C
“There you are!” Vivi greets me from above, peering down at me through the gap in the stairwell.
“Here I am!” I return in a whispered yell.
She watches me as I ascend the rest of the way up to her, grinning crookedly.
“Finally,” she says, spreading her arms as I arrive at her landing. “Bring the old times back.”
After a brief moment of hesitation, I accept the hug. We rarely hugged before, when I was still Chloe, but it does seem appropriate now. We haven’t been together like this in a long time. In a way, it’s like we haven’t seen each other for two months.
It was her idea to meet today, just the two of us, and it makes me feel guilty that I didn’t have the idea myself. It was even her idea to put a ban on any talk about schoolwork for the night. That’s a first, sort of. It’s been at least a year since we spent an entire evening with just the two of us and without studying, and before that we never did it intentionally. Studying together had kind of become an excuse for us to hang out. We would start studying and then, as we became tired, we’d switch to deep conversations in the half-light of her room or watch silly movies until we fell asleep halfway through.
Her Mum’s gonna cook for us, Vivi made sure of that, and then—well, we’re not sure what then, yet. The thought makes me nervous if I’m being entirely honest with myself. I know she said she wanted me back, but can that really hold up in the face of everything that’s happened? Surely, I must seem changed to her, even if I don’t feel very different to myself.
“You good?” Vivi asks, shifting against me. “You’re so quiet.”
My face goes hot, but I force myself to meet her eyes. “Your Mum hasn’t met me yet. I’ll have to make a good first impression, especially since I’m—”
The word gets stuck in my throat. I don’t know why, but I can’t bring myself to push it past my lips. Is it because somebody could hear?
Vivi glances at the open door to the apartment she shares with her mother. The exhaust hood is audible even through the closed kitchen door, and she grins and says, “I’ll just tell her you’re my boyfriend.”
My face—which had been warm before—goes impossibly hot at a snap. I’m suddenly very aware that I’m a good bit taller than her and that she’s standing very close to me. I have to look down to meet her eyes, and there’s a mischievous glint in them.
She breaks into giggles, bumping her fist against my shoulder. “You should see your face! You look horrified!”
“She could believe it!” I hiss, trying to keep my voice low, glancing at the door once more. But obviously, I know that I overreacted. I should’ve known it was just a joke.
“You almost did,” she grins as she steps away and leads me into the apartment.
Her Mum is busy frying potatoes when we enter the kitchen. I know N never owned any shirts or nice jumpers, but I made sure to at least put on one of the less ratty hoodies. I’ll definitely have to find the time to buy some more fashionable clothes once I’ve established myself as the kind of person who would even consider wearing them. Who knows, maybe I’ll even experiment a little with male fashion? I never really bothered getting into that—because why would I—but maybe the time will come soon?
Rose turns when Vivi steps into her line of sight, waving. She hadn’t heard us over the sound of the hood and the sizzling of the vegetables and oil. The smile she offers is kind, but far from the warmth it usually emanates when she sees me. But that’s normal, these days. This body meets less warmth from other people.
With a flick, Rose turns off the exhaust hood and comes over. “You must be Noel, right?” she says, offering her hand. “I’m Rose.”
“Yeah, hi.” I offer my most confident smile and shake her hand.
A few minutes later, we’re sitting around the dining table, steaming food on our plates.
“So, what’s the plan for tonight?” Rose asks in between blowing at her forkful of potato, onion and bacon.
Vivi gives her a look.
“What? I’m just curious,” she defends herself. “You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to.”
But of course, that would only make it worse. The thing is, neither Vivi nor I thought to agree on an excuse. I left all my school stuff at home, very intentionally so, so it won’t do to make up some school project.
“There’s this new movie that came out,” Vivi says without skipping a beat. “I mentioned that I was excited to watch it, and she’d watched the first movie of the series not too long ago, so we decided to watch this one together.” Our eyes meet as my heart plummets. She. Vivi goes on speaking like nothing happened. “And we’ve been meaning to hang out for some time anyway, but never really found time, so we just made it a sleepover while we were already at it.”
Rose raises an eyebrow and I know immediately that she noticed. She is Vivi’s mum after all. “She?”
“He, I mean.” Vivi blushes. “Did I really say—” She shakes her head as if to get rid of a dizziness spell. “It’s been a long day.”
***
“Damn, that was awkward,” Vivi whispers as soon as she has closed the door behind us, breaking into a disbelieving fit of giggles. “Well shit, I really need to improve my pronoun game.”
I give a slow nod, watching her from the centre of her room.
It’s a small room she lives in—about half the size of mine. It also looks entirely different from mine. Whereas mine was decorated in muted creams and whites, hers is a clash of colours, burgundy bedding with a dark bed-frame, and her white bathrobe hanging from the hanger on the door. She never redecorated as radically as me, the shelves and closet she told me she’s had since she was five. Only the bed and desk are kind of new.
Her room is much more reflective of the kind of person she is. There are pictures everywhere, of us, of her and Rose, of Lucy, Lila, and Nur. There are a lot of pictures of her with stage makeup and costumes on, even a few posters from the plays where she played the main part.
“You think she suspects anything?” Vivi asks, walking past me to her desk.
I shrug. “Couldn’t tell. And even if, I don’t think she’s crazy enough to come up with the same theory as you, right? I mean, what are the odds of that anyway?”
“Not as crazy as me, you mean?” Vivi grins.
“Definitely not as crazy as you.” She puts up with me, after all. But I don’t say that part, I know what she’d say.
Shush now, we’ll have none of that tonight. Positive thoughts, okay?
“So, what’ll it be tonight?” She taps her nail on the top of her laptop, tilting her head thoughtfully.
I look around. “Your mum thinks we’re gonna watch a movie. I’m too tired for chess or something.”
Two years ago, Vivi’s put it in her head that she’s secretly going to become a chess grandmaster, and while she’s not there yet, she’s a lot further than I anticipated back when she first brought it up. Playing against her is a pretty one-sided affair, unless she explains it to me along the way. Of course, I’ve never really minded losing, especially if it made her happy, but usually I do try to give it my best. I don’t have the capacity for that tonight.
“Aight,” she says, picking up her laptop and bringing it over to the bed. In the meantime, I open the bag I brought, retrieving my joggers and sleeping shirt.
“I’ll be right back.”
When I return from the bathroom, Vivi’s already slouched back in her bed, the laptop open on her nightstand.
“You never left to change before,” she observes, eyeing me as she sits up, readjusting the bunched-up blanket to make a better backrest.
I stop by the door, cocking my head. “I’ve never been a boy before.”
She shrugs. “You think that matters when you are still the same person?” It’s not a rhetorical question. The look she’s giving me is genuinely curious. “I mean, you don’t have to answer, of course, but you’re not making me uncomfortable.”
“No, I—I just—” My face is hot as I stop speaking and sit down next to her. She doesn’t press it.
I barely focus on the movie we’re watching. It’s the third movie in the genre by a particular director that came out not too long ago. We watched the first two movies half a year ago and they were good—a great atmosphere with good, healthy romance and witty jokes and banter. But I don’t really care for watching this one right now.
I’m in Vivi’s room again. I ate Rose’s dinner, got grilled by her, and now I’m sitting next to Vivi, breathing in that familiar aloe vera scent of her shampoo. I felt incurably lonely, that night when I fled the party at Jason’s, but now I’m not. Not with her by my side.
Vivi shifts abruptly, as if reading my thoughts. “Wait, why are they kissing now? I thought they were only fake-dating?”
She meets my eyes, and I’m just as stumped as she is. A huff more than a laugh escapes me. “No clue, honestly. I wasn’t really paying attention.”
Vivi laughs. “Me either.” With a tap of her pointer finger, the movie pauses and she looks at me, laughter barely contained behind her eyes. Her lips twitch. “I mean, not that it matters, right?”
I raise an eyebrow. “Who cares about movies anyway?”
“Exactly!” She throws a hand up theatrically. “The important thing is that I get to hang out with you again.”
There’s a pang in my stomach at the thought that this means that she prefers my presence over N’s, but it’s interrupted when a body collides with me and knocks me sideways onto the bed.
It’s Vivi, of course, and for some reason, she seems to have thrown herself against me in a tackle-hug.
She laughs as I turn onto my back, which leaves her half on top of me, her head resting on my chest.
When I raise my head to look at her, I see that she’s scrunching up her nose. “You’re bony,” she says, poking me gently in the ribs.
I raise an eyebrow, swatting her hand away. “You threw yourself at me. I’d say that’s a you problem.”
“Do you mind?” she asks, eyes twinkling.
I shrug, letting my head drop back. “Not really.”
Vivi snuggles closer, and I put an arm around her shoulders tentatively. She’s warm, even through the fabric of my T-shirt. It’s a strange feeling, being this close to her in this way. I would never have thought to initiate it, but now that we’re lying here like this—I wouldn’t break it off for almost anything.
I realise that Vivi was entirely right. I did miss this. The absence of her in my life has been carving me out on the inside like a sinkhole, and now that I have her back, it’s like I’m a little more whole again. Not completely, probably, but right now, right in this moment, that doesn’t matter so much.
“Maybe we should just start dating,” she says with a low chuckle. “I’m sure people would ask fewer questions then.”
I give a low snort. “So you’re not into girls after all?” With how many allusions Vivi’s been making over the years to the possibility of her liking girls, I would honestly be more surprised if she were straight.
“I’d make an exception for you.” I can practically see her wink at me as she says the words.
But now I’m curious. “Wait, so are you into girls?” I don’t even know why I care. Maybe it’s the fact that I just realised how much I care about her. I just realised we’ve been best friends for four years and I still don’t know this about her.
She shrugs. “Might be? But I’m not dead set on either. Like, I guess I’ll know once I start dating, right? Maybe not even then. I don’t think it really matters anyway?” She pauses. “Do you—know? I mean—with Noelle being, y’know? You were in love with her even when she was still a guy to you, weren’t you?”
“Yeah,” I say on an exhale. “Don’t think I’m set any way, either.”