Authors: Kirsten Rees
But the only thing I felt was shame. Not over giving up my virginity to a boy I probably wasn't going to see again, more that I’d let him down. I’d known he was looking for something to drag him out of his despair and I wasn’t it. I could never be enough to pull him back from the pain of losing his mother, and I didn’t have the strength to help him.
Strangely enough, the strongest memory I have from that time was the journey home after my first time. It was early evening but the sun was still shining on the grassy fields I saw out of the train window and there was a light breeze rustling through the trees. I can’t remember what I was thinking of specifically; perhaps I was wondering if I felt any different or maybe trying to think of anything other than what I’d just done.
Whatever had me so distracted, it was enough that it was too late to notice my right shoe starting to slip from my foot. As I was hustled through the opening doors, it fell through the gap between the train and the platform. I half turned, staring down into the darkened space until someone nudged me aside. The tiled ground was too cold to put my bare foot onto so I did a sort of shuffled hop over to the little intercom box and pressed the buzzer and waited.
It finally crackled and an older man’s voice spoke. “How can I help?” he asked.
“Eh well you see, my shoe has fallen off and it’s on the tracks.” I stated.
“Sorry dear, you’ll need to speak up.” he said.
Suddenly conscious of the other people on the platform who hadn’t yet noticed my predicament I raised my voice slightly. “My shoe has fallen onto the tracks!” I said into the little metal box.
Before I knew it, the trains had been put on delay and there was a man in uniform on the tracks fishing my missing shoe from between the tracks. By this point, people were staring at me with what seemed to be a mix of pity and annoyance. I could see two girls my age whispering to each other and watching with undisguised delight. This was more embarrassing that standing naked in front of a boy for the first time. I knew there was something very wrong in that, but I couldn’t explain why.
“Thank you” I said to the man who had rescued my shoe and then insisted on placing it back on my foot. He made a grand scene of kneeling down like the Prince in the story of Cinderella. A few of the people on the platform had moved closer to get a better view and looked like they were struggling to hide their amusement at this point. If this had happened in the present time I would probably have been on ‘
Youtube
’ within the hour.
On the other hand some of the people watching looked just plain annoyed at being delayed. I could swear I even saw one guy roll his eyes – I had spent my life doing everything I could to avoid the spotlight so I was hardly likely to have done this on purpose just to get attention. But whatever deity had made me the way I am, had also provided me with reasonably good health and an amenable personality, and had also seen fit to bless me with an unfortunate ability to end up in situations whereby if something could go wrong for me it simply will go as badly as possible. After thanking the kind man again I scuttled out of the station vowing to use the bus from then on.
After things ended with Conor I stopped going to the skating and when Christmas came around I had the perfect excuse not to spend so much time with that particular group of friends. Over the holidays I spent my time trying out several new hobbies and between these and studying for exams I was kept busy enough not to get preoccupied with thoughts of my first 'relationship'.
My thankfully good, mid-term exam results arrived in the post and by the time my seventeenth birthday came around in March I had an entirely new set of friends. Spring and my birthday came and went quickly - the last few months of my final year of school arrived and there had been no one else. I had given my body to a boy I’d known for less than three months without a second thought and yet I was still so painfully withdrawn. My uneasiness didn't go unnoticed by some of the boys in my year and very occasionally I found myself the subject of teasing on the subject. In my school gossip came and went in vicious circles and eventually the spinning bottle landed on me - a rumour circulated that I paid no interest to boys because I was not that way inclined. Since I was no longer friends with the group of girls who had known Conor, they felt no inclination to defend me. And I probably didn’t help the situation.
“Hey Nina, you know if you’re not sure which team you’re playin’ for, you and me could go a few rounds and that’d soon sort you out.” The boy who’d just spoken was in my year and he considered himself a player.
I on the other hand, regarded him as an asshole. Adults always say 'Ignore bullies and they will get bored and stop' - I sometimes wonder if there is a secret handbook that tells them to say this to kids. Because this statement falls in with the lines about Santa and the Easter Bunny - eventually we only pretend to believe it for our parent’s sake. His name was Jamie and he was on the school football team so he was big for his age and popular. All eyes were on him when he turned his attention to anyone and now I was on the periphery of his spotlight. I’d finally had enough of the taunts that wouldn’t stop when I ignored them and I wanted my anonymity back. I stepped close enough so I could smell his minty breath. “Jamie, maybe you’re right.” I replied sweetly.
He looked so smug that if I’d been prone to violence I could have slapped him.
“I do like boys, but a couple of rounds with you and I’m sure I’d go off guys for life.” As I walked away I heard people laughing, but I couldn’t be sure which of us they were laughing at.
At the time I gave the teasing the contempt I thought it deserved – I wasn’t offended by his insinuation, I was pissed that he choose to use sexuality as a means of bullying. I knew I wasn't anything special but I still found them immature and mind-numbingly ordinary. It was also one of the things that had set Conor apart from his friends.
The majority of them wanted to do what every teenager does until they could leave school and then go to university and eventually end up with a family, a steady job, a nice home, a car or two and annual holidays.
Everything that seemed so unexciting and ordinary to me and a life I didn't want to lead. I thought I had it right. I thought I knew better. Who were they to tell me I had to find someone special to complete me and settle down to a life of monotony...oh sorry...monogamy?
Alex thought how much Nina sounded so like him when he was her age. All he'd wanted was to travel the world and meet new and interesting people every day. Marriage and a regular job hadn’t even come into his mind. But of course hindsight can be a terrible thing and in his early twenties he had never once considered the loneliness that kind of lifestyle can eventually bring. Perhaps it’s maturity or maybe just something you need to discover yourself through experience but Alex had learned to appreciate friendships and family from afar. He'd had to leave to understand what it meant to come back to something that means so much. And painful as it is, he'd had to lose Nina before he finally found the courage to admit how he felt. Reading her words he began to realise how much she had changed in ten years and yet he somehow was beginning to feel closer to her for it.
I could have tried harder to fit in and be accepted but I think I've always been one of life's outsiders. And I was hardly about to admit to half the school that I had already offered up my virginity as a sympathy card. So I did my best to ignore the rumours about me and focus on studying for my impending exams in June. I just wanted to count down the days until I could walk out of the school gates for the last time.
My detachment wasn’t really an issue for me - in fact I preferred it that way - but it’s played a significant part in my difficulty in maintaining relationships. I've read that apparently, therapists often begin by looking to your childhood, so I thought back to mine but nothing seemed to strike me as emotionally scarring. I had grown up for the most part with only one parent and I'm sure some would say that would have left a mark. But honestly my sparing memories of my father were pretty okay ones and although I sometimes wished there could have been more, it had been seventeen years since he had left and I was far too young to have known him well enough to truly miss him. The memories were like flashes of a film I remembered with fondness. My youth was happy and care-free and I had a mother loving enough for both parents. And if I had had any need for a father figure, my brother Matthew sporadically takes it upon himself to fulfil the role.
Alex realised Nina had begun writing this sometime when she was twenty-five, the same year when they had met. Although it may have taken her a few days or even weeks to write all of this, he wondered if she had made her decision before or after meeting him. This diary contained what seemed to be a significant part of the last decade of her life and so even if he was mentioned it wouldn't be until the end - what had happened in those nine years? Part of him wanted to skip right to the end but he'd never been able to do that with a story. It would be like walking into the end of a conversation; like knowing the answer when you don’t really know the question or the context. So he resigned himself to persevering to the end.
It was nearly five years after this 'relationship' ended before I could say his name out loud without wanting to crawl back into bed and hide from the world. Although it didn’t so much end as come to a crashing halt. He was everything to me when I was with him and when it was over, it felt like a tornado had swept through my life.
Chris was so unlike the boys I had been used to seeing every day at school. The first time I saw him, the way he walked into the room drew all eyes including mine to him. He had so much presence, I couldn't help but stare and I felt alarmed as my cheeks burned. It was one of those defining moments in life when you remember every little detail. His eyes were a beautiful bright blue and I noticed he had one of those smiles that made it hard for the other people in the room not to smile back.
Was this it? Alex wondered. Maybe this guy was the reason Nina couldn't love him - because she had already been in love and couldn't give her heart to someone else. Perhaps she had decided to take her own life because she couldn't bear to be without him. And yet this was still near the beginning of the diary and somehow Alex couldn't believe it was all because of a bad breakup.
To this day I still don't know why he chose to sit by me. I couldn't fail to notice the look of disbelief on the faces of the girls sat around us.
“Hey.” He winked at me and smiled.
I gave him a kind of half smile, half look of terror. “Eh hi.” And since I could think of no reason why he should be sitting next to me, I asked the obvious question. “Are you looking for someone?” I said.
“Yeah, beautiful girl, brunette, great smile.” he replied.
My heart sank a little although I wasn’t sure why, it wasn’t as if I stood a chance with someone like him. In retrospect, I should have stuck with that exact instinct and got up and walked away. But when do we ever listen to our instincts in the presence of a gorgeous guy.
“She’s wearing a really pretty, green dress and I don’t even know her name.” he said.
I looked down at the green fabric covering my suddenly shaky knees and then back up to his face but not quite meeting his eyes.
“I’m Chris.” he continued.
“Nina.” I managed to say my name in little more than a whisper.
“It’s a pleasure to meet you Nina. I don’t believe I’ve seen you before and I would know since this is my friend’s flat.” he said.
“Oh, I’m not a gatecrasher.” I said hurriedly.
“No?” He smiled like I’d just let him in on a secret.
“My friend Sarah is dating a friend of your friend. Sorry that sounds kinda made up but it’s true. I’m not nearly cool enough to gatecrash a party.” I said shaking my head.
Who knows why I felt the need to tell him that bit but it was also true. I'd never been to a proper, totally-adult-free party in my seventeen years. Sarah had been in the same group of friends at school, we lived in the same neighbourhood and had known each other since my family had moved to the area and so through our parents we were sort of obligated to be friends and she had invited me along. After our exams she had invited me as part of a group to one or two events to ‘blow off steam’. On this occasion I was pretty sure it was because her Mother thought I was a nice girl and her 'going to a friend's house' cover would be more believable with me in tow. Sarah was now in the kitchen playing tongue hockey with the afore-mentioned flat owner.
Chris should have been with one of those girls who were far prettier, exuded confidence and would no doubt have known exactly how to act in front of this beautiful boy-man.
We only spoke for a short while, after which I watched in awe as he typed the number from my new birthday mobile phone into his and saved it under my name. I also noticed the spelling was wrong, but I didn’t correct him when he entered Neena and he didn’t ask.
“Well since the host is otherwise engaged I'd better go mingle, but I’ll call you okay beautiful.” And he was gone before I had a chance to say another word.
I stayed for a while longer, half on the pretense that it would be rude to have been invited and then leave my ‘friend’ but apart from asking me to pour her a drink while I was filling up my own plastic cup with lemonade, Sarah had all but forgotten I was there. I was tired and I wasn’t even sure Chris was still even there since I didn’t feel comfortable wandering around the flat. After another half hour of listening to a group of people chat drunkenly about the last time they had been this drunk, I gave in and called a taxi to go home.