Sorority Girl
Chapter One Chapter Two Chapter Three Chapter Four
Sorority Girl - Chapter Three
"Hi, Dad," I said into the phone.
I'd woken up early Sunday morning, calling home at 8:15 sharp because I knew my parents would have gotten home from church, changed clothes, and sat down for English muffins and coffee right about then. Listening to NPR and talking about the weather. They'd been doing it just the same for years.
"Jennifer? Is everything okay?" Dad was like that, he never expected me to call unless it was someone's birthday or I was in trouble.
"Yeah, Dad. Everything's fine."
"Did you go to church this morning?" he asked, just like I knew he would.
"Uh…" I almost lied, but if skipping church was a sin, then lying about it to your dad had be twice as bad.
"Jennifer, you go to church…" I listened for five minutes, which was a relatively short lecture by Dad's standards, "…and you'll be so much happier, okay?"
"Okay, Dad," I agreed, although I'd been paying more attention to the back of my cereal box, trying to help that crazy Waldo girl find her way through the maze printed on the back. "Hey, is Mom there? Can I talk to her?"
"She's right here, dear. I love you."
"I love you too, Dad," I answered and waited while he handed the phone over.
"Hey, Jen…You missed church?" Mom teased me, knowing full well I'd gotten the message.
"Yeah," I smiled to myself. "My car broke down."
"What car?" Mom asked sharply, but then she caught on. "Next year, okay? After you show some discipline." Which meant after I'd finished pre-law and started real school, that's when I'd finally get some wheels.
"I know. Yeah," I sighed. "Um, anyway, I gotta ask you something."
"Okay."
"Uh, well, it's about the sorority, Mom."
"You're all squared away with that?"
"Mmmm…No, I mean sorta, see…" I'd been trying to think of a way to ask my mom about bringing a virgin boy to her initiation, assuming she had.
"See what? What's the matter?"
"They want me to bring my boyfriend." I paused for a second. "You remember, I told you about him before."
"Larry?"
"Larry? No, Mom. William, the cute one." I took a deep breath. "Anyway, he's uh…Well, uh, he's a virgin, Mom, so I'm supposed to bring him to the initiation and, uh…"
"Um-hmmm…" She made a sound like she almost understood. "And you like this boy?"
"He's my boyfriend, Mom!" I chuckled. "Yeah."
"So what's the problem?" she asked, sounding genuinely confused.
"Uh, well, he doesn't really like the sorority, for one thing." But I probably shouldn't have said that, so I hurried on. "And I don't want him to get hurt or anything, you know?"
"Don't want him to get hurt," Mom echoed me and then we were silent for awhile.
"I just want to know why he has to be there, that's all. I want to know what's going to happen, Mom." I figured I couldn't be much more plain than that.
"Well, Jen, it wouldn't be much of an initiation if you knew what was going to happen, would it?" She chuckled a little and I rolled my eyes. "You have to decide on your own, part of the deal is trust."
"Trust?" I sighed. "Mom, all these girls do is drink and talk about sex. I don't even know half of them, and the other half…" I frowned. "I don't know."
"So I guess they don't know you either, huh?" Mom said reasonably. "Maybe it works both ways, have you thought about that?"
"What, they want to see if they can trust me to trust them?" I narrowed my eyes, staring at Waldo. "Does that even make sense?"
"Makes sense to me, but you always were a little…different," Mom pronounced, reminding me that I wasn't quite the daughter she'd envisioned. I was a little too sensitive for my own good, or so she liked to say.
"So you won't tell me?" I asked, just to make sure there wasn't any misunderstanding between us.
"No, can't do it, girl. I made a promise before you were even born," Mom said. "I can't go back on it just because you're soft on some boy."
"I love him, Mom," I said, not really planning on it, but she made me a little mad and that seemed like the best way to get back at her.
"Who?"
"William," I said, feeling very angry right then. "I'm going to ask him to marry me."
"Now hold on a second, Jennifer…"
I hung up the phone, nodding to myself. That would teach her. If I'd spent my whole life disappointing my mom, well, here was the best one yet. She'd probably cut off my allowance, disown me maybe, and never speak to me again or something. But God! What was the deal anyway? She couldn't give me one simple answer? That stupid sorority was more important to her than her own daughter? What kind of sense did that make? And trusting them…Yeah, right. I wouldn't trust any of them alone with William for five minutes. A bunch of college girls drinking beer and trying to fuck every hard dick they could find? Well, they weren't getting my boyfriend.
=-=-=-=-=
"Hello?" Donald, my boyfriend's roommate, answered the phone.
He was pretty hot himself, but if I wasn't very outgoing, he seemed positively anti-social, which didn't make a lot of sense to me because he looked like a swimsuit model. I'd caught Donald coming out of the shower once, wrapped in a much too small towel, and I'd almost popped on the spot. Tall and thin, dripping wet and blessed with a cock that had to be at least six inches soft, I'm not kidding. A hard, smooth chest, a real boyish six-pack beneath his outtie belly button. He'd looked like he'd just stepped out of the 'Boys of the PacWest' issue of Playgirl and I'd just stared at him like a nub.
I didn't think he'd ever forgiven me for that.
"Hi Donald…" I cleared my throat, "…is, uh, William there?"
"Fuck off and die, loser." He hung up the phone.
Nope, he hadn't forgiven me yet. I sighed, hanging up the phone and scratching my head. Between William's answering machine and his roommate's less than friendly suggestions, I wasn't getting anywhere fast. And this was the boy I wanted to marry?
"Oh!" I heard a masculine voice and I turned around to see Lance coming out of Susan's room. He'd sorta dressed in one of Susan's soccer jerseys and just a skimpy pair of boys' briefs, sexy tight ones with little pink hearts on them.
He was cute. Hell, every boy I knew was cute, who am I fooling? But a twenty-year-old coed walking around half naked, with some seriously toned and tanned legs; not to mention long blonde hair all wild and frazzled from what must have been some good marathon sex…What would you call him? Definitely cute.
"Hi Lance," I said, trying not to look at his legs and failing miserably. They led right up to the pink hearts and the bulge beneath them and…I forced myself to look away.
"I'm just, um…" He pointed towards the kitchen. "Susan wanted me to get her some coffee." He blushed and smiled and rolled his eyes, like wasn't this embarrassing?
"Sure, you know where everything's at," I nodded, watching his ass for a second as it rotated just beneath the hem of the jersey.
I grabbed the keys to Susan's motorcycle, deciding to take her up on her offer from the night before and give her and Lance some more privacy. It looked like they might need it. And then I had a really weird thought, even by my too sensitive standards.
"Hey, uh, Lance…" I stood in the doorway just as he was standing tiptoe to reach the cups, pulling that jersey up so I could see all of his perfectly round ass. I looked down quickly, as if those keys in my hand were just the most fascinating keys in the world.
"Hmmm…?" He giggled and at least Lance liked me a little.
I glanced up, making sure it was safe to look at the man and he stood there as modestly as possible, given what he was wearing. "I was wondering if I could ask you something." I paused. "Something sort of…Personal?"
"Uhhhh…Maybe." He giggled again and I bet he was fun as hell in bed. "What?"
"How long have you and Susan been together?"
"Mmmm…" Lance shrugged. "A long time. Since we were freshman. Why?"
"Since before she joined the sorority?" I asked, ignoring his question for the moment.
"Yeah." He put his coffee cup down, folding his arms over his flat chest defensively. "Why do you ask?"
"Uh, well." I wiped my fingers over my mouth nervously. "I was wondering if, um…if you were at her initiation?"
"Oh." Lance's blue eyes got a little bigger. "Ohhh…" he nodded like he understood. "You mean, was I the virgin that Susan brought…?"
I waited for him to continue but he didn't, much to my frustration.
"Yeah," he finally nodded, smiling and maybe blushing just a little. "I guess it's no secret, huh?"
"Uh, yeah…" I felt like screaming, or at least asking him what it was that wasn't a secret. Lance could be a total blonde, believe me. The boy wasn't ever gonna be a rocket scientist. I just had to find the magic words and he'd open right up, I could feel it. I was so close!
"Hey. Morning, Jen." Susan walked into the kitchen, stretching and just wearing the shorts that went with the jersey Lance was wearing. Her hard, muscular tits had dark love bites all over them and I looked away, slightly embarrassed and knowing I couldn't ask anything with Susan there.
"Hey, Sue," I smiled reluctantly.
"Mmmm…Where that coffee, baby?"
"Commmmming…" Lance sang, smiling at me and shrugging his shoulders playfully. He slipped past me carrying Susan's coffee and with it all the answers to my dilemma.
"Where are you off to?" Susan asked me, pulling a giggling Lance onto her lap once the coffee safely sat on the table.
"Uh, I'm going to see if William's around," I shrugged. "I thought I'd borrow your motorcycle."
"Sure, girl, go ahead." She turned her attention to Lance, reaching down to give the boy's balls a playful squeeze and I left them laughing and struggling behind me.
So Lance had been the virgin at Susan's initiation, I knew that much at least. And they'd stayed together afterwards, for three years at least, that had to mean something important. But William wasn't like Lance. William was a lot smarter for one thing, and a lot older than Lance had been. A few years doesn't sound like much, but at college the difference between freshman and senior years is more than significant. It's huge. William was also a lot more serious. He was looking for more than a college fuck buddy and so I couldn't depend on Lance's good example to comfort me.
I needed to know. I needed some proof that I wasn't going to try and convince William of doing something that we'd ultimately regret. It would have been so easy just to quit the whole stupid thing, and I was close, believe me. But my mom, that was the one thing keeping me in the game. She'd wanted a daughter who played football, and went hunting and fishing, who had that alpha personality to dominate everyone and everything around her. But that was Mom, not me. Need proof? She could dominate me from 2000 miles away and in all likelihood the next time I talked to her I wouldn't be getting married to William at all.
Especially if I couldn't even ask the boy.
=-=-=-=-=
I suppose I could have stood outside Williams apart, yelling his name like in that old Marlene Brando movie, A Streetcar Named Desire. Is that the one? But I decided to save that as a last resort, it was still reasonably early on a Sunday morning. Knocking on the door would probably get me a little farther.
"Are you retarded?" Donald opened it, of course.
"I just have to talk him, please?" I tried puppy-dog eyes and when it didn't seem like those were going to work, I took my mom's advice.
"Hey! Get out of here!" I pushed past Donald and his protestations, just like the alpha female I wasn't.
"William?" I called out, walking through their little dorm room, which comprised little more than a living room and two small bedrooms. They had a community bathroom down the hall and a cafeteria downstairs to share with the other residents. It wasn't bad but it made me appreciate rooming with Susan in one of the campus apartments.
I knocked on William's bedroom door while Donald stared at me, arms folded across his chest. He looked good when he was mad too. Not as good as when he did fresh from the shower, but not bad at all. He wasn't really on my mind though, William was, and I knocked again.
"William? Hey! It's me," I said through the door.
"Hi." He opened the door, looking at me without smiling.
"Hi." I did smile.
William turned away, leaving the door ajar and sat down on his bed. He tugged his t-shirt down and hitched some baggy gold sweatpants up. They were tied around his narrow waist with a drawstring. I entered the room, closing the door behind me softly and taking a deep breath. The air smelled like William. I mean, he just flooded my senses. I'd been in his room before, but this was the first time I ever noticed the way he just seemed to fill the air itself and I knew I was in love with him.
"I tried calling you," I said, sitting down on the small wooden chair at his desk, turning it so I could face the boy.
"I know." He looked nice, with his blonde hair brushed and tied back in a simple ponytail. His blue eyes were clear and I guessed that I hadn't woken him up at least.
"I left messages."
"I know," he nodded, but didn't offer any explanation.
"Why are you so mad at me?" I just had to ask. Some women, clever women, might have been able to talk around it, to draw out the answers without the anger to go with it. But I wasn't feeling especially clever.
"I'm not." William put on an innocent face. "I just…" he held up his hands, letting them flutter like little birds, "…I need some time to think, that's all."
"I've been thinking too…" I started, but now William had decided to talk and he cut me off, as if he hadn't heard me.
"I'm graduating in a few months. I talked to my dad and he wants me to come home. I can get my teaching certificate and they need teachers."
"William, I…"
"So I don't think we should, uh…" He frowned. He'd been looking at me, but now he looked down at his fingers, picking at his long thumbnail nervously. "I don't want to get too close to you."
"No. William, please…" I wasn't sure what he was telling me, but I didn't like it.
"It'll just make it harder to say goodbye later." He looked up then, his eyes soft, like he was ready to cry, even wanted to cry, but wouldn't. Not while I sat there with him.
"Are you breaking up with me?" I forgot what I was going to say for a moment while my mind finally caught up with William's words.
"I…Yeah, I'm…" William did cry then, just one tear and he looked down again, "…I'm sorry, Jen."
"But you don't understand." I spread my arms, leaning forward. "I love you. I…"
"No." He shook his head. "Just…Just go, okay? It isn't going to work, Jen."
"William…" But he wasn't listening, he just got up and left the room, leaving the door wide open and I heard another door close. He'd gone into Donald's room, away from me.
I sat there, rubbing my forehead, feeling the pain way down deep in my stomach, like a knife being twisted. What wasn't going to work? Us? Is that what he meant? Or did he think I was just playing some game with him? It was confusing, leaving me with nothing but lonely doubts and fears. I loved him, hadn't William heard that? If I was a real woman I would have kicked open the door, picked him up in my arms, and made him understand.
But I didn't.
"You should go." Donald stood there, almost smiling, I thought, except he really cared about William, so he wasn't gloating too much.
"Yeah." I left, pausing for just a second outside the closed door to Donald's room, thinking I heard a soft sobbing sound, but I didn't even knock. I just left.
=-=-=-=-=-=
"Send him some flowers," Mary suggested, sitting on the couch and tossing a football in the air. She looked pretty hung over. Everyone else in the sorority house was still sleeping, so I guessed they'd had another typical Saturday night.
"He broke up with me," I said, repeating what I'd already told her. "I don't think flowers are gonna fix it."
"Ah fuck it," Mary shook her head. "Boys pull that shit all the time. Flowers and poetry, I'm tellin' ya, Jen. Find that Fiona chick, Nancy's pledge, she's a lit major. Knows all that fag poetry shit. Ask her for something."
"Poetry." I leaned back in my chair, stretching a little, watching that football go up and down. I should have known better than to ask a bra like Mary for advice.
"You're still bringin' him to the initiation on Wednesday, right?" Mary asked, as if she hadn't heard a word I'd said.
"He broke up with me," I sighed.
"Oh yeah," Mary shrugged. "Could still bring him though. He's pretty fuckin' hot." She grinned. "Not a cheerleader or nothin', but I remember that time I went into the library…"
"You went into the library once?" I gave her a sarcastic look.
"What? I had to take a dump."
"Never mind."
"Nice fuckin' bathroom too."
"And then what?" I asked, not that it really mattered anymore. "Not the bathroom…I bring William on Wednesday and what happens?"
Mary shrugged. "You get initiated."
"Duh!" I put a stupid look on my face. "I mean, what happens?"
"We all bang the virgin!" Sarah said, walking into the room, scratching her ass and laughing. "We pull another train on the bimbo and put his picture in the Hall of Shame. We got anymore beer?" Sarah kept walking towards the kitchen.
I stared at the woman with my mouth hanging open.
"Ah, she's fuckin with ya, girl," Mary laughed. "Your Willie's gonna be safe as a baby in a crib."
I didn't know who was fucking with me. I wanted to believe Mary, but the truth was that Sarah had voiced my deepest fears and I'd been imagining all sorts of scenarios, mostly involving my sorority sisters holding William down and taking his virginity while I watched. It wasn't exactly a favorite fantasy of mine, as you can imagine, and try as I might I couldn't keep the images out of my head. They'd been plaguing me for nearly two weeks.
It was a trust issue, like my mom had told me. I just couldn't bring myself to trust the members enough to try and convince William to come with me. I didn't really think they'd rape him, none of the girls in the sorority struck me as evil, or even particularly mean. They weren't bullies or anything, just a bunch of girls away from home for the first time, going to school and having some fun. So my real fear wasn't so much William being physically hurt as much as emotionally, and if he was breaking up with now, while he still liked me, what would happen if he hated me?
Ding-Dong…The doorbell rang. I didn't even know the house had a doorbell and I looked around in momentary confusion.
"What the fuck?" Mary dropped her football and it bounced off the cluttered coffee table, spilling a bowl of stale chips and scattering three empty beer bottles.
"Who's ringing the damn doorbell?" Sarah yelled from the kitchen.
"Go check it, pledge." Mary looked at me. "If it's the cops I ain't here." She grabbed her football and went quickly up the stairs, pulling the electric number machine off the wall as she passed it. It was reading seventeen.
Ding-Dong…The doorbell sounded again and I got up to answer the door. So far as I knew, anyone who came to the Kappa Beta House just walked right in.
"Hi…Do you want to buy some Boy Scout cookies?" There were two of them, boys about sixteen-years-old maybe, dressed up prettily in their little green uniforms. They were holding a couple cardboard cartons that had the Boy Scout logo printed on them.
"I'm Todd and this is George. We're with Troop 69 and we're selling cookies to raise money for Camp Adventure!" the taller one said, as if reciting from memory.
"Oh, uh…" I stood there.
"Just three dollars a box and we got peanut butter, chocolate mint, and butter cookies…" the shorter one explained with a sweet smile.
I glanced over my shoulder. "I don't think…"
"Camp Adventure is a week long scouting trip where boys from all over the country meet for…"
"We'll do anything to sell some cookies." The shorter boy talked over his friend, smiling shyly and batting his eyes at me. "Anything at all."
"…there's activities too. Like canoeing and horseback riding and arts and crafts…" the tall one just kept talking.
I swallowed hard, wondering if I'd heard the boy right. They were seriously pretty, especially the short one. He had reddish hair and freckles scattered across his pert nose, with dimples when he smiled. The taller one had long black hair beneath his beret, cascading around his shoulders, and nice legs which his short pleated skirt and knee-high green socks did nothing to hide.
"Wha…What do you mean?" I asked, not really believing this could be happening. This was like something straight off the internet, one of those bad porn stories where every boy is a nymphomaniac and every girl has a three inch clit.
"If you buy a box, I'll let you kiss me," the redhead promised, smiling as he brazenly stared into my eyes.
"…at night all the boys will gather under the stars to roast marshmallows and sing camp songs together…"
"What if I buy 3 boxes?" I asked, feeling a little brave suddenly.
"Ummm…I can show you my panties," the boy said, leaning closer and dropping his voice. "If you buy six boxes though…"
"Hey!" The two boys jerked at the sound of Sarah's voice and practically ran off the front porch. Her voice even made me jump.
"You little rugrats, get out of here! I told you what was gonna happen if I saw you two again!" Sarah yelled after them. "And don't come back!"
Sarah reached around me, slamming the door and I just looked at her, standing there in her underwear, drinking a beer.
"What was that all about?" I asked.
"Those two?" Sarah shook her head. "They say they'll get naked and do whatever you want if you buy their cookies."
"Uh…" I tried to see a downside to that.
"Soon as you buy some though, and they get the money in their hot little hands, they're running. They don't take off shit," Sarah grinned. "Took Diane for about thirty bucks last week, good thing she ain't here."
"Yeah," I nodded, wondering briefly how many boxes I might have bought.
"Don't trust anybody but your sisters," Sarah said with a serious nod. Then she slapped me on my back, "You want a beer?"
"Uh, yeah," I sighed. "I guess so."
I only had one and I decided I'd get home, do some studying maybe, or just more pining for William. I had to talk to him again. I just couldn't let him break up with me. We'd been together less than a year, true, but it had been a good time, a special time, and we'd both felt it, I was sure. It had just taken me awhile to figure it out, maybe too long as it was turning out, but I thought I could fix it. I just had to find the right words.
"Your dad called," Susan said as soon as I walked through the door.
She was watching a football game on television, the Vikings and the Packers. "Throw it…Throw it…Ahhh…Brit you dick!" Susan was a Packers fan and Brit Farve was her favorite player, but old Brittney was suckin' it looked like, as she ended up face down for a big loss.
"My dad?" I asked, but Susan was into the game. I picked up the phone, dialing home, filled with the irrational fear that I'd given my mom a heart attack or something.
"Hi, Dad? It's me…" I sat down at the kitchen table, "…is everything okay?"
"Hi, Jennifer. What? Oh yes, dear, everything's fine," he replied, but he sounded a little anxious.
"Where's Mom?"
"Oh, she went golfing," Dad said. "Um, Jennifer, this marriage thing…Your Mom and I, well…What did you mean by that?"
"I don't know, Dad," I sighed. "Mom was kind of pis…making me mad, or something."
"Well, she's worried about it, Jen, and so am I." He paused. "What's wrong, dear?"
"Uhhh…It's sort of complicated, Dad." I'd never had any secrets from my father, but talking about boyfriends with him wasn't usually the best idea.
I mean, he was a boy too, so he could be a little picky about whom I went out with. My mom, being a woman, had only one criterion in a boyfriend: He had to be pretty. The prettier the better, like my dad, I supposed, who'd probably started out as a trophy husband and grown into something more. I didn't like admitting that, but I knew my mom too well to ignore the facts. She'd often told me all about her old boyfriends in high school and college, how they'd been beautiful and given up their cherries in the backseat of my Grandma's car.
Not Dad though…I mean, he was gorgeous, yeah. A serious DILF when I'd been in high school. All my friends were hot for him, but Mom was especially proud that my Dad had been a virgin on their wedding night.
So Mom should have liked William, right? I mean, they hadn't met each other, but she'd like him general since William was pretty and a virgin, and I loved him. But Mom wanted me to bring him to my sorority initiation and hadn't sounded very concerned about what would happen to him there. So that only made sense if William wasn't going to be good enough for me to marry, which probably meant he wasn't going to be a virgin by the time our wedding rolled around, and Mom would only know that if…It gave me a headache trying to figure it out, especially since my Mom could have cleared it all up so easily.
"I know you and your mother have your differences, but I'm your father," Dad reminded me needlessly. "So you tell me what's going on, Jennifer." And that wasn't a request.
"Well, there's a boy, William, and I love him and I think he loves me…" I started telling my dad everything. I told him how William and I felt about each other, about joining the sorority and the upcoming initiation, about our disagreement and finally, about William breaking up with me.
"I see…" Dad said, and there was a knock at the door, but I ignored it as Susan got off the sofa, "…and you plan on marrying this boy?"
"I don't know, Dad." I shook my head, even though he couldn't see it. "I think so. I mean, I love him, I know that. But he's graduating this year and I still have such a long ways to go…"
"You should bring him home, during Christmas," he decided, "And visit his parents too. You have time, right? You could stay here a few days, and then go wherever he's from…"
"Uh, Dad, that's kind of down the road, isn't it?" I laughed. William had broken up with me and I was supposed to bring him home for the holidays? Sometimes my parents lived in the twilight zone or something.
"I know dear, but I'm just thinking, that's all. You have to plan ahead. Be practical."
"Well, the only practical thing right now is to get back together with him," I said. "Christmas can wait…Uh…hold on a sec, Dad."
"Anything, huh?" I heard Susan say with a happy grin and as I moved closer to the door I could see why. "Hey, these two cuties want us to buy some cookies…" Susan smiled at me and then stopped smiling as I slammed the door on the two Boy Scouts. "Hey! What'd you do that for? They're hot! If we buy ten boxes they'll…"
"Trust me, girl." I shook my head at Susan. "They won't…Dad?"
"Still here, Jennifer. Now listen, you have to make up with your mother."
"I know, I know…" I sighed, sitting back down and ignoring Susan's frowning look. "The only way I can do that though is to get into the sorority, Dad, and William is the only virgin I know." I blinked, not wanting him to think all the boys I knew were sluts. "I mean, I know other ones, but…"
"So, you just make up with him then. You want to do that anyway, right?" Dad sounded pretty confident about the whole thing. "You get back together and go through your initiation and then bring the boy home so we can meet him."
And how simple Dad made it all sound, like he hadn't heard a word I'd said.
"But William doesn't like the sorority and I don't know what they'll try and do to him at the initiation," I protested. "I mean, what if, well…" it was sorta hard talking to my dad about this stuff, but I plunged on, "…what if they try and do something? So he isn't a virgin anymore, you know?"
Like a good old fashioned sorority gang-bang, Dad? Which was what I was basically saying and I even blushed a little, cradling the phone to my reddening cheek.
"You worry too much, Jen, you always did," he told me. "William will be fine, believe me."
"Believe you?" I narrowed my eyes. "How do you know?"
"Well, who do you think was the virgin at your mother's initiation?" he laughed softly.
"What?" My head was spinning.
Dad was a virgin on their wedding night, or so Mom had always told me, and she'd never said a word about the initiation. She'd had plenty to say about her other boyfriends though, and so I'd thought that some other guy had been there. Not my dad!
"I was there, Jennifer. I was the one," he said seriously. "William will be perfectly fine, believe me. He'll even have some fun."
"But…But Mom said you were a virgin when you got married and…" I felt like I had no shame, asking my own dad if he'd been a virgin or not. I told myself I'd feel guilty later, embarrassed too, but for now I had to know.
"I was a virgin when we got married. Yes," he replied without a hint of embarrassment, but with something more like pride really. "And if your William wants to be a virgin on his wedding night, and I sincerely hope he does, going to the initiation won't change that. His virginity will be safe, okay?"
"So the girls in the sorority, they're not going to…" I swallowed hard.
"Have you been looking at that internet pornography?" My dad clucked his tongue. "I warned you about that stuff. It isn't healthy for a girl your age to be looking at pictures of…"
I watched the football game while my dad gave me the standard version of his anti-porn lecture. It ran about six minutes long and involved a lot of strange and dire predictions like growing hair on my breasts and my clitoris turning green and falling off if I rubbed it too much. The important thing was that I finally had an answer, sort of, nothing specific but I knew I could trust my dad. He wasn't going to lie about anything this important. Well, my dad never lied about anything, so far as I knew, and I imagined his weekly sessions in the confessional with Mother Havenger were pretty boring for the old Priestess.
"…so no more internet porn for you, young lady," he finished up. "Understand me?"
"Sure Dad," I promised, crossing my fingers. "Look, I'll let you go now, okay?"
"Okay, dear. Now remember, you talk to William about coming home. Don't worry about the cost, alright? We love you very much, we just want what's best for you. Both of us."
"Okay, Dad. I love you too," I nodded. "Tell Mom I'm sorry I got mad, alright? Bye Dad. I'll call you next weekend."
"Okay, bye-bye, Jen." Mom made a kissing sound and I hung up the phone.
All I needed now was a plan, a way to win William back. The more I'd explained what I'd been going through to my dad, the more my feelings for the boy had crystallized. It seemed like every day I'd grown more and more attached to him, even as we grew farther and farther apart. I had to change that. He'd been crying when I'd left him, hurting inside, and that meant he really loved me. I just had to figure out a way to use that, to find the words to convince William that it was okay to love me.
Maybe I really did need some poetry.