The boy and his ribbon

It was my fault he demanded to know what I meant.

It was my fault I couldn’t answer him truthfully.

It was my fault he went out that night.

And it was my fault he stayed out until dawn and when he came back, lipstick stained his t-shirt and his hair was mused from another’s fingers.

I didn’t know if he’d slept with someone, but he’d definitely made out, and it ripped me apart.

I’d been hiding for years and I’d finally reached my limit.

I stayed away from him the next day and the day after that.

I made sure to wear socks long enough to cover my new artwork and even wondered if there would be a way to laser it off so I could pretend I’d never been so stupid.

For a week, our conversations consisted of stiff hellos, goodbyes, and how were your days, but it all came to a head on a Friday evening when his phone chirped on the coffee table.

He was in the shower after a long shift at the milk farm.

Normally, a Friday meant pizza or takeaway and a chilled evening in front of the TV, recharging after a long week.

Not this Friday.

This Friday, I picked up his phone and brought up the notification.

Ren Wild, the boy from the forest and avoider of company, had joined a hook-up site.

He’d been matched with three women in the area and had obviously messaged one because her reply was a simple: I’m interested for no strings. I don’t want commitment, either. I’ll meet you at Paddington’s at ten p.m. Bring a condom.

* * * * *

Can you understand why I did what I did next?

Can you put aside your judgment just for a little while and give me some slack for being a bratty, stupid teenager who didn’t grow up fast enough? Who chased away the one person she’d ever loved? Who ruined everything when it had all been so good?

If you can’t, then I don’t want you reading anymore—not that you will as I’m burning this in a few short days, anyway.

But if you can, then keep torturing yourself because it only gets messy from here.

Super messy.

End of the world, Ren leaving me, kind of messy.

Let’s see…first there was Tom.

Then there was Larry.

After that…some boy I didn’t get his name but tasted like blueberries from the lollipop he’d been sucking on.

The nights that Ren left and didn’t come back till late, hopping in the shower almost the second he walked in the door, and unable to meet my eyes the next morning, were the nights I stopped wishing.

I stopped hoping that one day…Ren and me…well, I stopped being so young.

I finally accepted what he was telling me. There would never be a Ren and me, and it was time I stopped killing myself over it.

The best way to do that was to find a replacement.

I only kissed the boys.

Or at least, I did at the start. By the time Blueberry came around, I was itching for more, if only to erase the blistering emptiness inside me.

I let him touch me.

I let him kiss my breasts and press his fingers inside me.

And I felt nothing.

I think that destroyed me the most.

Here I was doing my best to move on, but my body was just as broken as my mind. The things Tina told me should happen like the tensing and the quickening and the sparkling orgasms never happened.

All I felt was the probing of unskilled fingers and the swirl of tentative tongue.

Some nights, when Ren stayed out super late, I’d feel so rotten, so sick, so twisted, that the next evening—regardless if it was a school night or not—I’d find a party somewhere and crash. I’d dance like a slut and encourage like a whore, and when a boy finally kissed me, I’d want to vomit with tearful disgust.

For almost a year, we co-existed in shame.

Him doing whatever it was he was doing, and me doing my best to move on.

I didn’t want to be this doormat. I didn’t want to be this weak. When I hooked up with a guy, I pi