A Bad Boy Can Be Good for a Girl by Tanya Lee Stone Page B

slow things down,” he says.
    But I know he doesn’t mean it.
Nobody ever
means
that.
A coward’s way out.
    I can’t remember ever being this kind of seething mad
in my life.
Like I could smash him right in his
golden-boy face.
    â€œYou’re a chickenshit coward,
you know that!” I yell.
    â€œYou push and you push, and tell me how beautiful I am, and how special, and how much you want me, and I finally serve myself to you on a goddamn silver platter, and now you tell me you didn’t really want to get serious and that we should slow things down!
    â€œGod, you make me sick. My first time should have
been so great,
it shouldn’t have been, it shouldn’t have been . . .
Oh, get the hell away from me,
you make me sick.”
    I am sobbing.
    He just sits there.
    I wish I could stop crying long enough
to quote some kick-ass lyrics.
Like Ani DiFranco. I hear her snarl in my head.
“Someday you might find you’re starving,
and eating all of the words you said.”
    But I can’t get the words out between sobs.
    â€œI’m sorry, Vi—
I mean, Aviva. I’m sorry.”
    â€œJust go away.
God, just go away.”
    I sit there, my nose and eyes running, big wet spots seeping onto my sleeves. I sit there with my face in my hands until I’m absolutely sure he’s gone.
    I don’t ever want to see his face again.
    What a coward.
What did I ever see in him?

THE MESSENGER
    As if I’m not low enough,
Kristen comes up to me
in the caf.
I didn’t go near the Jock table today.
Found a different crowd.
Still, she finds me.
    â€œCan we talk?” she asks.
“What about?”
“C’mon, Viv, you know what about, I’m trying to help.”
    She sits down in unfamiliar territory. She doesn’t care.
She has this air of entitlement about her.
Queen Bee can sit anywhere she wants
without worrying about disturbing the little people.
    â€œHe feels really bad, you know,” she says.
“Yeah, I’m sure he does.”
“No really, he didn’t mean to hurt you.”
    â€œKristen, do you really think I’m that stupid? Of
course he meant to hurt me. If he knew everything
would be over as soon as we slept together, then he
had to know that would hurt me.”
    â€œBoys like that don’t think that way,” she says.
    â€œWhy, are
they

that stupid?”
    â€œWell, yeah, about stuff like this. They just don’t
think that far ahead,” she says.
    â€œIs that your way of defending him?
You want to be
next?”
A light dawns.
    â€œOh, you do, don’t you? Well, don’t let me stop you.
He’s all yours,
just watch your back—and your heart,” I say.
    â€œNow could you
please
leave and let me eat my lunch
in peace.”
    â€œI tried,” Kristen says, shrugs her shoulders, as
Little Miss Perfect walks back to jock-land.
    Oh
puh-leeze
, are we all so stupid? So blinded by a guy who tells us everything we want to hear? Slobbers all over us?
    You
know
she’s next.
    He shoots me a sheepish look.
Coward boy needs a messenger girl.
Bad boy feels bad.
Too bad.
Too damn bad!
    I’m such an idiot. And I’m so pissed at myself
because when I get older
and look back on my first time,
I was really hoping it would be a nice memory.
    Too bad for me, too.

JOSIE
    I’m still sitting in the caf,
not really sure what to do next,
when I notice this girl standing next to my table,
quietly waiting for me to notice her.
    â€œCan I help you?” I say.
“No, but I’m hoping I can help you,” she says.
    â€œWhat do you mean?”
“I’m Josie, I went out with him too.”
    â€œOh.”
“I think you should check out
Forever
at the library,”
she says.
    â€œForever?”
“Yeah, you know, the book by Judy Blume.”
    â€œWhy?”
“Because it wasn’t your fault,” she says.
    I try to say “I know that,”
but I’m choking