I am not Spanish. I am bored of being asked. Actually I come from Sunderland as do my parents and their parents before them. It is simply my misfortune to have been conceived on the Costa Brava. They thought it would be smart and cool to call me Juan. It ruined my childhood and made me the shy introverted young man I turned into. My schooldays were something of a romantic desert.
University turned out to be a whole lot better. I managed to get a place at the University of B.... through the clearing system, reading Political Philosophy. Which made me too late to get into one of the halls, relegating me to a dingy room in the house of Enid Strauss. Before you start getting excited, no I didn't end up rummaging through her laundry basket and discovering exotic lingerie and losing my virginity to a mature landlady. That is someone else's story.
But I do owe a big thankyou to Enid. It happened two and a half weeks after the start of term. I hadn't managed to pull during fresher's week and had not really managed to make any friends on my course, which was 75% male. Friday evening found me studying in my room preparing for my second Communism tutorial. Enid's suggestion that I joined her for a glass of wine in her sitting room was very welcome and I did flirt with the mature landlady fantasy, despite her rather plain appearance and a forty year age gap. That is how desperate and fed up I was.
We made small talk about this and that but I guess you aren't very interested in all that. The important thing for this story is that Enid recognised how pissed off I was and diagnosed the cause without a lot of difficulty. "You don't have a girlfriend do you Juan? And Uni hasn't proved to be as sexually exciting as you hoped it would be? Which I find surprising given where you are. You do know that there are 7 girls studying here for every 3 boys?"
I didn't as it happened. Everyone had told me how there would be loads of girls at Uni but that wasn't what I found. My course was mostly boys, men I suppose I should call us now we were eighteen and the women on the course were either distant or not my type or actively anti-men. And the Ornithology and Numismatics Societies were much the same.
"That may be the case in the Politics department but it's not like that in English, History, Sociology, Art History where this Uni concentrates. And you maybe need to be a little less nerdy in your choice of societies. Mixing in the right circles, and refreshing your wardrobe, should improve your chance of getting laid no end. You might even find someone you want a real relationship with. But I guess that just at the moment having sex is what you really need." Enid clearly wasn't a lady to pull her punches. "What sort of girl do you fantasise about? Blond? Asian? Tall? Cuddly? "
Not the sort of conversation I was used to having. Certainly not with women in their sixties.
"Blond I guess, or brunette, or redhead. English I suppose. I've never really imagined going with a black girl. Not that I'm prejudiced of course. It's just..."
"That you fantasise about what you see but can't touch. That's normal. But don't rule out women from other countries. I certainly never turned foreign men away when I was more active than I am now."
An interesting choice of words. Clearly Enid had not given up entirely on sex, though I hadn't seen any men in the house since I moved in. "It's not as if I have a choice, Enid. I simply don't meet any women, from anywhere, who are interested in me. My fantasy woman is tall with fabulous legs and loads of sexy undies but right now I just want to get in someone's bed and..."
"Lose your virginity. You are still a virgin right? Have you ever had a girlfriend? Do you have any sexual experience at all?" I hung my head in embarrassment. "I thought not. We are going to change that. You are going to have a great time over the next three years, I promise you." The ridiculous landlady fantasy floated before my eyes and I stared at her. At her tits actually. "Not with me Juan, don't be ridiculous, I could be your granny."
Whoops. Busted. "I wasn't suggesting that. Sorry. I think there are two problems. One is that I don't meet any women who seem interested and the other is that I have no experience in what to do if I do meet someone."
"In this town? It should be easy. The shortage of men in the university means that lots of the young men from the town get hoovered up by University girls away from home for the first time and anxious to spread their wings." By which I think she meant spread their legs. "Lots of young women your age are just as horny as you are you know. They see Uni as a place to find a boyfriend and the lads from town know that full well." Which simply increased my pessimism at my own chances. "Don't look so glum Juan. That means there are lots of local girls going without. Girls who are annoyed at the University women and pissed off at their former schoolmates for dumping them for more glamorous pickings on campus. Lots of them would jump at the chance of a bright young man like you. To jump into bed with you. You are going to have fun Juan I promise."
At Enid's suggestion and wearing a brand new shirt a good deal better than the rest of my limited selection I found myself sitting in the corner of the Wagon and Horses on Castle Street early on a Friday evening. It was my third visit. Enid was right. There were a lot of local girls in there. Some sixth formers from the High School, showing off their shiny new ID cards, lots of woman from the biscuit factory and the big store on the corner and plenty of others from who knows where. We men were certainly in a minority. But being in a big room full of interesting women is still a long way from actually having any sexual activity with anyone. My clumsy attempts at chat up lines on the first two evenings had got me nowhere.
I went back to the bar for another pint. "Have you been stood up again? This is the third time this week isn't it that you have been in here and ended up looking miserable." What a very observant barmaid. What a lovely pair of pointy tits. My under-used pole gave a little involuntary twitch.
"Uh, uhm. No not exactly I wasn't here to meet someone. Uhm, I hadn't made any arrangements to meet anyone. I, uhm, was just here having a drink."
"By yourself. And hoping to meet someone? But you're not having a lot of luck are you sweetheart?". Was she trying to chat me up? What could a women with such a sexy cleavage and a black bra possibly want with me? "I'm up here, if you can take your eyes off my tits".
"Sorry, I didn't mean, uhm......"
"It's all right, sonny. You're not the first man to talk to my chest, and you won't be the last. But don't go getting any ideas." Which dampened the twitching rather. "You're not going to get anywhere sitting in the corner all by yourself. If you want my advice you should come and sit up here at the bar. And maybe put your book away!"
