Page 42 of Sex Ed

‘Well, I was sixteen. We were only told it looked like tadpoles. No one told me it looked like Spider-Man webbing. I freaked out and had to Google it.’ I like hearing Ed laugh, he doesn’t do this nearly enough. ‘So let me be your sex Google. Do you have any questions from Sunday? Was it as you expected?’ I ask him, intrigued.

Ed sits up and I see him visibly gulp. ‘So you touched yourself while I was putting the condom on. Why?’

‘Well, I didn’t want to freak you out with foreplay… But generally, you don’t want to put the turkey in before you’ve preheated the oven.’

‘That’s quite an analogy. So you preheated the oven yourself? Could I have offered you some lube?’ he asks earnestly.

‘Maybe…’

‘So how do I preheat the oven? I’m thinking I should know how to do this, yes?’

‘It’s a good skill to have in your back pocket. If you can make a girl come first from foreplay then that’s a big win, Eddie. Plus, if you’re worried about busting your nuts too soon then it can add time to the sesh.’

He looks into space, that look of fear, confusion and pure shock on his face. I have no curriculum to my sex education but if I can send a man into the world who knows how to give head, properly, and not like a drunk lizard then maybe I’m doing a good thing.

‘Ed, would you like me to teach you about foreplay?’

He nods.

ED

I don’t know why I came to Mia’s house, but it may have been the knowledge that she’d have alcohol and is good at dragging me out of my general feelings of despair. She’d make fun of me, make me watch crap telly and then tell me how it is, in her blunt inimitable style.The reason you’re fretting about sex is that you just don’t know all of it. It’s not just the willy going inside the vagina, there’s a lot more to it. We’ve literally just skimmed the surface. So let me teach you. Like a practical lab partner, I guess. Or maybe a Mr Miyagi-style sex guru. Knowing Mia, she’ll get me to clean her house though, saying it’s all endurance practice.

‘Are we sure this is OK?’ I ask her as I sit here in my pants on Mia’s scruffy bed. I’ve been in Mia’s room once before and it really is like walking into an art installation crossed with a haunted house ride at a funfair. You don’t quite know what’s going to spook you next, some old toast or a sex toy just lying out there for the world to see. Mia watches me as I try to get comfortable. It’s not good form to ask her when she last changed her sheets, is it? I brush my hands over her tiger-print duvet. ‘This is a nice print, where did you get these from?’

Mia stands there and takes off her crop top in front of me. Nipples again, staring at me. She pulls down her pyjama bottoms and reveals she’s not wearing any knickers either. I take a deep breath that I may never exhale. She comes to sit down next to me.

‘So, first things first… that is not foreplay, asking me about where I got my sheets. I got them from Habitat though…’

‘Fancy.’

‘Ed. Focus… So, foreplay can be verbal. You can talk to me about what you’re going to do to me or talk about the effect I’m having on you…’

‘You make me feel happy?’ I tell her.

She wrinkles up her nose. ‘Bit shit. I want to make you feel aroused, rock-hard, like I want you to feel feral with how much you want to nail me,’ she roars, her fists clenched.

‘Oh dear, really? Men have said that to you out loud?’

She grabs her phone from the bedside table and I watch as she opens Tinder, scrolling through a line of started conversations.

‘You speak to a lot of men,’ I say, peering over her bare shoulder.

‘Here – this is Scott, if that’s really his name. He has a lovely turn of phrase.’

I hold her phone and feel my mouth go dry. ‘He doesn’t even know you and he wants to do these things to you. That’s quite a thing… And it works?’

‘It’s more effective than the ones who ask me about my favourite colour.’

‘Noted. Can you screen grab that for me and send it to me for future reference?’ I ask her.

‘One step ahead of you,’ she says, pressing buttons and winking at me. She puts the phone down and turns to me. ‘Right, next steps… So, when you’re kissing and fooling about with a girl, that’s when you need to do the work and find those places on her body that make her toes curl. Kiss me…’

‘Now?’

‘Well, yeah…’

She puckers her lips up and I smile as I move towards her, putting a hand to the back of her head. She’s good at the kissing. I always thought she’d be more aggressive, that there would be more spit, but it’s gentle, warm, and I lean my body into hers, pulling her in closer. She double taps my thigh and I lean away.

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