me before – not an unintentional one anyway. I used to make Mum laugh by doing them on purpose when I was about five, but Pop used to get so angry that Mum told me I should probably stop doing them and think of some other jokes. This one was so loud, so powerful. The kind of fart you do when you have been having to hold one in for hours. The volume and the speed at which it shot out of me was such a shock. Why was there no warning?
‘Renée?’ he says to the pillow covering my head. ‘It’s OK.’
‘But it isn’t OK. It is everything but OK.’ I just almost took off from an explosion from my own vagina. Nothing about this is OK.
‘Seriously, get over it. I’m the one who pumped you full of air.’
This is true. It wasn’t like that would have happened if he hadn’t ‘made love’ to me. I remain still for a few more seconds. My bum facing up, my face down, too scared to move in case my fanny is plotting more evil.
‘Seriously, Renée, just open the window. Sex is all about weird noises and smells. I don’t care about that stuff. All I care about is that we do it.’
Smells? I daren’t even ask what he means by that.
‘Has anyone ever fanny farted in front of you before?’ I ask, then I quickly add, ‘Actually, please don’t answer that.’
Dean laughs.
‘I’ll go make us some tea. Get back into bed.’
I wait until he has left the room before I move. Standing up, I jog up and down to get any last puffs of air out and I put on my underwear and clothes. I grab my bag, which is by the bed, and leave the bedroom.
‘I actually have to go,’ I tell him and Meg, who are both in the kitchen. She is wearing one of his T-shirts and her pants. It feels weird.
‘What, no tea?’ he asks, looking genuinely surprised.
‘No, I promised my aunty I would help her with some things at home. I do have to go. Thanks for such a great night, and congratulations on the play. It really was great.’
‘Ahhh, is she all embarrassed about her farty sound?’ Dean says, coming over to comfort me.
‘Dean? Please, Meg will hear you.’
‘She doesn’t care about that stuff. Come on, babe, don’t go. We can stay in bed all day?’
‘No, I really do have to go. But thanks, I had fun,’ I say, walking to the front door.
‘All right. I suppose I’d better crack on with the piece I have to write anyway,’ Dean says.
‘Anything interesting?’ I ask, genuinely curious.
‘Not really. Some idiot stole the skeleton from the science lab at Tudor Falls. The paper has asked me to do a piece on immature school antics.’
I do a good job of keeping my expression totally blank as I say, ‘That’s kind of funny.’ I am hoping Meg and Dean will see it the same way.
‘Yeah, funny if you think stealing something that educates children is a good thing.’
That wipes the smile off my face.
‘Just kidding,’ Dean smiles. ‘It’s hilarious, but whoever did it is going to be in a lot of shit when they’re caught. Trespassing and theft? That’s pretty bad.’
Shit. I smile tightly, hoping he’s exaggerating, and then spot a pen on the table.
‘I’ll give you my number then?’ I suggest, writing it down on the corner of an Indian takeaway menu. ‘Call me, if you like,’ I say as casually as I can. ‘I’d like that.’ I go over and give him an awkward kiss goodbye. ‘See you at school, Meg.’
‘Bye, babe,’ says Meg.
I leave, wondering what the two of them will do now. Will they spend the day together? Will he tell her about my fanny fart? Boys talk, I know that much. Bugger it, I just have to suck it up.
Bad choice of words.
Flo
‘So did you two kiss?’ asks Kerry as soon as we get to church. She slips in next to me on my regular pew. I wonder if I should tell her or not. Will it cause a weird atmosphere on Thursday nights? But I am in church, I can’t lie in here.
‘Yes, but just a little one,’ I tell her. I can’t wipe the big stupid smile off my face.
‘So is Gordon your boyfriend now?’
‘No. I mean, we only kissed once. But maybe. I think I would like that. He is great
, isn’t he?’
‘I suppose so.’ Kelly turns to face forward and I see something sag a bit in her expression.
The vicar comes in, and Kerry focuses on him in such a way that I can tell she doesn’t want the conversation to carry on. I subtly scan the church with my eyes looking for Gordon, bearing in mind that he could be behind me. Renée says you should always behave like the boy you fancy is watching you, in case he is. I know when she has a crush on someone because everything she does is like a performance. I could never be quite like that, but I do pull my tummy in and stick my neck out so I don’t have a double chin, just in case.
Then I see the back of Gordon’s head. He is about four rows in front of me with his head down. He is praying. I think there is a good chance that he is always praying. I know that most people in the church are thinking about God while they are here, but Gordon always looks like his mind has left his body and he is actually with God somewhere. Sitting on a cloud, having a chat. He is so connected to him, I wonder if I will ever get like that. I think I’d like to, I think it would probably be quite nice. To get off earth for a bit and go float around somewhere else chatting away to the Lord.
At the end of the service Kerry and I go outside, but rather than talk to me she walks off with Matt. I don’t know what I keep doing to offend her, but I need to try to sort it out. There’s a tap on my shoulder.
‘Flo.’ It’s Gordon. ‘You get to sleep all right after I dropped you home?’
I want to tell him the truth. That I lay awake for hours thinking about him, that I fancy the pants off him, that I wished he had kissed me properly. But I don’t, of course. I tell him I got to sleep just fine.
‘What are you doing now?’ he asks. I presume he wants to do something so I tell him, ‘Nothing,’ but then he says he is going to play an acoustic set to the parents and kids at Sunday school, and I wish I had made up something exciting that I was doing too. Even though there is nothing. He scrunches up his eyes a bit as he looks over my shoulder. I think he might be seeing who is about before he gives me a proper kiss, but instead he says, ‘Isn’t that your friend?’
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