Loveless(70)

‘Maybe,’ I mumbled, leaning back into the beanbag.

‘Why don’t you try with me?’

Wait.

What?

‘What?’ I said, turning my head to face her.

She rolled to one side so her whole body was facing mine, then held up both hands in a gesture of surrender. ‘I literally just want to help. I absolutely don’t like you that way – no offence – but you might be able to get a sense of whether it’s something you might like. I want to help.’

‘But … I don’t like you like that,’ I said. ‘Even if I was gay, I wouldn’t necessarily feel something just because you’re a girl.’

‘OK, maybe not,’ she said with a sigh. ‘I just don’t want to see you give up without trying.’

She was annoying me, and I realised that it was because what I was doing wasn’t ‘giving up’.

It was acceptance.

And maybe, just maybe, that could be a good thing.

‘I don’t want you to feel like you’re going to be sad and lonely forever!’ she said, and that was the moment I broke a little.

Was that all I would be? Sad and lonely? Forever?

Had I doomed myself by daring to think about this part of me?

Was I just accepting a life of solitude?

As soon as those questions hit me, they opened the floodgate to all the doubts I thought I’d been fighting off.

Maybe it was all just a phase.

Maybe this was giving up.

Maybe I should keep trying.

Maybe, maybe, maybe.

‘Fine, then,’ I said.

‘You wanna try?’

I sighed, defeated, tired. I was so tired of all this. ‘Yeah. Go on, then.’

It couldn’t really be any worse than the one with Jason, could it?

And so she leant in.

It was different. Rooney was used to deeper, longer kisses of an entirely different type.

She led. I tried to imitate her.

I hated it.

I hated it just as I had hated the kiss with Jason. I hated how close her face was to me. I hated the feeling of her lips moving around against mine. I hated her breath on my skin. My eyes kept flickering open, trying to get a sense of when this was going to be over, while she put her hand on the back of my head, pulling me closer to her.

I tried to imagine doing this with a person I liked, but it was a mirage. The harder I tried to think about that scenario, the quicker it disintegrated.

I was never, ever going to enjoy this. With anybody.

It wasn’t just a dislike of kissing. It wasn’t a fear or nervousness or ‘not meeting the right person yet’. This was a part of me. I did not feel the feelings of attraction, of romance, of desire, that other people felt.

And I wasn’t ever going to.

I really hadn’t needed to kiss anyone to work that out.

Rooney, on the other hand, was going for it, which I assumed was what she did with everybody. The way she kissed made it feel like she really did like me, but I realised suddenly that I knew her better than that. It was never about the other person. She was using this to make her feel good about herself.

I didn’t have the energy to start to understand what that meant.

‘Oh,’ said a voice from behind us.

Rooney moved away from me instantly, and I, hazy and a little weirded out by this whole situation, turned to see who it was.

I should have guessed, really.

Because the universe seemed to have it in for me already.

Pip had her jacket folded over one arm and a toastie in her other hand.

‘I …’ she said, then trailed off. She was looking at me, eyes wide, then at Rooney, then back at me again. ‘I brought you a toastie, but …’ She looked at the toastie. ‘It – er, fucking hell.’ She looked back at both of us. ‘Wow. Fuck you both.’





Rooney leapt to her feet. ‘Hang on, you literally don’t understand what was just happening.’

Pip’s stare hardened.

‘I think it’s pretty plainly obvious what was just happening,’ she said. ‘So don’t try and insult me by lying about it.’

‘I’m not, but –’

‘If this was a thing, you could have at least told me about it.’ She turned her stare to me, her face scarily blank of emotion. ‘You could have at least told me about it.’

And then she walked out of the room.

Rooney wasted no time in running after her, and I quickly followed. I needed to explain. Rooney needed to explain.

Everyone just needed to stop lying and acting and pretending all the time.

Rooney grabbed Pip’s shoulders just as she got to the end of the corridor and pulled her round to face her.

‘Pip, just listen –’

‘To WHAT?’ Pip shouted, then lowered her voice as a few passing students turned round curiously. ‘If you’re seeing each other fine, just go and fuck each other and enjoy yourselves, but you could have at least done me the courtesy of informing me so I could try and put a stop to my feelings and not be absolutely fucking crushed right now –’ Her voice broke and there were tears in her eyes.

I wanted to explain, but I couldn’t speak.

I had ruined my friendship with Jason and now I was destroying my friendship with Pip too.