by Alice Oseman
‘They’re fans. They don’t care about you; they don’t care about anything except The Ark. Do you know what they’d do to you if they found out who you were?’
‘Fucking hell, you make it sound like they’re serial killers, or something.’
‘They’re not far off.’
They continue to argue and I open another beer. I like Bliss, and I love Rowan, but honestly? I wish they would just break up.
I try to get drunk but obviously don’t try hard enough because by 10 p.m. I’m only on my third drink and don’t feel anything.
The music’s louder than it was earlier and people have started to dance. The floor vibrates, expensive clothing and expensive people flash under the changing colours of our LED lighting, bright white smiles, sparkly drinks. A cloud from the smokers hangs overhead like mist. I go and open a window, stick my head out, forgetting it’s raining, and get my shirt wet.
‘Hey, Jimmy,’ says a voice, and I turn round and find myself face to face with Magnet, real name Marcus Garnett, who was the most recent winner of The X Factor and who hasn’t been doing too badly; he’s had a couple of charted singles now. Ballads, I think. He sat on our table with us at the BRIT Awards this year.
I hold out a hand. ‘Oh hey, Magnet, you all right, mate? How’s it going?’
He shakes it and nods. He’s got a soft-looking face, a little bit teenager-ish. I think that’s why we got along. Everyone else I meet looks and behaves about ten years older than us and it just makes me feel like a baby.
‘Yeah, I’m pretty good, thanks, mate, yeah.’ He grins sheepishly. ‘Hey, you don’t wanna head upstairs, do you? The music in here is bloody loud, innit.’
I chuckle. ‘Yeah, sure. Lister’s just slowly making our neighbours hate us.’
‘This his idea tonight?’
‘Ha, yeah, you know what he’s like.’
Lister’s reputation for partying isn’t a well-kept secret.
We wander up the stairs, past groups of people chatting and drinking. I spot Rowan and Bliss sitting in a corner, talking and laughing. Rowan looks more relaxed now. Maybe they’ll be all right after all. I don’t know.
‘You just got back from your European tour, right?’ asks Magnet. The tenth or eleventh person who’s said those near-exact words this evening.
I tell him we have one more tour show to do on Thursday. We stop and stand in the upstairs corridor. The music is quieter up here, but my ears are still buzzing.
‘You’ve had an eventful few days, haven’t you?’
A door slams somewhere, making me jump.
‘Yeah, I guess …’
‘It’s not true, is it?’ asks Magnet, smiling. ‘You and Rowan.’
‘What? No …’ I go to take another swig from my drink, only to find I’m holding an empty glass.
Magnet laughs. ‘The shit the fans come up with, am I right?’
I almost want to laugh. As if this guy knows anything about having fans like ours.
‘Yeah.’
The track downstairs changes and everyone screams.
Magnet puts his hand on my arm. ‘If you need someone to talk to.’ He smiles, but it looks weird now, not as soft any more. ‘You can always call me up, yeah?’ He rubs my arm.
‘Er …’ The alcohol all seems to be hitting me at once. ‘Yeah.’
Magnet moves towards me slightly. ‘You need to have friends in this business, you know?’ He moves his hand up to my shoulder. ‘People you can trust.’
‘Mm.’
‘You can trust me, Jimmy.’
‘Mm.’
He puts his hand on my cheek. Why is he doing that?
‘You’re so hot in real life,’ he says under his breath, as if he didn’t think I’d hear.
I laugh, like he’s joking. The buzzing in my ears gets louder.
‘In real life,’ I say.
Then he leans in and presses his lips against mine.
Oh. Okay. Fine. This is fine. Can’t say I realised this conversation was going in this direction, but fine. The buzzing is so loud. Don’t know what I’m doing. It’s not like this is the first time this has happened with some random guy at some random party. I don’t know. Don’t remember. Don’t care. He’s got his hands on my face now. I don’t really feel anything for this guy. But maybe this is all I’ll ever get. Oh well. Who cares.
‘Oi, Jimmy.’
I stop kissing Magnet, turn round, and see Lister standing at the end of the corridor, leaning against the wall. He shakes his head at me. ‘Come on.’
I pretty much just start walking away from Magnet, without saying bye or anything, but he grabs me by the arm again and says quietly, ‘Hey, you wanna go somewhere with me?’
I look at him again. ‘Not really. Sorry.’
He pulls a little harder on my arm. ‘What, are you with Lister, then?’
I frown at him. ‘No. What the fuck?’
‘What’s fucking wrong with you?’ he asks me. Nastily. ‘Saving yourself for marriage?’
I don’t say anything.
‘What a joke,’ he says. ‘You were throwing yourself at me at the BRITs party.’
‘Jimmy, come on!’ Lister shouts from the other end of the corridor.
I try to focus on the knife inside my jacket. Remind myself who I am. Go home in my mind.
‘Am I not good enough for you? You Ark clones think you’re the fucking kings of the world, don’t you? But the only reason you have so many fans is because they all want you and Rowan to fuck each other.’
The swearword makes me wince.
He sneers at me. Where his face had looked soft before, he looks like a monster now. ‘Sometime soon something’s going to knock you down from your pedestal. And then you’ll come crawling back to the people who tried to be nice to you.’
I shake my head wildly and just walk away from him.
When I reach Lister, he gives me a little pat on the back and then shoots a look at Magnet, which is weird. Much more protective than usual.
He pulls me away and down the stairs, one arm round my shoulders.
‘Alcohol makes you a slut now?’ he asks. I know he’s joking, but the word still pisses me off.
‘Don’t,’ I say.
‘He wasn’t even attractive. We’ve met him, like, once.’
I shrug. ‘Oh well.’
Lister stops and looks at me. ‘Jimmy. Come on, mate. Since when did you have that attitude?’
‘I don’t know. I don’t know.’
I realise suddenly that Lister isn’t that drunk. If anything, I’m drunker than him, which never happens. Lister is the one who actually likes these parties, likes alcohol and spending money and hooking up with people. But something’s different tonight.
I’m too drunk to work out what.
‘You’re not like that,’ he continues. ‘You don’t just run around kissing anyone who appears in your immediate vision.’
‘I didn’t initiate it.’
‘But you went along with it!’
‘Yeah, well, maybe I felt like getting off with someone. Why do you care?’
Lister doesn’t say anything.
I let out a deep sigh. ‘I just want to be a normal teenager sometimes,’ I say.
‘But we’re not.’
I meet his eyes.
‘Why are you judging me?’ I ask. ‘You’re the one who does this stuff all the time.’
‘Oh, do I?’ Lister laughs and shakes his head. ‘You and Rowan … God … you still think …’ He trails off, and when we reach the bottom of the stairs Lister walks away from me.
I don’t see Magnet for the rest of the night and when the alcohol starts to wear off, my anxiety suddenly goes full throttle and I have to go and sit down in a corner and try to do some deep breathing but it’s not really working. Maybe I’m having a heart attack. Wouldn’t surprise me. Magnet’s not the first guy I’ve kissed and he’s probably not going to be the last either. Drunk Jimmy makes terrible decisions. But I don’t care wheth
er anyone knows about me being gay, anyway. What more can people do to me?
Sometimes I wish I was a normal teenager. I could go to a normal party and maybe kiss a boy and work out all that stuff like normal people do.
As soon as I think that, I hate myself for complaining.
I’ve really got nothing to complain about.
‘Do you ever feel trapped?’ I ask Rowan.
He frowns. ‘Trapped how?’
‘Like you can’t do anything without people watching.’
‘Why does it matter whether people watch?’
I shrug. ‘Must be nice to just … be a person.’
Rowan stares at me. The flashing lights reflect in his glasses. ‘But we’re gods, Jimmy. What’s better than that?’
As soon as I step out of the tube station, my phone informs me I have missed three calls from home.
Since Mum and Dad are normally asleep by this time, I call back immediately. Just in case it’s an emergency.
Dad answers. ‘Fereshteh?’
‘Hi, Dad.’
‘Ah, what a relief. We were getting so worried.’
‘Why? What’s up?’
‘You didn’t call. We thought you were going to call every evening.’
Oh.
‘Oh,’ I say.
Dad pauses.
‘Everything okay?’ I ask.
‘Fereshteh,’ he says, ‘all of this … feels such a shame.’
‘What? What d’you mean?’
‘You worked so hard, my darling. For your exams. We know you struggle with academic study. We know it’s not for you. But we wanted to honour this achievement with you.’
‘It’s not important,’ I say. ‘The leavers’ thing. It’s not important.’
‘Okay, so it isn’t important,’ says Dad. ‘But we’re still saddened that … you simply don’t seem to care about your achievements or want to celebrate them. You don’t value that part of yourself. You just … care about this boy band.’
‘You’re blowing this way out of proportion!’ God. He’s actually starting to annoy me now. ‘Dad, why would I want to celebrate myself when I’m so extremely average? You’ve got Rostam’s uni graduation coming up soon – just go enjoy that.’
There’s a long pause.
Then Dad sighs. ‘Is this a big, important thing for you, Fereshteh?’
‘Well, yeah. I really like this band.’
‘And what will you feel when you get home? When is the band obsession going to end?’
‘Why does it have to end?’
‘Because this is your life,’ he says. ‘Not the life of a band.’
I stop walking, and stand very still in the street. I’m almost at Juliet’s nan’s house and there isn’t a single person in sight. Just the dull yellow light of the streetlamps and the rain pattering against the pavement.
‘I just wanted to go to a concert,’ I say. ‘And then I’ll feel better.’
‘Were you not feeling good before, my girl?’ he asks.
I don’t think I’ve ever felt anything except The Ark.
‘My Jim-Bob! What are you doing, calling me at this hour? Tell me what’s wrong.’
It’s hard to talk because I’m kind of crying. Didn’t mean to. Someone started playing Frank Ocean over the speakers and then I started thinking about Grandad dying (it’s going to happen at some point) and then I went to find Rowan but he was standing in his bedroom with Bliss, Rowan with his arm round Bliss, Bliss’s head on Rowan’s shoulder, both of them staring out of the window at the rain. So I just turned round and started crying because I felt alone. It just happens sometimes.
‘Jimmy, Jim, talk to me, son. What’s going on?’
‘I … just wanted to talk to you.’
Grandad sighs over the phone. ‘Oh, Jim-Bob. Come on, lad. What’s wrong?’
I sit down on my bed. ‘I … just felt sad.’
‘Why are you sad, boyo?’
It’s hard to say proper words when you’re crying. Embarrassing.
‘Has something happened?’
I shake my head. ‘No, nothing’s happened.’
‘Then what’s going on, Jim-Bob?’
‘I think I’m lying to everyone … and I don’t want to lie to anyone any more.’
Grandad sighs again. ‘Oh, Jimmy. You don’t lie to me, do you?’
‘… no.’
‘Then that’s not everyone, is it? What’s this about?’
I wipe my eyes. ‘I don’t know who I am. Everything I do feels like a lie. I wake up every day and I have to be Jimmy Kaga-Ricci, this famous guy, and I have to smile at the camera and say hi to people but … I don’t even know who I am underneath that.’
Grandad chuckles. ‘Jimmy … you’re young. You’re only just starting to figure that out, lad.’
‘I hate myself.’
‘Why would you do that?’
‘Whoever I am … it’s bad.’
‘Why would you say that?’
I shake my head. ‘I don’t know. I just am. I’m lying.’
‘But what are you lying about?’
I reach inside my jacket and take out Grandad’s knife. It has my great-grandad’s name on it – Angelo Ricci. Holding it makes me feel real. It reminds me that I was born. That my life is something other than this birdcage I’m trapped in. Isn’t it? Isn’t it?
‘Everywhere I go, everything I do … I’m lying. I’m pretending. And everyone’s watching me … waiting for me to get it wrong.’
‘Jim-Bob … that’s normal. You put on acts for people. Everyone does that. It’s not a bad thing. It’s protection, son. You’ve got to protect what’s important to you. Especially when you’re someone like you.’
‘It makes me feel horrible.’
‘That’s the life you’ve got, my boy.’
This makes my eyes water again.
‘I don’t want it, then.’
‘Don’t say that, Jimmy.’
‘I don’t want it.’
‘Jimmy. Are you drunk?’
‘… no.’
‘Now there’s a real lie, boyo. Is Rowan there?’
‘No.’
Grandad huffs. ‘Jimmy …’
‘I can’t do it by myself.’
‘You’re going to have to one day, Jim-Bob. I’m eighty-four years old. We all have to do this by ourselves eventually.’
‘I can’t. When you’re gone … I don’t want to be here any more.’
‘You’ll be all right,’ says Grandad. ‘You’ll be all right, Jimmy. Are you listening to me? Jimmy? You’ll be all right, son. Come on, don’t cry. Shh. I’m still here. Come on, boyo. Shh. Grandad’s here. You’ll be all right. Everything’s going to be all right.’
‘god forgive us: we have burned a saint.’
– a soldier after the execution of Joan of Arc
There’s nothing quite like being woken up by a Twitter direct message that reads:
It was you
Despite having not read who it’s from, nor having any idea who it’s from, the sinister nature of the message makes my heart jump so hard that I’m immediately fully awake, and I jolt upright, in a fashion not dissimilar from yesterday morning’s Jowan revelation. I rub my eyes and focus in on my phone and read the name above the message.
Bliss Lai
Okay. So. What the fuck?
I read the full message.
Bliss Lai
It was you, wasn’t it. You told them.
What was me? What have I done?
Juliet’s bedroom door creaks open, and I whip my head round. Juliet is standing there, dressed and ready for the day.
When I hauled myself out of bed to pray at dawn, Juliet was in bed next to me, asleep. I hadn’t heard her come in, but it was a relief to know she didn’t sleep in Mac’s bed. Still, when I got back into bed afterwards, I couldn’t fall back to sleep for a whole hour.
She looks at me and holds up her phone in front of her so that the screen is shining at me through the dim
light.
‘Rowan’s got a girlfriend,’ she says.
She sounds like someone’s died.
I laugh at her. ‘Shut up.’
‘Angel,’ she says, snapping, like she’s angry. Then, remarkably, her eyes tear up, and her lips wobble. ‘This isn’t a joke.’ She wipes her eye with one hand.
‘I don’t understand,’ I say.
I don’t want to understand. I don’t want any of this to be happening. I want to go back to when everything in my mind was real. When I could read a story and it would be real and real life didn’t matter, real life was inferior.
Real life has arrived to punch us all in the face. Maybe I’m at that age now.
‘Everything from yesterday …’ she says. ‘Jowan. It wasn’t true.’
Juliet walks over to me and shows me some pictures, and they’re all of Rowan Omondi, and his girlfriend, Bliss Lai.
‘My girlfriend’s being attacked by paps in the fucking street on her way into work and you want me to fucking calm down?!’ Rowan screams at Lister so loudly that Lister actually recoils. ‘Fuck off, thinking you can help us, thinking you have any fucking understanding of what it means to care about someone, you fucking sex addict!’
It probably doesn’t help that Lister’s only wearing his boxers and smells quite badly of weed.
I shoot Lister a look that says ‘please go away’. He stares at me and then turns and leaves the living room.
I didn’t really sleep much last night. I locked the door, I looked under my bed and in my wardrobe and in my en-suite, I searched on my chest of drawers and in the corners of the ceiling for hidden cameras. I didn’t find anything, but that doesn’t mean nothing was there. I lay in bed and tried to rest but I couldn’t relax. It never really felt like home here in the first place.
I was woken up this morning by Rowan throwing one of the house phones at a wall, because his and Bliss’s relationship is out.
It was Dave, obviously. The evil interviewer. Because we fucked up that interview, he decided to run the story he wanted. And he had everything. Photos from various parties they’ve attended together, photos from private family gatherings, even photos back from the charity thing where they first met.