by Sonia Hartl
“That would be something to see.” Paul took a bite of his sandwich. “I’m assuming the girls know I’m not really your boyfriend. Do you want to stage a breakup, or no?”
“Why? Is there someone you’re interested in?” I tucked a lock of hair behind my ear, all casual. We hadn’t really discussed the breakup portion of our arrangement, and for some reason the thought of it made me queasy. “Because it’s cool if you are. I’ll back off.”
“Back off what?” He shoved a forkful of macaroni salad into his mouth, chewing while he contemplated. “I thought you’d be done with faking it.”
“I guess.” This breakup, fake-up, whatever, didn’t feel right. But if he didn’t want to pretend, I couldn’t force him into a role he no longer wanted to play. “We don’t need to stage anything; we can naturally go back to being friends.”
“Naturally, huh?” He balled up his empty plate. “If that’s what you want.”
Everything had gotten twisted up. I had no idea what I wanted, but he sounded annoyed with the whole thing. Trying to figure out my feelings and his snappy tone was like walking barefoot and blindfolded through a desert.
Was I developing romantic feelings for Paul? I had a strong urge to dig a hole and bury myself in it. This was my best friend. The boy I’d grown up next door to my entire life. It had to be the fake-dating. I’d somehow manufactured feelings because I couldn’t distinguish between real and not-real to save my life. I glanced at him and his expression floundered somewhere between irritated and confused. The same expression he’d worn when I’d complimented his cologne or that time I’d told him we should just go to junior prom together instead of stressing over finding and keeping dates.
My face flushed and I had to look away. God. What did that even mean? I couldn’t have romantic feelings for Paul. Where would that leave me when he walked away? Would it hurt our friendship? The fact that I was asking these questions left me reeling.
Maybe I could dip my toe in the water and see if it was warm enough to wade in. “I told you I liked faking it with you, and I meant that.”
“You also told me you didn’t want to ride my bike when we were seven. But I distinctly recall you stealing it out of my garage while I was at church and bending the front wheel when you ran it into a ditch.”
So much for testing the waters. “I’m so glad you’re my best friend. Who else can I count on to hold a mistake over my head ten years after the fact?”
“More recently, you told me you didn’t care about making junior prom court.”
“I didn’t.”
He raised his eyebrows.
“Okay, fine. It was kind of cool.” I threw a chunk of cheese at him. “Are you going to do this all afternoon? Trot out every lie I ever told and hold me to them all?”
“I don’t know. Maybe.”
“Good to know, because this mood sucks. Come find me when you’ve pulled your head out of your ass.” I headed back to my cabin. Mandy and Astrid always acted like they knew something about Paul I didn’t. Maybe they could sort out his shitty attitude.
“Wait. I’m sorry.” He stood and jogged to catch up to me, tossing his plate into the garbage on the way. “I don’t know why I’m being an ass.”
“Forget it. But for the record”—I poked him in the chest—“I felt really bad about your bike. I rolled pennies for a month to get it fixed.”
“You never told me that.” His expression turned too serious for broken bikes and rolled pennies. “I know everything about you. How do you still manage to surprise me?”
My toes tingled, putting me back on uneven ground. “A girl has to keep some secrets. But that was my last one, so way to ruin my mystique.”
“I somehow doubt that’s your last secret.”
He tucked his hands into his pockets and strolled away, leaving me with a low level of frustration I’d attributed to my tingling toes and general cluelessness. Somewhere between the fake-dating and our non-breakup, we’d wandered into something different. Not platonic, but still friendly. I didn’t know quite how to define it yet, but maybe, for once in my life, I didn’t need to rush headlong into figuring it out. If I could learn how to swim in an ocean I’d created, I could learn how to bounce along and let the waves take me where I needed to go.
Chapter 16
Free hour was in full swing at camp. I gazed out at the lake, at all the kids flying in the air from the Blob, and had another stab of anger for Priscilla. Not getting to try that thing would be my biggest regret when I left this place.
I pushed open my cabin door and found a group of fifteen girls packed into our tiny room. Half the rising juniors and a few sophomores. They all eyed me with varying looks of curiosity and anticipation.
“Hello, everyone.” I gave them an awkward wave.
“Excuse us.” Astrid took my arm and led me outside.
I put my hands on my hips. “What’s going on in there?”
“Don’t be mad.” She worried her heavy top lip between her teeth. “I did some thinking the other night, after all the stuff you told us, about how others could really benefit from hearing from you. The girls here … No one talks to them about sex.”
“You want me to talk to a bunch of Christian girls about sex?” Had she lost her mind? I was the furthest thing from a trained professional. “I can’t do that. I’m already on super-thin ice, and if Pastor Dean gets word of this—”
“He won’t.” Astrid held my shoulders. “These girls are in need of information, and if someone doesn’t tell them, it makes it easier for an Ethan to show them.”
“I’m not sure what you want me to say.” I hadn’t considered losing my virginity to be some big secret, not at home anyway, but I didn’t walk around with it written in black Sharpie on my forehead, either. “It’s kind of personal. I didn’t mind sharing with you and Mandy and Sarina, but I don’t know anyone in there.”
“You don’t have to get as detailed as you did with us. But it would help them to know it wasn’t all fun and games, you know? It could be like a sex workshop.”
I was pretty sure a sex workshop fell under “putting a toe out of line.” But if Astrid thought it was a good idea, maybe it wouldn’t be so bad? If we didn’t talk to each other, where could we go? They wouldn’t talk to their parents or their pastors willingly, not if they were anything like me. I’d debated having surgical memory removal after my mom gave me the Talk.
“If I’m not comfortable with a question, I’m not going to answer it,” I said.
“Absolutely.”
“I’d rather not go through the whole story again. It would be better if they just asked me stuff. That way they can decide what they want to know about.”
“Great idea.” Astrid nudged me forward. “You’re a natural leader. They’ll listen to you.” She pushed the door open. “CeCe has agreed to answer any questions you might have, but please be respectful. If she says no, don’t push it, or we’ll end the discussion.” She leaned against the wall beside me, giving everyone the stink-eye to let them know she meant business.
I cleared my throat. Public speaking, or any form of being put on the spot, usually had me searching in panic for the nearest exit, but I’d already told Astrid I’d do this. For reasons that escaped me at the moment. “Hi again. Most of you know me from the bonfire disaster. Since I’ve already been beyond humiliated in front of you all, what’s a few invasive questions among strangers who may, or may not, think my eternal soul is up for damnation?”
A few of the girls in the back exchanged uneasy glances. This was going well. I turned to Astrid, who gave me an encouraging nod. I didn’t know what she expected me to do. Maybe I knew how to give a hand job because Tyler Volk was a bossy asshole, and I knew what having sex exactly one time felt like, but that hardly made me fit to give a lecture on the subject. I thought maybe this was something we could talk about together, but Astrid clearly had other ideas. Ideas she hadn’t bothered to discuss with me before she shoved me into this situation.
>
“I know you don’t know me.” A pretty Latina girl with eyelashes so long that they looked store-bought raised her hand. “I’m Autumn Ruiz, rising junior by the way, but we talked about what happened to you last night.”
“And what did you decide?” I tried to keep the resentment out of my voice, but this wasn’t how I’d planned to spend my free afternoon.
“We don’t think you’re going to Hell. Actually, we think it was awesome that you stood up for yourself.” She glanced around at the other girls, who had apparently nominated Autumn to be their spokesperson. The girl sitting to her right whispered in her ear, face flaming.
“And we also think your boyfriend, Paul, is really cool,” Autumn said. A few of the girls giggled.
“Paul is great, but he’s not my boyfriend.” Maybe I shouldn’t have led with that. At the mention of Paul not being my boyfriend, two of the girls bent their heads together and started whispering. Which was unfortunate. Paul was not the good Christian boy they’d be able to bring home to Mom. “It’s complicated. He’s also had way more sex than me, so maybe he would be a better person for this Q and A.”
“We can’t talk to a guy about this stuff,” said a blond sophomore I recognized from the dining hall. “They don’t get it.”
“No, I guess they don’t,” I said. “But if you’re looking at me like I’m some kind of sexpert, you’re going to be sorely disappointed. I’ve only done it the one time, with one guy. There are other partners, and not all sex is heterosexual.”
Autumn averted her gaze. I hadn’t missed the way her cheeks had darkened, but I didn’t want to put her on the spot if she wasn’t out yet or if I’d misjudged her blush. Astrid shifted her stance, and I glanced at her to back me up.
This was her idea, after all.
Astrid pushed off from the wall to stand closer to me, a subtle show of solidarity, and I wanted to hug her for it. “This is a safe place for us to talk honestly, and if you can’t ensure your presence here is safe for everyone, you’re welcome to leave.”
A few of the girls looked around, as if they expected someone to walk out. No one did, much to my surprise, though Autumn put a lot of focus into picking at a hangnail on her thumb. At least we’d established some ground rules for this unexpected conversation.
After an uncomfortable beat, another girl raised her hand. “Does it hurt?”
“It hurt for me. A lot. Though I can’t stress enough, this might not be the case for you, and if your partner doesn’t care, it’s going to hurt worse. Because they’ll just go at it without bothering to see how you’re holding up.”
A few girls exchanged horrified glances, and I wanted to take the whole thing back. I kept letting my resentment for Ethan bite through my words.
“Look.” I held out my hands. “It’s not like I’ll never have sex again. I just had a really bad experience, but I’ve talked to people who’ve done it a lot and they think it’s great.”
By people, I mainly meant Paul.
“Not everyone likes it though, right?” Astrid’s nervous tone gave me pause. Astrid didn’t get nervous, and I didn’t want to give the impression that sex was some weird rite of passage.
I squeezed her shoulder. “Not everyone has to do it. I’m just talking about people who want to. They generally seem to think it’s fun, or whatever.”
“That’s a lie the patriarchy tells us so boys can keep getting laid,” said a short girl with a splash of freckles across her nose. Where did she get her information?
“The patriarchy desires girls while punishing them for being desirable. Your worth is measured by how well you squeeze between the lines. That’s the lie.” I did my best to keep the exasperation out of my voice, but from the way a few of the girls edged away from me, my best hadn’t been good enough. “However, girls can, and do, enjoy sex. Haven’t any of you ever masturbated? That felt good, right?”
Most of them shook their heads, some with more vigor than others, which made me think they were lying. But I couldn’t blame them. The one time I thought I’d give it a try, the idea of touching myself embarrassed me so much, I had to stop before I really started.
“Did you bleed?” a younger girl in back asked. “My cousin told me girls who have sex for the first time bleed worse than their periods, and it gets all over the guy.”
“I bled a little, but it wasn’t like anything out of a horror movie. Bleeding is going to be the least of your worries anyway. When you’re naked in front of someone else, it’s really hard not to pick yourself apart and focus on all your flaws.”
The girl turned stark white, and I had to wonder if I was any better than her cousin, who had obviously tried to scare her into keeping her virginity. Every time I opened my mouth, it felt like I said the wrong thing. No matter how many times I told them sex could be good, it’s like they didn’t want to believe me. Or maybe they had no reason to. It’s not like I had personal experience in good sex to back up my claim.
“I think I’m making a lot of mistakes here.” I glanced back at Astrid, who had that secretive smile on her face again. “Can we take a break? I didn’t expect to walk into this today.”
“That’s a good idea.” Astrid took the lead in the room again. “Let’s give this a rest, give CeCe a chance to be more prepared, and we’ll pick another time to meet up.”
After a few skeptical glances among the girls, they agreed. They probably thought of all the other times in their life they’d been promised a real discussion about sex, only to be told to wait. But I couldn’t use them as an open forum for me to complain about all the ways one guy had let me down. That felt icky, and dishonest.
After the girls had filed out of our cabin, Astrid turned to me. “Sorry I sprung that on you.”
“Yeah, what was that about?” I had a lot of annoyed energy buzzing around inside me, and I didn’t have a place to direct it. This discussion Astrid promised had somehow turned into a lecture and a disaster. I wasn’t mad at her, not really, but it felt like she’d led me into a tiger cage wearing a meat dress.
“Some of the younger girls came to me this afternoon with a lot of questions, and I didn’t know how to answer them. I was serious when I said you should lead workshops.”
“So you wanted me to scare them away from sex?”
“No. It’s not like that at all. I want them to be prepared for what it’s really like. None of us had any idea, and we’re supposed to be the senior leaders here.”
“That’s the problem. I don’t know what it’s really like!” I exploded, and Astrid shrank back from me. “What I told you guys was really personal, and supposed to be just for us. I didn’t know you were going to put me on display.”
“I promise I didn’t mean it like that.” Astrid’s baby-doll face scrunched up. “We learned so much from you, and I thought you could share your story, because I respect you.”
“I know you’re born into this life where you think every screwup is an opportunity for growth in other people, but that’s not me. My embarrassing sex story is mine, and I choose who I share it with. Clearly, I made a mistake.”
I walked away from her, slamming the door behind me.
Chapter 17
I marched up the path toward the big house, where I knew Paul would be on kitchen duty. I needed to see someone I trusted. With my eyes on my feet, I ran headfirst into him.
“Whoa. Hey.” He held my shoulders to steady me. “Where are you going looking like someone just ran over your cat and now you’re going to run over them?”
“I was looking for you,” I said. “Can we go somewhere that isn’t my cabin?”
“Hmm. Trouble in Christian paradise?”
“I think I traumatized, like, half the girls at camp.”
Paul laughed. “Why does that not surprise me?”
“Forget hellfire and brimstone. If the powers that be really wanted to keep good Christian girls from having sex, they’d just tell them what it’s really like.”
“Ouch.”
“Maybe that’s an exaggeration. But still. I’m mad right now, okay? Astrid invited a bunch of people to the cabin so she could put my awful sex life on display. Like I was a life lesson. ‘Wait for sex, girls, or you’ll end up like CeCe.’”
“I figured something like that would happen.” His lips thinned. “Walk with me?”
We took the trail that led behind the chapel, one not as frequently used or as well maintained. The grass had grown over, and it brushed against my ankles. We walked past a building that had fallen out of use. The blue paint chipped from hard winters and clung to the old clapboard like silent tears. We found a flat rock up on a hill that overlooked the whole camp.
After a long beat of comfortable quiet, where we sat next to each other and stared at the lake, he turned to me. “Do you think Astrid set you up to be a fallen angel?”
“I don’t know.” I rubbed my burning cheeks. “She said she didn’t mean it like that, and she always comes off as so genuine, but it felt like she wanted me to reinforce her stance on abstinence, and that’s not what I’m about.”
“Do you think it’s possible they’re just so starved for information, they’ll take what they can get, even if it’s not the greatest story?”
“I considered it.” When I’d left my cabin, I’d figured they could Google anything they really wanted to know, but they lived different lives than me. I had no clue what kind of trouble they’d get into for a simple Google search if they got caught. Or what misinformation they’d stumble upon. The Internet was a wasteland.
“I’m not defending Astrid,” Paul said. “Putting you on the spot like that wasn’t a good idea, but she probably thinks highly of you if she trusts your advice. I don’t think she intended to be malicious about it, or use you to scare Christian girls into waiting for marriage.”
My jaw dropped. “You’re giving her the benefit of the doubt?”
“Why so surprised? I like your cabin. They seem like cool girls.”
“You don’t like Christians.”
“I don’t like hypocrites.” He ran a hand through his hair. “Growing up in the church, I met a lot of different types. A good majority used Christianity to further their own sense of superiority, to hold their faith and knowledge over others as a way to condemn them while lifting themselves up. But I also knew genuine people. Kind people.”
