Loveless(35)

Rooney turned back round. She gave me a long, unreadable look.

‘Honestly?’ she asked.

‘Yeah,’ I said.

‘I just enjoy having sex,’ she said. ‘I’m single and I like sex, so I have sex. It’s fun because it feels good. I don’t feel a “spark” because it’s not about romance. It’s a casual physical thing.’

I got the sense that she was telling the truth. That really was all there was to it.

‘Anyway,’ she continued, ‘we’ve got much more important things to think about right now.’

‘Like what?’

‘Like the Shakespeare Society.’ Rooney finished changing into her pyjamas, grabbed her washbag, and headed towards our bedroom door. ‘Go to sleep.’

‘OK.’ And I did. But not before I spent a while thinking about the spark. It sounded magical. Like something out of a fairy tale. But I couldn’t imagine what it felt like. Was it a physical feeling? Was it just intuition?

Why had I never felt it? Ever?

On the Sunday of that second week, Rooney and I were chilling in our bedroom when someone knocked on the door. When Rooney opened it, at least thirty of her acquaintances entered, carrying balloons and party poppers and streamers, and then a guy got down on one knee in front of everyone and asked Rooney to be his college wife.

Rooney screamed and jumped on him, smothering him in a tight hug, agreeing to be his college wife. And that was that. I watched the whole thing go down from my bed, actually entertained. It was kind of lovely.

Once everyone had cleared out, I helped Rooney clean up the remains of the party poppers and streamers. It took a whole hour.

She’d gone out a few evenings that week, and she always came back with a story – a hook-up, or a drunken escapade, or some college drama. And I’d always listen, fascinated and, confusingly, jealous. Some part of me wanted that excitement in my life, but at the same time the idea of a night like that filled me with horror. I knew I didn’t really want to drunkenly hook up with a stranger, as fun as that seemed from the outside. I didn’t need to, anyway, now that I had my thing with Jason.

I’d wanted to be Rooney when I first met her. I thought I needed to copy her.

Now, I wasn’t so sure I could hack it.





Rooney gave me a long look as we sat down opposite each other in the Student Union café on the Wednesday of our third week of university. She then withdrew her MacBook from her bag.

‘What’s this about?’ I asked.

‘Oh, you’ll see. You will see.’

She’d dragged me here after this morning’s Heroic Age lecture but had refused to tell me why, explaining that she wanted to build up the tension. This only succeeded in irritating me.

‘I assume this is a Shakespeare Soc thing,’ I said.

‘You are correct.’

While joining the Shakespeare Society had not exactly been my idea, I had genuinely been quite excited to be involved. It felt like I was actually putting myself out there, trying something new, and it would hopefully result in a year of fun rehearsals, meeting new people, and enjoying my university experience.

But now it seemed that it would be a society of only four people, all of whom I already knew, and without enough members we probably wouldn’t even get to function as a real society anyway.

‘Have you decided what play we’re doing?’

‘Even better.’ She grinned.

Before I had the chance to ask what that meant, Pip arrived, Kanken slung over one shoulder, giant chemistry book in one arm and her button-up shirt baggy round her torso.

She pushed up her glasses and sat down next to me. ‘I assumed you would have found an excuse to get out of this. Like dropping out of university or running away to become a goat herder.’

‘Hey!’ I made a disappointed face. ‘I want to be here! I want to have fun university experiences and make memories!’

‘Memories like throwing up four times in one evening?’

‘I’m sure that was just a one-time thing.’

Rooney, ignoring both of us, checked her watch. ‘Now we’re just waiting for Jason.’

Pip and I looked at her.

‘You actually got Jason to agree to do this?’ Pip said. ‘He didn’t tell me he’d agreed to this.’

‘I have my ways,’ said Rooney. ‘I’m very persuasive.’

‘More like very irritating.’

‘Same difference.’

It was then that Jason, the fourth member of our Shakespeare troupe, wandered into the union café and sat down next to Rooney, shrugging off his teddy-bear jacket. Beneath, he was wearing full sports attire, including a sweatshirt that had a ‘University College Rowing Club’ logo on it.

‘Hello,’ he said.

Pip frowned at him. ‘Mate, since when did you join the rowing club?’

‘Since the Freshers’ Fair. You were literally there when I wrote my name down.’

‘I didn’t think you’d actually go. Don’t they have practices at like six a.m. every day?’

‘Not every day. Only on Tuesdays and Thursdays.’

‘Why would you put yourself through that?’

Jason huffed out a laugh, though I could tell he was a little annoyed. ‘Because I wanted to try something new? Is that so bad?’