It had made it easy to stay a virgin, even if I did feel like a freak for approaching thirty and still having my V-card. But my grandmother, who was remarkably open-minded about sex, often told me, ‘There’s no point to sex unless there’s feeling, Laurie. You can screw around with every guy you know for all I care, dear. I just want you to be happy. But you won’t find happiness at the end of a man’s dick. You have to find it for yourself.’
She’d said far more graphic stuff over the years, and it was always around the same topic.
My mom and grandmother knew how weird I felt for still being a virgin, and though they encouraged me to date, they also encouraged me not to just throw it away because I was tired of it.
Truth was, that was never an issue because unless I felt this huge welter of heat hitting me square in the chest with a date, there was no way I was putting out.
And as I never had, my virginity had never been under threat.
How had he stood it? I asked myself now as I’d often asked myself.
How had he kissed me and touched me, let me kiss and touch him, explore him in ways that were so intimate, that went beyond mere sex, when he’d known I wasn’t ready to take it to the next level?
His self-control still stunned me to this day. As did my own.
I should have slept with him all those years ago.
Shouldn’t have been afraid to embrace what we had, and should have gone all the way.
But I hadn’t. And considering what had come after, I still wasn’t sure whether that was the best thing I’d ever done or the worst.
The world jump-started again as I took a deep breath. I headed toward the booth where my parents always sat, and looked at Cooper who was sitting in my place.
He had an empty plate in front of him and a half-drunk glass of OJ.
When I approached, however, he slid deeper into the booth so he was opposite my father. Though I frowned at him, I decided against making a scene and slipped in beside him.
“Hey sweetie. Guess who hunted us down,” my mother greeted me, beaming a smile my way.
I squinted at her, wondering why she hadn’t warned me with a text or something. She could have at least let me know he was here…
Although, she’d probably have figured that I would find a way to avoid such a meeting at all costs.
The fact that they were all laughing upon my arrival also spoke mountains.
Whatever Cooper had told them, they’d believed him. They’d forgiven him.
For a second, the betrayal that whipped through me was so painful, I felt like I was suffocating.
How could they forgive him after all the heartache he’d caused me?
And yet, it seemed like they had if the sparkle in my mom’s eye was anything to go by.
Grateful when my mom’s godchild appeared at my side, her usual scowl not present, I grabbed onto her arrival with both hands.
“Hey Karen. How’s your mom?”
She was only seventeen and had way too big a burden on her shoulders. Mom and I tried to help out when we could, just to give her a break, to let her get some work done for school but we both worked full time jobs and had our own crazy schedules to work around too.
We did what we could but I often felt like I was failing her.
The kid was exactly that—a kid, and was way too young to have the weight of the world on her shoulders.
“She’s fine.” The response was tight enough that I knew she was lying. “What can I get you?”
I grabbed her hand, squeezed it. “I’ll be around tomorrow, okay?”
Her eyes flared wide. “Y-You will?”