It Sounded Better in My Head

by Nina Kenwood

  ‘You keep saying that,’ Alex says.

  ‘I’m hoping you’re going to catch on,’ I say.

  ‘You want to have sex?’ he says.

  Okay, finally.

  ‘Yes,’ I say, feeling relieved.

  ‘But you said last week we weren’t going to have sex,’ he says.

  ‘That was last week.’ A hundred things have changed since then. (Emotionally. In my head.)

  ‘Okay, but why today?’ Alex has rolled off me entirely now, and is lying by my side, which isn’t filling me with confidence.

  ‘Why not today? Let’s get it done.’

  He laughs, sounding nervous. ‘You’re making it seem like…’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘Like a chore.’

  ‘No, I’m not. I just want to get the first time out of the way.’ I am saying ‘the first time’ so he might think I mean the first time between us, but I am quite sure he knows I’ve never had sex before and that what I really mean is ‘my first time ever’.

  ‘Out of the way?’

  ‘Over with.’

  ‘That’s worse.’

  ‘You know what I mean.’ (I’m starting to think maybe he doesn’t.)

  ‘You’re freaking me out,’ he says, sitting up and rubbing his temples.

  ‘Just the first time might be not great. After that we can get better at it. Go beyond the basics,’ I say, trying to sound as upbeat as possible, and also hoping he won’t ask me what I think the basics are.

  ‘Your expectations of me are terrifyingly low.’

  ‘Isn’t it better to exceed expectations than fail to meet them?’ I honestly go into every situation with the lowest expectations possible, and it always surprises me when I find out that other people don’t think that way.

  ‘This conversation is very stressful.’ He gets up off the bed and starts to pace.

  ‘Well, I don’t want to make things worse, but I have something else to ask you,’ I say.

  ‘What?’ he says, looking pained.

  ‘How many people have you had sex with?’ I ask. The question has been on my mind ever since he wouldn’t answer that night in Queenscliff, and I figure as things are already going badly, I may as well head in this direction. It would really help me to know.

  ‘Wow. You definitely made it worse,’ he says.

  ‘Is it more than ten?’ Ten is a number that represents enormous experience. I might realistically never sleep with ten people in my whole life. If Alex has already had sex with ten people, I don’t think I can be with him. I don’t think I can be around him. The gulf between us is too wide.

  ‘Two.’

  ‘That’s not true.’

  ‘Why wouldn’t that be true?’

  ‘Zach told me it was more.’

  ‘Zach has no idea how many people I’ve slept with.’

  ‘So how many?’

  ‘Two.’

  ‘I’m not that naive. You’re cute, and you worked in a bar. It’s more than two.’

  ‘I’m short, hairy, and I worked in the kitchen of a pub. I spent most nights sweaty and covered in food stains.’

  I let a long silence hang between us.

  He puts his hands behind his head and lets out a long breath.

  ‘Fine. Fine. Six people. And that’s the truth! I have slept with six girls in my life. One was a girlfriend, two were kind of on-and-off casual things, and the other three were one-nighters.’

  ‘How many times with each?’

  ‘Natalie, I am not answering that. I don’t even think I could answer that. I don’t keep a tally of all the times I’ve had sex.’

  ‘I’m looking for ballpark figures, nothing exact. Like with Vanessa—’

  ‘I don’t want to talk about Vanessa.’

  That means Vanessa was great in bed.

  ‘How many of them did you meet on Tinder?’

  ‘What? None!’

  ‘I know you’re on Tinder,’ I say, in my most I-am-very-relaxed-about-this-information-and-it-doesn’t-scare-me-at-all voice.

  ‘I’m not, actually.’

  He throws his phone on the bed. ‘Go ahead and check.’

  I’ve made him surrender his phone for me to look through like a police officer. This doesn’t seem ideal. I nudge the phone back to him.

  ‘I’m not looking at your phone.’

  ‘Then you’ll have to trust me.’ The scariest words in the world.

  Now I’ve opened the floodgates and I know he has had sex with six different people, all I can think is: You have to ask him about diseases, you have to ask him about diseases. If I’m not mature enough to ask, I’m not mature enough for sex (that’s the mantra we learned at school).

  ‘Have you ever had an STI check?’ I say. There, I did it. And probably no one ever actually asks this question, and I can see why, because the moment after asking is terrible.

  ‘Yes. Once.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘It was fine. Nothing. Negative.’

  ‘How many people have you slept with since then?’ Maybe there is some secret way to have this conversation and still keep the mood light and flirty, but my approach definitely leans more towards a cross-examination. Maybe I should be massaging his shoulders or something. No, I think that would be weirder.

  ‘Two.’

  ‘Did you use protection?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Every time?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Okay.’

  So he might have something, he might not. I don’t really know what to do with this information. They never gave us an explanation of what to do with the answer, especially if the answer was like this one. Or if they did, I can’t remember. Should I ask for paperwork? Make him go back to the doctor? That sounds like something a teacher would suggest and no one would ever do in real life. I’ve had the HPV vaccine, so that’s something, at least.

  ‘Are you running out of questions?’ He looks hopeful.

  ‘I will probably never run out of questions,’ I say. He should at least know this about me.

  ‘Can I ask a question?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Why do we need to have sex today?’

  ‘You don’t want to?’

  ‘I’m worried that you don’t actually want to.’

  ‘It’s my idea. Of course I want to.’

  ‘We could wait and just let things happen. You know, decide in the moment.’

  ‘That’s how people get pregnant.’

  The idea of treating sex as something that might just happen is not an idea I can get on board with. It would be like getting in a car and just driving aimlessly. I always like to know where I’m going. I need to know before I start something where I’m going to stop.

  ‘I mean, be prepared, obviously, but see how we feel. Maybe we have sex today. Maybe we do something else. Maybe we do it next week, or the week after, or at some unspecified date in the future.’

  I don’t know how to tell if he’s being a good guy, or patronising, or if he doesn’t want to have sex with me at all (which wouldn’t be surprising after all my questions). I want to say, I am perfectly capable of knowing when I want to have sex, thank you very much.

  ‘Okay. Well, I have these,’ I say instead. I take the packet of condoms out of the drawer and sit them on the bedside table with a flourish. Usually it’s covered in books, tissues, earrings and mugs with a little bit of cold tea in the bottom, but I’ve cleared everything else away, which was a mistake, because now the condoms are alone, and I may as well have installed a blinking neon light that says SEX, SEX, SEX.

  The box itself is still wrapped in plastic, and I’m worried we’ll have to spend too long trying to unwrap it in the throes of passion. (To be honest, I don’t even know what the word ‘throes’ means but I guess it means we’ll be thrashing around in pleasure. ‘Thrashing’ might be a worse word than ‘throes’.) Maybe I should get some scissors. I’m not even sure when exactly the condom-putting-on moment is supposed to occur, or h
ow fast it happens, if you can take your time or if you need to be rushing.

  I think I’m visibly sweating now. I need a tissue to pat down my forehead.

  Alex sits back down on the bed.

  ‘How many people have you slept with?’ he asks. The question I was hoping we could skim past.

  ‘Um, not many.’ I know I just demanded a lot of answers from him, and it’s very hypocritical, but I’d really rather remain a bit mysterious on this topic. I’m certain he suspects I’m a virgin, but I’d feel a lot better if we could just keep it as vague information circling in our minds rather than spelling it out.

  ‘How many is not many?’

  ‘A very, very small amount.’

  ‘How small?’

  ‘A statistically insignificant number.’

  ‘Natalie.’

  ‘None.’

  ‘Okay.’ He rubs his palms on his jeans. I think he’s sweating too.

  ‘Is that a problem?’ I ask.

  ‘Of course not,’ he says, but he looks worried.

  ‘Your face says otherwise.’

  ‘My face is normal.’

  ‘It’s not.’

  ‘It is.’

  ‘You look like someone who just got told bad news.’

  ‘No, I don’t.’

  ‘Don’t worry, I’m not someone who has any romantic fantasies about their first time.’

  ‘Clearly. You’ve already told me how bad you think it’s going to be.’

  ‘Not bad. I never said bad. Just not good.’

  ‘Right. You brought me over here to get the not good sex out of the way.’

  ‘So we can get to the good sex. You’re leaving that part out.’

  Alex lies back on the bed and covers his face with his hands. His T-shirt rides up, exposing his stomach a little. I resist the urge to lie my palm against his skin, to press my face against it.

  ‘You’re killing me,’ he says.

  ‘Forget everything I’ve said today. Let’s start over.’

  ‘I can’t. It’s all burned into my brain.’

  ‘Well, unburn it.’

  ‘I’m trying.’

  ‘Would it help if I said something sexy?’ I don’t know why I suggest this, because I’ve legitimately never said anything sexy in my life, but I need to turn things around somehow.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘It would make us both feel awkward I think.’

  ‘Let’s try it. It might reset the mood.’

  ‘I really don’t think—’

  ‘You look great in that T-shirt.’

  He sits up a little, dropping his hands from his face.

  ‘You know what, I didn’t hate that.’

  ‘See? Now you try.’

  ‘Your hair looks really good today.’

  ‘That was a nice compliment, but it wasn’t sexy.’

  ‘Okay, you look great in that top.’

  ‘You’re just repeating me.’

  ‘Yes, but you look great for a different reason,’ he says, and his cheeks are a little bit pink. (I’m wearing my best-fitting bra with the Boob Top, so I know immediately what he means.)

  ‘We’re not bad at this,’ I say.

  He slides over and kisses me, and it feels good to have his body covering mine again.

  After a while I pause. ‘We’re not going to have sex today,’ I say.

  ‘I know,’ he says.

  ‘You don’t care that I keep changing my mind?’ I say.

  ‘No,’ he says.

  28

  Not the Result We Were Hoping For

  This is it, the life-changing moment, the what-will-I-be-for-the-rest-of-my-life reveal. Or, more accurately, the what-will-I-be-doing-for-the-next-three-years reveal.

  I have read the articles and heard from the career counsellors that no one has a career for life anymore, and we’ll all change jobs two hundred times and end up working in tech industries that don’t exist yet, and then robots will replace those jobs, and we’ll end up floating heads in glass cases buying things through our AI companions as the seas rise up to slowly consume us (Zach and I started co-writing a sci-fi novel based on this premise a year ago—it was going to be the first in a nine-book series, until we argued for a week over what to name the main character and then got distracted and forgot about it), and none of this really matters, except this moment right here, this am-I-getting-into-university-and-if-I-am-what-university-will-it-be-and-what-course-will-I-be-studying moment. This feels like it does matter, it really, really matters.

  University offers are announced online at 2pm. It’s 1.57pm. I have spent the past hour and forty-three minutes freaking out: deep breathing, pacing, chewing five pieces of gum at once until my jaw aches, blocking social media on my phone so I don’t have to see reactions from other people, regretting the blocking and trying to delete the social-media blocking app. An irrational feeling of dread settled on me this morning, that maybe I actually misread my score last year, that maybe it was all a mistake, that maybe it’s not good enough and I won’t be offered anything, anywhere.

  At least this is an improvement on how I behaved before the ATAR results were announced, when I got up at 6am and sat in my wardrobe for an hour, refusing to speak to Mum and Dad.

  The clock ticks over. I log in, and the page loads very, very slowly. And then there it is. The course I wanted, Bachelor of Arts, at the university I wanted, the University of Melbourne.

  There. I did it.

  Everything as expected. My choice has been made.

  It feels…anticlimactic.

  I thought I would be filled with relief, and happiness, and I am, sort of. A slice of my future is now hard and concrete. But still, for the hours and hours of study I went through in year twelve, I thought I would feel something…more. I want to jump around the room, and scream and cry with happiness. Instead I’m already thinking about how big and scary the university is, and how I have no idea what I want to major in. And what does an arts degree get you anyway? Why didn’t I apply for a law degree or a business degree or something vaguely useful? Or, on the other hand, why didn’t I apply for something risky and creative and interesting? Why am I even going to university? I should be travelling, experiencing real life. Nothing I’ve ever done has felt like real life to me.

  I call Mum, then Dad, and they’re both filled with excitement and pride, which should make me feel better, but somehow makes me feel worse, partly because I have to have pretty much the same conversation twice.

  I think maybe I am very bad at being happy for myself.

  I text Lucy, and she doesn’t respond, which is strange. I want to text Zach, but I can’t, because we’re still fighting, or, at least, I’m still furious at him and he hasn’t apologised and I don’t know where we stand with each other, and the fact that our friendship is a mess right now is one of the main factors contributing to my unease about everything.

  Then my phone rings, and Lucy’s name appears on the screen.

  ‘Hi,’ I say.

  ‘I’m outside.’

  ‘My house?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Well, come in.’

  I go to the front door, and Lucy is standing there, looking upset. ‘What’s wrong?’ I say.

  ‘I didn’t get in.’

  ‘Oh, Luce.’

  I hug her, and lead her into the lounge room. I fill the kettle, putting a bag of Lucy’s favourite herbal tea into the most soothing mug we own, which is so big that it is more bowl than cup.

  Lucy starts pacing in my lounge room. ‘Okay, first tell me what you got into,’ she says to me.

  ‘Arts at Melbourne.’

  ‘Good. Okay. That makes me feel a bit better,’ she says.

  ‘So you didn’t get into commerce at Melbourne?’ That was her first preference plan. Do a commerce degree, and then post-grad law.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Did you get into law?’ Her second, third and fourth preferences were undergrad law at othe
r universities.

  ‘No.’

  ‘At any uni?’

  ‘Nope.’

  ‘How is that possible?’ Lucy got great marks. Her mother bought her a monogrammed leather satchel as a graduation gift for doing so well.

  Now Lucy’s face crumples a little, and she doesn’t meet my eye. She sits down on the couch and puts her head into her hands. ‘I don’t know how to say it,’ she says.

  The kettle pings then, and I leave her for a moment to make the tea and bring it back in. I put it on the coffee table in front of her.

  ‘Careful, it’s hot,’ I say, like she’s a little kid.

  She still doesn’t raise her head from her hands. I take the cup back to the kitchen and put some cold water in, because I’m worried she’s too distracted to listen to what I’m saying and she’ll take a big mouthful and burn herself.

  ‘Okay, I’m just going to say it,’ she says, when I put the cup down a second time.

  ‘Good.’

  ‘On the count of three.’

  ‘Okay.’

  ‘Can you do the count?’

  ‘One, two, three.’

  ‘That was too fast. I wasn’t ready.’

  ‘One…two…three.’

  Lucy takes a huge breath in and lets it out. Her hands are shaking a little. ‘One more time.’

  ‘Luce. Come on.’ She’s starting to scare me.

  ‘Just do it one more time.’

  ‘One one thousand. Two one thousand. Three one thousand.’

  ‘Okay. Okay. Here it is. I lied about my score.’

  ‘You what?’

  ‘You and Zach got such great marks, and I saw them, and I just…pretended I got that mark too.’

  The morning our results were announced, the three of us had our usual group chat. Zach posted his mark first, then I wrote mine, and now I think about it, there was definitely a pause before Lucy posted hers. At the time it had seemed miraculous and yet completely right that we all got marks so close. We all worked so hard. We were all brought up to be over achievers. We studied together. It made sense. But maybe it didn’t.

  ‘Oh, Lucy.’

  ‘My score isn’t even that bad! It’s fine. Average, maybe. It just isn’t amazing like yours. It wasn’t good enough for law. Or anything at Melbourne Uni. I don’t know why I lied. There’s something wrong with me, probably.’