Absolute Beginners (Absolute #1) by S.J. Hooks Page B

me to stay longer? Once again, she’d pleasured me without getting anything in return, so did that mean that she’d like to have sex now, like last time? I was in completely over my head.
    At least I didn’t pass out on her again
.
    “Here you go,” she said, handing me a strange-looking bottle.
    “Um, what is it?” I asked.
    “A microbrew. You’ll like it,” she said with more confidence than I felt by looking at it. “It’s beer.”
    I took a sip and found that I did actually like it a lot. I gave her a smile.
    “Told you,” she said smugly. “I think I know what you like.”
    “Evidently,” I said, feeling my cheeks flush when my eyes darted to the spot where she’d been on her knees only minutes earlier. “You must be a mind reader.”
    She snorted and flopped down on the bed. “It doesn’t take a mind reader to figure out that you like beer and blowjobs, Stephen. I’m pretty sure that just proves you have a Y chromosome.”
    “Oh,” I said, feeling embarrassed again. She was so comfortable talking about sex and I’d never encountered such brazenness in a woman before. The only people I discussed such matters with were Richard, when I’d gotten the standard speech at age fourteen, and my brother, when he regaled me with stories of his many conquests, although I repeatedly told him that I wasn’t interested in hearing them.
    “Do you like doing it?” I blurted out.
    “Blowing you?” She grinned. “Sure, what’s not to like?”
    “Please don’t call it that,” I groaned, closing my eyes. She made the whole thing sound so sordid and carnal, which it obviously was, but I didn’t like to think of it in those terms. I opened my eyes again. She looked like a sweet, innocent girl with her pristine white robe and loose wavy hair, but she talked like an adult film actress. She was completely unashamed about sex, unlike me, who’d always kept it under the covers where I’d always believed it belonged.
    “There’s nothing wrong with calling things by their right names, you know?” she said.
    “I know,” I muttered, taking another sip of my beer.
    “Say ‘blowjob,’ ” she said, raising her chin slightly.
    “What? No!”
    “Pleeease?” she pouted.
    “No.” I couldn’t help but smile, though.
    “Come on, it’s just one little word. We’ll call it your vocabulary lesson for the day,” she coaxed.
    “No, I am
not
saying that,” I said, laughing. “And I think that’s two words, actually, but I’d have to consult a dictionary to make sure.”
    “Fine. What do
you
call it, then?” she asked, rolling over onto her stomach, crossing her ankles in the air.
    “I don’t call it anything.”
    “So, imagine that you meet a friend and tell him that you got laid. Finish this sentence.” She lowered her voice to sound like a man. “Hey, bro, I scored with this chick last night and she totally gave me a…”
    She looked at me expectantly, and I laughed again because she sounded just like Matt.
    “What?” she asked.
    “You sound just like my st—my brother,” I said. “But I would never say something like that.”
    “Why not?”
    “Well, that would be completely ungentlemanly of me, and since no one has ever done that to me besides you…you see where I’m going with this?”
    “You haven’t had a lot of sex,” she concluded.
    Understatement
.
    “No,” I admitted sheepishly.
    “I don’t get it,” she said. “Are you just really choosy with your partners?” She seemed genuinely puzzled by my lack of experience.
    “Not really. I-I guess a lot of women just didn’t choose
me
.”
    “Hmm,” she said, cocking her head to the side.
    Now she thinks I’m a complete loser
.
    “Well, screw them! Their loss is my incredible gain.”
    “I’m hardly a prize,” I said.
    “Please,” she scoffed, reaching for her beer. “You’re good-looking, fun to be around, and great in the sack.”
    I didn’t know which of her compliments shocked me the most: good-looking, fun,