I tried to imagine doing this with a person I liked, but it was a mirage. The harder I tried to think about that scenario, the quicker it disintegrated.
I was never, ever going to enjoy this. With anybody.
It wasn’t just a dislike of kissing. It wasn’t a fear or nervousness or ‘not meeting the right person yet’。 This was a part of me. I did not feel the feelings of attraction, of romance, of desire, that other people felt.
And I wasn’t ever going to.
I really hadn’t needed to kiss anyone to work that out.
Rooney, on the other hand, was going for it, which I assumed was what she did with everybody. The way she kissed made it feel like she really did like me, but I realised suddenly that I knew her better than that. It was never about the other person. She was using this to make her feel good about herself.
I didn’t have the energy to start to understand what that meant.
‘Oh,’ said a voice from behind us.
Rooney moved away from me instantly, and I, hazy and a little weirded out by this whole situation, turned to see who it was.
I should have guessed, really.
Because the universe seemed to have it in for me already.
Pip had her jacket folded over one arm and a toastie in her other hand.
‘I …’ she said, then trailed off. She was looking at me, eyes wide, then at Rooney, then back at me again. ‘I brought you a toastie, but …’ She looked at the toastie. ‘It – er, fucking hell.’ She looked back at both of us. ‘Wow. Fuck you both.’
Rooney leapt to her feet. ‘Hang on, you literally don’t understand what was just happening.’
Pip’s stare hardened.
‘I think it’s pretty plainly obvious what was just happening,’ she said. ‘So don’t try and insult me by lying about it.’
‘I’m not, but –’
‘If this was a thing, you could have at least told me about it.’ She turned her stare to me, her face scarily blank of emotion. ‘You could have at least told me about it.’
And then she walked out of the room.
Rooney wasted no time in running after her, and I quickly followed. I needed to explain. Rooney needed to explain.
Everyone just needed to stop lying and acting and pretending all the time.
Rooney grabbed Pip’s shoulders just as she got to the end of the corridor and pulled her round to face her.
‘Pip, just listen –’
‘To WHAT?’ Pip shouted, then lowered her voice as a few passing students turned round curiously. ‘If you’re seeing each other fine, just go and fuck each other and enjoy yourselves, but you could have at least done me the courtesy of informing me so I could try and put a stop to my feelings and not be absolutely fucking crushed right now –’ Her voice broke and there were tears in her eyes.
I wanted to explain, but I couldn’t speak.
I had ruined my friendship with Jason and now I was destroying my friendship with Pip too.
‘I don’t – we don’t – we’re not together!’ Rooney gestured to me wildly. ‘I swear! It was my fucking idea because I’m an idiot! Georgia’s just been figuring shit out and I’ve just been making stuff worse, making her date Jason as an experiment when she never really wanted to do that, and now this –’
It felt like the walls shattered around us. Pip clenched her fists. ‘Wait …’ She turned to me. ‘You – Jason was just an experiment?’
‘I …’ I wanted to say no, he wasn’t, I thought I liked him, I genuinely wanted to fall for him, but … was that a lie?
Pip’s face crumpled. She took a step towards me, and now she was shouting. ‘How could you do that? How could you do that to him?’
I stepped back, feeling tears forming. Don’t cry. Do not cry.
‘Stop blaming her!’ Rooney shouted back. ‘She was figuring out her sexuality!’
‘Well, she shouldn’t have done that with our best friend who’d only just got out of a relationship that made him feel like an actual piece of SHIT!’
She was right. I’d fucked up. I’d fucked up so bad.
Rooney physically put an arm in between me and Pip. ‘Stop trying to make this about something else when we know what this is about!’
‘Oh yeah?’ Pip’s voice lowered. There were tear stains down her cheeks. ‘What’s this about, then?’
‘About the fact that you hate me. You think I’m taking Georgia away from you and because she’s one of your only two friends, you despise me because you think I’m replacing you in her life.’