tying up loose ends ☆ a jack harlow fanfiction

2014

DECEMBER 2012

During Christmas break of their freshman year,  Jack and Beth sat on her basement couch watching The Nightmare Before Christmas while their parents drank and talked upstairs. Jack's little brother Clay was watching with them too, but he had gotten up to go to the bathroom. The two teenagers sat in silence for a second before Jack finally spoke.

"Have you slept with anyone yet?"

He knew that they both knew the answer to this question, but he also knew what he was doing by asking. Beth's face turned red and she refused to make direct eye contact with him.

"No, I haven't even kissed anybody yet," she responded.

"Seriously?" Of course, Jack knew this information. He didn't know any boys other than himself who even bothered to look at Beth unless they were cheating off of her on a test.

"Yes Jack, seriously. Now can we please get back to the movie?" Beth reached to grab the remote but at the same time, Jack reached for her hand and placed it in his. For the first time in the conversation, she looked at him.

"It's okay. I wasn't making fun of you. I can be your first kiss, you know, to get it out of the way."

Beth wanted to protest but something about the look in his eyes and the feeling of his hand is hers  was so pure and genuine that she decided not to. She didn't know that there would ever be another time where she could have her first kiss with someone who cared about her as much as she knew Jack did, so she simply nodded. His hand released hers and moved to her cheek. Beth allowed herself to close her eyes as Jack's lips brushed against hers. The kiss was quick and subtle but it felt right; it felt like home.

MARCH 2014

In the spring of their sophomore year, just days after his sixteenth birthday, Jack asked Beth the same question once again.

"Have you slept with anyone yet?"

This time, they were in her bedroom working on an English project. Despite not usually associating with Beth in school, he liked being her partner for projects. She kept him on track. A lot had changed in their lives since that first kiss. Jack was taking his music more seriously and was planning to release a mixtape in the fall. Beth now focused all of her energy into preparing for the SAT and ACT with hopes of attending Yale. They had kissed several times over the past year and a half, each of them passionate but containing a certain innocence that made both of them certain that it wouldn't end in sex.

"No, have you?" In fact, Beth hadn't even kissed any guys other than Jack.

"No, no not yet I haven't."

"Really?" Beth asked, looking up from her laptop. This surprised her. When Jack kissed her for the first time, she wasn't naive enough to think she was the only girl he'd ever kissed. Hell, he'd been getting handjobs since seventh grade. She knew their sexual experiences were very different.

"Yeah, the chance just hasn't come up I guess."

Beth nodded and tried to return to her work, but found herself distracted. She couldn't believe that Jack was still a virgin. It felt as though, even if it was just for that moment, they existed on the same playing field. They were two virgins who cared about each other deeply. Beth believed that if she even blinked, Jack's virginity would be gone and they would no longer be the same. She would have yet another reason to feel inferior to him, to feel as though she wasn't good enough and that's why he refused to acknowledge her in public. Beth knew she could trust Jack. She had trusted him with her first kiss and this should be no different. But there was more to it than that. It gave her a certain feeling of superiority to know that she would be the first person he ever slept with. She could feel his eyes on her, so she closed her laptop and crawled over to where he was sitting, leaned up against her bed. Now he was the one blushing.

"What?," he asked with his typical half laugh.

Beth shrugged. "I mean both of us are virgins and we're two people who care about each other. Besides, my parents won't be home for another hour."

"You serious?"

She nodded with a giddy smile and Jack chuckled in response, connecting his lips to hers. Beth went to pull his shirt up over his head, but knocked his glasses off of his face in the process. The entire undressing process consisted of smiles of admiration and the joking laughs of two kids who had known each other since birth, and yet it couldn't have felt more intimate.

"I have a condom in my wallet," Jack offered, but Beth shook her head.

"Don't bother. My parents put me on the pill in middle school for my acne." 

With that, he pulled her body closer to his as they collapsed onto the bed.

The whole experience was slow and gentle. Beth could truly feel the way Jack cared about her, the way his hands carefully explored her body as he constantly looked at her for reassurance. Several times, he leaned down to kiss her forehead. When it was over, she felt her eyes fill up with tears. She wasn't particularly upset, but the emotional experience left her feeling changed and unsure of her feelings towards Jack. Beth didn't want him to see her cry. It felt so childish, so cliche. He opened his arm for her to lay on his chest, but instead she turned the opposite way.   

After collecting herself, she said "My parents are gonna be home soon, you should go."

Flustered, Jack nodded and got up from the bed, collecting his pile of clothes from the floor and putting them back on. He stood in her bedroom doorway for a moment, admiring her naked body laid out on the bed.

"You're beautiful Beth; I mean it."

She smiled. "Thanks Jack."

He turned to go and Beth got up from the bed. She had slept with Jack, and she knew that things between them would never be the same again. More concerning, she thought that she might love him.