Charmed Thirds_ A Jessica Darling Novel - Megan McCafferty [113]
“Not one that looks like . . . like . . . a pig-in-a-blanket!”
“It's uncircumcised.”
“I know that. I just wasn't expecting to see one.”
“Why?”
“Because that's so . . . ethnic. And you're, well . . . from Connecticut.”
“Do you want to get a closer look?”
“Uh, not really. Can we just get under the covers now?”
“Okay.”
“And turn out the lights.”
“Okay. Do you want a blindfold, too?”
“Uh, no. Just a condom, thank you.”
This exchange pretty much set the tone for what would follow, which can be best described as the clumsy rearrangement of unfamiliar limbs and the execution of signature moves (the shocker!!!) that would only work with partners who were far, far away from the mattress on which they were being performed. And it got worse.
In the moments after the act, when his penis was retreating back into its fleshy burrow like a groundhog, Kieran started talking and wouldn't stop.
“I just gained at least forty-odd sex partners in about ten minutes,” he said.
It was more like two minutes, but that wasn't worth quibbling over when the statement as a whole was so ludicrous. “How so?”
“Well, I just had sex with you. And you've mentioned that your ex-boyfriend had sex with forty-something girls before you. And they say that when you have sex, you are having sex with every person your partner has ever had sex with, which is kind of a beautiful concept, when you think about it, all of these people bonded through what Socrates referred to in the Phaedrus as the blind, unreasonable eros . . .”
“Is this your idea of pillow talk?” I asked, my neck muscles strained with incredulity.
“I'm sorry,” he said. “I'm out of practice. I haven't had sex with someone new in more than two years. Usually my girlfriend and I would hurry up and get dressed so I could get her home before her curfew.”
“Well, that doesn't apply here, now does it?”
“We could just roll over and fall asleep,” he suggested.
“I think that's a very good idea,” I said, turning away from him.
Should I have expected any better? I've only really known Kieran for a week, and I'm not sure I even like him very much, yet I had sex with him. I've become the type of person who has sex with someone she's only known for a week. When did I become this person? Casual sex isn't unusual for most college students, but I've never been most college students and sex has never been casual for me.
I think that final postcard fucked me up. (Ha. In more ways than one.)
the tenth
This afternoon Kieran came knocking on my door.
“We owe it to ourselves to try again,” he said.
“No offense,” I said, waving him away with a National Enquirer with Vanna White on the cover, “but why would anyone want to relive what happened yesterday?”
And then he launched into his argument, about how the sex was so awkward and so bad because we were still thinking about our exes when we did it. And the only way we would ever stop thinking about our exes during sex is to have more sex.
“Besides,” he said. “What else is there to do?”
I looked down and out my window. Faces on the sidewalks were obscured by umbrellas, hats, and hoods. I could tell from their hunched-over hurrying that no one was happy to be outside, dodging the icy rain plunging down like minidaggers from the sky. There was nothing interesting on TV. I'd read all my National Enquirers. My Internet access was inexplicably hosed.
He had a point. And hadn't Dexy prescribed the same remedy?
So we went for round two.
And three.
And four.
And I'm happy to report that it was better, and not only because it couldn't have been any worse. I guess we're getting used to each other, which kind of makes an argument for monogamy. Or serial monogamy at least.
The way I see it, Kieran and I are helping each other. It's only practical for me to get out of this love limbo—this purguytory, so to speak—I'm in right now. There's no point in pining over Marcus. My relationship with him was bound to meet its end, and not only because his newfound New Ageyness would always be at odds with my innate nihilism. No, it was doomed