Radhika Sanghani - Virgin

My stomach sank in disappointment and rejection, and I turned back to the balding men and my vodka-lem. By the time I had downed the entire thing, Lara and the amazing guy were sipping out of piña colada pineapples and leaning against each other. I caught her eye and she mouthed sorry at me, even though she still had a huge grin on her face.

Andy or Mike nudged me and made a seedy joke about our foursome becoming a threesome. I realised I had to get out of there. I turned away from them, mumbling something about needing to go to the loo, and slipped outside.

I leant against a cold brick wall, too miserable and drunk to feel the cold. This whole idea had been stupid. Deep down, I’d known that from the start. But I had secretly hoped I would find a cute guy who would take me home, buy me breakfast in the morning and fall in love with me. Obviously, though, it was pretty, blonde, clever Lara who had found the ideal guy—and she didn’t even need one.

Everyone around me was laughing and chatting happily as they smoked their way to lung cancer. I felt so alone. That was the worst thing about my unwanted virginity—it made me feel so lonely. Lara hadn’t been a virgin for years and I was the only one out of our school friends who still hadn’t had sex. When we met up for people’s twenty-first birthdays, everyone shared stories about their boyfriends or regrettable one-night stands. It was standard uni experience stuff but I could never join in. They all gave me pitying looks— Aw, still a virgin, Ellie ?—and I used self-deprecating jokes to hide how much I cared. Secretly I wanted to be just like them.

‘You all right there?’

I turned around in surprise. There was a boy standing there, grinning at me. As my alcoholic daze cleared up a bit and my eyes adjusted to the light, I saw him properly. He was wearing a grey hoody and he had a flippy, emo fringe with a lip piercing. He was the only person at the club who didn’t look as though he’d walked off a yacht, and even the barmen were better dressed than him. He was also the only person who had come over to talk to me willingly.

‘Just a bit cold,’ I said, trying to force my face into an attractive pout.

‘Do you want a cigarette?’ he asked.

‘Sure,’ I said and took the one he offered me.

I lit the third cigarette I had ever smoked in my twenty-one years, breathed in sharply and coughed. A lot. He looked over at me with raised eyebrows, so I rasped, ‘Sore throat.’

‘Yeah, must be the cold.’ He grinned. ‘Happens to me all the time.’

I took another drag, swallowed the cough rising up my throat and nonchalantly flicked the ash from the tip of the cigarette onto the ground.

He looked amused.

‘So, have you … been here before?’ I asked.

‘Are you asking me if I come here often? Original chat-up line,’ he said with a smirk.

‘You’re the one who came up to me,’ I reminded him.

‘Fair point. No, I have never been here before, if you can’t tell by my general appearance. What about you?’

‘Me neither,’ I said, wondering what it would be like to kiss someone with a lip piercing. Would it get in the way?

‘So, do you want to go back inside?’ he asked.

I shrugged and threw the cigarette onto the ground, following him back down the stairs. We got to the bar and I waited for him to ask me if I wanted a drink. He said nothing so I bought myself a ten-quid vodka and lemonade, trying not to wince as I handed over my debit card. He bought himself a beer, and we leant against a fish tank in the middle of the club.

‘So, are you here alone?’ he asked.

‘I’m with a friend. You?’

‘Yeah, same, but he’s pulled so I’m alone.’

‘Cool, that’s, uh … good for him.’ I nodded, wondering how much of this static conversation I was going to have to put up with. He paused and looked into my eyes.

After a couple of seconds of intense staring, he leant in and kissed me gently on the lips. It wasn’t bad, until he stirred his tongue into action and started sliding it in. I felt the familiar rise of panic at not knowing what to do and tried to keep calm.

Even since my first kisses with James Martell, I’d never really figured out how to do it. When I was young and practised kissing on my hands, I knew deep down that when it happened for real, I would magically know what to do, just like a Hollywood heroine.

But the magic had never happened. Lip Piercing started rubbing his tongue against mine. I felt the metal of his piercing rub against my gums. I was tempted to run my tongue over it but instead I resorted to my fail-safe move of copying what he was doing. As always, it didn’t really work and my slightly oversized nose bumped against his. We switched sides and I braced myself for the tongue again.

I tried to remember the advice from a YouTube video I once watched. I started to massage his tongue with mine. Was I meant to go over and around it in a circular way, or go to the side of it? Was I meant to withdraw my tongue back into my mouth afterwards?

Closing my eyes, I hoped for the best. After a few minutes, he seemed to figure out that kissing with tongues was not my speciality and went back to lip kissing. I breathed a sigh of relief that we were done with tongues.

‘Ellie!’ Lara crept up behind me. She was grinning wildly and her long, silky hair was all mussed up. Her voice was girly and unnatural as she squealed, ‘This is Angus. He’s at Oxford as well, and get this—we have so many mutual friends!’

Obviously Angus went to Oxford. I gave him my best fake smile and turned to Lara, asking, ‘ Why have you suddenly become a posh dick ?’ with my eyes.

She ignored my look. ‘So, who’s this? Aren’t you going to introduce us?’

I pulled Lip Piercing towards me. ‘This is, erm …’ I looked at him and he looked blankly back at me. After a few seconds of social embarrassment, I glared at him. ‘Well, aren’t you going to say what your name is?’

He looked taken aback and stuttered, ‘Uh, yeah, it’s Chris.’

Lara air-kissed him before turning back to Angus. They went over to the bar and I was left with Chris. I looked down and saw he was wearing Converse. Angus had been wearing beautiful suede loafers. I sighed, but Chris grinned and pulled me towards him. We started kissing again and I wrapped my arms around him, trying to let myself enjoy it. He may have been the only misfit in the club, but at least he was a misfit who fancied me.

We were interrupted by bright, glaring lights. Chris broke away from me. ‘Oh shit, the club’s closing. I’d better find my friend and head off,’ he said.

‘Oh God, yeah. Me, too. I need to find Lara.’

‘OK then, see you,’ he said and walked off.

My mouth dropped open in shock. I wasn’t expecting him to suggest a spring wedding, but he hadn’t even bothered to ask for my number or to kiss me goodbye. His brief positive impact on my self-esteem slid away and I felt ten times uglier than I had at the beginning of the night. It had been more fun getting ready at home with Lara than it was to take part in this meat market.

Suddenly, I couldn’t believe I’d been considering giving my virginity to a guy I met in a club, who had a lip piercing , no less. And he didn’t even want me. I felt a tear stinging my left eye and stubbornly brushed it away. I wasn’t going to cry over some unattractive emo.

Then another tear came. I sat on a leather sofa in a dark corner of the club. I knew I would be able to laugh about this tomorrow with Lara, but right now it wasn’t funny. It just validated all the insecurities I’d tried to banish along with my moustache in Year Ten. Why had I expected more?

This was what happened on every night out I had pulled, since starting uni. The guy just left, or took my number, promising to arrange drinks, which he never did. I shouldn’t be surprised—I was used to it. I closed my eyes and stayed there alone until the urge to cry lessened and I got up to find Lara.