Page 62 of Confessions of a Virgin on a Dating App
“Uh…it was sort of mutual.”
“Let me guess…at some point, you two ended up alone in the shop together.”
I cringed, my eyes twitching.God, was it that obvious?
“Yeah. We talked, and, well, turns out we’re more alike than I thought.”
“It took youfive yearsto realize that?” Cassidy exclaimed. “I knew you two were meant for each other within a few months of meeting you.”
“What!? You never told me about this!”
Cassidy shrugged. “He’s like a decade older than you. And you didn’t seem like you wanted a relationship at the time.”
I nodded, my gaze locked on the road as I pulled up to a red light.She’s right. I wasn’t ready back then. I don’t even know if I’m ready now.
“Anyway,” Cassidy continued. “What happened that night? I’d assumed one of you rejected the other, but you both looked upset last night at prerelease.”
My stomach clenched. That was where things got messy. But if I could handle telling the truth to Devin, the person I’d eventually end up being intimate with, then I could handle telling Cassidy. After all, she was my best friend.
“I can’t have sex,” I blurted out, in much the same way I’d done in the hospital with Devin. “It turns out I have a condition called endometriosis, which is also why my periods are so bad.”
“Endometriosis? What’s that?”
“The doctor at the ER explained it to me, but the details are still sort of fuzzy.” I rubbed my head. “I meant to do more research on it later today. But long story short, I need surgery. Soon.”
Cassidy’s eyebrows shot up in alarm.“Surgery? God, Avery, I’m so sorry.”
“It’s alright,” I lied, remembering how badly I’d been trembling at the hospital the night before. “The doctor said it’s minimally invasive. It shouldn’t be too bad.”
“So all this time, with all that online dating…is that why you never found anyone? Is that why Tristan ended things?”
I didn’t respond, but Cassidy could tell by the way my face hardened and my knuckles clenched the steering wheel what the answer was.
“God,” she continued. “I didn’t know any of this. We’ve…been really distant from each other lately, haven’t we?”
I nodded, tightening the muscles in my throat to keep from crying.
“It’s habit,” I replied after a few moments of silence. “I bottle things up. I guess that’s what happens when you flee a controlling family and try to make it on your own. It’s hard.”
“I feel that. My parents are poor as dirt and still chose to have six kids. I was almost completely on my own as soon as I turned eighteen.”
A small crackle of realization seeped through my heart like electricity as I realized that my relationship with Cassidy was much like my relationship with Devin. We’d known each other for years, bonding over geeky hobbies and silly jokes, but we never prodded beneath our superficial exteriors. I didn’t know much about Cassidy’s life before I met her. I hadn’t even known she had five siblings.
I decided that was something I needed to work on. My past caused me to avoid difficult conversations like the plague, which in turn made my emotions pressurize within me until they eventually burst. From then on, I vowed to be a more open, honest person. Not just with the people around me, but also with myself.
“But yeah, to wrap up my story,” I continued. “when Devin dragged me to the hospital, I told him everything.”
“And it didn’t scare him away, did it?”
A warm, reminiscent smile lit up my face. “No. It didn’t.”
“God, that’s so sweet.” Cassidy sunk into her seat, her eyes hazy with longing. “I stayed up for a while after Devin put your drugged self to bed. I didn’t know the full details at the time, but I knew that whatever had happened between you two, you managed to work past it. And it made me realize that I needed to do the same with Aaron.”
“What do you mean?” I asked. “Did you reject him over personal issues too?”
Cassidy gave a dark chuckle, one laced with sadness. “Funny enough, yes. I also have a medical issue that I’ve never told you about. And now it’s time.”
“What is it?”
