by Nina Kenwood
‘That’s a big question,’ I say, stalling for time.
‘We don’t have to keep playing.’
‘I’m having fun,’ I lie, because even though it’s killing me, it would be much worse to stop playing this game and spend days and weeks (and, depending on how my future social life goes, potentially months and years) wondering what would have happened if I’d kept playing.
‘No, you’re not,’ he says.
‘Yes, I am. And no, I haven’t ever been in love. My turn. When are you going to tell your family that you got fired?’ I throw back something as fast as I can, so he won’t have time to dwell on my answer.
‘Tomorrow.’ He pauses and then laughs. ‘Maybe tomorrow. By the end of the week.’
‘Your Mum will understand,’ I say.
‘It’s more complicated than that.’
‘Tell me.’
‘I will if you ask the right question.’
‘It’s your turn.’
‘Hmmm. Okay. Did you want to kiss Owen in the spin the bottle game at the party?’
‘No. How many people have you slept with?’
He makes a small choked noise that makes me laugh. I knew that one would throw him.
‘Pass,’ he says finally.
‘Is that a point for me?’
‘You don’t really score this game.’
‘Well, new rule. We’re scoring, and I’m winning.’
‘If I’d known that, I would have answered,’ he says, shifting a little closer to me.
‘No, you wouldn’t have.’
‘I might have.’
‘Your turn.’
‘I’ve got to think of a tough one, now it’s about winning points.’
‘I have nothing to hide.’
‘Sure you do.’
I pretend to scratch my arm but really use it as an excuse to shuffle a little nearer to him. We’re now lying close enough that if I moved my foot a tiny bit, it might brush against his.
‘Okay. That night at the party, when we got each other in spin the bottle, did you want to kiss me?’ he asks.
There’s a long pause, and I’m so glad that it’s dark because my face is so hot it might be on fire, and that’s only half due to the sunburn. ‘Pass,’ I say.
‘I knew you had something to hide.’
‘Well, now it’s my turn,’ I say quickly. ‘And I’m asking the same question back at you.’ I can’t actually bring myself to say the words Did you want to kiss me?
‘Yes.’
‘What?’
‘Yes, I wanted to kiss you.’
My heart, my heart.
‘Oh.’ I have no idea what else to say. My mind is completely blank. I can’t even think of another question for the game.
‘I mean, I did kiss you. On the cheek,’ he says.
‘I know.’
‘So my answer should have been obvious.’
‘A kiss on the cheek is a different thing.’
I can’t believe we’re having this conversation. I especially can’t believe we’re having this conversation without me having a heart attack.
‘If you wanted to kiss me that night, why didn’t you?’ I ask, ignoring that it’s actually his turn. We’ve been talking quietly, but I’m whispering now. These are scary words.
‘Pass,’ he says finally.
I don’t know what to do with that.
‘Do you want to kiss me now?’ he asks, so quiet I can hardly hear him.
‘Pass,’ I say, because even in this moment, even with every opportunity in the world, I’m still too scared to say it.
That’s two passes each. The next person to pass loses but, for once, I don’t care about winning. I can’t bring myself to ask him the same question in return. My hands are trembling. But I don’t want to change the topic. Please, dear god, never let us move on from this very important topic of kissing and wanting to kiss.
‘Have you ever had the urge to kiss me before the night of the party?’ I say.
He’s quiet, and I listen to his breathing.
‘Yes. Once.’
‘When?’ I’m holding my breath.
‘That’s another question. You don’t get another question. It’s my turn,’ he says, and pauses to think. ‘Do you want me to kiss you right now?’ he says.
‘You already asked that,’ I say.
‘No, I asked if you wanted to kiss me. Now I’m asking if you want me to kiss you.’
‘They seem like very similar questions.’
‘Similar but different.’ He’s smiling, I can hear it in his voice. We’re facing each other, but I have my eyes closed.
‘Yes, I want you to kiss me,’ I say, my voice rushed and shaky. It feels like the single bravest thing I’ve ever said.
Before I have time to go into a full neurotic meltdown, he leans over and kisses me. His kiss is so quick and soft, a gentle touching of lips, that I could almost convince myself I imagined the whole thing. I open my eyes, and our faces are only inches apart on the pillow.
‘Your turn,’ he says. And I know he’s probably saying it’s my turn to ask a question, but instead I decide that he’s saying it’s my turn to kiss him, and before I can rethink my decision, I take all my courage and I move forward and put my hand on his stubbly cheek and kiss him.
14
Fifty-two Minutes
I’m kissing Alex.
I’m kissing Alex.
He kisses my neck and my collarbone, and it feels more reckless and thrilling than anything I’ve ever done or anything I may ever do again. I feel like I am bursting, like I can’t hold the particles of myself together anymore, like I could power a city with the electricity coming off my skin.
We kiss for fifty-two minutes, until the red numbers on the digital alarm clock on the bedside table say 12:42am. For a lot of that time, Alex’s hands are in my hair, on my face, on my shoulders, wrapped around me. After a while though, they venture further, sliding under my top. I’m not wearing a bra, it’s not hard for him to find the bits of me he wants to find. I put my hands under his T-shirt and feel the bare skin on his stomach and chest, and it makes me breathless.
I can feel things getting more intense, and I pull back a little. I stop kissing him, mostly because I feel like I’ll lose control of myself. He kisses my forehead, then shuffles back, creating space between us, but then reaching his hand out to touch mine. We don’t say anything, we just lie facing each other, holding hands, until we fall asleep.
15
A Day at the Beach
The next day, while we’re having breakfast, I am nervous. I’m keeping my head down and hoping no one notices the faint rash I have near my mouth from Alex’s stubble rubbing against me, and if they do, that they think it’s just part of my sunburn or my acne scarring.
Alex is not currently at the table. I think he’s still asleep. He barely stirred when I snuck out of the bed early this morning. I messed up the blankets on the trundle on my way out the door, so it looked like someone had been sleeping there.
I nibble on a scone and try to stop myself thinking about last night’s kissing, even though my mind keeps looping endlessly back to it.
The kissing was glorious. The kissing was terrifying.
At about the seven-minute mark, a little voice wormed its way into my head, reminding me that Alex’s hands were touching my body and my body is a minefield of potential humiliations. When his hands went near my hips and stomach, I kept thinking about how flabby they might feel, and when he put his hands on my back, under my T-shirt, I flinched away, because if he went any higher on my shoulders, he would feel the scars.
I want, so badly, to be the person who loves and is proud of her body, who says I am not giving in to the bullshit that is pressed on every girl from birth that what she looks like matters more than anything else. But the truth is, what I’ve looked like has shaped my life, or at least my recent life. So I am not the enlightened person I want to be. I wish I didn’t care what Alex thinks of my body, but I do. I’ve neve
r let anyone as close to me as I let Alex last night. I don’t even like people kissing me hello or goodbye, and last night I let someone press his face against my face for fifty-two minutes.
I didn’t let him into my underwear (he didn’t try, in truth). That’s an area of my body that represents anxiety I’ve never needed to fully contemplate before. For a start, I am not completely hair free. I’m trimmed down and waxed enough to wear bathers, but there is still lots of hair there and I’m not sure if I am supposed to have hair there. I mean, obviously I know I am biologically supposed to have it, and that women can do whatever they like with their body hair, but I still have a bubble of fear that maybe every single other girl my age keeps everything completely waxed or shaved off, all the time. I know Lucy gets waxed regularly, and I’m pretty sure she’s getting everything removed.
I once read online that guys my age watch so much porn they don’t even realise that women naturally grow pubic hair. Surely that can’t be true. Can it?
Not to mention, what if I am…weird down there. Maybe I’m lopsided, or my insides are on a weird angle or curve the wrong way or are too long or too short or too big or too small or just don’t feel right or look right or taste right. I wish there was some way of verifying for sure if I have a regular, standard, run-of-the-mill vagina and vulva before anything more happens with Alex. I could see a doctor, but I would be too embarrassed to actually ask the question (‘Hello doctor, do you think a nineteen-year-old guy with an unspecified amount of sexual experience would think it all looks generally okay down there?’). The internet says genitalia come in all shapes and sizes, that there is no right or wrong, and I know, intellectually, that’s true, but it gives me no real reassurance because I’ve never had to face the real prospect of someone interacting with mine before.
I thought I had catalogued and processed all my bodily anxieties years ago, but being with Alex has made me realise there are so many more possibilities.
I am also worried about Alex’s expectations. He’s nineteen and he’s had a girlfriend. Who knows what he’s already done. We were in a bed. At night. Kissing. Enjoying the kissing. Any other person in my situation would probably have had sex, no problems. Well, maybe not, but they would have at least considered it. But we didn’t even get to the halfway point of having sex. (I don’t know what the official halfway point is, but I doubt we reached it. We might not have got to a quarter of the way.) I don’t regret not having sex, but I regret not being the person who would have had sex.
I just feel like I am so bad at this.
I keep secretly worrying about my vagina and eating breakfast while Zach chats with his father about politics, Mariella listens to Glenn talk about dinosaurs, Anthony plays a game on his phone, and Lucy stares into space, sipping at her tea every now and then.
Alex walks in the door, panting. He’s not still asleep after all. He’s in exercise gear and he’s covered in sweat. I can hear the music blasting out of his headphones from across the room.
‘Where’ve you been?’ Zach says.
‘For a run.’
‘That’s not like you, sweetheart,’ Mariella says.
Alex frowns. ‘What does that mean?’
‘You don’t run,’ Mariella says, lifting a jar of Nutella out of Anthony’s reach, so he can’t spread a third layer on his already-Nutella-covered toast.
‘I run all the time,’ Alex says.
‘When?’ Glenn scoffs.
‘At the gym. On the treadmill.’
‘Yes, but you’re not a runner. You’re not someone who gets up early specifically to go for a run outside, in the morning, before breakfast,’ Anthony says.
‘You should all be out there running, making the most of this glorious day,’ Sal says, in his most dad-like voice.
‘Dad, when’s the last time you did any serious cardio?’ Zach says.
‘Your mother and I are going for a bike ride this afternoon.’
‘We are?’ Mariella asks, looking up in surprise.
‘Dad, you haven’t been on a bike in over ten years,’ Zach says.
I stop listening, because I’m a little bit mesmerised by a sweating Alex. Sweat is ostensibly gross, but somehow it’s not gross on Alex. His thick hair is pushed back, and when he rubs a towel over his face, little droplets reappear almost immediately. It should be disgusting, but it’s not. It’s appealing.
Maybe this is what falling in love is: you’re not grossed out by someone else’s sweat.
‘Do you guys want to come to the beach with me today?’ Alex says, looking at Zach and Lucy but flicking his eyes quickly in my direction and then away again.
‘With you?’ Zach looks confused.
‘Yeah. I’m meeting some friends at the back beach. I thought you three might want to come too.’
‘I’ll come,’ Anthony says, but no one responds to him.
There’s a pause. Alex doesn’t invite Zach places. Zach doesn’t invite Alex places. Their brotherly relationship is complex, and part of that complexity is maintaining very different social circles and activities at all times.
‘That’s very nice of you, darling,’ Mariella says.
‘Sure, we’ll come,’ Zach says, glancing at Lucy and then at me. I try to make a very, very subtle ‘I don’t want to’ face at Zach, but I think Zach reads it as an ‘I’m hungry’ face because he pushes the last scone on the table towards me.
‘What time?’ he asks Alex.
‘About two.’
‘Cool.’
Alex goes off to shower, and then leaves before lunchtime, saying he’ll meet us there.
By the time the afternoon rolls around, I’ve decided I really, truly, absolutely don’t want to go to the beach and hang out with Alex and his friends. I cannot go. But I dutifully change into my bathers anyway, because Zach and Lucy ignore my protests.
I am wearing a one-piece swimsuit that I am quite proud of myself for finding. It, amazingly, has a full back, and tiny little cap sleeves. I never thought such a thing existed until I saw it online. It zips up the front, and it’s sleek, and it doesn’t look too weird—in fact, it’s designed as a fashion choice, a kind of slinky catsuit type of bathers. So the scars on my back are hidden. The only parts of me that are very visible in a stressful way are my thighs. But if I unzip the top enough to show a bit of cleavage, I figure I can draw people’s eyes up to my boobs.
I put on a loose dress over the bathers, and Lucy gives me her big floppy straw hat—a hat that looks adorable on the shelf, and adorable on Lucy, and adorable in Lucy’s hands as she reaches up to put it on my head—but the moment it actually touches my head, it ceases being adorable and becomes ridiculous, as all hats do when they’re on my head.
But with the hat and my sunglasses, I feel somewhat safe and hidden.
It takes about ten minutes to walk to the back beach. I trail behind Zach and Lucy, half-listening to them chat but mostly fretting about seeing Alex with his friends.
‘What happened between you two last night that Alex is suddenly inviting us to the beach?’ Zach says, turning around and walking backwards, looking at me.
‘Nothing,’ I say, a little too quickly and forcefully. At some point, I’m not exactly sure when, I decided that I wouldn’t tell them about Alex. Not yet. Lucy would be too excited, too overeager to analyse every detail, and turn it into something bigger than it is. She would get my hopes up. She’d convince me of things that might not actually be true. She’d make me believe in love, and I need to be tougher and more sensible than that. I need to protect myself.
Zach, on the other hand…I’m not telling Zach mostly because I’m scared of how he will react. I don’t have siblings, but I know kissing the brother of one of your best friends is a big deal. And Alex and Zach already have a messy relationship. I don’t want to squeeze myself into the middle of that.
So now it’s a real secret.
We see Alex and his friends up ahead of us. They are playing Frisbee in the water, shouting and laughing and
diving to catch it. I see Alex, and Owen, and a couple of other familiar faces from the party, a few entirely new faces, and… Vanessa.
Vanessa is here.
I stop walking, and Lucy turns back.
‘What’s wrong?’
‘Nothing.’
‘You look pale,’ she says, peering under the brim of my giant hat.
‘Her face is sunburnt. How can she look pale?’ Zach says.
‘Are you okay?’ Lucy asks me, ignoring Zach.
‘Yes, I’m fine,’ I say, but my mouth is suddenly very dry. What the hell was I even thinking coming to the beach and kissing Alex and acting like I had any business being a part of any of this?
‘Let’s just sit here,’ I say, not wanting to get any closer.
We lay out our towels. It’s very hot, but I’m not going to go into the water or call any attention to myself. I get out my book and start reading.
At some point, Alex sees us. Zach waves at him, and he waves back, motioning for us to come closer, to come into the water, but he doesn’t walk over to us, and my stomach twists.
I’ve been reading the same page of my book for fifteen minutes, because I’m not really reading as much as holding it as a prop while I watch Alex and his friends.
Alex seems happy. He runs around, diving into the sea for the Frisbee, tackling and wrestling with his friends. At one point, he and Vanessa both run after the Frisbee, and she bumps into him, pushing him out of her way, and he laughs. She’s wearing a simple navy-blue bikini, and her dark hair is up in a messy top knot, and she runs and leaps and swims and dives with the confidence and joyful abandon of someone completely at ease in her body.
‘Let’s go for a swim,’ Zach says.
‘I’ll stay here,’ I say.
‘No, you won’t,’ Lucy says, pulling me to my feet. The three of us walk down the beach a little, getting closer to Alex and his friends. I’m still wearing my dress and hat and sunglasses. Lucy is in her red-and-white striped bikini, as bright and cheerful as a lolly, with red sunglasses and bouncing blonde curls. She looks like she should be playing beach volleyball in an ice-cream ad.
Alex and his friends are all in the water, and Lucy and Zach walk into the waves and wade out towards them.