Two-way Street

76 Days Before the Trip, 12:23 p.m.

“You had sex with him?” I say to Jocelyn, trying not to spit out my Sprite. Why she would wait until I took a drink to announce she had sex with B. J. is beyond me. Maybe because it’s the last day of school. So she feels the need to start the summer with a huge confession.

“When did this happen?”

“You mean when was the first time?” she asks, frowning.

“There’s been more than one time?” Is it possible she means more than one time in one night? Don’t boys need time to, uh, recharge? Not that I would really know much about that. The recharging, I mean. Or the sex in general.

“Yes,” she says, then leans in conspiratorially, since we’re in the cafeteria and all. “I think I might be a little addicted to it.”

Great. My best friend is a sex addict. And not only that, she’s addicted to doing it with B. J. Which is a mental picture I’m really trying to keep out of my head. Not that B. J. is ugly or anything, but still. It’s B. J.

“Well,” I say. “I’m going to have sex with Jordan.”

“Courtney!” Jocelyn exclaims. Her eyes widen and she puts down her fork, which she’s been using to eat french fries off my tray. I have no idea why she doesn’t just pick them up and eat them, but she won’t. She spears them with a fork and then dips them in the little cup of ketchup that came with my lunch.

“What?” I ask.

“You cannot have sex with Jordan.”

“Why not?” I ask. “I actually can. I mean, my body is capable of doing it.” I think it is, anyway. Although I do remember reading somewhere that if you don’t have sex for a while, your virginity actually grows back, and it can be hard for you to do it again. Not that that’s my situation, since I haven’t had sex before. But maybe if you wait too long, it gets harder to do it. But that’s insane, right? Besides, I’m seventeen, not thirty.

“Well, of course your body is capable of doing it,” Jocelyn says, rolling her eyes. She flips her hair over her shoulder and studies me seriously. “Courtney, you can’t undo this. It’s not like buying a new shirt.”

“I know that,” I say, rolling my eyes right back. “And the thing is, it doesn’t scare me.” It doesn’t. I want to be with him. I love him.

“Oh, my God,” Jocelyn says. “You love him.”

“No, I don’t,” I say, as if the thought of me being in love with someone is so totally ludicrous. Which, in a way, it kind of is. Here’s the weird thing—before I met Jordan, I kind of thought I would never be in love. Like, ever. It just seemed totally far-fetched that I would find a guy who would fall in love with me and take care of me and everything. But I did. I’m in love with him.

“You do!” Jocelyn says. “You love him. If you didn’t, you wouldn’t even be considering sleeping with him.” Damn. That’s what happens when you have a friend who knows you really, really well. You can’t get away with pretending to be someone you’re not.

“Does he love you?” she asks.

“I don’t know,” I say slowly, thinking about it. “I think he does.”

“Think is not good enough, Court,” she says. “Do you really want to sleep with someone if you don’t know they love you?”

“It’s not like that,” I say, frowning. “I love him. Isn’t that enough?”

“Not really,” she says. “This is a huge decision, Courtney. You have to make totally sure this is what you want. Because it’s something that’s forever.”

“What about you and B. J.?” I ask. “How come it’s okay for you guys?” This sounds like a sex double standard. How come she’s allowed to do it and I’m not? I’m not going to say anything, but sometimes I wonder if her and B. J. even really like each other. They never do anything except drink and make out. And now, apparently, have sex.

“Different situation,” she says. She pulls a tube of lip gloss out of her purse and lines her lips. “Want some?” she asks, extending the tube to me. “It would be really cute on you.”

I take it and dab a little on my lips, marveling at the fact that she can intersperse talking about sex with talking about lip gloss. How can she be so cavalier? Is this what happens after you have sex? You just talk about it like it’s nothing? That makes me nervous for some reason, to think that something that’s such a big deal now could end up being nothing in the future. Although I guess it’s to be expected. Like, look at the girls on Sex and the City. They did it all the time.

“How is it a different situation?” I roll the lip gloss around my lips, wondering if it makes me kissable.

“Because we’re different people,” she says. “I don’t know if you can separate the emotional from the physical.”

“Why would I want to do that?” I ask, frowning. Who does that? Separates the emotional from the physical? I guess sociopaths, maybe. And I guess Jocelyn is now claiming to do it, too, although I never pegged her for a sociopath.

“Because if you don’t, you could end up getting really, really hurt,” she says. “Listen, I’m not trying to discourage you. But you just have to make sure this is what you want to do.”

“It is,” I say. And I really do feel like it is. I want to have sex with Jordan. And when we go to Miami next month, I’m going to.