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Which was what brought her to Quinn and Levi’s house later that day. She felt jittery and a little bit reluctant to reveal too much to her sister, but she and Quinn were close, and Quinn knew what it was like to get caught in Fia’s overprotective tractor beam.

She hadn’t liked it, and Rory had a feeling Quinn would take her side on this.

Not that she was going to have sex with Gideon. But she was maybe going to have sex. And looking at Gideon, and fixating on his thighs, had taught her that perhaps there were some things she maybe needed to get straight.

Not that she didn’t get sex, the mechanics of it and all.

It was just after her incident, she had been so embarrassed that she had avoided a lot of things that pertained to it.

“I was just about to make a sandwich,” said Quinn. “Do you want one?”

“Yeah,” she said. “I would love one. Thank you.”

“No problem.”

Quinn bustled for a second, and then turned, gripping the edge of the counter. “Does this have to do with Gideon?”

“How did you know?”

“Because, it was weird the way he showed up the other morning, and now I hear tell you’ve been over there every day since.”

“He’s helping me learn how to climb a rope.”

“He... What?” She looked at her with round confused eyes. “Is that a euphemism?”

“No, it’s not aeuphemism. But I do have a date on Friday, and it is entirely possible that I will need knowledge beyond the euphemistic re: sex.”

“Rory...”

“I went with you to the bar. When we were considering maybe finding a guy. And I didn’t say anything to Fia. And I think that you owe me a courtesy.”

Quin looked defeated by this truth. “What courtesy? The sex talk?”

“I assume you and Levi have sex.”

Quinn went scarlet. “Yeah. A lot. But I don’t know that I want to...”

“Please.I realize that I have ignored my own education. I went away to school, and some stuff happened, and I came back, because... Basically, I did try to kind of hook up with a guy and it blew up in my face, and I’ve never gotten over that. Because it just reminds me of all the other times in my life I haven’t been good enough. When I thought things were going to go a certain way and they didn’t, and I have to get over that. I’m moving to Boston. Who is going to want to have sex with a twenty-seven-year-old virgin? I ask you. I am on the shelf by any definition. I am a spinster. I am going to have to tell people that I’ve been a nun up until this point to make them think that at least I had a good reason. I wish I did. I wish I had a purity ring. Something that I could tell people that makes it sound like this was a choice and not an accident of my awkwardness.”

“Oh, Rory,” said Quinn. “I don’t... What do you need to know?”

“How bad does it hurt the first time?”

Quinn winced. “I mean, that depends.”

“On what?”

Quinn looked left, then right. “Dimensions.”

Rory blinked. “Like...a multiverse?”

“Not those dimensions. Physical dimensions.”

“Oh. Well. How big is—”

Quinn held up a hand, palm out. “No. One day I will be drunk enough to have that conversation, but I’m not drunk at all, and I am not telling you that.”

“Are we talking mini cucumber, eggplant...”