25
Izzy was rummaging around in the back of the fridge when her phone buzzed in her pocket. Thinking nothing of it, she nearly dropped it when Nat’s name came up with “new iMessage” on the screen.
She couldn’t remember when she’d swiped her phone open faster.
Hiya. So we should probs talk. Maybe drinks tonight?
Izzy blinked. Then, before she could second-guess herself, she typed out a swift reply.
Yes please. Arms?
The reply dots appeared almost immediately. Disappeared. Appeared again.
How about that bar with the ducks?
Sure. 8?
See u then
Well.
Izzy clutched her phone in her hand and felt her thoughts racing ahead to tonight. What did we should probs talk actually mean?
+
By the time eight o’clock came around, Izzy had wound herself up into a frenzy.
We should probs talk, she had decided, now translated to one of three things: We need to stop being friends because … reasons, I’m sorry for being a stroppy cow will you forgive me, or, well, Izzy couldn’t actually think of a third. That was the one that worried her most, an unidentifiable mass of ectoplasm ready to suck up one of Izzy’s most important friendships. If it was even still a friendship. Did it still count as a friendship if you hadn’t actually properly spoken in nearly two months whilst still technically living together and hanging out with the same group of people?
A smaller part of her felt mean and petty and ready to lash out because it seemed like Natali was calling the shots. Hadn’t Izzy meant to stop caring as much at some point?
She snorted. Good one.
Anyway, Nat had reached out earlier. It was clear she was, at least, trying. Right?
Izzy had pregamed a bit at home, sucking down a glass of wine like it was her job, so by the time she walked through the door—and she couldn’t help thinking Nat had picked a neutral ground for some nefarious purpose—she was more or less a tremulous mass of nerves.
Nat was already there. She hadn’t noticed Izzy yet, so Izzy took the moment to pause and look at her. She’d got a haircut, and Izzy hadn’t even known. Her stomach did a thing. Nat had been using Izzy for her hair-cutting skills since they’d met, and she had gone somewhere else for this one.
Ectoplasm.
Izzy braced herself and walked forward, watching for the moment Nat would notice her.
She felt like she was approaching a tiger, with David Attenborough’s voice narrating the moment. Observe how narrowly she watches the predator, keenly aware that this peaceful moment could result in the bloody end of friendship should she make one wrong move.
Nat saw her and made a gesture like she was about to stand up but then thought better of it. Her beer was halfway gone already. “Hey.”
“Hi. Let me just grab a drink, all right?”
Nat nodded. For a moment, their gazes met. She forced herself to drop her stuff onto the bench before legging it to the bar.
Cider in hand, she made her way back. Nat allowed her to sit down and take a sip before opening her mouth and saying, “Look, I’m sorry.”
Izzy nearly choked on her drink. “About … which part?”
Nat rolled her eyes. “For being, you know. Horrid about this stuff to you.”
Izzy was rooted to her spot. She hadn’t honestly been anticipating this option. She had wanted it, longed for it, but now that it was unfolding before her, she didn’t know what to feel. It seemed somehow incomplete.
“Iz, say something.”
This, too, felt off. Nat was nervous, Izzy realised. Bizarrely, it never once occurred to her as a possibility that Nat would ever be nervous talking to her.
“Sorry, I just—I’m not really sure what to say, I guess.”
“I know. Look.” God. Izzy’d missed her. She’d missed her even while she’d hated Nat for abandoning her when Izzy had fucking needed her so much. “I had reasons for being pissed off, but I realise that it wasn’t enough to freeze you out, either. Or, maybe it was, but it was still a super shitty thing to do. To you.”
Izzy gripped her pint of cider. She had no idea how to even feel, much less what to say. She concentrated on the way Nat’s fringe fell over her eye and kept as still as possible. Ears pricked for the slightest sense of danger, Sir David supplied helpfully.
“Here’s the thing, all right? I was pissed off because.” A long pull of her drink. “You’re so.”
Izzy froze, still watching Nat, but Nat looked away the next moment. What, what, what am I?
“You swanned into the place and dropped a bomb on us, and like it was nothing to you. Like, a kiss had—”
“It wasn’t just a kiss,” she whispered. Had Nat fucked up their friendship because she thought Izzy was an actual fucking idiot? Or just an arsehole? She felt the need to defend herself bubbling up her insides.
“I know.” Nat deflated, looking into the depths of her drink. “I know it wasn’t. It was just—sudden. All right? You know what it was like for me to come out.”
Izzy made herself nod. So Dex had been right, then. This wasn’t about Izzy at all. She wasn’t sure if that stung more or less.
“I was fucked up over it as a kid, you know? I’d even thought about.” Nat stopped again.
Izzy knew this, too. How could she ever forget Nat telling her? Fourteen-year-old Natali had been so desperate, she’d reached for her mum’s pills, and she hadn’t gone through with it, but … yeah. Izzy knew.
“Anyway, I hated myself, all right? Just for being different, for being gay. And here you came in and were, like, oh, hey, turns out I like ladies, Kanye shrug.”
“That isn’t—” Izzy cut herself off. “Sorry. I know.”
“No, you’re right. It wasn’t like that, but that’s how it felt to me, and I was so bloody angry, Iz. I’m sorry. It wasn’t your fault, it wasn’t fair, but it was hard, all right?” The look she was giving Izzy was so fraught, Izzy felt like she was falling into it. Her head was spinning. “And I was angry for a while, but it wasn’t all on you, and I know that. So. I’m sorry. And then I was embarrassed and didn’t want to apologise because I’d been such an arsehole.”
Izzy waited for more, but Nat seemed to be done. Or at least waiting for a response, which she now tried to marshal, though it felt like walking through water. Slow, and every movement an effort. “All right. Thank you. I do understand, I think. Or it makes sense.”
“Look, that’s not the only reason, though.” Oh. “Like … yeah, being queer and experiments and—I know, I know, you aren’t just experimenting, trust me, I’ve heard all about it from Alex and Dex and anyway, you could have realised you were queer even without the sex bit, so I know. I was an arse. But that isn’t the only thing.”
She lifted her eyes to Izzy.
Fuck. Door number three.
Nat looked paler, suddenly, maybe it was just her lips. Something about her went a bit grey, and Izzy had just enough time to panic, to imagine a thousand different horrific scenarios—she’d accidentally slept with Nat’s ex, Nat had found out she was ill and dying, Nat was leaving London—when Natali said, “It isn’t just that you’d discovered you were queer.”
Izzy waited. She couldn’t feel her feet.
“It’s that you hadn’t done it with me.”
It was like tunnel vision, or a lurch forward, she wasn’t sure. There was this one scene in Fellowship where Frodo felt the pull of the ring and the trees on his path suddenly looked like they’d shifted, only they had clearly stayed still. It was brilliant camera work, and Izzy had always shivered at that scene.
That was what this moment felt like.
It was a pull of unreality, a sickening feeling growing from the pit of her stomach and into her heart, up to her throat.
She opened her mouth, but nothing came out.
Nat, when Izzy refocused on her, looked miserable, but also defiant, maybe. She jutted out her chin. “I’m sorry, all right? It isn’t your fault I’ve been in love with you since, like, forever. I just never thought it’d be an option.”
“You—”
“You never saw me that way. It’s fine, obviously. But, like. I feel like a complete arsehole right now, so you don’t have to say anything, okay? I just wanted to come clean, I’ve been—I just wanted you to know. It’s not you. Or, it is you, but not, like. Not like that. You did nothing wrong.”
Izzy swallowed through the dryness in her throat and stared as Natali reached for her messenger bag. “Wha–wait, Nat—”
“I’m going to be a cowardly shit right now and scarper.” Natali’s voice seemed to be coming from somewhere far away. “But that doesn’t mean I’m going to do what I’ve been doing. I miss you. I want us to be all right. So I’ll see you at home later, all right? I just have to go right now.”
Izzy somehow nodded through the din of her brain between her ears. All she could do was watch as Natali hesitated, stood up, gave Izzy a look she couldn’t quite interpret in the moment, laid a hand on top of Izzy’s, squeezed, and walked out of the bar.
Izzy sat in place, her cider forgotten.
She didn’t move until her phone buzzed in her bag, making her jump.
Without looking, she reached for it and swiped it open. She forced herself to look down.
Im sorry. Xo