Joey: You can drop her some subtle hints, though, see if she bites, so to speak.

Barnaby Rudge: Like flirt with her, you mean?

Joey: That's exactly what I mean!

Barnaby Rudge: I could try, I suppose. What if I've been reading her all wrong, though, and she doesn't like me like that?

Joey: Well, she must have given you some encouragement, otherwise you wouldn't say you think she's flirty with you. What sort of things does she do?

Barnaby Rudge: Hmm, dunno. Lots of winking, she tells me she misses me when I'm not here, she texted me today and asked me to get online 'cos she said she was lonely without me.

Joey: Flllliiiiiiiiiiiirt Alerrrrrrrrrt! Yeah, that's kinda flirty, isn't it?!

Barnaby Rudge: So it's not my imagination?

Joey: Well, unless she's like that with everyone, male and female, I'd say she was flirting. I mean, you don't tell people you miss them and you don't wink at them unless you want to let them know you're being flirtatious. Just my opinion, kiddo.

Barnaby Rudge: I really like her, Joe. It's proper messing with my head, all this.

Joey: I bet.

Barnaby Rudge: Yeah, #groan#. I'm still confused about why I slept with my boyfriend too.

Joey: You still don't know what to do, then?

Barnaby Rudge: No...I still wanna finish with him, which is why sleeping with him was all the more mashed up.

Joey: So why DID you sleep with him?

Barnaby Rudge: You tell me, Joe! Maybe I wanted to see if it sparked anything off, some sort of feelings towards him, I dunno.

Joey: But you said that it didn't?

Barnaby Rudge: Nope. It just made me feel ashamed of myself.

Joey: Ashamed?

Barnaby Rudge: For using him. I think I did it as a knee-jerk reaction 'cos Fickle had just told me she was meeting her ex for a drink.

Joey: Blimey! I can see why you're confused! Although I wouldn't feel too guilty about using him, Immy. He's a man; he wouldn't have felt used! For him it was just sex.

Barnaby Rudge: But it's, like, totally stoopid, isn't it? Sleeping with someone I'm planning to dump just 'cos someone I've never met but fancy the arse off just happens to go out with her ex-girlfriend for a drink.

Joey: And I'm sure there'll be plenty of guys and girls all up and down the country who've done something similar, trust me! It's just called being confused.

Barnaby Rudge: And I am gonna finish with Matt. It's just...it's hard, isn't it?

Joey: And not a very nice thing to do. I know, it's tough, isn't it?

Barnaby Rudge: And it's like, having to explain to everyone why I did it. That's what I'm dreading.

Joey: Well, at the end of the day it's nothing to do with anyone else. It's your life, your decision. But if you ask me, you can't even begin to get your head around the whole Fickle thing as long as you're still with your boyfriend, being eaten up with guilt about it all. So I guess either you stay with your boyfriend, not getting much out of being with him, and forget all about Fickle, or you finish with him and turn your whole attention to her.

Barnaby Rudge: That's what I've been thinking. I can't forget her, Joe. I can't stop thinking about her! It's all I do from the moment I wake up until the second I fall asleep at night, and then I even sometimes bloody well dream about her! She's in my head 24/7 and it's killing me!

Joey: Sounds like you got it bad.

Barnaby Rudge: I think I have. I feel miserable when she's not 'around' on MSN and then I feel like my heart's gonna burst with joy whenever she's online. She makes me happy and she's all I ever think about, all day at college all I can think about is her, what she's doing, where she is, and then I can't wait to get home and talk to her on MSN. Or, like, if my phone beeps and I see it's her sending me a text, it makes me feel soooo happy! Is that crazy?

Joey: No, it's not crazy, kiddo. I think it's what they commonly call Fancying Someone.

Barnaby Rudge: But it feels great and shitty at the same time. What's that all about?!

Joey: Welcome to the world of loopy-love bunnies! LOL. It's just crap when you're so into someone but you don't know how they feel, and you don't know what to do about it, isn't it?

Barnaby Rudge: Like with you and your best friend?

Joey: Exactamundo. Listen, kiddles, I gotta go, I'm sorry. I've gotta get some sleep.

Barnaby Rudge: No worries, Joe.

Joey: I'm off on a field trip with college tomorrow to Scotland until Friday. The minibus leaves at six in the morning, then a ten-hour coach drive. Yuk!

Barnaby Rudge: So you don't live near Scotland, then? LOL!

Joey: Very astute, Imms! Nah, I live in a town called Abingdon. It's in Oxfordshire, so hence the ten-hour drive!

Barnaby Rudge: No shit? I live in Oxford! I'm only about 10 miles from you, thassall!

Joey: LMAO, really? It's a small world innit, kiddo?!

Barnaby Rudge: Too right it is! So you're gonna be away all week, then?

Joey: 'Fraid so.

This wasn't what I wanted to hear. I was kinda hoping Joey might be around to guide me through what I had a feeling was going to be the week from hell for me.

Barnaby Rudge: Well, have a good one won't you, Joe?

Joey: I'll try. Hey, look, here's my mobile number. Text me if things get too heavy, yeah?

Joey typed up her phone number and I jotted it down quickly. I'd use it too. I was sure of that.

Barnaby Rudge: I'll try not to bother you too much!

Joey: It'll probably be a welcome distraction from studying amoeba in some murky Scottish loch!!

After we'd said our good-byes and Joey had logged off, I hung around online for a while, secretly hoping that Fickle might log on briefly before bed. I glanced down at my mobile and remembered what Joey had just said about perhaps giving Fickle the come-on, let her know I was interested. I wondered if I should text Fickle, say to her some of the things she says to me; tell her I missed her, that I wanted her to come online and talk to me. Then I remembered Matt and I felt the familiar sinking feeling in my heart, as I always seemed to when I thought about him.

Joey was right. There was no way I could even begin to think about letting Fickle know I liked her until I did something about Matt. I looked down at my phone again and without really knowing what I was going to say to him, dialled his number, my heart thumping wildly in my neck.

Chapter Nine.

"It sounded urgent on the phone." Matt frowned across the table at me the next night. "What's up? Is something wrong?"

I'd met Matt at our favourite local cafe, where you could get a burger, chips, and drink for under a fiver, so it did us quite nicely. It was nothing special, more the sort of place where if you wanted to know what else was on the menu, you just had to look at the stains on the cook's apron. You know the sort of place.

I looked over at Matt, taking in every detail of his face. I tried, for the last time, to find some spark inside me, something that might stop me from doing what I was about to do. But there was nothing. No lust, no fancying, no love. Genuine affection, sure, but no fireworks, no fire at all. Nothing that came even close to what Fickle ignited inside me.

I watched as Matt picked off a chunk of burger roll and shoved it into his mouth.

"It's not urgent, nothing's wrong." An image of Matt's face looming over mine, just as it had done the night we slept together, entered my head, making the skin on the back of my neck prickle. "Well, kinda wrong, but everything's okay. At least I think it is. Well, it will be. I hope so, anyway." I was stuttering now. "I just need to talk to you, Matt." I heard myself sighing at him.

"Okaaaay." Matt squinted, peering at me quizzically. He put down his burger and wiped his mouth with his napkin. "I think I know what this is about." He nodded.

"You do?" I frowned at him.

"It's about the other night, isn't it?" Matt reached for his drink and took a sip, watching me carefully over the rim of the glass.

"What about the other night?"

"You regret it, don't you? I was getting vibes off you even before I'd left the house."

I hesitated, thinking about what I was going to say next.

"You wish you'd never done it, I think." Matt pursed his lips.

"I do," I said slowly, feeling grateful to Matt for leading me into this conversation, so that I didn't have to kinda start from scratch.

Matt nodded and picked up his burger again, biting a chunk from it. I looked down at my own, half-eaten burger. A wave of nausea threatened to overwhelm me.

"I hope you don't think I forced you into anything, but you kinda seemed up for it when I came round." He shrugged. "I love you, Immy, and you love me, and it's what people in love do. Simple."

He loved me? Worse than that, he thought that I loved him too? I stared at him, kinda dumbstruck.

"You do realise that I love you, don't you, Immy?" Matt reached over and took my hand, stroking the palm of my hand with his thumb. "I guess I should tell you more often than I do, but it's kinda obvious, isn't it? That we're made for each other."

I guessed it was now or never.

Taking a deep breath, I slowly said, "I do wish I hadn't slept with you, yes, and I'm sorry for that," and watched as Matt blithely stabbed up some chips with his fork. "And I kinda...I kinda don't want to do this anymore either."

Matt's head sprang up and he stared straight at me. "Don't want to do what anymore?"

"This," I said feebly. "Us."

"Eh?" Matt frowned. "What do you mean?"

I tried not to sigh, wondering just how blunt I needed to be before he got the message, but before I'd even answered, the look on his face told me that the penny might finally be dropping.

"Wait a minute. I don't understand where all this is coming from. I thought you meant you just weren't ready to sleep with me. I was fine with that," he said. "I didn't think you wanted us to split up!"

"I'm sorry," I said, suddenly thinking what an insipid, crap word "sorry" can be in situations such as these.

"Sorry? So you're actually going to dump me?" I heard the words choke in his throat as he said them.

Silence. What could I say?

"Jesus, Immy! You're kidding me, right? Tell me you're joking, for shit's sake!"

"It's not a joke. I'm sorry." I reached over and took his hand again, not sure what else to do.

He snatched his hand from mine and shoved back in his chair, turning his head to stare out the window, like a petulant child.

"It happens," I added, probably not very helpfully.

He turned and looked back at me. "Not to me, it doesn't," he said.

That kinda pissed me off, I dunno why.

"But I love you," he said. "I've proper fallen for you, you know?"

Another silence.

"So...you don't love me?" Pain threaded through Matt's tone.

I shook my head, just wanting this to be over. "I do like you, Matt, I do. It's just, I dunno."

"Just liking me's not enough?" Matt's voice began to rise, while his face looked like it might crumple at any moment, and I suddenly thought how awful it might be if he started crying.

I shook my head again.

Matt picked up his napkin and stared at it, turning it over and over in his hands. "I don't understand where this has come from."

"It's not you, Matt. It's me," I said quietly, cringing at the cliche, even though it was a cliche that was actually true for once.

Matt robotically shredded the napkin, as if unaware of his actions. "How long have you felt like this, Immy?"

"A while."

"You should have said you weren't happy!" Matt's voice rose again, and people looked over at us, curiously.