What Are Friends For?: The will-they-won't-they romance of the year!

by Lizzie O'Hagan

  She’s dressed too formally for a weekend, like maybe she’s about to meet someone. Another date? My heart starts to hammer as I follow her stare down to the cracked screen in my hands, Tom’s cracked screen, the one I was just messaging her from. How long has she been standing there?

  ‘How are you?’ I force out the question.

  ‘What do you think you’re doing?’ Her eyes are still fixed on Tom’s cracked screen. They’re filled with fire, and not in the way I imagined her fighting for feminism or getting passionate about politics. No, right now she just looks really fucking fuming.

  ‘Reading?’ I try to hide Tom’s phone, replacing it with my book; I know it’s too late.

  ‘That’s Tom’s phone.’ Becky’s eyes dart to where it’s lying face down on the table. ‘And you were just messaging me.’

  ‘No, I wasn’t,’ I say, just wanting to tell her the truth, to make everything okay.

  ‘Max, I’ve just seen you.’ She shakes her head, reaching to grab the phone. Dammit, dammit, dammit. It’s still open on the app, and now she’s scrolling through the messages, reading her words, my words on the screen. I watch as her usually flushed cheeks become drained of colour and her mouth twists in confusion.

  ‘Look, Becky,’ I begin, voice as shaky as my hands. ‘I can explain . . .’

  ‘How long?’ She looks at me, too angry to sit down.

  How long? Such a simple question, with an answer that right now feels impossible. Since Tom stopped messaging? Since Yvonne got in touch? Since we first created her profile? Began laughing about books and films and articles together?

  ‘Too long,’ I say, sorrier than I think I’ve ever felt before. And just when I was starting to feel better.

  ‘No, Max, I need to know how long.’ She shakes her head, her whole body trembling with emotion. I’m sorry, Becky. I’m so sorry.

  ‘About six weeks,’ I say, only then realising how bad that sounds, how bad it is.

  ‘Six weeks?!’ she explodes, and a few heads turn to look at her. ‘Six weeks . . .’ she repeats under her breath, this time like she’s thinking, like she’s searching her mind to place it. ‘That’s . . . no . . . that’s just after we slept together, just after Tom cooled off . . .’

  ‘I know, I know . . . I just . . . Tom was going through some stuff and I thought he really liked you . . . he did really like you,’ I correct before I can hurt her further. ‘And I just wanted to keep things going for you both, because I really thought he’d come around. And then my friend died, and I . . .’ I can’t help my voice from cracking like the screen held in her hands, like my heart hammering in my chest. ‘It was selfish and stupid, but your messages were the only thing that made me feel better.’ I look into her eyes, not knowing why telling her this doesn’t feel intimate like our messages, but just wrong, like maybe I’ve got it wrong all along.

  ‘But I never messaged you,’ she says slowly.

  ‘I know, I know, you thought you were messaging Tom, it was stupid . . .’

  ‘No, Max.’ Her eyes widen. ‘I never messaged you, or Tom . . . not since that week when he cooled off. Whoever was messaging you,’ she shakes her head, ‘it sure as hell wasn’t me.’

  A stunned silence stretches between us, pulling us both in. It wasn’t Becky? Then who the hell was messaging me all that time? My heart races, my mind in turmoil. I need to say something. Anything. But what am I supposed to say? And who the fuck should I be saying it to?

  ‘But . . . but . . . how . . .’ I reach a trembling hand towards the phone and Becky’s fingers uncurl, like she’s so stunned that at least for the moment she has lost all her fight. I scroll through the app, heart belting out of my chest, sweat prickling across my forehead. These are her replies. Her messages. About Peggy. About the walk. About telling me to carry on . . .

  ‘Shit, no,’ Becky says, her face like thunder. ‘I deleted Tom’s number, I made her delete it too . . .’ Her eyes dart to me, for a second looking guilty, like just maybe she has some secrets of her own.

  ‘But who?’

  ‘Eve.’

  ‘Eve?’ I whisper, heart fit to burst. ‘Why would Eve . . .’ I begin, but my stomach is already sinking and Becky is rushing out of the coffee shop. No, no, no. She can’t disappear. Not now. Not like this. Not until I know what the hell is going on here. Without thinking, without even paying, I’m leaving my book and my coffee and the incriminating phone behind and following her out onto the street. Stop, Becky. Just slow down.

  ‘Becky?’ I shout behind her. Slowly she turns to look me dead in the eye. ‘Becky, please, can we just talk about this? We need to talk about this . . .’

  ‘Just leave it, Max,’ she hisses. ‘This is between me and Eve.’

  Eve? Eve? No, no, no. It can’t be. Can it? Rushing back inside, I throw too much cash on the counter before running back into the sunlight. I’m sure as hell in the dark. Becky had no idea it was me messaging her. She had no idea she had been messaging me. But Eve? Can it really have been her?

  Rushing into the road, I hail a taxi, bundling inside. How the hell has this happened? That night at the Fable. The Saturday in Soho. I shared stuff with Eve. She shared with me. But not our whole selves. I thought that was what I had been sharing with Becky.

  ‘Where to, mate?’ The driver turns in his seat. Where to? Who to? I have no fucking clue what’s right any more. Eve, Eve, Eve. Her name rushes through my mind. The way Becky’s did for so long. How did I get everything so wrong?

  Just breathe, Max, breathe. All I know is that Becky is on the warpath. Rushing home to Eve. Angry at her for this. Whatever this is. I need to get to her. To make everything okay.

  To find out what the fuck is going on.

  But this isn’t all about me. I need to make things right between Becky and Eve. Before I mess everything up even more.

  ‘Camden,’ I croak. To Eve. This is all about Eve.

  Maybe it always was.

  Tom: Dude, something’s happened. We have to get to Becky’s.

  Tom work: You’re still using my phone?

  Tom: Oh shit, sorry. It’s a long story. Just get yourself to Eve’s.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Eve

  It was all about me. I read the words I have just typed aloud to Buster. He’s purring on my lap, happy to be back in his usual spot by my overheating laptop. Until I realised how much the befriending scheme was helping me. Buster looks up at me. It’s a good ending. Unlike mine and Tom’s – or rather, Becky and Tom’s – which stopped abruptly as if in mid sentence. I just hope this article is good enough. If I’m really going to hand in my notice on Monday, I need it to be good enough.

  ‘Right, what should we do now?’ I ask Buster, who looks content to simply sit. But I’ve never been one to sit still for too long – except maybe when I’m lost in a book. Without thinking, my eyes scan our bookshelves for the one story I know will calm my racing mind. It’s not there. Maybe it’s in Becky’s room.

  Moving Buster and my laptop, I walk the short distance to her room and find my thumbed copy of Far From the Madding Crowd cast aside by her bed. Picking it up, I turn it over in my hands and can’t help but smile at the memory of sharing my thoughts on this story with Tom. Missing him hurts like hell. But I’m still glad he came into our lives. If he hadn’t, Becky would still be here, swiping mindlessly, trying to find someone to complete her. Now she’s out by herself, alone but not lonely. After all, algorithms rarely lead to love . . .

  Except for me, for a moment, they totally had. Sitting on the edge of the bed, I let my tears fall. Heart thumping, breath heavy; my body aches, my heart hurts. Not fast and light, like a fear I have to flee from, but raw and real: I loved, I lost, I let someone in. And I’ll do it again, only this time as me. Everyone deserves a second chance.

  Walking back into the living room, I find Buster’s face buried in
my handbag and the memory of my dad’s letters floats into my mind. Maybe he deserves another chance too? He says he’s changed, but what if he hasn’t?

  It doesn’t mean you’re going to go back to square one. Out of nowhere, Max’s voice rings through my messy mind as my legs surrender, forcing me to sit on the edge of the sofa. You’re different now, you’re stronger. So what if my dad hasn’t changed? I have. And didn’t I spend weeks, months, years just wishing that one day he’d get in touch, finally come knocking?

  Thud, thud, thud.

  I look up in the direction of the door, the one people rarely manage to find. Buster darts off, scared. My heart beats faster and faster. Who the hell? Dad? No, there’s no way. But who else would it be? Becky has a key.

  Rushing towards the door, I pull it open to see Becky standing there, her cheeks flushed red, hair a little wild. Her tiny body so fit to burst that it seems to fill the paved space outside our flat. What the hell?

  ‘I can’t believe you . . .’ Her wide eyes fix themselves on me and my heart starts to hammer again, panic rising. Why does she look so mad? Too mad to even find her key. What could possibly have . . . No. No. How would she know? ‘I know you’ve been messaging Tom. Pretending to be me.’

  ‘Becky, I’m . . . I can . . .’

  ‘Just because we messaged together at the start doesn’t mean it was okay to carry on doing it. Without my permission. Behind my back.’ She spits the words and I feel my tears starting to rise again.

  Oh shit. Shit.

  ‘I’m not . . .’ I begin, trying to hold it together. But how can I, when I can feel the thing most important to me starting to fall apart? ‘I did . . . for a bit . . . but I was doing it for you . . .’ Becky rolls her eyes, angry in a way I’ve never seen her before. ‘But then when I realised . . . I stopped, Becky. I stopped, because you’re the most important—’

  ‘Oh please. I knew you were enjoying it too much.’ She puts a hand up to stop me. It’s shaking. So am I. ‘But I just thought you were lonely, that you wanted a relationship of your own, that maybe . . .’ She looks at my wet cheeks, like for a moment she’s scared, stalling on a thought. I swear I see something like guilt fill her eyes. But what does she have to feel guilty about? This is all my fault. Everything. ‘But all this time,’ she breathes, pushing whatever thought has slowed her to one side, ‘you wanted Tom.’

  ‘I’m so sorry . . . I’m sorry.’ I say the words over and over. Sorry gets worn out pretty quickly without any action to back it up.

  But my actions did back it up. I stopped. I stopped messaging Tom even though at one point it was the one thing keeping me going. Until I realised that Becky and her family had been carrying me all along. ‘I stopped. Honestly, I stopped. That evening with your parents, I came to my senses, realised how much I had to lose.’ Hold it together, Eve. Just hold this all together. ‘I knew that whatever I felt I had with Tom—’

  ‘You never had anything with Tom.’ Becky’s words slice through my sentence.

  ‘I know,’ I cry. ‘I know he only ever liked you.’

  ‘No,’ Becky says. ‘You never had anything with Tom. It wasn’t even him.’

  ‘What?’ As I speak, I swear I see Becky reaching to touch me. Torn between wanting to rip me apart and wanting to hold my sorry pieces together. What? Of course it was Tom who was messaging. I read his name, savoured those three little letters every time they crossed my screen. If it wasn’t Tom, then who was it?

  ‘Eve.’ I follow the voice up to the top of the steps leading from the pathway to our poor excuse of a patio, tracing it all the way to . . . Max?

  ‘Piss off, Max.’ Becky turns around to see him walking to stand beside her. ‘This is between me and—’

  ‘Tom?’ I say, seeing his broad figure materialise like a mirage against our backyard backdrop.

  ‘No, this is Max, Eve,’ Becky says, her words dripping with sarcasm.

  ‘No, Tom,’ I say, nodding towards him as he too comes to join us in the tiny space outside our house.

  ‘Oh shit.’ He stumbles into a flowerpot, which falls over as if to make space for him.

  ‘What the fuck?’ Becky turns to look at him. Max is staring from Becky to me as I quickly brush the tears from my cheeks. ‘What the hell is going on?’

  ‘We can—’ Tom starts.

  ‘We can explain,’ Max says.

  ‘We?’ I ask, eyes fixed on him, heart hammering in my chest.

  Becky’s eyes dart between the three of us, angry and confused. ‘Oh fuck this.’ She throws her hands up in the air. ‘I don’t even care.’

  She turns to walk away from our home. But no, she is my home. And I can’t lose her. Not over this. Not over Tom. Not over Max.

  Running up the steps, I follow her down the side of the house and onto the street. Heavy footsteps sound behind me. Tom? Max? Who the hell knows? Right now, it doesn’t really matter. All that matters is . . .

  ‘Becky!’ I shout after her.

  ‘Eve, I can’t do this right now . . . I can’t . . .’

  ‘Evie?’

  We both stop, stunned. Eyes fixed on the man stepping out of the taxi, its door still open behind him. He looks at me, and I start to shake, torn between running into his arms and running away.

  ‘Dad?’ I whisper. ‘What . . . what . . . why . . .’

  I look at the taxi, lingering like maybe he won’t be staying. I look at Becky, crying now. Hard. No, she couldn’t have got in touch with him. There’s no way. She knows how complicated things with my dad are. Knows not to get involved. She doesn’t even know he contacted me. How could she? The only person I ever told about his letters was . . .

  I turn around to see Max and Tom standing behind me. Max’s eyes fix on mine, the way they did after the only real conversation we shared. Well, that we shared in person.

  Please don’t tell anyone what I’ve told you.

  Your secrets are safe with me.

  ‘Your friend got in touch . . .’ My dad steps towards me and Becky and Max move closer. No, no, no. Max was the only person I told. How dare he take matters into his own hands? I didn’t ask for this. For any of this.

  The taxi is still pulled up by the kerb, beckoning me in. My getaway car. I need to run. I trusted Max. I let him in. He let me down. Just like Dad.

  Run, Eve, run.

  And I do. Into the taxi, closing the door. The car, like my mind, pulling away. From Tom and Becky. From my dad. From Max. All the while not knowing why running away from him feels like running away from myself.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Max

  ‘Eve, Eve!’ I shout as she climbs into the taxi and closes the door. No, no, no. I hit the back of the vehicle as it pulls away, taking Eve away, and all my answers with her.

  God, I need answers.

  I turn to look at the three people staring back at me. Eve’s dad and Tom look as confused as each other. Becky is crying harder and harder, her shoulders heaving, unable to stop. What the hell has happened between them? Is this about the messages? I need to go after Eve, to make sure she’s okay. But her dad is here and Becky is inconsolable. What am I missing? And if I know, will it help me find Eve?

  ‘What’s going on?’ Eve’s dad asks the one question everyone is thinking. ‘I thought you wanted me to come here, but then you mentioned the coffee shop . . .’ He looks genuinely worried, his words catching in his throat. He’s just seen his daughter for the first time in years, all grown up. Becky, what have you done? And where has Eve gone?

  ‘Becky . . . look, I’m sorry how things ended between us . . .’ Tom risks a step towards her. Oh God, Tom. No. My eyes attempt to warn him. This isn’t about you.

  ‘This isn’t about you,’ Becky bites back through her sobs.

  ‘Then what is it about?’ Tom throws his arms wide, exasperated. I knew things would be messy when
I messaged him, but I never imagined this. I need to work out what the hell is going on, where the hell Eve has gone.

  ‘I’m Max.’ I turn to Eve’s dad.

  ‘Freddie,’ he says, reaching out a shaking hand. ‘Eve’s dad.’ He says it quietly, reluctantly, like he doesn’t deserve the title.

  ‘I’m Eve’s . . .’ I begin. But what am I? How many of those messages were hers? I look at Becky now, the woman I’ve spent the last few months imagining, in pieces before me. But which pieces of the woman I liked were actually hers? ‘Friend,’ I settle on. Eve really needs one of those right now. I turn to Becky. ‘We need to find Eve,’ I say. Her eyes are red, raw, and she looks sorry, so very sorry. But for what?

  ‘I’ve screwed up,’ she whispers.

  ‘Becky,’ Tom says again. Stop speaking, dude. You have no idea what’s going on. His eyes dart down the street to the small bunch of people gathering on the other side. ‘Why don’t we all go inside?’ Becky nods. Some things are best kept private, but right now I need everything in the open; I need to get to Eve.

  We bundle into Becky and Eve’s living room. Tom takes a seat on the sofa and the biggest ginger cat I’ve ever seen jumps on his lap. Buster. I walk with caution into the room, the one I’ve imagined Becky writing to me from so many times.

  My eyes scan the bookcases either side of the fireplace. The fireplace looks like it’s not been used in years. Unlike the books, which look thumbed and loved. But not by Becky. By Eve. There are traces of her everywhere, an open laptop discarded on the sofa to one side. Carefully I move it, sitting where she has just been, longing to read her words. But she’s not here. I don’t know where she is, and I need to find out. To find out whether she’s the woman I’ve been falling for all along.

  ‘Becky?’ I ask again. ‘What’s this about?’

  ‘My messages,’ she sobs, eyes darting to Tom.