Page 14 of A Very Snowed In New Year
Three Decembers Later
Being a twenty-two-year-old virgin hits different.
It’s poignant. I can’t decide if it gets easier or harder with each passing year. On the one hand, I have a lot more excuses for remaining virginal because I’m so busy going to classes, writing, studying, getting stuck in LA traffic, trying to find a parking spot at Trader Joe’s, doing the dishes and laundry, and waiting for my roommates to finish using the fancy hairstyling tools we all share.
On the other hand, I am surrounded by horny, drunk college guys a lot of the time.
Actually, that’s the same hand.
It turns out I don’t enjoy being around horny, drunk college guys—even the hot ones.
I’m still a hopeful romantic too, so I am now more determined than ever to hold out for the perfect guy and the perfect situation. Or at least I was until the day before I turned twenty-two in November. Like everyone else, I always become more aware of the passage of time right before my birthday and around New Year’s Eve.
I would just really love it if the perfect situation with the perfect guy could present itself before the end of this year because, to paraphrase the original theme song to my mom’s third-favorite TV show—the theme song you’ll only hear on the DVD set for the series, but not if you stream it, much to my mother’s dismay—I don’t want to wait for my life to be over; I want to know right now if boning is really as amazing as people say it is.
Until such time as I do find out for myself, I have writing of all kinds to keep me busy.
The phone in my hand dings with a text notification.
FUNNY COFFEE GUY:What?! Only one laughing face emoji for that one? That was worth three laughing face emojis or one ROTFL emoji at least.
Oh, Funny Coffee Guy. You aren’t as funny as you think you are. You must be really cute.
Before I even get a chance to shoot back a raised-eyebrow emoji, he sends another text.
FUNNY COFFEE GUY:Are you not entertained? Are you not entertained? Is that not why you’re here?!
Nice. AGladiatorreference. That’s one of my dad’s favorite movies. Good thing I’m here because Lainey would not have caught that.
“Hey, Lainey?!”
I can hear my roommate Lainey stomping down the hall in her stacked heels. “Yes, Poops?” My name still autocorrects to Poops. Even if it didn’t, this will never not be my unfortunate nickname. “Are you guys still texting? Do we like him?”
“He’s definitely nice. He’s not as funny as he thinks he is, but he just used a promising quote from a movie. Do you want me to continue treading water for you, or do you want to shift gears?”
“Bring it, Piper baby. Text hard or go home! Give him a brainy slut reply.”
I ready my thumbs. “Brainy slut who’s willing to receive an indecent photograph in response to her response? Or brainy slut who wants to engage in more banter before getting to the?—”
“The first one, obviously. I have to decide if I want to see him tonight.”
“Okie doke.” I type out a text on her phone. It’s a clever little spin on a different quote fromGladiator.
LAINEY:Will you not win the crowd? Give me something I’ve never seen before, Maximus…
I hand the phone back to its owner. She scrolls through the conversation I had with Funny Coffee Guy on her behalf while she was changing outfits. “I don’t understand any of this but thank you. Wait, is his dick named Maximus?! Wow. We got a flushed-face-emoji response. Here we go!” She crosses her fingers. It’s sort of heartening that she still gets so excited by penis pictures. “Come oooonnnn, Maximus!”
Lainey Nicholls is a very good friend who is really good at getting guys to buy her drinks, excellent at making out with them, and terrible at text banter or carrying on any kind of meaningful text conversation at all, really. I’ve been helping herflextwith guys since freshman year when we roomed together on campus. Now we live together in a three-bedroom apartment in Westwood, along with Tracy. I help Lainey sound brainy and sexy in text convos with her many suitors, and in exchange for this service, she makes sure I don’t—as she puts it—disappear up my own hopeless-romantic-wannabe-screenwriter asshole. She’s afraid that one day she’ll walk into my room to find a glittery puddle of virgin tears in front of a Final Draft document that just saysALL WORK AND NO SEX MAKES PIPER A DILDO HOARDERover and over again.
To be clear, Lainey is the one who keeps buying me sex toys. And IKEA storage solutions to hide them in. She also pays for all the Ubers and very often buys me dinner and reminds me to eat it when I’m lost in the second act of whatever rom-com script I’m writing, either for my screenwriting class or for fun. She can afford to do this because she has a trust fund.
I can afford to help her text guys because I am not too busy texting guys from my own phone. But that’s okay. I just haven’t met the right person to flext with yet. My thumbs are all warmed up for him when he’s ready.
I thought, for one night three years ago, that I had perhaps met my soulmate via email, but I haven’t heard fromfound your journalguy again.
Which is fine.
I also had this crazy secret fantasy for a while that maybe that guy who was emailing me was Holden Archer, because once he started doing more press forRiders of Storm and FireI learned that he has a sister who’s eleven years younger than him. And he would have started preproduction right around the time he saidhe had to leave town! But I kept that to myself. It’s what I call a Piper Dream. I had to let that one go.
