"You are just too bloody much to cope with sometimes, Rachel Earl! Don't even think of saying another word until you've sorted out that attitude!" She collapsed dramatically on the sofa, and whispered as if to herself. "I'm bloody pregnant, I shouldn't be having all this stress..."

That fucking baby again. It wasn't even born yet, and already she cared about it more than me. I felt like these days I was just in the way.

I knew that if I stayed any longer, I'd just keep shouting. So I did the only sensible thing I could do. I left. I could hear my mum shouting behind me to stop there right now, but what did she know? What did she expect me to do, sit in a corner in the house all my life not saying anything and pretending I didn't exist? What the fuck?

Besides, I had someone to meet. And I had already been held up ages and I knew he'd be angry at me for it too. Shit.

The actual reason I'd been going out was because I'd got a phone call from Liam. He was having another panic attack, and he needed me to come and sort him out. I walked as quickly as I could, scared to run. I knew people would start staring at me if I ran.

Liam's front door was open. Once I was inside I ran, and I burst into his room. He was stood in the middle of it, and the curtains were shut.

I think I must have startled him, because as soon as I came in he lashed out. I froze in shock.

"Ow," I said feebly out loud, feeling my arm go numb, and then start aching.

His face contorted and he swung his arm back and hit again, one, two, three times as I repeated "Liam, Liam, calm down, Liam-" until he stopped and collapsed into my arms.

I stroked his back as his chest heaved and he pulled hard at his hair. I was shaking but that was nothing compared to what he was feeling. He clung onto me like I'd stop him from drowning. And with lots of talking, lots of reassurance, I managed to slowly soothe him back to normality. We went outside into his garden, and he lit a joint for himself. He was still white-faced and his fingers shook, but he smiled at me gratefully.

"I'm sorry," was the first thing out of his mouth. I knew it was an effort to speak normally after a panic attack, and I could see how important it was to him to get this out.

"Nah, I'll live," I said, hand moving to feel the damage. I had the bright idea of poking it, and winced. That was going to be an impressive bruise, anyway. I laughed, trying to dispel the tension. "You've got a hell of a right hook on you. Mohammed Ali's got nothing on you, slugger." I nudged him to show I was joking. I think it was too soon, though.

"I was really scared you weren't going to come," he confided, still serious. "I was terrified. It was making me worse. I kept looking at the clock, and you were nearly half an hour. Half an hour."

"I'm sorry, Liam, I just-"

"No, I'm sorry, I was so..." he cast around for what to say. "I was so far into it, and I thought you'd ditched me and that you didn't care, so when you finally came in I just reacted."

He looked so apologetic, I wrapped my arm around him and rubbed his shoulder sympathetically.

"I'm sorry. I got caught up with some random bullshit with my mum when I was trying to get out of the house. I was trying to come as quick as I could, honest."

We went back inside and played some video games after that to take our minds off it. We're neither of us that good with the deep heart-to-hearts, we get enough of that forced out of us in therapy. Like, we can bring up stuff like that with each other if we really want, but it's never like we have to talk about it. We don't even have to sometimes. We understand.

Speaking of stuff we both understand, Liam was complaining about Group again.

"Talking about it never helps, it just dredges up the past, I mean, who the fuck would be like 'oh, going over that time I royally fucked up when I was 10 again and again and again really made me feel better, yeah, thanks guys,' I mean what the fuck?"

I laughed, and died in the game because I wasn't concentrating. He laughed right back, and he looked sideways at me with a mischievous glint in his eye.

"Should've known better than to play with a girl, that wasn't even a hard jump."

"Shut up!" I said, pausing the game and shoving him.

This started a playfight, and when we were done hitting each other with pillows we collapsed on the bed together. He kissed me all of a sudden, which still always came as a surprise to me somehow.

He drew back and smiled at me.

"You know what I like about you, Rae?"

I felt my heart beat louder in my chest. It wasn't a nice heart-beating, it was the feeling I always got when someone had something to tell me about what they thought of me. I always felt like they were about to say something horrible, that they'd point out something wrong with me whenever they said that. That they'd try and think of something good to say, and there'd be nothing. Just like with people looking at me, I couldn't face the scrutiny.

"What?" I asked.

"I can be so myself around you. Like... whatever I say, and whatever I do, I don't have to pretend. I can just do what comes naturally. That's what I hate most about therapy, that they were trying to change me. I don't need their approval to live my life, and I can't pretend to be a normal person like they want. This is real. We can be honest with each other. And you get it. You really get it."

I stroked his face. "Thanks, Liam." I didn't need to say any more, because he knew I was starting to feel the same. I leaned down and kissed him, and we were snogging for a while, my arms feeling heavy where I was holding myself off him so that I didn't crush him. When things started to get heated, he pulled away.

"Lights?" he prompted. And so I heaved myself off him and headed across the room to make sure we stayed under cover of darkness. I didn't have to face myself naked, and I didn't want to.

He didn't want to see me. He thought the way I was disgusting. And that was fine, you know. He didn't give me any of this bullshit about "oh, you don't look that bad," or pretend like he was fine with it or anything. It was real. Honest. He saw me as I really was. And it was the same way he saw himself, too. We understood each other, and we didn't have to lie.

"They think it's the gang's fault. As if. It's so patronising, like I can't even make my own decisions about my boyfriend, for fuck's sake."

Chloe surprised me then by dropping her used fag butt to the ground, stamping on it and immediately bringing out another one and lighting it. I'd seen her have the occasional cigarette before, but not like this.

"Since when do you smoke, like, properly?" I asked.

"Dunno," she shrugged. "Just decided to."

"Right," I said, frowning. "Erm-"

"How's things going with Liam?" she asked. I still didn't think she'd quite forgiven me for being the person who made him cheat on Amy, but she kept her tone neutral, not giving anything away.

"Erm, fine," I said, shrugging uncomfortably.

"Well, go on!" She nudged me, smiling and wiggling her eyebrows suggestively. "Give me the gory details! I've not got much to go on here. How far have you gone?"

I felt myself going red. I grinned, trying to make it seem like it wasn't as bad as it was.

Well, it wasn't that bad, was it?

"Hook, line and sinker. All the way."

Chloe's mouth dropped open, and she had to catch her ciggy. "No way," she said, starting to grin right back.

"Yes way!" I was grinning even harder.

"Oh my god, congratulations!" she shrieked. She pulled me into a hug, laughing. "You little minx! Why didn't you tell me as soon as you saw me! How could you sit on that news?"

"I dunno," I said, meaning it. "Like, don't tell anyone I said this, but, well... I don't really think he's that much to boast about. He's in, he unloads and he's out, do you know what I mean?"

She wrinkled her nose in sympathy. "Do I ever. Story of my life. But that's just what all men are like, eh?"

I was relieved to find out that that's the way it was for her too. Thank god. I thought I'd maybe just been crap at it or something. If it was that way for someone like Chloe too, then it was definitely not my fault.

"Tell me about it! You'd think they'd be better than my own hand, but no, they can't even manage that!"

Chloe stopped laughing and looked at me strangely.

"You what?" she asked.

"You know... when you decide to do it yourself? Men do a worse job than even that?"

"Rae..." she whispered, leaning in and slowing down, patiently explaining the way she did sometimes when I just didn't get it. "...I don't think girls are supposed to do that."

I'd been being weird again. I clammed up.

Which meant we sat in an awkward silence for a bit.

"So, er... how's things with Ian?" I asked.

"Fine, yeah. Well, they were fine until my parents came barging in there like I needed rescuing. Now he probably thinks I'm just a stupid kid. It was so embarrassing. I can't believe they went through my stuff to find his address. I thought I'd thrown that bit of paper away. Must've forgotten to empty the bin. I'm so stupid."

That was the lie they'd told her, not me. I think I'd got into their good books by snitching on her and they didn't want to ruin that. And I didn't want to ruin it either, so I went along with it.

"Yeah, but... Ian does treat you right, right?" I was scared to ask, so my voice was quiet. I could remember what his mate Saul tried to do to me. I'd never been so scared of another person in my life. I still hadn't had the courage to tell anyone about that.

Her face went tight, and she took another long drag from her cigarette. She forced a snort of laughter through her nose, trying to lighten up the situation.

"Well, he's rude, he gets way too into his video games, and he sometimes farts or burps in front of me and doesn't say sorry. But I've said it already, and I'll say it again, it's just what men are like, right?"

I put an arm around her and squeezed her.

"Bloody men. Farting and burping all over the place. They can't help it, y'know. Excess methane, it comes with the biology."

Chloe laughed and swatted at me.

"Shut up! You know what I mean. There's no changing them, that's all."

The silence continued as we slowly stopped laughing and couldn't think of what to say next. There was stuff to be said, I just didn't know how I was going to get the courage to say it. I took a deep breath. I counted to 10 inside my head.

"Chlo... he hasn't... well, he hasn't done anything you've not wanted him to, right?"

Scandalised, she shrugged me off.

"What are you saying? It's my business, it's not like I can't take care of myself. Of... of course not. God, no."

"I just think you could do so much better," I replied, lamely.

"Yeah well, he's hot, OK?" she snapped back. "I can deal with it. Now stop asking, you're not my mum."

We changed the subject to something a lot less stressful and she eventually went back inside. I went back to Liam's. I hated being around my mum these days, so it was a bit of a refuge for me.

His room always smelt really strongly of boy, and the curtains were always drawn. We always played video games together and more and more we ended up fooling around together. Was this a relationship? I know he'd said he wanted it to be, but I'd never really answered. I think that that meant I hadn't objected, so it was. At least, if his grunts of "mine, mine mine," were anything to go by as he thrust into me at his climax. He rolled off me and went straight to sleep after that, if the snoring was anything to go by.

I was in a new relationship. I'd officially moved on.

So why did I feel like shit?

Later on, my mum just barged into my room when I was getting changed. Like me having my own space didn't matter. Like she always did.

Her eyes bugged out when she saw the bruise on my arm. It had been a couple of days, so it was at that really impressive bruise stage, where it's all the colours of the rainbow and looks about a million times worse than it is.

"What is that?" she barked.

"Erm... I fell over." Why was I so crap at lying? Mum saw through me immediately, and grabbed my arm, inspecting the bruise.

"It was those girls again, wasn't it? I'll punch their bloody lights out!"

"Mum!"

"Seriously, it was them, right? Do you know their names? Do they go to college?"

"No, it wasn't them! It wasn't anyone! Calm down, Mum." I rolled my eyes.

"What was it then? Tell me!"

"Mum! I fell over. I told you that. Believe me, I fell over."

She started to wind down, and she blinked at me.

"Did you really fall over?"

"Yes, mum." I looked into her face and smiled to show I was telling the truth. Which I wasn't. But I wasn't about to get Liam into trouble either. "I just fell over. I whacked my arm on a tree root. It was days ago now."

"Whereabouts?" she asked.

"In the park," I said. Duh. Where else?

"Right, then. Never mind. OK." She turned to leave. In the doorway she turned back and gestured towards the pile of clothes on my floor. "I just came in to say that I want these tidied up and put into wash tonight. It's starting to smell off in here."

She didn't see the next bruise, or the next. It wasn't Liam's fault, as he explained it to me out of the two mechanisms, fight or flight, he always chose fight. When he was panicked or angry he sometimes didn't see anything else around him. And I understood. Because I knew what that felt like, to have no idea what you were doing. The amount of times in my life I'd suddenly realised I was eating and had been for some time were proof of that. Most of the time he managed to hit out at objects. Sometimes I just got in the way. He never meant to hurt me. It was just instinct. The self-hatred he always had in his eyes afterwards told me that, and that was familiar too.

I was in the canteen. Archie was surrounded by guys from the football team. I knew that me going to defend him would only make things worse (you didn't get a more manly reputation by having some girl come and fight your battles for you), but I watched, tense, ready to spring in there if things looked like they were getting really ugly.

Archie needed a best friend right now, and I wasn't it. I'd been such a crap friend to everyone, and I was just going to have to accept that. I wasn't good enough for anything.

Archie managed to escape, and walked quickly past our table. He shot me a quick friendly smile, but it was obviously put on. I watched him as he went past, and until he went out of the hall doors. Liam kicked me, hard, under the table.

"Ow!" I said, scowling at him.

"You gonna listen to me now, yeah?" he teased, a hard edge to his voice.

"Sorry, what? I was miles away."

"Yeah, I bet you were. I don't like it when you look at other guys, you know."

I could tell he was angry, but it wasn't like that, honest. I pulled a 'pfft, really?' face.

"Who, Arch? He's my mate, that's all."

"Yeah, like you've never fancied him. Look at him, all the girls in this place think he's the fucking second coming, are you honestly saying you've never looked at him like that?"

I flushed.

"Well, er..."

He raised an eyebrow at me, daring me to continue.

"Well, I did when I first met him, but-"

"See?" He threw his hands in the air. "And that sort of stuff, it never goes away." I opened my mouth to protest, but I realised it was true. However totally unavailable Archie was, he was still hot as fuck. There wasn't any denying that. Did I honestly never still think about his arse sometimes? Liam saw my inner struggle and continued. "Look, I just want to be the only guy you look at in that way. Hey, baby. Baby..." he reached across the table and squeezed my hand fiercely. He squeezed until it hurt. "I just scared I'll lose you, alright?"

I nodded, looking down. I looked up again and squeezed his hand back, sticking my tongue out.

"You won't lose me to Archie, Liam. That I can promise you."

He smiled back ruefully.

"Yeah. I know. People like him don't belong with people like us, anyway."

I fell asleep when I got home from college. I just felt worn out these days. Tired of everything. Then again, maybe spending too much time with the light off was starting to affect my sleeping patterns.

I was woken up by a gentle knock on my door, which meant it definitely wasn't my mum.

"Come in?" I said, rubbing my eyes. The door was pushed open and Archie poked his head round.

"Wow, did I wake you?" he asked.

"Just felt knackered," I said. He flopped down on the end of the bed, and sighed.

"Those twats at college are at it again."

"Oh, Archie. I know. I saw."

"Fucking dicks. Seriously, I thought that if I left them alone they'd leave me alone. But life just isn't bloody fair like that, is it?"

"I know," I said, rubbing his back. "I know."

"They all think I'm so fucking into them, too. They're convinced of it. Like, just because I'm gay I'd want to stick it in any guy that moves, like I'm nothing but some... some sex pervert, what the fuck."

"A 'sex pervert'?" I smiled. "Is there some other kind of pervert I'm not aware of?"

"You know what I mean." Archie wasn't in the mood for jokes. "It's just horrible, that's all. It's horrible. I hate it."

I pulled him into a hug and rocked him back and forth. He wasn't crying, but he... well, he nearly was. I held him until his breathing slowed, shushing him and telling him that they were only random twats and he'd be alright.

"I was watching, today, in the canteen. If they'd have started anything really bad, I would've been straight over there, but, you know, I didn't want to make it worse for you."

"Yeah. Thanks," he said. "I just wish Finn was here."

I froze. I didn't like mentioning Finn. I couldn't deal with it. Archie must have noticed, must have known, but he continued anyway.

"I went and got his uncle's number from his parents, and I actually called it. I was so close to telling him what was going on, I just wanted him to be there for me still, but I bottled it. Because seriously, what would I expect, for him to come riding in on a fucking white horse and rescue me?" He laughed weakly. "God, that's so emasculating. It's what he'd do, though, he's just like that. I don't want him to feel like he has to save me. I just want him to put the kettle on, have a good discussion about music and give me someone to hang around with in college that's not just Izzy, you or Chloe. No offense, but I miss my boy mates sometimes too. Plus you're all in the year below. I just wish he was here."

I gulped. Oh god, change the subject, change the subject... "Do you want me to introduce you to Liam? He's a boy. I know he's a bit weird and everything, but he's honestly really cool once you get to know him. Would that help?"

"Um..." Archie thinks about it before sighing and nodding. "Yeah, actually, I think it would. I've got to take all the friends I can get. To new friendship?" he said, miming holding up a glass.

"To new friendship," I agreed, pretending to down it in one. "I am quite thirsty, actually, I should get us something we can actually drink. It's only boring stuff in, I'm afraid - want some orange squash?"

"Um, yeah, um, in a bit, just..." he winced, not sure how to bring this up. He forced it out in a rush. "Do you want his number too? I think you miss him just as much as I do."

"No," was my kneejerk response.

"OK then, I just thought I'd offer."

"No," I repeated again, just as firmly, feeling the slimy tentacles of panic creeping up. "You stay here, I'll be right back up with squash, yeah?"

Later that night my mum caught me raiding the snack cupboard again. It had been a while since I'd done that without something happening during the day to set me off, but I'd entered that eating zone where I don't care about anything else any more. So Mum shouting "What am I going to do with you?" in my face didn't really help. I didn't respond, and just marched off to bed, feeling sick and disappointed in myself.

Inviting Archie to sit with us was awkward. For some reason, I hadn't really expected that. I think Liam felt like his special time was being ruined, that he couldn't be himself in front of this outsider. He was looking agitated, fidgeting with his fork, and he glared at me as Archie sat down next to me. This was a bad idea, I could feel it already.

"So, er... I know you've met before, but I don't think you've ever spoken properly. Liam, this is Archie. Archie, Liam."

"Nice to properly meet you," said Archie, with a polite smile. Liam didn't say anything, just glared. I nudged him with my leg under the table.

"Liam!" I hissed.

He kicked back in annoyance, but I was getting used to that.

"Oh, er, yeah, nice to meet you. Heard you've been having some trouble about your stuff, my girlfriend keeps a close eye on you."

"Um, yeah, I've heard she's been a bit worried."

"Yeah..." I cast around desperately for a subject change. "Hey, have you heard that new song, er, 'Sun Hits The Sky' on the radio yet? It's by, erm... Supergrass?"

"Supergrass!" Archie laughed, confirming, and it was suddenly comfortable again, music was what we knew. "Yeah, heard it last night. I'd never actually heard of Supergrass before, but they're pretty good."

"No, didn't they have that hit last year as well?"

"What was it called?"

Liam cleared his throat loudly.

"Er... Liam here's into video games, isn't that right Liam?"

"Oh right?" said Archie. "What console have you got?"

"Sega," answered Liam.

"Have you got Sonic? What's your favourite level?"

"Scrap Brain."

"Ah. That's the last level, right? I like Spring Hill Zone, it's like being in a pinball machine."

"You mean Spring Yard Zone."

"Yeah, that's it. Spring Yard, Spring Yard, yeah." Archie was nervous. This was not going well, and Liam was being very difficult to win round on purpose. I knew Archie wasn't even really into video games, but I'd sort of hoped he might be able to pull something about them out of the Vault Of Shared Experience Of Boy Things so that I could at least get them talking. I squeezed Archie's knee under the table, and smiled reassuringly.

"Rae?" Liam interrupted. I looked up at him. "Can you come and sit over here?"

"Why?" I asked.

"Because you're my girlfriend. Get here, now."

"Erm, I don't think-" started Archie.

"Shut it, you!" Liam snapped, pointing in his face. Archie raised his eyebrows and leaned back, intimidated and confused, raising his hands to show he meant no harm. I was confused as well.

"Calm down, Liam."

"What were you two just doing then, under the table?"

"Look, chill out-"

"What were you doing?" he demanded, louder.

"I was trying to reassure him because you're being such a jealous twat!" I looked around. Everyone in the canteen was watching us with interest. I felt myself growing hot as they all looked at me.

"I'll go," Archie offered.

"No, stay."

"Yes, that's probably best." Liam's voice was dark.

"No!" I looked around in desperation, seeing all the faces staring back. "Look, Liam, can we... can we take this outside? Please?"

We both got up and he stormed towards the doors. I saw Archie moving to get up, worried, but I shook my head at him.

"No. You stay here," I said, before following a Liam that was about to explode. I felt like I was walking into a war zone, about to go and step on a landmine without any armour on. I'd never seen him this angry in public before.

"Seriously, Liam, what the fuck? There's nothing going on, you know there isn't."

"I want you to stay away from him, you hear?" Liam was pacing, huffing like an angry bull. And I was the big red flag. I gulped.

"Look, Liam, it's alright. Just breathe in and out, count to 10."

"Don't you dare come near me with that bollocks!"

I'd hit a therapy-nerve.

"Liam, just calm down-"

"Don't tell me to fucking calm down. I have a right to be angry. I will not be calm!"

"Jesus, stop being so difficult!"

"I'm being difficult? I'm just reacting to what's right in front of me. You touched his leg under the table, didn't you? I saw."

"Liam!" I said, desperately. "It's not even like that! Didn't you learn anything from the way Amy acted around you? I won't let you decide who I can and can't be friends with!"

"Amy was right, you know. Look what happened. I was so into her, but you just came in and ruined it."

"Er, excuse me!?"

"Newsflash, baby. This right here, this is just what people in relationships do. They protect what's theirs."

I boggled. "What?"

"What I'm saying, if you need it simplified for you," he said, getting up closer to my face and dropping his voice. "is that I won't sit here like a fucking tool while you are all over hotter guys than me. You hear that?"

"He's gay, you idiot."

"So? I know that. It's not about him. It's about you. I just fucking care about you, you know that? I'm the only one that cares about you this much, oh please, Rae, don't do that." He was all over me then, and my stomach turned as he slobbered all over my face, and I felt trapped in his arms. I pushed him off and looked into his face.

"Look, Archie's one of my best friends!" I blinked back tears, knowing what I had to do, because right then I knew that we'd never move on from this, and I was about to hurt him maybe more than anyone had ever hurt him before. "We've been through a lot together, and while he doesn't always understand, you know, he tries to, he's been there for me, he's always been nice and helped me out. I can't cope with all this any more, I just can't. If... if you want to force me to choose between you and him, I'm choosing him. I've... I've got Kester's number if you need." He'd hung his head, and was vibrating like he was about to burst. That was it. I'd wrecked him, and there was no going back. "I'm so sorry."

As soon as I caught a glimpse of his face, I felt a chill of fear go through me. He grabbed me by the arms and shook me, hard, making my teeth rattle in my skull, shouting in my face.

"Ow, Liam-!"

"Get off her."

The voice came from behind me. It was Archie, who had decided not to sit back in the canteen after all. He was a lot smaller than Liam, and he adjusted his glasses nervously as he waited for Liam to respond, but I was so glad he was there. My knight in shining armour. Archie.

"Fuck off!"

"No! Get off her!"

"No!"

And of course, I was just being shaken like a fucking ragdoll, until Liam shouted this next thing:

"We're together, so just leave us alone!"

"Liam, we are not together any more!" I shouted back, and this shocked him more than I thought, like he hadn't realised it yet, because he shoved me backwards, hard, away from him.

I fell so embarrassingly, right in front of everyone at college. I staggered back a few steps and then landed flat bang on my arse. I felt everything move around me. And I knew it would look like such a rubbish fall to everyone watching but believe me, it fucking hurt.

"Leave her alone!"

I looked up in time to see Liam grab Archie, and Archie do some cool twisty move to escape and trip him up and push him backwards. My mouth gaped as I saw Liam go down. Archie looked at him in horror, but it was alright, Liam didn't seem that injured, just embarrassed.

And then the people round us started cheering. Archie backed away from Liam, and looked round at the crowd, bewildered. Someone came to help me up.

"What the fuck was that, Arch?" Archie gave me a sheepish grin.

"I've started Judo lessons. In case I needed to defend myself. Only been going two weeks."

"Nice one, mate." I gave him a shaky thumbs up and he pulled me into a hug. I looked around. Liam was gone.

"He sounds like a total psycho!" Izzy said, scandalised, when she was hearing the whole story in the pub.

"Izzy!" hissed Archie, raising his eyebrows meaningfully at her and glacing at me in a not-very-subtle way, which made her look at me in horror.

"Oh, Rae! Oh my god, I'm so sorry! I didn't mean it like that,"

"It's fine, Izz. It's fine," I reassured, before an all-too-familiar figure came and sat down with us.

And yes, that sounds creepy and ominous on purpose. As if this day couldn't get any worse.

"Finn!"

Luckily Archie took over and Finn slapped him on the back, saying that he'd heard Archie had saved the day.

"Rae, can I speak with you, please?" Chloe was looking at me, pleading silently. Yes. Thank god. I practically dragged her away, not even bothering to answer.

It was only once I got outside that I realised I was letting myself in for another roasting.

"Was what everyone said true? Rae, oh my god! Why didn't you speak to me?"

"I just... couldn't. I didn't speak to anyone. The whole point was that we didn't have to speak about... all the bad stuff. He's like me, you know."

"Don't ever say that!" Chloe had tears in her eyes now, and I was struck dumb for a minute. "Rae! He could've really hurt you! That's not what you're like at all. You're way too good for that, I just..."

I pulled her into a hug and cradled her head.

There was something I wanted to say, and there was going to be no good time to say it.

"So are you."

She tensed against me.

"What?"

"No, hear me out, Chloe. You know how you feel about me and Liam? I feel like that about you and Ian. You're my best friend, you're so amazing, but he doesn't treat you like you deserve. If I know it, you must be able to see it too. He's bad news." She didn't answer, and I sighed, pulling away to look her in the face. I scanned for any sign on her face that she was actually taking in what I had to say. I couldn't find it. "I can't make you do anything, but just think about it, yeah?"

"Yeah," she said, and I had no idea if she actually meant yeah or if she was just putting me off. I felt myself getting frustrated with her so I switched to a more neutral topic. "So, Archie doing kung fu, yeah?"

"I know!" she laughed, clearly relieved to get onto something else. "The Superhero of Lincoln."

"Well, don't call him that, he sounds less cool already," I said, pulling a face, and she laughed before our moment was cut short.

"Hey there Rae... Chloe. If I'm interrupting anything I can go, but... can I speak to Rae?"

"Of course," Chloe piped up before I could even open my mouth. "We're done, she's all yours."

I was giving her 'no no no' eyes but she pretended she didn't notice, just squeezed my arm, winked and left me to him. I decided I'd take back everything I'd said. She was a HORRIBLE friend. Finn came and sat next to me on top of the picnic table.

I decided the best defence was to switch to trying to act normal.

"Thought you'd swanned off to live a swanky new life in Leeds?"

Oops. That came out worse than I intended. Finn winced. I didn't blame him.

"Yeah, well. It wasn't really working out. And I decided running away from my problems wasn't the best way to go about things."

"And running towards your problems is?"

He huffed a laugh.

"Oi, you're not problems. You're my mates." He nudged me with his arm in an affectionate way, trying to make me smile at him. It sort of worked. "I've missed the gang so much."

We didn't discuss Liam much. Finn's one of those people that doesn't push, and sometimes that's not a good thing, but in this case I was grateful. I was still embarrassed that I'd managed to get myself into that situation, and I was still worried sick about Liam. I couldn't hack talking bad about him – not yet. Not until I knew he was OK, at least.

We didn't mention him until there was a bit of a pause in the conversation.

"You alright though?" asked Finn.

I shrugged.

"Yeah. I'll live. Plus, Archie knows kung fu now. Nobody'll touch him now."

"Still, I felt bad I wasn't there for you. Or Archie. I should've been there."

"Archie told me you'd say that."

"Still though. Felt like you needed a friend."

And I couldn't help my reaction next. My face fell without me wanting it to. How could it not? Here was Finn sitting right next to me – I could even feel the heat coming off him – and he was telling me over and over again that he wanted to be friends. I hadn't let myself think at all about the thing I'd read that he'd said in Chloe's diary. It was too much. It couldn't be true. She'd written plenty of things that I was pretty sure – well, mostly sure – were not true. Why was I letting myself think such obviously stupid things?

"Hey, what's that face for, you?" He said, and then his big dark eyes widened as he saw my face wasn't joking, and I totally actually couldn't help what it was doing. And I couldn't help myself. He was just too close, too overwhelming. I could feel him, way too close.

I reached out and grabbed his hand. It fit in mine just like it always did.

And then panicked.

I think he was shocked too, because he didn't move or breathe for a few seconds – the longest few seconds I'd ever felt – but thank god he finally moved, one more second and I would've just ran, packed my bags and tried to leave the country for good.

He squeezed back. I looked up in shock, and caught my own feelings reflected back in his face.

"Rae, I..." he let out a shaky breath. "I've got to be honest with you. I still like you, but I get that you've just got out of a bad relationship and, and you don't even like me back, so... I'll be whatever you want me to be. If that's friends, then I'm sorry I've been so crap at that so far, but... I'll do my best."

I was crying. I hated when I did that, it was embarrassing and always everything 1000% more dramatic than it needed to be. Then again, in this case, maybe it was justified.

"Finn..." I gulped, trying to summon up some of my old courage. "What are you on about? Of course I like you back. I'm sorry I've messed you around. I'm fucked up. Like, even more fucked up than you realise. And I don't want this to become something and then one day you see how fucked up I am and you leave. I couldn't handle it."

"I want to see you." Finn pulled me into a hug, and I melted against him. "I do. All of you. Nobody's all great bits. But nobody could fake having bits as great as you."

"What are you implying?" I giggled wetly, still blubbering.

"Not like that, you dickhead. Just talk to me about what's going on this time, yeah? I, I don't want to do something wrong and scare you away again. We'll go as slow as you need, we don't have to start anything until you're alright with it too, yeah?"

"Don't go away again."

"I won't," he replied. "But not just for you. I've missed everyone. I'm going nowhere."

I clung onto him until my breathing evened out a bit, and then for a long longer afterwards. I reached my hand up and started to trace on his back.

T-H-A-N-K Y-O-U-.

Finn smiled and held me tighter.