by KE Payne
“It’s crazy,” I whispered to her down the phone. “Crazy how you make me feel, Gem.”
“I’ve never felt like this about anyone, Immy,” Fickle whispered back. She paused. “Ah shit, I’m sorry, I’ve gotta go. I’m sorry.”
“S’ok,” I said, leaning back from the machine. “I’ve gotta go too.”
“I just wanted to hear your voice, thassall,” Fickle said, “And let you know that I’m counting the hours till I can talk to you again later.”
“Me too,” I said, tracing my finger up and down the glass of the coffee machine. “It’s gonna be a long day,” I added, groaning.
“I’ll speak to you later, yeah?” Fickle said. I could hear the sound of a door opening at the other end of the phone followed by the muffled noise of voices.
“Laters,” I said, snapping my phone shut and staring at it for a second, a stupid smile on my face.
“Someone looks happy.” A voice sounded next to me and I jumped as I felt an arm being casually flung round my shoulders.
I turned my head and saw Beth peering in through the glass of the coffee machine, then watched as she screwed up her nose and pulled a face.
“All tastes like shit but they still charge you two quid for it.” She glanced over to the bar and grabbed my hand. “For an extra 50p we might as well have something that tastes like it’s had a coffee bean run through it. Come on. I’ll buy you a latte if you tell me who or what’s put that stupid grin on your face.”
Before I could answer, she’d dragged me over to the counter and had ordered us two skinny lattes, fishing a five pound note out of her bag and hungrily eyeing up the cakes.
“D’you s’pose eight in the morning’s too early for a doughnut or two?” she asked, more to herself than to me.
“Nah, just the lattes, please, mate.” She jerked her head at the spotty guy serving behind the counter, her decision made, and handed him the fiver.
We turned away from the counter and she slung her arm round my shoulder again, pulling me in to her, making me spill a drop of my coffee on the linoleum floor.
“I don’t have a stupid grin on my face,” I said as we sat down at a table near the door.
“You so did, though.” Beth grabbed a sachet of sugar from a cup on the table and opened it.
“So maybe I’m in a good mood?” I said, kinda defensively.
“Did you get back with Matt, then?” Beth’s voice was high, almost anxious.
I snorted.
“News does travel fast, doesn’t it?” I gave her a wry look.
“Emily wasn’t gossiping, honest!” Beth put her hands up in the air. “She just happened to mention it. I suppose she kinda thought you might have told me too.”
“It’s no biggie.” I stirred my coffee, then tapped the spoon on the side of the cup. “I only told Emily ’cos I saw her the day after it’d happened and I was still feeling a bit weird about it all.”
“I wasn’t surprised, I have to say.” Beth studied me over the top of her cup, the steam from her coffee masking her face slightly.
“No?” I cupped my mug with both hands and blew gently into it, making the liquid inside ripple.
“Nope.” Beth sipped her coffee. “I always figured he was way more into you than you were him.”
“You were right.”
“Although I did find it strange ’cos he seems like the ideal guy, but I guess we’re all different, huh?”
“There was nothing wrong with Matt,” I said slowly. “It was me, not him.”
“That’s what they all say!” Beth laughed.
“But it really was all me, nothing to do with him,” I persisted, part of me wanting Beth to push me further. She didn’t.
“I heard on the grapevine that Sarah Burgess has been sniffing round him already.” Beth studied my face carefully.
“Then she’ll be a lucky girl if she gets him,” I replied truthfully.
“You wouldn’t be hurt if he moved on so quickly?” Beth raised her eyebrow.
“No,” I replied. “I wouldn’t. In fact, I’d be pleased for him.”
“Yeah, right!” Beth turned and looked away briefly before turning back to me. “You only say that to make yourself feel better for dumping a prize guy!”
“No, really.” I put my coffee cup down and leant back in my chair, folding my arms across my chest. “In fact, I’d actively encourage him to find someone who would be better for him than I was. He deserves someone nicer than me.”
“That sounds a little self-pitying, don’t you think?” Beth placed her coffee down in front of her and gave it another quick stir.
“I was a bit shit to him, to be honest.” I shrugged. “Could have been more enthusiastic than I was, I s’pose.”
“I’m sure you did your best.” Beth picked her coffee cup up again. “No point in flogging a dead donkey, though, was there, as my old gran used to say.”
“No, not when it wasn’t him I wanted,” I found myself saying.
“You wanted someone else?” Beth put her cup down again and leaned over the table. “You dark horse! You never said!”
“I didn’t dump him for someone else, though,” I said. “Well, not technically.”
“Technically, shmechnically!” Beth scoffed. “You gave him the old heave-ho ’cos you’ve got your eye on someone else, didn’t you?”
“Mmm,” I mumbled.
“Mmm?” Beth made big eyes.
“Mmmm!” I mumbled again, more exaggeratedly this time.
Could I tell Beth? I so wanted to talk to her about it, but a part of me was terrified she’d have the same reaction as Twiggy the night before. That was the thing about telling people you’re gay, I supposed. The danger was that everything they ever thought about you, or felt for you, could change in the blink of an eye and they might not ever think about you or treat you in the same way ever again. Why was that? Why did people automatically think you different just because you tell them you’re gay? You’re still the same person underneath, right? Still the same person who laughed and joked with them the day before. Still the same person whom they know and love.
I looked at Beth. I’d known her most of my life. We’d been at school together since year 11; we’d been told off by Mr Plummer for chatting in class together, we’d stood outside the headteacher’s door together for various misdemeanours, we’d taken exams together and now here we were, both eighteen, helping each other through our tough college years together.
“So you’re seeing someone else?” Beth’s eyebrows were practically touching her hairline by now. I looked at her in amusement.
“Sort of,” I replied.
“Sort of?” Beth repeated. “Surely you either are or you aren’t?”
“It’s complicated.” I shrugged.
“Isn’t it always with guys?” Beth laughed ironically.
“Yeah.” I laughed too.
I didn’t elaborate; after all, why should I? I decided there and then that I wouldn’t tell Beth about Fickle; I was absolutely sure she wouldn’t understand, and I didn’t want to risk alienating her over it. With Twiggy last night it had been different; the anonymity of the Internet made me feel braver, somehow. Typing it out to someone who was essentially still a stranger to me was a darned sight easier than telling someone face-to-face—especially one of my older friends. In that split second I decided that if Beth wanted to think it was a guy, then I’d let her. After all, I hadn’t even met Fickle yet. What exactly could I tell Beth about her? She’d think I was crazy, dumping a perfectly good boyfriend for a girl I barely knew. Even as I was telling myself this in my head, I could see it was ludicrous.
I felt deflated. I drained the last of my coffee and gathered up my bag, making some big show of looking at my watch and pretending I was late for my first lesson. “Well, much as I’d like to sit talking all day,” I said, scraping back my chair and stepping away from the table, “I gotta go.”
“See you later?” Beth looked up at me from her chair. �
�I’ll ask Emily over too. We can grill you about your new paramour.” She winked at me.
“Maybe,” I lied, knowing full well I’d do everything in my power to avoid them for the rest of the day.
I walked from the canteen and hurried up the stairs towards the college’s library, flipping open my phone as I did so. There was another text from Fickle, telling me she was at college and that she couldn’t concentrate on her work ’cos she was thinking about me, and what was it I was doing to her? She’d put a winking sign after it and, like, a thousand kisses and I wondered if I was doing the right thing, getting carried away with Fickle. Maybe Twiggy had been right? Maybe I just liked the attention Fickle was giving me and I was using her as an excuse to get away from Matt. But I’d gotten away from Matt, hadn’t I? I’d taken the plunge and finished things with him, and I was still crazy about Fickle. That wasn’t using her, was it?
I flipped my phone shut again, turning the corner just in time to see Matt walking down the corridor towards me. It was too late to turn and walk away as it was obvious by the look on his face that he’d seen me, so I carried on walking towards him, smiling warmly at him. It felt forced.
“Hey,” I started as we finally stopped in front of each other, but my voice sounded strangled. I cleared my throat and said, “Hey,” again, louder this time.
“Hey.” Matt gazed down. He stood awkwardly in front of me, hands dug deep in his pockets, college bag slung diagonally over his shoulders. His hair, as always, was just so, his skinny jeans slightly ripped, tight T-shirt with the name of some band I’d never heard of before written across the front. It was Matt, just like he’d always been.
“How’re you?” I asked, kinda weakly.
“Yeah, good.” He looked down at his feet. “You?”
“I’m good too, yeah.” I nodded.
There was an awkward silence as we both stood facing each other, neither sure what to say.
“So what’ve you been up to lately?” I asked, not particularly caring, just asking for want of something to say to break the deafening silence.
“What, since you dumped me?” Matt twisted his mouth to the side.
“Yeah, about that,” I started.
“It’s cool.” Matt adjusted his bag and stared down at his feet again. “It happens, yeah?”
“I’m sorry,” I said, truthfully. “I really am.”
“I know.” Matt looked straight at me. “Like I said, it happens, and I still feel like shit about it right now, and I wish we were still together, but I’ll get over it.”
“Sarah Burgess has been asking questions,” I said casually. “She could help you get over it.” I pulled a face and he laughed.
“I know, I heard.” Matt rolled his eyes exaggeratedly.
I put my hands in my jeans pockets and scuffed my foot back and forth on the floor, shifting my glance from Matt’s face down to my feet.
“But I am sorry, Matt. You gotta believe that. We just, I dunno, we just weren’t right for each other.” I thought about taking his hand, then thought against it, instead keeping both hands firmly in my pockets.
“I guess.” Matt shrugged. “And I know you’re sorry ’cos if you say something then I know you really mean it, and I appreciate that. Doesn’t mean I understand why you did it, though…” His voice trailed off.
I nodded, unsure how to answer that, and automatically glanced down at my bag as I heard my phone beep from somewhere deep inside it.
“I better go,” I said, moving away. “I’m glad you’re doing well.”
Matt nodded.
“Yeah.” He paused, and I wondered for a minute if he was going to say something else. “Well, I’ll see ya, yeah?” he said, before brushing past me and wandering off down the corridor.
I watched his retreating back and felt, well, nothing again, just like I’d felt nothing that night at the café. I was glad, though, that I’d seen him so soon after finishing with him, and that I’d had a chance to tell him again how sorry I was. Maybe it made me feel less guilty, more able to move on. I don’t know. All I did know was that now I’d spoken to him I really could move on and concentrate more on Fickle without feeling so bad about it all. I fished my phone out of my bag to see who’d texted me and, half-expecting to see a message from Fickle, instead saw it was from Joey.
Hey trouble, it said, Back from Scottyland. U around l8r? Wd b gd 2 talk.
I texted her back, secretly glad that Joey wanted to talk to me. Wanna Skype l8r? I wrote. We can talk in hushed tones. Parents have ears LOL.
Joey answered pretty much straight away.
Sure thing! Got heaps to tell you!
I was dying to tell her about Fickle; Joey would understand far more than Twiggy, Beth, or Emily about it all. With another grin I snapped my phone shut and finally headed off to the library, my mind now set towards the work I knew would be waiting for me there.
Chapter Thirteen
Later that night, after a day more gruelling than I thought it would have been, with lessons and meetings with course leaders about forthcoming work and such, I finally arrived home just desperate to be able to switch off and indulge in a few hours’ fun on the message board.
I called out around the house, standing in the hall listening for a reply from anyone. There was silence, so, knowing I could talk to Fickle safe in the knowledge no one would eavesdrop on us, I flipped open my phone and dialled her number. I felt the familiar squidgy feeling in my stomach when, after a couple of rings, she answered.
“Hey, gorgeous,” she said. “How was your day?”
“All the better for speaking to you,” I replied, shrugging my jacket off and flinging it onto the stairs. I wandered into the kitchen and heaved the fridge door open, peering inside searching for something to eat.
“I was thinking today,” Fickle said. “About us meeting up, you know, like I said before?”
I put the piece of cheese that I’d found lurking in the back of the fridge and that had been en route to my mouth down on the sideboard, suddenly nervous.
“Yeah?” I said, kinda unconvincingly.
“Yeah,” Fickle replied. “After all, we wanna get to know each other better, don’t we?”
“Well, yeah,” I said, again without much enthusiasm.
“You don’t sound keen.” Fickle sounded hurt.
“Oh I am, I am,” I replied truthfully. “I s’pose, I dunno, I s’pose I’m just kinda nervous at the thought, thassall.”
“What’s there to be nervous about?” Fickle laughed. “It’s cool! I really like you, Immy, I wanna meet you.”
“I really like you too, Gems,” I replied. “And of course I wanna meet you, you know I do.”
I swallowed hard.
“Good,” Fickle said. “So go get your arse on the Internet and look up some trains. We can find somewhere halfway and meet there, yeah?”
“When?” I said, “I mean, when do you wanna meet?” I climbed the stairs to my room and sat myself down in front of my computer.
“This weekend?” Fickle replied. “I think I’ll burst if I don’t get to see you soon.”
I stared at the computer screen as it kicked into life and eased out a breath, trying to quell the shakiness in my voice. This was real. This was happening. Me and Fickle were going to meet and I wasn’t sure it was what I wanted.
Wait, who was I kidding? It was exactly what I wanted, but I was crapping myself at the thought of moving things with Fickle to another stage.
“Saturday?” I ventured. “I could look up trains for next Saturday.”
“Saturday sounds good,” Fickle said. “Wait, I’m putting on my laptop. Lemme see what trains I can find too.”
“Wanna Skype?” I asked, typing the URL of a train company into the computer with one hand. “You have Skype, don’t you?”
“I can’t.” Fickle lowered her voice. “Mum’s downstairs and, well, you know.”
I laughed.
“Yeah, I know. It’s all very clandestine, isn’t it?�
�� I said, watching as the page on the screen started to download.
“I love it,” Fickle whispered, “I get a real buzz from it, don’t you? All this secrecy. I always do.”
“I guess,” I replied. Truth was, I hadn’t really thought of it that way. I was just happy that me and Fickle had admitted that we fancied each other. Anything else hadn’t really occurred to me.
After ten or so minutes looking at trains, we each both chose and paid for a train from our respective cities that would mean we would both arrive at Birmingham railway station, which was halfway between us, mid-morning on the following Saturday. I chose a mid-afternoon train home, telling Fickle I would need to get back early evening so that I could have a lift back from the station. It was a lie, albeit a white one. In reality, I was shit-scared that me and Fickle wouldn’t hit it off and worried that we’d spend the whole day in silence, each of us wishing to God we’d booked an earlier train home. I figured if we did get on, there would be plenty of other times to meet, right? Best play it safe for this first one.
“So we’re done,” Fickle said. “Saturday eleven a.m., Birmingham New Street station.”
“No finer station in the country.” I giggled.
“I really can’t wait to meet you, Immy,” Fickle said. “It’s gonna be sooooo good.”
I sat back in my chair and puffed out my cheeks. Please, God, I thought, let her be right. Let it be good.
*
After we’d both said good-bye and I’d logged off again, I spent the next hour kinda just walking round the house in a daze, wondering just what the hell I was doing. It was madness; it was weird; it was like nothing I’d ever done before and a million questions kept creeping into my head, like, was it safe? Was it right? Was it what ordinary people did, meeting a total stranger at Birmingham New Street railway station on a Saturday morning?
I rubbed my eyes impatiently. I wanted to meet her, I really did. I mean, how would I ever know if what Fickle and I had been telling each other could ever be true unless I did meet her? How would I know if my feelings were real if all I ever did forever more was just to talk to her on the phone, or on MSN? I snatched up my phone and, knowing the one person who could make all this seem sane was back home from Scotland, wanting to talk to me, sent a text with a plea of help to her. Joey was going to be my voice of reason tonight.
