Page 72 of Sex Ed

‘Are you telling me to rewrite the ending?’

‘Sad poems are good, ones that transform the emotion hit you more in the feels, you know?’

He smiles and I look over at Yolanda who winks at me.

‘What is feels? Why am I hitting you there? Are they balls? Like the teabags?’ Iva asks, and the whole room descends into laughter.

With the lesson ended and baby yoga about to start in fifteen minutes, Yolanda helps me stack the chairs in this huge hall space, defined by the shine and scratches on its parquet floor. I had my first snog in here and the last birthday party before my dad died. I remember every little detail. We hired a man to do the disco who had a playlist of five different songs, jam tarts and dayglo orange crisps, the boys all kicking the balloons around like footballs. To this day, it may have been the best party I’ve ever had.

‘Yolanda, don’t do the tables – you’ll hurt your back,’ I tell her, trying to snatch one of the trestles from her wrinkled hands.

‘And you’ll scuff your nails,’ she informs me.

‘True but I can fix nails.’

Yolanda writes me memoirs, anecdotes about family, almost like she’s journalling everything before her mind and memory give up on her. They are poignant tributes to her mother, recipes, stories of her background that are joyful and steeped in colour, set in lands far away.

‘The girls and I were wondering about your friend and his nose. Is he OK? You know we still feel awful about that,’ she enquires.

‘Oh, Ed? Yeah, he’s fine. Not broken. We told everyone he fought off some well-hard muggers to make him look manly and tough.’

She laughs. ‘He seemed like a nice boy, you know? Does that have legs?’

I shake my head at her. ‘You know, men and women are allowed to be friends. That’s all he is.’

‘Whatever, I saw the grinding salsa stuff in the corner,’ she tells me, mimicking the moves.

‘Stop that,’ I say, pointing a finger at her. ‘He’s just… Ed.’ I shrug my shoulders.

She does a strange dance with her eyebrows which tells me she doesn’t believe me.

‘Oh, shush. Plus, he kind of has a girlfriend. He’s dating a teacher from our school so that puts the kibosh on that.’

Yolanda looks at me glumly, pouting. ‘I bet she’s not as great as you.’

‘Well, few are,’ I say, sticking my tongue out at her. ‘But this is good for Ed. He’s been a wallflower for so long, it’s time that someone saw him for all his kindness and loyalty. He’s such a good bloke. He can be so funny. He will be a great boyfriend and look after her and put her first and he deserves that, he deserves to be happy.’

Yolanda stops stacking chairs for a moment as I say this. ‘And you don’t deserve any of that?’

‘Yolanda, I deserve Harry Styles, but he’s just never available when I need him.’

She laughs and it rings around the walls of this place. ‘What I’m saying is, you deserve to be happy, too, with someone like this Ed.’

‘I am happy,’ I argue.

‘I hope so, lovely girl.’ She comes over to give me a hug. ‘That was all your mother ever wanted.’

A lump grows in my throat to hear the words. ‘You’re such a bitch for trying to make me cry,’ I say, wiping my face with my sleeve.

‘Your best bitch though, right?’

‘Always.’

ED

Not that I’ve not planned this to the hilt, but tomorrow might be the day I have sex with Caitlin and the anticipation of the event has made me slightly nauseated. This isn’t good. I can’t be so nervous that I throw up. There’s no coming back from that. What if the nerves affect my erection? What if I faint? I did that once at a school public speaking competition. It was a hot day and I fainted and someone had to get out some smelling salts, and slap me lightly.

The plan is Caitlin’s going to come over here for a light dinner, nothing too carb heavy, a nice Chablis will be involved and then, hopefully, things will progress to a point where we will end up in the bedroom, which I’ve just cleaned vigorously, opening up the windows to let some of this fresher spring air into the flat. I’ve got new sheets waiting to go on, my pants have been freshly laundered, candles are waiting to be lit. However, Mia has told me things might also start in the living room, so I’ve also vacuumed the sofa and Febrezed the curtains. Why have I done that to my curtains? She won’t notice my bloody curtains.

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