Page 71

He does, saying, ‘Clearly, other people’s opinions of you matter a lot more than whatyouthink.’

‘If this is your way of trying to convince me you’renota self-centred prick …’

‘I don’t think it’s self-centred to want to live my life on my terms, not some … prescribed, conventional rubbish that I don’t care about, or doesn’t make me happy. Cosplaying and being into this nerdy fantasy series isn’t hurting anybody. I don’t see why I shouldhave to push it aside or pretend it doesn’t matter to me just so other people accept me better.’

When he puts it like that …

‘It –’ he starts, and falters, and my ears perk up. I turn my face towards him – or towards the door, rather. Straining, I hear the stilted, ragged breath he draws. I imagine him running his hand over his hair.

I wonder if it feels as soft as it looks.

Finally, he says, ‘You were right. Itdoesget lonely sometimes. D’you think I didn’t get bullied for being such a nerd? For – I don’t know, foreverything. For wearing my hair too long, for reading too many books, daring to be a decent left-wing and earn a place on the football team when I was supposed to fit this mould everyone else designated for me, for beinginterestedin stuff at school, for … And I … I tried, once. For a while. I cut my hair, I stopped trying in class so much, I did all the things everyone else told me I was supposed to be doing.’

Wore the right clothes. Got the right school bag.

Got off the bus at the right stop before school to bump into the right classmates.

Max must be finding it easier to talk without having tofullyconfront me, too, because this is more than I ever would’ve imagined him saying to me otherwise. Half the time, he talks around me and won’t even lookat me. Normally, that would annoy the hell out of me, but right now, it feels … different.

Like we’re on level ground.

And I want him to keep talking.

‘What happened?’ I ask.

I imagine him shrugging. After a beat, Max lets out another of those curt, dry barks of laughter. ‘I was miserable as sin, what do you think happened?’

‘Oh.’

‘I still got bullied, but at some point I just thought, fuck it, why am I even bothering?’ His voice rises, gets heated, but it’s still not angry. It’s something else, something that makes me wish the door wasn’t between us and I could see the look in his eyes. ‘Why should I make my life – makemyself– smaller for their sake, when it didn’t change anything anyway? If they were going to pick on me, I might as well enjoy myself. My dad’d say, “They’re just jealous,” or that they’re dissatisfied with their own lives, but I don’t know how true that really is. I just figured that I didn’t want to waste my life pretending I didn’t care about the things Idocare about.’

He falls quiet, and I’m too frozen to do what I really want to, which is reach for the handle and open the door. His words bounce around inside my head, and I remember the way he walked around the cons in fullcosplay, how unbothered he was. I thought he was being superior and all up himself, but … maybe it’s not that after all.

Defensive, he’d said, which checks, but also maybe he’s just …

Confident. Himself.

I wish I could be a bit more like that.

‘You’re right,’ I tell Max. ‘That’s not so self-centred.’

‘Sorry if I made a dick of myself by judging you.’

‘Sorry if I did that to you, too.’

‘Truce?’ he says, and there’s a smile in his voice.

‘Truce,’ I agree. Then I say, ‘It wasn’t … I mean, I don’t think I’ve been totally fair to you, either. To be honest, I’ve been … reallyjealousof you.’ The words taste like ash, and I press the cold glass of my cider to my forehead, hunching over my knees. But I’ve said it now, I’ve put it out there, I might as well carry on. ‘Because you and Jake got so close so fast, and I thought we were best friends, so I felt really pushed out. Maybe Ididgo a little harder on the OWAR stuff at the beginning when I wasn’t actually that into it, to try and make up for that.’

‘You don’t say.’

‘But I think I was … maybe a bit harsh to you, because it was hard for me.’

After a moment, Max says, ‘Like at Comic Con.’

‘Yeah. Yeah, like then.’

‘Cerys,’ he says, and his voice pulls all consonants in my name into something soft and enticing. ‘I wasn’t trying tostealhim from you. I mean … you do realize that, right?’