looked so easy. But even imagining myself doing it made me feel a bit nauseated.
I hope this doesn’t sound like I thought badly of Rooney for flirting and making connections and setting herself up for, without a doubt, some sort of grand university romance that she’d be able to tell her grandchildren about when she was an elderly over-sharer.
I was just very, very jealous that I wasn’t her.
The main event of the Tuesday of Freshers’ Week was ‘College Matriculation’, a bizarre pseudo-religious ceremony that took place in Durham Cathedral, at which we were welcomed into the university. We all had to wear posh outfits and our college gowns, which made me feel very sophisticated.
I stuck with Rooney until, on the way out of the cathedral, I spotted Pip and Jason, walking together across the grass, no doubt heading to their own matriculation ceremony. They saw me, and we ran to each other through the graveyard in what felt like slow-mo with the Chariots of Fire music playing in the background.
Pip leapt on me, almost drowning me in her college gown. She was dressed as fancy as she’d been dressed at prom – full suit and tie, a halo of carefully styled curls, and she was wearing a cologne that smelt like a forest after the rain. She felt like home.
‘I’m going to write St John’s a letter of complaint,’ she said into my shoulder, ‘to tell them to let you transfer to Castle.’
‘I don’t think that will work.’
‘It will. D’you remember when I complained to Tesco and they sent me five packets of Maltesers? I know how to pen a strongly worded letter.’
‘Just ignore her,’ said Jason. Jason was also suited up – he looked fancy too. ‘She’s still hungover from last night.’
Pip stepped back, adjusting her collar and tie. She did look a little less chipper than usual.
‘Are you OK?’ she asked. ‘Is your roommate being normal? Are you dying of stress?’
I thought about these questions and replied, ‘No to all.’
Speaking of Rooney, I glanced over Pip’s shoulder to see how far ahead Rooney had walked, only to find that Rooney had actually stopped at the edge of the graveyard and was looking back. Right at us.
Pip and Jason turned to look.
‘O-oh, she’s there,’ Pip mumbled, and immediately started adjusting her hair. But Rooney was still looking at us, and she smiled and waved, seemingly directly at Pip. Pip awkwardly raised a hand and waved back with a nervous smile.
I wondered suddenly whether Pip had a chance with Rooney. Rooney seemed pretty straight, judging by how many guys I had seen her flirt with and that she hadn’t tried flirting with any girls, but people could surprise you.
‘You getting along with her OK?’ asked Jason.
‘She’s really nice, yeah. She’s better than me at, like, everything, which is annoying, but she’s fine.’
Pip frowned. ‘Better than you at what?’
‘Oh, you know. Like, making friends, and, I dunno. Talking to people.’ Flirting. Romance. Falling in love, probably.
Neither Jason nor Pip seemed impressed by this answer.
‘OK,’ said Pip. ‘We’re coming round tonight.’
‘You really don’t have to.’
‘No, I know a cry for help when I hear it.’
‘I’m not crying for help.’
‘We need a pizza night, urgently.’
I saw through her immediately. ‘You just want to have an opportunity to talk to Rooney again, don’t you?’
Pip gave me a long look.
‘Maybe so,’ she said. ‘But I also care about you. And I care about pizza.’
‘So she’s just, like, insanely good at getting people to like her?’ said Pip through a mouthful of pizza later that evening.
‘That’s pretty much it, yeah,’ I said.
Jason shook his head. ‘And you want to be like her? Why?’
The three of us were sprawled on Rooney’s aqua rug, pizza in the middle. We’d had a minor debate about whether to watch our group favourite, Moulin Rouge, or Jason’s favourite, the live action Scooby-Doo movie, but we eventually settled on Scooby-Doo and were playing it on my laptop. Rooney was out for the night at some sort of themed bar night, and had I not already made plans with my friends, I probably would have gone with her. But this was better. Everything was better when Jason and Pip were here.
I couldn’t admit to them how desperately I wanted to be in a romantic relationship. Because I knew it was pathetic. Trust me. I completely understood that women should want to be strong and independent and you don’t need to find love to have a successful life. And the fact that I so desperately wanted a boyfriend – or a girlfriend, a partner, whoever, someone – was a sign that I was not strong, or independent, or self-sufficient, or happy alone. I was really quite lonely, and I wanted to be loved.
Was that such a bad thing? To want an intimate connection with another human?
I didn’t know.
‘She just finds it so easy to talk to people,’ I said.
‘That’s just what life is like when you’re abnormally attractive, though,’ said Pip.
Jason and I looked at her.
‘Abnormally attractive?’ I said.
Pip stopped chewing. ‘What? She is! I’m just stating facts! She’s got that sort of “I could step on you and you would enjoy it” energy.’
‘Interesting,’ Jason said, raising an eyebrow.
Pip started to go a bit red. ‘I’m literally just making an observation!’
‘… OK.’
‘Don’t look at me like that.’
‘I’m not.’
‘You are.’
Since the events of prom, I’d given some solid thought as to whether I might actually be a lesbian, like Pip. It would make sense. Maybe my lack of interest in boys was because I was, in fact, interested in girls.
That’d be a fairly sensible solution to my situation.
According to Pip, the hallmarks of realising you’re a lesbian were: firstly, getting a little intensely obsessed with a girl, mistaking it for admiration, and sometimes thinking about holding their hand, and secondly, having a subconscious fixation on certain female cartoon villains.
Jokes
