Fic: The Shortest Distance Between Two Points Pt. III
See Part I for summary, art link, and acknowledgments.
Part III: Freddie
I wish I was a girl/so that you could believe me/and I could shake this static every time I try to sleep./I wish for all the world/that I could say ‘Hey Elizabeth/you know I’m doing all right these days’.
“Hi, this is Effy. I’m not talking right now, but leave a message and maybe…”
Freddie flipped his mobile shut and fell back against his pillows. He stared at the ceiling, wondering why Effy hadn’t answered any of his calls in days. After he had made sure Katie was all right he had gone to back to the lockers, but Effy was nowhere to be found. She wasn’t in school, Anthea had claimed she wasn’t at home, and her phone kept going to voicemail. He thought maybe he should have stayed with her after the fight, but Katie had been hurt and it was mostly his fault. He sighed, staring at his mobile again. He scrolled to Effy’s name and sent her another text, begging her just to call back and talk, or something.
He felt really fucking pathetic sometimes.
Freddie thought about booting up his laptop and having a wank, or maybe just staring at the phone until Effy called him back. He wasn’t sure which would make him feel more like a loser. He flipped his phone back open, stared at his empty inbox for a moment, then scrolled through his contacts again. Cook, Dad, Effy…he forced himself to keep going to Emily, JJ, Karen… Katie. He had really cocked that up. And now he had not only cheated on her, he’d physically hurt her. He pressed call, trying not to think too hard about why he was calling his ex-girlfriend when his current one wouldn’t speak to him.
“What do you want Freddie?” Katie answered abruptly after a couple of rings.
“I…I just wanted to say sorry, y’know…”
“You did that already, several times. I got the message,” she interrupted.
“Not just for the other day, Katie, for…everything. I really treated you like shit last year, and I never intended to hurt you.”
The phone was silent for a long time. Freddie cleared his throat and tried again.
“I was wondering if you wanted to hang out, maybe get coffee or something?”
There was a heavy sigh and Katie finally spoke, “Fine, pick me up at seven. And Freddie?”
“Yeah?”
“Try not to be catatonically high this time, okay? I don’t feel like sitting around talking to myself.”
He winced, grateful she couldn’t see his embarrassment over the phone. “Sure, Katie.”
He shut his mobile after she hung up, and closed his eyes tight. He was just trying to be nice to her after all she’d been through because of him. There couldn’t be anything wrong with that.
*-*-*
Freddie took a deep breath and rang the doorbell. He checked his watch again, it was seven exactly. Katie had always been pissed when he was late. He heard the click of heels in the hallway and then there was a hand cautiously turning the doorknob.
“Hey Kay…” He paused as a bright shock of red hair flashed under his nose, “Oh, I mean hi Emily.”
“Shut up.” Emily hissed over her shoulder as she hurried past him and down to the end of the street.
Freddie heard the sputter of an engine and Naomi came around the corner on a motor-scooter. She waved to him as Emily grabbed the extra helmet and swung her leg over the bike behind Naomi. Giggling, Naomi revved the throttle and they sped away. Freddie smiled, and then turned around quickly as someone cleared their throat behind him.
“Oh, hey Katie. Your sister seemed to be in quite a hurry, couldn’t even get a proper hello out of her.”
“Yeah, nothing stands between her and muff-diving these days,” Katie said with an exaggerated eye-roll.
She seemed to be suppressing a smile though, and Freddie felt a laugh coming on as she tried to look exasperated. As he began to chuckle, so did she. Soon they were both laughing, Katie almost doubled over. After a moment, she grabbed the door frame and caught her breath.
“Come on, you promised coffee and you’re buying.”
*-*-*
Katie sat on a park bench, leaning on her crossed legs and letting the warmth from the coffee seep into her hands. Freddie stretched his legs in the grass next to her bench. He took a drink, then cursed as he burned his mouth. He set the coffee on the ground and sucked in some cold air to cool himself.
“So,” he asked after a moment, “Naomi actually starting to grow on you?”
“Ugh, she still has the fashion sense of a colour-blind baboon, but Emily is disgustingly happy these days so I guess I’ll put up with her, for now.”
“What was with the sneaky exit?”
“Mum still can’t believe she birthed a homo. She’s not exactly friendly when Naomi comes round, like it’s all her fault.”
“Fuck. Star-crossed lovers and all that shit?”
“Yeah, sure.”
Katie stared off at the city stretched out from the foot of the hill below them. She still wasn’t sure why Freddie was suddenly interested in spending time with her. He hadn’t been able to manage that much when they were actually dating.
“You all right?” he asked.
“I guess. I mean, if you’re worried about my health, repeated head injuries apparently haven’t given me brain damage yet.”
“Yeah…sorry…” Freddie winced.
“You can stop apologising. It won’t change anything.”
He sat up on his knees and leaned against the arm of the bench, forcing Katie to look his way.
“I was hoping it would at least change your opinion of me. “
She tried to reply lightly, “Yeah, well, you still owe me for being such a prick, but I guess the coffee is a start.”
He was staring at her hard, as if seeing her for the first time. She broke away from his gaze, just as he leaned in to kiss her. She turned her head and his lips brushed against her cheek. She flinched away reflexively.
“Don’t Freddie. I may not like Effy much, but you shouldn’t fuck things up with her too, you know.”
Freddie fell back into the grass and put his head in his hands, cursing to himself.
“Don’t worry,” he said, “I may have managed that already. She hasn’t answered my calls in days.”
“What!?” Katie said, shooting up off of the bench.
She narrowed her eyes as she fumed, “So you just decided since your girlfriend ditched you that I was sure to be available? God, you’re so pathetic, you can’t even stand to be alone for five minutes.”
“Katie, no, it wasn’t…”
“Just piss off, Freddie.”
She stormed away from him, leaving her coffee cooling on the bench.
*-*-*
Freddie wandered around the park in a haze. He had fucked it all up again, monumentally fucked everything up. There was only one way to make it better: forgetting. He fished around in his pockets for his cigarette case, filled with neatly rolled spliffs. He lit up, walked, smoked, walked. He found himself at a lake filled with ducks, swimming about in pairs. He threw a stone from the shore, skipping it into the crowd of wings, sending the couples in different direction, feathers scattering in their wakes.
Freddie walked again, eventually wandering home, finishing his second joint on the way. He went up to his room, past his dad’s shouts about missing dinner, past Karen mocking his hair, past the picture of his mum, re-framed at the top of the stairs. He collapsed on his bed and pulled out his mobile. He stared at his empty inbox until the tiny letters blurred and sleep claimed him.
*-*-*
Effy scrolled through the list of Freddie’s texts, deleting them one by one without replying. She usually had no reason to pay attention to anything Cook said, but now his words kept circling around her head. This was all just a game. A game she had started on the first day they all met.
She was the only one who could stop it. She had to start fixing this now, because the one who kept getting hurt was the one who had never agreed to play.
*-*-*
Katie took off her heels on the doorstep before slowly twisting the doorknob and slipping inside. She crept up the stairs, avoiding the third one that creaked, and went into her room. She dropped the shoes onto a pile of clothes on the floor, followed it with her top and skirt. She sniffled as she pulled an old t-shirt on, and there was a rustle of sheets from Emily’s bed.
“Katie? Where were you?” Emily sat up and whispered into the darkness.
Katie sat heavily on the edge of her own bed, staring at her sister as her eyes adjusted to the gloom.
“Sorry I didn’t phone home, but I wasn’t exactly expecting you to be sitting here worrying about me,” she replied, her voice dripping with sarcasm.
“What was Freddie doing here earlier? Were you out this whole time with him?”
“I don’t want to talk about it.”
“Well I do, okay? I am worried about you. You’d rather watch the X-factor than go to a party lately, you’ve actually been studying, and now you’re hanging out with your ex-boyfriend who is currently dating the girl who put you in the hospital. You aren’t yourself.”
“And you would know this how? It’s not like you’ve cared about much lately besides sneaking off to go pray at the altar of Naomi Campbell’s twat,” Katie spat out the name like a curse.
“Jesus, Katie, don’t talk like that! I’m trying to help…”
“You’re so fucking up yourself!” Katie interrupted, barely managing to keep her voice down in the otherwise silent house. “I’m sorry I’ve not been all sunshine and roses lately, but I dunno, maybe it has something to do with my boyfriend fucking the girl who hit me in the head with a rock and then being beaten up by my sister in front of the entire school. Oh, and then you abandoned me for the world’s most obnoxious cunt of a lesbian.”
“Wow Katie, tell me how you really fucking feel,” Emily snapped, her voice tinged with hurt.
“I think this little chat is over. I’m going to bed.”
Katie lay down with her face to the wall. She could hear Emily sniffling a bit from the other side of the room, but her anger helped her block out any guilt. She rubbed at her eyes. They were dry and stinging, but she had no more tears left to cry.
*-*-*
Cook slunk into school late through the back doors, trying to lay low. He was fairly certain there was going to be trouble when the head found him, he just hoped he wasn’t expelled on the spot. He made it all the way to his first class before he heard Doug’s voice behind him.
“James Cook! Harriet needs to see you in her office post-haste.”
He wasn’t good at playing innocent but he sat down carefully in the office and gave Harriet a quick smile, then waited for her to speak.
“James, there was a fire in the dorms a few nights ago that began in your room. And the room was a rubbish heap, it appeared to have been wrecked before the arson, as if someone had broken in. Were you at home that night? Did you see anyone strange in the halls?”
Cook couldn’t believe his good fortune. They already suspected someone other than him, all he had to do to get away with it was go along with their story.
“No miss, I was with, um, a lady friend all that night.”
“Someone from college?”
“Uh, yeah.”
“Good, bring her here and we’ll hear her side of it.”
*-*-*
Katie wanted nothing more from the day than to not have to see Freddie’s stupid face. Thankfully, he seemed to have gathered enough of his senses about him to know to stay out of her way. She was hurrying to her next class when someone grabbed her arm and pulled her into a closet.
“What the fuck?” she exclaimed into the darkness, knocking over a broom as she tried to get her bearings.
“Shh, Katiekins, I need your help,” Cook whispered, grabbing her wrist again, more gently this time. “See, there was this fire in my room and I told them I was out that night…”
“Fuck’s sake, what did you do?” Katie interjected.
“Nothing! Nothing, it was an accident, but they’ll put me out on me arse if they think it’s my fault. Can you give me an alibi, Katie? Please?”
Katie sighed. The last thing she wanted was trouble at school to top everything off, but Cook sounded so pathetically desperate.
“I’m beggin’ you Kate, help a lad out here.”
“Fine, let’s get this over with.” Katie huffed.
She had to shove Cook off as he attempted to hug her in glee.
*-*-*
“So, Katherine, James was with you the night of the fire?”
“Yes. We were out, dancing and stuff. He walked me home and, well...you know.”
Katie smiled slightly, and lowered her eyelashes, doing her best to look embarrassed (not that it was difficult under the circumstances). Harriet sniffed slightly, as if trying not to express her distaste.
“Well then, I suppose will have to assume some local hooligans were responsible. James, I’m afraid the rooms will be under repair for some time. You do have somewhere else to stay, correct?”
“Yeah, sure, staying with my mum right now.”
“Good. Well, back to class with you both.”
They stood and walked out of the office as quickly as possible. As soon as they were out of earshot, Cook broke into a manic grin.
“Oh ho, Katie, that was tip-top. She ate you up hook, line, and bloody sinker!”
“Well, duh. You totally owe me though for having to imply to school officials that I went anywhere near your unwashed little prick.”
“Oi, little?? I take offence at that!”
“But not at ‘unwashed’ I see. Brilliant.”
“Hey, there’s only one shower for the whole floor, all right? Communal living ain’t all it’s cracked up to be, especially when the dorms aren’t co-ed,” Cook said with an aggrieved sigh.
“I’m sure you make do,” Katie said with a smirk, but then bit her lip. “Cook, you weren’t lying about having someplace to stay though, were you?”
“Nah, it’s cool. Don’t worry your pretty little head about me, Katiekins.”
“Hmph, don’t worry, I won’t.”
Katie rolled her eyes and walked away with a swish of her hips.
*-*-*
Freddie chewed thoughtfully on his chips as he finished up his politics coursework. JJ was long finished with his and was going over flashcards filled with random trivia to prepare for uni interviews.
“Do you think I should use both hands when I shake hands with the interviewers? Is that a more confident greeting or does it just seem desperate?” JJ asked, flipping through his cards.
“I would say stick with just one, but use a firm grip. You don’t want to seem like a nervous pussy.” Freddie replied, not looking up from his chips and book.
“Huh, that’s what Cook said too.”
“You’ve seen Cook lately?” Freddie asked, with some increase in interest.
“Uh, no, no of course not. H-he told me that a long time ago,” JJ stuttered.
“JJ…”
“Fine, ok, I might have seen him.”
“Where?”
“At my house…andtheshed,” JJ finished hurriedly, squeezing his eyes shut as if he knew that last part wasn’t supposed to come out.
“Jesus, the fire…he’s sleeping in the shed, isn’t he?”
“No. No, he told me to say he was staying with his mum...oh bugger.”
Freddie stood with a sigh, tossing his books in his bag. He walked out the door, his eyes involuntarily turning toward the ceiling.
“See you J. I’ve got to go take care of the homelessness problem of Great Britain.”
*-*-*
Freddie took the stairs to his room two at a time, ready to throw his bag on the floor and go see to Cook. As he opened the door, however, he found a face staring back at him from the bed.
“The door was unlocked. You should really be more careful,” Effy said with a shrug and a click of her boot heels, dangling over the foot of his bed.
The bag slid slowly from his fingers to the floor, and Freddie wandered to the bed and sat carefully next to her.
“Hi, Effy.”
“Hey.”
“Where have you been?”
“Oh, around.”
“Why wouldn’t you answer my calls?”
She didn’t reply, just gave him that look. It was as mysterious as the first time he saw her, the look that said she already knew everything about him, so he should really know the answer to his own question by now. It made him feel like an idiot, yet drew him in at the same time.
He felt compelled to ask, “Are…we okay?”
“I don’t know.”
Her eyes bored into him as she swung a leg over his hip. She leaned in slowly as she straddled him, bringing her lips softly to his. As soon as she made contact he found himself kissing back, desperately. As she opened her mouth to his tongue, he could feel her tugging at his belt buckle. His dick was already straining against his jeans, but he was still unsure of why he and Effy were suddenly back on. He hesitated as he broke off the kiss and then leaned back in. Her eyes were on him in a second.
“Is this a game to you?” she asked, eyes wide and impossibly blue.
“No, of course not! I love you.”
“Why?”
The question hit him like a punch to the gut, blunt and hard, draining all the blood out of him.
“Because…you’re beautiful. And perfect, and amazing…”
“That’s mostly lies and exaggerations, Freddie. Tell me something true.”
He forced himself to breathe before he replied, “When you’re gone, I miss you. Like there’s a hole in my heart or something.”
Her eyes softened slightly, but that didn’t prepare him for her next question.
“What about Cook?”
“What about him?” he asked, confused.
“Do you miss him too? Because you’re about to lose your best mate. And it will be my fault.”
He didn’t have an answer. She gracefully dismounted him and lit a cigarette as she walked towards the door.
“Figure out what’s most important to you Freddie. I’ve got to do the same.”
*-*-*
Cook was just lighting his spliff when Freddie came through the shed door. He jumped up out of the worn couch, tensed, ready for a confrontation. Freddie’s eyes were bloodshot though, his shoulders stooped. He flopped into the dirty chair and motioned for the joint. Cook passed it and sat back down.
“I thought you’d be coming to put me out on my arse,” Cook said with a tooth-baring smile.
“I was planning on it,” Freddie coughed out between puffs.
“But?”
“But then I saw Effy.”
Cook bit his lip trying to not say something smart-arsed. Something told him that Freddie was getting to a point, so he silently took the spliff and puffed it to mask his nervous energy.
“She started making out with me and then…asked if I thought we were a game, asked why I really loved her. Then she just left, said I needed to figure out what was most important to me.”
Cook took Freddie’s increasing agitation as a sign to pass the joint back. He sucked on it and coughed, but didn’t say anything else for a while. Cook sprawled himself on the couch and waited.
“I think it may be over.”
The confession came suddenly, and after months of tension, Cook wasn’t sure whether he was happy or just relieved.
“To be honest, Cook, I’m not sure she ever cared about either of us. I just…”
“Don’t talk about it now, mate,” Cook interrupted. “There’s only one thing to do in this situation.”
“What?”
Cook reached under the couch and pulled out a dusty bottle of tequila.
“Get utterly fucking wasted.”
*-*-*
Freddie took a pill from the bag Cook handed him and swallowed it down with a swig from the dregs of the tequila. He was already lashed, but he figured a bit more couldn’t hurt. It felt good to just let go and not care about being stoned and useless for once. Cook was the last person to care and it was the first time Freddie had felt comfortable around him in too long.
Cook was laughing convulsively on the couch, his head hanging off of it towards the floor, his face turning red.
“Remember when JJ started explaining orgasms in biology in primary school, and every time he said ‘penis’ the teacher’s face turned purple until she finally said ‘Jonah , next time you say the word ejaculate I swear I will have you expelled’”
“I remember I almost pissed myself when he started talking with his hands.”
Freddie imitated JJ’s awkward wanking motions, and he and Cook fell into laughing fits. He was warm all over, and feeling fuzzy, but a thought kept itching at the back of his mind.
“Cook?”
“Hmh?” Cook grunted, his head almost on the floor now.
“You aren’t going to try to go after her now, are you?”
Cook flopped off of the couch and crawled over to Freddie’s chair, slinging an arm around his neck.
“Nah, it just doesn’t seem worth it anymore. Don’t fucking tell anyone, but I missed you, you fucking cunt.”
“Right,” Freddie snorted.
“I’m well serious,” Cook insisted, not sounding serious in the slightest. “I missed hanging like this. I fucking love you to bits, mate, I keep trying to tell you.”
Freddie sat up as Cook pulled him into a rough hug. He hugged him back tight, the words ‘best mate’ finally starting to mean something to him again.
It was fine until he felt something hard pressing into his leg.
His head shot up and Cook jumped back at the same time.
“Fuck, man, I’m so stoned. I don’t know up from down I guess…” Cook quickly stuttered.
He coughed and scratched at the back of his head, unable to meet Freddie’s eyes. Freddie got up and backed towards the door.
“Yeah… me too. I think I’m going to go get some sleep.”
He left the shed and wandered into the dark, finding his way to his room mostly by feel. He tripped on his way up the stairs and froze, waiting silently to make sure he hadn’t woken his dad. Once he was safely inside, he crashed on his bed, staring at the blackness above his head where he knew the ceiling was. His head buzzed quietly, but his heart was beating incredibly loud. Despite the noisy thoughts swirling in his head, he soon drifted into sleep.
*-*-*
Cook had long lost his hard-on and Freddie was long gone from the shed before he woke from his stupor and stopped staring at the floor. He wasn’t sure what had been in the pills, but the lingering warmth in his chest had to be from his wicked buzz, not the feeling of Freddie’s arms locked around his neck.
His phone vibrated in his pocket. JJ had texted to ask if Freddie had been pissed at him. He almost laughed at the irony, and deleted the message without bothering to reply. Still staring at the glowing screen, he opened his photos. Slowly falling back into the worn couch cushions, he went through them, deleting the pictures of Effy one by one. As soon as her blue eyes stopped staring out at him he felt the knot in his chest unwind. He took a long, slow breath and held his mobile up to the picture of him, JJ, and Freddie, swords crossed and smiles on their faces. He snapped a photo and set it as wallpaper before passing out, phone cradled to his chest.
*-*-*
Freddie awoke sweating, sheets tangled painfully around his waist. He kicked his way free and went to the bathroom, splashing cool water on his face. He tried not to let thoughts of Cook invade his mind, but it was useless. He tried to rationalise, it wasn’t as if he hadn’t seen Cook’s cock before, everyone in school had. So what was the big deal if he felt it through a few layers of cloth?
He pulled some clothes off of the floor and threw them on. He jogged lightly down the stairs, stumbling at the bottom, still woozy from the night before. He grabbed some bread and cheese for breakfast on the way through the kitchen, thinking about whether to avoid the subject or try to explain that it was no big deal. He chewed on the bread, trying to settle his stomach, as he walked through the garden and opened the shed door.
Cook was stretched the length of the couch, completely naked. He looked up groggily as Freddie stopped short in the doorway and swallowed hard.
“S’hot,” he slurred.
“Yeah…”
Freddie knew he shouldn’t be staring, he shouldn’t want to look, but he couldn’t help it. Cook slowly sat up and took notice.
“It’s not just me then,” he said with a smirk.
Freddie gulped, realising he was getting hard. He backed against the door but couldn’t bring himself to turn the knob and escape.
Cook shouldn’t have been able to close the space between them so fast, but in the blink of an eye he was leaning into Freddie, his breath hot against Freddie’s lips. Freddie squeezed his eyes shut and surged across the last few inches.
As their lips caught at each other, he thought briefly about inevitabilities, how many times over the past year punches had turned to harsh kisses and bitter ‘I love you's between them. When Cook easily undid the buttons of his jeans, he stopped thinking all together.
Part IV
Part III: Freddie
I wish I was a girl/so that you could believe me/and I could shake this static every time I try to sleep./I wish for all the world/that I could say ‘Hey Elizabeth/you know I’m doing all right these days’.
“Hi, this is Effy. I’m not talking right now, but leave a message and maybe…”
Freddie flipped his mobile shut and fell back against his pillows. He stared at the ceiling, wondering why Effy hadn’t answered any of his calls in days. After he had made sure Katie was all right he had gone to back to the lockers, but Effy was nowhere to be found. She wasn’t in school, Anthea had claimed she wasn’t at home, and her phone kept going to voicemail. He thought maybe he should have stayed with her after the fight, but Katie had been hurt and it was mostly his fault. He sighed, staring at his mobile again. He scrolled to Effy’s name and sent her another text, begging her just to call back and talk, or something.
He felt really fucking pathetic sometimes.
Freddie thought about booting up his laptop and having a wank, or maybe just staring at the phone until Effy called him back. He wasn’t sure which would make him feel more like a loser. He flipped his phone back open, stared at his empty inbox for a moment, then scrolled through his contacts again. Cook, Dad, Effy…he forced himself to keep going to Emily, JJ, Karen… Katie. He had really cocked that up. And now he had not only cheated on her, he’d physically hurt her. He pressed call, trying not to think too hard about why he was calling his ex-girlfriend when his current one wouldn’t speak to him.
“What do you want Freddie?” Katie answered abruptly after a couple of rings.
“I…I just wanted to say sorry, y’know…”
“You did that already, several times. I got the message,” she interrupted.
“Not just for the other day, Katie, for…everything. I really treated you like shit last year, and I never intended to hurt you.”
The phone was silent for a long time. Freddie cleared his throat and tried again.
“I was wondering if you wanted to hang out, maybe get coffee or something?”
There was a heavy sigh and Katie finally spoke, “Fine, pick me up at seven. And Freddie?”
“Yeah?”
“Try not to be catatonically high this time, okay? I don’t feel like sitting around talking to myself.”
He winced, grateful she couldn’t see his embarrassment over the phone. “Sure, Katie.”
He shut his mobile after she hung up, and closed his eyes tight. He was just trying to be nice to her after all she’d been through because of him. There couldn’t be anything wrong with that.
*-*-*
Freddie took a deep breath and rang the doorbell. He checked his watch again, it was seven exactly. Katie had always been pissed when he was late. He heard the click of heels in the hallway and then there was a hand cautiously turning the doorknob.
“Hey Kay…” He paused as a bright shock of red hair flashed under his nose, “Oh, I mean hi Emily.”
“Shut up.” Emily hissed over her shoulder as she hurried past him and down to the end of the street.
Freddie heard the sputter of an engine and Naomi came around the corner on a motor-scooter. She waved to him as Emily grabbed the extra helmet and swung her leg over the bike behind Naomi. Giggling, Naomi revved the throttle and they sped away. Freddie smiled, and then turned around quickly as someone cleared their throat behind him.
“Oh, hey Katie. Your sister seemed to be in quite a hurry, couldn’t even get a proper hello out of her.”
“Yeah, nothing stands between her and muff-diving these days,” Katie said with an exaggerated eye-roll.
She seemed to be suppressing a smile though, and Freddie felt a laugh coming on as she tried to look exasperated. As he began to chuckle, so did she. Soon they were both laughing, Katie almost doubled over. After a moment, she grabbed the door frame and caught her breath.
“Come on, you promised coffee and you’re buying.”
*-*-*
Katie sat on a park bench, leaning on her crossed legs and letting the warmth from the coffee seep into her hands. Freddie stretched his legs in the grass next to her bench. He took a drink, then cursed as he burned his mouth. He set the coffee on the ground and sucked in some cold air to cool himself.
“So,” he asked after a moment, “Naomi actually starting to grow on you?”
“Ugh, she still has the fashion sense of a colour-blind baboon, but Emily is disgustingly happy these days so I guess I’ll put up with her, for now.”
“What was with the sneaky exit?”
“Mum still can’t believe she birthed a homo. She’s not exactly friendly when Naomi comes round, like it’s all her fault.”
“Fuck. Star-crossed lovers and all that shit?”
“Yeah, sure.”
Katie stared off at the city stretched out from the foot of the hill below them. She still wasn’t sure why Freddie was suddenly interested in spending time with her. He hadn’t been able to manage that much when they were actually dating.
“You all right?” he asked.
“I guess. I mean, if you’re worried about my health, repeated head injuries apparently haven’t given me brain damage yet.”
“Yeah…sorry…” Freddie winced.
“You can stop apologising. It won’t change anything.”
He sat up on his knees and leaned against the arm of the bench, forcing Katie to look his way.
“I was hoping it would at least change your opinion of me. “
She tried to reply lightly, “Yeah, well, you still owe me for being such a prick, but I guess the coffee is a start.”
He was staring at her hard, as if seeing her for the first time. She broke away from his gaze, just as he leaned in to kiss her. She turned her head and his lips brushed against her cheek. She flinched away reflexively.
“Don’t Freddie. I may not like Effy much, but you shouldn’t fuck things up with her too, you know.”
Freddie fell back into the grass and put his head in his hands, cursing to himself.
“Don’t worry,” he said, “I may have managed that already. She hasn’t answered my calls in days.”
“What!?” Katie said, shooting up off of the bench.
She narrowed her eyes as she fumed, “So you just decided since your girlfriend ditched you that I was sure to be available? God, you’re so pathetic, you can’t even stand to be alone for five minutes.”
“Katie, no, it wasn’t…”
“Just piss off, Freddie.”
She stormed away from him, leaving her coffee cooling on the bench.
*-*-*
Freddie wandered around the park in a haze. He had fucked it all up again, monumentally fucked everything up. There was only one way to make it better: forgetting. He fished around in his pockets for his cigarette case, filled with neatly rolled spliffs. He lit up, walked, smoked, walked. He found himself at a lake filled with ducks, swimming about in pairs. He threw a stone from the shore, skipping it into the crowd of wings, sending the couples in different direction, feathers scattering in their wakes.
Freddie walked again, eventually wandering home, finishing his second joint on the way. He went up to his room, past his dad’s shouts about missing dinner, past Karen mocking his hair, past the picture of his mum, re-framed at the top of the stairs. He collapsed on his bed and pulled out his mobile. He stared at his empty inbox until the tiny letters blurred and sleep claimed him.
*-*-*
Effy scrolled through the list of Freddie’s texts, deleting them one by one without replying. She usually had no reason to pay attention to anything Cook said, but now his words kept circling around her head. This was all just a game. A game she had started on the first day they all met.
She was the only one who could stop it. She had to start fixing this now, because the one who kept getting hurt was the one who had never agreed to play.
*-*-*
Katie took off her heels on the doorstep before slowly twisting the doorknob and slipping inside. She crept up the stairs, avoiding the third one that creaked, and went into her room. She dropped the shoes onto a pile of clothes on the floor, followed it with her top and skirt. She sniffled as she pulled an old t-shirt on, and there was a rustle of sheets from Emily’s bed.
“Katie? Where were you?” Emily sat up and whispered into the darkness.
Katie sat heavily on the edge of her own bed, staring at her sister as her eyes adjusted to the gloom.
“Sorry I didn’t phone home, but I wasn’t exactly expecting you to be sitting here worrying about me,” she replied, her voice dripping with sarcasm.
“What was Freddie doing here earlier? Were you out this whole time with him?”
“I don’t want to talk about it.”
“Well I do, okay? I am worried about you. You’d rather watch the X-factor than go to a party lately, you’ve actually been studying, and now you’re hanging out with your ex-boyfriend who is currently dating the girl who put you in the hospital. You aren’t yourself.”
“And you would know this how? It’s not like you’ve cared about much lately besides sneaking off to go pray at the altar of Naomi Campbell’s twat,” Katie spat out the name like a curse.
“Jesus, Katie, don’t talk like that! I’m trying to help…”
“You’re so fucking up yourself!” Katie interrupted, barely managing to keep her voice down in the otherwise silent house. “I’m sorry I’ve not been all sunshine and roses lately, but I dunno, maybe it has something to do with my boyfriend fucking the girl who hit me in the head with a rock and then being beaten up by my sister in front of the entire school. Oh, and then you abandoned me for the world’s most obnoxious cunt of a lesbian.”
“Wow Katie, tell me how you really fucking feel,” Emily snapped, her voice tinged with hurt.
“I think this little chat is over. I’m going to bed.”
Katie lay down with her face to the wall. She could hear Emily sniffling a bit from the other side of the room, but her anger helped her block out any guilt. She rubbed at her eyes. They were dry and stinging, but she had no more tears left to cry.
*-*-*
Cook slunk into school late through the back doors, trying to lay low. He was fairly certain there was going to be trouble when the head found him, he just hoped he wasn’t expelled on the spot. He made it all the way to his first class before he heard Doug’s voice behind him.
“James Cook! Harriet needs to see you in her office post-haste.”
He wasn’t good at playing innocent but he sat down carefully in the office and gave Harriet a quick smile, then waited for her to speak.
“James, there was a fire in the dorms a few nights ago that began in your room. And the room was a rubbish heap, it appeared to have been wrecked before the arson, as if someone had broken in. Were you at home that night? Did you see anyone strange in the halls?”
Cook couldn’t believe his good fortune. They already suspected someone other than him, all he had to do to get away with it was go along with their story.
“No miss, I was with, um, a lady friend all that night.”
“Someone from college?”
“Uh, yeah.”
“Good, bring her here and we’ll hear her side of it.”
*-*-*
Katie wanted nothing more from the day than to not have to see Freddie’s stupid face. Thankfully, he seemed to have gathered enough of his senses about him to know to stay out of her way. She was hurrying to her next class when someone grabbed her arm and pulled her into a closet.
“What the fuck?” she exclaimed into the darkness, knocking over a broom as she tried to get her bearings.
“Shh, Katiekins, I need your help,” Cook whispered, grabbing her wrist again, more gently this time. “See, there was this fire in my room and I told them I was out that night…”
“Fuck’s sake, what did you do?” Katie interjected.
“Nothing! Nothing, it was an accident, but they’ll put me out on me arse if they think it’s my fault. Can you give me an alibi, Katie? Please?”
Katie sighed. The last thing she wanted was trouble at school to top everything off, but Cook sounded so pathetically desperate.
“I’m beggin’ you Kate, help a lad out here.”
“Fine, let’s get this over with.” Katie huffed.
She had to shove Cook off as he attempted to hug her in glee.
*-*-*
“So, Katherine, James was with you the night of the fire?”
“Yes. We were out, dancing and stuff. He walked me home and, well...you know.”
Katie smiled slightly, and lowered her eyelashes, doing her best to look embarrassed (not that it was difficult under the circumstances). Harriet sniffed slightly, as if trying not to express her distaste.
“Well then, I suppose will have to assume some local hooligans were responsible. James, I’m afraid the rooms will be under repair for some time. You do have somewhere else to stay, correct?”
“Yeah, sure, staying with my mum right now.”
“Good. Well, back to class with you both.”
They stood and walked out of the office as quickly as possible. As soon as they were out of earshot, Cook broke into a manic grin.
“Oh ho, Katie, that was tip-top. She ate you up hook, line, and bloody sinker!”
“Well, duh. You totally owe me though for having to imply to school officials that I went anywhere near your unwashed little prick.”
“Oi, little?? I take offence at that!”
“But not at ‘unwashed’ I see. Brilliant.”
“Hey, there’s only one shower for the whole floor, all right? Communal living ain’t all it’s cracked up to be, especially when the dorms aren’t co-ed,” Cook said with an aggrieved sigh.
“I’m sure you make do,” Katie said with a smirk, but then bit her lip. “Cook, you weren’t lying about having someplace to stay though, were you?”
“Nah, it’s cool. Don’t worry your pretty little head about me, Katiekins.”
“Hmph, don’t worry, I won’t.”
Katie rolled her eyes and walked away with a swish of her hips.
*-*-*
Freddie chewed thoughtfully on his chips as he finished up his politics coursework. JJ was long finished with his and was going over flashcards filled with random trivia to prepare for uni interviews.
“Do you think I should use both hands when I shake hands with the interviewers? Is that a more confident greeting or does it just seem desperate?” JJ asked, flipping through his cards.
“I would say stick with just one, but use a firm grip. You don’t want to seem like a nervous pussy.” Freddie replied, not looking up from his chips and book.
“Huh, that’s what Cook said too.”
“You’ve seen Cook lately?” Freddie asked, with some increase in interest.
“Uh, no, no of course not. H-he told me that a long time ago,” JJ stuttered.
“JJ…”
“Fine, ok, I might have seen him.”
“Where?”
“At my house…andtheshed,” JJ finished hurriedly, squeezing his eyes shut as if he knew that last part wasn’t supposed to come out.
“Jesus, the fire…he’s sleeping in the shed, isn’t he?”
“No. No, he told me to say he was staying with his mum...oh bugger.”
Freddie stood with a sigh, tossing his books in his bag. He walked out the door, his eyes involuntarily turning toward the ceiling.
“See you J. I’ve got to go take care of the homelessness problem of Great Britain.”
*-*-*
Freddie took the stairs to his room two at a time, ready to throw his bag on the floor and go see to Cook. As he opened the door, however, he found a face staring back at him from the bed.
“The door was unlocked. You should really be more careful,” Effy said with a shrug and a click of her boot heels, dangling over the foot of his bed.
The bag slid slowly from his fingers to the floor, and Freddie wandered to the bed and sat carefully next to her.
“Hi, Effy.”
“Hey.”
“Where have you been?”
“Oh, around.”
“Why wouldn’t you answer my calls?”
She didn’t reply, just gave him that look. It was as mysterious as the first time he saw her, the look that said she already knew everything about him, so he should really know the answer to his own question by now. It made him feel like an idiot, yet drew him in at the same time.
He felt compelled to ask, “Are…we okay?”
“I don’t know.”
Her eyes bored into him as she swung a leg over his hip. She leaned in slowly as she straddled him, bringing her lips softly to his. As soon as she made contact he found himself kissing back, desperately. As she opened her mouth to his tongue, he could feel her tugging at his belt buckle. His dick was already straining against his jeans, but he was still unsure of why he and Effy were suddenly back on. He hesitated as he broke off the kiss and then leaned back in. Her eyes were on him in a second.
“Is this a game to you?” she asked, eyes wide and impossibly blue.
“No, of course not! I love you.”
“Why?”
The question hit him like a punch to the gut, blunt and hard, draining all the blood out of him.
“Because…you’re beautiful. And perfect, and amazing…”
“That’s mostly lies and exaggerations, Freddie. Tell me something true.”
He forced himself to breathe before he replied, “When you’re gone, I miss you. Like there’s a hole in my heart or something.”
Her eyes softened slightly, but that didn’t prepare him for her next question.
“What about Cook?”
“What about him?” he asked, confused.
“Do you miss him too? Because you’re about to lose your best mate. And it will be my fault.”
He didn’t have an answer. She gracefully dismounted him and lit a cigarette as she walked towards the door.
“Figure out what’s most important to you Freddie. I’ve got to do the same.”
*-*-*
Cook was just lighting his spliff when Freddie came through the shed door. He jumped up out of the worn couch, tensed, ready for a confrontation. Freddie’s eyes were bloodshot though, his shoulders stooped. He flopped into the dirty chair and motioned for the joint. Cook passed it and sat back down.
“I thought you’d be coming to put me out on my arse,” Cook said with a tooth-baring smile.
“I was planning on it,” Freddie coughed out between puffs.
“But?”
“But then I saw Effy.”
Cook bit his lip trying to not say something smart-arsed. Something told him that Freddie was getting to a point, so he silently took the spliff and puffed it to mask his nervous energy.
“She started making out with me and then…asked if I thought we were a game, asked why I really loved her. Then she just left, said I needed to figure out what was most important to me.”
Cook took Freddie’s increasing agitation as a sign to pass the joint back. He sucked on it and coughed, but didn’t say anything else for a while. Cook sprawled himself on the couch and waited.
“I think it may be over.”
The confession came suddenly, and after months of tension, Cook wasn’t sure whether he was happy or just relieved.
“To be honest, Cook, I’m not sure she ever cared about either of us. I just…”
“Don’t talk about it now, mate,” Cook interrupted. “There’s only one thing to do in this situation.”
“What?”
Cook reached under the couch and pulled out a dusty bottle of tequila.
“Get utterly fucking wasted.”
*-*-*
Freddie took a pill from the bag Cook handed him and swallowed it down with a swig from the dregs of the tequila. He was already lashed, but he figured a bit more couldn’t hurt. It felt good to just let go and not care about being stoned and useless for once. Cook was the last person to care and it was the first time Freddie had felt comfortable around him in too long.
Cook was laughing convulsively on the couch, his head hanging off of it towards the floor, his face turning red.
“Remember when JJ started explaining orgasms in biology in primary school, and every time he said ‘penis’ the teacher’s face turned purple until she finally said ‘Jonah , next time you say the word ejaculate I swear I will have you expelled’”
“I remember I almost pissed myself when he started talking with his hands.”
Freddie imitated JJ’s awkward wanking motions, and he and Cook fell into laughing fits. He was warm all over, and feeling fuzzy, but a thought kept itching at the back of his mind.
“Cook?”
“Hmh?” Cook grunted, his head almost on the floor now.
“You aren’t going to try to go after her now, are you?”
Cook flopped off of the couch and crawled over to Freddie’s chair, slinging an arm around his neck.
“Nah, it just doesn’t seem worth it anymore. Don’t fucking tell anyone, but I missed you, you fucking cunt.”
“Right,” Freddie snorted.
“I’m well serious,” Cook insisted, not sounding serious in the slightest. “I missed hanging like this. I fucking love you to bits, mate, I keep trying to tell you.”
Freddie sat up as Cook pulled him into a rough hug. He hugged him back tight, the words ‘best mate’ finally starting to mean something to him again.
It was fine until he felt something hard pressing into his leg.
His head shot up and Cook jumped back at the same time.
“Fuck, man, I’m so stoned. I don’t know up from down I guess…” Cook quickly stuttered.
He coughed and scratched at the back of his head, unable to meet Freddie’s eyes. Freddie got up and backed towards the door.
“Yeah… me too. I think I’m going to go get some sleep.”
He left the shed and wandered into the dark, finding his way to his room mostly by feel. He tripped on his way up the stairs and froze, waiting silently to make sure he hadn’t woken his dad. Once he was safely inside, he crashed on his bed, staring at the blackness above his head where he knew the ceiling was. His head buzzed quietly, but his heart was beating incredibly loud. Despite the noisy thoughts swirling in his head, he soon drifted into sleep.
*-*-*
Cook had long lost his hard-on and Freddie was long gone from the shed before he woke from his stupor and stopped staring at the floor. He wasn’t sure what had been in the pills, but the lingering warmth in his chest had to be from his wicked buzz, not the feeling of Freddie’s arms locked around his neck.
His phone vibrated in his pocket. JJ had texted to ask if Freddie had been pissed at him. He almost laughed at the irony, and deleted the message without bothering to reply. Still staring at the glowing screen, he opened his photos. Slowly falling back into the worn couch cushions, he went through them, deleting the pictures of Effy one by one. As soon as her blue eyes stopped staring out at him he felt the knot in his chest unwind. He took a long, slow breath and held his mobile up to the picture of him, JJ, and Freddie, swords crossed and smiles on their faces. He snapped a photo and set it as wallpaper before passing out, phone cradled to his chest.
*-*-*
Freddie awoke sweating, sheets tangled painfully around his waist. He kicked his way free and went to the bathroom, splashing cool water on his face. He tried not to let thoughts of Cook invade his mind, but it was useless. He tried to rationalise, it wasn’t as if he hadn’t seen Cook’s cock before, everyone in school had. So what was the big deal if he felt it through a few layers of cloth?
He pulled some clothes off of the floor and threw them on. He jogged lightly down the stairs, stumbling at the bottom, still woozy from the night before. He grabbed some bread and cheese for breakfast on the way through the kitchen, thinking about whether to avoid the subject or try to explain that it was no big deal. He chewed on the bread, trying to settle his stomach, as he walked through the garden and opened the shed door.
Cook was stretched the length of the couch, completely naked. He looked up groggily as Freddie stopped short in the doorway and swallowed hard.
“S’hot,” he slurred.
“Yeah…”
Freddie knew he shouldn’t be staring, he shouldn’t want to look, but he couldn’t help it. Cook slowly sat up and took notice.
“It’s not just me then,” he said with a smirk.
Freddie gulped, realising he was getting hard. He backed against the door but couldn’t bring himself to turn the knob and escape.
Cook shouldn’t have been able to close the space between them so fast, but in the blink of an eye he was leaning into Freddie, his breath hot against Freddie’s lips. Freddie squeezed his eyes shut and surged across the last few inches.
As their lips caught at each other, he thought briefly about inevitabilities, how many times over the past year punches had turned to harsh kisses and bitter ‘I love you's between them. When Cook easily undid the buttons of his jeans, he stopped thinking all together.
Part IV