Nicki
Phoebe’s a riptide and I’m in her pull again. No matter how distracted I am by everyone telling me how much I’m glowing, and better get some sleep while you still can, and when are you due again, I’m only focused on her. My eyes are scanning the glass house for her, needing to know her exact location. I view myself through her gaze, imagining what she sees and how she interprets it. My tasteful maternity dungarees bought new from the tasteful maternity dress store. My swollen stomach bulging with my heteronormative decisions made at the stereotypical age. This Instagram clusterfuck of a baby shower we’re attending. Honestly, Charlotte’s just put us into ‘teams’ again, and I’m pretending to care what Keanu Reeves looked like as a baby when all I want to do is make eye-contact with her, share a moment, get back to who we were again.
It’s been well over a year since I’ve seen her. She seems exactly the same. And yet, here I am, everything changed and about to change even more. She’s on a team across from me on the other sofas, caught in the middle of a huddle of women, all being passive aggressive about who gets to hold the pen, pointing at their sheet and whispering loudly, ‘ I think that one is Taylor Swift .’ I watch Phoebe glaze over, drumming her slim fingers on the coffee table, not even looking at the sheet but, instead, around at the cornucopia of baby shower paraphernalia strewn about the place. The balloons, the stork decorations, that damn peony wall that’s releasing such a sweet stench I’m almost choking with my supersonic pregnancy sense of smell. Then, what I’ve wanted, her eyes find mine. Immediately I wish they hadn’t as she’s so penetrating, so unafraid of holding eye contact. The room fades to muted tones, as she raises one perfect eyebrow and asks me, without saying anything:
What happened to you, ?
What happened to us?
The room dissolves further and I’m back there, waiting with her for the night bus. It was another Tuesday Is The New Friday. Another night of clicking at the bartender for more shots, of complaining about our colleagues, the new Meta algorithm, the state of my marriage, how the last tube is always too early because fucking hell I’ve missed it again. Our weekly ritual. I could already taste the halloumi kebab we’d order at the place around the corner from hers on the walk home. My shoes were hurting so I was leant on the bus stop bench, dangling them off my feet, laughing at one of her jokes, when Phoebe leant over and kissed me.
‘Phoebe, no,’ I’d said, pushing her away.
Phoebe hadn’t moved her face though. She held it so close her freckles blurred.
‘.’ She’d whispered my name, her breath hot on my face, smelling sweet from the cocktails we’d been sipping at a cool place I’d never known existed without her. Yet another night of her patiently listening as I endlessly complained about how I worried I’d settled down too soon, how I was too young to feel so bored, how I loved Matt but I worried I wasn’t in love with him anymore. Then her cutting me off. ‘ Why are you whinging when you could be dancing? ’ Dragging me from our booth, and spinning me onto the tiny dance floor, where I could actually feel the shackles of my life drop onto the sticky floorboards. Phoebe’s breath smelt delicious. When Matt drank, the sweetness of his breath repelled me. We never had drunk sex as I couldn’t stand the reek of him – the beer sweating out of his pores, the bleary red eyes, the stink of hops on his tongue. We didn’t have much sex anyway, and everyone says to get drunk to help things along, but don’t they realise what drunk men smell like? And how shit and selfish men get in bed after a few too many? Matt could semi-regularly make me come but only if he dutifully followed the gentle foreplay and exact paint-by-numbers positioning I needed to get off. But, after three pints, he’d ignore all this knowledge and try to have porn sex with me. Always pushing me into doggy, always slamming into me, muttering filth, like ‘ I know you like it like this, ’ when he knows I don’t. When men are drunk, they have the sex they want. That’s what Matt smells like after three pints – bad sex. Phoebe smelt like peonies, cradling my face as she knelt on the filthy East London pavement in front of me – eyes uncertain and full of lust. It took a moment to comprehend what had just happened. I could still taste her on my lips and it was like Parma Violets. I should’ve been shocked and disgusted. Annoyed at her, for taking a punt when I’m so clearly not interested. I should’ve felt deceived, even, that maybe our friendship was something she was using to try and ‘turn’ me or whatever, but, in the seconds after the shock wore off, I didn’t feel any of those things at all.
All I felt was, OK, wow, I need to kiss you back.
Three night buses had stopped and lurched away again before we broke apart, panting, and then laughing in that delicious delirium you share after kissing someone for the first time. It had been over a decade since I’d had a first kiss. I’d forgotten how heady and frothy it was, to break that barrier with someone, knowing there was no coming back from it. For a moment or two, I floated on the euphoria of the sensation, and on the surprise turn this night had taken. Then, as Phoebe raised her eyebrow and leant in towards me, reality struck like a gavel in a courtroom, and I pushed her away.
‘Hang on, what just happened?’
She laughed. ‘We kissed, . Finally.’ Phoebe leant in again, her sweet lips brushing mine and I responded again, pulling her into me, my hand skimming her back. Wow, it felt good. Amazing. Natural. And, yes, long overdue. Phoebe let out a moan and I joined her and went to stroke her chest, like how I do when I kiss Matt, though, of course, she had breasts, and, as I touched them – their softness, their not-maleness – something soured in my throat. I pulled back again, shaking my head.
‘No no no.’
Phoebe, not getting it, laughed against and leaned in again. ‘Yes yes yes,’ she said.
‘What the fuck? Stop it. How dare you?’ My voice slurred, while my drunk brain tried to catch up. Phoebe was my friend. Friend. A lesbian friend, yes, but I wasn’t gay. I was straight. Hadn’t ever thought of women that way. Hadn’t even kissed a girl as a dare, or to get boys off when I was younger so they could watch. Rage charged in, joining the mess. And, umm, I was fucking married! I’d just cheated on my husband. It was easier to be angry at Phoebe than disgusted at myself. ‘What the hell is wrong with you?’ I’d shouted, pushing her again, this time so hard she fell back onto the pavement. A group of drunk men outside the chicken shop cheered as she fell. She looked up at me, baffled and humiliated, and I couldn’t take it. I’d stood up and started striding off in some random direction, letting the unknown streets of the city swallow me and what I’d done, while Phoebe scrabbled to run after me.
‘? ! Come on. Where are you going?’
‘Away from you,’ I called back, arms crossed, walking as fast as I could in my stupid work heels, past neon doorways to thudding music. ‘How dare you kiss me!’
‘You kissed me too. Please, we need to talk about this.’
I dodged a group of younger women, shivering outside a club in the smoking area, singing an Adele song to distract them from the cold. Phoebe continued to chase me through Shoreditch. ‘Stop walking away. Please. Come on, . Be a grown-up.’
I halted and let her catch me up. Mainly, I was drunk and lost – I only ever ventured into East London with Phoebe to guide me through the graffiti and pop-ups and groups of youths inhaling laughing gas. I slowly turned around and her outline was neon against the glow of a nightclub sign.
‘You’ve been lying to me,’ I told her. ‘You’ve been pretending to be my friend.’
‘, come on, that’s not true.’
‘You’ve been making me vulnerable, getting me to open up about my life and marriage so you can . . . seduce me.’
Phoebe, to my surprise, burst out laughing. ‘Seduce you? . Come on.’ She took a delicate step forward. ‘You know that’s not it. You know we’ve been falling in love with each other.’
‘What?’
‘It’s been as much as a surprise to me as it has been for you. But, please. Think about it. We’ve not been friends in ages. We’ve been so much more than friends.’
‘Stop it.’
‘We’ve been sharing a bed at least one night a week. We talk all the time. Go out alone all the time. Tell each other our secrets. , I think about you literally all the time. You feel the same, I know it.’
‘No.’
‘I love you, .’ She looked so beautiful, stencilled by the city lights.
‘Stop. I’m married.’
‘And you’re unhappy.’
‘I’m not. And I’m not . . . g—’
‘Gay? Is that why you’re freaking out?’ She tilted her head to one side, her eyes wet and wide with empathy.
Was it that? I held my head to stem the spinning. The thump of the nearby club matched my raging heartbeat. Everything I thought I knew about myself was spilling up onto the pavement. I’d just kissed a woman and I’d enjoyed it. A woman had just told me she loved me and I wanted to say it back. A woman! With a vagina! What do you even do together? I had no idea really. Did I want to do things to Phoebe’s body? I felt vomit bubble up my throat as I thought through the reality of it, and within seconds, I couldn’t acknowledge this evening. I put my hand up to hail a passing black cab and walked off.
‘You can’t honestly be leaving right now,’ she called after me.
‘Leave me the fuck alone,’ I shouted back. The cabbie juddered to a halt and I jumped in while Phoebe patted the window. ‘Clapham North please,’ I told him. ‘Ignore her.’
Nobody but millionaires get black cabs in London. Everyone knows it’s about ten grand a mile, and the journey from north to south takes as long as a transatlantic flight. But it was my only escape route so I slumped against the seat, wiping tears away, and listening to the driver’s low, bored whistle as he steered me through the smeared lights of the city. She kept calling but I turned off my phone, willing the driver to go faster. When I eventually got back to our flat, parting with ￡72, I ran to the bedroom and climbed into bed with Matt, spooning him from behind, sodden with guilt.
‘?’ he murmured, waking in the darkness, sleep heavy in his voice. ‘What are you doing back? I thought you were staying at Phoebe’s?’
‘I missed you,’ I told him, wrapping my arms around him, stroking his body. It was so dark I couldn’t really see him and had to trace his outline with my shaking hands. The bulk of his muscles, the thickness of his thighs. I was instantly horny, and started stroking up his thigh, skimming over his groin through his pyjama bottoms.
‘You’re drunk,’ he announced, catching my hand and stopping me. I leant in to kiss him. ‘Definitely drunk,’ he declared at the taste of my mouth but I felt him smile in the blackness.
‘Not that drunk,’ I told him, giving him permission.
I thought he would push me off. It was 2.30am. Work tomorrow. We’d not had sex under such circumstances in years. Obligation overruled any stirrings. We would save our sex for a more appropriate time with fewer consequences the following day, and then, of course, never get around to it. But maybe Matt could sense me slipping away. The end of us hovering in a mist over our bed. Because, when I reached for him again, he was hard. Hard with a thing I understood what to do with. When we’d finished, he fell asleep almost instantly, like maybe it was a dream he’ll forget. Now accustomed to the darkness, I watched his face – innocent and unknowing in its unconsciousness.
As a woman, I had no such luxury to drift off to sleep beside him. I got up, bending over to keep as much of his cum inside me as I could, before running to our en-suite and cleaning myself up on the toilet, peeing to ensure I didn’t get a UTI. I spent many moments with my head between my legs, sobering up, replaying the night, the kiss, the argument, the sex – scarcely able to believe this dramatic mess had found itself in my dull and orderly life. Impossible questions swarming around as I blinked at the bathmat hanging over the side of the shower.
Was I gay?
Bisexual?
These words. These labels. So definite. With such a storyline.
I always knew from when I was very young . . .
I didn’t know.
I didn’t want to have sex with women.
I’d never fancied one.
I didn’t fancy Phoebe, did I?
Fancy.
What a strange word.
Childish. Simple.
The walls of the en-suite squeezed in. Sleep fell heavy on my eyelids, whispering, ‘ If you pass out, , all of this will go away. ’ I wiped myself for a final time, stood up, brushed my teeth to rid the taste of Phoebe and Matt from my tongue, stared at my reflection for a while just because that’s what I’d seen people do in films whenever they did something dramatic. I had never done anything dramatic with my life, so I had only a script of clichés to follow.
I needed to turn my phone back on to set my alarm and a barrage of messages erupted. I didn’t read any of them as I punched the alarm in – my phone telling me it would go off in only three hours and seven minutes’ time.
Sleep.
Escape this.
I climbed into bed next to the warmth of my familiar husband and stared at the ceiling for three hours and seven minutes until my alarm went off—
Someone to my side shrieks with laughter and I’m jolted back. We all eww at a blown-up photo of Voldemort as a baby. Here I am again. At my baby shower. Sitting on a sofa, surrounded by everyone celebrating Matt’s baby growing inside my stomach. From the outside, everything is how it should be. Conventional old , doing the conventional thing at the conventional time, with the conventional guy. Picture perfect.
Except Phoebe’s eyes find me again, that questioning arch of her eyebrow, asking me the silent question. And me, trying to figure out how to communicate my silent answer.
Yes, I love you too.
The same words I’d typed out and sent to her the next morning. Imploding my life.
Transcript: Inspector Simmons interviewing Lauren Powell
Simmons: Character witnesses for you have unanimously stated that you’re a considerate and caring person. The phrase ‘not a bad bone in her body’ has been used many times.
Lauren: That’s very nice of you to pass on, thank you.
Simmons: Do you think that’s a fair assessment of you?
Lauren: I try to be nice to people. Doesn’t everyone?
Simmons: Tell me, Lauren, is it ‘nice’ to send threatening and abusive messages to people on Instagram? [Silence] Phone records show that, on the day in question, you were blocked, after sending many unpleasant messages to a hypnobirthing Instagram account. [Silence] And, in fact, that’s not just a one off. Our records show you’ve created multiple burner accounts for the sole purpose of targeting and abusing this person. What do you think your friends would say about that? [Silence] You look angry, Lauren.
Lauren: I am.
Simmons: For being found out?
Lauren: No. For you saying it’s ‘abuse’ to simply tell the truth to someone.
Simmons: They weren’t very nice messages, Lauren.
Lauren: I’ll tell you what’s not very nice. Telling women to hold a fucking comb to help with the pain of contractions during labour.