Hi. I'm a little stalled on A Winter's Tale, so here something else. I have this one pretty much planned out, so hopefully we'll get through it fairly quickly.

If you don't know 'Yakkity Sax', it's also the Benny Hill music. If that helps.

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Jade was sitting alone at a table in the Asphalt Cafe, engrossed in her phone, when she heard a familiar sigh, and Tori dropped down into the seat opposite. "Hey."

"Hey," Jade said without looking up.

"What are you watching?"

"I posted the video of Robbie getting attacked by that dog. It's getting a lot of hits."

"Jade!"

"What?"

"That wasn't funny! It was awful. He had to go to the hospital and everything. "

"Yeah, you're right. It was awful."

"So why post it?"

"Because then I set it to 'Yakkity Sax', and now it's hilarious."

"Good grief." Tori shook her head. There was a long pause, broken only by the faint sound of a saxophone and Jade's sniggering, before she spoke.

"Can I ask you something?"

"Mmmm?"

"Are we friends?"

The question was so unexpected that Jade looked up. "What?"

"Are we friends?"

"In what way?"

"In the way," Tori said, patiently, "that two people sometimes are, when one of them isn't being a total gank."

"Oh, come on, Vega," Jade said. "You're not that big a gank."

"I'm not talking about me."

"Oh."

"So?"

"So what?"

"So, are we friends?"

Jade considered this. She looked back at the phone. "I guess so."

"Really?"

"You want it in writing?"

"No, but…"

"Wait," Jade said, suspiciously. "Are you expecting me to hang out with you? I think you should know that this doesn't oblige me to hang out with you."

"You already hang out with me."

"I know. But I don't have to."

"No, I'm not expecting you to hang out with me."

"Good."

Tori fell silent. There was a long period broken only by the sound of her fidgeting with her bag, until Jade couldn't stand the suspense. "So, are you asking for a reason?" she said. "Or did you just drop by for validation because no one's told you you're pretty for a couple of hours?"

"You think I'm pretty?"

"Don't push your luck, Vega. So?"

"Well," Tori said. "It's just…" She hesitated. "I need some advice."

"Advice?" Jade said, surprised. "From me?"

"Yes."

"Why can't you ask someone else?"

"Because you just said we were friends."

"Yeah, but I didn't know it was going to involve me having to do stuff. And why would you trust me to give you advice, anyway?"

"Again, friends."

"Yeah," Jade said. "But you've got to balance being friends against the opportunity for me to watch you fail spectacularly. I'm not sure I can pass that up."

Tori sighed. "You know what?" she said. "Forget it." She started to get up. "I thought we might be able to have an adult conversation for once."

Jade relented. "Okay, fine," she said. "I'll help. But seriously, though, why me? Don't you usually go to Andre for this kind of thing?"

Tori sat back down and pulled a face. "I can't."

"Why?"

"It's not really something I can ask a guy."

"Trina, then. She's got to be good for something. Or Cat."

I can't ask Trina because she's a blabbermouth, and I can't ask Cat because it would make her brain explode."

"If Cat's brain was made of dynamite she wouldn't have enough to blow her hat off."

"The point is," Tori went on, ignoring her, "that I don't really know anyone else that has any…" She squirmed, uncomfortably. "Experience."

"Experience?" Jade echoed. "Experience of what?" She noticed that Tori was blushing furiously, and her eyes widened. "Ohhhhhh," she said. "Oh. My. God."

"What?"

"Please don't tell me this is about sex."

"Shhh!"

"Jeez, Tori, how old are you? Do you really need me to give you the whole 'birds and the bees' talk?"

"No!"

"You know, you can get books out of the library on this stuff, or just google it. I might be going out on a limb here, but I'm pretty sure there's something about sex on the internet."

"I know how to do it!" Tori hissed, glancing around furtively to see if anyone was listening. "At least, I know how to do it in theory," she conceded. "What I want to know is… when."

"When?" Jade said. She thought for a moment. "When your parents are out, I guess. Or there's always the back seat of the car on the way home from the movies if you're desperate."

"Not that sort of 'when'," Tori said. "I mean… well, the thing is, I've been seeing this guy-"

"Ted."

"-Ted, and… Wait, you know about that?"

"Of course I know," Jade said. "Everybody knows."

"How?"

"Cat told us."

"What?" Tori said, horrified. "But I told her not to say anything!"

"Yeah, good luck with that. So go on. You're dating this boring guy, Ted…"

"He's not boring."

"He sounds boring."

"You've never even met him!"

"He's dating you, Tori, how exciting can he be?"

"You do know how this friendship thing's supposed to work, right?"

"Not really, no."

"Well, anyway," Tori said, glaring at her, "we've been seeing each other for a little while now, and he's getting kind of keen to… move things along, if you know what I mean."

"Unfortunately, yes."

"And I was just wondering when it's the right time to… when it's appropriate for me to…" Tori was practically smoldering with embarrassment.

"To let him get past third base and score a home run," Jade supplied.

"Yes," Tori said, relieved.

"I see. And you're asking me why, exactly?"

"Because you've had a long-term boyfriend."

"Have I?"

"Beck," Tori said. "Remember? Tall guy, dark hair, Canadian. You're dating him."

"Oh." Jade pulled a face. "Yeah."

"I mean, how did you guys know when you were ready?"

"What makes you think we've done it?"

"Haven't you?"

"Well, yeah. But I don't like people making assumptions about me."

"So, how did you know?"

Jade shrugged. "We never really thought about it, we just got drunk one night and did it."

"That's not much help."

"Well, what do you want me to say?"

"I don't know," Tori said, in frustration. "It's just, I don't want people to think I'm… you know, easy," she said, "but on the other hand I don't want him to lose patience and dump me."

"Well if he does that, he wasn't worth dating in the first place."

"But what if he goes around telling everyone there's something wrong with me?"

"I've got to say, Vega, you don't sound like you have a very high opinion of Teddy-boy, considering you're thinking about losing it to him."

"I do," Tori said, wretchedly. "He's really sweet, and I like him. But you know what guys are like. They talk. I don't want people to think I'm weird."

"That ship sailed loooong ago."

"Very funny. Look, are you going to help me, or are you just going to sit there making smart remarks?"

"I don't know, yet. Do you actually want to do this?"

There was a fraction of a second's hesitation. "Yes."

"I mean, with Ted, specifically. Because if this is just about popping your cherry without getting a bad reputation, I'm pretty sure you could find someone else. Hey, what about Andre? Give it up to him, he'd be pretty cool about it."

"Jade," Tori scolded. "Don't be gross. He's a friend. Anyway, he's seeing that weird girl from ballet class."

"Okay, what about Robbie? There's a kid who could use some action," Jade suggested with a straight face. "Plus it'd all be over in a couple of seconds, you wouldn't even have to break a sweat."

"I'm not looking for potential candidates," Tori said, exasperated. "I'm happy with Ted. I just need to know when."

"Okay, okay." Jade held up her hands. "Sorry. This is difficult for me. I'm not used to people wanting my opinion."

"You're always giving them your opinion."

"I know. I'm just not used to them wanting it."

Tori slumped dejectedly over the table, head on her hands, and Jade felt a pang of pity. She'd never thought about this kind of thing, because until Tori had started at school, her world had consisted of her and Beck, everything else was just background noise. The idea of other people's approval or disapproval had never crossed her mind. But Tori was different. Tori cared very much what other people thought. She reached out a hand and awkwardly patted her on the head.

"Tori, look, just… Just don't do anything you're not ready for, okay?" she said. "Don't worry about what it looks like, don't worry about what people think about you. Just go with what feels right, because that's what's going to count at the end of the day – whether you feel good about yourself or bad about yourself afterwards. And a lot of that's going to come down to whether you feel like he respects you or not. Whether you trust him. I trusted Beck, which is why it wasn't a big deal for us. If you don't trust Ted, then maybe you should wait until you do, or find someone else."

Tori looked up and blinked. "You think?"

"Yeah," Jade said. "But don't beat yourself up over it. Let's face it, in ten years' time it's not going to matter a damn who you lost it to, it'll just be something to laugh about at the class reunion. Unless you get yourself knocked up."

"You make it sound so romantic."

"There's nothing romantic about teenage sex, Tori. Trust me," Jade said. "Especially not the first time. It's all wham, bam, thank you ma'am then he's wiping his dick on the curtains while you lie there wondering what all the fuss was about and whether you can risk putting your grandmother's heirloom quilt through a hot wash to get rid of the stains."

Tori shuddered. "Thanks. You know I'm never going to be able to look Beck in the eye again, don't you?"

"Just telling it like it is. And it serves you right for making me think about you having sex. Look, I'm not trying to put you off, okay?" Jade said. "I'm only trying to make sure you go into it with realistic expectations. I can't tell you when it's right because that's up to you guys." She looked down at the table and picked at a splinter. "I just don't want you to get hurt, that's all."

There was no reply, and she looked up to find that Tori was gazing at her with an odd expression. "What?" she said defensively. "I can care if I want to." She felt her face burning. "Anyway," she said quickly, looking away, "that's all I've got. Take it or leave it." The bell rang. "Right, gotta go."

She turned to leave, but found Tori's hand on her arm. "Jade?"

"What?"

Tori smiled genuinely, for the first time. "Thank you."

"Yeah, well." Jade shifted, uncomfortably. "Don't make a big deal out of it." She shouldered her bag, and made her way into school.

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So, Tori and Ted, don't they sound like a lovely couple? I'm sure we're all rooting for them to live happily ever after.