RADHIKA SANGHANI is a twenty-three-year-old journalist. She works full-time for The Daily Telegraph’s Women’s section, where she writes about politics, health and trends that make her editors blush. She grew up in London, but spent time working in Chile and Barcelona, where she fell in love with the Spanish language. She studied English Literature at University College London, followed it up with a Master’s in Journalism at City University London and now spends all of her time writing.

You can find her tweeting at @radhikasanghani.

www.millsandboon.co.uk

To anyone who has ever gone through the pain of a Brazilian wax

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I could not have written Virgin without my girlfriends—you all know who you are. Your honest confessions about masturbating, finding semen in bath tubs and battling with your pubes have given me so much inspiration and endless laughter. Thank you.

To everyone who read Virgin when it was just the slightly weird book I was writing to cheer myself up—thank you so much for your invaluable feedback and for loving Ellie. That’s you, Sarah Walker, Bex Lewis, Ella Schierenberg, Sarah Johnson, Rhiannon Williams, Olivia Goldhill, Andrea Levine and even Kim Leigh. Thank you, Rory Tyler, for being the only male I know who was brave enough to read Virgin. I know you’re still not over the Mooncup.

I also really want to thank my parents. You had no idea I was writing Virgin until I told you it was being published. I know a lot of it has been quite a surprise to you and not what you expected I would write, but thank you for still being so proud of me and supporting me.

Thank you to my editor, Anna Baggaley, and everyone at Harlequin for carefully editing Virgin and loving it so much from the very start.

Lastly—none of this would have happened if it wasn’t for Maddy Milburn, my agent. Thank you so much for believing in Virgin and making this all happen!

Table of Contents

Cover

About the Author

Title Page

Dedication

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

CHAPTER NINETEEN

CHAPTER TWENTY

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

CHAPTER THIRTY

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

Copyright

CHAPTER ONE

Ellie Kolstakis

21 years old

Non-smoker

VIRGIN

I STARED IN HORROR at the words on Dr E Bowers’ computer. The status of my hymen was plastered across her screen in capital letters.

V-I-R-G-I-N

The letters glowed luridly on the green computer screen, the kind used before Steve Jobs figured out Apple. They imprinted themselves into my mind in an eighties blur. A lump of anxiety lodged itself into my throat and my cheeks started burning. I felt sick.

My humiliating secret was all over my medical records and Dr E Bowers was going to see it. I didn’t even know what the E in her name stood for but she was about to find out that in the two and a half years I had spent at uni, not a single boy had wanted to deflower me. Not one. I was twenty-one years old, and I still had my V-card.

‘Ms Kolstakis,’ she asked, pushing her rimless glasses up her nose, ‘you’re a final-year student at University College London, and you’re here to register, is that correct?’

I forced my paralysed face into a smile and tried to laugh politely. ‘Yep, I don’t know why I didn’t join earlier. I, uh, I think it’s because I just didn’t ever get fresher’s flu, you know?’

She stared blankly at me.

‘Um, also, you can call me Miss Kolstakis, or just Ellie, if you want,’ I added.

She turned her head back down towards the forms, creasing her brow as she struggled to read my messy attempt at writing in block capitals.

I wiped the sweat from my palms onto my jeans and told myself to be calm. She was a doctor. She wasn’t going to be shocked by meeting a twenty-one-year-old virgin. Besides, she was probably just going to ask me about the Kolstakis family history and the worst thing I would have to tell her would be about Great Granddad Stavros smoking a pack of cigarettes every day from the time he was nine. He didn’t even die from lung cancer in the end; he choked on an almond at the age of eighty-nine.

She breathed in sharply. ‘Mmm, oh dear—this isn’t very good at all. You drink more than twenty units of alcohol a week?’

Oh, God. If she figured out I had deliberately rounded down by five units I would probably be on the first bus out of here to rehab.

Dr E Bowers cleared her raspy throat.

‘Oh, sorry.’ I giggled nervously in a way I hadn’t since Girl Guides. ‘I don’t always drink twenty units a week. Obviously it’s just during term time. We normally go out on Thursdays. Oh, and Mondays. Sometimes Wednesdays, but that club night is kind of full of freshers these days so we don’t go as much.’

Dr E Bowers furrowed her forehead and pursed her lips together. She started tapping away at her keyboard and I held on to the edges of the chair with anxiety. I focused my gaze on her computer. The six letters were no longer there. She had scrolled down the page without commenting on them. I breathed out an audible sigh of relief.

A sentence appeared at the bottom of the screen. Over twenty units a week, heavy drinker, binge drinks.

‘Wait, I’m not a binge drinker!’ I cried. ‘In fact, I’m not even a heavy drinker. I’m a normal drinker—I barely drink anything compared to my friends.’

‘Ms Kolstakis, twenty units a week is still rather a lot. You should think about cutting down, or you’ll be back here asking for a new liver in ten years,’ she said severely.

She tucked her Princess Diana-circa-1995 hair behind her ears and continued, ‘I see you’ve left this section about sexual health blank on your forms. Are you sexually active?’

I died.

Am I sexually active?

I couldn’t even talk to my friends about just how unsexually active I was, let alone Dr E Bowers. Someone who wore glasses with no frames was never going to understand how traumatic it was to be a final-year student who had never had sex. I bet she lost hers through a hole in a bed sheet as they did in the Middle Ages. She stared into my eyes as though she could read my mind. I felt my body perspiring. I wished I’d worn a black top.

I fidgeted in my seat. ‘Oh, right, well, I’m actually not really very sexually active so … I didn’t bother filling in that section. I’m not pregnant, never have been and never will be at this rate!’

Her lips stayed in a thin line and she blinked her anaemic-looking eyes at me.

I made a mental note to stop trying to distract her with failed attempts at humour and quickly added, ‘Honestly, I definitely don’t have any STIs or anything. It’s completely impossible.’

‘Ah, so you’ve been tested recently for chlamydia and so on?’ she asked.

‘Well … no. I just can’t have chlamydia. I’m … well, I’m a … I mean.’ My voice broke and my words trailed into silence. I couldn’t bring myself to say the word out loud. My best friends grew up just knowing this stuff and I’d spent the past three years hiding it from everyone I’d met at uni. I opened my mouth to try again but no words came out.

‘Yes?’ Dr E Bowers blinked and looked directly at me. ‘You’re a …?’

‘I’m a v … a vi …’ Great. On top of everything, I’d managed to develop a stutter.

I took a big breath and tried again. This time the words tumbled straight out of me. ‘I’ve never had sex before so I can’t have any STIs. Or STDs. Well, neither.’

She blinked again. ‘But you are sexually active?’

Um. Does one failed attempt at a blow job and a few fingers jabbing into my vagina count as being sexually active?

‘I don’t know,’ I replied miserably. ‘I mean, I’ve never had sex but I’ve kind of been to third base.’

She sighed. ‘Ms Kolstakis, are you sexually active or not? This is a confidential space. I just need to know whether or not to give you a chlamydia test.’

My stomach plummeted straight down into my five-quid plimsolls, taking my jaw with it. My own doctor didn’t believe I was a virgin. ‘No! I’m telling the truth, honestly. I’ve never had sex. I don’t need a chlamydia test.’

She squinted at me as though she was looking for any traces of a post-coital glow on my face. ‘Do you have a boyfriend at the moment?’ she finally asked.

I lowered my eyes in shame. What kind of student was I, who had never had a boyfriend and was unable to answer a single question about sex when I was in my sexual prime?

‘No,’ I mumbled.

She turned to her screen and scrolled up without warning. I started in panic as the six letters emerged on the monitor. I threw my hands up to my face, shielding my eyes from the V-word.

She sat looking at the screen for twenty-seven seconds before she clicked it away and turned back towards me. Slowly, I lowered my hands from my flushed face.

She looked at me with something resembling pity. ‘Right, then, Ms Kolstakis, I’m going to give you this chlamydia test to do at home. It is self-explanatory, but essentially you just use the cotton bud to swab your vagina and post it to the address in the pack. You should hear within a couple of weeks. Is that all right?’

I stared at her with my mouth gaping open. ‘I … What?! I just told you that I’ve never had sex—why do I need a test?’ I cried out.

‘We offer free chlamydia tests for everyone over the age of twenty-one who is sexually active or has been in close contact with someone else’s genitalia.’

‘But you know I’m not actually sexually active.’ I blushed furiously. ‘I have never been, well … penetrated.’ I stumbled over the last word.

Dr E Bowers raised her eyeballs to the ceiling. ‘Ms Kolstakis,’ she said, ‘I am now well aware that you are a virgin. However, I advise that you take this free test I am offering you to ensure that you do not have chlamydia. It is still possible—though very rare—to catch it in other ways.’

‘But what other ways? Surely fingers can’t give you chlamydia?’ I blurted out.

‘No, they cannot. However, you can catch it from oral sex or if a penis has been around your vagina, even without penetration.’

How Dr E Bowers knew that James Martell’s penis had touched my VJ but never actually gone in, I will never know. I stared at her mutely, impressed for the first time by her medical abilities.

She pressed the envelope into my hands with a knowing look. I stood up, clutching it. I could barely see past the bright green letters flashing in my head so I walked in an undiscerning daze back out through the waiting room. My throat felt parched and scratchy from mortification so I stopped off at the water cooler. As I poured myself a plastic cup of water, I felt something fall behind me.

I turned around in surprise and saw an upturned cardboard box lying in the middle of the room surrounded by small silver packets scattered all across the waiting room floor and under the waiting patients’ seats. Oh, God. My satchel must have knocked it off the shelf behind me.

I closed my eyes briefly in shame before forcing myself to bend down and pick the box up. The waiting patients in the room were staring so I pulled my jeans up, hoping my faded M&S knickers weren’t on show. Crouching on my knees and trying to pull my jumper down to hide my VPL, I started picking up the packets. I was half-finished shoving them carelessly back into the open box when it suddenly hit me. These weren’t just shiny silver packets that I was picking up from under people’s feet. They were condoms.

The irony was not lost on me as I fled the surgery, my eyes swimming in hot tears. I ran out into the street and chucked the brown envelope straight into the first bin I saw. My face burnt red-hot as I watched it sink in with the empty McDonald’s paper bags, taking my dignity down with it.

I was nothing but a twenty-one-year-old VIRGIN.

CHAPTER TWO

LIFE AS AN adult virgin is more complicated than you might think. Obviously it is normal, there are thousands of us, and there is absolutely nothing wrong with it. Choosing when to have sex is a completely individual decision, and everyone is different. Some people choose to wait till marriage, and some just want to wait for the right person. Others are religious, and others are just too busy being successful in every other area of their lives to worry about something as minor as intercourse.

At least, that’s what the internet said when I looked it up the second I got home from the doctors’ surgery.

I knew Dr E Bowers hadn’t even believed I was a virgin to begin with, because clearly no average-looking third-year university student who drank ten-plus units a week could still be a virgin. Except me.

I buried my head in the duck-feather pillow I’d spent a week’s food budget on. I pulled my duvet over me to try to block out the six letters blinking over and over in my head: V I R G I N V I R G I N V I R G I N.

I hated the word. I hated it just as much as I hated the fact that I was one. It wasn’t fair—why did I have to be the only non-deformed, non-religious girl who got stuck with an untouched inner lotus at the age of twenty-one?

I sighed loudly and let my mind go over the familiar responses to the ‘Why am I still a v*****?’ question that visited me as regularly as my period.

1. It was my parents’ fault. They were education-obsessed immigrants who moved from Greece to Surrey and sent me to an all-girls school. Their plan was for me never to meet any boys so I wouldn’t be distracted from their one and only goal for me: Oxford University. Result? I didn’t get into Oxford and I didn’t meet any boys, either.

2. I was a very unfortunate-looking teenager. By the time I figured out how to make myself look passable and wear a bra that gave me enough support to show off my 36D assets, it was too late. All the boys from the school next door already had girlfriends, and to them I would always be the slightly unattractive and quiet girl with big boobs hidden behind massive jumpers, and long dark curly hair that was more horizontal than vertical. It didn’t help that all the other girls had figured out how to pluck their eyebrows and flirt while I was locked up in my bathroom with a bottle of bleach, battling my moustache. By the time I got to uni, I realised I had missed out on learning how to talk to boys. After a few minutes of my blunt humour and self-deprecation, they usually moved on to talk to real girls. Girls with minimal body hair, button noses and socially appropriate senses of humour.

3. My dysfunctional family. I was an only child, which meant most people assumed I had spent a spoilt, lavish upbringing pleading with my parents never to have another child so I could have all their attention. The reality was that I spent my whole childhood avoiding my mum and dad whenever they were in the same room, which meant most of my formative years were spent on the swing in the back of the garden with my imaginary older brother, or reading books under my duvet. Consequently, I moved up to the top reading set at school, developed an over-active imagination and became obsessed with my friends’ functional families. I couldn’t figure out how all this linked to the ‘why am I still a virgin’ question, but it had to have had some kind of psychological impact on me. My latest theory was that it gave me a pathological fear of men.

4. I was a late bloomer. I spent every lunchtime listening to my friends talk about their first kisses and boyfriends but their lives always seemed so far removed from mine. Over the years, they moved on to second base, third base, and when they were all finally losing their virginity, I was still the only girl who had never kissed anyone. I sat on the socially acceptable side of the sixth-form common room. I hung out with the cool people and eventually managed to wear the right clothes, but somehow I didn’t kiss a single boy until the ripe old age of seventeen. I didn’t stop there, either—I begged him to have sex with me. He said no.

5. The Bite Job. It happened just before the First Kiss refused to deflower me and it is the reason why I have a fear of penises (penii?), second base, third base, rejection, teeth and pubic hair. It is my worst memory.

We were at Lara’s eighteenth birthday and I was wearing a dress so low-cut you could see my bra. It was just like any other party, except this time, an actual boy came over to speak to me. James Martell. He was no Mark Tucker (Year Thirteen’s own Brad Pitt from the boys’ school) and his nose was, surprisingly, bigger than mine—but he was funny and had floppy blond hair. He took me upstairs to Lily’s older brother’s bedroom and drunkenly pushed me onto the bed.

We snogged. I mirrored what he was doing with his tongue and wondered why none of my girlfriends had ever mentioned how much saliva was involved. Then his hands started creeping into my pants. Any self-respecting girl who was having her first kiss would have yanked them back out, but not sexually starved Ellie. I let his fingers venture down into my VJ and let him poke away. I carried on shoving my tongue down his throat at full velocity and after a few minutes of discomfort in my sacred zone, he stopped. We went back downstairs holding hands and swapped email addresses.

We ended up chatting on the computer every night for two weeks until one Saturday evening when he invited me over. I was so nervous I ended up sitting on the loo excreting my nerves for an hour beforehand. After a second shower, I got the bus to his.

We sat in awkward silence for half an hour until he swooped in and started kissing me. We snogged on the sofa for a while before he put his hand down into my pants again. This time I was more prepared and didn’t wince in pain when he started waggling his fingers around. The next thing I knew, he was pulling my dress over my head and I was naked bar my pink polka-dot underwear.

He pulled his clothes off, undid my bra and slid my knickers off. He stared in shock. After a few seconds of total silence when I wanted to curl up in a ball and die, he threw his head back and howled with laughter.

I froze. Why was he laughing at my vagina? I stood, paralysed with humiliation, and waited for him to speak.

His laughter died down. ‘Wow, I knew you had some hair down there but I didn’t realise you had a full-on bush. You’re the first girl I’ve ever met with an unshaved vagina.’

I hadn’t shaved. Why hadn’t I shaved? Why hadn’t I known I was supposed to shave?

He didn’t seem to care very much because he carried on kissing me. Then he pulled his boxers off and I saw his naked penis staring at me. It was the first one I had ever seen and I kept trying to sneak a peek at it while we snogged. I felt it gently prodding my thighs and as we writhed on the sofa, I realised it was rubbing around my VJ.

I reached out and touched it. It felt alien and alive. I was about to move my hand away when he moaned in pleasure and I realised I was going to have to give him a hand job. I tried to remember what the girls at school had said, and with fear settling in my throat, I slowly began to move my hand up and down.

It looked like an extra limb and had the texture of an old cucumber. I had no idea how tightly to hold it, or at what speed I should be moving my hand up and down. What if he thought it was awful? What if he didn’t come? What if he laughed at me again? I panicked. Without thinking I took my hand off his penis, broke away from the kiss and crawled down the sofa. I took it into my hands and slipped it into my mouth.

I felt my face getting hot as thoughts raced through my head. I tried to make my mouth fit around him and began moving my head backwards and forwards. The minute I started I knew it was a mistake. I had thought it would be easier than the hand job but I could not have been more wrong. I had absolutely no clue what I should be doing. I opened my mouth wider and pushed forward, when suddenly I heard a loud yelp.

I stopped what I was doing and dropped his penis in shock. I looked up and saw him try to pull his face into a smile.

‘What’s wrong?’ I asked, though I didn’t want to know.

‘It’s just, um, you bit me.’

I felt bile rise in my throat and wanted to throw up and cry in the corner. Feeling my skin prickling with humiliation, I laughed shrilly and said, ‘Oh, sorry.’

I wanted to leave but there was no escape. If I ran away, everyone at school would know. I took a deep breath and went back down to his penis. I tried to carry on like before but this time I wrapped my lips around my teeth. It was so uncomfortable it had to be wrong. I tried to go down deeper and then gagged. I swallowed the urge to throw up and carried on. How was I going to finish?

I pulled away from his penis. ‘James, let’s have sex.’

He laughed awkwardly. ‘Um, are you serious? I thought you were a virgin.’

I flushed fuchsia. ‘So? I’m seventeen. I’m ready.’

He looked at the floor. ‘Ellie, we’ve only kissed a few times. I can’t take your virginity.’

‘But … I want you to. Please?’

He squirmed. ‘I can’t. Not like this. Your first time shouldn’t be like this.’

Standing, I pulled on my pink dotted knickers and did my bra clasp with numb fingers. I ignored his protestations and left.

I never saw James Martell again. I avoided the parties that I knew he would attend, and I blocked him on instant messenger. He didn’t try to call me and I never did anything more than kiss someone ever again.

Once I got home from the GP surgery, I lay down on my bed and felt a familiar wave of disgust flood over me. Only this time it wasn’t just because of The Bite Job. It was mixed up with Dr E Bowers.

I always knew it was weird that I was a twenty-one-year-old virgin, but it hadn’t really hit me until I saw those green capital letters screaming at me from my medical records. I wasn’t even eligible for a chlamydia test. Dr E Bowers had given it to me either to make up a quota or because she thought I was a religious nut-job who didn’t want to go the whole way but secretly gave head to every guy around. If only.

I sat up straight in my bed. This was it. I was in my final year of university and I would never be surrounded by so many horny men again. This was my last opportunity to lose my virginity and I had to grab it now. I had to ditch my V-plates by the time I graduated in summer—which meant I had four months to finally understand what an orgasm was and to learn how to give blow jobs.

I took a sharp intake of breath and visualised my future.

In June, I would go back to Dr E Bowers, get a chlamydia test and make her swap VIRGIN on my records for SEXUALLY ACTIVE. The next time I came into contact with a condom, it would not be falling off a shelf in the doctor’s surgery; it would be on an actual penis. And this time, it wouldn’t just rub around my vagina à la James Martell; it would be going straight in there.

CHAPTER THREE

‘OK, OK, SO HAS everyone got some kind of alcohol? There’s some more vodka over here if you need any.’

Kara, a pretty brunette who used to wear Topshop in her hometown but had swapped it for vintage clothes and brogues when she came to London, poured generous amounts of vodka into all our glasses.

Somehow I had been invited to an end-of-term party at Luke’s house, just before we broke up for Easter—Luke being the leader of the ‘cool’ group in my English Literature course. I didn’t own any vintage clothes whatsoever so I never really felt like part of the group and didn’t fully understand why they invited me to their parties. Maybe some of them thought my general uniform of jeans and woolly jumpers was a deliberate anti-fashion statement. Obviously they were unaware that dresses and fur coats made me look like a sad transvestite trying too hard, and high-waisted things just accentuated the birthing hips I may never have a chance to use.

‘Can we just start already?’ shrieked Hannah, who was wearing the vintage white nightdress she wore day in and day out, a strand of fake flowers around her head. ‘I’ll go first. Does everyone remember the rules?’

Without giving anyone a chance to respond, she lurched on. ‘So obviously it is called Never Have I Ever, so when the person says something like, “Never have I ever shagged someone who was married,” then if you have done that, you drink. If you haven’t done that, you don’t. Even if you are the person who said it, you still have to drink if you have done it.’

‘Hannah, we get it. Just start,’ moaned Charlie. ‘And can you please start with something better than shagging someone married? That’s so boring.’

Hannah put on a deliberate pout. ‘Well, why don’t you start, Charlie?’

He grinned, rubbing his hands together. Charlie was the joker of the group, and he liked nothing more than being given the spotlight so he could make everyone groan and laugh over his filthy sense of humour. This was his prime opportunity. I gulped as I tried to mentally prepare myself for what was coming. If I managed to make my face look calm and unbothered, no one would know that I would be lying through my teeth.

‘All right, so, never have I ever fucked someone in a public place.’ Without waiting for anyone else to start drinking, Charlie raised his glass and downed it. Everyone rolled their eyes until he shot them the cheeky grin that had probably made so many girls want to shag him in public in the first place.

I hesitated over whether to drink. I needed to choose wisely. I couldn’t just develop a new personality for this game; I needed to think which sexual things I would have done if I had lost my virginity years ago like everyone else. A brief layer of sweat formed on my top lip. It was too late to drink now so I put my glass down and looked around to see who had drunk.

Eight people raised their glasses, and six of us hadn’t. I breathed out in relief. I was one of six, which made me normal, kind of, and there was always safety in numbers. With the edge of my sleeve, I wiped the beads of sweat off my top lip.

Hannah—who had drunk—started waving her arms around and said, ‘OK, my turn! So, never have I ever cheated on anyone.’

Some of the boys sighed in boredom, but even Charlie refrained from criticising this, probably because he was just as curious as everyone else to see who drank. I started to wonder if I could drink for this one. Obviously I hadn’t actually ever had a boyfriend to cheat on, but back when I was messaging James Martell during those two weeks pre–Bite Job, I once got drunk and accidentally snogged someone else at a party. I think it lasted two-point-five seconds, and I have no idea who it was, but it was definitely cheating.

Feeling confident and sexually active, I drank some of my vodka and Coke. Three other people drank with me, and ten did not. Oh God, I was in the minority. This was dangerous, because someone could ask me about my story, and what exactly would I—

‘Ellie! I can’t believe you’ve cheated on someone! That seems so unlike you! So tell us, who were you dating, and who did you shag?’ On cue, Hannah interrupted my thoughts and brought me crashing back to the reality of Luke’s living room with its vinyl records stuck to the walls.

Shag? Surely cheating could include snogging, right? Why did EVERYTHING have to be about sex?

‘Oh God, um, it was ages ago. I was seventeen, and I was dating this guy called James Mar—’ I paused, suddenly remembering that Joe, one of the guys in the room, had gone to the same school as James. Hopefully he would have no idea who I was talking about, especially because I was trying to pass off this casual fling (could I even call it a fling?) as a bona fide relationship.

‘So, yeah, I was dating James, and I hooked up with someone else. When I was drunk, at a party. Not very exciting.’ I laughed awkwardly.

Hannah looked at me with raised eyebrows and did a feminine snort as she turned away, literally flouncing her hair. I’d thought only shampoo models did that.

Marie, a Belgian ex-model with a block fringe, asked, ‘So, it is my turn now?’ All the boys looked up at the sound of her accent and grinned their assent. ‘OK, so I have had anal sex.’

I choked on the pretzel I was eating and coughed. No one noticed because all the boys were grinning and admiring Marie’s looks while Hannah shrieked about her getting the rules wrong and ruining the game. I grabbed my glass and drank quickly, feeling better as the bits of pretzel were flushed down my throat.

I looked up to see who had actually drunk for this, wondering if Charlie would. I saw Hannah staring at me with her beady eyes as she shrieked, ‘Oh, my God—Ellie just drank, as well! So that’s five of the boys, Marie, Emma and Ellie. Wow, Ellie, you’re such a dark horse.’

All of them were staring at me. I saw Charlie’s appreciative expression, and something like lust spreading across his face. I felt the blood drain out of my cheeks and tried to force my face into something resembling a smile. I shrugged as I fake-smiled too brightly and reached back into the bowl of pretzels.

‘So, who did you do it with?’ asked Hannah persistently. I could have killed her.

Luckily, Emma—the only girl there whose clothes looked way more Topshop than charity shop—came to my rescue. ‘Uh, I thought we were playing Never Have I Ever, not Twenty Questions,’ she said.

Hannah shrugged and Emma carried on. ‘But if we are allowed to ask questions, then why don’t you tell us your cheating story? You already made Ellie tell hers.’

Hannah looked confused. ‘Um, I didn’t drink for the cheating one.’

Emma’s hand flew to her mouth. ‘Oh, my bad. I got confused with the question. For a second, I thought it was about being the person who slept with someone who was already in a relationship … like you did with Tom. Oh shit, I’ve said too much,’ she finished as Hannah’s face went purple.

Kara turned around in shock. ‘TOM, AS IN, MY EX-BOYFRIEND TOM?’ she screeched.

Emma shot me a wink and I let out a yelp of laughter, which no one noticed because they were too engrossed watching Kara scream at Hannah. I grabbed my coat and bag and slipped towards the door, using this as the perfect escape opportunity. I was about to leave when Emma snuck out from behind me.

‘So, how much fun was that?’ She grinned.

‘You saved me,’ I replied gratefully.

‘From that skank? I know, I can’t stand her.’

I stared at her with my mouth wide open. ‘No way, are you serious? I thought everyone loved her. She’s so pretty and confident and has the Shoreditch style down to a T.’

Emma rolled her bright blue eyes. ‘OK, so she’s pretty, but it seems like she only owns one dress and her personality is so grating it hurts to be around her for more than an hour.’

I started laughing, surprised. Who would have thought anyone else could see past Hannah’s fake-flower headband into her unhippy heart? ‘Oh my God, I couldn’t be happier you just said that,’ I cried. ‘I thought I was the only one who hated her.’

Emma grinned through her thickly coated red lips. ‘Trust me, you’re not alone in this, babe. Anyway, we should go for cocktails and share our anal sex stories.’

I made a strangled, yelping sound and Emma looked at me questioningly. Oh God, to lie or not to lie?

I compromised with a half lie. ‘Um. That part wasn’t actually true. I’ve never had anal sex. I just drank because I was choking on a pretzel and then it was too late to say no.’

She threw her head back and let out a throaty cackle. ‘OK, wait, so why didn’t you just tell Hannah you accidentally drank and didn’t mean to admit you took it up the bum?’

I flushed at her very visual words. ‘I guess I wished I was the kind of girl who, uh, took it up … there,’ I admitted. For a second, it had been kind of exciting to have Charlie look at me as though I was shaggable.

‘Babe, anyone can be that girl. I’m sure the guys are queuing up to do you up … there.’ She grinned.

I looked at her doubtfully. ‘They’re not.’

She dismissed me with a wave of her hand. ‘You must be going to the wrong places. Next weekend, you’re coming out with me. Text me,’ she said, blowing me a kiss as she turned back to the party, sashaying on her five-inch-heeled boots.

She left a trail of Miss Dior Chérie in her wake and I couldn’t help imagining what it would be like to be Emma. Maybe if I started wearing perfume instead of the strawberry body spray I bulk-bought two years ago, I could have casual sex stories and stand up to Hannah Fielding.

I looked down at the soggy pretzel I was still holding and realised I had a long way to go.

CHAPTER FOUR

I WOKE UP with a loud groan as I remembered what had happened at the party. My eyes were still glued together with sleep so I groped around blindly for my mobile and called Lara, my best friend.

She was my first port of call whenever something humiliating happened to me. I turned my horrible luck with men into funny stories for her so we could laugh about them and help me forget how much it hurt deep down. The Bite Job had given us enough ammunition for years.

Lara had given up her V-plates a year earlier than the legal limit, at the age of fifteen. He was called Marc, went to a school near ours in Guildford, and it only happened once. She was never exactly sure if it counted as sex, because even though he had penetrated her, it only lasted a couple of seconds and he didn’t go fully in. Marc never called again.

Now she had moved on and was living my parents’ dream by studying law at Oxford. Although her Facebook relationship status was still single, she had been having an on-off thing with a guy called Jez for three years. They’d met at the start of her gap year and had been having casual sex ever since. I wished I’d taken a gap year.

She picked up the phone on the fifteenth ring. ‘Ellie, thank God you called. I’m having a crisis.’

I pulled the duvet over my head. ‘Me, too. I played Never Have I Ever with the hipster crew and I told them I had anal sex.’

‘Why would you say that—you haven’t even had real sex.’

‘AND YOU THINK I DON’T KNOW THAT?’ I yelled down the phone at her. She responded with silence and I sighed despondently. ‘Anyway, I give up on my life—it’s too depressing. What’s your crisis? I hope it’s worse than mine. I need major distraction.’

‘Trust me, it is. I’m home for Easter and want to see Jez but, as usual, he is being a dick and won’t reply to my messages. So now I’m in central London just waiting for him to reply so I can see him tonight.’

‘Wait—so you’re in London with no plans? Why don’t you come over to mine?’

‘Well, I’m kind of already on my way.’

‘I can’t believe you assumed I’d be home alone with nothing to do.’

‘But that’s exactly what you are doing.’

‘OK, point taken. Anyway, I hope you’re willing to ditch Jez, because I have a proposition for you and it involves going out tonight.’

‘But what if he calls and wants to see me? I don’t know if I can go out out tonight.’

‘Lara, come on. He is ignoring you, which he does every few weeks, so you can’t just be at his beck and call. Embrace your inner feminist, stop being his booty call and come out with me tonight to help me lose my virginity.’

She started laughing. ‘Are you kidding? You want to lose your virginity tonight? To a stranger?’

‘Yup.’

‘I’m not helping you get deflowered by a one-night stand. You’ve held on long enough so you may as well last a bit longer for The One.’

‘I am so bored of that phrase,’ I retorted. ‘Do you know how many websites have advised me to keep on waiting? WikiHow’s entire virginity page is full of Hare Krishna crap like that.’

‘Did you actually search for virginity advice on Wikipedia?’

‘See how desperate I am?’ I pleaded in my best whiny voice.

‘Promise you’ll never do that voice again and I’ll consider it.’

‘Oh, fine. Have you brought any chocolate with you? I’m going to need calorie support for when I tell you about last night.’

‘I’m on a diet again.’

‘Are you kidding me?! You’re a size eight—you don’t need to diet.’

‘I know, but I feel kind of gross and I was planning to see Jez tonight and I didn’t want to be bloated.’

‘Lara, you’re speaking to someone who had to buy size twelve jeans the other day—and they still left imprints on my legs when I took them off. Do not even think about saying you feel fat. Besides, do you want to end up looking like those anorexic A-listers in magazines? They’re completely airbrushed and no normal humans look like that and—’

She groaned through the rest of the rant I recited to her every time she tried to diet. We had both decided long ago never to become girls who only ate celery and used their diaries for cumulative calorie counting, but occasionally one of us lapsed and found the willpower to start dieting. It was normally Lara.

‘OK, OK, I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘I’ll see you in five with chocolate.’

We sat looking doubtfully at the pile of clothes on the bed. I had no idea what to wear. Cosmo’s ‘What to Wear for Any Occasion’ guides were open on twenty website tabs but none of them had a ‘What to Wear for Finding a One-Night Stand to Lose Your Virginity to’ page.

‘Once we’ve chosen where we’re going, it will be easier to choose an outfit,’ said Lara.

I sighed and fell back onto the pile of discarded dresses on my bed. ‘The thing is, I don’t want to lose it to a skanky student, especially because I might see him again, so we can’t go to a student place….’

‘OK, why don’t we go somewhere a bit nicer?’ she suggested. ‘In Mayfair or something? Lots of people from my uni go out round there.’

Normally the thought of going to those clubs made me come out in a cold sweat. Hordes of Oxbridge graduates in designer clothes would make me stick out like a sore thumb. However, I had already tried the typical student clubs and had no luck whatsoever.

I shrugged. ‘You know what? Fuck it. I’m desperate. Let’s go to a posh club.’

She whooped and I carried on. ‘Besides, I may as well get deflowered by someone who can actually afford to buy me a drink. Hell, if I shag someone wealthy with connections, I might even get a writing internship out of it.’

Lara stopped cheering. She crinkled up her perfect-sized nose and stared at me. ‘Are you sure you’re not being a bit, um, blasé about this whole breaking-your-hymen thing?’

I exhaled loudly. ‘Look, I know I sound a bit crazy. But honestly, it just feels like a burden now. Even if I did meet the right guy, he would run a mile if he found out I’m still a virgin. It just makes me look weird—kind of like I saved it for him. If I can get rid of it with an ONS, then I’ll feel so much freer after, you know?’

‘Did you just abbreviate one-night stand?’

I ignored her. ‘I promise I won’t regret it. I’ve thought about it a lot and I know it’s the right choice for me. I just want to get this humiliating experience over with as soon as possible. Please help?’

‘Oh, fine. Let’s go to Mahiki. Prince Harry and his friends go there so at least you’ll lose it to someone who can pay for an abortion if you need one. Besides, it’s cheaper on Mondays for students.’

Hours later, Jez still hadn’t texted Lara back so she decided she would look for an ONS of her own to take her mind off him. We decided to wear black to respect the impending death of my virginity and picked out two short dresses from my wardrobe.

‘OK, so if I’m planning on getting down and dirty tonight, I need to shave my legs.’ I paused and then carried on. ‘And more important, what am I meant to do with the hair down there?’ I whispered. ‘You know what happened last time.’

Following the Bite Job, I had decided it was time to get rid of my pubes. A quick poll had revealed that all my classmates had been shaving their vaginas since they turned fifteen but no one had thought to tell me. I realised where I had gone wrong in leaving my pubes au naturel. I was too embarrassed to ask my friends for more info so I researched the topic online. It didn’t take long to learn the difference between a Hollywood and a Brazilian. Every website and magazine said that the au naturel vagina had only been acceptable in the seventies.

I realised I had to sort out my bush immediately because if I ever met another guy—or, more likely, got run over and had to wear an operating gown in hospital—I would be a laughing stock the minute they took my pants down.

I began my task right away. I ran a bath, and with grim determination climbed into it, brandishing my pink Venus razor. Shaving cream was too expensive to bother with, so I took a deep breath and reached for the shower gel. It was empty. Typical.

There was a bottle of shampoo and conditioner on the side. Conditioner was basically the same as shower gel, right? I figured it would be fine and slathered it all over my pubes. Then, without really knowing what I was doing, I started to shave the triangle area. My never-cut pubic hairs immediately got tangled in the razor and it started yanking them painfully. I persevered for twenty minutes before I realised I should have trimmed them to start with. I grabbed some nail scissors and started.

I finished snipping away with the scissors and went back to the razor. This time it was much easier, and the hairs disappeared. It got trickier around the more delicate areas, where I tried to pull the skin taut for a cleaner shave. When I got to the lips, I was navigating in total confusion. I was so terrified of cutting something important that I just left all the hairs on the side of the clitoris. I rubbed around with my hand to check if there were any other obvious patches I’d missed, but I couldn’t find any.

Until I headed down south and realised with horror there was a line of hair going up to my anus. I had no idea if you were meant to get rid of this bit, too, but figured I may as well finish what I’d started. I held my bum cheeks wide open and leant forward in the water, wishing I hadn’t put so much bubble bath in. I held my breath, carefully shaving upwards. It was hard to keep the razor close to the skin but I managed to get most of it off. I swapped sides and then breathed out in relief. I felt as though I’d just had a gruelling Pilates class.

I was about to climb out of the bath into the comfort of my dressing gown when I remembered Lily saying the lips were the one area where boys didn’t want hairs in case they went down on you. There weren’t exactly any boys queuing up to go down on me—but then, I reasoned, they wouldn’t if it got around that I had a hairy vagina. With a resigned sigh, I pulled the lips apart as far as I could and found the hairs growing only a few millimetres away from the clitoris.

Picking up my razor again, I slowly started steering it around the delicate parts, wishing I had invested in a special bikini razor.

Then I screamed. I had cut it. I had actually cut my clitoris.

I grabbed the shower head and turned the cold water on max. It numbed my vagina, and gradually my cries turned into self-pitying whimpers. I had another peek at it and it looked OK. It was only a tiny nick. I thanked God that I hadn’t accidentally lopped the whole thing off. I got out of the bath and dried myself gently before limping off to bed.

By the next day, I’d forgotten about the cutting incident. It seemed to have miraculously healed and I spent the entire morning feeling deliciously smooth. I even spent a full twenty minutes admiring my naked body in front of the mirror. The mass of hair that had used to terrify me and make me feel anything but sexy was gone. Post-shave I felt like a New Woman.

A few hours later, everything changed. I sat on the loo to pee and screamed in agony. The urine was trickling against my cut and it was more painful than anything I had ever experienced. I couldn’t pee without crying. I was fucked.

The only option was to dehydrate myself and not pee. I wandered around school for the next couple of days in a state of hell. Dante’s seventh circle of hell had nothing on my life post-shave. I was thirsty, faint, and had to stop wearing mascara because I cried so much every time I peed.

On top of that, the hairs had already started to grow back as stubble. It was itchy as hell and I couldn’t stop scratching. I had to hide in corners in public to scratch my vagina, and I winced whenever the outer lips rubbed together. In the mirror, it looked as hideous as it felt. The stubble made my poor lady bits look like a middle-aged man’s beard.

It took four days for the cut to heal and I spent every evening writing I hate my life all over my diary in five different felt tips. Eventually I worked up the courage to tell Lara exactly what had happened and she laughed so much she cried.

When I mentioned it again four years later, she was still laughing.

‘Oh my God, I totally forgot that,’ she sniggered.

‘It wasn’t funny,’ I snapped. ‘It was agony and I’m never letting a razor go anywhere near my vag again.’ I paused. ‘So what do I do instead?’

‘Why don’t you use a cream?’

I raised my eyebrows at her. ‘I can’t really see a cream having much effect down there. The hairs are kind of thick.’

‘No, it’s fine. The creams are designed to work on all types of hair. Why don’t you go ahead and trim, and I’ll go to the supermarket and buy the cream?’

‘OK, but if it goes wrong, I’m blaming you,’ I warned as I chucked her my wallet and walked into the bathroom to start the preparation. I hated trimming my pubes. I didn’t know what length to trim them to, and Lara was useless in this area because she was so fair her entire body was hairless. I doubted she had ever had to decide which hair removal method was best because she definitely didn’t have any. I’d noticed in Year Seven when we changed for swimming.

I started trying to pull the hairs together in clumps so I could trim them in mini sections. I channelled my inner hairdresser, sectioning the hair in between my fingers and cutting the ends of it. I snipped away as best I could, struggling as I did the lips. The hair fell away into the loo bowl and eventually I was left with a relatively evenly trimmed vagina. I leaned over so my head was in between my legs. Then the door swung open.

‘Jesus, Ellie, what are you doing?’

I snapped my head up and pulled my dress back down. ‘What happened to knocking? I was checking for stray hairs but I’m tempted to give up on them now.’

‘Yeah, you can just get them with this,’ she said, as she triumphantly waved a tube of hair removal cream and a bag of M&M’s. As I reached for the chocolate she threw the cream at me.

‘I figured we’d need extra chocolate for this. We can eat them while we’re waiting for the cream to de-hair you.’

I rolled my eyes but dutifully pulled my dress up. Lara groaned, ‘Ellie, I seriously wish you wouldn’t just whip all your clothes off without some kind of warning.’

‘What? I went to an all-girls school.’

‘We went to the same school.’

‘Exactly, so you should be fine with it. How much of this stuff do I put on?’

She examined the packet. ‘Right, you need to make sure all the hairs are covered, so I’d just put loads on if I were you. And then we leave it for ten minutes but you’ll probably need fifteen because it says leave it on for two minutes longer for tough hairs.’

‘Twelve minutes, then.’

‘You’re standing in front of me with your vagina out. Trust me, you need fifteen.’

I slathered the white cream, which stank worryingly of chemicals, over my pubes. Then I sat on the loo with my legs spread wide open so the cream wouldn’t wear off against my thighs. Lara was lying in the empty bath, passing me M&M’s.

‘I don’t understand how a cream can be as effective as a wax wrenching the hairs out. How can this stuff do the same thing?’ I asked.

‘Judging by the strong smell coming from between your legs, there are enough chemicals in there to burn them off.’

‘Ohmigod, do you think that if I leave it on for too long it will burn me?’

‘Nah, probably not. Shall I check the instructions, though?’

I tried to reach for them to chuck over to her but I couldn’t without getting off the loo. Instead I held my hand out for more M&M’s.

‘What does the timer say?’

Lara glanced at her iPhone and announced, ‘You officially have forty-five seconds and then you’re free to wash it off.’

I jumped up in excitement and gestured for her to get out of the bath.

Gingerly, I switched the shower on and did a silent prayer. I moved the shower head down and waited for the hairs to wash away.

Two minutes later, I was still waiting. Panicking, I started to rub them, and a few came off in my hand. The rest stayed, so I rubbed harder. A few more came away, but after five minutes of frantic rubbing, I was left with a vagina scattered with small patches of pubes. It looked like a sad, bald potato sprouting hairs.

CHAPTER FIVE

WE SPENT TWO HOURS and a bottle of wine consoling me. But by the time we tottered out of my room, we were both snorting with laughter.

‘It looks like one of those Mr Potato Head toys,’ sniggered Lara. ‘With a receding hairline.’

‘Here’s hoping some lucky man in Mahiki is into the sparse-pubes look.’

‘Yeah, you never know, it could be some kind of fetish.’ She giggled.

‘Poor vagina,’ I said, as we hobbled to the bus stop on our high heels. It was cold so we wore coats but left our legs bare for sex appeal. I wished I hadn’t relied on alcohol to keep me warm.

‘If we were rich, we could get a cab,’ said Lara as we finally sat on the 390 towards Green Park.

‘But you can’t down vodka-lems in a cab,’ I reminded her.

‘You aren’t allowed to drink alcohol on public transport either, Ellie.’

‘Seriously?’

‘Yes, you idiot.’ She rolled her eyes at me as I handed her the plastic water bottle we had filled up with vodka and a tiny bit of lemonade. She glugged then gagged and I obediently repeated the procedure. We carried on like this until we got to the club and wobbled inside, where we showed them our university cards and were only charged a fiver each.

‘Oh my God, have you ever seen so many designer clothes? I feel like I’ve just walked into an Abercrombie catalogue.’ Lara looked around in disgust at the mass of blond people surrounding us.

‘I know. If I cared enough this would definitely give me an eating disorder. How am I going to find my devirginiser when I’m surrounded by this inbred gene pool?’

‘Alcohol?’

The club was packed with Oxbridge graduates tanned from weekend trips to St Tropez. We headed over to the bar and within seconds, a couple of men were buying us drinks. They were old, slightly balding, and were tucking a bit more than their shirts into their trousers, but as they were happy to splurge their cash on us, we ignored the natural layers bulging out of their waistbands. They bought us whatever we wanted, but drew the line at twenty-quid piña coladas that came in real pineapples. Lara and I spent the next few hours rolling our eyes and getting drunker, while the men carried on chatting and skirting around the topic of their families.

‘So, Ellie,’ asked the fatter of the two, pulling me out of my daydreams, ‘do you want to dance?’

I widened my eyes at Lara and before I had time to mouth ‘help’ at her, she grabbed my arm and dragged me away. ‘Just off to the loo.’ She smiled sweetly at the disappointed men.

‘Oh my fucking God, I can’t handle them any more,’ I groaned as I collapsed onto an armchair in the bathroom.

‘Tell me about it,’ she cried. ‘I swear I can see the hair on their bellies through their shirts. And have you seen Mike’s sweat patches? I actually thought his shirt was grey until I saw the collars.’

I stared at her blankly. ‘Which one’s Mike?’

‘Are you kidding me? The one who just asked you to dance, Ellie.’

‘Oh, the fat one,’ I said. ‘What’s the receding hairline one called?’

‘Andy,’ she said, as she layered more mascara onto her lashes. ‘Have you been listening at all?’

‘Um, I know they work in real estate, or finance, and probably have two depressed wives at home,’ I replied.

‘Ugh, this is so miserable,’ she moaned. ‘Let’s just get one more drink out of them, and then go dance. If I have to hear one more thing about Andy’s BMW Z4 Roadster I’m going to drown myself in my vodka-lem.’

‘Yeah, I don’t care about video games at all,’ I agreed.

There was a moment’s silence as Lara turned to face me. ‘You know he was talking about his car, right?’

‘Oh fuck. I thought it was some kind of PS4,’ I admitted.

She snorted with laughter and pulled my arm, shaking her head. ‘This night is ridiculous. Fuck it, one more drink and then we’re off to find some actual fitties. Deal?’

I nodded reluctantly and let her lead me back to the balding forty-year-olds.

‘Girls, you’re back,’ cried the fatter one. ‘We bought another round, and some tequila shots.’

Lara and I glanced at each other and shrugged. ‘To us,’ she announced before we downed our glasses. I grabbed the lemon and started sucking it dry when I felt someone staring at me. He was wearing chinos, a blue denim shirt, and had the most symmetrical face I had ever seen. I choked on the lemon skin. I had found the perfect person to deflower me.

I fluffed up my hair, wiped away any smudged mascara from beneath my eyes and gave him my best smile. He smiled back, and I clutched the edge of the table to support myself. I turned to Lara to share my excitement with her, and then slowly, my smile dropped off my face as I realised she was smiling at him, too, and—oh, look, he was smiling back at her, not me.

My stomach sank in disappointment and rejection, and I turned back to the balding men and my vodka-lem. By the time I had downed the entire thing, Lara and the amazing guy were sipping out of piña colada pineapples and leaning against each other. I caught her eye and she mouthed sorry at me, even though she still had a huge grin on her face.

Andy or Mike nudged me and made a seedy joke about our foursome becoming a threesome. I realised I had to get out of there. I turned away from them, mumbling something about needing to go to the loo, and slipped outside.

I leant against a cold brick wall, too miserable and drunk to feel the cold. This whole idea had been stupid. Deep down, I’d known that from the start. But I had secretly hoped I would find a cute guy who would take me home, buy me breakfast in the morning and fall in love with me. Obviously, though, it was pretty, blonde, clever Lara who had found the ideal guy—and she didn’t even need one.

Everyone around me was laughing and chatting happily as they smoked their way to lung cancer. I felt so alone. That was the worst thing about my unwanted virginity—it made me feel so lonely. Lara hadn’t been a virgin for years and I was the only one out of our school friends who still hadn’t had sex. When we met up for people’s twenty-first birthdays, everyone shared stories about their boyfriends or regrettable one-night stands. It was standard uni experience stuff but I could never join in. They all gave me pitying looks—Aw, still a virgin, Ellie?—and I used self-deprecating jokes to hide how much I cared. Secretly I wanted to be just like them.

‘You all right there?’

I turned around in surprise. There was a boy standing there, grinning at me. As my alcoholic daze cleared up a bit and my eyes adjusted to the light, I saw him properly. He was wearing a grey hoody and he had a flippy, emo fringe with a lip piercing. He was the only person at the club who didn’t look as though he’d walked off a yacht, and even the barmen were better dressed than him. He was also the only person who had come over to talk to me willingly.

‘Just a bit cold,’ I said, trying to force my face into an attractive pout.

‘Do you want a cigarette?’ he asked.

‘Sure,’ I said and took the one he offered me.

I lit the third cigarette I had ever smoked in my twenty-one years, breathed in sharply and coughed. A lot. He looked over at me with raised eyebrows, so I rasped, ‘Sore throat.’

‘Yeah, must be the cold.’ He grinned. ‘Happens to me all the time.’

I took another drag, swallowed the cough rising up my throat and nonchalantly flicked the ash from the tip of the cigarette onto the ground.

He looked amused.

‘So, have you … been here before?’ I asked.

‘Are you asking me if I come here often? Original chat-up line,’ he said with a smirk.

‘You’re the one who came up to me,’ I reminded him.

‘Fair point. No, I have never been here before, if you can’t tell by my general appearance. What about you?’

‘Me neither,’ I said, wondering what it would be like to kiss someone with a lip piercing. Would it get in the way?

‘So, do you want to go back inside?’ he asked.

I shrugged and threw the cigarette onto the ground, following him back down the stairs. We got to the bar and I waited for him to ask me if I wanted a drink. He said nothing so I bought myself a ten-quid vodka and lemonade, trying not to wince as I handed over my debit card. He bought himself a beer, and we leant against a fish tank in the middle of the club.

‘So, are you here alone?’ he asked.

‘I’m with a friend. You?’

‘Yeah, same, but he’s pulled so I’m alone.’

‘Cool, that’s, uh … good for him.’ I nodded, wondering how much of this static conversation I was going to have to put up with. He paused and looked into my eyes.

After a couple of seconds of intense staring, he leant in and kissed me gently on the lips. It wasn’t bad, until he stirred his tongue into action and started sliding it in. I felt the familiar rise of panic at not knowing what to do and tried to keep calm.

Even since my first kisses with James Martell, I’d never really figured out how to do it. When I was young and practised kissing on my hands, I knew deep down that when it happened for real, I would magically know what to do, just like a Hollywood heroine.

But the magic had never happened. Lip Piercing started rubbing his tongue against mine. I felt the metal of his piercing rub against my gums. I was tempted to run my tongue over it but instead I resorted to my fail-safe move of copying what he was doing. As always, it didn’t really work and my slightly oversized nose bumped against his. We switched sides and I braced myself for the tongue again.

I tried to remember the advice from a YouTube video I once watched. I started to massage his tongue with mine. Was I meant to go over and around it in a circular way, or go to the side of it? Was I meant to withdraw my tongue back into my mouth afterwards?

Closing my eyes, I hoped for the best. After a few minutes, he seemed to figure out that kissing with tongues was not my speciality and went back to lip kissing. I breathed a sigh of relief that we were done with tongues.

‘Ellie!’ Lara crept up behind me. She was grinning wildly and her long, silky hair was all mussed up. Her voice was girly and unnatural as she squealed, ‘This is Angus. He’s at Oxford as well, and get this—we have so many mutual friends!’

Obviously Angus went to Oxford. I gave him my best fake smile and turned to Lara, asking, ‘Why have you suddenly become a posh dick?’ with my eyes.

She ignored my look. ‘So, who’s this? Aren’t you going to introduce us?’

I pulled Lip Piercing towards me. ‘This is, erm …’ I looked at him and he looked blankly back at me. After a few seconds of social embarrassment, I glared at him. ‘Well, aren’t you going to say what your name is?’

He looked taken aback and stuttered, ‘Uh, yeah, it’s Chris.’

Lara air-kissed him before turning back to Angus. They went over to the bar and I was left with Chris. I looked down and saw he was wearing Converse. Angus had been wearing beautiful suede loafers. I sighed, but Chris grinned and pulled me towards him. We started kissing again and I wrapped my arms around him, trying to let myself enjoy it. He may have been the only misfit in the club, but at least he was a misfit who fancied me.

We were interrupted by bright, glaring lights. Chris broke away from me. ‘Oh shit, the club’s closing. I’d better find my friend and head off,’ he said.

‘Oh God, yeah. Me, too. I need to find Lara.’

‘OK then, see you,’ he said and walked off.

My mouth dropped open in shock. I wasn’t expecting him to suggest a spring wedding, but he hadn’t even bothered to ask for my number or to kiss me goodbye. His brief positive impact on my self-esteem slid away and I felt ten times uglier than I had at the beginning of the night. It had been more fun getting ready at home with Lara than it was to take part in this meat market.

Suddenly, I couldn’t believe I’d been considering giving my virginity to a guy I met in a club, who had a lip piercing, no less. And he didn’t even want me. I felt a tear stinging my left eye and stubbornly brushed it away. I wasn’t going to cry over some unattractive emo.

Then another tear came. I sat on a leather sofa in a dark corner of the club. I knew I would be able to laugh about this tomorrow with Lara, but right now it wasn’t funny. It just validated all the insecurities I’d tried to banish along with my moustache in Year Ten. Why had I expected more?

This was what happened on every night out I had pulled, since starting uni. The guy just left, or took my number, promising to arrange drinks, which he never did. I shouldn’t be surprised—I was used to it. I closed my eyes and stayed there alone until the urge to cry lessened and I got up to find Lara.

She was outside snogging Angus. I stood there, waiting for her to kiss him goodnight. The bouncer looked me up and down and winked. ‘You going home alone, darling? You don’t have to, you know.’

Of course, the only person who wanted to take me home was the old, overweight bouncer. He started leering down my dress, so I pulled my coat over my shoulders and turned away. My drunkenness faded into acute sobriety as I walked towards the bus stop. Lara and Angus followed, hand in manicured hand.

CHAPTER SIX

THE MORNING AFTER, I woke up to find myself splayed out across my double bed. I yawned widely and stretched my arms across the mass of pillows under me. Then I sat up straight. I was in the middle of my bed, which I was meant to be sharing with Lara. Where the hell was she?

I grabbed my silver metal glasses from my bedside table, which I wore strictly only in the privacy of my bedroom, and I hobbled towards the window to pull open the thick curtains.

‘OWWWWW, GET OFF ME!’

I screamed in alarm at the unfamiliar male voice coming from my floor, and jumped over him to the window. I yanked open the curtains and blinked as light flooded the room. My eyes gradually adjusted and the fuzzy male lump on my floor turned into Lara curled up on the floor with Angus-from-last-night. His face was bright red where I had stood on it and he was rubbing his eyes angrily. Lara was lying next to him on her front, naked apart from a black bra. They had my throw draped over them, but it was only half covering Angus’ Male Zone.

I stared in silence at them as my brain took in the scene. Slowly, I asked, ‘Why are you both on my bedroom floor?’

Lara groaned and rolled over onto her back. She pulled the throw over her body, leaving Angus totally exposed, and I tried not to stare at his trimmed blond pubes creeping up his six-pack in a snail trail. She yawned loudly and said, ‘I can’t believe how uncomfortable your floor is. You could have given us your bed.’

It all came back to me. Last night at the bus stop, Lara had begged me to let Angus come back to mine, because he was in London visiting a friend so they couldn’t go back to his. I had been so depressed and drunk that I had agreed, on the condition that they couldn’t have my bed. Clearly they had accepted my offer.

I stared at them wordlessly, then looked down at myself to check that I wasn’t also half-naked. I was wearing an oversized T-shirt and last night’s black knickers. Wordlessly, I climbed over them, went into the bathroom and closed the door.

My head was throbbing and I had just found my best friend lying naked on my tiny bedroom floor with a guy I had fancied. I was hung over, jealous and irrationally angry.

I needed to shower away my feelings and last night’s sweat before I went back out as a normal, happy-for-my-best-friend human being. I pulled my T-shirt over my head, slid my knickers off and climbed into the bathtub.

As my second foot touched the bottom of the tub, I slipped backwards, falling onto my back with a thud. I screamed in pain and swore as loudly as I could.

Rubbing my sore back, I sat up and inspected my hand. It had some white stuff on it and I realised it was probably the hair removal cream from yesterday that I had spent hours washing off.

Then a horrendous thought came to my mind. There were other things that looked white and gloopy. Sexual things that had nothing to do with my hair removal cream. OH MY MOTHERFUCKING GOD. Had Lara and Angus come in here to have sex in my bathtub while I slept alone next door?

I looked closer at the white stuff but I’d never seen real semen before, not even in all its dried up glory, so I was clueless. I scanned the rest of the bathroom for other evidence. Lara’s lacy Calvin Kleins were scrunched up on the bath mat. My worst fears were confirmed.

I screamed as loudly as I could until my screams turned into hysterical sobs. I wiped my hands on the sides of the bath. I could hear Lara banging on the bathroom door and calling out to me, but I ignored her and turned the shower on.

I stood there for what seemed like forever, letting the hot water wash away my hangover and humiliation. Lara hadn’t really done anything wrong, bar the whole sex in my bath thing, but this entire experience just made me feel so … rejected. She and I had gone out together to have fun and meet cute guys, but I was the one who genuinely wanted to take a guy back home. Except, obviously, it was Lara with her perfect nose, long blond hair and Oxford education who was taking the men home—even though she was still technically seeing Jez. I knew I was being the bitchy girl who couldn’t handle having a prettier, more successful best friend, but that thought just made me cry more.

Forty-five minutes later, I walked out of the bathroom, now cocooned in my dressing gown. Lara was sitting, fully clothed, on my bed. She was alone. As I walked in, she looked guiltily up at me. She sat in silence, waiting for me to say something.

I gave in. ‘So, has Angus gone?’

‘Yeah. Ellie, I’m really sorry. I shouldn’t have brought him back here—that was really weird of me.’

‘Don’t be silly. It’s fine.’

‘No, it’s not fine. We—Oh God, I have to admit something to you.’

‘Go on, then.’

She shuffled on the bed, fidgeting with her hair, which still looked shiny and glossy, and then took a deep breath. ‘We had sex together. In your bathroom.’

I waited a few minutes to let her suffer, and then calmly said, ‘I know. I found the evidence.’

Her face wrinkled in confusion and then crumpled in shock. Her hand flew in front of her mouth and she groaned. ‘Fuck, is that why you screamed? Shit, Ellie, I’m so sorry! This is so embarrassing. I feel so bad. It’s just, I was so drunk and we really wanted to have sex but we didn’t have anywhere to go….’

I sighed. ‘It’s fine, honestly. If I were you, I probably would have done the same—except I would have washed the bathtub afterwards.’

She lowered her face in shame again. ‘I know. I’m a bad person. I’m sorry. I owe you.’

I sat down on the bed next to her and knew I had already forgiven her. ‘Anyway, let’s just forget it. How was it with Angus?’

She brightened up and smiled happily. ‘He was really nice. We swapped numbers and made plans to go for coffee next week. He’s doing his Master’s so he’s a couple of years older than us, but he seems like a really decent guy.’

‘Better than Jez?’

She snorted, ‘Babe, even your emo from last night is better than Jez. What was with that, anyway?’

‘Uh, well … after you heartlessly abandoned me, I had to fend for myself, and I guess drunk Ellie couldn’t find anyone better to hang out with. So, that happened.’

‘I guess the mission failed, then?’

I nodded, scrunching up my face. ‘I think it was for the best. I can’t really lose my virginity like that. I don’t think I’d mind losing it to a total stranger, but last night was kind of seedy….’

‘You’re right. And you know what? I’m proud of you for not giving in. I’m sure you could have easily gone home with the emo guy, but you didn’t, so well done for resisting,’ she said.

‘I guess,’ I replied uncomfortably, deciding I didn’t need to admit to her that Chris hadn’t actually offered me his services. Or a drink.

‘No, seriously, Ellie. I’m glad you didn’t lose your virginity to some stranger. I know you feel like it makes you different because everyone we know has had sex, but being different really isn’t a bad thing, you know.’ She paused, and then added, ‘Besides, it’s better to be a virgin than to have sex in your best friend’s bathtub, like I just did.’

I felt my skin prickle and I crossed my arms. It was all right for Lara to say being different was a good thing, but she had never had to make up lies during Never Have I Ever or sit in silence while our school friends giggled over awkward sex stories. She got to have awkward sex with Jez—and Angus, too, apparently.

‘How is being different a good thing?’ I asked.

‘I don’t know.’ She sighed. ‘I guess…. I wish I hadn’t thrown my virginity away on a total dick, and you haven’t, so that makes you different. You have morals. It’s a good thing.’

‘I didn’t have a choice, remember? The dick I tried to give my virginity to said no.’

She rolled her eyes, ‘Ellie, that was, like, four years ago. You need to get over the James Martell thing.’

I winced.

The James Martell ‘thing’?

‘Um, Lara, you know how horrible that was for me. The Bite Job was awful—you can’t deny that. And then he totally rejected me. I couldn’t just “get over it”.’

‘He was a decent guy, Ellie,’ she said, her tone irritable. ‘If you hadn’t been so terrified of seeing him again, you probably would have ended up going out, and eventually losing your virginity to him in a really nice way. Instead, you just totally flipped out about it all.’

‘What do you mean?’ I asked in a slightly strangled voice, knowing I wouldn’t like the response.

She sighed. ‘Don’t hate me for saying this, but I think you’re scared.’

‘Scared?! How can you say that?’ Hurt welled up inside me. ‘Lara, it’s so easy for you. You never had to worry about any of this, and OK, so Jez is a bit of a dick to you, but you both clearly really like each other and you’ve been seeing him on and off for years. It’s different for me. You have no idea how hard it is to be alone when everyone around you is in a relationship or living single life to the max and sleeping with the whole university.’

‘But you’re not alone, are you?’ she snapped. ‘You have your friends, you’re doing well at uni—but you’re just obsessed with finding a guy and losing your virginity. If you forgot about that for one second, you might actually enjoy your final year instead of freaking out the whole time.’

I felt tears start to sting the back of my eyes. ‘Do you ever think for a second that I do try?’ I asked her. ‘That losing my virginity is important to me because it would help me finally fit in? You fit in without even trying. I don’t even understand why I’m a virgin. No one we know has ever had an issue losing their virginity—more often, they regret losing it to the wrong guy. You had an opportunity with Marc but the only one I’ve ever had was with James Martell. Maybe I fucked it up because, yes, post–Bite Job I was scared of seeing him, but I was seventeen. Since then, no other guy has been interested in me so I’ve never had an opportunity to try again. Lara, I try so hard to meet men and none of them ever do anything more than kiss me—exactly like last night. You just go out to a club and a hot guy comes over and flirts with you. I get stuck with the old men and emos, and then my best friend has sex in my bathroom with a stranger. Do you not understand why I feel alone?’

‘Oh my God, why do you keep going on about the bathroom thing?’ she asked, her voice becoming shrill and high. ‘I’m sorry that Angus preferred me to you. Maybe it’s because I’m not so desperate.’

I felt as though she had whacked me across the face. ‘Desperate? You actually, genuinely think I’m desperate? How can you say that?’

She looked guilty but the apology I expected didn’t come. ‘Well, I just think you’re a bit … I don’t know, obsessed with this whole thing. You wanted to lose your virginity to a guy in a club.’

‘So?! It’s my choice,’ I replied, trying not to cry. ‘Lara, you can’t judge me when you’ve never been in my position.’ I closed my eyes tightly and blurted out something I regretted immediately. ‘Why have you suddenly decided to care about it, anyway? You never have before.’

Her mouth dropped open. ‘I’m sorry, Ellie, but are you suggesting I don’t care? I’m here for you whenever you need me. I drop everything every time you have a crisis, which is pretty much every other day.’

My hurt morphed into anger. ‘So? We’re best friends—that’s what we do. OK, fine, I have a lot of crises, but they’re not serious. I don’t … I don’t mope about them or anything.’

She cried out in disbelief, ‘Please, Ellie. You are so self-pitying. And you know what? You can be really selfish, too.’

‘I can be selfish? Look who’s talking! We spend hours talking about Jez every couple of days, analysing his text messages, and going on and on about the latest news at Oxford when I don’t even go there, and I don’t care about the people there.’

‘Exactly,’ she spat. ‘You don’t care about the people in my life but you expect me to care about whatever guy recently smiled at you on the tube, or the people you hate in your English course. It’s almost like you’re jealous of me.’

We stared at each other, and our words seemed to echo around the room. This was our first fight. I didn’t know how much of it we meant. Was it true? Was I selfish? The silence was unbearable. I finally understood the phrase about cutting the tension in a room with a knife.

She stood up abruptly. ‘Whatever. I’m leaving.’ She grabbed her bag and coat, and walked out of my room, slamming the door behind her.

The minute she left, I burst into tears and all the anger dissolved into hurt and regret. She was right—I did self-pity and mope and I was selfish. But wasn’t everyone? And how could she say those things to me? Didn’t she care that she had just hurt me more than any boy ever had?

I curled into a ball on my bed and began to cry very quietly. My wet hair soaked through my dressing gown, but I barely noticed. Lara thought I was desperate.

CHAPTER SEVEN

SHE STILL HADN’T CALLED. It was Wednesday and I didn’t know whether to stay in my Camden room or go back home to Guildford. Lara would be there, too—or maybe she had gone back to Oxford to be as far away from me as possible. We’d never had a falling-out before.

In the cold light of day, a bit of the anger had come back. The things she had said were so hurtful, and so … true. She had blurted them out without caring how I felt, and I’d been just as bad. I couldn’t face her and I couldn’t even begin to start processing the thought of an apology. I had spent all of Tuesday crying, eating my feelings and distracting myself with movies. Now I had an ice cream hangover and couldn’t spend another second in my own company.

The only option was to pack up my stuff and head home in defeat for the Easter holidays, but I couldn’t bear the thought of sitting around in Guildford with nothing to do. The only reason I normally went home was to spend evenings with Lara, watching films and lounging in the park. I couldn’t face going back yet. At least if I stayed in London, I would be surrounded by people. I needed a distraction, to spend time with someone different so I wouldn’t have to think about Lara.

Suddenly I remembered Emma. If she was still around, maybe we could have our promised drinks. Before I could change my mind, I reached for my phone and sent her a text asking if she was free. I hadn’t even had a chance to put my phone down when it buzzed with a reply.

Yes! So glad you texted. I say we get a late pub lunch and start drinking immediately afterwards. Girly cocktails?

Perfect. Where shall we meet?

See you at The Rocket at 3pm?

Done!! x

Feeling proud of myself for taking the initiative and doing something with my day, I showered quickly and decided to walk the thirty minutes to the pub to work off some of yesterday’s calories. I’d forced myself into my favourite black skinny jeans and even though it had taken me half an episode of Friends to do them up, they were finally covering my cellulite and inspiring me to walk briskly. I flicked around on my iPod until I found my Fuck You, World playlist. It was a relic of my teen angst days but I needed to reembrace life. And dancing to The Killers was the easiest way to do it.

Forty-five minutes later I arrived at the pub and collapsed, exhausted, into a booth. I had just ordered tap water when Emma walked in. She gave me a hug, enveloping me in flowery perfume, long feathery earrings and her jaggedly-cut blond hair. Thank God I had worn my favourite jeans and black suede boots with gold studs, because otherwise I would have been seriously underdressed. Emma was wearing a chiffon cream shirt over a black bra, paired with jeans, heeled boots and a furry leopard-print coat.

‘So, have you ordered yet?’ she asked. ‘I’m craving a full fish, chips and mushy peas with a proper sticky toffee pudding.’

‘That sounds so good. Except I ate a whole tub of Ben & Jerry’s last night.’

She looked at me sympathetically. ‘Ouch. Who is the bastard?’

‘I wish it was a guy.’ I sighed. ‘Long story short, she is—or maybe was—my best friend from school, who just decided to tell me everything she’s secretly disliked about me for years, out of the blue, after having sex with a guy I fancied in my bathtub while I slept obliviously next door.’

‘Whoa, sounds like you’ve had a rough few days…. Who was the guy? Was he fit, because if he was, then surely the bathtub sex is excusable?’

‘I guess so, yes. I mean, neither of us knew him. We just saw him in a club, fancied him, and he chose her.’

‘And then went back to yours and your friend got it on with him in your bathtub? Classy girl,’ she said, shaking her head with an admiring smile. ‘Babe, you could blame her for this, but I think what’s happened here is you’ve made the classic mistake of having a best friend who gets all the guys. You need to go out there and get a new best friend—preferably an uglier one.’

I snorted with laughter but she grinned at me and carried on.

‘OK, maybe that is a bit drastic. But you know what? There are so many girls like this out there. Pretty girls who get all the guys without lifting a finger and then rub it in their friends’ faces. Bitches.’

I laughed. ‘OK, I feel like we’re not talking about my friend any more. Do you have direct experience of this, Emma Matthews?’

Emma rolled her eyes. ‘Do I? At school I was second to Alex, because she was blonder than me and had bigger boobs. That’s all the Portsmouth guys cared about, by the way—some cultural context for you. You’d do really well there,’ she added, making me blush as she looked down at the cleavage I’d tried to hide with a high-cut top. ‘But anyway, then I realised that all those years of rejection and being second choice had taught me loads. Ten years later, I am now oblivious to rejection and I can proposition a man without really caring what he says back.’

I looked at her with unadulterated awe. ‘So, you ask men out?’

‘I’ve been known to do so. And for the few who say no, the dozens who have said yes and given me some of the best nights of my life have made it worthwhile.’

‘I’m officially impressed,’ I said. ‘The closest I’ve ever come to asking someone out was when I asked a guy called James to take my virginity when I was seventeen and he said no.’

She burst out laughing. ‘Oh, wow, that kind of rejection is enough to put anyone off. Seventeen, huh? That’s kind of late to lose your virginity. We all lost ours before fifteen, but then half of the girls in my year at school got pregnant before A-Levels. So I guess we aren’t really a fair reflection of the greater world.’

They all lost their virginity at fifteen? Oh God, I was a circus freak. A cable TV channel was probably going to end up doing a documentary on me. The twenty-one-year-old virgin.

I forced a smile. ‘Ah, well, I don’t think anyone at my school has ever got pregnant before being respectably married to a doctor or lawyer, aside from Molly Hanson in 1984, who ran off with a teacher after he got her pregnant in sixth form. Since then, the school hasn’t allowed male teachers under the age of forty unless they’re gay. They’re scared the girls will run off with them.’

‘They have a point. I definitely would have run off with Mr Branson if he’d asked. It’s only because he was so good-looking that I was motivated enough to get an A in Physics. So anyway, when did you lose your virginity after the big rejection?’ she asked, drawing out the last three words with dramatic pausing.

I flushed red. I didn’t want to lie to Emma because she was so open with me. But I couldn’t tell her I was a virgin … especially since she clearly didn’t know anyone who was still a virgin post-GCSEs. But how would we ever have a proper friendship if she didn’t know the one defining detail about me?

I quickly blurted out the truth before I lost my courage. ‘Well, it never actually happened for me,’ I admitted. Her face screwed up in confusion as her mind started to process what I said. She was judging me, and oh my God, I was freaking out. I rushed on, ‘Well, until a few months later when I got drunk and that was that.’

She grinned. ‘Ah, the classic drunken first time. Happens to us all.’

I plastered a bright smile on my face and hated myself for being too weak to stick to the truth. ‘Yup! Though I can’t say I’ve had many repeats of it, so I’ll have to live vicariously through you.’

‘Ugh, I know. There is a major male drought going on these days. But is there anyone in the English course you fancy? Charlie, maybe?’ she asked with a knowing smile.

I wrinkled my face up in disgust. ‘God, no! I could never keep up with his filthy sense of humour.’

‘Yeah, I know, right! It’s like … what is he trying to cover up with it? I reckon all those stories are just there to hide the fact that he has got a little secret of his own—a very, very little one.’

‘Are you trying to tell me he has a tiny dick? How would you know that?’ I asked her in shock.

She laughed and tapped the side of her nose. ‘I have my sources. Let’s just say I overheard Marie saying something to Fiona.’

‘Marie and Charlie? You have got to be kidding me,’ I gasped.

‘Marie and everyone, more like. The girl is a serious player—and that means something, coming from me.’

We ordered our fish and chips and carried on gossiping well into the sticky toffee puddings and our second mojitos. I felt a bit guilty for lying to the most open person I’d ever met, but I figured the second I slept with someone, the lies would be true, and she would never need to know about the half lie.

‘Anyway,’ Emma said as she spooned the last bit of caramel sauce off her plate and threw her spoon down in triumph, ‘we got so distracted that I forgot to be more supportive about your fight with your friend. What actually happened?’

I groaned. ‘It’s too depressing to relive.’

‘Do it.’

I took a deep breath. ‘OK, but remember … you asked for this.’

‘Disclaimer accepted. Spill.’

‘So, we went out on Monday night to Mahiki. I was craving a man and she’s already seeing someone, so we went out to try to find me a guy. A couple of disgusting old men bought us drinks and we took full advantage. Then we both saw the perfect guy, but of course blond attractive Angus preferred blonde attractive Lara, so they hooked up. Meanwhile, I got distracted by an ugly little emo boy and snogged him, even though he was the only person not wearing a designer outfit.’

‘Whoa—first, what are you trying to say about blonds, Miss Kolstakis? Second, I can’t believe you were in Mahiki and you managed to find an emo.’ She laughed. ‘I admire your skills.’

I raised my eyebrows at her. ‘A skill? I feel like it’s more like a curse.’

‘I don’t know … I’d much rather be with someone a bit different than another typical Oxfordite.’

I paused and briefly wondered if I would have enjoyed being with Angus. He had been pretty rude when I stood on his face. ‘I don’t know,’ I said. ‘I give up on men. Especially because I then got very drunk and agreed to let Angus stay with Lara in my tiny en-suite bedroom. And when I woke up I stood on his face, realised that they were both NAKED and then … and then I decided to shower it all away and slipped on what I thought was hair removal cream. But as I was lying flat on my back in the bath, crying out in pain, I realised that I had slipped on Angus’ come.’

Emma spat out her drink and burst out laughing. I grumbled at her to stop enjoying my humiliation so much, but after my attempts failed, I grudgingly joined her and we laughed until we were both close to tears.

‘That … is just … so funny,’ she said, gasping for breath. ‘How do these things happen to you? Even the situation where you accidentally told the whole of UCL English Literature class that you loved being bummed even though you never have been.’

‘I didn’t exactly tell them I loved it….’

‘Yeah, sorry, the rumours going round are a bit different.’

I froze. ‘Please tell me you’re joking.’

‘Oh, come on, it’s not that bad. I think even Charlie has a newfound respect for you. The boys all fancy you now.’

‘Am I meant to be flattered that they now only fancy me because they think I’m a dirty sex maniac?’

‘Excuse me,’ said Emma as she plonked her glass back onto the table. ‘Don’t knock anal sex until you’ve tried it.’ She paused, and then lowered her tone. ‘Except, it can have slightly disastrous consequences.’

I stared at her, picturing her and an unknown man covered in poo. ‘What?’ I asked in alarm.

‘That girl Alex I was telling you about? The first time she did it, they were at the guy’s house and his dad walked in. The guy was so terrified he pulled out immediately, just as she clenched in panic, and … her rectum dislodged and came out with it. The dad had to drive them to hospital.’

I gulped, mentally vowing never to have anal sex.

‘That’s … that’s awful,’ I whispered, trying to erase the very vivid image from my mind.

She nodded slowly. ‘If it hadn’t happened to her, I never would have believed it. It sounds like one of those urban myths, but, unfortunately for Alex, it was true. Some might call it karma,’ she added with a grin.

I let out a shocked laugh.

‘Anyway,’ she said, ‘I’m so glad we’re hanging out. You’re definitely the most normal person I’ve met in our course so far.’

‘Same here,’ I said, smiling at her warmly and realising how true it was. ‘Although, that’s really not saying much,’ I joked and she rolled her eyes at me. ‘Honestly, though, sometimes I feel kind of distant from the rest of them. They’re fun and everything, but I’m never sure how much I have in common with them,’ I admitted.

‘I know,’ she cried out. ‘Like, why do we always have to drink red wine and pretend we hate pop music? Sometimes I just want to embrace my inner mainstream self. In fact,’ she said as she raised her glass in the air, ‘here’s to not being cool and not giving a fuck.’

We clinked our glasses together laughing and she called the waiter to bring us more cocktails. He was young and cute, and I shot him my most flirtatious smile but he didn’t seem to notice. Emma, meanwhile, was beyond subtle smiles and eye contact. She flirted openly with him, and wrote her number on the bill when we paid two hours later. When we left, she winked at him and he grinned back at her.

‘I can’t believe you did that, Emma. You’re so brave,’ I lisped as we left the pub.

She laughed. ‘He was so cute I had no choice. My inner lust for him was so overpowering that I just fell prey to my desires. Here’s hoping he calls….’

‘Will you care if he doesn’t?’

‘God, no! He’s a waiter in a bar. There are hundreds of those all over London. Who cares if one of them doesn’t fancy me back? He might have a girlfriend already, or be gay—except I do have a pretty good gaydar—or he might just not like blondes.’

‘You’re my new idol, Emma,’ I said as I tripped over a jagged paving stone.

‘Oh-kaaay, little lady, that’s good to know. But I reckon we should get you home before you throw up all over your new idol.’

‘I’m not that drunk,’ I said, as she bundled me into a cab and told the cab driver an address that wasn’t mine. I laid my head on her furry leopard-print coat and closed my eyes.

CHAPTER EIGHT

I WOKE UP with a headache and saw flashing lights in front of me. I blinked a few times and realised they were fairy lights. Different-coloured ones encased in paper stars, carefully positioned to illuminate a life-sized poster of Rihanna. I looked down and saw that I was stripped down to my underwear and my half-naked body was barely covered by a zebra-print duvet cover.

‘Emma?’ I called out, my voice creaking as though it hadn’t been used in days.

The door creaked open and she rolled in, wearing a hot-pink dressing gown, carrying two floral mugs. ‘Hiya! I brought tea.’

Gratefully I took a mug from her and eased myself up onto my elbows, wincing as a sharp pain shot across my head. ‘Thanks so much for letting me stay here yesterday.’

‘No worries. There was no way I was letting you go home alone in that state. Anyway, I don’t know if you can stomach it but there’s kind of a party happening tonight that you should totally come to.’

‘You’ve got to be kidding. I feel like I’m dying.’

‘It’s the Easter holidays! We have no lectures, and as you told me about a million times last night, you officially have nothing to do back in Guildford. So I can’t think of a single reason why you shouldn’t come.’

I groaned. ‘Emma, I’m an emotional wreck. My best friend doesn’t want to know me any more, I spend my free time eating ice cream alone, and when I do persuade someone to hang out with me, I don’t shut up about all of the above. Why do you want me to come to this party with you?’

‘Stop self-pitying, Ellie Kolstakis,’ she said in a mockmum voice, before putting her cup down and looking me in the eyes. ‘When you’re not moaning about how crappy your life is, you’re hilarious and loads of fun. So I think you should have a shower, then come sit on the sofa with me and watch that new series everyone is obsessed with, and then we can get glammed up and hit the party. How does that sound?’

‘It definitely sounds more appealing than going back to mine and packing up all my stuff to take home.’

‘Exactly. And then I promise you can go home to your family tomorrow and I’ll leave you alone. For now, though, take these.’ She threw me a towel and some tracksuit bottoms. ‘Get showered up. I can’t wait to put you in one of my outfits tonight. You’re going to look so hot.’

I raised my eyebrows at her and walked out of her room, trying to cover my underwear-clad body with her towel. She called out after me, ‘It’s the door on the right. My housemates have all gone back home for Easter, so don’t worry about anyone walking in on you showering. Feel free to enjoy that shower head however you want, babe! ‘

I ignored her tip and had a very uneventful shower. We spent the entire day watching a new series about terrorists and the CIA whilst eating carrot sticks and hummus. After seeing Emma’s fridge, which looked like an aisle from Whole Foods, I now understood why she was still a size six and I wasn’t. The other day’s fish and chips had clearly been her day off weight-watching.

When the evening came round, Emma led me up to her room and forced me into trying on dresses that wouldn’t go up past my bum.

‘Emma, this is getting embarrassing now. I’m a 36D with a sometimes-size-twelve bum, and I’m not going to fit into your clothes. Please can we give up?’

‘You’re only a couple of sizes bigger than me. We can definitely find you something. Ugh, I’m so jealous of your bum. I wish I had one. Mine is just flat.’

‘Stop trying to make me feel better, Emma.’

‘No, I’m serious! Beyoncé is my hero and I dream of having curves like her. In fact, let me prove it to you,’ she said, suddenly starting to rummage through her drawers. After a few minutes she triumphantly pulled out a pair of large knickers. ‘There!’

‘Are those Spanx? Those suck in your fat, Em.’

‘Nooo! Look, they’re padded pants! They have all this padding at the back to give you a structured bum,’ she said, waggling her tiny posterior at me.

I burst out laughing as she pulled the pants on over her black thong and began dancing like her bum idol in the new music video everyone was talking about.

‘OK, point proven. I will squeeze myself into one of your insanely glam dresses if you go out wearing those pants.’

‘Ellie, I already wear these as many times as I can before I have to do a whites wash. Oh my God, I’ve had a brainwave. I think I have a very, very cool chiffony dress lying around somewhere. It wouldn’t only fit you—it would look amazing!’

After a fifteen-minute search, which uncovered numerous sparkly ones instead, Emma found the dress she meant and I put it on.

I looked critically at myself in her full-length mirror. I was expecting it to hang shapelessly from my boobs, which were hooked up in my most industrial, thick-strapped bra. Instead, it gave me a feminine shape. It was black chiffon, sleeveless and even made my legs look shapely. It was covered in a dark blue peacock print and Emma had persuaded me to wear it with her black, five-inch-heeled ankle boots. She had even cajoled me into putting on a pair of long silver earrings, to which I had agreed only as a compromise after refusing to wear two huge peacock feathers dangling from my ears. My long brown hair still looked a bit out of control and there was nothing that could be done about my prominent, straight nose, but the dress did detract attention from the centre of my face.

‘You look amazing, Ellie,’ remarked Emma as she surveyed my body.

‘I guess I look as good as I’m ever going to,’ I admitted and she rolled her eyes.

‘You need more self-confidence, babe. Embrace your hot bod and work those curves,’ she said, as she rummaged distractedly in her drawer.

I raised my eyebrows. She thought I had a hot bod? She was wearing black velvet platform heels with tiny coloured gems all over the heels and a skintight cotton dress that she wore braless and tightsless with the peacock earrings I had rejected. Standing next to her, I felt like a nun, but when we walked into the party—at her friend Amelia’s house—I was relieved I’d gone for a more toned-down look. Most people there were the typical hipster types: the guys in checked shirts and skinny jeans, while the girls wore oversized jumpers and boots with tiny floral dresses underneath. I was grateful I had listened to my inner Greek mum and worn thick black tights.

Emma was the only one who looked as though she had walked out of a Soho nightclub, but she seemed oblivious to this and ran towards Amelia, shrieking, ‘OH MY GOD, HI!’ as we walked in.

Amelia had short dark hair that suited her elf-like face, piercings all up her ears, and she was wearing a man’s denim shirt with ripped tights. She and Emma looked as though they were from different worlds—or opposite social scenes at the very least—but they hugged as though they had been friends for years and started sharing stories with each other so loudly the whole room turned to stare.

I smiled politely when Emma remembered to introduce me, and then decided to disappear for a while so they could catch up without the awkward friend hovering behind them. I mouthed something about coats and a loo to Emma, before slipping off in search of company—or, if that was too optimistic, in search of somewhere to hide.

I walked around with my coat slung over my arm, scanning each cluster of people to see if I recognised anyone. Even though everyone there was a third year student at UCL, I realised I didn’t know a single person and was forced to give vague I’m actually looking for a friend and totally belong here eyes to anyone who gave me a questioning look. Once I had given out the look-over ten times, I decided to give up. I chucked my coat onto a pile of khaki anoraks in a bedroom and took refuge in the bathroom.

I hated forcing myself to speak to strangers at parties. All my teenage insecurities came flooding back the second I became the new girl or walked into a room full of people I didn’t know. I put the toilet seat down and sat on top of it. Emma’s flippant remark about me needing more self-confidence drifted into my head. I thought I had ditched the low self-esteem levels that had haunted me through school when I was surrounded by impossibly attractive girls and their boyfriends who hadn’t ever fancied me, but I clearly hadn’t. I couldn’t even admit I looked good after spending two hours getting ready.

I needed to sort myself out or my entire life was going to pass me by. While I was moping around and wishing someone would shag me, everyone else was moving on and carpe diem–ing. Maybe Lara was right and I should stop blaming my virginity for every problem I had. I sat up straight. I needed to take a leaf out of Emma’s book and get over my teenage bullshit.

I stood up and walked over to the mirror, scrutinising my face. My thick dark hair was not as out of control as I always assumed it was, and fell over my shoulders in acceptable waves. I’d refused Emma’s fake eyelashes but after seeing her with a full set, I had compensated for my short ones by piling on layers of mascara. The result was that I now had long eyelashes, satisfactory hair and an impressive outfit. I gave myself a small smile and started a version of the same self-help speech I’d been giving myself since I was thirteen and saw it in a copy of Just Seventeen magazine.

‘I, Ellie Kolstakis, look amazing. I am a beautiful, confident individual and I can have anything I want. I will go downstairs, I will be amazing and I will be brave. I am incredible.’

I couldn’t help grinning widely after the speech. It worked every time. I didn’t care how lame, clichéd or romcom it was—the self–pep talk was a tried-and-tested method. It had a good success rate for a reason and I was damned if I was going to miss out on it. I winked and pouted at myself in the mirror until I realised how ridiculous I was and quickly left the bathroom. I shut the door and found myself face-to-face with my all-time favourite person.

‘Oh my God, Ellie,’ said Hannah Fielding, who had swapped the flowers round her head for a piece of fabric tied into a bow. ‘I can’t believe you’re here. I’ve never seen you at one of Meely’s parties before.’

‘Yeah, well, I don’t really know, erm, Amelia very well, but I’m here with Emma. In fact, I should probably find her—I’ve been ages.’

‘Yeah, I’ve been waiting ages. I could have sworn I heard you speaking to someone in there.’

I shrugged my shoulders and held out my phone weakly. ‘I took a phone call while I was in there. Anyway, so good to see you. I’ll see you later, I’m sure.’

I turned and bolted down the stairs before she could say anything else. I put my head into my hands, wanting to curl up in a corner, but then I saw Emma. I was still on the staircase, so she couldn’t see me from my vantage point but I saw her walk over to a very attractive guy and start talking to him. At first he just looked pleasantly surprised, but within seconds his body language suggested he was interested. OK, I understated—he looked as though he was ready to throw her over a banister and shag her immediately.

How did Emma find it so easy? She didn’t even let people like Hannah bother her. I trudged down the rest of the stairs, suddenly feeling the effects of my motivational speech slowly ebbing away. I poured myself a glass of vodka with a few drips of orange juice.

I was gagging after my first sip when I saw a guy standing in the corner of the room on his own, his arms crossed. He wasn’t very attractive—his face was kind of squashed-looking and he was very pale and freckly. On top of that, he looked pissed off. He was wearing a dark red zip-up hoody and had a book poking out of his pocket.

He looked like a pretentious idiot. The perfect guy on whom I could practise my confident new persona.

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