Library Romance

Why do us guys not meet beautiful girls in the library, sweep them off their feet and whisk them off into a whirlwind romance more often? Because ultimately you'll be made to feel like a dirty sexual predator, that's why.

This sentiment, though perhaps a sweeping generalisation, was borne out of gruelling experience; an experience that was at first titillating and thrilling but was ultimately no more than a social experiment gone horribly wrong. The story begins with me sitting in the library weighing up the feasibility of studying Rochester’s entire body of work in a single day, with concentration at a premium. Letting my eyes sweep over the room I see the usual: guys on the BBC Sport webpage, girls watching episodes of ‘Gossip Girl’ or something equally as inane, the female warden who’s shaped like conjoined elephants, and I’m beginning to curse my decision to study in the halcyon anonymity of level four when I notice a Snow White look-alike studying law a few tables down from me. Her Chanel bag and designer clothes tell me that she is no common floozy to be won by scruffy scallywags like myself, so I content myself with lascivious day dreaming rather than planning a mode of attack. However, as I gorge upon her aesthetic finery I start to notice that she is returning my lustful gazes, which gets me thinking that this could only mean two things: a) I am the subject of a ‘stop staring at me you potential rapist, before I alert the library security’ glare, and was about to be set upon by library staff or b) We would be having rampant sex in the ornithology section of the library in approximately ten minutes. Neither was the case. Instead, the charade of studying opposite each other continued for a few days, turning every study session into fantasy-fuelled procrastination until she eventually beckoned me over and we exchanged awkward chat and mobile phone numbers. Score.

With round one of the courtship battle having been valiantly fought out in the library, round two inevitably took place via the frustratingly impersonal and linguistically vague proxy of the text message: the agony of receiving only one ‘x’ after a text and the unmitigated ecstasy of receiving three, because you always fall into the trap of assuming that there simply must be a direct correlation between the number of kisses you receive and how much the girl wants you naked in bed, sweating all over her.

Having successfully negotiated my way through this courtship minefield, and having grudgingly spent about £10 on what were for the most part dull and pointless text messages, I manage to secure myself a date in the west end. So, with a tumultuous stomach and clammy hands I trudge down Ashton Lane to await my library belle.

She turns up fifteen minutes late but I don’t mind because in my opinion what she lacks in punctuality she makes up for in abundant sex appeal. Either that or my vision has been clouded by a month’s loneliness and desperation, who knows. We get a seat at the bar and I only just withhold the urge to grimace when the barman asks for £8.00 for our two drinks: I’m drinking some gay cocktail because I get the impression she wants her guys to be slightly classier than a Tennents man. Things were going well until my suspicions about her were vindicated when within the first few minutes of small talk I uncover a social abyss between us that already seems insurmountable:

“So what is it your father does?” I ask, without any genuine interest, only hoping to avoid any lengthy awkward silences.

“Well, actually, he has a sort of business empire in Africa and the Middle East so that keeps him quite busy,” she replies with unnerving nonchalance, “but he’s quite boring really – we’re not that close.”

I ask her what she means by boring and somehow refrain from laughing when she answers thus: “Well he’d rather spend money on pointless things like going into space as a tourist than buying pretty things for me.”

As it turns out, her father is a multi-millionaire who is going to be one of the first commercial space tourists with Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic programme, at a cost of approximately £150,000. So why the hell did I shell out £8.00 for two measly drinks? Has this girl no idea how skint us students are supposed to be? Well, probably not now I think of it.

After she dropped this socio-economic bombshell we speedily uncovered a whole plethora of our diametrically opposed interests, forcing me to consider the possibility that ogling the nearest hot female in the library was not necessarily conducive to finding a perfect match. We then finished our first cocktails, which I presumed would signal a hasty end to our ill-fated liaison, when to my surprise she suggests that we go ‘watch a film’ back at hers. Now I can’t speak for everybody but that’s generally been understood that suggestion as a euphemism, so you might forgive me for thinking the evening had taken an unexpected turn. I grab my coat with unprecedented swiftness.

We arrive at a flat that’s opulence is alien to any sort of student lifestyle I’ve ever known and start watching an awful film, ‘Factory Girl’ I think, about Edie Sedgwick that’s designed to make her seem oh so cool and perhaps even impress me with her knowledge of all things chic. As I expected, the film is merely a guise for teenage style making out and before long she’s straddling me. Things are moving along rather smoothly and she appears to be leaning back, a signal of intent for floor-bound eroticism: well I’m game if you are, hen. As we writhe on the floor I start to undress her and my wandering hands are met with surprisingly little resistance: maybe she swells with sexual avarice after having endured a sheltered life, ruled by the domineering hand of her over-protective father and now plans to unleash the sexual fury that simmered underneath her well maintained façade of being ‘daddy’s little girl’? Again: score.

But oh! how I read the signs wrong. After five minutes of what seemed like a suitable precursor to the rampant sex I had envisioned in the library she sits up with a look of consternation across a face of newfound innocence. She explains that she is somewhat unversed in the ways of love, and in particular the kind of smutty love that I had hitherto supposed her to have been practically forcing upon me in a somewhat intimidating and empowered manner. In trying to explain that not all guys are sexual predators after only one thing I only succeed in digging myself a hole of momentous proportions without any means of clambering back out onto level ground until the inevitable happens: “I think you’d better leave.” Suits me to be fair, this is perhaps the most awkward situation I could have envisioned when I was apprehensively preparing for our first date. As it stands I feel like I’m in a Dr. Pepper advert.

The lonely walk home let me reflect on where the night went wrong and I can’t help feeling we were two entirely different types trying to fit into the mould of the other for the sake of a physical attraction. Maybe she felt she had to act sluttish to appeal to a working class ragamuffin like myself and found out that it really didn’t suit her, or was it my sex drive contorting every idle remark into an indicator of unbridled lust?

In any case, three ‘x’s didn’t mean ‘tie me up and fuck me rough’ after all; perhaps she did want to watch that piss-poor and horrifically inaccurate film; maybe she’s not a sex-starved nymph, burgeoning with untapped sexual energy. Such intimate personality characteristics cannot be discerned purely by covert glances in the library, so what was I to know? It just goes to show, don’t expect too much from a girl double-taking you in the library, she’ll only end up thinking you’re a sexual deviant. Oh, and also – the Lady and the Tramp story? Bollocks.

The Trials of the Sexual Health Clinic

I had always been a firm believer in the practice of simply cross referencing my current girlfriend’s clinic results with my own penis and sanguinely accepting that my sexual health was in good shape. This was proved to be unmitigated folly the dark, dark morning I found an unsolicited growth underneath my foreskin. The clinic had never managed to invade my to-do list due to a potent mixture of raw fear and pure apathy, but on that day I solemnly surmised that push had definitely become shove. On the bright side, the news I heard on the radio on the morning of destiny mentioned that some progress had been made regarding an AIDS vaccine and with this in mind I sauntered, quite unperturbed, toward my local clinic for the very first time.

“Why are you here; lumps, bumps, discharge?” asks the form when I get to the clinic. I gingerly note down “small lump on gland” and immediately receive the “I knew it” glance from the attending nurse. It dawns on me then that this whole affair is more likely to be painstakingly awkward than just a bit of banter. I’m asked to write down what name I would prefer to have called out for me and instantly a plethora of droll pseudonyms spring to mind: Sir Shagalot, Shagpuss and Donkey Dong to name a few. When Joseph Fritzel enters my thoughts I decide enough is enough and surrender my real name.

I wait and haughtily disassociate myself with the demographic of my lascivious peers, amusing myself by inwardly sneering at the tattoo’d hard-man whose shiftiness betrays that he is either struggling to endure the indignity of the whole waiting affair, or is currently having to rebuff the advances of his gonorrhoea flaring up. The choice of music adds to my mirth as Lou Bega’s Mambo Number 5 is followed by Metro Station’s Shake It. What next - Marvin Gaye, Shaggy? I also, predictably, notice a particularly attractive girl sitting opposite me but for the love of Christ this is not the time - or the place.

A young male nurse calls my name and I don’t know whether to be relieved or disappointed. We engage in the kind of small talk that’s only legitimate context is between a prostitute and a first time client. After the initial jousting, shit gets real and I’ll never forget the unbridled panic of simultaneously trying to answer his questions truthfully and not disgust him by my hitherto reckless behaviour. I failed on both accounts almost instantly I’m ashamed to admit.

The tests themselves were monumentally less painful and degrading than I had feared – apparently the dreaded ear bud down the urethra trick is long gone: a blood and urine sample combined with a physical once over on the old meat and two was sufficient. That didn’t stop the nurse idly chatting to me for a full three minutes after having examined me before telling me I could pull my trousers up. Being a good sport, and not one to cry rape, I casually took this as a compliment. Ultimately I had a small wart (which he benevolently froze off for me) but that was nothing too serious and quite common so I took his word for it and clapped myself on the back for being a brave little boy.

Next I had to casually exit the clinic with my composed and stern “I do not have AIDS” expression and await my results, which would take two weeks. The wait for results is painful, but nothing is as painful as the deliberately inserted dramatic pause the automated results service you phone taunts you with. It’s OK when Chris Tarrant does it, but when you’re waiting to find out if you have AIDS it’s a bit irresponsible I think.

All clear! Thank heavens! Now, let’s party.