Virgin Terri

Chapter 2: The Aftermath

Tasha found me in the band locker room.

Crying. Keening. Shoving an ice cream sandwich down my throat.

With a concerned gasp, Tasha dropped her backpack and fell to her knees, already wrapping her dark arms around me in a comforting embrace. I cried into her pink sweater, too emotional to speak just yet. That stupid twitter page had said I'd slept with Roy. Me! The girl who'd never been asked to a school dance, the girl who did her best to avoid even being looked at by guys. Now everybody was talking about me. Everybody was assuming things about me. I let out another wail.

"Terri," Tasha sighed, running a hand over my brown curls, "please, stop crying." My response; another cat-like moan. "Look, it's not that bad," Tasha tried, holding me out at arms' length to study my runny-nosed, teary-eyed face. "People have sex all the time here," Tasha explained. "Nobody's going to trip because you hooked up with Roy." My fists tightened -- I hardly noticed how I'd squished the ice cream sandwich in my left hand.

"I didn't hook up with Roy!" I hollered and then, because I knew no one would believe me, I started crying again. Pathetically. Like, I'm pretty sure I left a snot trail on Tasha's shirt. To her credit, the girl didn't say anything about that, just patted my back and continued whispering comforting words to me until I'd cried out all my tears. 

"...You ready to talk about it now?" Tasha asked. I sniffled.

"No." But I turned to face her. "I don't even know where this page got that idea from." 

"The Fourth of July was the day of Samuel Thompson's house party, right?" Tasha asked. I nodded. "Was that the day Roy and Cassidy got into that fight?" Again, I nodded. "And you went after him, right? Because when he'd stormed off, he'd stepped on Taylor's shoes?"

"Yeah..." I didn't like where Tasha was going. "I talked to him, figured out what his problem was, and told him to apologize. Which he did. No shenanigans, no hanky-panky. Roy was probably too plastered to even recognize me." 

"Yes, but you still were alone with him," Tasha pushed. "Maybe someone saw you guys, connected the wrong dots." Yeah, maybe. But why post it now? Something that'd happened so long ago? Besides, there weren't many people who'd seen me pull Roy aside. Aside from Tasha and Taylor, it'd just been Rachel. Maybe some of Roy's friends. Tasha seemed to know where my mind was going. "I can ask around," Tasha offered, "figure out who tipped off the confessions page." I smiled a little.

"Would you?"

"Of course, T, you're my girl." Tasha patted my face warmly. "Now get up. I know the brass instruments let their spit out here, and I doubt you want to be wallowing in saliva right now." She didn't have to tell me twice. In seconds, I was on my feet, staring at the floor in disgust. Tasha giggled at my reaction. "Of all places to hide, why here?"

"Band practices during this period," I muttered. "I knew no one would find me."

"No one but your fantastic best friend Tasha." She looped her arm in mine. "Let's go find Taylor and talk about this as a trio. Three heads are better than two." And Tasha led me out of the locker room, all brass, no fear. Tasha's braveness had always been something of wonder to me. She wasn't as rough-around-the-edges as Taylor, but she wasn't as meek as I was. Tasha had her own spicy energy burning around her, like she was a little walking sun.

Me, I felt more like a burnt out star. 

Especially once we'd entered a more populated part of the hallway, where eyes immediately careened towards me. I could tell in the way people's voices dipped, in the way their fingers jabbed in my general direction, that their conversations were now centering around the tweet about me and Roy. I felt myself shrinking into Tasha.