Summary: When Robby and Jack discover their daughter is no longer a virgin, they need to confront her and their own feelings.
Warnings: Robby loses his mind, Yelling, teen sass, talk of contraception, condoms, talk of STI/STD testing
Living with teenagers is like living with a bomb. Or at least that’s what Robby thinks as he picks up the plethora of sweatshirts and socks and pajamas that are scattered throughout the house. The way his kid just seemed to explode their clothing off their body as soon as they walked in, astounded him.
He picked up one of her friendship bracelets that had been carelessly hung on the banister and made his way upstairs. He opened the door to his daughter's room to find yet another explosion. He grumbled to himself as he dropped the laundry basket on the floor. He went to put the bracelet in her bedside table drawer when something caught his eye. Two somethings in fact.
A round, pink disk filled with dated pills. A small foil with a distinct circular impression.
All color drained from his face as he picked up the birth control and condom. He had not taken her to get that prescription. Jack hadn’t brought it up. She had done this without their knowledge.
“Jack!!” He bellowed. He was not ready for this. Not at all.
The sound of Jack cursing as he grabbed his crutches rang through the house as he quickly made his way down the hall.
“What!?” He walked in, expecting blood and tissue everywhere with the way Robby had yelled. His eyes fell to the objects in his hands.
“Did you…?”
“Nope.” Jack shook his head. “Fuck. She must have gone to Planned Parenthood or that women’s clinic. They don’t ask questions.” Jack leaned against the doorframe, his chest suddenly tight.
“Oh shit.” Robby’s eyes fell on the trash next to the nightstand. An empty wrapper. Empty. Meaning used. There was a flash of relief that the used condom wasn’t in that trash. Then, the realization that she was having sex under their roof.
“Well…silver lining, she’s being safe.” Jack took a deep breath.
“She’s 16!” Robby howled.
“Yeah. This is usually when they start…experimenting.” Jack cleared his throat.
“Not in my fucking house!” Robby growled as he pushed past Jack and down the stairs.
Jack followed after him. Jack was always a little more relaxed about moments like these. When they got called to the school because she had been caught smoking, he wasn’t happy but he wasn’t surprised. Robby had a full breakdown.
“Mike. You have to take a breath.” Jack sighed as he watched Robby grab his phone. “What are you doing?”
“I’m calling her! She could be out there having sex right now!” He screeched.
“She’s at her best friend’s house working on that English project.”
“Likely story.” Robby dialed their daughter. “Eleanor Rebecca Abbot-Robinavitch, you get your ass home now!! You have a lot to explain!” He growled.
“Dad? What the fuck?” Eleanor was panicking.
“I found your birth control and condom stash!”
“Fuck. I can explain-”
“Get. Home. Now!” Robby hung up the phone.
“You’re going to bust a blood vessel. I’m going to have start a stroke clock.” Jack grumbled as he fell onto the couch.
“Why are you so relaxed!?” Robby paced in front of him.
“Because, I knew this day was coming and I’m not looking at this like some kind of betrayal.” Jack snapped.
“I…She’s too young…”
“Micheal. She’s not. She’s at a very average age for this shit. You know that. We are not an abstinence only family. She’s just being a teenager.” Jack leaned forward, trying to get him to see some reason.
“She’s supposed to come to us. We’re supposed to know what’s going on in her life.” Robby stopped, his emotions catching up with the drop of adrenaline.
“So, that’s the real issue.” Jack nodded. “You’re feeling left out.”
“I’m feeling terrified.”
“Join the club, big guy.” Jack chuckled.
“We have a teenager.”
“Yeah.”
“We have a sexually active teenager.”
“Yep.”
“Why do I feel too old for this and not old enough?” Robby flopped down next to Jack.
“Because no one is ever ready for their baby to grow up. And this is the biggest sign that she is. That she doesn’t need us the way she used to.” Jack felt his heartbreaking a little.
“I’m still mad.” Robby rubbed his eyes.
“Me too. But she still listened to us. She got the pill, the condoms. She heard us enough.” Jack rubbed the back of Robby’s neck.
The door clicked open and Eleanor creeped in. She dropped her backpack by the door and kicked off her shoes as slowly as possible. She tiptoed into the house, trying to avoid her parents. She failed when she made eye contact with them as she walked by the living room.
“Get in here.” Jack barked.
“Fuck.” She cursed to herself as she hung her head and mad her way into the room. Her parents sat on the couch, faces red and scowls etched into their brows.
“Sit.” Robby motioned to the armchair next to the couch.
“I can-”
“Sit down!” Robby yelled. Eleanor quickly sat in the chair.
“We are…disappointed. We are upset. You went behind our backs. That’s not only disrespectful, it’s hurtful.” Jack sighed.
“I’m sorry.” Eleanor hung her head.
“Where did you get the prescription?” Robby crossed his arms. Eleanor mumbled something inaudible.
“If you’re mature enough to have sex, you’re mature enough to speak with your full chest! Do not mumble!” Jack hissed.
“Dr. Santos gave it to me!” Eleanor gasped.
Jack and Robby looked at each other, shocked. They hadn’t expected her to say she had gone to someone they worked with for birth control.
“You came to The Pitt?” Jack looked at her confused.
“No. I…I had a question and I texted her. She offered to write it for me. Said she’d rather I was safe than sorry.” Eleanor shrugged.
“Right. Well, she’ll be spoken with as well.” Robby gritted his teeth.
“I’m not having sex.” Eleanor said.
“Do not lie. Not right now. Not to us.” Robby had a look of anger on his face that Eleanor hadn’t ever witnessed and it sent a chill up her spine.
“I’m not!”
“We saw the used wrapper in the trash!” Jack threw his hands in the air, frustrated.
“Okay…that was just me trying to understand how to use it. That’s all!” Eleanor tried to explain.
“So, you haven’t had sex?” Robby tried to breathe.
“Um…well, you were making it seem like it was happening all the time. It was just the once.”
“Jesus Christ! Nora!” Robby shot out of his seat. “This is not a joke! This is serious! What you’re doing is a very adult thing with very adult consequences!”
“I know!”
“Mike, sit down. Just…everyone breathe.” Jack tried to keep the situation from getting completely out of hand.
“I love him. It wasn’t just a rash decision.” Eleanor started tearing up.
“Is it Brennan? I thought you broke up.” Jack ran a hand through his curls.
“We did. But, we got back together. It was supposed…I don’t want to talk about it.” She wrapped her arms tight around herself. Jack and Robby picked up on the small gesture, the inflection of her voice. The hair on the back of their neck stood on end.
“Did he…Nora, did he force you?” Jack tried to swallow the rage bubbling up his throat like hot lava.
“No.” She wouldn’t look up. “No, I wanted to. He just…he said it was going to cement our love, make us closer.” She cringed at the words. “He said we shouldn’t be exclusive today.”
Robby hung his head, feeling like an ass.
“Nora.” Jack sighed.
“I thought he loved me.” She cried.
“Come here.” Robby waved her over. She got up and sat on his lap, curling into him as she sobbed. “I’m sorry, baby.” He hummed, kissing the top of her head.
“I made a mistake.” She cried.
“It’s okay.” Jack rubbed her back.
“I can’t take it back!” She buried her face in Robby’s chest.
“You’ll learn from this moment, even if it hurts right now. He’s not worth your time, if he can’t see what an incredible person you are.” Jack smoothed the hair from her face.
“I’m sorry, I should have come to you.” She started to calm down. She climbed off Robby’s lap to sit between them.
“So do we.” Robby tucked her hair behind her ear. “Nora, we’re upset that you felt like you couldn’t come to us about this, more than anything.”
“I just…I think I knew you’d talk me out of it. That you’d make me see the mistake. I don’t know.” She shook her head.
“Probably. That’s a good thing.” Jack said.
“I know that right now this feels like the biggest thing to happen ever, but I promise you’ll barely remember it in a few years.” Robby offered her a smile.
“You don’t remember your first time?” She looked up at him with hopeful eyes.
“Well…bits and pieces. No one has a good first time. It’s always awful and embarrassing.” Robby cringed at the memory.
“He’s right. It’s…always fucking weird.” Jack chuckled.
Eleanor sat with the information, digesting it. Her knee was bouncing, biting at her fingernails. Jack took her hand from her mouth. She had been doing it since she was a baby. It bothered him more than Robby.
“When…fuck, this is awkward.” Robby groaned. “When did this happen?”
“Oh. Two weeks ago.” Eleanor shifted in her seat.
“So, when you said you were spending the night at Sarah’s.” Robby rubbed his eyes, pressing the heel of his hand into them until it hurt.
“You cannot lie to us, kiddo. What if something had happened? If we don’t know where you are, that is dangerous.” Jack scolded.
“I know. I’m sorry.” She hung her head.
“Look, we’re proud of you for using protection. You were at least safe in that regard.” Robby sighed.
“So, I’m not grounded?” She gave them a comically large smile. The two men started cackling.
“Oh-ho-ho you are so grounded!” Robby laughed.
“Barely above imprisonment, practically locked in your room type grounded!” Jack snorted.
“But-”
“You lied. You snuck around behind our backs, you enlisted our coworker into getting you medications AND you disrespected us. No fighting this one.” Jack crossed his arms.
“You’ll be going to school and coming home. No parties, no football games, no going to the movies. You’re on full lockdown.” Robby nodded.
“But!”
“Nope. You made your bed, you’re going to lie in it. You’re nose will stuck in a book for the next two weeks. No phone.” Jack watched her eyes grow into dinner plates and the tears start. She knew he was the one that would cave to tears. She was too damn smart.
“I need my phone!” She cried.
“You don’t. We all lived very well before those damn things, you’ll learn.” Robby tried to get her to turn to him. He could see Jack faltering. As much as he was a hard ass at work, he was soft when it came to their daughter.
“And you’ll be going to the women’s clinic for a check up and testing.” Jack took a deep breath.
“What? I don’t need all that.” Eleanor crossed her arms.
“Can you tell me that you believe that boy has only been with you? He’s never had sex with another girl?” Jack asked. Eleanor was going to argue but the realization that he had more than likely lied to her made her clam up.
“Right. If you want to be so adult, this is what it’s like. You need to take care of yourself, testing is part of that. It’s not a punishment, it’s not a judgement. It’s about being safe and healthy. That’s all.” Robby explained.
“Fine.” She huffed.
“We love you. That’s why we’re like this.” Jack wanted to just wrap her up in his arms like she was his baby again. He knew she’d just fight it and that would hurt worse than stopping himself.
“Whatever.” She scoffed.
“Hey.” Robby scolded. “Not how we respond to affection.”
“Sorry.” Eleanor sighed. “I’m mad right now, but I love you too.”
“Thank you.” Jack bit his lip to try and stop from laughing. “Go to your room.”
Eleanor bolted up and made it to the door before Robby protested.
“Ah! Phone. Now.” He reached out his hand. Eleanor cursed under her breath. “What was that?”
“Nothing.” She growled as she slammed the phone in his hand and stomped away.
Robby fell back against the couch with a big sigh. The tension finally leaving his body as Jack flopped next to him.
“Did we fuck that up?” Robby asked as he absent mindedly played with Jack’s curls.
“Probably. Who gets it right?” Jack huffed.
“Do we kill Santos or thank her, I can’t figure it out.”
“I’m waffling between the two. Probably thank her. But definitely yell at her first.” Jack laughed.
Sending love and hope to everyone who is fearful of what their lives may become now the decision of Roe v Wade has been overturned.
Regardless of what you would do if you became pregnant, abortion is a right, not a luxury or a privilege. No person who does not want to be pregnant should be forced to carry that pregnancy to term or travel hundreds of miles just to terminate it safely. Nobody should be judged for their decision, and nobody should have that decision be taken away from them.
Allowing anywhere to make abortions illegal in any and all circumstances will not decrease the number that happen. It will just increase the number that happen unsafely. It will increase the number that kill the person too. It will increase the fear, and it will decrease the quality of life many people face. And now the government have started, they will not start. They claim there was nothing in the constitution that allows abortion. This means they will try and limit access to contraceptive pills too.
The people who will be most impacted are the poor, those of ethnic minorities and those who already have children. We cannot turn our backs on them now. Take a moment if you need it, because god knows we all do, but then come back and come back fighting.
Amnesty USA have a helpful page about fighting for abortion rights that you can find if you click here.
Remember that it is still legal to travel to another state to receive an abortion despite the decision. If you need one and are unsure of the nearest clinic, then click here.
And once more: the right to an abortion is a human right. If we allow this to be taken away, the supreme court will not stop until nobody has personal freedom over their body or their lives.
excuse me if i should have asked this on your sideblog, but i need to understand the canon from the author: did Bunny get on birth control before she and spencer started having sex to be preemptive or is she just lucky lmaoooo I also feel like spencer would have asked in a deleted scene (beyond ch 20 haha)
I LOVED the most recent chapter and it might be be of my favorites and’s saying something because I love them all! thank you so much and take care :)
You’re all good! This is a frequently asked question so I’m going to put it on its own post.
The short answer is that she is on birth control. The reason I don’t specify it on screen is because there are many different effective forms of birth control, and I don’t want to pick any specific one.
Also, I have been on birth control since I was a tween because I had intense hormonal migraines. So, I tend to forget that a lot of people don’t take it unless they are sexually active (totally chill!).
I tend to envision them having the conversation before the conference. Either because Bunny just got on it and blurts it out, or because she just wants him to know and doesn’t know when to tell him.
Alternatively, I picture her very sneakily trying to step away every night around the same time to take her pill in secret. Eventually, Spencer confesses that he’s known the whole time. She’s mortified, which he finds very silly.
Thanks for your kind words and interest in my work. I hope you continue to enjoy yourself! ❤️
I'm reading about ways to prevent getting pregnant because I want to be educated in that sphere. I would love to have a baby, but I'd also love to just spend some time with my husband, to enjoy ours being together. Some fall away immediately, the ones that are abortive ones, for example, some have way too many side effects...the only reasonable way of contraception is using a condom, but, surprise-surprise, some males don't like them because 'the sensations are not the same'...mister, are you willing to make your woman suffer through side effects and health risks of hormonal contraceptives? Are you that heartless so that you don't mind your girl going through that pain? I'm not coming up with things, I read articles and I watch videos, and there are sooooo many men complaining about how condoms are just not the same. Nah. No way. I'm willing to stay single and not know love at all if it saves me from putting anything risky into my body, be it meds or implants or whatnot. Also, I think that if your man loves you, he wouldn't want you to be harmed and be put to risk (and there are too many, have you ever seen the instruction sheets to hormone pills?)
P.S. this is my opinion, and I do not push it onto anyone. You go out there, research and decide what's best for you, I'm only talking about my ideas and conclusions.
some more realisations of the weekend for you folks
-> My aunt made a curry with Quorn chicken and it was most excellent, 400% stealing the recipe. Also surprised the fake chicken didn’t have a weird texture or aftertaste.
-> I thought I’d be OK with staying by myself at her house to catsit but it has honestly been a little lonely (aforementioned cats are off doing their own thing and are not the most friendly to begin with). Listening to my Sass playlist and have the TV on in background, plus pretending to do the thesis so am definitely a little distracted.
-> I think my commentary so far is mostly just misappropriated Christa Wolf quotes fashioned into a series of essays on why I think she’s swell (she’s not even the author I’m translating). I’m going to frankenstein together whatever I had in mind, edit it as much as possible and confer with my fab supervisor (who I need to reply to anyway...)
-> Was looking at an old journal I sometimes go back to and noticed I have cyclical issues with relationship things, i.e. lack of communication, lack of closure on either end, going out with nice/decent enough guys who most likely want a girlfriend and whom I end up being allergic to, repeat ad nauseum, etc. etc. Feel like I should keep this in mind next time I end up going out with someone and acknowledge what it is I want and assert it as such. I still haven’t officially concluded things with dude I’m meant to be seeing but he doesn’t bother getting in contact with me anymore anyway and we just see each other in college when other people are around.
-> Trying to track whether or not the pill has had any unpleasant side-effects on my mood (considering the predisposition to anxiety). Paradoxically, when people say it’ll have an effect on your mood and it’s filled with hormones I dismiss it as some kind of old wives tale, but when I do hear from friends that it had negative effects on them I do believe them. I guess because that’s their literal experience and stuff. Anyway I think my overall mood has been better than usual but that could just be compared to horrible semester 2 deadlines and shitey shiteness.
-> Have been wondering to what end going to counselling is still useful and if I should ask for more advice on coping techniques for things (having crapped all over mindfulness off the bat). I feel like I’m still in the preliminary stages with it sometimes, like I just use it as a vent, and other people sometimes mention tips they’ve gotten from times when they’ve had to go (not that I’d apply them even...) She really validates my feelings and I need to remember progress isn’t linear, plus I’ve noticed some areas in which I can recognise where the anxiety is coming in and to what extent it is or isn’t a thing, so I think this is good.
-> Trying to be a bit more mindful of whether or not I’m validating friends’ feelings or feeding into their negativity, both when we’re both not feeling optimum, and when they’re having problems with stuff. One of my friends was a bit upset at her housemate the other day and I’m limiting my criticism to calling him “a jealous little prawn man” and simply telling her that her feelings are valid. Not sure how else it’s possible to proceed. A year ago (or even recently enough) I probably would have been saying he sounds like scum, avoid him (something I’m doing in my own house right now) and a ton of other essentially negative crap that wouldn’t help her in her situation, trying to grow up a bit more within myself. But if anyone told me to grow up at any stage I’d probably have absolute kittens. I guess coming to this realisation over time counts as growth?
I can’t stomach any more ignorance from relatives or my fellow grad class this evening (which has been going on for hours) on the subject. It makes me sick to my stomach to think about the people who are going to suffer under Trump.
My father just asked me why women in Vancouver are marching. He said he doesn’t understand, because politicians can’t magically erase ‘women’s rights’.
Both President Trump and Vice-President elect Pence have stated they want to defund Planned Parenthood, which is the major fallback for birth-control and other health procedures that we Canadians (with insurance) take for granted.
There is a planned sister march in Vancouver http://dailyhive.com/vancouver/womens-march-vancouver-this-weekend
I'm on a new pill and idk whether it's psychosomatic (my friend said it made her cry all the time and I got worried) or whether it's actually fucking me over but I'm sooooo pissy and low and shit self-esteem re: jobs (why am I not a better candidate, why do I have no strings to my bow, why is everyone better than me, why don't I just do something about it, why don't I make time to do something about it etc etc etc) and also mood-swingy and sometimes super happy I'm gonna have the actual period and then if I don't level out into the slightly less erratic human being that I usually am I'm going to the doctor's cos fuck this m8 I so don't need this
‘I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception; in sorrow though shalt bring forth children’ – Genesis.
I remember the exact moment when I realized that the differences between boys and girls were so extreme that my friendships would never be the same again. There had been rumours all the way throughout primary seven of, ‘The Talk’ the one where they tell us what periods were all about and how not to have a baby. We sectioned off away from the boys, who teased us enormously, sneering over each and every one of our inevitably bloody futures. I had knots in my stomach as Mrs Deek rolled out T.V. and popped a video in the player.
‘WHAT IS A PERIOD? ‘, It bellowed.
I felt more solidarity to my female classmates after that. That for better or worse, today, tomorrow or in a few years, we were all (more or less) going to bleed. We knew it was going to happen.
Some girls didn’t feel the same way. Although we didn’t really understand it, a period meant sexuality, and sexuality was bad. One girl tried on a pad when she didn’t need one yet at our youth club to see what it was like. Another girl in our class caught her buying it, and spread the rumour that she was a, ‘dirty slut’ because she’d started her period. After that, we whispered the word ‘period,’ and took pinkie swears not to tell anyone if we were discussing anything vaguely in the realm of gender anatomy.
The boys that I was friends with told me they liked me better before I realized I was girl and slowly stopped inviting me to play video games and eat pizza with them after school.
In high school we learned all about how not to get pregnant, why condoms were important and how our lives would be over regardless if we had an abortion or kept these hypothetical children they were warning us about, until pregnancy became a fear.
I remember the first time that I ever let a boy touch me. It was warm outside and my arms were freckling. I was wearing ripped up, baggy, denim trousers that I’d had since I was 13, slung low so the waist band of my girl boxers were showing. It read, ‘I love boys pants’ and had apples and cherries printed on it.
I skipped school to sneak around the town with him, stealing kisses in corners of car parks, reading comics in the library, clicking together in the shadows.
We were lying on the grass together in front of a petrified tree. His hand walked across my stomach, and carefully disappeared beneath the fabric. We hadn’t been kissing, or talking and although I knew I should have felt some stirring in my bones or hear blood rushing to my head, I didn’t. I kept still and silent.
He put my trembling palm on top of a hard lump under his trousers, I felt it swell and quiver like a snake. My eyes grew to the size of the moon and sweat immediately pooled below my nose. I shrugged away, saying that it all hurt too much. He smiled and hugged me tightly. We lay on our backs under the shade of the tree for a little while longer, and we didn’t talk about the incident again.
When you’re a teenager, friends become your family. Parents never had much of an idea about anything, but your friends always know whether you’d want them to or not. That was the way it was. Sometimes my mum would comment if a name sprang up more than once,
‘What’s so and so like?’ and it would always be met with a quiet hum of consideration or a poorly executed lie.
If I had lived with dad, he would have made me switch my phone off at night and ask meet anyone who sounded slightly masculine, but he moved out before Hurricane Hormone arrived. It was your friends you spoke you to, that was always the way it was.
My best friend was first on the pill. Kate started menstruating two years before I met her, way before my body had even considered growing hair. She wore low cut shirts to school, and sometimes she rested her breasts on the table while she was talking. Her boyfriend had his hair cut in such a way that it looked like a mushroom was sprouting from his head. I knew him from primary school; he’d pushed me off my roller blades when I was six.
I had been kissing a beautiful boy on Friday nights in the underpass near my house. He was 16, with dark eyes and skin like rice paper. When he kissed me he always put his hands in the indents of my hips and slowly fluttered his fingers like moth wings. The first time I ever saw him I flipped and never quite got back on my feet.
One day before school Kate and I met at the tunnel where all the smoker kids hung out. The younger ones stood in little clouds together, hawking and spitting next to our shoes, while the older ones tried to sell off their half smoked ‘snout’. We went to the other side of the tunnel and hid ourselves behind a shallow wall. Under her rain coat she pulled out a white paper bag,
‘I got loads when I went to get the pill’ and she thrust it into my hand.
I opened it up to see a rainbow of condoms, different sizes, thickness, flavours, wrappers.
‘Do they come in different colours?’ I asked
‘What…’
‘Colours? They’re all in different wrappers, so do they come in different colours’
She looked at me with her mouth half open and her eyebrow cocked, ‘Jesus. Just put them in your bag, hurry up!’
She lost her virginity that weekend. I quietly held on to mine for another month.
She didn’t really talk about it much and said when I lost mine I’d understand why. It was just something that people did; like eating dinner, and now it was done she could get on with other things like apply for uni.
When I finally lost mine to the boy with dark eyes, nothing really happened. I hadn’t really known what to do. After being turned around, moved about, stood up and sat down to find a position that was good enough for him, I only felt aware how naked I was in front of another person. Afterwards I curled up like a shrimp; feeling like a petal had been plucked from me. I lay, staring at the back of someone who felt like a complete stranger.
I met Kate the next day and told her I knew what she meant.
I went on the pill a year later. It was the week before Christmas and we were both afraid we might be pregnant. I asked Kate to come in the room with me; she held my hand and I rolled my thumb along the ridge of her finger. Our faces burned red asking questions like,
‘Can you really get pregnant if they don’t do it in you’ and my big question mark:
‘Can you get pregnant if you start period the next day?’ – We weren’t pregnant, just terribly misinformed. The nurse was a stout woman, whose cheeks wobbled a little when irritated, which in this instance happened a lot. She answered our questions with a tone of disbelief and eventually asked where we’d gotten our sex education from.
*
Geary happened because the boy with dark eyes broke my heart. Geary liked to tell girls they were beautiful, I know this because he had been whispering it in my friends’ ear all night before she eventually got fed up with him. She burst in on us and flew into a frenzy because she claimed him first. Her breath smelled of vodka and cigarettes. He didn’t say anything at the time, but brought up when I’d bumped into him at a night club a few years later. He said he wondered how my body had changed since then. He never got to find out.
James with the first person I’d known with a kid. He became a dad at 23 and watched his then girlfriend birth a little human that he helped create. He told me she was so badly torn that she had to stay in the hospital for a week. She didn’t like me much, but I thought she was a super hero.
He would hold me like he would his daughter, tucked into his arms with my legs dangling like a rag doll. Whenever I tried to say something about it he would run a finger lightly across my eyelids and whisper, ‘shh’ until he thought I was subdued enough.
We were walking together after having a fight. It was the first time I had ever tried to blunt my sharp tongue, to be a little quieter, to take up less space in the hope of being desired just that little bit more. He took my hand and said, with a detectable hint of surprise in his voice,
‘I actually had a really nice day.’ I carefully stretched my lips at him into an ersatz smile. He patted me on the head and said, ‘Good girl,’
I looked at him incredulously and replied, ‘Aye, alright dad’
He made an arch of disgust with his mouth and his eyebrows flew up almost into his hairline. He said I had issues.
Dave was all long hair and rock and roll. He would appear every now and then in my twenties, always in the cross road at the end of a relationship where, completely depleted of energy and any stitch of my own identity, he would find me inevitably wailing into my pillow, ‘who am I?’
He was always on something. Life plus, I would call it. Life plus drugs. Life plus alcohol. Life plus obsession with new records/clothes/women. He took that one foot I’d have left on the ground and swept it away from me in haze of his vices, which I’d willingly adopt for a night. He was fast. I’d already have tasted his tongue in the first minute of the record playing. He held a little paper bomb in front of me and asked, ‘wanna go on a trip?’ I was never that into drugs when I was teenager, but his eyes were like honey and his lips were peach pink.
When I was 25 I was mad about Tate. I loved his body. You’re never really sure what to expect. It’s a game of chance when the lights go off. I trickled my fingers across his stomach and came across a familiar, softness indented on his right hand side, a small scar. I slid down his body and kissed him on his silver slither.He didn’t as much as flutter but his eyes were strangely bright in the dark.
They always thought you owed them something, and you’re never quite equipped with the tools to chisel away at their persuasions. As a teenager you don’t feel strong enough in your conviction when you say no. Maybe’s leave a gap, something they can wriggle into, wriggle next to you, try to wriggle right up inside of you. They all want to know you now, because you’ve got boobs under that top, because you wanted to wear a skirt, because you fancied a chat.
I always kept my eyes closed at their half open mouths. Their thick saliva flowing into my mouth, and their hot breath in my ear. They all had things in common. Eventually the moan of one would lead into the whimper of another, and you couldn’t remember who's freckle you liked so much on that earlobe.
You don’t try to explain it, not in hushed voices at sleepovers or drinking wine with the girls; after they’ve nuzzled you, bit you and lapped up every inch of you, you start to feel adrift in something unknown.
They all had that in common – when they were finished between your legs they would look at you as if they were surprised that you’re still there. You’re different now, the potential is gone, and they fucked that away.
You wonder how long you can keep it all up. You’re almost past your twenties and you don’t want to have children. You’ve never wanted to have children, ever since the secret of womanhood was passed on to you, ever since you let the first boy touch you – you just knew. You take your pill with pride, but they always want something.
