Fresh Page 9

  “There is only one class I like and it’s not this. The others have failed to inspire me thus far.”

  Rose leans back very slowly, crosses her arms and cocks an eyebrow while a smug grin spreads across her face. “And which class is the one you like?”

  Ohhhhh, no she doesn’t.

  I shake my head. “Nope, nuh uh.”

  “It’s your screenwriting class, isn’t it,” she states rather than asks.

  “No, it’s my Plants and People class,” I lie. “I love learning about plant structure and growth processes.”

  Rose smacks the table in excitement and points her pen at me. “Ohmygod! I was right, you do like screenwriting!”

  “I do not.”

  “Admit it!”

  “Never!”

  “Come on, you can’t even give me that one?”

  “Je refuse . . .”

  “Can you two either leave or shut the hell up? I’m trying to write,” Monica snaps at us and Rose immediately drops the act, returning her attention back to her laptop. I’ve only met Monica a few times and she’s always been kind of dickish, so either she’s a dick all the time or she’s just a dick when I’m around. Either way, it really makes me question what Rose sees in her. Watching them together is an uncomfortable experience. I check my phone and sigh. It hasn’t charged enough to turn on in the two minutes since I plugged it in. I fold my hands under my chin and try to be quiet for Rose’s sake, but you know those annoying people who can’t handle uncomfortable silences and must fill every quiet moment with idle chatter? Well guess what? I AM ONE OF THOSE ANNOYING PEOPLE.

  “So, anyways, about my essay,” I say. “It’s the only assignment we have for the entire semester and it’s worth 90 percent of our grade but the guidelines are pretty loose; we just have to pick a specific topic within the realm of love and eroticism and dissect how it is depicted in media and entertainment. I have to make it good and stand out, but I don’t know how to do that.”

  To my surprise, it’s Monica who perks up. “Make it personal.”

  “What do you mean? Like say I would argue instead of one would argue?”

  “No,” Monica says. “Make it about you. Start with your thesis, then move on to examples to support your thesis and then top it off with your own personal experiences and how they compare. I took that class last year, your teacher loves that kind of shit.”

  “Huh,” I say, leaning back in my chair as I consider that option. “That could work.”

  “So what’s your topic?” Rose asks.

  “I want to write about what comes after virginity.”

  “What do you mean?” she asks.

  “There are tons of movies and books about people losing their virginity, but no one ever talks about what comes after that. Like, everyone sucks at sex when they’re first starting out, but what about people, especially women and queer people, wanting to and learning how to have good sex? Where are those stories? So yeah, this could work. I could top the essay off with some personal thoughts about my own experience with good sex.”

  Rose sets down her pen and leans forward. “So you’ve had good sex then?”

  “Yes, of course I have,” I say right away and then pause. “Wait—what do you mean by good sex?”

  She closes her laptop and looks at me. “Well, what do you mean by good sex? Because for me, I’m not just talking about an orgasm. An orgasm is a nice by-product, but it doesn’t necessarily need to be the point or the goal of sex. What I’m talking about is connecting with someone in a moment where the world melts away and there’s nothing left but the two of you, your bodies, your heat, your breath, where you open yourself up, let the walls tumble down and reveal yourself to your partner and them to you. And I don’t mean the tension-releasing, frenetic sex. I’m talking about the slow, hot, tension-building kind of intimacy where you take your time and savor every moment. The kind of sex that leaves your knees shaking and your body dripping.”

  Oh.

  Oh, damn.

  I don’t think I took a breath the entire time she was talking.

  I have to clear my throat before I can speak again. My mouth has suddenly gone dry from my jaw being on the floor for the last minute. “Uh, hmm, uh, yeah, no. I don’t think I’ve had that kind of sex before.”

  “You should experiment then,” Monica says and to be honest, I completely forgot she was even in the room with us. “Go have sex with a bunch of people and write about it for your essay.”

  “Seriously?” Rose furrows her brow at Monica. “That’s your suggestion?”

  “Why, what’s so wrong with that?” Monica crosses her arms in front of her chest. I get the distinct feeling that I’m about to be left out of the conversation any moment now, so I sit back in my chair and watch them go at it.

  “Your advice for her is to sleep with some strangers and then tell her teacher all about it in an essay? Doesn’t that seem weird to you?”

  “Not if she gets consent from her partners to write about the experience—and why are you suddenly so against it now? You didn’t balk at the suggestion before when I told her to make it personal,” Monica argues.

  “I wasn’t suggesting she have multiple partners, I was suggesting she find one person!”

  This time Monica looks to me and says, “Oh right, I forgot Rose is a traditionalist.”

  Rose looks pissed. “I’m not a traditionalist, Mon. I just think a bisexual person—”

  I hold my hand up to stop her. “Whoa, who, whoa, hey now. If you insist on labeling me, my sexual orientation is horny,” I joke and hope they laugh because the fighting is making me feel all prickly and nervous.

  Rose offers me an apologetic look. “I’m sorry, it’s just that there’s this negative stereotype about bi people being . . . promiscuous.”

  “So I’m not allowed to get messy and explore my sexuality out of fear I might be a stereotype?” I am genuinely interested in what Rose has to say, but Monica cuts her off before she can even start.

  “Get over yourself, Rose. No one’s type of relationship or sexual activity relates to their orientation. Fuck the stereotype.”

  Rose blatantly ignores her and says to me, “I just want you to be safe.” And now Monica is the one who looks pissed.

  “Why do you even care so much?” Monica asks, her voice harsh.

  “She’s my resident!” Rose yells, her voice rising above Monica’s.

  “Oh sure, that’s the reason—”

  Rose sucks in a breath between her teeth, like she’s ready to strike, and as much as I want to steer the conversation back to stereotypes and sex positivity, it’s obvious this conversation is no longer about me now and I should go.

  I yank the phone charger out of the wall and hand it back to Rose. “Thanks for letting me borrow this and for the advice and all the other stuff, but clearly you two have . . . some things . . . to talk about so I’m going to go ahead and let myself out. Have a good evening, ladies.”

  I grab my bag off the floor and slowly back out of the room and away from whatever the hell that was. Yikes. I don’t know if all that was about me, or them, or sexual experimentation or politics or what but that was some weird-ass energy I do not want to be around.

  As I leave the library, I turn my phone back on and it lights up with a text from Lucy letting me know Kenton has left. When I get back to the third floor, I almost walk in the room without knocking again out of habit, but recent events have taught me to do otherwise, so I politely tap my knuckles on the door and wait until I hear Lucy shout, “Come in!” I open the door and shield my eyes, you know, just in case.

  “Are you sure it’s safe?” I tease. I peek between my fingers, but when I see her sitting on her bed, with her knees tucked up and her head buried between them, I immediately drop the act and go to her. “Ohmygod, what’s wrong? Are you okay? Did he hurt you? I will fucking kill him if he hurt you.” I wrap my arms around her. Her face is blotchy and wet.

  “No, no, nothing like that. He di
dn’t do anything, we didn’t do anything. I don’t know why I’m crying.” She tries to wipe away her mascara but it only spreads even more across her face, making her look like she’s auditioning for a goth metal band. I offer her the hem of my shirt.

  “I’d be crying too if I was dating a guy with a peep as small as Kenton’s.” I’m hoping my joke will make her smile but instead she buries her head between her knees again.

  “Oh my god you saw it!”

  I laugh and rub her back. “Lucy, I swear, I did not see your boyfriend’s peep. I was just kidding!” It takes a minute but I eventually coax her out from behind her knees and take her hands in mine. I look her right in the eyes. “What’s going on, lady?” She fidgets with the rings on her fingers. I tap the top of my shoulder and she rests her head on it and I lean my head against hers. Her hair smells like she’s been stealing my shampoo. I wait as long as she needs to compose herself.

  “I took Micah’s advice. I invited Kenton over today because I wanted to try again, but we were trying to get him . . . going, you know, and—”

  “I walked in,” I say.

  “Yeah, that didn’t help either,” she laughs but keeps going. “He wanted to try again after you left but I just wasn’t feeling it. So we had a long talk and I told him I felt like we had moved a little too fast and maybe I wasn’t as ready as I thought.”

  “How did he take it?”

  “Good, I think. I don’t know, he can be hard to read sometimes. I mean, he said he was okay with it and then we decided that we’d do . . . third base more until I am ready for more.”

  “Ohmygod, just say oral, you nerd,” I tease.

  “Hey! If you can’t say penis and vagina, I don’t have to say oral.” She shivers at the word.

  “Fair enough,” I say and remove my head from hers so I can look at her. “You don’t have to do anything with Kenton until you are both ready. You know that, right?”

  “Yes, I know that.”

  “Good.” I smile and kiss her cheek.

  She sits up straight and exhales a steadying breath. “I think it just hit me today, how fast things have changed in such a short period of time. It’s a little overwhelming.” I nod in agreement as she keeps talking. “I couldn’t wait to get here, but now that I am here it’s . . . harder than I expected, I guess.”

  “But not as hard as Kenton, amiright?” I raise my hand and wait patiently until she reluctantly gives in and high-fives me back. Then she laughs and wraps her arms around me.

  “I am so glad we got paired together,” Lucy says. “I don’t know what I’d do without you.”

  “Probably not get walked in on as much.”

  “Probably,” she agrees.

  “And you’d eat less waffles.”

  “That too.”

  “And have a cleaner room.”

  “Okay, okay, okay,” she says and finally sits up straight again, wiping away all the tears from her lovely face.

  “You gonna be okay?” I ask her again just to be sure.

  “I think I just needed a good cry,” she says, and even though her eye makeup is a hot mess, she looks better. “So where have you been? I texted you over an hour ago.”

  “Oh yeah, I’ve been at the library with Rose.”

  Lucy scrunches her face. “Hold up, you were at the library . . . with Rose?”

  “Yeah it’s a short story, but first let me tell you about this essay I’m going to write.” I hop off her bed and hold my hands out like I see all the musical theater kids do when they practice in the common room. “I’m calling it Project Tender Chicken . . .”

  * * *

  1 The banana is just for show. You and I both know I’m never gonna eat it.

  2 Is this how non-ADHD people feel around me?

  3 The international symbol for tender chicken.

  4 AND BECAUSE I’M USED TO NOT KNOCKING.

  5 What’s the polite way to apologize to your roommate and her boyfriend whose boobs and boner you just walked in on? Does Hallmark make a Sorry I caught you and your new boyfriend sexing it up! card?

  CHAPTER 7

  And so begins a grand undertaking wherein I, Elliot McHugh, shall embark on a mission of the utmost importance: Project Tender Chicken. And in case you’ve been skipping over all my hilarious footnotes, tender chicken is my own personal phrase that essentially translates to lady wood, a girl boner, the female hard-on. It’s both a noun and a verb and now it’s your new favorite phrase.

  Okay, so, here is how this is gonna go. For the next month or two, I am going to get it on. A lot. And the best part is, it’s ALL IN THE NAME OF ACHIEVING A HIGHER EDUCATION.1 My goal? Fully embrace the freedom being emotionally unattached affords me and find the Holy Fucking Grail of Sex. I don’t care how much time and energy this will require; all other aspects of my life are now secondary to Project Tender Chicken.

  It’s Rose’s question I can’t get out of my head. Have you ever had good sex? What turns you on? What turns you off? And the truth is, I don’t know. How does anyone know? How do YOU know? And it’s got me thinking that maybe this is what college is for. Sure, sure, yeah college is also about getting a degree blah blah blah and whatever, but isn’t it also about figuring out who you are and who you want to be? And I’m not just talking about a career, I’m talking about who I want to be as a human fucking being. And how else are you supposed to find the answers if you don’t go searching for them? So strap in or strap on, my friends! Fuck it, let’s do this.

  ELLIOT MCHUGH PRESENTS: THE TENDER CHICKEN SPECIAL

  ANDERS

  I didn’t go very far to find my first partner. In fact, all I had to do was walk up one flight of stairs to the fourth floor to find Anders, an acting major who looked like he could play a Swedish viking on TV. I met him outside the Little Building a few weeks ago and I’d been curious to try him on for size ever since. And now, I have.

  “How about now?” He asked nicely as he readjusted the angle of his wiener. He pushed in deeper and it did not feel good.

  “Ack!” I cried out from underneath him. “You still keep hitting my cervix. Can we try it from behind instead?”

  “Okay!” Anders said. We’d been going at it for nearly an hour and while he was very enthusiastic, we couldn’t quite get a good rhythm going. He pulled out, got off the bed, and I flipped over, got up on my hands and knees, and we gave it a go. Unfortunately for me, when Anders came in for a landing, he miscalculated and his peeper nearly slipped into my pooper.

  “No, no, no, no! Wrong hole! WRONG HOLE!” I screeched. He jumped back and immediately started apologizing.

  “I’m so sorry! Are you okay?” He looked genuinely terrified.

  “I’m fine!” I said even though my butt had a slightly different opinion.

  “Do you want to keep going?” He asked and I was amazed he still had a boner. I certainly didn’t.

  “Uh, no, I think this might be a good place to stop.” I pulled the sheets up to cover myself while Anders reached for his boxers.

  I didn’t return his text the next day.

  YVONNE & TOBIN

  I met Yvonne and Tobin in the darkroom when I got bored waiting for Micah to finish one of his journalism seminars one evening. I started to wander the halls when I saw someone come out of a red-lit room. I had never been in a photography darkroom before and I didn’t even realize a class was going on, so I walked right in—but no one seemed to notice I wasn’t supposed to be there. I watched as they took these white glossy sheets of paper and gently slid them in plastic trays filled with clear liquid. Look, I get it, current technology is cool and all, but there is something completely captivating about watching a black and white nude photograph of a beautiful woman materialize before your very eyes.

  “Did you take this?” I asked as a student used rubber tongs to delicately press the photo paper into the liquid bath.

  “Yeah, this one’s mine,” they said.

  “This is really fucking good.”

  “Thanks
,” they smiled. It was cool that they weren’t totally weirded out by a stranger coming up and getting all critique-y of their work.

  “Who is this?” I asked, unable to take my eyes off the photo.

  “That’s Yvonne, she’s my girlfriend,” they said with a beam.

  “Wow, you are lucky. I could eat her up.”

  They looked at me, and for a second I worried I had overstepped and been too forward but then they said, “She and I would love that.”

  And then, for one very successful week for Project Tender Chicken, I was the guest star in an erotic, three-episode arc in Yvonne and Tobin’s relationship. Y&T invited me to stay—to be with them—but as soon as I was asked for some kind of commitment, all those old, familiar anxieties started creeping up again and I lost all interest. I declined their offer. I haven’t seen either since.

  EVA

  Sasha introduced me to this Puerto Rican girl, Eva Grey. Sasha met her in a creative writing class and from what she told me, Eva writes fantasy stories with super hot sex scenes and has been single for a while and ready for someone new, so I was really looking forward to our date.

  Lucy went home for dinner like she usually does on Sundays, so Eva and I had the room to ourselves. I set the mood perfectly—I restrung the fairy lights without Rose knowing, and I bought one of those oil diffusers to blanket the room in a vanilla and musk scent. I was just putting on my favorite sexytime playlist when she arrived. I let her in and as soon as I took a seat on my bed, Eva was on me. Literally. She jumped on my lap and straddled me. Her kisses were rough and sloppy and she squeezed my tits so hard it felt like she was going to pop them. Very gently I peeled my face from hers and said, “Hey, hi. So um, mind if we slow this down a bit?”

  Her hands flew to her mouth in embarrassment as she got off my lap. “Was that too fast? Ohmygosh, that was too fast. I’m so sorry, I’m nervous. This is my first time with a girl.”