Rooney said nothing for a few moments.
And then she said, ‘Listen, Georgia. You might feel that way right now, but … don’t give up hope. Maybe you’re going through a rough patch at the moment, like, I don’t know, the stress of starting uni or whatever, but … you will meet someone you like one day. Everyone does.’
No, they don’t, was what I wanted to say.
Not everyone.
Not me.
‘It’s a real thing,’ I said. ‘It’s a … it’s a real sexuality. When you don’t like anyone.’
I couldn’t say the actual words, though.
It probably wouldn’t have helped if I had.
‘OK,’ said Rooney. ‘Well, how do you know that you are … that? How do you know that you won’t meet someone one day who you really like?’
I stared at her.
Of course she didn’t understand.
Rooney wasn’t the romance expert I’d thought she was. I was pretty sure I knew more than her at this point.
‘I’ve never had a crush on anyone in my life,’ I said, but my voice was quiet and I didn’t even sound confident, let alone feel confident about who I was. ‘I … I like the idea of it, but … the reality …’ I trailed off, feeling a lump in my throat. If I tried to explain it, I knew I would just start crying. It was still so new. I’d never tried to explain it to anyone before.
‘Have you kissed a girl, then?’
I looked at her. She was looking at me level-headedly. Almost like a challenge.
‘No,’ I said.
‘So how do you know you don’t like that?’
Deep down, I knew this was an unfair question. You didn’t have to try something to know for sure you don’t like it. I knew I didn’t like skydiving. I definitely didn’t need to try that out to prove it.
But I was drunk. And so was she.
‘I dunno,’ I said.
‘Maybe you should give it a go before you … you know. Completely reject the idea that you could possibly find someone.’ Rooney laughed again. She wasn’t trying to do it in a mean way. But that was how it felt.
I knew she just wanted to help.
And that sort of made it worse.
She was trying to be a good friend, but she was saying all the wrong things because she didn’t have the faintest idea what it was like to be me.
‘Maybe,’ I mumbled, leaning back into the beanbag.
‘Why don’t you try with me?’
Wait.
What?
‘What?’ I said, turning my head to face her.
She rolled to one side so her whole body was facing mine, then held up both hands in a gesture of surrender. ‘I literally just want to help. I absolutely don’t like you that way – no offence – but you might be able to get a sense of whether it’s something you might like. I want to help.’
‘But … I don’t like you like that,’ I said. ‘Even if I was gay, I wouldn’t necessarily feel something just because you’re a girl.’
‘OK, maybe not,’ she said with a sigh. ‘I just don’t want to see you give up without trying.’
She was annoying me, and I realised that it was because what I was doing wasn’t ‘giving up’。
It was acceptance.
And maybe, just maybe, that could be a good thing.
‘I don’t want you to feel like you’re going to be sad and lonely forever!’ she said, and that was the moment I broke a little.
Was that all I would be? Sad and lonely? Forever?
Had I doomed myself by daring to think about this part of me?
Was I just accepting a life of solitude?
As soon as those questions hit me, they opened the floodgate to all the doubts I thought I’d been fighting off.
Maybe it was all just a phase.
Maybe this was giving up.
Maybe I should keep trying.
Maybe, maybe, maybe.
‘Fine, then,’ I said.
‘You wanna try?’
I sighed, defeated, tired. I was so tired of all this. ‘Yeah. Go on, then.’
It couldn’t really be any worse than the one with Jason, could it?
And so she leant in.
It was different. Rooney was used to deeper, longer kisses of an entirely different type.
She led. I tried to imitate her.
I hated it.
I hated it just as I had hated the kiss with Jason. I hated how close her face was to me. I hated the feeling of her lips moving around against mine. I hated her breath on my skin. My eyes kept flickering open, trying to get a sense of when this was going to be over, while she put her hand on the back of my head, pulling me closer to her.