Dance Away with Me(29)

“And my dad’s Brad Winchester. You probably heard of him.”

Tess nodded.

“I don’t have a boyfriend yet,” Jordan said. “But I might. And my mom says that any girls who have sex when they aren’t married get AIDS.”

“That isn’t true,” Tess said. “But it’s easy to catch an STD or to get pregnant, which is why you have to take care of yourselves.”

Wren had begun to fuss, and it was time for her to eat. Tess had all she could cope with right now, and she didn’t need three inquisitive teenagers staring at her as if she held the secrets to the sexual universe. She had to send them home to their parents.

But what if their parents shut them out? That happened too frequently. “Let me get her a bottle, and we can talk. Why don’t you all have a seat?”

A few minutes later, as Wren tugged sleepily at the bottle and the girls settled on the couch, Tess reminded herself how frequently Trav had warned her about sticking her nose in where it didn’t belong. He’d also said she was too judgmental, but that was mainly when she criticized his taste in music.

She brought Wren closer to her body. “Let me tell you up front that I don’t think it’s a great idea for kids your age to have sex.”

They all spoke at once.

“We’re not going to . . .”

“I would never . . .”

“I’m not . . .”

Tess held up her free hand. “You have enough to cope with right now—school, parents, peer pressure—and no matter how nice a boy is, having sex too early can make life difficult. In too many cases, the girl ends up being the loser.”

“Like, if she has sex and some of the other kids hear about it,” Ava volunteered. “And then everybody would say she’s a slut.”

“I hate hearing that word used against women,” Tess said. “If she’s a slut, that means he is, too.”

Jordan nodded. “That’s what I think.”

“Maybe he’s not any more ready than she is,” Tess said. “And maybe she’s the one pressuring him. Or maybe he’s not as nice as she thinks he is.”

“Connor is super nice,” Ava said earnestly.

“And so is Anthony,” Imani said.

The shawl slipped down over Tess’s bare shoulder, and she readjusted it. “But from what you’re telling me about your health class, they might not know any more than you do.”

Imani fiddled with the arm of the couch. “A lot of boys say it’s not that big a deal.”

“And if you have cramps, it’ll make them go away,” Ava said.

Jordan tugged on a lock of her hair. “I heard you can’t get pregnant the first time. But I don’t believe that. It’s not true, is it?”

“It’s definitely not true,” Tess said.

Ava caught her pink bottom lip between her teeth. “What if a boy says—if you don’t have sex with him, he’ll like break up with you?”

Tess took a calming breath. “That would be your lucky day because, if a boy ever says that to you, you know for a fact that he’s a complete jerk and you absolutely have to break up with him first.”

Jordan looked pointedly at Ava, who said, “But you can’t get pregnant if you do it in the pool or hot tub, right? Or standing up.”

“Stop!” Wren twitched against Tess’s outburst. “Sorry, little one.” Tess brushed her cheek and returned her attention to the girls. “You can get pregnant in any position, sitting, standing up, lying down, in a car, on a trampoline—although that might be tough to pull off—but the point is, where there’s sperm and a vagina, you can get pregnant. And if sex isn’t a big deal, why do we spend so much time thinking about it?”

She caught a movement out of the corner of her eye and realized North had returned and was standing inside the front door. From the expression on his face—incredulity mixed with general pissed-off-ness—it seemed he’d been standing there for a while.

She gave the girls a big smile and stood. “If you have more questions, please talk to your parents.”

“But . . .”

“Promise me you’ll at least think about talking to them.”

Three sets of betrayed puppy dog eyes met hers. Ava flipped her enviable hair. “Yeah, like I really want to be locked in my room for the rest of my life.”

Tess started to tell her to have more faith in her parents, but from what she’d seen of Kelly Winchester, Ava might be right to have misgivings. Tess felt an all too familiar frustration with unrealistic parents and with schools that clung to a curriculum that left teens achingly vulnerable. If she didn’t step up, was she any better? “If you have more questions, come back in a couple of days.” Even as she said it, she suspected she was making a mistake. “And don’t get pregnant before then!”

They giggled, chirped their thanks, and turned to leave, only to falter in embarrassment as they finally noticed North standing in the doorway.

“Don’t worry about him,” Tess said. “He only cares about himself.”

Ian stepped aside to let the girls hurry past. The door closed behind them, and he shot her one of his incredulous looks. “Just to make sure I understand . . . We’re not only running a clinic here, but you’re now teaching sex education classes in my house?”