Sitting beside Gil on a squeaky vinyl bus seat on Wednesday, I couldn’t tell if I was numb because of the pouring sleet we had just sprinted through, or because of what we were about to do.
He gazed at the graffiti in black marker on the seat in front of us. “‘Your mum shags cows,’” he read. “That’s nice.”
“Seriously.” I smiled, with effort. “So, your folks will be around?”
He unzipped his purple coat. “Mum probably. Me sister maybe too.”
“Do they have the slightest clue who I am?”
“I’ve mentioned you. My American friend, I’ve said.” He nibbled at a hangnail. “Haven’t told them all we get up to, of course.”
“Of course.”
Since getting on the bus he hadn’t looked at me for more than a split second. I decided to voice the topic that hung in the air between us like a misty ghost. “So, what are we going to get up to?”
Now he looked at me, letting his gnawed hand drop to his lap. His brow crinkled in anxiety. “Dinnae ken. What do you think?”
Lest you wondered, “dinnae ken” does not signify a kinky sexual activity; it’s merely the Scottish version of “don’t know.”
I laced my cold fingers together between my knees. “Well, I’m not a virgin or anything...”
“Me neither. Girlfriend, a year or so back.”
“Oh. Good. But the thing is...” I had mentally rehearsed this conversation so often while at work that the image of tea-stained cups and bleached dishtowels jumped into my head as I spoke. “I’ve never done it with Tony. So, I know it’s weird, but I don’t think I ought to do it with you either.”
“Ah. All right.” He actually sounded cheerful.
I looked over. His face had relaxed into a smile. Feeling insulted even though I was the one issuing limitations, I asked, “You don’t care?”
“Well, we wouldn’t want to rush things.” He dropped his arm around me. “Besides, I’ve stacks of CDs I’d like you to hear, and we couldn’t have you being distracted from that.”
I grinned. “Of course not.”
He leaned into me so our sides pressed together, and as I took a breath I caught his scent: subtle spicy deodorant mingled with the melted sleet in his long hair. My insides melted a little too, and I remembered to add the rest of my speech. “Granted, I only mean we shouldn’t do anything that requires birth control. There are other things...”
I let my sentence trail off to make sure he understood. Judging from the slow, heated kiss he slid onto my lips as his answer, he got the picture.
After we stepped off the bus, he led me along a quiet winding street to a narrow townhouse. On either side stood half a dozen buildings identical to it, all connected at the shoulders in one long row. Each house had a little square front yard--garden I reminded myself. No one said yard here. An overgrown rhododendron dropped water and yellow leaves on me as I brushed past.
“Mum! Hello!” Gil hollered, shutting the door behind us.
The old walls bore new floral wallpaper. The carpet was beige and knobby. In front of us, the stairs climbed to a second story. Loosening my coat in the warmth of the house, I sniffed the air and identified the smell as curry.
Gil hung up his coat, turned to get mine, and plucked a leaf off it before hanging it on a peg. “Mum? Amy?”
“God, yell louder, Gilleon?” A blonde girl in her early teens wandered out of the kitchen. Steam uncurled from the bowl in her hand.
“Amy, my friend Eva. Eva, my horrible so-called sister Amy.”
Amy had applied too much blue eye shadow, and a halter top was uncalled for in cold weather like this. But she was still cute--a feature that ran in the family, evidently. Stirring her food, she said, “Hi. Staying for dinner?”
“Hi. Um, I don’t think so, but thank you.”
Gil already had one foot on the stairs, his hand holding mine. “Amy, where’s Mum?”
“Shopping. Got nothing to eat. I bought this on the way home.”
“Right. We’re upstairs. Leave us alone or die in a nasty fashion.” He tugged my arm and up we went.
“Nice to meet you,” I called down, and heard her giggle. Apparently, snickering at your sibling’s love interests was a universal phenomenon.
In Gil’s room, rock-band posters covered every inch of wall and ceiling, and his shelves sagged under stacks of CDs.
He shut the door behind us. I pretended not to notice our newfound privacy, and inspected his possessions more closely.
Sandwiched alongside the CDs were a few paperback novels by people I’d never heard of. Against the wall a dark brown desk held an old laptop computer and a pair of drumsticks. One snare drum and one cymbal perched on stands beside the desk. His bed, which I tried not to look at, was twin-sized and rumpled with a black and red checkered duvet over orange sheets. Good to know his clashing color sense extended into his home decor.
Gil popped a CD out of its case and slid it into his laptop. “Here. Name the band.”
The music kicked in through the speakers, sweeter than I expected, a jangly pop tune with a husky-voiced male singer. “Hmm,” I said. “Travis?”
“Aye, very good.” His hands slid onto my waist from behind. “They’re Scottish, you know.”
“I remember. Haven’t heard this one, though.”
“It’s a B-side collection. I’ll burn you a copy.” He bent his head to nibble my ear and cheek. His fragrant hair tickled my skin.
I turned, smiling. “Thought you didn’t want to distract me.”
He chuckled, the sound vibrating through my jaw as he nuzzled my neck. “Eh, just keep listening and don’t mind me.”
In a few stumbling steps we toppled onto his bed. With an alignment of limbs I wound up lying on top of him, my hips moving to find the most delicious angle against his body.
His fingers, still cold from our walk, pushed up my sweater and unhooked my bra, sending shivers across my back. He rolled me onto my side and captured my breasts in both palms.
I closed my eyes. “I apologize.”
“Hmm?”
“They’re dinky. Sorry about that.”
“That’s all right. Me hands are small too.”
While we kissed, I unbuttoned his jeans to slide my hand beneath them, and felt him catch his breath. Okay, I had never done this with Tony, either. But drawing the line at going “all the way” counted for something, right?
Tony probably sat in class at Wild Rose High right now. Did he add eight hours to the clock and imagine what I was doing? Could he have possibly fathomed it would be something like this? He was on close terms with God; would God tell him?
And for some reason I thought of Laurence, a mere few miles away, who probably did have a good idea what I was doing. Imagining the guilt he would happily inflict upon me if he found out, I almost stopped, almost pulled my hands and boobs and dangling bra away from the grasp of this Scottish boy I’d only met a couple of months ago.
But wasn’t this what I had daydreamed about since before even meeting Gil? Wasn’t this the experience I had intended to acquire, so I could become worldly and make more informed decisions about life? Wasn’t this the fun I had longed to have?
Did I love Gil? I had to ask myself again. Tonight, with the music and the bed and the warmth and his scent, I whispered to myself, Almost. I almost love him.
That was enough. Our connection felt good--ultimately the simplest but strongest factor in why I didn’t stop.
In my head I conjured a transparent magical sphere that I flung outward to surround Gil’s bed, shielding us from the eyes of anyone in this world or the next. We were invisible and we could continue and nothing was wrong with it.
Or so I let myself believe.