Around Simfield - Part 3
Sally Mamuyac liked to believe she was normal.
Of course, normal was all relative, and there was probably a limit on how normal you could be when your mother was half-alien. But she worried about the effect her home life had on her too, and so she tried to keep her general judgment separate from her family’s… oddities. As such, she was considered a prude by the rest of her family, just because the idea of being in a three-way or open relationship was not her personal cup of tea.
Well, she might not have been able to tell whether she was a ‘prude’ or her family’s behaviour was just as weird and embarrassing as she perceived it sometimes, but even she thought this was ridiculous. She was lying on her boyfriend’s bed, in her boyfriend’s bedroom, with the door shut, and even with all the adults out of the house, and what were they doing?
“So I thought if we placed the title in the top middle, and then had the paragraphs going down and then across the poster… we should probably break up the text with pictures, but you want to get the ratio of text to images right - too much text and it’s too boring and professional, too many pictures and it’s unprofessional and patronising…”
They were actually working on the homework project. On a Friday night. And never let it be said that Sally wasn’t interested in school or homework; she had definitely inherited her grandfather’s love of knowledge - both by nature and nurture - but they had all weekend! And they were alone. In his bedroom.
She supposed she was lucky; if Jerry were to act anything like Robin’s un-official boyfriend Elliot Harris, she would be kicking him to the curb, even in his own house. But a girl had needs, and her desire for knowledge did not stop at the curriculum, oh no. It was nice that she wasn’t being pressured into things, but part of the flattery was supposed to be that they were managing to hold themselves back out of respect, not that the thought hadn’t even crossed their mind. A girl could get a complex about that.
“So what do you think?” Jerry suddenly asked her, and she had no idea what he’d been saying.
“Yeah, that sounds great.”
He smiled contentedly, eyes roaming across their half-finished poster from behind his glasses. He was cute and he was clever, but he could be very dim.
“Jerry?”
“Mmm?”
“We are dating, aren’t we?”
He looked up at her blankly. “Er, yes. I thought so?”
“That’s what I thought too,” she sighed.
“Why? What’s the matter?” his oblivious but obvious concern was both heart-wrenching and frustrating.
“Is this really all you want to be doing?”
He looked down at the poster and then back at her, eyebrows drawing together, perplexed. “Well… it’s important.”
“Is it? It doesn’t count towards our final grade, and we have plenty of time.”
“But…” he started, eyes roaming the poster again before looking up at her. “Well, what do you want to do?”
She sighed again. This would be so much easier if she was either of her sisters. Rose would probably just take her top off, and Robin probably wouldn’t even have bothered with that; just jump on the guy and take control yourself if he won’t. But Sally was not either of her sisters in any way. Maybe she could have a word with Jerry’s cousin Amy to push him in the right direction…
“… Couple stuff.”
He blinked. “You want to go out to dinner or something?”
No, you idiot, I want you to kiss me and hold me as if you’ve never wanted anything so much in your life. Curse your parents for bringing you up so well. “That’s too much hassle at this time - there must be stuff we can do here.”
“I’m sure Amy or my aunt will have romantic movies on DVDs around here…”
Arrrrgh. “Do you find me attractive?” she finally blurted out.
He blinked at her again and frowned slightly. “You’re beautiful.” His truthfulness was written all over his face.
Don’t go melting over that - you have a point to make! She cleared her throat and tried to force the growing smile away. “But you don’t want to… do things with me.”
“Yes I do - I chose you for my project partner.”
“Yes but, Jerry, normally when boyfriends and girlfriends work on things together they don’t do that much actual work! Especially on a Friday night when their parents are out of the house!”
“So what do you want to do?”
“I want you to kiss me!”
“Oh. Well I can do that.”
“But you don’t want to!”
He frowned again. “I never said I didn’t want to, it just didn’t cross my mind.”
“We are alone, and I am lying on your bed with you, and it doesn’t cross your mind to so much as kiss me? Does that kind of stuff ever cross your mind?”
“Yes,” he said defensively. “I mean, the sex-ed lessons alone-”
“And is it ever about me?” she asked quietly.
“Well… I don’t know,” he shrugged helplessly, “… I guess I… just don’t really think about you that way.”
She let out a long breath and smiled wryly down at the bed at the end of it.
“But, I mean, it’s not you personally, I don’t think about that kind of stuff half as much as-”
She shook her head. “No Jerry, it’s fine. If you don’t, you don’t. I just wish I knew before.”
“I don’t know… this is the first relationship I’ve ever been in. And you’re a girl and were always such a good friend when we were kids…”
“But that doesn’t make us compatible for a proper relationship,” she sighed. “It’s okay. But maybe we should both try and find people who we can’t help but want to tear the clothes off of.”
Jerry stared at her.
“Sorry, that’s my family’s influence rubbing off on me. There doesn’t have to be any tearing off of clothing if people don’t want.”
“Oh, okay. Are we- We are still friends though, right?” he may not have been her boyfriend any more, but that innocent concerned look was never going to stop being adorable and melting her heart.
“Obviously,” she smiled. “So, anyway, if we want to get an A+ on this poster, what I think we ought to do is…”
[Pictures for the helping of imagination:
Sally's the girl on the left, with her sisters: Robin in the middle, and Rose on the right.
And this is Jerry Jayapalan *tries not to heart him*]