Chapter 28 #2
Creative . . . Coming from Henry. My friend has many talents, but – sorry – creativity is not normally one of his strong points.
Why that should be different in bed is a mystery to me, but the sounds I can sometimes hear through the thin wall to his room don’t exactly suggest that Emma isn’t getting the full benefit of it.
But maybe he’s right. Maybe talking really isn’t a bad idea. Asking what’s good and what isn’t. And until then I’ll just pray it’s not too late.
TORI
Kit had to spend a week in hospital. He’s doing OK, he was lucky, and instead of going home to his parents, he’s moved into a vacant room on the fifth-form wing. Close to Will.
Mrs Sinclair ensured that Kit gets a full scholarship. It won’t solve his issues with his father, but at least he’s safe now.
Of course, the story of what happened, and the news that Kit was rushed to hospital in an ambulance, soon got around.
I haven’t seen him at break times yet, but he and Will are at the midnight party in the old greenhouse this evening.
He looks about as battered as Charlie did after his punch-up with Valentine.
I try not to think about how lucky Charlie was that Val didn’t give him anything worse than a black eye and a fat lip.
I can feel his eyes on me the whole time.
The others are talking, laughing and drinking.
Charlie isn’t drinking, but he’s constantly looking in my direction.
We haven’t had a chance to talk in peace since last week.
The conversation we need to have feels too important to be squeezed in at break or during a rehearsal.
But it’s inescapable. We had sex. It was my first time.
And I think Charlie needs to know that. If he doesn’t already.
And if I can’t pluck up the courage to address the subject, all I can do is guess.
Charlie will understand it’s important to me.
He’s not like Val, who would definitely have laughed and then said it didn’t faze him that I hadn’t done it before.
Who would probably have been irritated with me for making things complicated again if I’d tried to talk to him about it.
It’s not like Charlie and I never argue, but it’s different.
I get him. I can generally predict it if something’s going to rile him.
He doesn’t come up with totally unexpected accusations and he doesn’t insult other women.
Dark red flags – and my friends could all see them.
But me? I defended Val to them. Because he was so deep in my head that I couldn’t see it.
Because I wanted to heal his broken soul.
Whatever the cost – in this case, my self-worth.
I don’t know what it is about Val, but it was like an evil spell that suspended all my common sense.
I’ve read so many books and I always thought nothing like that would happen to me.
Because I’ve got my principles and a healthy awareness of myself.
Because there are enough people in my life to remind me of that, and to protect me.
Ha, and they did too, but I wouldn’t believe them.
Val came between us. Right from the start, he badmouthed my friends, and that bothered me the whole time.
It was the first, and maybe the most important, sign that he’s dangerous.
But I wouldn’t see it – until Charlie had to get into a fight with him.
I walked away from Valentine by my own strength that night, but who knows where it would have gone from there?
Who knows if I’d eventually have given in so that he’d leave me in peace?
I’m so glad I didn’t. That this first time will always belong to me and Charlie.
The thing I secretly wished for. To lose my virginity with him, even if ‘lose’ is such an inappropriate word.
Because ‘lose’ suggests you should keep it, as if it’s some kind of honour.
If I lose my virginity, it’s because I’ve taken a conscious decision.
It shouldn’t mean ‘Don’t worry about it, you’re so young.
It’s good for you to wait.’ It should mean ‘Don’t worry, you don’t need some erect dick inside you to prove that someone found you sexy enough. ’ But nobody ever tells you that.
I jump as I feel a hand on my shoulder. Charlie runs his fingers gently down my spine before resting both hands on the back of the armchair in the old greenhouse.
‘Hi,’ he says.
As I turn towards him, he kisses me. Just like that, even though everyone can see.
‘Hello,’ I whisper, as our lips part again. ‘What’s up?’
‘Are you all right?’ he asks. ‘You look sad.’
‘Sad,’ I repeat.
‘Yes.’ He doesn’t look away. ‘So I just wanted to make sure.’
‘I’m not sad,’ I say. And that’s not even a lie, because the mere fact of him asking makes me the opposite of sad.
And it reminds me that it doesn’t matter what happened – or almost happened – with Valentine.
That’s in the past. A mistake, an experience, which I’ve learned from.
This, Charlie and me, this is the present.
And it’s perfect. No red flags, just Charlie, who breaks off his conversation with his friends to come over and ask if I’m OK.
He suppresses a yawn, burying his face in my shoulder as he does so. I stroke his hair.
‘Are you tired?’ I ask.
Charlie kisses my throat. ‘Are you tired?’
I shrug. I might have been just now, but he’s creating a tingle in my stomach that’s pushing all tiredness away.
‘Want to go?’ I ask, all the same.
He freezes. Then he kisses the spot behind my ear and whispers, ‘Yes.’
‘Come on.’ He pulls me up.
Emma says something to Henry and they wave us goodbye, grinning to each other. They’re impossible.
Charlie doesn’t let go of my hand as we leave the greenhouse and step outside.
It really is spring, I think, because the air is warmer than I expected.
Suddenly, I can hardly wait. Summer nights with Charlie, wing time while it’s still light outside, creeping out to swim in the loch in the last of the daylight, never sleeping, never waking out of the dream.
I start to guess what Charlie has in mind when he pulls me into the north wing and we walk down the dark corridor towards the theatre.
It’s not locked. I giggle quietly as Charlie pushes me into the dark auditorium.
The middle of the night. Just the two of us.
The heavy door falls shut and the silence in here is different.
It wraps itself around us like a heavy cloak as we walk down the steps.
The faint light of the emergency exit signs is enough for me to know where to put my feet.
Down below, in the front row, Charlie switches on the little lamp that Mr Acevedo uses to make notes when we’re rehearsing in small groups.
‘Ever been here at night before?’
I jump as Charlie comes to stand behind me. Close behind me. His voice sounds clearer in the amazing acoustics, but that’s not what’s giving me goosebumps. It’s the way it cracks slightly, which I find endlessly attractive.
‘No, have you?’ I turn so that the edge of the stage is at my back. And Charlie’s right in front of me. The light falls sideways onto his face.
He answers me with a kiss, and I thank my lucky stars. It’s a different kiss. It’s deep and thoughtful, slow, intense. It’s a perfect kiss. And perfect hips are part of a perfect kiss, pressed together, and the suppressed trembling that’s making my knees weak.
‘Tori,’ he whispers, as his lips glide over the corners of my lips. He pauses just a few centimetres from my face. I can hear him gulp. Another of those sounds that will now always drive me crazy. Charlie, at night, swallowing, aroused, the two of us in the theatre. ‘About last week . . .’
Last week. When I think about last week, I mainly think about our trembling bodies in my bed. Did he notice something?
‘Yes?’
He moves away a little.
‘Do you think it counts as a first time when it only lasted about thirty seconds?’ he asks, and my blood runs cold.
OK, then. He knows.
My laugh sounds high-pitched, awkward, and I want to cry. On the spot.
‘I wanted to tell you,’ he continues.
Hold on . . .
‘What did you want to tell me?’
He looks at me, just for a moment. He’s nervous, I can see it. I see him bite his lip gently before he answers. ‘I’d never done it before.’
‘What?’ I blurt out.
He what?
Is he pulling my leg? Had he really not? What about Eleanor?
I open my mouth, but I don’t speak.
‘Say something,’ he begs.
‘It was your first time.’
His jaw muscles tense. ‘Yes.’
‘Why didn’t you say?’
Yeah, why didn’t he? We’d probably both have been more relaxed if we’d known it was a debut for both of us.
And he knows that. Doesn’t he?
‘I didn’t want it to be weird.’ Charlie looks down again. ‘It doesn’t matter.’
‘It does matter,’ I say. ‘Of course it matters.’ And then: ‘It was my first time too.’
He didn’t know.
I’m sure of that as he jerks his head up and his eyes widen.
‘Wait, what?’
I say nothing.
‘But I thought . . .’ He hesitates. ‘Val?’
I laugh out loud. ‘God, Charlie. No.’
‘You were prepared, you even had condoms, I thought . . .’
‘No.’ I don’t know why my eyes are suddenly stinging. ‘That was just a precaution. I wanted to be ready just in case. But, luckily, I never used them with him.’
Charlie stares at me and I can practically see the cogs whirring in his brain, the puzzle pieces I’ve thrown him over the last few weeks fitting together. Random scraps of the past that I wish I could forget, but never will.
‘Tori, I didn’t know . . .’
I shake my head. ‘Why would you?’
‘We’re so stupid,’ Charlie whispers. He sounds genuinely shocked.
I have to laugh. ‘We really are.’
‘But . . . what made you think it wasn’t my first time?’
I hesitate, then just say it. ‘Eleanor?’
He looks at me like I’ve gone mad.
‘That’s a no, then?’
‘Tori, no. God, no.’
‘But anyone can see your chemistry on the stage,’ I justify myself.
‘Yes, but does that mean you have to have sex?’