didn’t start putting out, he’d break up with me for Jenna Garcia. He said that nobody liked a prude and it wasn’t that big of a deal; I just needed to let loose. So I did it. I gave him my virginity and then two days later, he broke up with me and started dating Jenna anyway.”
I roll over, causing her to lie on her back and look up at me as I loom over her. “He’s fucking stupid,” I tell her, pressing a kiss to her jaw. “Who was this Jenna girl, and why was she so special?”
“Jenna was the it girl back at my old school. She was sixteen at the time and had just blossomed into a woman the summer before I got there. So while most girls were still skinny and flat, she had curves for days. It didn’t hurt that she was extremely popular and rich. She was just better than everyone. In a teenager’s eyes, anyway.”
I shake my head as I watch the expressions on her face change.
“After that, he told everyone that we had hooked up, and it was like everyone was bidding for my attention. But after him, I was done with the popular jock type. So, I went after guys that I shouldn’t have. I figured, hey, why not? I dated a good guy and he treated me like shit. Surely the cute bad boys couldn’t do much worse, right?”
I don’t talk. I don’t think she needs me to.
“Anyway, that was my downfall. I got in with the bad kids. We’d skip school, drink, party, get into trouble. By the time I was sixteen, I had been kicked out of school and had to go to the loser school with the rest of the troublemakers. Going there was only worse for me. I no longer had the option of being good. Everyone there was into partying and drinking and sex. And then, it was only worse with the guys, because at sixteen, I had started to fill out. The girls hated me—I quickly grew bigger and better. And the guys, well, they loved me even more than they had before.”
“Does all this have something to do with getting kicked out?” My hand is on her stomach, trailing up and down from the bottom of her breast to her hipbones and back.
“Sort of. I had been giving my mom a lot of trouble for years. She didn’t deserve the way I treated her. I mean, I was young and just wanted to do what I wanted to do. She was trying to protect me, but I hated her for it. Then came her boyfriend, Marco. Marco was a loser. He had had a good job at one point in time, but he got hurt and got a huge settlement. The money went straight to his head. He bought a big mansion, fancy cars, and spent thousands of dollars at clubs to impress everyone. That’s where he met Mama. She was waitressing at a club.”
“Your mom?” I ask, unable to process this story. Her mom was always good-looking for an older, married lady, but I’d never think of her dressing skimpy or working at a club.
“Yep, Mama changed a lot after Daddy died, and she did what she had to do. Anyway, in walks Marco. He’s attractive, charming, and he has money. It didn’t take him long to win her over. Then came the day that we got kicked out of our shitty apartment for not paying rent. We moved in with him, but my attitude had only gotten worse. And with Mama occupied with her new boyfriend, I was free to cause even more trouble. Like I said, I had grown a lot over the years, not mentally, but physically. And those bad guys, they weren’t the only ones to notice. So did Marco. He’d say things to me when Mama wasn’t around. Innocent things to start with. He’d tell me how pretty I was, how I was much more mature than other girls my age, how any guy I chose to be with should consider themselves lucky. But that changed to dirty things, and then came the night when he came home drunk and thought that I’d have sex with him.”
I feel my body tense with anger.
“I was asleep in my bed and he came in. He woke up me and covered my body with his. I had just gotten home from a party, and I was drunk and high. I