Lizzie Bennet Diaries one-shots

Truth

A game of Truth or Dare breaks something loose in Lydia she didn't even know she felt.

~~~

"Truth or dare, Kat?" Lydia asks, taking another sip of their bottle of wine.
She, Milo and Kat are sitting on the floor of Kat's dorm.
"Uuhh... truth?" Kat stretched her arms. "Too lazy to get up for a dare."
Damnit. Lydia was way better at thinking up exciting dares than a good question. Besides, all the good questions had already been asked. So, after a short pause, Lydia settled on the old classic: "Ever kissed a girl?"
"Sure!" Kat answered, "Couple of times."
Lydia knew deep down she maybe shouldn't, but she was too drunk to care. "Ever fucked a girl?"
Kat blushed. "Well... Not really..."
"Kat doesn't do fucking," Milo explained.
"What is wrong with you?!" Lydia asked laughing, "It's one of the best things in the world!"
Kat shot Milo a glance. "I, well- It's not that I don't do fucking, as Milo so eloquently puts it. It's that I never have, and don't really want to. At least, not right now. But not never either."
Lydia looked at her, genuinely confused. "Why would you not want to?"
"Ever heard of asexuality, Lydia?" Kat asked.
"No," Lydia answered.
"You know how sexuality is a spectrum? Like, you can fall for the same gender, the opposite gender, anything in between."
"Yeah," Lydia said, taking a big sip from the wine. She had come here to play Truth or Dare, not to be educated on sexual diversity. But this was clearly important to Kat, so she let her continue.
"Well, there is another way in which it's a spectrum. How much sex you want, I guess, or technically, how quickly you feel sexual attraction-" She glanced at Milo- "I'm explaining this all wrong."
"Not at all," he said, "Continue."
"So on the one side of the spectrum is asexuality, which is when someone doesn't experience sexual attraction at all. Many asexuals do experience romantic attraction, they just don't want sex. If you don't experience romantic attraction, that is called aromantic. On the other side of the spectrum is hypersexuality, when you experience lots of sexual attraction. I identify as demi, or demisexual, which means that I'm not fully asexual, but I experience much less sexual attraction than what would be considered "normal"," Kat said, doing air quotes around that last word.
Lydia's head was reeling with all that new information. She downed the rest of the bottle of wine as she tried to process all of it.
"So..." she eventually said, her voice dangerously soft, "This 'hypersexual' thing, that is an identity? Something that people call themselves?"
"Yes," Kat answered.
"And they're proud of it?!" Lydia inquired, her voice getting louder and louder as she continued, "They wave their 'hypersexual' flag high because they know it's who they are?! They are not ashamed, and they don't hide or apologise for their existence, because they know it's completely natural and they were made that way?!" She got up and started to pace around the room. "They know it has nothing to do with being slutty, or an attention seeker, or energetic?! They know that it is okay to be that way?! They know that it's okay to exist the way they are?!" Lydia sank back down on the floor, unable to cope with the whirlwind of emotions she felt.

"Lydia is acting like a stupid, whorey slut again."

The words rang in her head like a death sentence. She remembered every little detail of the past 10 years. From the first time she had heard the rumours that were being spread about her on the playground to the tweets and comments that she got when George- God, even before she had ever kissed a boy, her class had known. Nothing quite like a group of small-town kids to immediately pick out the 'different' one. She remembered every time Lizzie had called her a slut, and every time her mother had said she "wouldn't get a husband this way". Every disapproving glare Lizzie had thrown her way when she was flirting with a drunk boy at Carter's and every time she had responded by practically throwing herself at him and making sure Lizzie saw. Every time Jane had softly tried to tell her that "maybe it was time to settle down and get a real boyfriend" and every time she drank the uneasy feeling that she would never be good enough for her family away. All those memories hit her at the same time, and it was such a whirlwind of loss, fear and pain that Lydia could do nothing but hide her head in her arms and try to stop existing.
"Lydia? Are you okay?" she heard Kat ask, but it seemed to come from far away. She was vaguely aware that Milo had put an arm around her, but it seemed to be happening to another Lydia, in another body.

As the clouds in her brain started to pull apart and Lydia could see bits and pieces of the sky again, Lydia also started becoming aware of her body and her surroundings. The first thing she noticed was that she was very, very cold. The second thing she noticed was that she was sitting on the floor and the steel bed was pricking uncomfortably in her back. She shifted a bit into a more comfortable position, and that's when she noticed Milo was still holding her. She laid her head down on his shoulder, and he let her. As she tried to process what just had happened - and what had happened? she wasn't entirely sure - a couple of things came forward. One, she had spent a long time to live up to everyone's expectations of her, negative as they may be. Everyone thought she was a party girl and a slut, so she had done everything in her power to be just that: a party girl and a slut. Two, that had drained her. The bigger her party girl persona had become, the smaller she had felt. She hadn't told anyone, because please, the Ly-Dee-Yaah didn't do small. No, she was the star, the life of the party. Three, she didn't want to go back there ever again. She was happy in her new life in New York, with Kat and Milo. Here, she could just be Lydia. Not the Ly-Dee-Yaah, not the party girl or slut, not the girl with the sex tape, not anyone's little sister. Just Lydia. A girl who enjoys partying, and drinking, and sex. A girl who was once hurt really badly by a guy she trusted, and a girl who is a little sister to Jane and Lizzie Bennet. But most importantly, she was herself. And all of those things were nothing but tiny pieces in the puzzle that made Lydia Bennet. And maybe, this hypersexual thing was also a piece of that puzzle. Not a slut. Not wrong. No need to change. Just different. A title that she could claim as her own. For herself. Not for anyone who judged her.
Lydia moved out of Milo's arms. "Thank you, Milo. I'm okay."
The look he gave her said that he didn't believe her, and neither did Kat. And to be fair, Lydia felt a little wobbly, unsteady. She was still shaking, but not holding onto herself as fiercely as before. She couldn't help but think of a baby deer, still getting adjusted to his new life. She was okay. More than okay. "Really, I'm good. I guess- I just found a word that described me and didn't judge me at the same time. I'm not used to that, and it made me rethink a lot. But I'm good now." A little softer, she added: "Thank you, Kat. I really needed to hear that."