“Stock, Broke & Two Girls with the Immitude”

Aspen Leary had become a close friend in recent months. We’d spent a lot of time drinking alcohol and talking about girls. His girlfriend and my girlfriend were in the same year group and we’d been in the same Psychology class last year.

His girlfriend, who had once been friends with Ella before Aspen’s girlfriend’s miraculous transformation from pretty girl to alternative girl, had just dumped him.

“You’re kidding me? She dumped you?” I asked him, on a recent trip to the city whilst in town looking at DVDs.

“Yeah she did. It was over the phone too, whilst she was in a pub, with God knows who, drinking God knows what.”

“No way. Is she serious? Well, she sure is mature.”

“I know. It’s like I thought I meant something to her, but obviously not. I mean, she didn’t even give me any reasons. She just did it.” He looked bothered by it.

“Well, would you have still thought that if she’d done it face to face, with reasons?” I asked him, intrigued.

“Yeah, probably. But it was just, over the phone while in a pub? It’s pretty immature, and really hurtful.”

“Oh definitely dude, I understand.”

This was the perfect example of what I called ‘the immitude’, I thought to myself. Immitude was the attitude immature girls have to certain things. Relationships, politics, sexuality, all of those sorts of hot topics etc.

“They certainly do know how to get what they want,” Aspen told me in a pub after I’d spent money on DVDs that I clearly didn’t need.

“They sure do. I mean, I spend so much money on Ella and it’s like, I'm on the verge of not having any.”

“Well Noah, it’s the way we were brought up. We are gentleman, you see.” He took a gulp from his pint of cider, and laughed.

“Gentleman my arse. More like beggars by the end of it.” I slammed down my pint glass.

“Wow, taking this a bit seriously aren’t you?” I hadn’t meant to slam it down, it just happened.

“Well it’s just I feel like I'm always paying for Ella, for everything: Cinema tickets, snacks, drinks, parties, meals. I just feel like it’s getting too much.”

“It’s true, you shouldn’t be paying for all of that.”

“Has it got to the point where we have to have money to be in a relationship?”

“What? Like we pay relationships like we pay bills?” Aspen had hit the mark.

“My point exactly. Plus, I don’t even have a job. She does! Aren’t we meant to be living in an equal society in which females are equal to males? What ever happened to the gentlewoman?”

“Well, maybe it’s not just because you’re the guy, maybe it’s because you’re older too.” He made a good point. Was it because I was older, and was the ‘gentleman’ that I was expected to pay for everything.

That night, I had a thought: could I really afford to be in a relationship that I couldn’t pay for, and which I couldn’t really see lasting any lengthy amount of time, what with my move to either California or London looming?

So, I made a conscious decision to see Ella more. I wanted to invest my time in her more, it was almost as if I was investing in the stock market. Had Ella’s stock just gone up?

“So Noah, this party next Friday night, are you finally going to be my drinks then?”

“What?” Shocked. To. The. Core.

“Well, are you?”

“Ella. I always do! How can you say that?”

“I was joking. Calm down.” She didn’t sound like she was joking. Maybe she doesn’t realise I'm pretty much broke, and with impending university fees coming up, I shouldn’t be spending my money on buying drinks for her she can easily afford herself. Of course, it would be nice if I could do that, but, at this time in my life, when I have no money, “I pretty much reject the idea of the ‘gentlemen’.”

Once I was home, I logged online to my bank. Had Ella’s stock just gone down? Was it time to accept that maybe I should just cut loose and accept my losses? I sipped my water. Was this stock retrievable?

“I mean sometimes, she makes me feel special.” I told Aspen in the library while ‘studying’ for an upcoming exam.

“Like how?” He inquired. “How are things in the bedroom”?

“What things? And what bedroom? Seriously, like, I think she wants to. On New Years Eve she was kissing my neck and getting me,” I looked around, the librarian walked past our table, “Up…but then she’d get another drink and just hang off me, and that’s pretty much a turn off, also her parents were in the next room, and that’s just chance taking, especially when it isn’t even her house either.”

“Ah I see.”

Would improving things in the bedroom, and taking ‘it’ to the next step solve my financial problem? Would I invest more if she would? For now though…her stock was hanging in the balance.