I look at Sam, his camera broadcasting my every move to all of America. I think of my mom’s prediction that I would fall into the underground world of sex and debauchery all the while embarrassing my whole family and disgracing their good name. I look at Jasmine’s hopeful face. “I’m coming,” I say, picking up the pace and rushing down the sidewalk so I can keep up with her.

THEN

“I can’t believe you went to a strip club!” Grant says that night on the phone.

“Why not?” I ask, settling into the huge tan chair near the phone. There’s a little camera perched on the table next to it, so that all our phone conversations will have both audio and video.

“I don’t know,” Grant says. “It just doesn’t seem like something you would normally do, you know?”

“Well, of course it’s not something I would normally do,” I say, sighing. I pull my legs up underneath me and curl up in the chair. “I mean, why would I?”

“I just mean it’s not something that it seems like you would do, ever. Like, even if the opportunity presented itself, you know?”

“Why do you say that?” I ask. “I’m not a prude.” I can go to a strip club if I want. I’m hip and open-minded. I don’t have to cringe at the sight of a naked girl. Besides, it wasn’t really that skanky in there. I mean, it could have been because it was during the day and there weren’t too many people there, but it seemed classy. Almost sexy.

Plus. It’s not like I’m a virgin or anything. Corey and I held out until the beginning of our senior year, when his parents went away for Labor Day. We had the whole house to ourselves, and it just kind of happened.

Actually, that’s not true. It was totally planned. Corey had been wanting to do it for a while, but I was scared. I always thought that I would wait, if not until I was married, then at least until I was, like, twenty or something. But Corey and I were in love, and we’d been together for a year, so it felt like the right thing to do. Corey wasn’t a virgin—he’d been with one other girl at his old school, which actually didn’t bother me. I knew he loved me, and I figured it would make it easier—at least one of us would know what they were doing.