Page 38 of I Love You, I Love You, I Love You

From then onwards I become so annoying. I like dropping Christopher’s name into conversation: ‘Let me check with Christopher’, I gloat, even though there’s absolutely nothing to check in with Christopher about. Having a boyfriend (pending) means I am on the radar with cool girls in school. They invite me to their coffee mornings at Starbucks. Isobel Chaser invites me to a Games Night at her house where all the boyfriends come and they get drunk and pretend they know how to play poker. I hear the last one got a bit wild, that they raided Isobel’s dad’s whiskey collection and refilled the empty bottles with cold tea. That they snuck into rooms and worked their way up the bases. It’s a hard balance to strike: you have to hope you don’t go too far and yet keep up with the pack. Ideally everyone in a friendship group gets fingered as the clock strikes the exact same hour but you can’t always plan these things – it really is a game of trust and good faith.

‘Oh, and bring Christopher,’ she orders, turning away, like it’s as simple as that.

Aoife looks at me as if I’m joining a suicide pact. ‘You’re not gonna go to that, are you?’

Course I’m not. I obviously don’t want to actually drink coffee or hard alcohol or get fingered in real life!

‘Maybe, but I’ll check with Christopher,’ I say.

How punchable am I?

Me getting a boyfriend (pending) is, I can only assume, the reason Lowe is off with me. He’s abrasive. Moody. Can’t he just be happy for me that I’ve pretty much settled down? He texts me one word answers, doesn’t call me back. Sometimes he phones just to show me he’s grumpy, in case I hadn’t noticed. When I ask, ‘Do you want to talk about your mum?’ he says, ‘No,’ in the same tone I would use to tell my parents to ‘piss off!’ I say, ‘I’m always here for you.’

And he says, ‘K.’

You started it, Lowe! You were the one that started hanging out with a girl who wasn’t me, do you think I WANT to be gathering emergency boyfriends like this?

Maybe I have to give him his space?

He says, suddenly, ‘There’s this girl, Saskia, in my art class who likes me apparently.’

I’m like, ‘COOL.’ WHATEVS.

‘When she’s eighteen, she’s gonna get her clit pierced,’ he says/threatens.

Idiot. Don’t act like you know where a clit is, Lowe. You can’t even pin a tail on the bloody donkey. Fool.

‘Great,’ I reply. ‘Good for Saskia.’

I haven’t quite located my own clit yet but I assure you that once I do, there is no way in hell I am messing around with that precious pearl of nerves.

What can I pierce that will be cool and isn’t going to hurt? A fingernail? Do people pierce their hair?

‘What about druggy Megan?’ I ask.

‘What? Who?’

‘I thought SHE was your girlfriend?’

‘Ha. No.’

Don’t HA me. I’ve gone out of my way to get a boyfriend here and he was single all along?

‘I might invite Christopher over at the weekend,’ I bait to make him jealous, to get him back for Saskia’s clit-piercing plans, but then I reverse that hard work by adding, ‘Come if you want?’, really hoping he says yes. The way I’m always hoping he says yes. What I’d really like is for Lowe to say yes to coming to my house and Christopher to just not show up. That would be ideal.

‘Christopher?’ He cracks up, laughing at me, not with me.

‘What? What’s so funny?

‘He prefers Chris.’

It has become that pedantic. So, they’re still hanging out, then. This is an uncomfortable cross of boundaries. We’re two children fighting over the ragdoll of poor, sweet Christopher, Chris, using him as a pawn. A third party has got involved in our duel and we can’t deal with it. Like, will Christopher pick a side? And what was Christopher saying about me to Lowe? Would he tell him if I was a good kisser?

‘Well, I call him Christopher,’ I defend defiantly.

‘Whatever. You guys aren’t serious anyway.’

I’m SORRY what?

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