Page 23 of Mostly My Boss
I wasn’t buying it. I’d seen Nicki do shots in our room before heading out to meet people. Whiskey, tequila, vodka. Whatever she could get her hands on. She said a couple of shots loosened her up. I didn’t really want to know how much looser she could get.
Eventually she settled down, then Ethan was leaning into her more than me.
Thank God!
Like I needed a drunk Ethan falling all over me.
I watched the movie but the whole time I was thinking,How long do I have to sit here and watch this? Is there a good break at some point?I couldn’t remember if there was.
It was a classic.The Breakfast Club. One of those movies all teenagers had to sit through as some rite of passage when the reality was that everyone who starred in the movie was, like, in their fifties.
You were supposed to watch the movie and see yourself in it. The goth chick, the jock, the nerd, the rebel, and the homecoming queen.
I’d been none of those things. I was somewhere off script. The teacher, maybe, who’d handed down detention because the students had broken the rules. Or the responsible one who understood that there was never any real gain from a Saturday detention.
Although I did like how Molly Ringwald gave the finger. That sort of classy fingers-half-bent pose. I was going to practice that when I got back to my dorm.
“So do you think she is?” Ethan asked.
“Is what?” Nicki asked, hopping on a chance to be part of a conversation with Ethan. The truth was, most of the time Ethan’s conversations were over her head. Not that he was intentionally esoteric or that Nicki was dumb. They were just never on the same wavelength.
“A virgin? In the movie. I mean, it feels like it, doesn’t it.”
It was the part of the movie where everyone essentially virgin-shamed Molly Ringwald while getting ready to slut-shame Ally Sheedy.
I shook my head. This movie was so ridiculous.
“Totally, you can tell,” Nicki said. “They all walk with a stick up their ass. And they’re all a little too angry, if you know what I mean. Molly’s got the vibe down pat.”
“So stupid,” I muttered.
“What?” Ethan asked.
“Virgins don’t walk a certain way. They don’t talk a certain way. They’re simply people who haven’t fucked yet. The stereotypes are so unoriginal.”
Nicki and Ethan both looked at me as if I’d said something astonishing.
“It’s true,” I insisted.
“Oh my god,” Nicki said. “Are you a virgin?”
Ethan seemed in shock. “Seriously, Jules?”
I no longer gave a fuck about the people behind me. I scrambled out of the sleeping bag, grabbed my thermos of unspiked hot chocolate, and stepped carefully over them.
“I’m going to fall asleep. It’s too cold. See you back at the room, Nicki.”
I didn’t say anything to Ethan. Not even a reminder to take the extra sleeping bag he’d brought with him back to his room. I thought that was both rebellious and cruel of me. There were a few moans and calls to duck, which I instantly did.
Fifteen minutes and a brisk walk later, I was at Hollis Hall. Hollis wasn’t as nice as Grays or Apley, but it could have been worse, and I could have been stuck in Canaday, which looked like a big block of cement.
Happy to have the room to myself for a time, I got undressed and headed to the common bathroom for a hot shower. We had a sink and toilet in our room but that was it. The shower room was empty, and I let the hot water pour down over my head until I forgot…everything.
When I returned to the room, my phone had blown up with a bunch of texts. From Nicki. From Ethan.
I ignored them all. I wasn’t going to answer their questions and I wasn’t going to give them any more reason to speculate on an answer. My virginity or lack thereof was nobody’s business.
I was climbing into bed when this time, instead of a text, the phone actually rang. I picked it up off the nightstand because I couldn’t not look. It could be my mother.
