Love-shy Read Online Free Page A

uncomfortable talking to me, and judging by the obscene gestures they were always making with their clarinets, they were definitely not shy about expressing their alleged familiarity with the female anatomy. As everyone packed up their instruments, I pulled the yearbook out of my bag and drew big crosses in pink highlighter over the faces of Jamal, the bassoonist and the two clarinettists. Not even one yellow ‘maybe’. Still, each face I highlighted in pink was one face closer to PEZZ imist’s true identity.
    I had a free period after lunch, so I headed to the library to finish an article I was writing for the school paper about gender imbalance in our English syllabus. I picked a seat where I could also stake out the computer where I’d first discovered the love-shy website. Maybe PEZZ imist would come back.
    I scribbled a few sentences for my article in my notebook, then googled ‘love-shyness’ on my phone. I could write the gender imbalance article later.
    I wanted to know why love-shyness only applied to men. Didn’t women get love-shy too? The article explained that the effect of shyness was different for women, because society had determined ages ago that men had to be the proactive partner in relationships. Equal rights were swept aside when it came to dating. It was the guy who was expected to ask the girl out – and it was also the guy who was supposed to propose to the girl. So shy girls would still get asked out and proposed to, but shy guys wouldn’t.
    The article also claimed that relationships were more important to a man’s wellbeing than a woman’s. A study of male medical students showed that the ones who got married in their early twenties were happier and more successful than those who were single throughout university. Another study took married and unmarried men and women in their fifties, and found that the unmarried women were the happiest, and the unmarried men were the least happy. This was because women had nurturing, emotional relationships with their friends, and could have proper deep-and-meaningfuls with them while eating ice-cream, whereas men were rubbish at talking about their feelings.
    Fair enough, I supposed. Although I wondered where men like my dad fitted into this theory. He was sustaining an intimate, personal relationship with another man. Could gay boys be love-shy?
    â€˜I hope you’re working on the introductory speech for tomorrow night, Penny.’
    I glanced up to see Hugh Forward, my Year Ten co-captain and fellow debater, with a Biology textbook in one hand and a battered paperback of Walt Whitman poems in the other. He was automatically crossed off my love-shy list because at a cast party for the school play last year he’d tried to stick his tongue in my ear. I’d politely convinced him that this was not a good idea. With my knee. His eyes still watered a little whenever he looked at me, but that was a good thing, because it made him a total pushover when it came to drafting class policies or allocating budgetary resources for social events.
    â€˜What?’ I said, craning past him to see if anyone had sat down at the love-shy computer.
    â€˜Tomorrow night,’ he said. ‘The Debating semifinal. You didn’t forget, did you?’
    I laughed with just the right amount of scorn. ‘Don’t be ridiculous. It’s all under control.’ I was pretty sure I could walk in there totally unprepared and still debate the pants off everyone else.
    I expected Hugh to walk away, but annoyingly he didn’t. ‘What are you doing?’ he asked, trying to see the screen of my phone. I quickly turned it over.
    â€˜Writing an article for the Gazette ,’ I said. ‘Did you know that in Year Ten we only study one text written by a woman? And there are no female protagonists on the syllabus from Years Eight to Ten. I mean, what kind of message does that send to our students? Are women’s