“I’m not scared,” I said again. “But sex is kind of a big deal for me.”
He nodded, all serious face. “Yeah. It is for me too. I’ve never . . .”
“Wait. You haven’t?” God, for all his varsity kisses, he was a virgin, same as me.
“No. We’d both be having our first time together.”
I took a breath. “Together?”
“Yeah. And it would mean something. It does mean something. You mean something to me.”
My heart beat even faster. I breathed through my nose three times, then licked my lips and whispered, “Okay.”
“You sure?”
I nodded. “Do you have protection?” Because for all that I was doing something daring and a little dangerous and very unlike me, I was never going to give that up.
He pulled out his wallet and held up a square foil. “Cam’s safety condom.”
I hid my face with my hands. “Oh God. I’ll die if he knows we used that.”
Mateo tugged at my wrists. “Hey, hey. It’s me. I wouldn’t say anything. You know I wouldn’t say anything. This, now, it’s just you and me, okay? Tell me you want this.”
I shoved my fears into the back of my mind and reached out to touch Mateo’s cheek. “Yes,” I breathed. “Yes. Yes. Yes.”
Then I helped him slide off my pants and lower me from the wooden pew onto the red carpet. Thousands of student feet had walked over this carpet and I was about to lose my virginity on it. We were about to lose our virginity together on it. I almost laughed at the absurdity. But I didn’t, because this was my first time and, finally, I knew it was right and I had nothing to be afraid of.
Mateo shifted and my logical brain tried to bust back in. I was doing this, and dreamworld or not, there were some things to address. Mom had lectured about “first times” enough that I didn’t expect a lot on the physical front. My big O in the truck earlier was a surprise, and it was a lot bigger than anything I’d ever accidentally done myself, but Mateo had good hands and I had always been sensitive down there. Still, I had every expectation that sex would hurt, that I would likely bleed, and that he wouldn’t last long. All of Mom’s “sex-positive education” and her insistence on “owning your orgasm” couldn’t really undo what I’d learned from overheard girl conversations in school or even speculated about with Eve, and the essays in the first-time book I’d read were too varied to be of much help on the “what is this going to feel like” front.
I shut my eyes for a second and willed my logical brain away. This was Mateo, who I wanted so much I couldn’t imagine anywhere else I’d rather be. This was the boy who made my whole self shake and tingle, and feel like I had to pee.
“Open your eyes, Chloe,” Mateo whispered. I peeled them open and looked.
He moved between my legs and slid his pants and underwear down. I’d seen a penis before—thanks, internet—but not in real life. I’d felt Mateo through his jeans earlier, but it looked different up close. Sort of red and a little angry looking.
“You’re circumcised,” I blurted, then wanted to die.
He laughed. “Yeah. So?”
I was completely exposed, all naked on the red carpet with only my fingernail-bitten hands to cover any of me. I wanted to either get to the sex so my dumb logical brain would stop interrupting or snap my legs shut. But my brain refused to let go without an explanation. “You’re from Mexico. I thought the rates of circumcision in Latin countries are really low.”
He gaped at me.
“God. Sorry, my parents are really into different cultures. I know a lot of weird facts.”
Oh, jeez. I hated hated hated my mouth’s refusal to ignore my brain.
He raised an eyebrow. “You really want to get into a discussion about this right now?”
“No. God no. Sorry, you’re right. Go ahead.”
I tried to relax, but I must have looked all contorted because Mateo put his hand on my thigh and said softly, “We don’t have to. I don’t want to pressure you.”
“No. I want to. With you. First time for both of us.”
“You’re sure you’re not scared? I’m a little scared.”
I laughed and something in me eased. Then I whispered, “You’re sure no one can come in here?”
“Positive,” he said, then bent his head and shifted it down. Down, down, down, past my stomach. My legs snapped together, and he said, “Ow.”
“Sorry. God. I’m sorry. This isn’t going well. I’m so sorry. But not that, okay? You don’t have to do that. Prep me or whatever you think you’re doing. It’s fine. Just, you know, go ahead with the main act.”
He laughed again and moved up to kiss my stomach and the top of one of my boobs. “For some guys, going down on a girl is the main act.”
It was a line. It had to be a line. I couldn’t forget how Cam had said Chloe Donnelly tasted like old Miracle Whip and if what I’d overheard in gym class was anything to go by, guys did not like putting their mouths anywhere near the vulva.
But he looked down like he was interested in seeing me. Which made my whole body feel like it was on fire, though if it was from embarrassment or desperation, I wasn’t totally sure.
“My mom told me not to shave because you need pubic hair in evidence collection kits, but Eve said every girl does it so I did.” Oh God. It was the worst blurting I’d ever done. My logical brain had rocketed into overdrive in a mortifying way. I slapped my hands over my face and hoped for a heart attack so I could die right there on the floor. Right there on the crappy red carpet, which no longer seemed to be full of history but more the location where I’d be mocked for the rest of my life. Do you remember that girl who was trying to lose her virginity but messed it up by talking about rape kits? Isn’t this where that “shaving girl” cock-blocked some poor guy with her own stupid, blurting mouth?
I expected Mateo to at best laugh and at worst say he wasn’t going to have sex for the first time with such a blurty freak show after all. But he peeled my hands away and kissed my face in a bunch of different places, over and over. Cheek, jaw, forehead, nose, eyelids. “I like you so much, Chloe,” he said. And he repeated “so much” with each kiss.
I eased my legs open again. He picked up the condom he’d set to the side, and because I’m me and couldn’t stop, I took it from him and rolled it on.
He watched my hands and then laughed once in this kind of throaty way. “You sure this is your first time?”
“My mom made me watch videos about how to put these on right. Most condom failures happen because they aren’t put on properly. Or they’re old and break.”
Mateo grinned and kissed all the places on my face again. “I think I’d like your mom.”
“Yeah, maybe. But she can be a bit much.”
“At least she didn’t make you practice on a banana.”
I grinned, feeling at ease even though this conversation was going nothing like I’d ever imagined. “That’d be a waste of a condom and a banana.”
He laughed and then, without any fanfare or real warning, he pressed in. I was having sex, with no real plan or long, drawn-out discussion or presex conversation with my friends or my mom. I was doing it. For Mateo, for me, for us. God, the things I was willing to do for him, the things I would give up for him.
Where the hell was my logical brain now?
It was pretty much shut down because having sex with Mateo actually felt good. Really, really good. There was no burning sensation or tearing or feeling like I was going to split in half. There was just wet and warm and . . . oh.
“The pee thing is back,” I gasped, when his hips pressed in a little more and he reached down to touch my clitoris.
“What?”
“Oh. Oh.” I didn’t know what to do or say. This was different from in the truck, different from the loofah. My body got super tight and tense and then I was twitching, twitching, twitching, which I definitely had never done like this before, and clinging to him and whispering his name. And maybe it sounded like a
plea to him too because he started moving faster and felt bigger, which was confusing but I couldn’t register any of that.
After what felt like an hour of me twitching but was probably twenty seconds, he paused and pressed himself up in a sort of half push-up and said, “Did you . . . did you just come?”
I slammed my eyes shut. “Yes,” I whispered.
“Chloe.”
I peeked one eye open and he looked so happy and pleased. My heart flipped over, fully in control now. My logical brain had been orgasmed out of me completely. Mateo kissed my face again, the same pattern he’d done the first time. Cheek, jaw, forehead, nose, eyelids. But now his hips moved as he kissed me, and he whispered, “Thank you, thank you, thank you,” with each kiss. Finally, he jerked and shuddered, and it was done.
He laugh-groaned after a few seconds. “I didn’t know it was going to be like that. That was . . . pretty great.” Then he pulled out of me and tied up his condom full of what seemed like an ungodly amount of semen—Mom had trained me not to say things like cum or jizz or love custard or man batter or whatever other gross words guys used. He held it awkwardly because there wasn’t exactly a Kleenex around or a wastebasket.
“I guess you came too, huh?” I said.
Then we both laughed for a long time and he put his tied-up condom on the edge of the pew while we started tugging on our clothes. Mateo ran down to the bathroom to get toilet paper, then wrapped the condom up and wiped off the damp spot on the pew.
It was sleazy and furtive and a little bit gross, but I’d had sex for the first time in the church my parents had gotten married in. And I wasn’t afraid or anxious, because it was Mateo’s first time too. And he made me feel like I mattered.
I followed Mateo downstairs where he tossed condom-filled toilet paper into the trash and washed his hands. Then he brushed my hair behind my ears and said, “That’s the best time I’ve ever had in church. It was totally pink.”
I swatted him and said, “You’re so ridiculous.”
He smiled at me, his lip ring glinting and his eyes full of warmth. I wanted to tell him I loved him. I wanted to thank him for making sex better than I could have imagined. But my logical brain had pushed its way back in, and the game and stupid Chloe Donnelly and a tiny prickle of worry about whether the condom might have failed were all in the way of my heart truth.
We stood at the chapel door and Mateo kissed me again. “I’m going to go find the guys. We’ve got about a half hour till we need to meet at the library. Give me a three-minute head start in case anyone is around.”
I nodded. “See you back at the library.”
“Yep. It’s almost done.”
Then he slipped out of the chapel, leaving me alone. I wanted to hold on to the magic of the past hour just a little bit longer, and gather myself together. I felt lighter, in that way when you’re trying to solve a difficult precalc problem and after trying it a dozen different ways, you finally get it. And I wondered if sex was always going to feel like that, or if it was just sex with Mateo.
I brushed my fingers over my lips and smiled. Then I took a deep breath and pushed out the door of the Herrick Chapel entrance and straight into Chloe Donnelly.
26
“I need your phone,” she said from the top step outside the chapel.
“Excuse me?”
“I need your phone. I’m supposed to check in at home.”
Dumbly, I pulled my phone from my hoodie pocket and handed it to her. I watched her thumb swipe and then flip through something. The glow from my phone lit her face and made her eyes look weird and ghostlike. She smiled, then handed me back my phone.
“I figured it was Mateo. You look deflowered. I hope it was as good for him too,” she said, crossing her arms.
I flinched. “You were reading my texts?”
“You’re so quick, Other Chloe.”
I didn’t want to give her any kind of power over me, and I wasn’t ready for a conversation. Particularly not with her. I gathered as much of my courage as I could and said, “Did you need something or were you just spying and being creepy?”
Her eyes flashed. “Yes, Other Chloe. As a matter of fact, I was hoping you’d explain to me exactly why you decided to play after all.”
I shrugged. “These are my friends.”
She laughed in this cruel, sneering kind of way. She looked a little unhinged, her pupils blown out like she was on drugs. Her pretty white-blue eyes had taken on a strange, slightly possessed look under the street lamps. “They are definitely not your friends. If you’ve learned anything over the past few weeks, I’d hope that it was at least that.”
What could I say? She wasn’t wrong. I shoved a finger in my mouth, and she laughed again. It was like pinpricks on the base of my neck. I dropped my finger and said, “What in the hell is wrong with you? Don’t you care about anyone but yourself?”
“No. I don’t. I really, really don’t.”
“Then why bother with us? With this game?”
“Because I was bored.”
I blinked, her voice echoing in my head. “That’s it? You started all of this? You played Gestapo because you were bored? That’s . . . cruel.”
“So?”
Fury burned in my stomach. “All this stuff you’ve done, all these lives you’ve tried to ruin were because you were bored? Do you even know how that sounds?”
She smiled and all the wrongness about her was more obvious than ever. “Yes. I do. And Mateo’s little plan? His idea to ‘take me down’? That’s not going to stop me. You think I care about the guys’ asking me for a platinum favor? You think I’d give in over that? Stupid girl. Stupid people, all of you. Don’t forget, Other Chloe. Cheaters automatically lose.”
Oh God. Oh God.
“No one will play with you anymore,” I whispered. “You can’t make them.”
She adjusted the blue-green scarf at her neck. It looked exactly like mine. “You have no idea what fear will make people do. Look at the world you live in. You’ll see.”
“You’re such a huge bitch,” I said, my voice tight with anger. “You’re the worst thing that ever happened to any of us. You can’t keep doing this. We’ll tell. Everyone will tell.”
She stepped back. “Poor Other Chloe. So much to learn still.”
Then before I could say anything else, she turned and headed back toward Central Campus. I wanted to scream. I wanted to shout every horrifying word I could think of at her. This wasn’t a girl with low self-esteem who just needed someone to befriend her. This was a girl with no feelings at all. I slumped down on the sidewalk and took several breaths. She knew about Mateo’s plan somehow. I felt sick and so, so defeated. A small part of me must have thought it actually might work. But now? I couldn’t imagine a way out of this for Mateo, for any of them, really.
I sat there for ten more minutes until my butt got too cold. I walked around the back of the arts building toward the library, trying to figure out how I’d tell Mateo what happened. My mind couldn’t conjure any ideas to protect him. I wanted my mom and dad. I wanted them to tell me what to do, to tell me how to get out of this.
Mateo was already there when I got to the library, and the guys had huddled. I heard Cam laughing and even Aiden and Josh seemed more at ease, like that first time when we’d played a practice game on Pearl Street and it didn’t mean anything. I hated that it was going to be ruined. I knew I should say something before Chloe Donnelly got there, but I couldn’t force myself to speak. The numbness from earlier seeped in again, but now it felt different, not like strength but like I’d lost everything.
Mateo glanced at me and smiled, and for a second warmth bloomed inside of me. We’d still be a we. I’d figure something out. I had to. I couldn’t let go of everything that had happened in Herrick Chapel. A spark lit inside. Mateo and I would figure something out together.
“Where’s Chloe Donnelly?” Holly asked.
“Don’t know,” I mumbled.
Eve eyed me, tilting h
er head like she was trying to figure out a difficult puzzle. Too many things happened during the game and I couldn’t imagine how I looked from the outside. Sexed up? Defeated? Determined? As unhinged as Chloe Donnelly had looked twenty minutes ago?
I stood for a few minutes, working up the courage to pull Mateo aside. Still not sure how he’d react if I singled him out in front of everyone. I knew I should tell everyone about Chloe Donnelly knowing the plan, but I couldn’t. Too afraid they’d think I told her. Too afraid that I’d bear the brunt of their defeat.
By ten forty-five, when Chloe Donnelly still hadn’t shown, everyone was pissed.
“Jesus, she’s fucking late and she doesn’t even have a phone. This is probably another game she’s playing. I’m not giving this cunt more than another five minutes,” Cam said.
“God, you’re a douche,” Aiden said. “Seriously. What is wrong with you?”
Cam glared at him. “I’m done with this fucking girl and her games. Pretty sure I’m not the only one.”
“You know you’re not,” Aiden said. “But ease up. We’re almost done.”
Only, as more minutes passed by, Chloe’s absence didn’t feel like part of her game. It felt like a problem. Five minutes later Aiden stepped forward and said, “Has anyone seen her tonight?”
Silence. Finally, I stepped forward and said, “I saw her a little after ten outside the chapel.”
Cam looked pissed. “And you’re just mentioning it now? Jesus. You could’ve said something.”
“Sorry,” I mumbled.
Mateo’s face went a little pasty. “What did she say?”
I shook my head, defeat dragging over my skin. “She knows about your plan. I don’t know how. But she said cheaters automatically lose.”
“What?” The starkness on his face gutted me. “Did anyone tell her?” Mateo asked, looking at everyone. I glanced around too, but they all looked innocent. Except for Eve.
My eyes went wide. “Eve?”
Tears filled her eyes. “I didn’t realize. I mean, I just . . . I thought if she knew I was on her side, maybe I could talk her into easing up a little. Maybe I could convince her to let it all go. Forget about it.”
Four-Letter Word Page 25
