Scarlett Epstein Hates It Here(58)

Finally, I pull away from him, even though it feels unnatural to separate again, and I try to pull myself together. I sniffle, draw the back of my hand across my wet eyes. I wish I could yell at him for being such a jerk lately, but I’m too drained. And besides, it’s too late. I already saw the glimmer in this “hot popular guy” of that chubby comedy nerd I was best friends with when we were thirteen, the weirdo who knows exactly what half-hour stand-up set will reach me through my thick armor of bullshit. Gideon is still Gideon. Maybe that’s all I need to know.

A few trips back and forth to the fridge later—becoming increasingly, acutely aware (in a good way) of Gideon checking out my butt in the neon shorts each time I go into the kitchen—we have torn through the six-pack. I’m tipsy and laughing and feel like the big things, the real things, are far away. I’m in a mental place that’s pretty rare for me, which is: I just want things to be easy. Context-free. I want to be like any nondescript boy and girl sitting on a sofa drinking beer, across America, right now.

After three beers, I drop my final bottle in “the recycling,” a repurposed Target bag hung on the living room door, and saunter back to the sofa.

“Hey, where’s your mom?” asks Gideon. “I want to say hi.”

I know exactly where she is—she’s meeting Brian’s mother at that Mediterranean place downtown—but instead of going into it, I opt for, “Out?”

“Oh, right, Out. I like that place.”

I smile, even though it is an incredibly silly joke that isn’t worthy of him.

“Great tapas bar, Out,” I say.

“I’m into their wine list.”

“They’re always so crowded, though.”

“To tell you the truth, it always seemed a little overrated,” he replies, looking at me a moment too long as he swigs his beer, his big hand wrapped around the neck of the bottle. It’s a weird way to hold a beer. I feel a rush of affection toward him, mixed with a mystery ingredient.

It’s lust, you idiot, my body informs my brain. You still like him and like-like him, despite all his shitty transgressions as a Popular. You liked him first, and now other people like him too, and when that happened, you felt like you had to stop. Scarlett Joan Epstein, you are a hipster.

He’s just sitting there, leaning back against the sofa, finishing his beer, one arm sprawled over the back of the couch, so guy-ish and appealing. He catches me looking at him, and we regard each other with a mix of bemused Are we gonna do this? and Is this gonna f*ck everything up forever?

In the end, he is the one who goes for it, circling my waist with both his hands. I instinctively arch my back, accessing, for the first time ever, something my body knows how to do but my brain doesn’t. His warm tongue is sort of beery, but not in a bad way. We kiss for a really long time, until it starts getting more breathless and I finally straddle him, wrapping my hands around his neck as he keeps holding my waist. We seem to be taking turns craning our necks in this make-out session (which bodes well if the thing Dawn once told me is true, that whoever likes the other person more is the one who cranes their neck). Gravity begins to take over, so I start awkwardly falling backward, but his hands are so solidly wrapped around my back that I’m not scared, and he moves gently down off the sofa with me in his arms.

To my distant surprise—distant because my brain is waving goodbye as my body speeds off down the highway—we are now on the floor, me on my back, him on top of me sliding his hands down my back to grab my ass. My brain argues feebly: But I’m so mad at him! I gasp loudly without meaning to as he breaks away to move down and kiss my neck. My legs have wrapped around his back of their own accord, another testament to the power of biology. He slips one hand under my shirt and the other one goes for the drawstring on my shorts.

I realize this is how mistakes happen—not thinking, just doing. (Have you ever heard that Katy Perry lyric “No regrets, just love” and wondered how many teen pregnancies it inspired? I have!)

“Wait, wait, wait, wait,” I breathe.

“What?” He yanks on the drawstring but accidentally knots it too tight to open, so he just tries to wedge his hand inside my shorts.

I am about to lose my virginity to an * just because we hung out when we were kids, says my brain.

Oh my God, please shut up, you get to drive allllllll the time, give me the keys for once, my body replies.

But my brain won’t shut up. I am about to lose my virginity to a guy who makes fun of fat people.

“Wait, stop.”

He takes his hands off me and lies on the floor, facing up and breathing shallowly. I stay on my back, also staring up at the ceiling.

“I, um, I can’t.”

I’m trying to sound nonplussed, like I have almost-sex with guys all the time and coolly stop short because I am playing hard to get.

“No worries! Like, not at all,” Gideon says, now sounding vaguely panicked. “I—I mean, did I go too fast? Or did I do something you didn’t want me to do?”

I look at him with my eyebrows raised incredulously.

“Just now? No. But the last couple of months all you’ve done is stuff I didn’t want you to do.”

I sit up stick-straight like I’m in an executive office chair—as if this somehow gives me more authority—trying to catch my breath.

“I mean, first of all, what about Ashley?” I ask.