Fierce Fragile Hearts

by Sara Barnard

  Caddy is still looking at me. I turn, keeping my body close to him, my hips turned into his, both of us still in motion. His mouth finds mine, as I knew it would, as I’d wanted. We kiss as we dance. His hand rests on the small of my back and moves me in. It is the full-on, sweaty kind of kiss you can only have in the middle of a dance floor. Part performance, part warm-up.

  He kisses the corner of my mouth, my jaw, my neck. ‘Want to go outside?’

  I let him take my hand again and lead me through the crowd to the edges of the club where I can suddenly breathe properly again. Neither one of us looks back. I follow him outside where it’s colder than I’d expected. Goosebumps prickle up over my skin, and to my surprise, he notices immediately.

  ‘Whoa, hey,’ he says, smiling. He runs his hands up and down my arms with an innocent kind of sweetness I’d never have expected from him. ‘Too cold?’

  ‘It’s fine,’ I say. ‘Do you have any cigarettes? I just want a smoke.’

  His brow furrows a little. ‘You just want to smoke?’

  I nod.

  ‘You don’t want to …’ He looks so baffled, I almost feel guilty. Almost. ‘I thought you were coming out for …’

  How is it not blindingly obvious that the show in there was just that, a show? Is he really that dense? He can’t really think that I, who turned him down once before and is best friends with the girl he’s been flirting with, could want to actually be with him?

  He gets it eventually, though. And I know the exact moment he does, because he grabs a hold of my arm and says, almost incredulously, ‘Bitch.’

  I’m not sure exactly what would have happened next if it had been left up to us, but it’s taken out of our hands when Caddy appears. A Caddy so angry she’s actually shaking.

  ‘We’re going,’ she says. ‘Just thought you should know.’

  ‘Going?’ I repeat. My voice is a bit of a squeak.

  ‘Yeah.’ I’ve never seen her like this. Behind her, I spot Rosie, making a you’ve-done-it-now face at me, and Jade, hanging slightly off to the side, arms crossed. ‘I thought I should say bye. Because I never want to see you again.’

  ‘Caddy!’

  ‘Hey, Cads,’ Owen begins.

  ‘Fuck you, Owen,’ she snaps, and I can see tears brimming in her eyes. ‘Just … fuck you, OK?’ Her voice cracks, and it stabs my heart.

  ‘Caddy,’ I try again. ‘Look, this was just—’

  ‘This was just you being you,’ she interrupts. She turns suddenly. ‘Owen, get lost.’

  He scarpers without another word, like the weasel he is, leaving the two of us staring at each other. Rosie hovers, anxious.

  ‘You—’ Caddy begins. Slowly, with purpose.

  ‘Um,’ Rosie pipes up. ‘Cads?’

  ‘Go ahead,’ I say. ‘Say it.’

  ‘No, don’t say it,’ Rosie says, stepping forward and taking a hold of Caddy’s wrist. ‘Come on, Cads. You’re drunk and upset. Let’s go. We can talk it over tomorrow.’

  ‘You think I got with him because I like him?’ I ask, trying to keep my voice steady. ‘You think I’d want that waste of space?’

  ‘He’s not a waste of space.’

  ‘Yes, he is, Caddy! He’s so below you. And you’re risking everything you have with Kel, who loves you, for him?!’

  ‘You don’t know anything.’

  ‘I have eyes,’ I snap. ‘You were making it so obvious tonight, Caddy. It was pathetic.’

  ‘I’m pathetic?’ Her voice is three times its normal volume. Rosie’s eyes widen in alarm. ‘Says you? Really?’

  ‘I’d know, right?’

  She’s so furious she can barely speak. It would probably be funny if it wasn’t so devastating. But, hell, I’m pretty mad, too. Devastated and mad is not a good mix.

  ‘You,’ she manages. She actually points at me. ‘You need to sort your fucking life out.’

  I do the worst thing. I laugh.

  ‘Suze,’ Rosie hisses, looking anguished.

  Caddy’s tears have spilled down her face, streaking mascara, and out of nowhere I think about the first time we met. Caddy, sixteen and awkward, staring at me from the front door of her house, naked dismay all over her face. It’s kind of like how she’s looking at me now. Like I’m the most disappointing thing she’s ever seen. The last thing she’d ever want in her life.

  I turn and walk away, back into the noise of the club. I ignore Owen, who is hovering by the bar, and head for the cloakroom. I just want to get my coat and escape home.

  ‘Hey,’ a voice calls, and I groan. ‘Um, Suzanne?’

  I turn because I have to, even though it’s Tess’s voice and she’s the last person I want to speak to.

  ‘Did it work?’ she asks.

  I look at her, trying to figure out if she’s being sarcastic. But her face is anxious, as if she’s really asking me.

  ‘I don’t know yet,’ I say.

  ‘Well, good work, anyway,’ she says. ‘You’re a hell of a lot braver than me.’

  Brave. Well, that’s one way of putting it.

  31

  ‘Pyro’

  Kings of Leon

  I’m woken the next morning by my phone buzzing by my head. I reach for it, groggy, pushing my hair out of my eyes. Matt. Why is Matt calling me? At 8.06 a.m.?

  ‘Er, hello?’

  ‘Hey,’ he says. ‘Listen, I’m coming to Brighton.’

  ‘What? Why?’ I sit up, blinking. Did we make plans? Did I call him while I was drunk and ask him to come down?

  ‘I’m on my way to Kel’s,’ he says, and I realize why before he even says it, the knowledge landing solid as a punch. ‘It’s him and Caddy. They’ve broken up.’

  I’m waiting on the front steps of my building when Matt pulls up. Caddy hasn’t answered any of my messages and she’s ignoring my calls, so I’m guessing she’s still furious with me. Rosie, being Rosie, had anticipated my stream of messages before I’d even sent a single one with the line: Keep me out of this. She’d followed it up with a softer, Love you, obvs. But seriously. Keep me out of it. I’d hesitated over how to reply, tempted to make my case anyway and pester until she promised that we’re still friends, but I’d restrained myself. Instead, I’d replied, I love you. Have fun with Jade? Go to the Pavilion. Sorry for being the worst. She sent an eye-rolling emoji and nothing else.

  ‘So,’ Matt says, when I slide into the passenger seat beside him. ‘Last night.’

  ‘What do you know?’

  ‘Just that they’ve broken up.’ He changes gear, glancing into the rear-view mirror. ‘Kel called me at, like, 4 a.m. He’s gutted.’

  ‘Who broke up with who?’

  ‘It kind of sounds like it was a mutual thing. Not in a good way, but mutual.’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘He said they had a fight earlier in the day and she went out without him? And then she called him crying so he picked her up.’

  ‘And that turned into them breaking up?’

  ‘Sounds like it. Haven’t you spoken to Caddy?’

  I mumble something deliberately unintelligible and shrug, which makes him shake his head and smile a little. ‘Bad night, huh?’

  ‘It wasn’t the best.’

  It had seemed like a good idea to go to Kel’s with Matt, but when we arrive Kel just rolls his eyes, like he’s annoyed.

  ‘Mate,’ Matt says, opening his arms and bringing Kel in for a brief, backslapping man-hug. Why don’t men just hug properly? Hugs are so nice. They’re missing out. ‘How are you doing?’

  ‘Shit,’ Kel says. ‘Totally shit. Hey, Suze.’ I make sure to give him a proper hug and he squeezes me back tight. ‘Didn’t think I’d see you.’

  ‘Why not?’

  We follow him into the house and through to the conservatory. Matt and I both sit on the sofa but Kel stays standing, rubbing the back of his neck.

  ‘I thought you might have enough going on with Caddy?’ He raises his eyebrows at me and I flush. ‘She told me everything. She’s p
retty mad at you. Have fun being the scapegoat.’

  ‘Scapegoat?’ Matt asks.

  Kel lets out a humourless laugh. ‘Suze didn’t tell you about Owen?’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘This isn’t about me,’ I say. ‘Why are we talking about me?’

  ‘Good question,’ Kel says. ‘But seeing as we are, you want to fill me in on what’s actually been going on with this guy? Did you know about him and Cads?’

  Oh shit. Matt looks at me.

  ‘Um …’

  ‘Did you?’ Kel repeats. ‘Look, I get that you’re loyal to Caddy, but seriously, Suze. Fucking hell. You’re meant to be my friend, too.’

  My face feels incriminatingly hot, even though I’m more confused than guilty. Should I have told Kel? I hadn’t even thought about it. Besides, it wasn’t like she’d even done anything with him, was it? What was there to tell?

  ‘And if you knew she liked him,’ Kel continues, his voice picking up, ‘why did you get off with him?’

  Oh God, this is all too confusing. And Matt is sitting right there, staring at me. If I say the truth – I was trying to make a point and, hey, it obviously worked, right? – will that make things better or worse? I swallow and sink a little into the sofa, shrugging.

  ‘Wait,’ Matt says. I look at him beseechingly, but he says it anyway. ‘Who did you get off with?’

  ‘Owen,’ Kel says impatiently.

  ‘I’m still not clear on who Owen is.’

  ‘The guy Caddy—’ Kel’s voice breaks and he stops, waves his hand in frustration and walks out of the room.

  ‘OK,’ Matt says to me. ‘You’re going to have to fill me in.’

  ‘Caddy has a crush on a guy from her flat,’ I say. ‘And he was there last night, and they were being flirty. So I …’ God, it made so much sense last night. ‘Well, I kind of kissed him.’

  ‘The guy she has a crush on?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I wanted to show that he wasn’t worth it,’ I say. ‘Like, he’s obviously not good enough for her if he’d get off with me, right?’

  His whole face scrunches, incredulous. ‘What?’

  ‘You know what I mean.’

  ‘Do you know how completely fucked that reasoning is? Why would you even get involved?’

  ‘Because I love Kel, and she was going to do something stupid. Seriously. I was worried she was going to kiss Owen, and that would have been even worse.’

  ‘But now they’ve broken up over it.’

  ‘They haven’t broken up over that,’ I say, the words coming out like a snap. ‘They’ve broken up because they’ve been having issues for months. You must know that. Owen is a symptom, not the problem. Besides, are you even surprised? Isn’t this always inevitable, anyway? This is why we don’t want relationships, right? Because of bullshit like this.’

  Matt’s eyebrows have risen as I spoke. ‘Oh, you want to have that conversation?’

  ‘What does that mean?’

  Kel comes back into the room then, saving both of us from having to hear the answer. ‘I’m going to get drunk,’ he announces.

  ‘Mate, it’s not even eleven,’ Matt says.

  ‘Fuck time,’ Kel says. ‘Fuck fucking everything.’

  ‘Wow,’ I say. ‘This is a whole new side of you, Kel.’

  ‘And fuck you, too,’ Kel adds, and he’s kind of joking and kind of not. ‘You’ll drink with me, right, Suze? There’s tequila in the kitchen.’

  ‘Kel, even I draw the line at tequila in the morning.’

  He rolls his eyes at me and leaves the room again. I glance at Matt, who’s pinching the top of his nose, face scrunched.

  ‘Maybe I shouldn’t have come?’ I ask, lowering my voice. ‘Maybe you should just have guy time?’

  ‘Maybe,’ Matt says, shaking his head. ‘He’s not usually like this. I thought he’d be happy to see you, otherwise I would’ve said don’t come.’ He breathes out a sigh. ‘Plus, I didn’t know about all the shit that apparently went down last night. Kinda wish I’d been there now.’

  ‘Me too,’ I say. I can hear Kel clattering around in the kitchen, the sound of a kettle being poured.

  Matt smirks. ‘Oh yeah? Sounds like I would’ve been competing for your attention.’

  ‘Oh, please,’ I say. ‘As if.’

  I love how he can light a spark in me with just one smirk. I really do wish he’d been there last night; maybe I could have talked to him about Caddy and Owen instead of just reacting, and we could have fixed it somehow, together. Or, more likely, we could have just been kissing. Either would have been better than what actually happened.

  He raises his eyebrows at me and I can’t resist leaning over to kiss him, just once. Kel’s still in the kitchen, it’s fine. But then Matt kisses me back, and it suddenly feels like a really long time since we kissed, and I’m sliding across the sofa, on to his lap, his arm is around my waist, everything is great—

  ‘Guys, seriously.’ Kel’s voice is sharp as glass. ‘Seriously.’

  I duck my head away from Matt’s, hand over my mouth, and move sheepishly back from him, as casually as I can, up on to the arm of the sofa instead, like I was meant to be sitting there all along.

  ‘Sorry,’ Matt says.

  ‘Sorry,’ I say.

  ‘Sure,’ Kel says. He’s holding three mugs of something steaming, and the sight of them balanced so carefully in his hands, the fact that he was in there making drinks for all three of us, makes me feel suddenly sick with guilt.

  ‘Kel, want me to make breakfast?’ I offer. ‘If you don’t have bacon, I can go out and get some, make bacon sandwiches?’

  He shakes his head, leaning to put the mugs on the table. ‘Don’t bother.’

  ‘What can I do? Just say.’

  ‘Nothing. Just … It would be really great if you could stop using me as your excuse to make fucking doe eyes at each other.’

  I feel my eyebrows lift as Matt glances at me, then back at Kel. ‘That’s not what we’re doing,’ he says.

  Kel rolls his eyes. ‘Whatever. I just can’t deal with this today, OK? Suze, why are you even here?’

  ‘For you,’ I say, stung.

  ‘Yeah? It’s not my lap you’re dancing on.’

  ‘Mate,’ Matt says, sharp. ‘Chill the fuck out.’

  My skin is tingling with the shock of not just what Kel said, but the way he said it. He’s never talked like that to me before. I didn’t even know he could. So cold, so sarcastic. Part of me knows I should get up and leave, because that’s probably the safest thing for our long-term friendship, but another part of me, the part I have trouble controlling and the part I don’t understand, wants to snap, Do you want it to be? To see what he’d say, to push him, to light the fuse and watch it blow.

  But I force myself to wait three seconds before I speak, and that’s long enough for Kel’s face to crumple, his fist to go to his forehead, his head to shake. ‘Suze, I’m sorry. Fuck. It’s not you I’m mad at.’ He closes his eyes and sighs a long, jagged sigh.

  ‘I should go,’ I say, sliding off the arm of the sofa.

  ‘You don’t have to …’ Kel begins, but I shake my head at him.

  ‘It’s OK. This should be your guy time. No doe eyes.’ I chance a smile, and he sighs again, a reluctant, answering smile flickering on his face.

  He hugs me, his arms pulling in tight around my shoulders. ‘You’re all right, Suze,’ he says, quiet.

  ‘I really did come here for you,’ I reply. ‘Honest.’

  ‘Ish,’ he replies. ‘I’ll talk to you later.’

  Matt has got to his feet. ‘I’ll drive you back, Suze,’ he says, as if I haven’t walked the twenty minutes from Kel’s house to mine a dozen times or more.

  ‘OK,’ I say.

  We’re both quiet as we walk to the car, and still neither of us speaks as Matt starts the engine and eases out of the space. Finally, he says, ‘Don’t mind him. He’s just upset.’

 
; ‘I know,’ I say. ‘It was a bit of a dick move for us to kiss like that, though. I feel bad.’

  ‘Well, yeah, maybe.’ He gives a sheepish shrug. ‘We probably could’ve saved it for later.’

  I smile. ‘Later? There’s a later?’

  ‘I’d like there to be a later, if you would.’ He’s not looking at me, his eyes on the road, but he’s smiling.

  ‘Can later be right now?’ I say, only half joking.

  He laughs. ‘Don’t tempt me.’ We’re already at Ventrella Road. ‘I have to get back to Kel, though. He’s got to come first right now.’

  I sigh as if I’m disappointed, when actually what I’m thinking is how much I like that Kel is his priority. How decent he is. ‘Let me know about later, then,’ I say.

  ‘Are you working today?’

  ‘No, tomorrow.’

  ‘OK. I’ll call or message later. Listen …’ It’s so weird when people ask you to listen in the middle of a conversation, as if up until that point you were doing something else. Especially when they don’t follow it with anything.

  ‘Yeah …?’ I prompt.

  Matt looks at me, then out at the parked car in front of us. He grimaces, rubbing the side of his forehead with the palm of his hand. ‘It bothers me that you kissed that guy.’

  ‘Why?’

  He lifts his hand slightly to look at me. ‘You know why.’

  ‘Well, no, I don’t. Because we talked about this, and I thought the whole freedom thing was a part of it. Which means you’re free to kiss other people, and so am I.’

  ‘I know that.’

  ‘So why are you bothered? It’s OK for you to kiss other girls but I can’t kiss other guys?’

  He lets out a quiet yet audible groan. ‘I haven’t.’

  ‘Haven’t?’

  ‘Been kissing other girls. Or anything else.’

  ‘Since when?’

  ‘Since … Christmas?’

  Oh. Oh. ‘Why not?’

  ‘Because I just … haven’t wanted to.’ He shrugs a little. ‘It’s all you, in my head. All the time. I know you’re free to do whatever you want, but I guess it’s just not that great to hear that you don’t feel that way about me.’