by Alice Oseman
‘Because it didn’t have enough members to continue,’ said Sadie coolly.
I sat down next to Pip in the front row. She leant over to me and whispered, ‘I just wanted to ask what the Freshers’ Play would be this year.’
‘What is it?’
‘No idea yet. This is still happening.’
‘What if I funded the society myself?’ Rooney asked.
Sadie raised an eyebrow. ‘I’m listening.’
‘I-I don’t need any of DST’s money. I just want to put on a Shakespeare.’ She looked genuinely desperate. I hadn’t realised she cared that much about this, honestly.
‘Do you know how much it costs to put on a play?’
‘Um … no, but –’
‘Hiring the theatre? Costumes? Set? Rehearsal space? All using the DST’s time and resources?’
‘Well, no, but I –’
Sadie sighed again.
‘You need five members to count as a society,’ she said. ‘And we’ll hire the theatre for you for one performance.’
Rooney closed her mouth. Blinked once. Then said, ‘Wait, really?’
‘Not gonna lie, I am just doing this so you’ll stop bothering me.’ Sadie whipped a notepad out from the stack of flyers she had with her on the stage. ‘Who are your members?’
‘Rooney Bach,’ said Rooney, then looked around at me and Pip.
We didn’t even have time to protest.
‘Felipa Quintana,’ said Rooney.
‘Hang on, no,’ said Pip.
‘Georgia Warr.’
‘Wait, what?’ I said.
‘And Jason Farley-Shaw.’
‘Is this legal?’ said Pip.
‘Who’s the fifth?’ Sadie asked.
‘Um …’ Rooney faltered. I figured she would just conjure up the name of one of her many friends, but she didn’t seem to be able to think of anyone. ‘Er, I guess we haven’t got the fifth member yet.’
‘Well, you’d better get one quick, OK? We’re giving you funding for this. I need to know you’re serious.’
‘I will.’
‘Put on a good enough production by the end of the year and I’ll consider giving you full funding next year. Does that sound reasonable?’
‘Um. Yes. Yeah.’ Rooney unfolded her arms. ‘Th-thank you.’
‘You’re welcome.’ Sadie reached around her for a plastic bottle and took a deep swig from it – one that made me think that whatever was inside wasn’t water. ‘I don’t think you realise how much work it is putting on a production. It needs to be good, OK? Some of our plays go to the Edinburgh Fringe.’
‘It will be good,’ said Rooney, nodding. ‘I promise.’
‘OK.’ Sadie looked directly at me when she said, deadpan, ‘Welcome to Durham Student Theatre. We sure do love drama.’
‘I don’t understand why you can’t just let me have this one and be in my play,’ Rooney snapped at Pip as we walked back to college. ‘What were you gonna do? Join the Mime Society?’
‘I was going to do the Freshers’ Play like a normal fresher,’ Pip snapped back. ‘They’re doing The Importance of Being Earnest, for God’s sake. A classic.’
‘Shakespeare means a lot to me, OK? It was basically one of the only things that I enjoyed at school –’
‘What, and I’m supposed to drop my interests and hobbies just because you’ve got a sob story? This isn’t the fucking X Factor.’
I walked a few paces behind them as Pip and Rooney bickered, their voices getting gradually louder and louder. People around us on the street started turning to observe the scene as they passed.
Pip wrapped her bomber jacket tightly round her body and ran a hand through her hair. ‘I get that you were, like, a star performer at your school, but, like, so was I, and you don’t get to come here and pretend like you’re better than me just because you like Shakespeare.’
Rooney folded her arms. ‘Well, I think putting on a Shakespeare is a bit more noteworthy than some little comedy play.’
‘Some little comedy play? Apologise to Oscar Wilde right the fuck now!’
Rooney halted, bringing us all to a stop. I was contemplating diving into the nearest café. She stepped slightly towards Pip, then seemed to change her mind, and stepped back again, keeping a safe distance between them.
‘You’re just here to have fun. Well, I’m here to actually do something that means something.’
Pip shook her head. ‘What the fuck are you talking about, dude? This is a theatre society. Not a political party.’
‘Ugh, you’re so annoying.’
‘So are you!’
There was silence for a moment.
‘Please be in my society,’ said Rooney. ‘I need five members.’
Pip looked at her, expression unchanging. ‘Which play are you doing?’
‘I don’t know yet.’
‘Can it be a comedy? I’m not doing this if we’re doing any of the boring-ass history plays.’
‘It’ll be a comedy or a tragedy. No history plays.’
Pip narrowed her eyes.
‘I’ll think about it,’ she said.
‘Yeah?’
‘Yeah. But I still don’t like you.’
Rooney smiled broadly. ‘I know.’
Pip headed off towards Castle, leaving Rooney and me alone on the cobbled street by the cathedral.
‘What just happened?’ I asked her.
Rooney let out a long breath. Then she smiled.
‘We’re putting on a play.’
I had somehow asked out one of my best friends, and there was absolutely no way for me to take that back, which meant that I probably needed to follow through and actually go on a date with Jason Farley-Shaw.
He ended up messaging me about it the day after the DST meeting.
Jason Farley-Shaw
Hey so how’s about that movie/food?
I got the message while Rooney and I were in an intro to poetry lecture, and instead of listening to the lecturer drone on about Keats, I spent the hour analysing this message. I didn’t open it, but I could read all of it from my home screen. I didn’t want to open it, because I didn’t want him to know that I’d read it, because if he knew I’d read it, I’d have to reply so he didn’t think I was ignoring him, and for some reason, the idea of continuing this incredibly new and incredibly weird flirtation with Jason was making me want to abandon my degree and become my brother’s plumbing apprentice.
The very ordinary smiley-face emoji and the single, sensible question mark were extremely not like Jason, which suggested that he, too, had been overthinking this conversation. How should I reply? Should I be grammatically rule-abiding and polite? Or should I just start sending him memes straight away, like normal? How was this supposed to work?
To be absolutely and completely honest, I didn’t want to go on a date with him at all.
But I did want to want to go on a date with him.
And that was the crux of my problem.
‘Why are you staring at your phone like you’re trying to make it explode with your mind?’ asked Rooney once we’d walked back to our room after the lecture.
I decided to be honest. Rooney would probably know how to approach this.
‘Jason messaged me,’ I said.
‘Oh!’ She dumped her bag on the floor and rolled on to her bed, kicking off her Converse and pulling her hair out of its ponytail. ‘Nice. What’s he saying?’
Sitting on my own bed, I held up my phone to her. ‘I kind of asked him out yesterday.’
Rooney leapt off her bed.
‘You did WHAT?’
I paused. ‘Um. I asked him out. Was that … wrong?’
She stared at me for a long time.
‘I don’t understand you at all,’ she said finally.
‘… OK.’
She sat back down, pressing her fingers to her lips.
‘OK, well … good. This is good.’ She took a breath. ‘How did this happen?’
‘I dunno, I
was just thinking about it after what you said, and – I mean, I guess I just thought – like, I realised …’ I folded my arms. ‘I do.’
‘You do what?’
‘Like him.’
‘Romantically?’
‘Mm.’
‘Sexually?’
I made a spluttering noise because I was suddenly picturing having sex with Jason. ‘Who thinks about sex that quickly?’
Rooney snorted. ‘Me.’
‘Anyway, I do like him.’ I do. I did. I probably did.
‘Oh, I know you do. I saw this coming from the moment I met him.’ She sighed happily. ‘It’s like a movie.’
‘I don’t know what to text him back,’ I said. ‘Help me.’
I felt a little bit embarrassed. This was simple stuff, for Christ’s sake. This was twelve-year-old-level Dating Skills.
Rooney blinked. Then she got up from her bed, walked over to me, and gestured for me to budge up. I obeyed, and she flopped down on to the duvet beside me, taking my phone from my hands. She opened the message before I could stop her.
I watched her read it.
‘OK,’ she said, and then she typed out a message for me and sent it.
Georgia Warr
Yes for sure! You free at all this week?
‘Oh,’ I said.
She slapped my phone back into my hands.
I expected her to ask why I couldn’t accomplish such a simple task. I expected her to maybe laugh, in a nice way, about how much I had been panicking about this.
She gave me a long look and I waited for her to ask: Was that so hard? Why couldn’t you do that yourself? Do you even want to talk to Jason? Was your panic because you have a crush on him or are you panicking because you’re not even sure what you’re doing, or why you’re doing it, or whether you even want to be doing it? Are you panicking because if you can’t even want to do this, you might never be able to want to do this?
But instead she just smiled and said, ‘No prob.’
Jason and I arranged our date for that Saturday, which meant I had five whole days to panic about it.
Thankfully, my second week at university was a welcome distraction.
Both Rooney and I were now faced with actual university work – real lectures and tutorials and reading ten whole books in four weeks. And we were settling into our new life living together too. We’d always go to lectures together and go to lunch together, but she liked to go down to the bar in the evenings or go out to a club with other friends, while I preferred to sit in bed with biscuits and a fanfic. Sometimes Rooney would talk to me about ideas for her Shakespeare play, chatting excitedly about how she would do the set and the costumes and the staging, and other times we would just talk about whatever – TV shows. College gossip. Our home lives.
I didn’t really understand why Rooney had chosen me. Clearly, she could have anyone she wanted as whatever she wanted – friend, partner, hook-up, even someone to playfully banter with. But despite being able to befriend anyone, and having fifty acquaintances already, it was me she ate with, and walked through Durham with, and hung out with when she wasn’t partying.
I was probably just convenient. That was the nature of roommates.
But all in all, it was OK. I was OK. Maybe I wasn’t the socialite I’d come to university hoping I could be, but living with Rooney was OK, and I’d even managed to secure a date with someone. An actual romantic date.
Things were looking up.
As it turned out, there was nothing interesting to do in Durham apart from eat out, drink, and go to the cinema. Unless you particularly like looking at old buildings. But even that got tiring after you’d walked past them every day on your way to Tesco.
I wanted to think of something actually fun to do with Jason, like ice skating or bowling or one of those cool bars that doubles up as a mini-golf place. But Jason immediately suggested going to the little ice-cream café on Saddler Street, and I didn’t have anything better to suggest, so I agreed. Plus, ice cream is nice.
‘You’re going on your date?’ Rooney asked, just as I was about to leave our room on Saturday afternoon, about ten minutes before we’d agreed to meet. She looked my outfit up and down.
‘Yes?’ I said, looking at myself.
I was just wearing my normal clothes – mom jeans, a cropped woolly jumper, and my coat. I thought I looked quite good, actually, in my usual sort of cosy bookseller way. We were only going for ice cream, for God’s sake.
‘You look cute,’ said Rooney, and I felt like she really did mean it.
‘Thanks.’
‘Are you looking forward to it?’
I actually hadn’t really been looking forward to it. I guessed this was due to nerves. Everyone gets nervous about a first date. And I was very nervous. I knew that I needed to chill out and be myself, and if I didn’t feel that spark after a while then we just weren’t meant to be.
But I also knew that this was a chance for me to actually experience romance and be someone who has fun, quirky experiences and doesn’t die alone.
No pressure, I guess.
‘Pistachio,’ said Jason, looking at my choice of ice cream as we sat down at a table. He was wearing his teddy-bear jacket again, which I loved for its sense of familiarity and cosiness. ‘I forgot that you’re literally a disgusting gremlin when it comes to ice cream.’
The café was cute, tiny and decorated with pastel colours and flowers. I admired Jason for suggesting it. It was straight out of a romance novel.
I glanced at his selection of ice cream. ‘Vanilla, though? When they had cookies-and-cream?’
‘Don’t bash vanilla. Vanilla is a classic.’ He popped a spoonful into his mouth and grinned.
I raised my eyebrows. ‘I forgot how basic you are.’
‘I’m not basic!’
‘It’s a basic choice. That’s all I’m saying.’
We sat at our little round table in the ice-cream café and talked for an hour.
We talked about university for most of that. Jason explained that his history lectures were already a bit dull, and I lamented about the length of my reading lists. Jason admitted that he didn’t think the drinking-clubbing lifestyle was really for him, and I said I felt the same. We spent a long time talking about how we both felt Freshers’ Week was a monumental let-down – marketed to be the best week of your whole university life, only to turn out to be a week of endless drinking, visiting gross clubs and failing to make real friends.
Eventually conversation dwindled a little, because we’d known each other for years, and we’d already had dozens, if not hundreds, of deep chats. We were already at the point where silence didn’t feel awkward. We knew each other.
But we didn’t know how to do this.
Be romantic.
Date.
‘So this is weird, isn’t it?’ said Jason. We’d long since finished our ice cream.
I was leaning on my hand, elbow on the table. ‘What’s weird?’
Jason looked down. A little embarrassed. ‘Well … the fact that we’re … you know … doing this.’
Oh. Yeah.
‘It’s …’ I didn’t really know what to say. ‘I guess it is. A bit.’
Jason kept his eyes firmly down, not looking at me. ‘I’ve been thinking about it all week and I just … I mean, I didn’t even know you might like me like that.’
Neither had I. But then I had no idea what ‘liking someone like that’ was even supposed to feel like. If it was going to be with anyone, it was probably going to be with him.
His voice grew a little quieter and he smiled awkwardly, like he didn’t want me to see how nervous he was. ‘Are you just doing this because of what Rooney said when we all went out that night?’
I sat up a little. ‘No, no – well, I mean, maybe a little bit? I think her saying it made me properly, um … realise that I wanted to. So … I guess I started thinking about it after that, and … yeah. It just felt like … I guess it just felt right.’
Jason nodded, and I hoped I’d made sense.
I just needed to be honest. Jason was my best friend. I needed to make this work and do it at my own pace.
I loved Jason. I knew I could be honest with him.
‘You know I’ve never done this before,’ I said.
He nodded again. Understanding. ‘I know.’
‘I … want to go slow.’
He went a little red. ‘Yeah. Of course.’
‘I like you,’ I said. At least I thought I did. I might have if I tried, if I encouraged it, if I pretended it was real until it was. ‘I mean, I-I think I could – I want to give this a chance, and I don’t want to regret anything when I’m on my deathbed.’
‘OK.’
‘I just don’t really know what I’m doing. Like. Theoretically, yes, but in practice … no.’
‘OK. That’s OK.’
‘OK.’ I think I was going a bit red too. My cheeks felt hot. Was it because I felt flustered around Jason or because this whole thing was a bit awkward to talk about?
‘I don’t mind going slow,’ said Jason. ‘Like, all my romantic experiences until now have been a bit shit.’
I knew all about Jason’s past romantic experiences. I knew about his first kiss with a girl he thought he really liked, but the kiss was so terrible it actually put him off doing it again. And I knew about the girlfriend he’d had for five months when we were in Year 13 – Aimee, who went to our youth theatre group. Aimee was kind of annoying in a Jason is my property and I don’t like anyone else hanging out with him sort of way, and Pip and I never liked her, but Jason was happy for a little while, so we supported the relationship.
Or, at least, we did until we figured out that Aimee had been making all sorts of comments to Jason about how he wasn’t allowed to hang out with certain people, and he needed to stop talking to other girls – including me and Pip. Jason put up with that for months until he realised that she was, in fact, a shithead.
Jason had sex for the first time with her, and it pissed me off that he’d had that experience with someone like that.
‘This won’t be shit,’ I said, then rephrased. ‘This … won’t be shit, will it?’
‘No,’ he said. ‘Definitely not.’
