LITMIR.BIZ

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to good pukey sick feeling in her stomach in one easy step. And, little did he know, Amy was already ordained online. Handy.

      ‘Yeah, you’re right.’ I threw in a light laugh and a toss of the head for good measure, sort of a cross between a total sex goddess and a smallish pony. ‘I get it.’

      ‘It’s just tricky, the whole friends with benefits thing,’ he said with a smile, combing his fingers through my hair. Or at least he tried to comb his fingers through my hair. Long curly hair plus an all-night sex session equals many, many tangles. ‘It never seems to work, and you’re my best mate. I don’t want you to get hurt in this.’

      Ohhh.

      It was amazing how much damage you could do with so few words. Friends with benefits. Best mate. And thank goodness he didn’t want me to get hurt. THANK GOODNESS.

      ‘I think I need a shower,’ I said, grabbing a towel off the radiator and holding it against myself as I clambered out of bed. ‘Yes, I do.’

      ‘Wait, you’re not pissed off, are you?’

      I span on my heel and stared down at the man in my bed. Tall, cute and, as it turned out, a bloody good shag. And weirdly, it felt like that was all I knew about him.

      ‘Why did we, you know …’ I started, not sure where I was going. ‘Last night. Why did you have sex with me?’

      ‘Because you kissed me.’ Charlie was doing a much better job of keeping his voice down than I was and looked as though he would really like me to try harder.

      ‘And if I hadn’t kissed you, we would never have …’ I just couldn’t bring myself to say it again.

      ‘I don’t know, because you did.’ He was talking to me, but his eyes were definitely scanning the room for his boxers. ‘Is this just regular post-sex crazy girl behaviour or what?’

      ‘I wouldn’t know.’ I snatched up his pants and threw them in his face. M&S cotton boxers, definitely bought by his mother. ‘Because I don’t have enough casual sex to know whether or not it turns me into a crazy girl.’

      ‘Can you not shout?’ he mumbled, pulling the boxers off his face. ‘Your mum is going to hear.’

      ‘And we wouldn’t want that, would we?’ I bellowed. Not shouting, bellowing. ‘We wouldn’t want anyone to know that I forced myself on you.’

      ‘Bloody hell, can you calm down?’ Charlie hissed, shuffling out of the bed and trying to put his giant hands on my shoulders. ‘What is wrong with you? All I said was I didn’t want to tell Amy that we slept together until we’d had time to work out what was going on. What’s not OK about that?’

      ‘Everything,’ I replied. I would not cry. I would not cry. I would not cry.

      I didn’t want a shower any more. I just wanted to leave. Shaking his hands off my shoulders, I pulled on my knickers, my skinny jeans and a baggy black jumper Amy had the foresight to include in my packing. While crying.

      ‘Don’t, please.’ His voice had changed from confused and angry to confused, angry and a little bit scared. ‘Just sit down and talk to me.’

      ‘I don’t want to sit down,’ I said, my eyes burning bright red. ‘I don’t want to talk to you. I don’t want to work out what’s going on. I already know what’s going on. You’re a wanker.’

      ‘Why am I a wanker?’ Charlie asked, incredulous, as I grabbed my handbag and checked for all the essentials. It felt like it would really ruin the moment if I had to manhandle myself into my massive bra, so I picked it up and threw it in my handbag instead. ‘What have I done that you didn’t want me to do?’

      ‘Nothing,’ I said as I curled my hair around itself and fastened it in a topknot. ‘I did want to kiss you and I did want to sleep with you but I do not want to be your fuck-buddy, Charlie.’

      There wasn’t a lot of point pretending I wasn’t crying now, and so I turned to face him, tears streaming, nose running, the whole ugly crying extravaganza.

      ‘I have been in love with you for so long, and I had no idea how not to be. I didn’t think actually sleeping with you would be the way to sort it out, but apparently it was. So thanks.’

      Before I could launch into legitimate sobs, I opened the bedroom door, slammed it shut behind me and ran downstairs. Mum and Brian were drinking Sunday morning coffee in the kitchen in complete silence.

      ‘I think me and you need to have a talk, young lady,’ Mum said, cool as a cucumber.

      ‘I do not agree,’ I replied, slipping my feet into my Primark ballet pumps. ‘Brian, can you please run me to the station?’

      ‘Course I can, love,’ he said, coffee on the table, car keys appearing from his jeans pocket. ‘Come on.’

      ‘Don’t you dare walk out of this house, madam.’ Mum sounded shocked. It was fair. It was, after all, the first time in my entire life that I’d answered her back or not done as I was told. Fairly impressive at twenty-eight. ‘You sit down at this table and tell me what exactly is going on with you or you don’t come back to this house ever again.’

      ‘I’ll leave my keys with Brian then,’ I shouted as I passed through the front door. Probably a bit rash. I probably wasn’t thinking entirely straight. Or walking straight just yet.

      ‘Oh dear God, it’s drugs, isn’t it? I knew it. All those late nights in the office, never having any money, fired for “no reason”. What is it? Heroin? Are you doing the heroin?’ She was shouting just loud enough for the neighbours to have that on Facebook in the next ten minutes.

      ‘Yes, Mum,’ I replied as calm as you like. ‘I’m doing all of the heroin. Track marks up and down my arms, can’t get enough of the stuff. It’s aces.’

      Marching towards the door, all I wanted was to be out of that house.

      ‘Tess Sigourney Brookes, you come back here this instant.’ My mum did not sound amused.

      I didn’t turn round. I didn’t reply. I just got in the car.

      ‘Sorry to be a pain in the arse, Brian.’ I gave my lovely stepdad an apologetic smile as I buckled my seatbelt. ‘Just not having a very good week.’

      ‘Happens to the best of us, love,’ he said as he started the engine and backed out of the driveway. ‘Happens to the best of us.’

      When I finally arrived back home, the flat was gloriously empty. The battery was flat on my phone and I’d left the charger at my mum’s, so there was very little to do but have a bath, wash away every trace of Charlie Wilder and collapse on the settee with a big bag of Wotsits. Or four big bags of Wotsits.

      A week ago, I’d been prepping for my first day in my big new job. Seven days on, I had no job, I had no prospects, I’d shagged Charlie, I’d fallen out with Charlie, and I was relatively certain my mum had a bit of a bag on with me. I had excelled myself. An entire decade’s worth of drama in one week.

      ‘Sometimes things need shaking up,’ I’d told the rubber duck in the bath. ‘You’ve got to test the limits sometimes.’

      He didn’t reply. He was getting a real attitude.

      I was deep into my third episode of Come Dine With Me when I heard someone hammering on the front door.

      ‘Yay, Vanessa,’ I whispered, pulling my stripy blanket up under my chin.

      ‘Tess, are you in there?’

      Not Vanessa. Charlie.

      It was too late to run into my room and hide under the bed, so I did the next best thing I could think of. Pull the blanket over my head and shout, ‘No.’

      But when I pulled the blanket down over my eyes, I saw a tall, creased-looking boy in the corner of my living room. All six feet three inches looking sad and stooped. My

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