This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.5 License.
SOMETIMES I LOVE GUYS.
October 2006
I was minding my own business this afternoon, doing a load of laundry -- man, don't you love the smell of fabric softener? It just makes the whole day seem weirdly nice -- and who should come down into the basement but good old housemate Shane, toting a bag full of dirties. Now, this was an event. Normally, he and Michael just "forgot" to do their laundry, left it lying in the basement near the washers, and I did it for them. This time, Shane was suspiciously on the case.
Since I was clearly already in mid-chore, I expected him to drop his laundry and bug out. He didn't. He parked it against the wall, and as far as I could tell, had no intention of doing anything but hanging around and watching the spin cycle with me.
Weird.
I was reading -- Twilight, Stephanie Meyer -- and I wasn't paying him any real attention until Shane said, "So ... can I ask you something personal?"
NEVER a good sign, especially when it's delivered kind of casually, and the guy saying it won't meet your eyes. Then again, if you're perverse like me, it's an opportunity to torment your normally not-very-sharey friend.
So I stuck a bookmark between the pages and gave Shane my full attention. "Shoot."
For a long couple of seconds, I thought he was going to chicken out; he leaned against the wall, all shaggy hair and downcast eyes and thumbs dragging down the pockets of his baggy blue jeans. Cute, just not my type. I could definitely see why he was Claire's, though.
Shane cleared his throat and said in the direction of his feet, "How old were you when you first did it?"
Oh. Right. "When you say did it -- "
Shane gave me an exasperated look. "Don't give me the innocent act."
"Moi? Never. By the way, usually when guys want to talk about my sex life, they bring me drinks first."
Shane, poker-faced, handed over his freshly opened can of Coke. I chugged a thick, sweet mouthful, made sure to moan suggestively about it, and said, "I was fourteen."
That surprised him enough to look up. "Seriously?"
"Yeah, I know. Stupid, right?"
"None of my business," he shrugged. "But that seems pretty young."
"Bad time at Casa de Rosser. Mom and Dad were giving me hell, I wanted to prove I was in charge of my life. Thought I was ready."
"Were you?"
I gave him a look. "You're kidding. Did you miss the part where I was fourteen?"
Shane seemed to hit the end of his conversational road, and he just stood there, looking vaguely uneasy. I finally took pity on him. I put the book aside and said, "He was nineteen. The guy." Shane's own age now, actually. "The thing is, any guy that age willing to go to bed with a fourteen year old virgin is kind of by definition an asshole, and guaranteed to be a terrible lover. So I guess I'm the poster child on how not to lose your virginity."
"Who was the guy?" Shane's question was directed back toward the ground, and too quiet. Sweet, but kind of scary, too. I knew where this question was heading.
"Oh, no way. I'm not letting you go beat his ass for being a lousy lay. I know you, Shane."
"He was nineteen and you were fourteen," he said. Disturbing, how quiet he was. "Don't think bad technique is exactly his biggest crime."
"When did you pin on a badge? Look, you must have come down here for something other than a trip down Bad Memory lane. So what do you want to know?"
He shifted uncomfortably, crossed his arms, and I thought for a second he was going to just bolt back up the stairs rather than commit. He edged toward the stairs, then decided to stay. He finally said, in a rush, "What did he do wrong? Your guy?"
I snorted. "What didn't he? Oh, you're looking for specifics, right. Well, here's a big clue ... first time sex hurts for a lot of girls. If your girl starts to cry, for God's sake, stop. I don't mean, like, leave, but at least give her a chance to get it together again."
"Yours didn't?"
"Let me put it this way: he barely noticed I was conscious, much less freaking out." There was such a thing as being overly blunt, and I saw Shane wince. I took pity on him; he looked pretty miserable, and I wasn't trying to scare him out of the idea completely. "Anyway. Advice from the front lines, just ... be yourself. I know you, Shane. You'll be fine. You and Claire both will be."
He cleared his throat. "I -- just don't want to hurt her."
I got that. It was kind of sweet, really. "You want somebody else to hurt her for you? Wow. I don't know if that's selfish or creepy."
"What?"
I shrugged and picked up the book, leafing through to where I'd left the placeholder. "Somebody's going to be her first, and it's going to be pretty soon -- next year, the year after. If you don't screw it up, it'll probably be you."
Shane reclaimed his Coke and chugged it, then three-pointed the empty can into the bin in the corner. "And on that note, thanks for scaring the hell out of me. It's so nice we had this little talk. Let's not ever do it again." And he headed up the stairs, moving fast.
"What, no thank you?" I called after him. "You came to me, just remember that!"
"I'm trying hard to forget it!"
"Hey, Shane?" I raised my voice. He kept going. "Roses and a little Barry White work great, too. Just saying!"
"Shut up!"
"Also, strawberry-flavored -- "
"Shut up!"
Mission accomplished. I had made Shane flee the field of battle, and the laundry room was mine, all mine. I picked up Twilight and stretched out with a sigh of deep satisfaction. That lasted right up until I realized Shane had managed to completely distract me from the fact that he'd left his laundry behind.
Guys. You've got to love them. They can be such cowards ... but then again, Shane had worked up the courage to ask the question. Not typical guy behavior.
Maybe soon, I'll actually get them to do their own laundry.