exactly.’ This felt easier than to confess that her nerves were minimal because she knew exactly what sex with Lawrence Paulson would be like.
The first time, it had been unplanned, spontaneous and fantastic. They had met by chance at the bus stop, both a little late finishing school, her because of volunteering to litter-pick, trying to curry favour with Miss Carter, who had organised it, and him because of football practice. It was only later that Bessie would swap the word chance for fate, thinking that this meeting had surely been written in the stars . . . They had sat on the bench chatting, the bus had come and gone, and they had flirted. He had kicked at her leg playfully, she had touched his hair with the excuse of restyling his fringe – and the next thing she knew, they were kissing frantically and he was pulling her body on to his. They had grabbed each other’s hand and then, without too much planning or forethought, she had whispered into his ear, ‘Come on!’ and they had hurried to the alley that ran up the side of the school playing field, where she kicked off her pants and stood on the step to a garage, and they had done it. Quickly. And that was that. The virginity ship had sailed.
It wasn’t romantic or chaste or gentle or loving or anything like she had imagined it might be. But then most of what she knew about sex was gleaned from reading The Thorn Birds under the covers with a torch or from the Endless Love video she and Michelle regularly rented from the petrol-station video shelf. In fact, it was nothing like she had imagined it might be. It had felt wonderful, exciting, exhilarating, and to see Lawrence’s face in the throes of submission had made her feel nothing short of powerful. Lawrence Paulson, the good-looking boy who had made the football team, was a prize that made her feel less ordinary. He had chosen her – her! And she had chosen him. Familiar were the tales around the kitchen table of how her parents and grandparents had met, and their stories were truly non-eventful, and so why could her and Lawrence’s love story not start at the bus stop? In the wee small hours, her mind leapt ahead and she saw him taking her little case from her hand after a trip and admiring her red suit – before welcoming her home with a cup of tea, open arms and a need for sex. The thought thrilled her.
What did make her nervous, however, was the fact that this was a secret from Michelle, the girl with whom she shared everything.
After leaving the alleyway, she and Lawrence had giggled and run back to the bus stop and she had felt changed in the subtlest of ways, having cast off the last vestige of childhood and taken control of a situation that she had at some level feared.
As the number seventy-two bus pulled into the stop, Lawrence had whispered in her ear, ‘You’re special, Bessie, and so cool. I think about you before I fall asleep.’
Bessie had thought her heart might burst through her chest. Her first thought was that she couldn’t wait to tell Michelle. His wonderful admission had been almost as intoxicating as their physical act. Turning to him, she had beamed, and he had leant in with his end-of-day breath and the whiff of sweat clinging to his skin and said, ‘We should keep this between ourselves. Let’s not tell anyone.’
‘No one?’ she had questioned, wondering initially how she might keep such a thing from her friend.
‘No one.’ His eyes had bored into hers.
‘Okay.’
They made a pact and it had given her the confidence to repeat the act eight more times over the coming months. And what was the harm, if no one was ever going to find out? She and Lawrence secretly passed notes; these too sent a frisson of joy through her core. The messages were always simple, scribbled in pencil on scraps of paper – Tonight after school or Thursday at six. No need to state a venue; Bessie knew where: the garage step in the alleyway, where they would meet, giggle, and she would hurriedly kick off her underwear. For the fleeting minutes of their union, nothing in the whole wide world existed . . . She could escape, free from all the small worries that sat in her mind like tiny thorns