Page 6

Three

Joah

Right, so here’s the thing—kissin’ Ysolde Featherstonhaugh? That was a proper headfuck on its own, yeah? But havin’ sex with her? Christ almighty, that was out of this fuckin’ world. No lie. Like, I wasn’t high tonight or owt—not even a cheeky spliff—but might as well have been.

Thing is, I’m not the biggest fan of what comes after sex, you know?

Girls don’t always know what to do with it—fair enough, it’s a weird adjustment, innit?

Before sex like, and even during, there’s this—I dunno—haze?

Warps how close you are actually to the person you’re with, crazy close like—and it feels real, don’t it?

Right up until you come and then—gone. Like someone switched the lights on and you’re lookin’ ’round thinkin’, What the fuck now?

Weird, innit?

Some girls hang about, yeah? Try and stretch that closeness out longer—but me? Once I’m done, I’m done. Ready for ’em to sling their hook—just want ’em outta there, you get me? But her? Lyin’ there in her bed tonight…mate, you couldn’t pay me to get up and go.

And here’s the mad part—she ain’t even doing owt sexy, nowt wild or over-the-top. She’s just there, you know? Just—existing like.

Leant back against the fuckin’ thirty-five pillows on her bed in nowt but a white vest that—thank you, God—is real fuckin’ sheer, and some lacy knickers that are different to the ones I took off her just before, so fingers crossed I get to take these ones off her too, know what I mean?

She stares over at me and plucks the cigarette that’s hangin’ from me mouth. Takes a drag, bats her eyes calmly, like she doesn’t have a fuckin’ care in the world.

Never done this before—not since Pip, anyway.

And that was different, wasn’t it? Proper relationship, started seeing each other when we were eighteen, on and off for two years.

Bit of a circus, that. But this? Here, now?

This ain’t the same. It’s… I dunno. Lying in bed with her shooting the shit is par for the course of a relationship like that, but this—here—it’s something else.

“Do you have any secrets?” she asks, battin’ them lashes like she didn’t just go and lob the most diabolical question fuckin’ known to man right bang into the room. Sounds cute comin’ from her, but. Everythin’ do though, don’t it?

Give her a suspicious look. “Yeah.”

“Tell me one?”

Nod me chin at her. “You first.”

“There are like three different boys that all believe I lost my virginity to them.”

I squint at her. “Why?”

“Because I told each of them that I lost my virginity to them.” She shrugs. “Men go mad for it. I’m not sure know why—”

I start laughin’. Fuck, that’s pretty funny, innit? She’s not wrong, I guess. Summat about it.

“So who’d you lose it to?” I ask.

She stares me in the eye, face all proper straight. “You.”

Makes me laugh, that, and that makes her happy which makes me happy because I don’t know, suppose I am a soft lad now, aren’t I?

“Now you go,” she tells me.

Push me hands through my hair as I have a think. “Dunno—I kind of wanna join the Twenty-Seven Club.”

“You want to… die …by the time you’re twenty-seven?” she asks, dead serious.

I shrug. “Maybe.”

Her eyes do this quick sweep of my face, up and down, like she’s sizin’ me up. “How old are you now?”

“Twenty-three.”

She don’t look confused, not really—nah, she’s more pissed off than owt. “So you’d like to die in four years?”

Another shrug from me. “Pretty fuckin’ rock and roll.”

“Pretty fucking stupid,” she fires back, ain’t even a pause there to think about it.

Takes me back a bit. Hope she don’t catch that on me face—feel like she might have but, so firstly, fuck her for that, you get me? And second, fuck it—I would really fancy fuckin’ her for that. There’s summat about being called on me shit, you know?

I lift a brow. “You callin’ me stupid?”

“If you want to die in four years purely for the sake of rock and roll , you don’t need me to call you stupid—your desires are doing that for you.”

Scratch me neck, don’t look away from those eyes of hers. “Rock and roll is me whole fuckin’ life, you know what I mean?”

She gives me this smile—annoyin’, man—almost like she’s sorry for me or summat, you know? Then she fuckin’ uppercuts me again with a little whisper. “Well, perhaps you should find something else to live for, then.”

I stare over at her—best face I ever fuckin’ saw, and I’ve seen a lot faces—wonder to meself if maybe I have just—? Found somethin’ else to live for, I mean. Maybe I found her on some shite Sunday night, end of Feb 1995.

She watches me closely as she takes a drag of my cigarette. “What’s your favourite element?”

Give her a bit of a frown. “What?”

Take back my cig from her.

“Element,” she says, her little eyebrows arched up. “You know, like earth, wind, f—”

“It ain’t obvious?” Give her a look for not fuckin’ knowin’ that about me already as I take a drag. “Fire.”

“Oh,” she goes but she don’t look all that happy with me answer—and you know what’s fuckin’ weird? Don’t like it. Don’t fuckin’ like that she ain’t happy with my fuckin’ answer, but why the fuck do I give a shit, know what I mean?

Nod my chin at her. “What’s yours?”

She pursues her lips. “Water.” She fights off a bit of a smile. Fuck, she’s cute. Ain’t never called a bird “cute” in me fuckin’ life, but here we are.

She gives me an awkward smile. “Which bodes rather well for us…”

I let out a “hah,” like it means fucking shit—know what I mean? Girls go funny about shit like that, but it don’t mean owt.

“Oi.” Nod my chin at her. “Here’s an actual important question, yeah—What’s your favourite song?” I ask her.

“Of yours?” she asks the ceiling.

Shrug like that ain’t fucking exactly what I was fishin’ for. “Sure, go on—”

She glances over at me, grimaces a bit. “I don’t…know…a lot of your music?”

Sorry, wait—what the fuck?

Scrunch me face up at her. Can’t believe it, can I—is she havin’ a laugh?

I scoff. “What the fuck?”

Everyone knows our music. Like, everyone. I mean—fuck me. Probably Never is literally the fastest-sellin’ debut album in the history of British music. That ain’t just big—mate, that’s fuckin’ massive.

She gives this little shrug, all apologetic-like. “I just know the big ones…”

I glare at her, full-on scowl. “They’re all fuckin’ big ones.”

Rolls her eyes at me, fed up. And, swear to god, her lookin’ done with me might be the best drug I’ve ever had.

Proper rush. Gives me this weird, fucked-up thrill, having to try hard to impress someone, you know—?

Cos these days, I don’t gotta try at all, do I?

I could cough in the drink of every other girl on the planet, and they’d probably thank me, might even ask me to do it again.

Not her, but. Nah, she’d probably fuckin’ cough right back—and then chuck the whole thing straight in me face.

“Go on.” I nod at her. “Favourite song ever then…”

She purses them lips of hers, thinkin’.

“I don’t know. It’s a tie probably. Between ‘Crimson and Clover’ and ‘Unchained Melody.’”

“Whoa,” I say—and shit. Didn’t mean to say that out loud, did I—but fuck, here we are, all the same.

Surprises me, then. Dunno why that surprises me—just, I had this weird dread in me that she was gonna like, break my heart and say a fucking Take That song. Maybe Celine Dion—? But Tommy James and the Righteous Brothers? I can work with that, know what I mean?

“What?” She frowns defensively.

“I dunno.” I shrug, and that much is true. “You. Everythin’ about ya… It’s all whoa, innit?”

Her cheeks go pink, and she rolls over, face down, into her pillow.

“That was a very cute thing to say,” she says, voice muffled now by her pillow.

“No, fuck—” I shove her—not too hard but, cos I’m pretty sure if you pushed her too hard, she’d fly off like a crisp packet in a breeze. “I’m—no—I ain’t cute. Fuck that.”

She peeks up at me from her pillow, sly as you like, side-eyein’ me. And the way she’s lookin’—the way her face is just there, grinnin’ even though I can’t really see her gob—it’s dead obvious she don’t agree.

Nod my chin at her, proper eager to move on from all this cute shite, cos let’s have it right, I ain’t fuckin’ cute, am I? Nah, I’m a fuckin’ legend, man.

So I go for it—the question I’ve been gaggin’ to ask her all night. Try to play it dead casual, though, not like some clingy fucker.

“You seen me play before?”

She rolls back in towards me.

“Once.” She gives me a small smile. “Glastonbury last year.”

“Oh, fuck—” My face drops, and I know I look more gutted than I should. Proper embarrassin’, really like—Why the fuck do I even care? Know it wasn’t my best show, yeah, but it was fuckin’ Glasto. Don’t need to prove myself to anyone.

But now all I can think about is her stood in the crowd when I ballsed up that one note in “Ultra Violet.” Makes me want to chuck meself straight off the terrace just thinkin’ about it, you know?

Try to laugh it off, dead casual. “Sounded proper shite that day, didn’t I?”

She rolls her eyes. “No, you didn’t.”

“No, I did, yeah…” I shrug. It’s true but. “We’re better now.”

“Well, I thought you were good then.”

Shake my head at her because she’s wrong—we weren’t.

Thought we were, but I’m fuckin’ better now.

Does make me happy though, that she were there, know what I mean?

That she saw me up there. Me first Glasto, that’s kinda a fuckin’ thing, innit?

Not gonna say it to her, though, like a right fuckin’ nutter, but I reckon like maybe one day I might be pretty fuckin’ chuffed she was there just.

“We’re playin’ this year again,” I tell her. “Come. I’ll do better.”

She smiles, amused, then nods. “Okay.”

“Promise?” I ask, brow up.

She nods again once. “I promise.”