Page 39 of I Love You, I Love You, I Love You

This stings because it’s true. Christopher and I haven’t spoken on the phone once; we don’t even really text. We haven’t even kissed since that time at the garden centre and he was bored and possibly stoned. Now I think about it, I don’t even know his surname.

Still, Christopher and Lowe plan to come to my house, together. I organize a house clean-up faster than any sixty-minute makeover you’ve seen on TV. I use a whole can of air freshener. Hurtle bleach around like salt to ward off bad spirits. My cleaning style: rabid. Nonsensical. Stuffing, scrambling, shoving stuff into cupboards, under beds, high up. Hoping they’ll see 251 as shabby-chic, bohemian, Takeshi’s Castle instead of a gothic death-trap. Rusty nails that stick out like werewolf claws: fun! Exposed live wires and pipes to trip on: thrilling! All snares, obstacles, for newcomers to confront, to earn respect, before Mum will even consider taking them seriously.

I’m more excited that Lowe is here. And we all know it. It’s as obvious as the grass being green. Lowe, however, has come – it seems – purely to be a watchdog. Not that Christopher and I need watching.

‘Woah, your house is so sick – it looks like the house in Fight Club!’ People always gawp at our house like it’s a museum, forgetting we have to live here. Christopher buys me a graffiti pen as a no-reason gift, adorable. Then the BOYS come to my room. The walls and furniture will be gossiping about this for weeks, losing their minds that the guy they’ve seen me dream about or lose sleep over is now here. I watch Lowe admiring my magazine cut-outs and posters, my photos of friends pinned to my noticeboard and silly ornaments on the shelves. What does he think of me? Why isn’t he SAYING anything? We take turns to tag my wardrobe with the pen.

When Mum gets home she is excited by the arrival of ‘strapping young lads!’ And instantly, after taxing them for weed, sends them out to work on the garden with its upturned broken plastic chairs and metal barbed wire, broken glass and fox poo. Christopher is given the task of mowing the overgrown grass. I watch him, chugging away, working up a sweat, smiling, and for a second Lowe isn’t the only person in the entire world I focus on. He sort of moves into the background a little bit and – for once – I’m able to see someone who isn’t him. Perhaps it is possible that I could like boys who aren’t Lowe. It’s some sort of light at the end of a tunnel.

But my thoughts are broken as Christopher accidently catches a frog in the violent whirring jaw of the mower. ‘OH SHIT! I am SO sorry!’ he yelps. He shouldn’t be the one apologizing.

I feel so bad for him, dark frog’s blood spluttering down his light-blue jeans. The young boy in his face seems to jump out like a scare on a ghost train. It really isn’t his fault; our garden is just such a mess we didn’t even know we had frogs. ‘That’s not our frog,’ I say, trying to make him feel better, but Mum acts like a disappointed zookeeper, like he now owes her compensation for the murdered amphibian. That will be a new unwanted core memory for poor Christopher. I look at Lowe like oh, fuck off.

The next day I text to check in, to see if the frog’s blood came out of his jeans, and Christopher doesn’t reply for ages. When he finally does, he says:

Soz ran out of credit. Blood came out. Thx. x

Even in the short lived hundredish hours of our small relationship, I know something is up. I pluck up the courage to call him.

His older brother answers and says, ‘Chris’ – oh, shit, it is Chris – ‘it’s some girl for you.’

I’m not some girl. I’m his sweetheart.

I ask, ‘Is everything OK?’

He says, ‘ … Er.’

‘Is it about the frog?’

‘No, it’s nothing to do with the frog.’

‘So what’s up?’

‘I’m gonna step away if that’s cool.’

Silence.

‘OK,’ I say.

Annoyingly, this is only making him fitter. Damn.

‘I don’t think it’s working.’

Ouch. OK. I replay the day at my house in my head. All I see is Lowe. And the frog. I can’t even picture Christopher; it’s like he wasn’t even there.

‘No worries,’ I say.

I can’t work out if I just got dumped or not. I reckon I probably did. Which is annoying because now I just fancy him more.

Before I start work on my debut non-fiction on romantic relationships, The Rejection is the Connection, I should probably start sharing the news.

Lowe’s dad answers. I don’t even have to say it’s me.

‘LOWE!’ he bellows and I wait, going over the minor details of my publicity spin as to why Christopher and I broke up. Do it like Dawson’s Creek; they always know how to break up properly. Big words help. No words are better but I am not good at that.

‘Hey.’ He sounds breathless, like he ran for the phone. ‘How are you?’

‘Good … considering … ’ I add, referring to my recent break-up, but he doesn’t bite. ‘You?’

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