Slam by Nick Hornby Read Free Book Online

believed what, but it didn’t matter really.
    We slept together for the first time that night.
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    â€œHave you got anything?” she said, when it was obvious that we might need something.
    â€œNo. Of course not.”
    â€œWhy ‘of course not’?”
    â€œBecause…I thought we were going to the cinema.”
    â€œAnd you don’t carry anything around with you? Just in case?”
    I just shook my head. I knew blokes at school who did that, but they were just showing off, most of them. They did it to look flash. There was this one kid, Robbie Brady, who must have shown me the same Durex box fifteen times. And I’m like, Yeah, well, anyone can buy them. Buying them isn’t a big deal. But I never said anything. I’d always thought that if I needed anything, I’d know well in advance, because that’s the way I am. I never go out thinking, Tonight I’m going to shag someone I don’t know, so I’d better take a condom with me. I’d always hoped it would all be a bit more planned than that. I’d always hoped that we might have talked about it beforehand, so that when it happened we were both prepared for it, and it would be relaxed, and special. I never liked the sound of the stories I heard from kids at school. They were always pleased with themselves, but it never sounded like the sort of sex you read about, or saw in porn movies. It was always quick, and sometimes they were outside, and sometimes there were other people nearby. I knew I’d rather not bother than do it like that.
    â€œOh, you’re a nice boy,” said Alicia. “My last boyfriend, he always carried a condom around.”
    You see? That was exactly what I meant. He always carried one around, and he never got to use it, because Alicia didn’t like the way he was trying to put pressure on her. Sometimes condoms really really stop you from making babies. If you’re the sort of kid that always has one on you, then no one wants to sleep with you anyway. At least I was with someone who wanted to have sex with me. Did that make me any better off, though? Alicia’s ex didn’t have sex with her because he always carried a condom around; I wasn’t going to have sex with her because I didn’t. At least she wanted to have sex with me, though. So on the whole I was glad I was me. Which was probably just as well.
    â€œI’m going to go and steal one,” said Alicia.
    â€œWhere from?”
    â€œMy parents’ bedroom.”
    She stood up, and started to walk towards the door. She had a vest on, and her knickers, and if anyone saw her, they wouldn’t need to be an incredible genius to work out what had been going on in her room.
    â€œYou’re going to get me killed,” I said.
    â€œOh, don’t be so soppy,” she said, but she didn’t explain why a fear of being killed was soppy. To me, it was just common sense.
    So I had probably two minutes on my own in her bedroom, lying on her bed, and I spent it trying to remember how we’d got from there to here. The truth was, there wasn’t much to it. We came in, said hello to her mum and dad, went upstairs, and that was it, pretty much. We never talked about it. We just did what we wanted to do. I was pretty sure, though, that she wanted to go all the way because of her ex. It wasn’t much to do with me. I mean, I don’t think she’d have wanted to do it if she hated me. But when she’d said to me at the party that she might change her mind, I could see now that she wanted to get him back for something. It was like a joke on him. He kept asking her, and she kept saying no, and then he got pissed off and dumped her, and so she decided to sleep with the next person who came along, as long as he was half-decent. I had a bet with myself that if we did have sex that night, it wouldn’t stay a secret between us. She’d have to find some way of letting him know she