by KE Payne
The truth was, it wasn’t a big deal to me, but I sure as hell didn’t want Emily and Beth to know that. I sat and looked at them exchanging sly glances between each other and wanted to tell them both the truth; that I’d done everything in my power to avoid being alone with Matt, anything to avoid what I knew would be the inevitable. I didn’t want to sleep with him, simple as that.
He obviously wanted to take our relationship to the next stage, but for me, just dating and kissing were enough. I had begun lately to wonder if I was frigid, because of the whole “not feeling anything” when we kissed, and that worry was compounded by my lack of any interest in him. Because I wasn’t into him, my not wanting to have sex with him was hardly surprising, was it? How could I tell my two closest friends that, though? The same two friends who thought Matt was the catch of the century, and two friends who I knew, if they were dating him, would jump at the chance to sleep with him.
I was different.
“You do fancy him, don’t you?” Beth persisted.
I paused before I answered her.
“Yeah, ’course,” I lied, picking up the tattered beer mat again. “We just haven’t found the right time to, you know, do anything. It’s no big deal.”
“Well, all I’ll say is that you’d better not let the grass grow and all that.” Beth winked.
“Why?”
“Why?” Beth snorted. “Guy like that? You kidding me?”
I shook my head, fully understanding what she was saying, of course, but playing dumb for the hell of it.
“Guys like Matt have women swarming round them like bees round a honey-pot.” Emily drained her glass and bent down to gather her bag from the floor by her feet. “If you hold back then he’ll start looking elsewhere, is all we’re saying.”
“Blimey, Em!” I whistled impatiently. “I’ve told you, the moment hasn’t been right yet, thassall!”
“Really? From what I heard he was banging his last girlfriend within a week of meeting her.” Emily looked at her watch. “Ah shit it. Gotta go, next lesson’s in five.”
She rose from her chair.
“I’m not having a go, Immy. I’m just saying. Guys like Matt don’t grow on trees.”
I stared moodily into my beer glass as Emily hooked her bag over her shoulder and left the pub.
“She’s only thinking about you,” Beth said after Emily had gone. “You just don’t show much interest in him, that’s all.”
“I do,” I said defensively.
“You don’t,” Beth said gently. “You never talk about him. Every time we ask you about him you go real moody and won’t tell us anything.”
“I don’t,” I said, even more defensively this time.
“You so do! You should be bubbling about the fact you’re with him, but you don’t seem that bothered. Every time we ask you about him, you don’t show much, I dunno, much enthusiasm.”
“Maybe that’s just the way I am,” I said, draining the last of my beer.
“Maybe.” Beth smiled.
“Anyway, I’m going to one of his gigs tonight,” I said, scraping my chair back and heading for the door. “At the Metro in town,” I added, by way of explanation.
“Then at least try and look happy about it,” Beth replied, following me out of the door and back to college.
*
College dragged all that afternoon, as I kinda knew it would. I spent most of my lessons alternating between thinking about what Emily and Beth had said to me at lunchtime and looking at my watch, waiting for five o’clock, but for whatever reason dreading it.
During my particularly dull English lesson that afternoon, I tried to figure out exactly why I wasn’t looking forward to going to the gig that night. I’d forget about it, then as soon as I remembered that Matt would be coming for me after college, I’d get this pit-of-the-stomach feeling that I just couldn’t fathom.
I didn’t want to go; that much was obvious. But why? Other girls my age would give their right arms to get free tickets to a gig, even more so if they knew they’d be going with the coolest guy in the college. Perhaps I was hesitant because I knew something would be expected of me that night; that I’d have to play the doting girlfriend, lovingly gazing up at her hot boyfriend in his hot Emo gear, playing in his hot band.
It wasn’t me, though. The doting girlfriend bit, I mean. It felt fake, like an act, like it always did when I went to see Matt play. I’ve never been a fan of the mosh pit, preferring to avoid being jumped on and flattened by some hairy seventeen-year-old tattooed kid, so I’d stand to the side and watch Anathema perform from there. I was always happy doing that. The band was wicked, and I did love the music they played, but I was always just happy watching from the sides while what seemed like hundreds of other teenagers went bat-shit crazy at the sight of Matt doing his thing. The fact it was my boyfriend playing up there on the stage was neither here nor there for me. Evidently I just don’t do the gazing up stuff so well.
It’s like, when I went to see his band play at the Cellar a few weeks back, I could see this girl standing in the pit shouting out his name, trying to reach out to him, telling him she loved him. You know, she was practically crying ’cos she was so overwhelmed by him. He was totally on fire that night, I’ll grant you, but I remember just looking at her and thinking—really?
I could have told her I was his girlfriend. Hell, I ought to have told her I was his girlfriend, maybe I should even have thumped her for flirting with him, but what did I do? I just ignored her, never said a word to her. I just carried on moshing to the music at my safe position at the side of the pit, watching this sea of heads, happy to take a back seat from it all.
I thought when I got home that night that I should have felt jealous that this girl was practically throwing herself at my boyfriend, but all I’d thought at the time was, yeah, good band, good singer, good music. Nothing more. I didn’t think about the lead singer being my boyfriend, I didn’t care that this girl would have had him there and then if she’d had the chance. Then of course I worried that there was something wrong with me, like I was missing an envy gene or something, as well as being bloody frigid.
Now I knew that tonight was going to be the same as before: girls throwing themselves at Matt, and girls crying over Matt. I was dreading it.
When five o’clock eventually came and my lesson was over, I found Matt waiting for me outside my classroom, sitting a little way down the corridor with his back against the wall. He had a pencil tucked behind his ear and was busy writing something down on a piece of paper with another pencil—lyrics, probably—occasionally staring up at the ceiling before hastily scribbling something down again.
Two girls in front of me from my class spotted him and nudged each other, giggling between themselves, and not for the first time in my lifetime, I thought about just how shallow some girls could be.
“Hey, Matt.” One of the girls stood in front of him, holding her folder tight against her chest, and looked down at him.
I saw Matt look up from his paper and watched as a wide grin spread across his face.
“All right?” He looked at the other girl and nodded an acknowledgment to her too.
I looked at Matt from over the girls’ shoulders and tried to feel some spark of something—anything. Okay, so he looked good, even I had to admit that, with his hair swept over just so, his skinny black jeans and scuffed Airwalks on, slumped on the floor like he didn’t have a care in the world. But that’s really all I thought—“nice Airwalks, Matt!”
“You’re playing Metro tonight, aren’t you?” The first girl was still looking coquettishly down at him.
“You coming?” Matt looked up at her, still grinning.
“You’re kidding me!” The second girl spoke now. “Tickets sold out, like, weeks ago for it.”
“That right?” Matt chewed on his pencil as he carried on looking at them both.
The two girls looked at each other, the first girl trying and failing to hide a grin. All the time I watc
hed them all from the doorway of my classroom, curiosity making me stay there rather than go out and speak to them.
Suddenly Matt flipped open his bag, which had been on the floor next to him, and put the piece of paper he’d been writing on inside it. He then rooted around inside the bag, evidently looking for something, finally bringing out two tickets. He hauled himself to his feet and handed the tickets to the first girl, who squealed and flung her arms round his neck.
“There’s no such thing as sold out.” Matt bent down and picked his bag up, putting it over his shoulders. “Not in my book, anyway.”
“Wicked, Matt!” The girl looked at the tickets as if they were gold-leaf.
“I’ll see you girls later, then?” Matt stuffed his hands in his pockets and leant against the wall. He turned his head and suddenly spotted me, still lurking by the classroom doorway, and a huge grin spread across his face.
“Hey, blondie!” he called over to me, lifting himself away from the wall and sauntering over, bending his head to kiss me when we were close enough.
I could sense the two girls, still behind him, and could imagine their reactions, their faces, like—what’s he doing with HER?—but maybe I was being paranoid as usual.
He slung his arm casually over my shoulder and jerked his chin in recognition to the two girls as we walked past them, me shutting out their lowered voices as we walked down the corridor and out into the bright sunshine outside.
“We’ll go and eat before we head over there, yeah?” Matt said, more as a statement than a question.
“Sure.” I just kinda wanted to go home, but how could I tell him that? Without even realising it, I’d conceded defeat.
“Ryan texted me this afternoon. He’s bringing the gear in the van later.” Matt smiled down. “Means we can have longer together to eat.”
Ryan was the band’s drummer, a stocky guy of about twenty with a large tattoo on the back of his neck, and the only one in the band who could drive. More importantly, the only one with access to a van. He had a stunning girlfriend, some girl called Lou who he’d been seeing for over three years. He doted on her and she doted on him too; I often found myself wondering how it would feel to have such a level of unconditional love.
*
The gig was, well, just as a gig should be. Matt was good, I’ll give him that, but instead of listening to them perform from the mosh pit, I hung around in the wings, watching them from the sides. Perhaps seeing those two girls earlier that day had unsettled me; perhaps I didn’t want to be seen as just another groupie. Perhaps I wanted to distance myself. Who the hell knows?
After they’d finished performing and loaded up the van, Matt talked Ryan into driving me home, something I was grateful for, because I just wanted the night to be over and to be back home, away from it all. Away from the pretence, I supposed.
Matt and I ended up being squashed up in the back of the van with the drum kit as Ryan took corners too fast, taking racing lines on the short journey out of town and back up to my house. I stared out of the window at the streetlights zipping past us and listened idly to the drone of Ryan and Lou’s voices in the front of the van, talking over the sound of the engine.
“Man, you’re so fickle! Do you know that?” Lou was joking with Ryan about something.
Fickle.
The sound of the word made me instantly think about Fickle and I wondered what she was doing right at that moment, and whether she would still be online by the time I got back. I thought about the conversations we’d had over the past few nights, smiling to myself as I remembered some of the stuff she’d said that had made me laugh out loud.
Fickle.
“So how was it?” Matt leant over and whispered in my ear, jerking me back to reality. “You enjoy it?” His voice was hoarse from the singing, giving it a husky edge.
I nodded. “It was good, yeah.”
“Just good?” Matt gasped, pulling a pretend hurt face. “I thought we rocked.”
“Well, you rocked good, yeah.” I laughed.
“I’m glad you came, babe.” Matt leant his head towards me, putting his arm round my shoulder, and kissed my hair.
I nodded.
After what seemed like the longest journey ever, Ryan finally turned the corner into our street and pulled up outside my front door, turning his head and grinning at me.
“Taxi for Miss Summers. That’ll be ten quid please, love.”
I grinned back at him, then turned my head and kissed Matt briefly on his cheek, then gathered up my bag.
“See you, Immy. Take care, yeah?” Ryan rammed the gearstick into reverse.
“Give us a minute, man!” Matt playfully cuffed Ryan’s head, then reached over to grasp my hand, which was on the door handle. He tucked a stray bit of my hair behind my ear with his other hand.
“Your parents in?” Matt jerked his head towards our front door.
“Yeah,” I replied. I tried to make a joke. “Probs watching some documentary about Marxism or dancing dogs or something.”
“Shame.” Matt winked at me.
I felt myself tensing, just wanting to get out of the van and into the house.
“You’ll text me later, yeah?” Matt ran his hand up and down my thigh and looked at me intently.
“’Course.” I smiled tightly, trying to make myself feel less tense.
Matt leant his head closer and, with his hand still moving up and down my thigh, kissed me. I surreptitiously tried not to make my head jerk back, instead I made an effort to kiss him back, jumping slightly as I felt his tongue slip into my mouth at the very same moment that his hand stroked my inner thigh, making me instinctively press my legs closer together.
“Get a room, guys, puh-lease.” Ryan puffed out his cheeks in mock exasperation as he watched us from his rearview mirror.
“Young love, Ryan.” Lou poked her tongue out at him. “You surely remember what that felt like!”
Ryan laughed, drawing Lou towards him and kissing her.
I pulled my head away from Matt and felt the urge to wipe my mouth, but knowing that I couldn’t, instead smiled at him and pulled my bag up close to my chest.
“Thanks for the lift, Ryan.” I grabbed at the door handle again, this time successfully managing to open the door without Matt intervening.
“No probs, babe.” Ryan winked at me.
I turned to look back at Matt.
“See you soon,” I said, getting out of the van before he had a chance to kiss me again.
“I’ll ring you later, yeah?” Matt grinned up at me.
I nodded, shutting the van door a little harder than was necessary and walked to my front door. I stood there a while, feeling an overwhelming feeling of misery, coupled with the palpable relief I felt as I heard the van reverse slightly, then move off back down the road.
Chapter Four
I couldn’t wait to get inside the house that night and log on. I was dying to talk to someone—anything to take me away from the reality that was my shit-confused life, if only for an hour. The rest of the family were already in bed, not ensconced in front of any Marxism documentary, of course, although the chink of light from under my parents’ bedroom door told me that Mum, in all probability, was still propped up in bed with her nose in the latest Danielle Steel while Dad slept on, oblivious to the light.
I looked at my PC, sitting patiently waiting for me, and wondered how a machine could have this apparently innocent little message board inside it that was making me question everything about my life. It had become my lifeline, that message board; I was certain about that. Was that normal? Was it right? It was turning into an obsession. Was that healthy?
Maybe it was the anonymity of the board I liked, or maybe it was because the friends I had made on there listened without judging. What I did know was, lately, they were always there, at the end of the computer, waiting for me, ready to talk and listen, ready to laugh and joke. I liked that. I needed that.
I looked at the computer again.
&
nbsp; Blast it. I logged on and saw that both Twiggy and Joey were on MSN, Joey having just added me the night before. I breathed a sigh of relief. Thank God! The voices of reason!
Twiggy: Hey you!
Barnaby Rudge: Hey, yourself! How you doing?
Twiggy: Crap day at work. Knackered! You?
Barnaby Rudge: All right. You work???!
Twiggy: Yeah, for my sins. In a supermarket. I’m one of those annoying checkout girls you’re always served by!
This was progress. Now at least I knew what Twiggy did for a living.
Another box flashed up:
Joey: Hey chickeroo!
Barnaby Rudge: Hey, Joey!
I giggled. I’d been talking to Joey on the board for over a week now and already knew that she was eighteen, like me, and at college, doing Biology and something else I couldn’t quite remember. I also knew that she called everyone, without exception, either chickeroo or kiddo. I liked that.
Joey: You been up to mischief?
Barnaby Rudge: Why you say that?
Joey: Well, it’s a conversation starter, isn’t it? Tell Joey all about it.
God, if only!
Twiggy: I’m logging off, BR. I’m on the early shift tomorrow.
Barnaby Rudge: No worries. You back tomorrow?
Twiggy: Yeah, of course! Cya!
I looked back at Joey’s message.
Barnaby Rudge: I wish I could tell you about it, Joe, I really do!
Joey: I got all evening, kiddo. Well, not all evening ’cos it’s like nearly midnight already, but y’know!
Barnaby Rudge: Nearly midnight? Whoa! How’d that happen? Good job it’s Friday, hey?
Joey: Aye, indeed. No sodding college tomorrow, thank feck!