Beautiful Together

by Andrea Wolfe

  "And then there's my older brother, too," he said. "But he moved out a few years ago. We thought he was going to make big money in the financial industry, but now he just works at a pet store." He cleared his throat. "I just want to get a good paying job so I can help my mom out while she goes back to school. I know she wouldn't want to take the money from me, but it's the least I can do."

  I felt myself losing it. Hearing him talk like that was absolutely heart-wrenching. I mean, no one really knew about any of this at school as far as I knew. It was so noble of him.

  "Don't worry about it, Naomi," he said reassuringly, fully aware of how I felt. "Everything is fine. And now that I have you, everything's even better."

  I nestled between his arms again and stayed there.

  ***

  Mason and I grew even closer. At the three month mark, things were going smoother than I could have ever imagined. The football season was over, so Mason had a lot more free time. Jesse, just as before, was distant and looking noticeably hung over whenever I saw him at church.

  He was always with Carla, and I was always with Mason.

  After Mason told me about his mom, we started spending a lot of time at his house. And even after being there dozens of times, we still hadn't run into her.

  She usually went into work right around the time we got home from school, and she got back after Mason had already taken me home. I knew what she looked like from the family pictures on the wall, and Mason looked considerably like her.

  In the photo, she was quite tall and skinny, with blonde hair like Mason's. She was smiling big, her arms wrapped around the shoulders of her boys. They were both just young kids in the photo, but she still looked super proud even then.

  The house always reeked of smoke in the common rooms, and it was clear that Donna was the source. Mason always left his door closed, hoping to keep the smell from reaching his private space. It seemed to work.

  His room was simple and plain, the walls sparsely covered with posters of movie stars and sports heroes. He had an older computer at a small desk where he did homework, and a small TV in the corner.

  We spent so much time over there, mostly because there was no one around to disturb us. In a way, it felt like we were using his mom since she paid the rent. But he encouraged it, and it seemed fine to me.

  Our kissing began to go further and further until things were really starting to become questionable. And although neither of us ever wanted to stop, we still had reservations about the whole sex thing that kept us within certain limits.

  Regardless, I loved when he touched me, and it drove me crazy when he rubbed himself against me when we were making out. I was starting to figure out that maybe sex was kind of like that, and, after beginning to feel a little rebellious myself, I grew more curious.

  We started stripping down to nothing but our underwear, and after a couple weeks of that, I finally let him take the next step.

  We had already been kissing for what seemed like hours, rolling around, hands crawling all over each other. The pillows and the comforter were on the floor.

  An idea hit me, so I stopped and gave Mason a devilish smile. "Why don't you ever take off my bra?" I asked. "Don't boys usually do that for girls?"

  "You never mentioned it!" he said, a little flustered. "I would have done it if you asked. You're beautiful. I just wanted to be polite. I would do anything for you."

  I shot him a dirty look. "Anything?"

  He giggled. "I guess, probably."

  I looked up at his beautiful chiseled chest, his hair messy from our fooling around. His smile was hypnotic, and it was hard to look away. "Okay, Mason, take off my bra."

  He nodded and then reached behind my back, his skin hot against mine, fumbling with the clasps. "It's tough," he said.

  I toyed with him. "Well, we can stop if it's too hard—"

  Just then I felt the tension release on one side. "Got it," he said proudly. I figured he'd just pull it off from there, but instead he delicately worked the second clasp until it was also loose.

  I wriggled out of the straps slowly, leaving the bra resting on my breasts.

  "Can I—"

  "Yeah," I said, taking his hands and setting them on my chest. His grip tightened, and then he lifted the bra, so slowly and delicately, like he was opening a Christmas present.

  "Oh my God," he said. "You're so perfect." He immediately buried himself in the cleavage, licking, and kissing, slow and sexy at first. I loved how it felt. But then he started getting goofy and jiggling my boobs in his hands until I was shouting for him to get the hell off me.

  That tender moment was ruined, but it was still perfect.

  From that point on, we were down to underwear. That was it, the only thing keeping us from full nudity and then, presumably, sex.

  It was around that same time that I got paired up with a girl named Arielle Walker in AP history class for a pretty intense group presentation. She hung out in completely different social circles and was a grade ahead of me, which meant she was also a year older.

  A lot of people thought she was weird because of how she dressed, but I found her remarkably refreshing after I got to know her. She was really funny and smart and sarcastic, but at first, I doubted her as a partner. And then, on the second day we worked together, we had a pop quiz. Literally everyone in the class bombed it except her.

  And she was the first person done. Her intelligence just came naturally.

  Even after I respected her as a partner, our first few interactions were still kind of difficult. I don't think Arielle had expected much from me either, but once I told her I had seen Blood Lake—she had just watched it the previous weekend and figured I'd have no idea what she was talking about—she came around fast. Like super fast.

  She loved horror movies.

  Adding to the weird factor was that Arielle was kind of a punk/hipster, and she went to a lot of local concerts. And, as I quickly found out, she also had a lot of sex. I didn't know how she did it, but she somehow managed a full-time career of partying on top of doing well in school.

  She would fall behind in the project, not touching anything for days, and then suddenly present me with some of the best, most insightful work I had ever seen.

  Arielle had three piercings in each ear, her naval pierced, a nose ring, and her tongue pierced. She was also a thrift store goddess, always dressed in denim jackets and torn jeans and faded punk band t-shirts. I assumed we looked like total opposites when people saw us together.

  And she liked to dye her hair extreme colors.

  She was definitely pretty, but it wasn't obvious with the way she dressed and acted. I guess it ensured that the posers, as she un-affectionately called them, stayed away from her.

  Her dad was apparently super rich, and so he just kept her bank account filled and didn't do much else. And he traveled a lot too. Her mom was... well, out of the picture.

  I wasn't sure if these were good or bad things, but I didn't think too hard about it. Regardless, she was really mature given her unusual life circumstances.

  One day, we were meeting at Tanner's Coffee, the local cafe, after school to work on our project. As usual, she was ranting about her bohemian lifestyle and I was doing my best to follow along.

  "You really should come out to one of these punk shows," she said, sipping her Americano. I got tea when we met there since it was always late in the day and caffeine would have kept me up all night—the exact reason why she was drinking it.

  "Maybe I will sometime," I said. "Maybe Mason will come along."

  She groaned. "God, that reminds me, I'm having some... issues with Daniel."

  "Oh?" I asked. "Is it something serious?"

  She shrugged. "Well, kinda. You've got a boyfriend, Naomi. I mean, you know how guys can be. It's bugging me."

  I was used to her talking endlessly about her very foreign problems— sex and drugs and late nights and wild behavior and older guys and acid trips—problems that never required any r
eal input from me other than listening. But this was apparently a rare opportunity for me to contribute.

  I took a long sip of my tea. It was some fruity herbal blend, one that consisted mostly of lemon. "You can ask me anything," I said. I didn't know what was coming, but were growing pretty close and so I figured it was the right way to answer. "Go ahead."

  "Okay, cool," she said, smiling. "So, if your guy finishes early, does he go down on you?"

  I was suddenly painfully aware of everyone in the coffee shop. I mean, it wasn't like they had heard her question or anything, just that I suddenly felt so inexperienced and small and obvious.

  "Uh," I said, lifting my cup to my mouth to buy more time. While I knew what she meant—the words were in English after all, and intelligible—I didn't really know what she meant.

  "It's not that tough, is it?" Arielle asked impatiently. "God, I need a cigarette. Am I really that unlucky? It just seems like good sex etiquette to me."

  I felt like she could see right into me, see the blatant inexperience on my face. Sex had never seemed like a big deal until that very moment, when one of my peers was staring me down, trying to ask me something very specific about it.

  I couldn't decide whether to lie or tell her the truth. "I... don't know," I blurted out.

  Arielle's eyes glared back at me, through loose strands of black hair with yellow streaks and presumably boring straight into my innocent soul.

  "What do you mean, you don't know? Does Mason do it or not? I'm just trying to get input here. You don't need to be shy about sex, Naomi. Seriously, it's cool. I'm not gonna tell anyone your bedroom secrets." She took a quick sip of her Americano and frowned. "Dan claims that I don't give him enough blowjobs in general to warrant it, but if we're having sex, we're both supposed to get off, right? That means he should—"

  Although I knew that her pushiness was just part of her, it was getting to me. I felt my cheeks turning red and hot.

  And then of course, it happened. "Wait... are you a virgin?" she asked tersely. "Oh shit, I'm so sorry. I didn't mean for it to come out like that. I mean, it's totally fine and—"

  "Yes, I'm a virgin," I said, shrugging. "I probably won't be for much longer though," I added a little pathetically. But after reaching the peak of humiliation, I finally started to loosen up.

  "Holy shit, I never would have guessed." She nodded curiously at me.

  "I guess I'll take that as a compliment."

  "Yeah, you're hot, dude. And well, you're really missing out. I mean, it's not a big deal, because if I talk it up too much, you'll probably freak out or something and wait even longer. But when it goes well, it's awesome."

  I bit my lower lip and turned my cup in a circle on the table, listening to that awful, yet somehow comforting rubbing sound between the tabletop and the ceramic mug. I watched everyone walking around the coffee shop, suddenly cognizant of the fact that probably all of them had sex. Maybe good sex, maybe bad sex. But still sex.

  I shrugged. "What should I do next?" I asked. For some reason I felt like this was exactly what I needed to take the next step with Mason, this blatant social nudge.

  Arielle finished the rest of her drink in one long swallow. It was clear by how fast she was talking that she was amped up on caffeine. It would have been a great moment to drop the current discussion and get as much done on the history project as possible—but I knew that wasn't about to happen.

  "Is he a virgin too?" she asked wryly. She seemed to have totally forgotten about her own issue.

  "I guess I don't actually know," I said. "But I think so."

  She nodded. "Well, you need birth control, obviously. Are you on the pill or anything? If you want the pill, you're going to have to get an exam."

  I shook my head. "No. But it seems like my mom would figure that out somehow and probably kill me."

  "Okay, okay," she said, nodding, pen clenched between her teeth. "So I guess you need condoms. You can get them for free at the Planned Parenthood. And you can ask them about other forms of birth control too. Someone might try to talk to you, but they're all really cool there."

  I gulped hard. The more she talked about this, the more I felt like I wasn't ready, like it was a huge commitment. Like too much could go wrong and ruin my life every time Mason and I did it.

  But who knew how Mason felt. Was I secretly driving him mad because we hadn't gone all the way? He always told me how hot he thought I was, so maybe it was getting too hard for him, no pun intended.

  Suddenly, I was questioning how serious our relationship was. I mean, could a relationship really be serious without sex? Without totally giving ourselves to each other like that?

  Arielle seemed to notice my internal monologue. "You're just gonna have to let it happen, dude," she said. "You'll figure it all out. If he's a virgin, the first time probably won't be that great. But if he cares about you, he'll make it work."

  I sighed. My brain was totally overloaded. "Yeah, okay. Well, I think we should get some work done now," I said, hoping to escape the discussion.

  She nodded and smiled. "Well, I definitely need more coffee then."

  Even though we managed to finish a lot, I couldn't stop thinking about sex. After it was switched on in my brain, I just couldn't turn it off.

  My relationship with Mason was going to change, I knew that much.

  5

  A few days after our conversation about sex, I borrowed my mom's car and drove to Planned Parenthood. I still hadn't seriously brought up sex with Mason—we also hadn't had much alone time since my mom's family was in town all weekend for my Uncle Jack's birthday—but I decided I wanted to be prepared when I finally did.

  I liked that I was taking the lead instead of just dumping it on Mason because he was a guy. It made me feel more responsible, more like an adult.

  Just as Arielle had promised, the whole experience was painless. I was initially nervous about running into someone I knew—or someone from church—but everything turned out fine.

  I ended up with a big handful of condoms, probably twenty or thirty. They barely fit into my purse.

  The whole time I was thinking about the fact that the condoms basically represented the total number of times Mason and I could have sex. Thirty condoms meant we could have sex thirty times. Thirty. It was so weird to be thinking like that, but I couldn't shake it. We hadn't even done it once yet, and I still had no idea when it would actually happen.

  On my way back, when I was two blocks from home, I realized I had told my mom I was going to buy make-up—and I clearly didn't have any make-up. I wasn't about to get busted with a bunch of condoms in my purse and sent off to some Christian boarding school.

  I turned around and went back to the closest supermarket and grabbed some blush and eyeliner, the cheapest stuff possible since I didn't actually need it.

  On my second drive home, I thought about how thankful I was that I had met Arielle. Given our different cliques and social statuses, we were a very unlikely pair. But for some weird reason, it worked.

  And thanks to her, I had free condoms.

  I got home and into my room without any trouble. My mom's eyes were glued to the TV as she watched a nature documentary about Africa. She barely even noticed me.

  I deposited the contraband into the innermost pocket of my backpack until I thought of a better place to hide it. The backpack made them portable and convenient in case the need ever arose.

  After that, I sat down on my bed and called Mason.

  ***

  Just as I had expected, Mason did want to have sex, but he wasn't bringing it up to be polite. Sure, we had our passion-driven, body-on-body conversations in which we nearly did it—but we never actually spoke about it, other than casual mentions.

  "Are you ready though?" he asked me. We were cuddled up in his bed, nearly naked under the blankets as usual, sharing body heat. Between words, we listened to each other breathe.

  "Not right this second," I said.

  He laughed and itch
ed his scalp. "I don't mean right this second. I mean, do you want to do it? To go all the way? I don't want to pressure you if—"

  "Are you a virgin too?" I asked pointedly. I needed to get it out of the way, and the moment finally felt right.

  "Yeah," he said, almost proudly.

  "You are?" I said, mouth agape.

  "Well, I could say the same thing about you," he said. "Hottest girl in the whole school and still a virgin? What the hell is she waiting for?"

  I giggled and gave him a playful jab in the gut. It felt like a rock. "You're a jerk. My question is, how the hell is the quarterback still a virgin? Every girl in the school wants your super hot body."

  "Just been waiting for the right one," he said. "I have very refined tastes," he said in a really bad French accent.

  I swallowed hard, unable to play around. "Am I really the right one?" I asked, speaking every word with incredible deliberation. "You mean that?"

  He leaned forward and kissed me hard. "Of course you are," he said. "You're the most beautiful, intelligent, gorgeous, funny, witty, wonderful girl I've ever met in my life. I lose my mind when I'm with you, Naomi."

  His words hit me like bullets from a gun at close range—and oh God, they hurt. My defenses were totally gone; his words pierced right through to my heart, and I was so powerless to stop them.

  "You... really mean that stuff?" I asked. In that moment, I wanted to compliment him back, but I couldn't find the words. I saw flashes of color in my brain while detached thoughts rushed by.

  I thought about my conversations with Arielle. I thought about the sexually promiscuous teens in the slasher movies. I thought about Mason—and I looked at him too. Well, more like consumed him with my eyes.

  His wide, strong shoulders and chest, so chiseled and full, the kind of muscles that make you lose your mind when they're glistening with sweat. He didn't really have any hair on his chest, but that didn't make him seem any less masculine. That gorgeous, slightly lopsided smile. Teeth that were naturally straight, even without any orthodontic work. Biceps that were both threatening and comforting depending on the circumstances.