The silence in the sitting room was unbelievable. I’m in real trouble now. Daddys face is like thunder and even my brothers and sisters are not laughing which is strange for them coz they are always laughing at me. What was wrong with what I said? All I seem to do is stumble from one crisis to another. No sooner do I come to terms with something terrible happening to me and I learn to live with it than I’m told I have an even bigger problem. Don’t know what I’m going to do now.
It’s not even my fault, it all started because my stupid sisters Bernie and Gina and their friends want me to kiss a boy and not any boy, No! The ugliest one they could find for me. Why would I want to kiss an ugly boy, yes I’m desperate for a boyfriend and I know I’ve said I’ll do anything but I didn’t mean it and I’m especially not desperate enough to kiss an ugly boy. You think my sisters would understand, although their taste in boyfriends is not exactly the best but for them to laugh at me and tell me I’m going to die a virgin because I won’t kiss an ugly boy, well that’s downright horrible. I don’t even know what they mean when they say I’m gonna die a virgin, what’s a virgin for goodness sake? But when I ask them they split themselves laughing.
I asked Mammy what a virgin was and after she finished throwing a hairbrush at me and blessing her forehead repeatedly she told me it’s the statue of Our Lady that we have in the garden. How is a statue a virgin if it’s a statue, makes no sense but I don’t want to be a statue coz the one in the garden gives me the creeps, no matter what end of the garden I play in I swear she’s watching me, I told daddy that she watches me really creepily and he said I have to tell the priest in confession the terrible things I said coz apparently Our Lady is our mother. How could our lady be our mother sure Mammy is our mother and there is no way I’m going in to tell the priest? I’m tortured enough with nuns and holy statues and hail Marys chasing me in my nightmares without priests joining them and I’m starting to think there is a conspiracy against me involving them coz once my sister Gina told me I was adopted. When I’d finished crying I still didn’t believe her but she said how I couldn’t possibly be Mammy and Daddy’s child with a name like Valerie. It kinda makes sense coz all my brothers and sisters were named after saints in heaven (Bernie appeared to loads of children and Regina did stuff like wash the Lords feet) and I have never heard of a saint called Valerie.
Anyway I’ve come to terms with being adopted but if I find out my real mother is a statue in the top of my garden whose name is virgin then someone is going to suffer for it.
It was time to take a deep breath and ask Daddy. I can’t take much more of the laughter, every time I pass one of my brothers or sisters or one of their stupid friends they giggle and shout silly virgin after me, maybe if Daddy tells what being a virgin means then I’ll be able to help the statue at the top of the garden, I’ve tried talking to her just in case she is my mother and at least I won’t feel so bad for saying she gives me the creeps but it doesn’t make any difference she still gives me shivers.
“Daddy, can I ask you a question?” my voice was trembling so much I thought I was going to take a heart attack, asking Daddy questions always gets me punished, my brothers and sisters don’t suffer the same fate but that’s coz they said they ask normal questions but how can asking Daddy what a virgin is so I don’t become a statue not a normal question?
“What is it, and hurry up coz the news is on in a minute? “Oh I hate interrupting Daddy when one of his programmes is on, it makes him mad. OK one more deep breath. “Daddy, what’s a virgin and how do I stop being one?” Oh Oh, Daddy’s face is gone a very funny colour. “What’s wrong with you child?” his voice began to get louder and louder, “Where did you hear that word from?” his spluttering slowed down long enough to hear my sisters howl with laughter. Something in the way they laughed told me I was done for. ! “I I I...” words failed me and I hung my head towards the floor. I was surely the child of the statue in the garden and now Daddy knew I knew it meant he might not want to be my Daddy any more. “Get up to your room and let me hear the news” he turned away to the television and left me hoping no punishment would follow later.
A completely sleepness night followed and dragging myself out of bed to get ready for school I was a little more content. All I had to do this morning was avoid Daddy then when I got to school I could look up the word virgin in the dictionary and I’d know that way. I don’t know why I didn’t think of the dictionary before; I could have saved myself a lot of grief.
Daddy avoided, I ran in the school gates and straight to my classroom and grabbed the dictionary. Virgin, Virgin, ah there it is and it has a few meanings
| 1. | a person, esp. a woman, who has never had sexual intercourse |
| 2. | an unmarried woman who has taken a religious vow of chastity in order to dedicate herself totally to God |
| 3. | any female animal that has never mated |
| 4. | a female insect that produces offspring by parthenogenesis |
| 5. | a person who is new to or inexperienced in a specified field: a political virgin |
Ah no; none of it makes any sense. I’ve never heard of sexual intercourse, it sounds like one of those famous mazes we read about in school. I don’t understand the word chastity and anyway I’m not dedicating myself to God coz the nuns and the hail Marys are belonging to him. A female animal doesn’t refer to me which is just as well coz I don’t know what mated means. I’m not a female insect so it has to be number 5, someone who is new to a field, I go to new fields all the time on my adventures so that’s it, that’s what all the fuss was about, I’m a political virgin. Big deal!
Back home I waited for my sisters friends to arrive and I made my announcement. “You lot can laugh at me all you like, I’m happy being a political virgin so there “ I stormed out of the room amid peals of laughter and a few minutes later Gina and Bernie followed me out. “Why do you think that’s what virgin means” Gina asked. “I’m not stupid” I shouted at her “I thought it meant Our lady was my Mammy because of being adopted but it doesn’t so I looked it up in the dictionary and seeing as I’m not a female insect and I’ve never heard of sexual intercourse then I have to be a political virgin coz I go to new fields all the time, and I don’t care if I die that way coz I like fields”. Their laughter hit a new level “Ah Valerie, we’re sorry for laughing it’s just being a virgin does mean you have to have sexual intercourse, we should have told you”. “But I don’t know what that means; does it mean there is something wrong with me”? Tears were starting to fill my eyes now. “No” Bernie laughed again “There’s nothing wrong with you and there is nothing wrong with Our Lady being your Mammy, Sexual Intercourse is like snakes and ladders only for older people, someday you won’t be a virgin and then you’ll understand”.
That evening after Daddy came home from work I sat hiding from him in my bedroom trying to figure out the revelations that had hit my life, when Bernie came up to my room. “Daddy wants you in the sitting room so hurry up”. So he didn’t forget the punishment, I should have known. I could only hope he didn’t send me to live in the garden with my real mother.
“Valerie” Daddy seemed happy. “Everyone is discussing what they want for Christmas and you’re the only one who hasn’t said, so sit down and tell us what you want”. Oh wow there will be no punishment and I get to talk about presents. Could I dare ask, would this be my opportunity to show my sisters and their stupid friends that I could be all grown up and that I could stop being a virgin without their help? “Oh Daddy” I gushed with incredible happiness “I don’t want much, just a game”. “A game? Is that all?” Daddy smiled at me “Ok a game it is, what’s it called”.
“Oh thank you Daddy, thank you so much, it’s called sexual intercourse”.
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