Something to Offer

© 2004 by Penelope Street

Part 2: My True Love

"I told my mom," I announced with pride the next morning.

Denise and Lynn looked at me dumbfounded for several seconds. Lynn finally spoke first. "What'd she say?"

I shrugged. "Not much. She was more concerned about pregnancy than anything else. She's making an appointment so I can get on the pill."

Denise's jaw fell.

Lynn, however, smiled. "Aren't you glad you told her?"

"Yes," I replied, almost as an admission.

"It still seems wrong," Denise noted.

"What?" I asked.

"Having sex with someone besides your husband."

"I don't have a husband," I retorted.

"Exactly," Denise countered.

I dropped my brow and shook my head. "What is the big deal?"

Denise sighed. "It just seems so; I don't know;

personal

."

I smirked. "That's part of what makes it special."

"How can it be special," Denise responded. "If you do it with just anyone?"

I was stunned by what I considered to be an entirely baseless allegation. "I will

not

just do it with anyone," I asserted in the harshest whisper I could muster.

Denise steered her narrowed green eyes straight into my soul. "Sure seems like it."

"What is the big deal with you and sex?" I asked. "It's a natural thing, yet you act like it's something evil."

The question seemed to stun her for second. The next second her face melted. "It's just," Denise began with a sniff. "I tell myself I'm waiting for marriage, but who'll want to marry me anyway? Heck, no boy has ever even tried to hold my hand. I'm just a boobless beanpole!"

A tear rolled down the redhead's cheek. I started to protest, but my agitated friend continued her rant. "You may be captain of the math team Wendy, but I can do a little arithmetic too. Fifty-three percent of the population is female. If

every

male marries one of us, that's still more than one out of ten of us girls that gets left out. One out of ten! And I'm going to be one! I just know it."

"That's why," Lynn began with a big smile, "we should encourage lesbianism. It puts the numbers back in our favor!"

I cut Lynn a sharp glare for what I took to be a most ill-timed jest, before I directed my attention back to Denise. "You're not going to be left out."

The redhead pursed her lips before snapping, "How do you know?"

"Just a few weeks ago I thought the same thing. I figured no boy would ever want anyone as fat as me. But then..."

"You're not fat!"

I turned to see Lynn's smile had vanished; her lips were barely parted over her clenched teeth. I looked down at my pear-shaped form. "Are you sure?"

Lynn's eyes narrowed as her nose wrinkled. "I'm sure!"

"Yeah," Denise chipped in. "You're not fat."

I crossed my arms and rubbed my elbows as my eyes wandered betwixt my two friends. "Thanks."

Lynn smiled, and then opened her mouth to say something, but the bell for class cut her off. "We should talk again at lunch," she noted as the clanging subsided.

"We always do," I said.

Lynn put her hands to her hips. "You know what I mean."

Denise sighed. "Why?"

"Because we should," Lynn insisted. "That's why."

We did talk at lunch, and then some of the next day too. Lynn and I managed to convince Denise that she was more than pretty enough to attract any boy worth having. She still insisted she was saving herself for Mr. Right, but she no longer seemed concerned about me fucking as many Mr. Wrongs as I wanted. Soon the three of us giddily discussed what boys we liked as casually as if we were picking out a sweater.

Before long, Christmas came; and with it my father. Being unsure what Mom had told him, I was timid around the man at first. I suppose I'm still not sure what exactly she told him. I never talked about sex with Dad and he never asked.

If my father was disappointed with me, he never showed it. He seemed his jovial self; Mom and I were both thrilled to have him home for the holidays. I don't recall much of what we did over the break. Probably just sat around together and watched the tube. With my dad there, I suspect that meant a lot of football.

For the local teams, there was mixed success on the gridiron. The Steelers lost their final contest and missed the playoffs, but Pitt and Penn State both won their bowl games with the Panthers finishing number two in the polls.

On a more personal note, Billy Drake failed his mathematics course and was ineligible for sports during the spring. I felt like I had let him down, although, in hindsight, I'm not sure I could ever have taught him as much as he needed to learn. Cindy Pierce stuck with him though, even though he was no longer a real jock, confirming that she truly loved him for who he was and not what he was.

The New Year started as most do, with high hopes. Mine centered around a boy named Joel Dirks. I'd carefully selected him because he seemed pleasant enough, was in the choir instead of sports, didn't appear to have a girlfriend, and was in at least one of my classes. That he was cute didn't hurt either.

After several days of stalking, I managed to find a moment alone with my intended quarry. "So," I began as casually as I could. "You have a girlfriend?"

Joel shook his head.

I smiled. "You want one?"

The lad creased his brow. "You?"

I nodded. "Yes."

Joel shook his head twice. "Sorry," he replied in a flat tone. "I just couldn't think of you in that way."

I pressed my lips into a thin white line as I absorbed the unexpected rejection. All of my old insecurities broke out of lockdown and began to riot. "Ok," I managed with a nod. "Thanks anyway, I guess."

"No problem," Joel shrugged. "See ya 'round."

I stood in the corridor and watched him walk away. After having what seemed like the entire football team wanting to be my boyfriend I was stunned that someone didn't want me. I absently scratched my brow as I considered how I could tell my two friends after bragging most of the previous week about my selection.

* * *

"Did you really expect every boy to want to go out with you?" Denise asked with a self-satisfied smirk.

I tried to take my medicine like a big girl. "Yes," I nodded. "I suppose I did."

"You need to ask someone you're already friends with," Lynn suggested. "At least a little. You hardly knew Joel."

"Yeah," Denise added. "What did you see in him anyway?"

I had asked myself the same question most of the morning. "I don't know," I admitted. "Do you ever wonder if we really control who we're attracted to or if it just sort of happens?"

"Yeah," Lynn nodded, her blue eyes bright. "I wonder that a lot."

"Me too," Denise added.

"Who are you attracted to?" I asked, to neither of them in particular.

The two girls looked to one another as if each wanted the other to answer.

Denise finally shrugged. "Mark Blum."

Lynn creased her brow. "That little geek from the science club?"

Denise nodded.

"So why don't you tell him?" I asked.

Denise sighed and pursed her lips. "I'd just feel embarrassed."

"Why?" I countered quickly.

"Aren't the guys supposed to do the asking?"

"Why?" I repeated.

"I don't know," Denise replied. "It just seems that's the way it's done."

"That's the way it

was

done," I insisted. "I'm not going to sit around and wait for some boy to come to me either. Remember who came? All the jocks, that's who. Why should they have all the fun?"

"I'd be embarrassed too," Lynn admitted.

"You?" I queried. "I know guys ask you out; cute ones too. Why don't you ever give one a chance?"

"Oh, I have someone in mind," Lynn replied. "But the timing's not right. I can feel it."

I shook my head. "Now is always the right time to ask."

Lynn responded with a similar shake of her head. "Not this person. When you see who it is, you'll understand."

Denise tilted her head. "Now I

am

curious."

"Me too," I agreed.

Lynn smiled. "Too bad. For now you'll just have to trust that I'd rather spend my senior year with you two than with some guy I wouldn't give a shit about in five years anyway."

"Fine," I shrugged. "Have it your way." I turned to Denise. "That still doesn't explain why you don't tell Mark how you feel."

Denise twisted her lips for a few seconds before replying, "I'd be too afraid he'd just laugh."

"Not me," I insisted. "I'm not going to play turtle just because one fool doesn't know a good thing when it asks him out."

* * *

In spite of my oath and my intention, I found myself unwilling to make the move. I made a list of candidates and discussed them amongst my friends. The specter of rejection, however, kept my resolve suppressed.

Thus it was nearly a month later before I again dated and it was my next boyfriend who did the asking, at our lunch table no less. The first hint I had of his arrival was the stares from my comrades seated across from me. They had had that same look when Billy Drake had shown up. I turned, half-expecting to see him again, unsure what I would do if I did. As my view passed beyond my shoulder, instead of Billy, I saw glasses, freckles, braces, and Mark Blum.

"Wendy?" Mark prompted in a trembling voice.

"Yes?"

Mark's eyes wandered as he swallowed. "I was wondering if maybe you'd go to a movie with me."

My mouth dropped slightly. I inhaled as if to reply, but was flabbergasted. "I, uh…" I began, then stopped. I snapped my focus to Denise, intending to let her know I had in no way gone after her beau.

To my surprise, the redhead was all smiles. "Sure she would!" she announced before turning to me. "Wouldn't you?"

I looked back to Mark and smiled. "I, uh, guess so."

Mark flashed his full set of braces. "Great!" Eyes wide, he turned and strode away, moving more like a zombie than a boy.

I snapped my head back to Denise. "What do you mean saying 'yes' for me?"

For the first time I could recall, my friend was excited to the point of giddiness. "Oh, you just

have

to," she squealed.

I leaned across the table and asked in a hushed tone, "Why do you want me to go out with the boy you like?"

Denise moved her face closer to mine. "As long as he's seeing you, I know he's not seeing anyone else. Then, when you dump him, maybe I can pick him up on the rebound!"

I dropped my brow and my jaw. "That's just

weird

, Denise. What exactly do you want me to do?"

Denise sat upright and shrugged. "I hadn't thought that far. Just date him for a little while until he's good and hung up on you, and then break up with him."

I looked back over my shoulder in the direction Mark had departed. "What does he see in me?" I wondered aloud.

"You're smart," Denise offered without hesitation.

Lynn flashed a wicked smile. "Maybe he's heard you're easy."

My jaw fell. "I'm

not

easy!"

Lynn's smile broadened. "I didn't say you were. I just said he might have heard you were."

Considering the blonde's meaning, I brought my lips together as if to speak, but I could find no words. With reluctance, I admitted my liaison with Billy might have given me a somewhat seedy reputation, one I had even cultivated. I looked back to Denise. "What if he does think I'm easy? What if he wants to do

it

?"

Denise put her hands below the table and leaned still closer to me. "Go for it! Break him in for me! But you have to tell me all about it!"

I shook my head. "I don't know if..."

"

Please

," Denise begged. "Do it for me. I'd do it for you!"

I raised my eyebrows. "You'd fuck a guy for me?"

Denise withdrew her face. Her smiled vanished. "I don't know," she admitted. "But it's not like you haven't done it before."

I felt myself tense, but realized in the next moment that in her giddy state, she had meant no affront. "Aren't you the one that thought sex outside of marriage was bad?" I inquired.

"This is different," Denise protested. "It's Mark!"

I had never seen my friend so excited about anything. "Are you sure?" I asked.

Denise smiled again. "I'm very sure!"

"You better be," Lynn said. "Because here he comes."

I turned to see Mark sheepishly returning to our table. "I forgot to ask what day," he said. "I was thinking Valentine's Day, if that's ok."

I smiled. "What day is that?"

"Saturday after next."

"Do I get to pick the movie?"

"Sure."

"It's a date," I concluded. "You want to pick me up at six?"

Mark's eyes wandered again. "My mom will have to give us a ride. I don't have a license yet."

"Oh," I said. "I do. Maybe my mom will let me use her car."

"That'd be great!"

"I'll ask tonight," I declared. "And let you know tomorrow."

Mark nodded. "Great."

I smiled for a few seconds, expecting him to depart. "See you then?" I prompted, brows high.

"Right," he started. "Great. See you then."

I turned back to my friends as my new boyfriend ambled away. He looked so scrawny compared to Billy. I realized the true reason I didn't want to date him was because of his appearance; the very reason, I am sure, that many guys discounted me. In that moment, I felt shallower than I had before, or have since.

The days leading up to our movie date were among the most awkward. I felt very much like a common harlot, hired by my friend to seduce her beau and then, somehow, find a way to pass him off to her. But I knew what rejection felt like. I wasn't sure I could hurt Mark, even for Denise. My stomach was far from settled when my date climbed into the passenger seat of our family wagon.

"Hi!" Mark said, flashing his full set of braces. "What are we seeing?"

"Well," I replied, reaching for the ubiquitous column shifter. "I think it's either

The Incredible Shrinking Woman or Flash Gordon

."

"It's your pick," Mark reminded.

My initial inclination was to make him see the former, so that he'd never want to go out with me again. "I really don't care," I admitted. "Did you have a preference?"

"How about

My Bloody Valentine

?" Mark suggested.

"What's that?"

"Horror film."

"Ok," I replied, being completely naive regarding the entire slasher genre. I cannot recall any other pair of syllables that I have ever uttered that I came so soon to regret. My hands spent most of the next two hours in front of my eyes.

On the way home, I determined to put my hands to much better use and took Mark to one of the parking spots I'd discovered with Billy.

"What, uh, what are we doing?" my date inquired as I steered into the dark and deserted lot.

I killed the ignition and slid across the seat. Bringing my mouth inches from his, I whispered. "What do you think?"

Mark tongued his lips. "I, uh, ..."

I terminated what was certain to be yet another naive inquiry with a kiss. As our mouths explored, our hands did likewise. Even as our lips intertwined, I managed a smile when my novice lover went to second base without invitation, albeit through my blouse. I returned the favor by moving my palm to his groin. I emitted a low snarl as I felt the hardness, and the damp spot, in his trousers.

"No," Mark gasped, breaking our kiss as my fingers found his zipper.

"No?" I queried, with a mischievous smile. I slid down his form as I continued to peel his jeans from his loins. "No what?"

"No. I don't..." Mark started as I freed his erection.

His protest terminated as my lips first met, then enveloped, the end of his shaft. He didn't issue another objection after I had him in my mouth; he was mine for the night. As fast as he unloaded in the front seat, I knew he'd be ready for round two in the back. Round three was an unexpected bonus.

An hour later we cuddled in the folded-down cargo area of the wagon, in what I imagined to be the afterglow of a magnificent fuck. I closed my eyes and relived the magic of the first cock exploding within me and how my pussy seemed to clench in sync with every spasm of my lover's pulsing shaft. For a handful of minutes, I bathed myself in that naive bliss. The first clue I had that my partner was feeling something entirely different was a single sniffle.

My eyes bolted wide, wandering for several seconds before I dared prop myself up on one elbow. "Are you ok?"

"No," Mark whimpered before he burst into tears. The eruption of the boy's sorrow was no minor weeping; he turned on the full waterworks in addition to gasping and sobbing.

I reached to pull his head to my shoulder, unsure what to say, much less what was the source of his distress. "What is it?" I finally managed.

"I wanted my first time to be special," the boy gasped between sobs.

My chest felt hollow in an instant; the lad's now crushed hope had pummeled my core as a one-two punch with Denise's similar wish. The third blow landed but an instant later as I grasped the implication that the back of a station-wagon in the parking lot of an idle factory with an unworthy seductress was far from

special

in his eyes. Examining our forlorn surroundings amid his continued wailing, I could but agree.

"I'm sorry," I offered. "I didn't know."

"I said 'no,'" Mark recalled between sobs. "But you didn't listen."

You should have said it twice

. I started to defend myself thus, but realized he had said it a second time before I had appealed the decision to what in teenage males is always the highest authority.

In my headlong rush to deflower the innocent youth I had never imagined he might not want a girl. Oh, I imagined he might not want me, and had set out to prove otherwise; but it never crossed my mind he didn't want

any

girl; at least not yet. My spurious attempt to confirm I was pretty on the outside had shown instead how ugly I could be on the inside.

"I'm sorry," I repeated for lack of anything better to offer.

"Oh," Mark moaned between sobs. "I so wanted to wear white to my wedding."

I never grasped until that moment how boys could be just as sentimental as girls, and just as traumatized, about surrendering their virginity. My tears joined Mark's as I understood I'd done Denise's bidding after all; I'd broken him in and broken his heart, all in one night.

* * *

"So what'd you see?" Denise asked first thing Monday morning, her smile so wide I thought her braces would surely spring from her teeth.

"

My Bloody Valentine

," I said.

"What's that about?" Lynn asked.

"A Valentine's Day party in an abandoned mine," I related. "Then everyone acts like morons while some lunatic kills them all."

Lynn shook her head slowly. "Oh; one of those."

"Oh," Denise squealed, "I love those kind of movies."

I wrinkled my nose. "You do?"

"Yes!"

"Explains why you think sex is a bad idea," Lynn quipped.

Denise either missed or ignored the joke. "Did Mark like it?"

I nodded. "I think so."

"What'd you do afterwards?" Lynn inquired with a sly grin.

"I went home."

"Really," Denise asked. "You didn't go to dinner?"

I snorted my contempt. "No! And I'm glad I didn't eat before either. I still don't have my appetite back."

"So," Lynn started, her eyes mischievously large, "did you go home

alone

?"

"Yes," I asserted at once. "I took him home and drove straight home myself."

Denise bounced her brows. "Did you at least kiss him?"

I pressed my lips together and exhaled a long breath through my wrinkled nose. "He had popcorn stuck in his braces," I lied. "I just couldn't."

Lynn's features contorted from her forehead to her neck. "Yuck!"

"No kidding," I agreed.

"Hey!" Denise started. "I get stuff stuck in my braces all the time."

"Yeah," I grunted as a half-chuckle. "And I don't want to kiss you either."

"Very funny," Denise snapped. "When are you taking him out again?"

"Depends if he asks me out again," I said. "But I don't think he will."

Denise's jaw dropped a bit. "You can ask him!"

I bobbed my head ever so shallowly for several breaths. "What if I don't want to?"