by Alice Oseman
‘We’ll go slow.’
‘Yeah. This is new territory.’
‘Yeah.’
‘And if it doesn’t work out …’ Jason began, then seemed to change his mind about what he was going to say.
I’ll be honest: I still wasn’t even sure that I was into Jason. He was super nice, funny, interesting and attractive, but I didn’t know whether I was feeling anything other than platonic friendship.
But I would never know unless I persisted. Unless I tried.
And if it didn’t work out, Jason would understand.
‘… we’ll still be friends,’ I concluded. ‘No matter what.’
‘Yes.’ Jason leant back in his chair and folded his arms, and God, I was glad that I was doing this with Jason and not some random person who didn’t know me, who didn’t understand, who would expect things from me and would think I was weird when I didn’t want to …
‘There’s one other thing we should probably talk about,’ said Jason.
‘What?’
‘What are we going to tell Pip?’
There was a silence. I honestly hadn’t even thought about how Pip would feel about this.
Something told me she wouldn’t be happy about her two best friends getting together and majorly distorting the dynamics of our friendship group.
‘We should tell her,’ I said. ‘When we find a good time.’
‘Yeah. Agreed.’ Jason looked relieved that I’d said it. That he didn’t have to be the one to suggest it.
‘Best to just be honest about it.’
‘Yeah.’
When we left the ice-cream café, we hugged goodbye, and it felt like a normal hug for us. A normal Jason and Georgia hug, the sort of hug we’d been having for years.
There wasn’t any sort of weird moment when we felt like we should kiss. We hadn’t reached that point yet, I guessed.
That would come later.
And I was fine with that.
That was what I wanted.
I thought.
Yeah.
When Rooney returned to our room that night, she wanted to hear every detail of my date with Jason. I would have been fine with this, were it not 4.38 a.m.
‘So it went well, then?’ she asked after I’d finished giving her the rundown from where I was wrapped up like a burrito in my duvet.
‘Yeah?’ I said.
‘Are you sure?’ she asked. She was sitting on her bed, cup of tea in one hand and make-up wipe in the other.
I frowned. ‘Why?’
‘You just …’ She shrugged. ‘You don’t sound very enthusiastic.’
‘Oh,’ I said. ‘I mean … I guess I just …’
‘What?’
‘I’m not sure if I really like him like that yet. I dunno.’
Rooney paused. ‘Well, if the spark’s not there, the spark’s not there.’
‘No, I mean, we get along really well. Like, I love him as a person.’
‘Yeah, but is the spark there?’
How was I supposed to know that? What the fuck was the spark? What did the spark even feel like?
I thought I’d understood what all these romantic things would feel like – butterflies and the spark and just knowing when you liked someone. I’d read about these feelings hundreds of times in books and fanfic. I’d watched way more romcoms than was probably normal for an eighteen-year-old.
But now I was starting to wonder whether these things were just made up.
‘… Maybe?’ I said.
‘Well, you might as well just wait and see how it goes, then. When you know, you know.’
That sort of made me want to scream. I didn’t know how to know.
Honestly, if I’d had any sort of feelings for girls, I would have wondered whether I wasn’t straight. Maybe boys in general were the problem.
‘What does it feel like when you get the spark?’ I asked. ‘Like … tonight. You – I assume you were with a guy?’
Her expression dropped instantly. ‘That’s different.’
‘Wait – how? Why?’
She stood up from her bed and turned round, grabbing her pyjamas. ‘That’s just different. That’s nothing like this situation.’
‘I’m just asking –’
‘Me having sex with some random guy is not similar to you dating your best friend. Completely different scenarios.’
I blinked. She was probably right about that.
‘So why do you have sex with random guys?’ I asked. As soon as I said it, I realised what a blunt and invasive question it was. But I did want to know. It wasn’t like I was judging her – honestly, I wished I had her confidence. But I didn’t understand how she did it, really. Why she wanted to do it. Why would someone go to a stranger’s house and take their clothes off when you could just stay home and have a safe, comfortable wank? Surely the end result was exactly the same.
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?’
‘No, no. Sorry.’ Pip nudged him with an elbow. ‘It’s cool.’
Rooney clapped her hands together loudly, halting their conversation. ‘Attention, please.’ She flipped up her MacBook. ‘The presentation will now commence.’
‘The what?’ said Pip.
‘Jesus,’ I said.
On the screen was the first slide of a PowerPoint presentation.
A Shakespeare Medley: A short but compelling presentation by Rooney Bach
‘Short … but compelling …’ I repeated.
‘I relate,’ said Pip.
‘What’s happening?’ asked Jason.
Rooney clicked to the next slide.
Part 1: The Premise
a) A medley of several Shakespeare scenes (only good ones) (NO history plays)
b) We each play different roles in various scenes from various plays
c) All the scenes explore the theme of LOVE and it feels very deep and meaningful
This did actually pique my interest. And it seemed to interest Jason and Pip too, as they both leant forward to watch as several images appeared on screen: Leonardo DiCaprio and Claire Danes looking traumatised in their Romeo and Juliet movie, followed by David Tennant and Catherine Tate lounging around in their West End production of Much Ado About Nothing, then a picture of someone with a donkey mask on, which was presumably from A Midsummer Night’s Dream.
‘I have decided,’ said Rooney, ‘that instead of just doing one play, we’re doing the best bits of a load of them. Only the good ones, obviously.’ She glanced at Pip. ‘None of the history plays. Comedies and tragedies only.’
‘I hate to say it,’ said Pip, ‘but that’s actually a fun idea.’
Rooney flicked her ponytail back with a triumphant expression. ‘Thank you for admitting that I’m right.’
‘Hang on, that’s not what I –’
Jason interrupted her. ‘So we’ll get to play lots of different parts?’
Rooney nodded. ‘Yes.’
‘Oh. Cool. Yeah, that actually does sound fun.’
I raised my eyebrows at him. I’d thought he’d rather join the Musical Theatre Soc, honestly. He’d always preferred musicals to plays.
Jason shrugged at me. ‘I want to be in a show this year, and you know if we try and audition for the Freshers’ Play or Musical Theatre Soc, we either won’t get in because so many people want to be in it, or we might get relegated to a tiny role. You remember in Year Ten when I had to be a tree in A Midsummer Night’s Dream.’
I nodded. ‘A thrilling experience for you.’
‘I don’t particularly feel like wasting a year of my life turning up to rehearsals just to stand still and wave my arms around occasionally.’ Jason glanced at Rooney. ‘At least with this we know we’d get lead roles and a decent amount of lines. And we’d be doing it with friends. It’d be fun.’ He slapped his thigh and leant back in his seat. ‘I’m in.’
Rooney was beaming wide. ‘I should have hired you to do the presentation.’
‘Oh my God,’ said Pip, folding her arms. ‘I can’t believe you’ve converted Jason to your side already.’
‘It’s my charm and intelligence.’
‘Fuck off.’
Rooney moved on to the next slide.
Part 2: The Plan
a) I will decide on the plays and scenes we’re doing
b) I will direct
c) Weekly rehearsals until our performance in March (YOU MUST ATTEND ALL OF THEM)
‘Hang on,’ Pip spluttered, running a hand through her curls. ‘Who made you supreme overlord of the Shakespeare Soc?’
Rooney smirked at her. ‘I think that’d be me, actually, considering it was all my idea.’
‘Yes, well …’ Pip went a little red. ‘I … I think we should have some say in who directs.’
‘Oh really?’
‘Yes.’
Rooney leant forward over the table so she was staring directly at Pip’s face. ‘And what’s your say?’
‘I –’ Pip cleared her throat, not quite able to maintain eye contact. ‘I want to co-direct with you.’
Rooney’s smirk dropped. She said nothing for a moment. And then –
‘Why?’
Pip stood her ground. ‘Because I want to.’
That wasn’t the reason. I knew exactly why Pip was doing this.
She wanted to one-up Rooney. Or at least be her equal.
‘That’s my condition,’ she said. ‘If you want me to be a part of this, I want to co-direct.’
Rooney pursed her lips. ‘Fine.’
Pip smiled wide. She’d won this round.
‘Moving on,’ said Rooney, and clicked to the next slide.
Part 3: The Fifth Member
a) Find them
b) Lure them in
c) Shakespeare Soc gets approved as a full society
d) SUCCESS
‘Lure them in?’ I said.
‘Yikes,’ said Pip.
Jason chuckled. ‘Sounds like we’re trying to persuade people to join a cult.’
‘Yes, well …’ Rooney huffed. ‘I didn’t know how else to phrase it. We just need to find a fifth person,’ she went on. ‘Can you all ask around and see if anyone’s interested? None of this matters if we can’t recruit a fifth person. I’ll ask around too.’
The three of us agreed we’d ask people we knew, though I wasn’t sure exactly who I’d be able to ask, since all of my friends were sitting with me at the table.
‘You’ve really thought about all this,’ said Pip.
Rooney smiled. ‘Impressed?’
Pip folded her arms. ‘No, just – not really, no. You’ve done the bare minimum of what’s required as a director –’
‘Admit it. You’re impressed by me.’
Jason cleared his throat. ‘So … rehearsal this week
?’
Rooney’s smile turned into a wide grin. She smacked her hands down on the table, drawing the attention of most of the people in the room. ‘Yes!’
We all agreed the date and time, then Pip and Jason had to leave – Pip to a lab, and Jason to a tutorial. As soon as they’d left the café, Rooney stood up and flung herself over the table to hug me. I just sat there, letting it happen.
That was our first ever hug.
I was just about to move my arms to hug her back when she pulled away, sitting down and smoothing her ponytail. Her face returned to her usual Rooney face: an effortless smile.
‘It’s going to be amazing,’ she said.
Our troupe consisted of two star performers who both wanted to be in charge, one girl who threw up every time she acted, and one boy who might possibly be the love of my life.
It was going to be an absolute disaster, but that wasn’t stopping any of us.
‘This is perfect,’ said Rooney, at the exact moment Jason tried to walk into the room and smacked his head on the top of the doorframe so hard that he let out a noise like a startled cat.
To her credit, Rooney had tried to book a decent room for our first ever Shakespeare Soc rehearsal. She’d attempted to book one of the giant rooms in the university buildings near the cathedral where lots of the music and drama societies practised. She’d also tried to book a classroom in the Elvet Riverside building where we had our lectures and tutorials and would take our exams at the end of the year.
But Sadie was failing to reply to Rooney’s emails, and without the DST’s clearance, Rooney was not allowed to book rooms for the Shakespeare Society.
I’d pointed out that we could probably just rehearse in our bedroom, but Rooney insisted we find a proper rehearsal space. ‘To get us in the zone,’ she’d said.
And that’s how we ended up in a rickety room in the centuries-old college chapel with such a low ceiling that Jason, who is six foot three, had to actually crouch a little to walk around in. The carpet was faded and worn and there were decaying Sunday School posters on the walls, but it was quiet and free to use, which was all we really needed.
Pip was on FaceTime to her parents as she entered the room, talking in Spanish too fast for my GCSE-level skills to keep up with, looking somewhat exasperated as her mum kept interrupting her.
