by Alice Oseman
Everyone wants to have sex with Lister Bird.
‘Who was the first one?’ I ask.
‘First time I had sex?’
‘Yeah.’
He pauses again, as if debating whether to tell me.
‘It was when I was sixteen,’ he says. ‘With some woman we met at a recording studio.’
‘Woman? How old was she?’
Lister laughs.
‘She was thirty-two,’ he says.
My mouth drops open in horror. I sit up, leaning on one elbow. ‘Thirty-two?’
‘Yeah, but it’s fine. It’s not like I didn’t want to do it. I mean, I was nervous, but, like, she didn’t force me, or—’
‘That’s not right,’ I say.
‘What?’
‘That’s too young.’
‘I knew what I was doing.’
‘No, you didn’t,’ I snap. ‘She did. She took advantage of a teenager who didn’t know what he was doing and probably thought that he was getting an actual relationship out of it. A few months younger and that would be legally classifiable as rape. Imagine if you’d been a sixteen-year-old girl and she’d been a thirty-two-year-old man?’
Lister lies very still as I speak, his face expressionless.
‘Are you angry at me?’ he says.
‘Do you just have sex with people to make them like you?’
‘What? No!’ He sits up too. ‘No, and I don’t do that any more anyway—’
‘Well, you had sex with that girl at the BRITs this year—’
‘God, you’re just like Rowan,’ he spits out, then climbs off the bed and away from me. ‘I didn’t think you’d react like this as well.’
My stomach drops a little. ‘You told Rowan?’
He doesn’t say anything.
‘Why did you tell Rowan and not me?’ I ask, just confused now. What’s his problem with me?
‘I didn’t want you to know about it,’ he mumbles. ‘I didn’t want you to judge me. But I guess you did.’
‘I’m not judging—’
‘Neither of you get it. It’s different for me.’ He turns to me with one last pleading look. ‘You and Rowan have each other but you have to see that it’s different for me. Being Lister Bird.’
I just shake my head. ‘What does that mean?’
The final bit of hope in his expression drops, and he stands up from the bed and walks towards the door.
‘Why else would anyone want to be around me?’ he says. ‘I’m Lister Bird. Why else would anyone want to be around me other than to get with me?’
Juliet peers round her front door with a mix of fear and disbelief on her face.
I ended up telling her the truth about the situation over the phone, but she hadn’t believed me. She thought I was joking. Even when I told her that it wasn’t a joke. Three times.
‘You weren’t joking,’ she says, speaking to me but staring at Bliss Lai, who is standing next to me.
‘Well, no,’ I say.
Juliet still looks like an eighteenth-century widow in mourning. She’s legitimately wearing black – black jeans, black T-shirt – and her eyes are a bit red. I almost feel bad. Has she been crying about this? I know she loves Rowan, but … she didn’t think she had a shot with him, did she?
‘Hi,’ says Bliss, cutting through the silence. She puts one hand on her hips and grins sheepishly, as if this whole situation is an administrative error. ‘So sorry about this.’
Juliet takes a long look at Bliss. Then she stands up straight, flicks her hair back, and says, ‘Don’t be sorry, none of this is your fault. Whatever dickhead leaked those photos deserves to go to prison.’
Bliss relaxes at Juliet’s words, and Juliet ushers her inside, taking her bag, asking her if she wants tea, laughing and joking and generally acting like she’s known Bliss for years. Bliss follows her, a little confused but visibly relieved, and she shoots a quick grin back at me as she follows Juliet into the house.
I breathe a sigh of relief and wonder why I ever doubted Juliet. I make friends with good people.
The three of us are standing in the kitchen, chatting casually and getting to know one another, when the door creaks again and Mac peeks his head round the frame.
He’s grinning.
‘I was feeling lonely in the living room all by myself!’ he says. He enters the room and leans jauntily against the kitchen counter.
Bliss gives him a weird look and then looks at me as if to say Who is this and why is he here?
Juliet points at Mac. ‘Oh, this is Mac, by the way. He’s here to see The Ark too.’
‘Hi!’ says Bliss.
‘Wow,’ says Mac, smiling. ‘So, you’re famous now. I’m jealous.’
There’s a pause, and then Bliss laughs awkwardly.
‘Not sure there’s much to be jealous of, bud,’ says Bliss, ‘unless you wanna date Rowan Omondi.’
Mac immediately starts spluttering. ‘Oh, no, no, erm, no, I’m not – I mean, I like The Ark, but I’m not – It’s not – I’m not –’
Bliss raises her eyebrows at him. ‘Is the word you’re looking for “gay”? It ain’t poisonous.’
Juliet widens her eyes at Bliss’s bluntness.
‘Erm, yeah. I’m not,’ stammers Mac.
‘S’fine, man. Chill.’
I glance at Juliet, trying to keep the huge grin off my face. She’s staring at Bliss, somewhat amazed.
‘Erm, anyway,’ says Mac, determined to keep the conversation revolving around him and only him, ‘so, you must have had a crazy day!’
Bliss chuckles. ‘Yeah, I guess you could say that.’
‘Can’t Rowan help you?’
Bliss rolls her eyes. ‘I don’t need his help.’
Mac chuckles. ‘Well, I mean, wouldn’t it be easier if you just … went and hung out at his place, or whatever?’
Bliss shrugs. ‘Not really. Why would that solve anything?’
‘I don’t know … he’s rich and powerful, he can do something, can’t he?’
‘Rich and powerful. You make him sound like a dictator.’
I can’t say I fully understand why Bliss doesn’t want to go and see Rowan. Surely if they’re in a relationship, he’d be the first person she’d seek help from, not some random Ark fan she met in a Wetherspoon’s less than twenty-four hours ago.
Finally sensing he’s not wanted, Mac says, ‘Erm, well, I’m gonna nip to the loo while you ladies drink your tea.’ And he speeds out of the room.
Bliss turns her head slowly towards me and Juliet, her eyes wide and a big smile on her face.
‘Okay, not being funny, but why do you have the human embodiment of a mosquito in your house?’
I let out a snort. Even Juliet smiles a little in the corner of her mouth.
‘He’s not that bad …’ says Juliet, but it’s half-hearted.
‘Mate,’ says Bliss. She wanders over to Juliet and pats her on the shoulder. ‘Please, please God, do not tell me Junior Conservative of the Year is your boyfriend?’
‘Erm,’ Juliet says.
‘Please no.’
‘Well, technically no.’
‘Technically no?’
‘Erm …’
‘Oh no. Oh no no no no no.’ Bliss looks at me and puts her hand on her heart. ‘Have you been letting this happen?’
Juliet looks up at me, mildly embarrassed.
‘Well,’ I say, ‘it’s not really my place to comment on my friends’ romantic interests.’
‘Excuse me, it’s your place as a friend to tell them when they’re almost dating a guy who can’t even use the word “gay” without spontaneously combusting.’
She’s probably right.
I look at Juliet. ‘Er, yeah. He’s a bit of a dick.’
Juliet doesn’t say anything. She looks betrayed.
‘Yikes,’ says Bliss.
‘Can we not talk about it?’ asks Juliet, turning round and starting to clear up our empty tea mugs.
Bliss raises he
r eyebrows at me.
When Mac returns I take him out into the corridor and tell him a dramatic story about how Juliet will feel so much better after this morning’s events if she could just have a milkshake from Sainsbury’s. I don’t even have to finish my sentence before Mac is volunteering to go. I’m not even sure whether he wants to impress Juliet or whether he just wants to get away from Bliss before she says something so blunt that he starts to cry.
Bliss, Juliet and I sit on the carpet in the living room with an open tub of mini brownies in between us.
Bliss has her fingers clasped together like a village elder and is somehow staring down at the both of us, despite being shorter than me.
‘So,’ I say, ‘what’s it like dating Rowan Omondi?’
‘Ugh, let’s not talk about that,’ says Bliss.
I shoot a glance at Juliet, but she’s zoned out again, like she did earlier.
‘Oh,’ I say, ‘er … sorry?’
‘No, no, it’s just, I don’t know.’ Bliss rubs her forehead. ‘I don’t know, man. I feel like my life revolves around Rowan. And I don’t want it to.’
‘Oh.’
‘I guess I can’t help it now.’
‘Can’t help what?’
‘My life revolving around my boyfriend.’ She says the word ‘boyfriend’ like it’s a particularly bad swearword.
‘Oh.’
Juliet is now eyeing Bliss carefully.
‘I had plans,’ says Bliss. ‘Plans for my life. And now …’ She starts to laugh. ‘What’s gonna happen to me now? All I’m ever gonna be known for is being a band boy’s girlfriend.’
‘It’ll die down,’ I say. ‘Stuff like this is only hot news for, like, a week, isn’t it?’
‘This is The Ark we’re talking about,’ says Bliss. ‘Come on. You’re in the fandom. You know what it’s like.’
She’s right. This won’t die down in a week. The Ark fandom will be talking about it for the next three years, at least. People will track down Bliss’s every move. She won’t be able to move house, go to university, go on holiday, go anywhere without someone spotting it, posting about it, talking about it.
And they’ll hate her. The ones who are in love with Rowan, anyway, which is a lot of them. They’ll hate her.
‘Everything will be all right,’ I lie.
She laughs. ‘You’re sweet.’
‘Maybe you should talk to him,’ says Juliet in a small voice.
‘And say what?’
‘I don’t know, tell him how upset you are?’ Juliet fiddles with her hair nervously. ‘Maybe he’ll be able to do something.’
‘I don’t need his help.’
‘But … he’s your boyfriend. You act like you’re not even friends.’
Bliss frowns. ‘It’s different. We don’t see each other very often because he’s always busy.’
Juliet looks away with an eyebrow raise. ‘Okay.’
‘Look, I know you’re just sceptical because you’ve got a thing for Rowan.’
Juliet’s head snaps back towards Bliss. ‘What?’
‘Yeah, Angel told me yesterday.’
Both of them look at me.
‘Oh wow,’ I say. ‘You’re not about to start arguing about a boy, are you? Because then we’d have reached a new level of pathetic in this conversation.’
Juliet sighs. ‘No.’ She looks back at Bliss. ‘I’m not, like, in love with Rowan. I mean, he’s hot, yeah, but I ship Rowan more with Jimmy than anything else. I think I’m more upset about that.’ Her voice quietens. ‘This week has been a rollercoaster.’
Bliss chuckles. ‘Oh yeah. I forgot that was a thing.’ She shakes her head. ‘He really hates that.’
Juliet puts her head on her knees. ‘I don’t want to talk about boys any more.’
Bliss nods. ‘I don’t want to talk about boys ever again.’
I look at them both, feeling quite glad that I don’t have to deal with this sort of situation in my life.
‘They do love each other, though,’ says Bliss. ‘Rowan and Jimmy.’
My heart does a little leap.
‘Not in that way,’ she continues, ‘just in a friend way. But … I don’t think that’s any less special.’
Oh. I guess I never thought of it like that.
Juliet nods. And then she smiles.
‘You seem cool,’ she says to Bliss.
Bliss grins. ‘So do you. We should be friends now.’
‘Yeah. Fuck these boys.’
‘And not in a sexual way. In a “throw them in the bin” way.’
‘Yeah.’
Bliss holds up a hand for a high five, and Juliet reciprocates, and they both laugh a little and then look at me.
I think of Jimmy and feel like a traitor, but then I meet Bliss’s high five too.
Bliss stays for the whole afternoon. Every time we suggest she might want to call Rowan, or her mum, or a taxi, she says no.
I think she just wants to pretend that nothing is happening.
When it’s afternoon prayer time, it finally hits me that she’s here, and I helped her, and that has to be a sign.
It has to be fate that we met.
The good news is that Bliss being here takes Juliet’s attention away from Mac almost entirely. The three of us bond over watching ridiculous Jowan fan videos on YouTube – extra dramatic ones comprised sad Hozier tracks and slow-motion glances between the two boys – which Bliss finds even more hilarious than we do. We sit for a while and talk about our lives, Bliss telling Juliet all the things about her that she told me yesterday, her school life and wanting to save nature and her horrible HMV job, and Juliet telling Bliss about her dream of being a theatre set designer and all the private-school pranks she’s been a part of. Then we all decide to play Cards Against Humanity, which I win spectacularly after I match a card that says ‘This is the prime of my life. I am young, hot, and full of ____’ with a card that says ‘Poor life choices’. Juliet doesn’t even drink the milkshake Mac went out and got her. It just sits and gets warm on the kitchen counter.
‘Oh dear,’ is Dorothy’s reaction when the situation is explained to her.
‘Oh dear, indeed,’ says Bliss. She laughs, but I think she’s crying on the inside.
‘Well, you’re welcome to stay here for as long as you’d like,’ says Dorothy, linking her fingers together on the kitchen table. She’d been out for most of the afternoon at a ‘health club’. I have absolutely no idea what a health club is, but I hope I can spend my whole retirement at one. ‘I’ve rather been enjoying having so much excitement in the house.’
Bliss smiles at her. ‘That’s so kind … I should probably go home, though. My mum’s just texted and she’s getting pretty worried. And the paparazzi have mostly gone away for now.’
‘Well, if you’re sure. But the house is open if you need to escape anytime.’
‘Thank you, I really appreciate that.’
It’s nearly dinnertime when Bliss gets into a taxi and leaves. Juliet and I wave her off, like we’re saying our final farewells to a deployed soldier. The car disappears round the corner, and then it’s just Juliet and me, standing out in the rain. Little droplets make a dotted pattern in her shirt.
‘You’d think her life would be perfect,’ says Juliet. ‘She has the guy. You know? She’s got the guy. The ultimate fantasy dream.’ She turns to me. ‘Do you know what I mean?’
I know what she means. She means that Bliss is living the dream of millions of girls around the world. And yet, she still isn’t happy.
‘I know what you mean,’ I say.
‘I feel like … the dream … The Ark … it’s not helping any more,’ she says.
I’m so confused by the statement that I don’t even ask what she means. She looks at me, and I wonder whether she’s waiting for me to say something, or ask something, I don’t know. What does she want me to say? What am I not doing right? Why aren’t we happy and enjoying ourselves in this week that we’ve been waiting for since l
ast year?
‘God, today has been the worst,’ she says.
I look at Juliet and almost recoil. She looks devastated. I mean, we’ve all had a bit of a day, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen her so miserable.
‘Yeah,’ I say. ‘This Rowan-Bliss thing just came out of nowhere.’
She looks up at me, a sad, almost disappointed expression on her face.
‘Yeah,’ she says. ‘The Rowan-Bliss thing.’
But I just say nothing and she walks inside, leaving me out in the rain.
I should probably go and apologise to Lister, but I don’t know what to say.
I wish it was tomorrow already. I want normality back.
Even if normality is waking up at 5 a.m., sitting in a chair for an hour while someone does your hair and make-up, eight hours of press events and interviews, then an evening of sound checks, rehearsals, and then a concert in front of twenty thousand people.
I’d rather have all of that than this.
A house of silence.
It’s 9 p.m. now. As far as I know, Lister and Rowan have been in their rooms for hours, only wandering out when it’s unavoidable to go to the bathroom or get some food. I’ve been dozing on and off since about four o’clock, Netflix still playing episodes of Brooklyn Nine-Nine one after another, but I might as well give up trying to sleep, since it doesn’t seem like it’s going to happen.
I’m starting to remember how claustrophobic it is in here. In this apartment.
Which is awful, really. Ungrateful. Twenty people could easily live here.
I just wish we could go outside.
I roll out of bed and stand up. All the blood rushes to my head and immediately I’m hit with a headache. Great. Just what I need.
Maybe I should go and say sorry to Lister.
No. I didn’t do anything wrong. Did I?
Maybe I should go and talk to Rowan.
I don’t want to talk to Rowan.
Don’t want to think about this mess.
Don’t want to think about anything.