The Making of Us

by Debbie McGowan

  Leigh held out their phone for me to read; it displayed the same message I’d received.

  It was dark…ish. Dark enough with the curtains drawn to need the lamp on. And we were on the bed—sitting up, playing on our phones. Matty’s text gave us just under two hours to make the most of our alone time.

  “Ha!” Leigh started typing. “Your mum’s blaming me!”

  My screen had dimmed; I reactivated it and read my mum’s comment.

  I take back what I said about you being a good influence.

  The ‘LOL’ and winky face took the sting out of her light ticking off. I smiled, loving the way Leigh and my mum were bantering on Facebook, and reached up, gingerly running my finger over the tender swelling, tracing it upwards to the tiny ball, and down again to the ball at the other end. I felt like I’d had minor surgery—I suppose I had, in a way.

  It had hurt less than I’d expected it to. The body artist got me to sit in a black vinyl reclining chair, similar to the one at the dentist, and marked where the piercing would go. I had no clue if it was the right place, but Leigh said it was, so I sat back and watched the pincers advance, closing my eyes at the squeeze and clinging to the arms of the chair as the needle pushed through. The bar went in, the ball was screwed on, I listened carefully to the aftercare advice, paid up, and that was it. Done. In spite of the evidence—onscreen and on my face—I couldn’t quite believe I’d done it.

  “OK!” Leigh flung their phone on the windowsill, using the change of position to edge closer. “What shall we do now?”

  Hyper aware of the slight but meaningful contact between our thighs, I reached behind me to deposit my phone. It slid across Leigh’s and landed somewhere with a glassy clunk. I peered over my shoulder, couldn’t see it, didn’t care…

  Leigh traced with a fingertip the abstract square print on my t-shirt, right to left, up, across, hand spanning my chest, down to my side, firm press, coaxing me to meet them halfway. I shifted down the bed until I was lying almost flat, and they shifted with me, the silent moment before our kiss like an elastic band stretched to its fullest…and released.

  We were past pretence, beyond the slow build. The kiss was frantic, urgent, out of control. Desire kicked some of my fear into touch, enough that I slid my fingers under the hem of Leigh’s top, so caught up in the kiss, the closeness, the everythingness—that what I was doing only properly registered when Leigh tensed and held their breath.

  “I’m sorry,” I whispered and would’ve moved my hand from where it was, but it was trapped between Leigh’s arm and their side.

  “It’s OK. But…so it’s not a shock, I’m stubbly. From when I waxed.”

  I hummed to show I’d heard, and Leigh relaxed, but it was taking some effort.

  I asked, keeping my tone light, because it was a tricky topic but I’d find out at some point anyway, “How hairy are you? When you don’t wax.”

  Leigh lifted on one elbow and looked me in the eye, one brow raised, mouth tipped to match in a disbelieving but amused smile.

  I winced. “It’s a rude question, I’m sor—Leigh!” They yanked my t-shirt up as far as my nipples. I grappled for it, tugging it back down at the sides. “Leigh! What—”

  “Not as hairy as you,” they said and faceplanted the middle of my chest—that god-awful moob cleavage—and blew a really wet raspberry.

  “Agh! That tickles!” I giggled and instinctively squeezed my arms in to protect myself, which only made my moobs more obvious.

  Nuzzling between them, Leigh made some kind of obscene turkey-gobble noise, and I totally lost it, crying from laughing and wondering what the hell had happened to my shame of a few seconds ago. OK, yes, I felt exposed—no one had seen my body since…well, since I grew all that body hair—but I wasn’t desperate to cover up or escape. In fact, I didn’t want to escape at all.

  But I was really ticklish. “Ple-a-ase-st-op-p!”

  Leigh’s grin was impish, but they did as I asked while I caught my breath and resisted the temptation to pull my t-shirt down again.

  “This’ll make it easier,” they said.

  “What?”

  The light went out.

  I blinked blindly, trying to force my eyes to adjust, only aware of Leigh’s movements and a soft ruffling sound.

  “What’re you doing?” I asked.

  “Take your top off.”

  I drew breath and held it. Suddenly, this all felt very serious again.

  “Is it off?”

  “Not yet.” I could see Leigh’s outline, no detail, confirming they were already topless. It gave my motivation a jumpstart. I grabbed the hem of my t-shirt and tugged it upwards, wriggling it past my shoulders and over my head. “OK, it’s off,” I confirmed, a bit of panic mixed in there with a whole lot of anticipation.

  Leigh’s touch on my chest was firm and assured, cool fingertips connecting with skin through my chest hair.

  “Confession time,” I said.

  “Another secret?”

  “Um…yes. Definitely one to keep between you and me.”

  “OK?”

  “I waxed my chest once.”

  Leigh stayed quiet.

  I went on: “It was pointless, and it really hurts.”

  “Yeah, tell me about it.”

  I inhaled deeply, exhaling slowly as Leigh’s fingers reached around my side, where they tickled lightly. I squeaked and tensed, and Leigh giggled, at the same time moving in closer, their arm now resting on my chest. The warmth registered half a second before their body made side-on contact with mine, and I groaned, unable to suppress either it or the desire to touch, to feel more.

  Wrapping my arms around Leigh, I drew them close. Our kisses merged hungrily one into the next, the sensations almost too much. I was on the brink. It would’ve taken no more than one brush of a knee across my crotch; Leigh was lying diagonally across my chest, and our lower bodies weren’t touching yet—luckily, because I had more to say.

  “That was only the preamble, incidentally.”

  “Oh? What’s the rest?”

  Right up to the last second, I was debating whether I should leave it to some point in the future, say it now, or say it never, and Leigh was allowing me to get there in my own time, but the same nerves holding me back were also keeping my climax at bay. I gave myself the mental equivalent of a shove off a diving board and blurted, “Your hairiness turns me on.”

  There was the briefest pause, before Leigh gave an amused, “Uh-huh?” simultaneous with a change of position that put their thigh between mine, mine between theirs. “You don’t want me to wax?”

  “You should do it if you want to, but…” Oh, God, I was close, and embarrassed, and close. “I won’t be complaining if you don’t.”

  The heated pressure on my thigh intensified as Leigh pushed and rocked, and our bodies rubbed together. I could only hope I wasn’t misreading the rapidness of Leigh’s breaths and movements, because it was beyond my control now. My inhibitions gone, I gripped Leigh’s head and lifted off the pillow to kiss them, dragging my lips over their chin and cheek. Exhilaration, bliss and…

  Like a roller coaster, up, up…over—the—top…and down, down… Oh…shoot! Why did I say that? Why?

  We panted into the silence, out of sync.

  My question, “Did you…?”

  Their answer, “Mmm. Did…oh, yeah, you did.”

  We’d need clean pants—we’d probably need to do some laundry, too at some point. It was only our third night. A launderette? I’d Google it in the morning…

  “So, you’ve got a thing for body hair, huh?”

  I laughed, so embarrassed I’d shared, but yeah. I wasn’t going to deny it. What was the point when it was true? “That OK?”

  “Totally.” With a cheeky tweak of my nipple that made me gasp and slap my hands down on both, Leigh crawled away to the end of the bed, where I admired their dark silhouette against the whiteness of the door as they pulled on their top and pointed at their pants. “Gonna c
hange these.”

  “OK.” I closed my eyes as they slipped out of sight.

  * * * * *

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  “We could go to the zoo,” Leigh suggested.

  “The zoo?” Not that I had any better ideas for how we should spend our day. The sun was shining, but it was gusty, and the red flags were out on the beach. Hazel assured us they wouldn’t be for long; however, our sporting heroes were suffering a fair bit for their waterskiing adventures and weren’t overly keen on anything too physical, or nothing more physical than Matty’s stretch-and-moan routine, which was entertaining me no end. Meanwhile, Leigh was manipulating Noah’s shoulders. He didn’t look like he was enjoying it.

  “The zoo?” His tone was much more ‘are you for real?’ than mine had been.

  “The zoo,” Leigh confirmed with a shrugged appeal to Matty for backup.

  “How about you, you, you? You can come too, too, too…” Matty sang, and danced, more backing singer than backup. Noah covered his eyes and groaned. “We’re going to the zoo, zoo, zoo.”

  That was two in favour, and I didn’t care one way or the other. I patted Noah’s shoulder. He whinnied. “Face facts, mate. We’re going to the zoo.”

  “Zoo, zoo. How about you, you, you…”

  “Fine.” Noah raised his voice over Matty’s singing. “Anything to shut him up by this point.”

  Seeing as Hazel was heading out for groceries and wouldn’t even hear of us catching the bus, we all piled into the VW, then unpiled with strict orders to call when we wanted picking up, unless we were planning to go on to a nightclub, in which case we were on our own. We thanked her and waved as she tootled off the way she’d come.

  “Nightclub,” Leigh repeated with a laugh and peered down at their outfit: a long-sleeved stripy t-shirt, intentionally ripped-to-ribbons jeans with turn-ups, and baseball boots. Funky, sexy, just perfect. They probably would get into a nightclub. The rest of us, not so much. Noah and I were wearing jeans, checked shirts and t-shirts, and Matty’s pants defied description. He might even have been wearing a skirt. Whatever, his shredded white Blondie t-shirt—with a long-sleeved black t-shirt underneath—looked like an original 1980s edition that had gone a few rounds with his nan and grandad’s dogs.

  Leigh and Matty bounced off ahead of us, arm in arm, to the ticket office, and it struck me again how alike they were, with their outlandish outfits and wild hair. I still didn’t know what colour Leigh’s was; whenever they were in touching distance, I forgot to ask. They and Matty were alike in other ways, too—extrovert, friendly, a bit on the crazy side in a good way, rather than because of their shared experiences of foster care and being slapped with the ‘special needs’ label. I didn’t doubt for a second that those experiences made them who they were—uniquely clever, loving, kind, accepting of other people’s differences—perhaps because they were different, and in the best possible ways.

  “You OK there, mate?” Noah asked.

  I smiled. “Yeah.” And then some. I’d been to zoos before, and they weren’t really my thing, but sharing a day with Leigh and my best buds? Couldn’t get better than that.

  We caught up with Leigh and Matty, who’d already bought our tickets and handed them over then walked ahead again as soon as we were through the barrier. Noah pulled back further, and I slowed to match his pace.

  “Did you notice that photo of Matty in Hazel and Stu’s sitting room?” he asked.

  I side-eyed him for his daft question. The photo was almost as big as my Pink poster.

  Noah strolled on, hands in pockets, watching with a pensive expression as our respective partners pored over their zoo maps. “Matty’s parents lied to him, when he was little. Told him his nan and grandad were dead.”

  “Jesus.”

  “He didn’t believe them—they said stuff like that all the time, apparently—so they changed it to his nan and grandad wanting nothing to do with him, which was closer to the truth. Hazel and Meg were talking about it yesterday.”

  “Meg’s Hazel’s sister, right?”

  “Yep. Like peas in a pod. Good people. She didn’t say it outright, but the gist was, Hazel and Stu cut their ties with Matty’s mum because of the drugs, and moved back here. Then they tried to get guardianship and were turned down because they lived too far away. If they’d stayed in Norwich…”

  “Ah, man. That’s tragic.”

  “It is, but like Matty says, if it’d panned out, we probably wouldn’t have met.” I glanced Noah’s way; he smiled. “We’re getting married. Did I tell you?”

  “Um…no?”

  “Sorry, mate. I sort of lost track of who we’ve told and who we haven’t. Not that you’re a long way down the list or anything, but I had to tell Mum and Dad first, of course, then Adam and Sol, and it’s not imminent. Maybe next year sometime, but…I’m really sorry, Jess.”

  “It’s OK,” I said, and it was, if not a bit out of the blue. “Congratulations!”

  “Cheers. You sound surprised.”

  “Hmm…I am and I’m not.” I knew they’d get married at some point, but the way Noah was with uni, I’d thought he’d want to wait until he’d finished his Master’s.

  “So…” He tugged his hands free of his pockets and rubbed them together. He was nervous, and I had a butterflies-inducing feeling I knew why. “D’you, um, reckon you can stretch to being my best man?”

  I sniffed and clicked my teeth, contemplating, or pretending to. “What about Adam?”

  “What about him? I mean, if you don’t—”

  “Behave. Noah, I would be honoured to be your best man.”

  “For real?”

  “Totally, one hundred percent for real.”

  Noah sighed heavily, like he’d honestly thought I’d say no. As if! “Thanks, mate. It means the world to me. You mean the world to me—to both of us.”

  “Likewise,” I said. We were both tearing up a bit.

  Noah nodded in Matty’s direction. “He’s so happy here. I mean, he’s nearly always happy, but it runs deeper.”

  “Funny you saying that. I’ve been thinking the same about you.”

  “Knock-on effect, probably.”

  “Yeah, probably.” There was more to it, but we were almost caught up again. Matty disappeared around a corner; Leigh pointed in the direction he’d gone and also disappeared. Noah and I sped up.

  “I tell you what,” he said, “I’m not looking forward to the goodbye on Saturday.”

  “It’s only Tuesday.”

  “Yeah, but still.”

  I sighed. So much for Noah’s newfound sunny disposition, although he wasn’t in a bad mood. Just a thoughtful one.

  “We’re doing the monkey walk,” Leigh explained when we finally reached them, and yes, Matty had taken that literally.

  I checked the map they’d given me with my ticket. “We’re going the wrong way round.”

  “I told him that.”

  It didn’t really matter. After all, we had to start somewhere, so why not at the end instead of the beginning?

  The monkey walk was actually a lot of fun—I could never get over how much like us some species were. There was one little guy—an emperor tamarin, which Leigh decided was his name and Matty decreed him ruler of MonkeyLand—who looked like an olde-worlde professor with his droopy white moustache and baldy head. All that was missing was a monocle.

  Next after the monkeys was a miniature farm, which we mostly bypassed, seeing as Norfolk was basically one big farm, although none of the livestock back home looked as miserable as the Visayan warty pig.

  “If he had a book, he’d look just like you, Noo,” Matty said with a grin. Noah scowled but took it in his stride.

  From there, we went to the meerkats, which were opposite the lions and the most interesting of the two. There was something quite disconcerting about seeing enormous beasts used to roaming the dusty plains of Africa held captive in a muddy enclosure, albeit a fairly large one. The lions lay there passively as we a
nd all the kids on half-term break trooped by. Meanwhile, across the way, the meerkats were digging and squabbling and doing their very best to entertain us; we stayed awhile to watch them before moving on to the penguin pool.

  I must admit by that point, I was bored, and I’d expected Matty would be, too, but he’d never visited a zoo before and was enthralled. I leaned on the wall, watching the penguins swimming while Matty rattled off a running commentary to match their actions. Leigh came to stand next to me; I greeted them with a “Hi.”

  “Hi. You OK?”

  “Yeah. You?”

  “Uh-huh. How’s the eyebrow?”

  I’d forgotten about it until then. “Throbbing a little. Nothing I can’t handle.”

  “Course!”

  I glanced Leigh’s way, and they grinned, teasing me. I put my arm around them, and they reciprocated. “Has Matty told you his and Noah’s news?” I asked.

  “What news?”

  “They’re getting married.”

  “When?”

  “Next year.”

  “No way…Matty!”

  “Yeah?”

  “What’s this about wedding bells?”

  “Oh! Yeah, me and Noo are getting married.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “Cos…I dunno.” He looked perplexed. “I just…I dunno. Sorry.”

  Now I really was suspicious, but Noah was all uptight, so I left it alone. Whatever was going on, he’d tell me in his own time. I turned back to the penguins, watching Noah and Matty out the corner of my eye. Matty stretched up to speak into Noah’s ear; Noah nodded.

  “We’re going to get food,” Matty said.

  “OK. We’ll be there in a second.” I waited until they were out of earshot. “What d’you think’s going on?” I asked Leigh.

  “No idea. I’ll see if I can get it out of Matty when we’re at the beach tomorrow.”

  “I’ll do the same with Noah.”

  “Cool.”

  We both pushed off the wall together and strolled towards the snack bar where Noah and Matty were queueing.

  “I was wondering…” Leigh said.

  “Hmm?”