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“Yeah, but sometimes people don’t like that. They find it annoying. Or they figure out things about me underneath that aren’t so fun, and then aren’t as interested in being my friend. Both of which should really apply to you. Honestly, I don’t know why they haven’t yet.”
“Probably because that all sounds daft. I mean, fuck’s sake. You’re a little bit annoying, sure. But not in a bad way annoying. More like in some other way annoying. A kind of funny way that’s entertaining. And as for the other thing—why the fuck don’t people appreciate someone like you trusting them enough to tell them their scary things? That sounds grand to me.” He paused then, considering. Or at least, she thought he was considering. But then he suddenly finished with this: “Plus, you know. When you tease me it doesn’t feel like shit. And that’s always something I appreciate.”
And after he had, she knew.
He hadn’t wanted to confess that. But he’d done it anyway.
So now she was going to confess something, too.
“Well, just so you know, I thought the same of you, not long ago.”
“What, that I’m soft and funny? Are you having a laugh? I’m like fucking concrete. Humorless concrete. Encased in a vibranium box, buried six feet down.”
“Alfie, the very fact that you just put it like that proves you’rehilarious. And anyway, that’s not what I was talking about. It was the other thing, the thing about not teasing someone in a way that feels like shit. You do it, but it doesn’t hurt.”
“Yeah, but that’s just because it would be terrible to. It would be terrible to crush someone as sweet as you. Like trampling a gentle talking mouse from a story about them triumphing over adversity,” he said, and all the way through he didn’t even look at her. He was busy fussing with his cuff link, like this wasn’t a cool thing he’d said. So it was only after a moment of silence that he seemed to realize his words had had an effect of some kind.
At which point he looked up.
And saw her astonished expression.
And got completely the wrong impression about it.
“Sorry. I didn’t mean to call you a gentle talking mouse,” he said.
Because he was a fool who didn’t understand a single thing about himself.
He didn’t know he was kind. That he was the sort of person who hated the thought of ever punching down. Or maybe even that this was a wonderful thing in him. It was all just there, casually, instinctively, while he went on, oblivious.
And she kind of didn’t want him to be.
She kind of wanted him to know.
“It’s all right. To be honest, I thought it was really lovely,” she tried, and though he chuffed and called her a bloody great weirdo in response, she knew she’d hit the mark. She could see the blush creeping over his face.
And just called it like she saw it.
“Trying to undercut being a softie with me now, are you,” she said.
And to his credit, he didn’t try to deny it.
“Yeah. Is it working, by any chance?”
“Not even remotely.”
“Fuck.”
More silence followed, then.
It was of the more comfortable type, however.
Like they’d joked themselves out of the various discomforting things that had come at them all at once and could now take a brief breather. A few moments of quiet tea drinking, and maybe a bit of amusement, followed by some measure of resignation when it came to their predicament.
Because as much she was still fully against leaning in, she could feel herself starting to debate it in her head. To think about things like what people would surmise if she didn’t. And not just the bad people, not just his stans, merrily insulting her all over social media. The people who were currently cheering her on.
She checked her mentions while they were in this lull in the conversation, and there were fifty times the amount that had been there before. And some of them seemed so young, so impressionable, so pleased that some plump lass from nowhere had made good in this way.Like a curvy Yorkshire Cinderella, one of them had written.
And it was meant in a slightly jokey manner.
