But as we got closer to Sunday, she started to get a little more into it. She began bobbing on the spot as we ran through the piece. Sometimes she even sang along, just a little bit, like she was sure nobody could hear her.
By the end, I almost thought she was having fun.
We all were, really.
We were all having so much fun.
And this was going to work.
The night before that Sunday, Rooney did not go out.
I wasn’t sure why. Maybe she just didn’t feel like it. But for whatever reason, she looked up from her laptop screen as I returned from the shower and asked, ‘Wanna watch YouTube videos and eat biscuits?’
I squeezed into her bed, which was, like last time, pretty uncomfortable, so I said without thinking, ‘What if we moved our beds together?’ and Rooney said, ‘Why not?’ So, we did. We both pulled our beds into the centre of the room, squishing them together to make one giant double bed, and started watching TikTok compilations while making our way through my packet of chocolate digestives.
‘I’m really nervous about tomorrow,’ I confessed halfway through the third video.
‘Same,’ said Rooney, crunching a biscuit in her mouth.
‘Do you think she’ll like it?’
‘I honestly have no idea.’
We didn’t say anything else for a little while, and we soon finished the biscuits too. When the fourth video ended, Rooney didn’t go to find a new one, so we just lay there silently in the light of the screen.
After some time – maybe a few minutes, maybe longer – she asked, ‘D’you think it’s weird I’ve still got that picture of Beth?’
I rolled my head to face her.
‘No,’ I said. That was the truth.
‘I do,’ she said. She sounded so tired.
‘If she couldn’t be bothered to keep in contact when you moved schools then she doesn’t deserve you,’ I said. I was angry at Beth, honestly. I was angry at her for making Rooney care so much about someone who didn’t care about her.
Rooney huffed a tiny laugh into her pillow. ‘It wasn’t her. It was me.’
‘What d’you mean?’
‘When I was in Year Nine … that’s when I met my ex-boyfriend.’
‘The … horrible one?’
‘Ha, yeah. There was only one boyfriend. And he was horrible. Not that I realised that at the time.’
I didn’t say anything. I waited and let her tell the story.
‘He went to a different school. We would text each other all day every day. I was instantly obsessed with him. And I … I soon decided that the best thing would be for me to move to his school.’ She snorted. ‘I just screamed at my parents until they let me move schools. I made up lies that I was being bullied, that I had no friends. As you can imagine, I was the actual worst child alive.’
‘And Beth was from your old school?’
There was a pause, before Rooney said, ‘Beth was the only real friend I ever had.’
‘But … you stopped speaking to her …’
‘I know,’ said Rooney, rubbing one eye with her fist. ‘I just … I thought having a boyfriend was the best thing ever. I thought I was in love. So I immediately gave everything up. Beth. Everyone else I knew at school. My whole life was at that school. I had … hobbies. Me and Beth did all the school shows. I went to the drama club. I’d always pester the head of drama to let us do a Shakespeare and she’d always give in. I was … happy. I was actually happy.’ Her voice quietened. ‘And I gave all of it up to be with my boyfriend.’
And Beth had forgotten her. Rooney had remembered, Rooney had never stopped thinking about what her life would have been like if she hadn’t chosen ‘love’ over everything else. She’d never stopped imagining what it would have been like to grow up with someone who really, genuinely cared about her.
‘My life was just horrible throughout the three years we dated. Well, I say dated, if you’re not counting the ten billion times he broke up with me, then decided we should get back together. And all the times he cheated on me.’ Rooney’s eyes were damp. ‘He decided everything. He decided when we would go to parties. He decided we should start drinking and smoking and going to clubs using fake IDs. He decided when we would have sex. And I just kept thinking … as long as he was happy, then I must be living my dream. This was love. He was my soulmate. This was what everyone wanted.’
And this had gone on for three years?