There are some things that you don't tell anyone. Certain events or stories that you keep all to yourself. Not because they're too detrimental to those who know, but for one of two reasons: they're either immensely embarrassing or you're afraid that people will suddenly treat you differently.
Now, there are two kinds of girls: those who are virgins and those who are not. Let me clarify something for you: virginity doesn't define who you are. There's no way to know if a girl is a virgin just by looking at her. It's not as if a red A is plastered upon her bosom, like Hester Prynne in The Scarlet Letter. Virginity is an amorphous kind of trait; indefinite and shapeless.
This is the story of how I lost my virginity. It is a maladroit tale, a cataclysm of lies I'm not too proud of. But, I do ask you one thing: refrain from judgement until the end.
Listen, now.
*
"This is disgusting."
Celeste O'Connor pursed her lips into a tight pucker, as if she'd swallowed an entire lemon. Her blond curls were pulled back, her pale eyes glued to the sandwich in front of her, which was dripping with mayonnaise and chunky pieces of tuna.
"I second that motion," I said, tucking my knees to my chest.
The day was warm. The Californian heat cascaded from the blue sky, pouring over my freckled shoulders. There was a cluster of plush trees to our left, the shade simply out of our reach. Students paraded over the front field, packed together in tight-knit groups, gossiping and making over dramatic gestures with their hands, which were covered in glittering jewelry.
I finished my granola bar and crumpled the wrapper in hand, my throat begging me for more liquid.
"Do you have any cash on you?" Celeste finally asked, her sandwich plummeting onto a plastic bag, making an atrocious squishing noise as it made contact.
I nodded towards my purse.
Celeste smiled, her teeth crooked. Her hair stood up in wisps around her gaunt face, the humidity turning her curls to unwanted frizz. Her nails, chipped with an orange polish, lifted up the flap on my denim purse. After a couple frustrated seconds, she snapped her head up at me.
"It's like you're carrying a Pharmacy in here," she rolled her eyes, "I mean, who needs four shades of the same lipstick?"
"A girl can never have too many lip products."
"You're insane."
"Bite me," I retorted.
With an aggravated sigh, Celeste yanked my purse into the air and shook all of the contents onto the table. "There," she said, triumphant. "Now I can see what I'm dealing with." She flicked away a pair of my dirty gym socks.
Celeste and I'd been friends for too long. She was over-dramatic, over-sensitive, and over-indulgent in every sense. She was a handful, but I loved her. When we were younger, people used to call me "Pepper Peyton" because my hair was as red as a the crimson coloured vegetable. During art glass, Celeste had glued each of their lockers shut with crazy glue.
She was absolutely, irrevocably insane.
After finding some money to finance her purchases, she returned with a bag of chips and a can of soda.
"How nutritious," I rolled my eyes.
"Shut up, Peyton," she told me, reaching into the bag with her glossed nails and removing a ruffled chip, "it's the last day of school, I'm allowed to break my cleanse."
Celeste's cleanse consisted of trying to eat healthy then coming to my house and pigging out on butter flavoured popcorn. We'd both broken our New Years resolutions, which consisted of eating healthy (that never seemed to work for anyone), losing our virginity (we were both still as pure as pastors), and to do better in school (which seemed nearly impossible).
I raised my face to the sky, allowing my skin to soak in the sun.
Placing her food onto the picnic table I was sitting on, she began throwing all of my items back into my purse.
Celeste's once placid expression turned mischievous. I tilted my head to the side, observing her as her eyes widened.
"What?" I finally asked. I ran my hands over my bare legs, which were prickly from my lack of shaving them. Every time I showered I grew distracted by singing and reading the back of the shampoo bottles. My razors were just very unappealing to my lazy self.
"What's this?" a gleeful giggle removed itself from her pink lips. She raised a small package in front of me, waving it side to side. The silver square package glinted against the sun's crude rays. I narrowed my eyes, searching for an excuse. My heart rose in my chest and I reached forward, attempting to yank the package away from her grasp.
"A condom?" Her eyes were ominous and curious. "Peyton, why in the world would you need a condom?" She raised her straight eyebrows. I shrugged sheepishly.
"You don't have to keep repeating the word."
"What word?" she smiled. "Condom?" I frowned. "What were you planning on doing with this?"
"It's to have sex," I snapped, pulling it from her sweaty hands, "Obviously."
She continued to look at me with her large, doe eyes. Celeste leaned forward, placing her thin face into her big palms. "You and Josh finally gonna do the nasty?"
I scrunched my nose. Celeste always came up with the most inappropriate comments on taboo subjects.
"Oh, Lord Jesus," I flushed, "you make it sound a lot worse than it really it."
"You guys are finally gonna rub pets, aren't you?"
"You're disgusting."
"Oh my God," her eyes grew wider. "You still are a virgin, right? Please tell me you haven't sealed the deal yet. Not without telling me, your best friend." I remained silent, and her eyes glossed over with anticipation. "You better be a virgin, so help me I will murder your first born child..."
"Keep your voice down!" I yelled to her. People surrounded us and there wasn't a doubt in my mind that they could hear what we were saying. I wondered if they were listening.
"I'm still a virgin, you don't need to track down my unborn child." I held the condom more tightly in my hand. "I'm just hoping that Josh can change that for me."
Josh Aker and I had been dating for nearly six months. Like Celeste, I'd known Josh for a long time, and when we were younger, I grew up with the mentality that we would end up getting married. Recently, Josh had been acting strange around me, and I hoped that us sleeping together would create a new bond that perhaps hadn't been established.
"You're kidding, right?" she smiled. "You hope he'll do that favour for you? Peyton, he's been begging you for what, four months now? All guys are the same. They all want to get laid. It's in their nature."
"I guess you're right."
"Why the sudden change of heart? A couple weeks ago you said you didn't know if Josh was the one for you."
"I'm not all too sure. All I know is that everyone else is doing it and I don't want to be a bad girlfriend to make him wait."
"It doesn't make you a bad girlfriend. It's a mutual decision and if you're not ready, don't feel obliged to do so." Celeste went through these phases of philosophical therapist. "One last toast?" she asked, motioning to her soda.
We raised our drinks and shouted in unison: "To virgins!"
"I have chemistry next," Celeste grimaced. "I'm going to get detention if I show up late one more time, and I don't think he'll hesitate to hold me in on the last day of school." She leaned forward and kissed me on the cheek. "Bye, you filthy animal!"
Celeste O'Connor was taking all of the AP classes available in our high school curriculum. Her parents were very strict, and they continuously compared her to her younger brother, Nathan. She needed to work hard in all of classes, because her parents couldn't afford college for her and her brother.
In the near distance, I saw Josh. He was the shortest amongst his friends, his blue Yankees cap pulled over his dark hair. His teeth, product of years of braces, were perfectly straight, a row of shiny pearls. Taking a deep breath, I allowed my legs to carry myself towards him.
I popped a mint into my mouth and combed my hair out of my eyes. His eyes, the colour of the night sky, found mine and he signalled to his friends that he'd be right back.
"Josh!" I waved a little too enthusiastically, hitting myself in the face with my hand.
"Hey, Peyton," he offered me only a quick smile. I leaned in for a kiss, but Josh didn't seem to reciprocate or notice. I pretended to take a step forward instead and bobbed my head, trying to brush off the awkwardness of the situation. "I was wondering if we could talk."
I smoothed my skirt and tried to plaster a confident smile onto my face.
"Sure. I actually wanted to talk to you also." I leaned against the trunk of a rough tree, slipping and falling onto the ground. He rolled his eyes and gave me his hand. "Thanks."
He took me gently by the wrist and my face hurt from smiling so much.
"What did you want to talk about?" I asked him, fixing my purse onto the crook of my arm. We sat down on a picnic bench and the wood itched my bare legs. My fingers twisted the black studs in my ears.
"I've been thinking a lot about us lately," he said slowly. I sighed with relief. Maybe I didn't have to bring up the sex talk at all. Perhaps Josh and I were on the same page for once.
"Me too," I breathed dreamily. My hand reached for his knee and I nuzzled my face close and let out, what I hoped, was a seductive growl. To me, it sounded like a dying pig.
"Peyton, I think you're getting the wrong idea." I allowed my hands to fall back to my sides. My ponytail flapped in the wind and fond it's way into my face, tangling with my lip gloss.
"What do you mean?"
"I just..." he had a habit of trailing off, "I don't think this is going to work. I don't think that we're going to work." I could feel my expressions evolving from surprise, to shock, to confusion. Quietness filled the air between us and I blocked out all exterior noises.
"What?" my voice was barely a whisper. My purse fell to the ground with a heavy thud.
"Lately you've seemed distant and I didn't know whether or not it was because of me or..." he looked directly into my eyes. "Someone else?"
"I'm not cheating on you," the hurt in my voice was impossible to miss. Josh was my first boyfriend, along with my first real kiss.
"Don't you feel the same way?" Josh asked me, turning his thumbs over each other. "Isn't this what you had to talk about?"
"Ha, yeah," I lied. "Of course. Absolutely. Perfect."
He leaned forward and placed a hand on my back, giving me a friendly pat. "See? It all works out. With summer rounding the corner, it would have just made things more complicated." Meaning that I could have made his other summer flings complicated.
"Yes," I said, "of course. Completely understandable. I mean, who needs a relationship anyway? Relationships are for people who want to settle down, and I'll let you know, I don't want to settle down. Woo, not me. I'm the type of girl who likes to party and get it on!" by the end I was practically yelling, my words just spilling out.
Josh frowned. "I still love you, Peyton. Just... as a friend. I still believe in relationships, but not this one."
"I love you, too." I felt like slapping myself in the face with a brick.
"So, it's agreed? Friends?"
I held my breath for a couple solitary moments. "Yeah, friends." It took every ounce of my willpower to utter those words.
"Terrific." He shook my hand. "I'll see you at Graham's tonight, right?"
I gave him a tight nod and he realized that I was done talking. He rose and walked back towards his friends as the fifth period bell finally sounded.
Graham was one of our mutual friends, who always threw parties and small gatherings with friends whenever it was possible. His parents divorced a couple years ago, and since then, his mother allowed him to do as he pleased, which included hosting events with a lot of underage drinking.
There would be around ten of us at Graham's, and I knew that I wouldn't be able to avoid Celeste and Josh. I would have to either face my ex boyfriend or tell my best friend that my elaborate plan of losing my virginity had gone to complete turmoil.
I'd choose the latter.
If I had slept with Josh earlier, would it have prevented him from breaking up with me now?
I lifted my purse to my lap and removed another breath mint. I fingered the condom package and couldn't help but smile. Just as I was about to give myself to Josh, my first love, he abandoned me. My luck seemed to be perfect.
For now, my virginity continued to remain under its reigns. Everyone was losing it so quickly, and it was my turn to feel like I belonged to this taboo game.
An aching feeling surmounted in my stomach: this was going to be a summer to remember. Perhaps, for all the wrong reasons.