Despite her absence, despite the silence, despite the confusion, neither of Matty's parents did give her even somewhat of a concerned or confused look the moment she arrived home. Instead it was all just nods and smiles, accompanied by vague drifts of conversation, and days spent apart - with Matty going straight to Charlie's from work, and staying there for a few hours, but at least making a point of getting home before ten, of sleeping in her own bed.

As although neither of her parents had looked at her that way, Louis certainly had. And there was nothing she might ever do to avoid that.

The looks came in time, though. After a few quiet days, after perhaps a world of still nothingness, of a family that was essentially broken, in a way that was overwhelmingly her fault. She knew, after all, that Louis sat away in his room and worried about her, and her parents sat together and worried about the distant nature of consequently both of their children. Then with the matter of sitting and worrying with one another, they found themselves desperately searching for anywhere to pin the blame, even if that had to be each other.

Matty knew it all too well, and still, she did nothing. The house remained quiet, and still, with the TV on in the background, and perhaps the sound of plates being washed in the kitchen, met with only one pair of footsteps: hesitant and almost nervous to tread up the stairs.

But Matty didn't feel guilty like she thought she might. Her mind didn't trace around the situation until she physically shut down. It bothered her, but not to the extent that it meant something. She'd felt distant from her family for a long time before all of this, after all. And there was just something about these four walls that meant so little in the matter of home and comfort, especially when she compared them to a certain flat all the way across town.

Because Matty never spent very long at home anymore. She spent nights, in her room, with the lights off, with her head elsewhere, and the window open, smoking a cigarette as she perched on the windowsill, usually either listening to music or on the phone to Charlie. They spent breakfasts together, but they were rushed, and there was so much more on everyone's mind than each other, with work and school, and love and hate, and places and people to be, taking up everything else, as they might awkwardly bump into one another as they waited for the kettle to boil.

And then Matty would go out to work, to stand behind a counter and make every type of bullshit fancy coffee under the sun, and smile at customers: at sweet little old ladies, at tired middle aged men, at school girls that might giggle and blush as she took their order, and guys, guys like George. The sort of people she'd used to stand there and admire, but now meant so little at all. And Matty would go out for a smoke in her break, and try to think up a million reasons why she was doing okay. Because still, she hadn't even spoken to George, despite what she'd proclaimed to the rest of the world.

As after all, Gemma, and Amber, and Marika, were all so very confident in the good side of Matty: in the person that had kept her promise - that had met George with honesty that night, and found just something more than a guy at a club willing to fuck her. And of course, Matty would lie to them too: anything to keep up the illusion, and as time went on, George's texts grew less frequent, and Matty managed to pretend that was okay.

Then after work, she'd go straight to Charlie's, where he'd be waiting for her, and they'd sit around and kiss until their lips grew numb, and talk shit about everything and anything and maybe even each other too, and they'd smoke bitter cigarettes, and drink enough to make the world glow gold even in the most dismal of afternoons, and they'd lie there, so very close together: hot skin against cold, and as people, as skin and bones and thoughts and feelings - they'd share something. Something more than just the steady pitter patter of the rain against cold, frosted glass.

And Matty would go home. As she always did eventually. But Charlie wouldn't let her leave without a fight. Without long stares and regretful sighs, and something to ensure that she'd keep coming back. But of course, she always would, because even in the most quiet and uncomfortable of afternoons, this was home, and he was her's, even in the most simple and stupid of ways.

Matty didn't get back until half past ten that Thursday. It was later than she would have liked it to be, but it was so very cold outside, and she'd wanted to stay there in bed - warm and content forever. But she always had to come home in the end.

She'd texted Gemma briefly on the walk home, making sort of half plans for that weekend - to sit around and maintain smiles like everything was okay, and pretend that she had the kind of guts to talk to people like George, or maybe just even tell her best friends about her new boyfriend. As after all, she hadn't yet. She hadn't told a soul.

It wouldn't last forever: Matty knew that. The facade would come crashing down in time, and she could never escape it. But for the meanwhile, for the cold Thursday evening air: everything was quiet, everything was still, everything was peaceful, even if just for now.

By twenty to eleven, she made her way inside, and wandered slowly into the kitchen. She reckoned that she at least had enough time to settle herself down with a cup of tea before she really had to chase up some very persistent thoughts - the ones that she'd found running rampant around her head as of recent. However, as the world would have it, Matty was stopped just before she reached the kettle.

What had Matty so frozen in her tracks was not the simple presence of her mother, rummaging through the kitchen cupboards at the other end of the room, but the way her mother did finally turn and look her, and almost painfully stared her down.

For it had been a long time coming, but there she found it - that Thursday evening, that overdue, concerned and confused look. And the worst part of Matty was even excited to see it, raising her eyebrows across at her mum, before she marched over to the kettle, and setting it on to boil.

Yet before Matty even really knew what was happening, Denise had crossed the room in what seemed like one stride and turned the kettle off at the plug, even going so far as to yank the socket out of the wall, ridding the room of the steady humming of boiling water, and instead plunging them into a desperate silence, as she met Matty with a strikingly emphasised look to her eyes.

"Mum..." Matty didn't quite know what to think. She looked almost helplessly between the plug and her mother. "What's-"

"What's going on?" Denise finished for her, her voice perhaps harsher than she would have liked it to be. She cleared her voice and tried again. "Sorry. I-"

Matty shook her head, taking a step back from her mother, wishing more than anything that she could just simply remove herself from the situation: to hide away upstairs behind a locked door, and just deal with the consequences when they did eventually come to arise.

"Matty." Denise tried again, following Matty as she tried to retreat backwards out of the room. "We need to talk."

"What?" Matty came to a halt, pressing her back against the countertop as she met that same look in her mother's eyes again and again. "Why?" She continued. "What is it? What's wrong?"

Truthfully, she knew what was wrong. Perhaps everything was wrong. And her mum had more than a right to sit her down and demand that she talked to her about some of this mess going on out of her reach. But Matty just couldn't see why it had to be now, especially with everything else going on in her head, and just what had finally brought her mum to this conclusion.

It was then, however, that Matty glimpsed her reflection: faint and distorted in the aluminium body of the kettle, but still, even from across the room, Matty could make out the stark red colour of her lipstick.

And it was then, at quarter to eleven, that her heart dropped right through her chest. She'd left Charlie's in such a hurry, with such a mess, that she'd left with her makeup on, and her hair tied back prettily, and Gemma's heels put neatly by the front door. If only at the very least, she stood there, before her mother, with jeans on, and not that horrifically tight, obscenely short leather skirt that Gemma had also insisted that she'd taken from her.

"Oh..." Matty trailed off, holding her gaze to her reflection for just a moment more. Denise followed her gaze, and the came to the same understanding, and just for a moment, she stepped away from Matty, and looked up at her with sympathy, over anything else.

"We need to talk." Still, she couldn't help but repeat. This time, however, Matty gave way to a nod, deciding that she had to be right.

"Can I make that cup of tea though, first?" She asked, almost tentatively, as if she truly managed to fear whatever response she'd receive.

Denise hesitated momentarily, but in the end, nodded.

It was almost eleven by the time that they were sat down in the living room, with the table light producing a warm, almost comforting glow around them, as they positioned themselves on opposite ends of the sofa, with two mugs of tea sat on coasters at opposite ends of the coffee table.

Matty thought about wiping the lipstick off, about wiping the full face of makeup away too, at pulling her hair down, at feigning some pretence, or forming some lie, but she thought about a lot of things, about George, and what she should have said to him, and about Gemma, and all the promises and lies between them, and about her brother, sat upstairs with too much on his mind, and about her father, and wherever he might have been.

Yet in the end, all of those things remained as they were: just thoughts, nothing more, and nothing less. And Matty turned to her mum, and waited for her to find the right words to fill the almost damned silence that had filled out between them.

"What is it?" Denise met her with a desperate kind of sigh. "What's going on, Matty - please? You're hardly here, you hardly to speak to anyone anymore, you've not got the time, almost, but I can't imagine just what you're doing with all that time. And I thought maybe you were just with friends, or with a girl, or something, and you'd talk about that if you needed to, but..."

Denise drew out a sigh. "I don't mean this to come across the wrong way, love, but where could you possibly be and what could you possibly doing that leaves you coming home at eleven at night, with bright red lipstick on your face."

Matty snorted; she couldn't help herself.

"I'm not saying- that... I'm not-" Denise fell into another sigh. "I've not based the fact that I'm worried about you off the fact that you've come home wearing lipstick, because that's... that's really not it, it's just... I'm worried about you, and you've come home wearing lipstick, and it's all got a bit much. And I kind of feel like I don't know what I'm doing anymore with you, because you're an adult now, and I think about that, so I don't bother you as much as I want to, but I do worry, so very much, and it's just all got a bit much."

Matty met her with a smile: oddly touched by it all. Still, she couldn't think for the life of her as to just what she was possibly supposed to say. "So it's not that you don't like the lipstick?" Matty raised her eyebrows, watching her mother's reaction with nothing but amusement.

She raised her eyebrows right back at Matty. "The lipstick's nice. It's a bit... shocking, maybe. But I think it's very you. Suits you, as well. It's just... very... there."

Matty snorted, attempting to keep their conversation as lighthearted as she could manage. "Opposite of me then. I'm hardly there, I'm hardly here, I'm..."

"Where are you then?" Denise struggled to fill the silence, watching Matty with, again, that concerned look in her eyes.

Matty let out a sigh, stretching herself out against the sofa. "I'm safe." That was all she could give her mum in the end.

Denise watched her carefully. "You don't want to tell me." It wasn't hard to infer.

Matty shook her head.

"I'm worried that it's affecting you. That it's affecting all of us. You need to spend more time with us, Matty. I don't even know if I have the right to say that, seeing as you're an adult now, but I'm your mum, and I'm worried about you."

Matty gave way to a rather reluctant nod.

"Yeah." She added, not meeting her mother's eyes. "I'm safe. I'm with... friends... I just... I didn't mean it to happen, but you get caught up in just staying nights and having fun, and I guess I am eighteen now, and I... I'm safe, I promise."

"Okay." It took all she had to say it, but Denise did in the end. "That's okay. You need your independence and your space. I just... would really appreciate it if you talked to me about it. Not about everything, not like reporting to me, but just mention things, casually, if they come up. Not like you're hiding everything away."

"I'm sorry." Matty let out a sigh.

Denise watched her for a moment. "And don't think I'm fussed about the lipstick, alright? It's just lipstick. I don't want you to feel like you can't wear it at home, or have to hide it or something. It's just lipstick."

Matty smiled and nodded, and wished so very desperately that really was just lipstick.

-

Matty wasted away the sunlight, under an artificial warmth, spending perhaps far too much of her Saturday morning in the shower, finding an odd sense of comfort and safety under the hot jets of hot water spilling out across her body.

She found herself in there for over forty minutes - back towards the shower wall as she watched little droplets of water trace her form down from her chest, over her legs, and down to her feet. She let the water pool around her, and her skin grow red and raw - she let herself fade away, so very desperate for her senses just to fade out too.

But she found the same solution in the end. It took her thirty absent minutes, trying so desperately to keep her heart and mind in check, before, eventually, she gave in. She didn't want to think about her dick, let alone touch it, but it was there, and it craved just as much attention as she did.

And in that moment, as she stood there under the water, nothing seemed to matter very much at all anymore, just the very moment she curled her fingers in tightly around her cock.

Then soon enough, she was grasping the wall desperately to keep herself upright, as she struggled to subdue little moans and gasps that were just so very eager to escape her lips. She bit down on her lip until it bled, all in aid of keeping her mouth closed, and she stood there, thighs shaking furiously, as she found release in the worst place of all.

It took Matty the remaining ten minutes just to stand there and think, to remain, motionless, and broken somehow, or at least in pieces: hastily taped together, but just moments away from falling apart. She felt sick. And that felt pathetic to say, because this was nothing, but it wasn't at all. This was just her stupid head, and those stupid thoughts of George that she couldn't quite get off her mind.

It was George's hand wrapped around her cock instead of her own, instead of Charlie's even. It was the rather odd realisation that George was someone she'd trust with anything - someone she'd maybe even beg to put his fingers around her cock, to touch her everywhere, to say anything, to do anything to her. Not only would she let him, she'd dedicate her life to begging for it.

Then for the first time, as she got out of the shower that Saturday morning, she saw that everything with Charlie was just nowhere near as perfect as she would have liked it to seem.

She then set to drying herself: rubbing her skin raw, as she stood absently contemplating the world, letting the morning burn away around her as something inside of her did too.

-

Matty barely had time to settle back down in her room again by the time there came a knocking at her door. After what she could easily dub the most traumatic wank of her life, she'd really needed some peaceful alone time - a space to think - to sit around and maybe consider calling up Gemma, and consider finally relaying the full details of the situation to her.

"Can I come in?" Louis' voice was soon audible from out in the hallway, cutting into her thoughts with what Matty might have even misplaced as spite.

"Yeah." She let out a sigh, falling back onto her bed and staring up at the ceiling as Louis made his way inside, glancing across at Matty with that same gut wrenching kind of concern in his eyes.

Matty hated this. She hated seeing her brother like this. She hated knowing that she was doing it to him.

"Are you not going to go down and get breakfast?" Louis watched her for a moment, waiting to see if she'd move, before eventually giving up and sitting down on Matty's bed beside her.

Matty shook her head. "Not hungry."

They both knew that wasn't true. Louis could tell that Matty just really wasn't in the mood for talking to people that day. He thought about inquiring as to why, but instead just lay down beside Matty, and in time, followed her gaze right up to the ceiling.

Matty was a little surprised to find that Louis had accepted her response as it was - like he'd even believed her lie. She knew, of course, that he hadn't, but still, the fact that he thought better than to persist really began to twist and pull at her insides. She wondered if this was him giving up - she wondered if this was the last person finally giving up on her, and then she couldn't help the panic that flooded her body in response.

Matty sat up with a start: taking them both by surprise. Her eyes grew wide like circles as she met her reflection in the mirror across the room; she looked a state, with curls flying out and sticking up in all manner of angles, and her skin still too pink from the forty minutes or so she'd spent in the shower.

"Matty?" Louis sat up slowly, watching her carefully, and doing all he could to keep himself as calm as possible. It was evident that there was something else now: something had just gone off inside of Matty's head, and he just had to accept that he wouldn't for the life of him, really be able to figure what it was, but despite that, he knew he had to help her the very best he could.

She swallowed hard, sucking her bottom lip into her mouth and then out again, leaving it red, swollen, and bloated. "I'm sorry." Matty's apology was quick, and arguably, insincere.

"About what?" Louis let himself wonder, even if just for a brief moment, whether this was it, whether this was finally the explanation of everything he'd been missing.

"About being shit." Matty choked out, her words rather blunt, and so very tired of everything. "I'm scared. It's all bullshit, Louis. It's all fucking bullshit." She stopped herself rather suddenly, looking across at her younger brother, with eyes blown even wider. "I'm sorry." She apologised quickly, shaking her head.

"It's okay." Louis assured her, placing what he hoped might have been a comforting hand on her shoulder. "Come on, you really... you can swear in front of me, come on, do you really think I've never heard the word 'fuck' before?" Louis even managed a laugh.

Matty raised her eyebrows, glancing across at her brother with a questioning look. "Mum will kill me."

"She's not going to find out about this, come on-"

"Not about that." Matty cut him off, finishing for him. She shook her head, and pulled her gaze back down to the ground. "Mum will kill me." She repeated, as if trying to convince herself of it in some regard.

"What for then?" Louis couldn't help but ask: not even fully sure if he was supposed to.

"She'll say she won't, but she will." Matty shared an almost self-deprecating laugh with herself. "Fucking hell, Louis." She choked out, perhaps just because she felt she could.

"What is it?" Louis continued to ask, growing braver by the second.

Matty shook her head, continuing to laugh through the unsettled, almost deathly feeling spreading up throughout her body from her stomach.

"Fuck." She let out a sigh, leaning back once more and throwing herself down onto the bed. This time, however, Louis watched her from where he was sat, carefully studying the look in her eyes. Instead of pushing her further, he let the room fall back into silence, giving her ample opportunity in which to speak.

It was just as Louis began to think that he'd made entirely the wrong decision, and that another word may never slip out of Matty's lips, that she did finally begin to speak.

"I've... I've got this... I've got this boyfriend, Lou."

Matty almost expected her stomach to drop right through her body and to the floor the very moment the words did finally slip her lips. She expected the whole world to turn on its head, maybe even the room to set on fire if she was feeling particularly dramatic, but instead, she found nothing at all.

The room was still, silent, and her heart remained firm: beating inside of her chest.

Louis finally figured that Matty was awaiting some sort of response from him before elaborating further, and cleared his throat before adding perhaps the only thing he could think of. "Oh. What's his name?"

Matty sat up instantly at that, staring across at Louis like he was mad. Completely utterly fucking mad.

"What's his name?" She repeated, staring down at her brother like the question was the most preposterous thing she'd heard in her life.

"Yeah..." Louis trailed off, unable to determine just what it was that he'd managed to set off in Matty. "What's his name?" He repeated, quieter this time around.

"Not... 'oh you're gay?' or whatever?" Matty finally managed to find it within herself to speak, her tone coming across as almost even a little bit agitated. "Not... 'I can't believe it', or 'seriously?', or 'no, you must be joking, you've had girlfriends'. No fucking... 'so you're gay now?'... no... fucking... just... 'what's his name?'. That's all you can say?" Her eyes grew wide. "All you can say?"

Louis studied her face for a good moment. "I kind of guessed that you might be." He admitted, wondering if it was impolite not to be surprised. "I mean... the whole 'trust me I'm never going to get someone pregnant', and then once you almost said 'he' instead of 'she', and I didn't say anything, but I noticed."

Matty stared across at her little brother: completely astounded. "I'm not even gay." She choked out, feeling rather like she needed to.

"Okay." Louis smiled back at her. "Just because you have a boyfriend doesn't mean that you're gay, I mean, there are other sexualities, aren't there?"

"Yeah..." Matty gave a nod, and let herself pretend that Louis was right, and that was it.

"So what's his name?" Louis continued after a moment. Matty once again, looked across at him like he was mad. "No, seriously. What's his name? I want to know." He assured her.

"Charlie." Matty finally gave into a response. "His name's Charlie."

She stopped for a moment, but the very second she saw Louis' mouth moving into place to form a response, she knew that was something she couldn't handle, at least not yet, and found the first thing on her mind to fill the silence with instead.

"That's where I am." Matty continued: a grave kind of desperation evident in her tone. "When I'm gone... most of the time. I spend a lot of time at his. I'm sorry. I feel bad. I feel bad about everything. I didn't want to say, but I didn't want to keep it a secret. It would be different if he was a girl. I hate that."

"It doesn't matter." Louis told him. "Doesn't matter if you're with a boyfriend or a girlfriend. You're still gone, and we're still worried, and we don't care whether it's a boyfriend or a girlfriend you're with, just that you're safe."

"We?" Matty raised her eyebrows.

"Me, mum, and dad." Louis supplied, like this was all so much more simple than it really was.

Matty shook her head. "I can't tell them." She admitted. "Not in a million years. God, Louis, you know... I'm really... I'm terrible. I can't talk about things at all, especially not things like this, especially not coming out."

"You came out to me just fine." He assured her.

"But I had to." Matty did a better job of convincing herself.

"You didn't have to." Louis spoke rather plainly, slowing his tone a little.

"No. I was going to lose you otherwise. I could see that. And I'm twice as scared of losing you than I could ever possibly be scared of what you could say." Matty cleared her throat. "I had to. But I'm glad that I did. It didn't feel like I thought it would."

"What did you think it would feel like?" He couldn't stop himself from asking.

"Like the whole world was ending, really." Matty gave way to a laugh, playing with her hair. "But it felt like nothing. A good kind of nothing. Because it does matter, and it does change things. It just... it's okay. Isn't it?"

"Yeah." Louis told her, offering up a smile that seemed to mean the whole world. "It's okay. More than okay. It's brilliant."

"Shut up." Matty rolled her eyes. "It's not brilliant, it just is."

"No." Louis shook his head. "He makes you happy, doesn't he?" Matty felt almost obliged to nod. "Then that's... that's brilliant. Because that's what I want really, to make sure that you're happy."

And Matty sat there for a good while, unsure of just quite what to think, because she thought that Louis was right, and that she was, but she knew deeply, on a much more complex level, things just weren't quite as they seemed.

She sat there for a good while, and thought about every little fight, and every stupid moment, and the whirlwind nature of it all, of what Gemma just finally might say when she gathered the courage to tell her, and just what it had meant to find her hand curled tightly around her dick, wishing desperately that it could be George's.

-

Matty had come to a sort of conclusion. Well, really, she'd only vaguely managed to draw up plans in her mind, and the actual conclusion of the matter was something she only really reached as stood right on Gemma's doorstep.

She wondered if this was where she might always find herself in the end. She wondered if Gemma would grow tired. Tired of making her cups of tea, of shelling out bottles of wine, of sitting her down and listening, listening to the worst kind of silence, or to the worst kind of noise. Tired of letting her stay the night, tired of the spare room, and the way it was never quite clean, and how Matty kept a spare set of clothes in the drawers.

Matty wondered if Gemma was tired of her in general. If she'd quite reached that point yet.

It took Matty all of three minutes to bring herself to finally knock at Gemma's front door, finding however, that as she tapped on it, the door fell open into the hallway. Matty stared at the small slither of light leading into Gemma's home, and just wondered for while. She wondered why her front door had been left unlocked, and why the house seemed so on edge - even with a forced kind of stillness and silence.

She didn't have to wonder for very long.

The silence split right in two with a great force, with a sudden shouting from further inside, with two familiar voices that Matty couldn't quite properly place from the distance.

Matty knew that this was a clear sign that she shouldn't go inside; that now wasn't a good time. But she did so regardless, perhaps unable to control her feet as they stepped over the threshold and pulled her inside. But that was a lie. She was well in her own control - she was just desperate: pathetically needy, and so very alone.

Matty didn't quite come to regret her actions until her carefully placed quiet footsteps drew her to the living room doorway. She stopped herself just out of view, her eyes growing wide as she settled her gaze upon the scene before her.

"I'm worried about him. I'm fucking- you couldn't just... you couldn't just mention like... oh yeah, by the way, he doesn't fucking hate your guts? How hard is that, Gemma? How hard? How hard is it to send one text, four fucking words - Matty doesn't hate you. How fucking hard would that have been?"

Matty's inside tensed up, feeling an awful lot like she just couldn't breathe; she'd never seen George like that before - quite so angry. She'd never even really considered that George could get into such a state, but here he was, and it was all over him.

Gemma shook her head across at him. "Not my business to say, though, is it? And how would I know if anything had gone on between you two? Come on, surely you fucking know Matty enough to know that... sh- Matty doesn't talk about well basically anything, about problems, or life, or fucking arguments. Matty doesn't open up, you know that? Matty doesn't just come over and sit down and offer up an entire life story. Matty doesn't even come over when s- they really need to. In a state, or whatever. Matty sits at home and cries and doesn't talk to anyone. I'm not the person who could be able to tell you the great details of how Matty feels about you? No one can."

Matty's stomach began to fall away inside her chest. Really, she did appreciate the lengths Gemma had gone to as to not misgender her, all without outing her to George. But coupled with the subject matter, put together with all Matty could never do for her. Matty knew that she wasn't the kind of friend anyone deserved.

Matty moved her gaze across to George, to the way the morning sun caught his face - to the way his eyes seemed to shimmer in the light. Yet that was all so superficial, it meant nothing at all, because George was beautiful, more than he could ever be inside of Matty's head. But still, Matty hadn't spoken to him in weeks, and that felt so deathly permanent as she faced it like this.

"You should have-" George choked up, shaking his head and turning away from Gemma. "Fuck. I don't know what you should have done. I'm just... I really thought I fucked up somehow, you know? I couldn't stop thinking about that. Couldn't stop thinking about him. What I'd done. Maybe it had been too much when he'd stayed at mine, and I'd let him fall asleep on me. Maybe he didn't want that, maybe he felt like I pushing things, maybe he thought like I was taking advantage of him. And I fucking... those thoughts aren't leaving me alone, Gemma. I'm sorry. I'm just. I'm going a bit mad. Amber told me not to tell you, but she wanted me to talk to you. I think maybe Amber just wanted me to shut up about him. I think I want me to shut up about him. I want it all to stop. I want it all to go away. But I want him to come back. I miss him. That's fucked, isn't it? He obviously doesn't miss me. Obviously doesn't give a fuck about me. But I miss him. So much. It's stupid. I'm stupid."

And as the house fell back into silence, Matty felt her insides turn to mush, because here it was - a very real reminder of horrible kind of person she could be. This was what she did to people, this was the mess inside her head hurting other people too, this was how she would eventually break and ruin everything she'd ever loved. Everyone she'd ever loved.

George was wrong when he'd thought he might break her. Matty could do it in an entirely different way: without even realising, and with twice the pain.

"George..." Gemma finally began to speak: her voice perhaps overly tentative, and so very lost. Matty watched Gemma carefully, recognising the distraught kind of look mixed up in her eyes, and hated to know that she'd put it there.

"Yeah." George let out a sigh, stretching up to cover his face, and the fact that he was wiping tears from it. The gesture might have fooled Gemma but it hid nothing from Matty.

"I tried." Gemma's voice was almost pleading, looking up at George with hopeful eyes, like that alone might somehow make this right. "I didn't know. I didn't know what was going on. And when Amber told me... I tried. I really did. I thought Matty had spoken to you last weekend. Was going to at least. That's what Matty told me."

"Speak to me?" George raised his eyebrows. "You say that like it's something. Like he's got something to tell me. More than, 'oh yeah, I don't hate you'."

Gemma hesitated a moment before she gave a nod. "Matty has." She bit her lip, letting go of the part of herself that had sworn not to mention a word of it to George. "It's... important. Like... it's not that... Matty... Matty's scared. Of what you'll say. Or maybe just of the act of telling you. I don't know exactly which."

"Should he be?" George continued to ask. And Matty remained silent, feeling her insides crumbling to dust - perhaps not even so much as George's persistent use of the word 'he', but just in relation to the situation as a whole, to the way George was clearly breaking before her. To the wiped away tears still evident on his face. That was what really snapped Matty in two.

"No. I don't think so." Gemma let out a sigh. "But, Matty thinks so."

"Will he ever tell me?" George pulled his gaze down to the floor. "Will he ever even talk to me again, for fuck's sake...?"

Gemma wished she could have promised George the world, but she couldn't promise him even a single thing in it. "I don't know." She muttered, pulling her gaze away from George's, and in the process of doing so, turned to the doorway, and to the shadow of Matty stood, so very wide eyed, behind it.

Matty's skin grew cold, doing her best to retreat away into the shadows, but as she attempted to do so, she found that the world really did just truly despise her, as she seemed to trip over nothing, stumbling and steadying herself against the living room door. It was as she did so, however, that the door moved under her weight, creaking open and almost shoving her right into the doorway: leaving her almost painfully visible.

Matty didn't quite know what to say at all.

Neither did George.

And really, neither did Gemma. But she was the one that did the talking in the end, seeing as she was soon to realise that she was the person in the room who was definitely the least likely to start crying within the next minute.

"Matty..." Her voice was almost painfully soft, taking in Matty's appearance - relatively nondescript, of course, aside from the bright red lipstick, which was something Matty had really taken a liking to. The lipstick left a stark, almost painful contrast, seeming to demand its own space and its own silence amidst the room, amidst the lost looks, amidst the mess they'd made, all three of them.

"Yeah..." Matty trailed off, drawing a heavy sigh. "You left your door open. Funny that." She couldn't help the way her tone seemed to grow increasingly bitter. "Funny that. Isn't it? Because I came over to talk. You know, to sit down and offer up my life story. What's going on in my life, and all that. Because I'm not stupid, and I know I need to tell you, I need your advice. What I don't need, is you fucking talking shit about me, fucking slagging me off, and that look in your eyes like you're going to tell him everything."

George didn't quite know how he was supposed to feel in relation to being referred to as 'him'. Really, he was just perhaps overly grateful to be referred to by Matty at all.

"I'm not slagging you off, I'm telling the truth. We're worried about you. And I think maybe George should know." Gemma grew a little braver, approaching Matty with a stern look held in her eyes.

"Sound just like my fucking mum, you do." Matty rolled her eyes, giving way to a little snort.

"What? Are you surprised? That she's worried about you as well? That everyone's worried about you? Because you're making a real fucking mess out of your life, out of yourself, here. It's fucking hard not to." Gemma wondered perhaps if she'd been a little too harsh, but it was the point where she reckoned Matty just might have to take it.

"She's not worried. Not really." Matty rolled her eyes, shaking her a little. "She just has to care. She doesn't care about where I am, not really. She doesn't want me around. Not really. She just... she had to. She's worried about the lipstick and what that means, and if I end up getting myself killed or not. Because that, that'll make her look bad."

Gemma watched Matty in what was almost disgust. "Oh fuck off, Matty. You know that isn't true. I know your mum. I've known her for years, and she's lovely. And of course she cares about you, she cares about you so much. You're the one that's stopping her. You're not letting her in."

"So it's my fault?" Matty glanced across at her, seeming to regard her as little more than abhorrent.

"Well..." Gemma trailed off. "Yeah." She went for in the end. "It kind of is."

"Gemma-" It was then that George finally interjected, seeing that something had definitely gone too far. However, Matty even barely let him begin.

"You can fuck off. The both of you. Like fuck can you possibly understand or think you fucking know, what the fuck's going on in my fucking head, just fuck off. Like forever, alright?"

And Matty barely even gave herself a moment to think about just what she'd done before she'd stormed out, tears flooding down her cheeks as she made a desperate stumble out into the street.

She thought then that she was safe - free from complications and consequences, to run and hide away from the rest of her life. It had barely even taken Matty ten seconds to come to a firm conclusion that Charlie's place was where she was ultimately headed, but it seemed as if those had been ten seconds too many, as she'd slowed, taking a moment for herself and her head, the calm and the quiet was sliced right in two with the hammering of footsteps against the pavement.

"Matty!" She didn't even have to turn and look to know it was George.

Despite the fact that all she wanted to do was run and hide, to avoid everything, to avoid him, in particular, her feet seemed rooted to the pavement. And for a brief moment, Matty remained still, silent, and perhaps even waiting, for George to catch up to her.

"Don't go. Please." George flat out begged her, standing between Matty and the other end of the street.

Matty swallowed hard, sinking her teeth deep into her bottom lip. "Alright..." She muttered in the end, pulling her gaze down and away from George's.

George let out a rather exasperated sigh, and Matty took a moment to wonder whether he'd been expecting that kind of reaction at all.

"I fucked things up again." Matty let out a sigh, daring to meet George's eyes for just a moment. Still, he looked down at her with all the love in the world, but never the love that Matty needed.

"No you didn't." George assured her, sounding even somewhat certain of it.

"No. I did." Matty raised her voice a little way: so very desperate to prove her point. "Gemma fucking hates me, again. So, Amber and Marika are going to be pissed at me. My parents fucking hate me. I'm fucking things up at home, everything's fucked, because I'm never there and everyone's worried, but I'll never talk about anything, because I'm fucked in the head, I am. And then I fucked things up with you, because I'm stupid and pathetic, and couldn't bare to fucking face you, and I shouldn't even dare to fucking face you anymore. I don't deserve it. I don't deserve you. I don't deserve you still looking at me like I'm important, like I'm special, like I matter. I'm a fuck up, George. A real, fucking, fuck up."

George didn't quite know what he was doing as he pulled Matty tightly into his chest, in the middle of the street, in the middle of the day, but without a care in the world.

And they remained like that for a good few minutes, as Matty slowly began to weep against George's chest, and didn't quite possess the courage to have him look at her like that.

"You're not." George whispered down to her, meaning every word.

"It's my fault." Matty reiterated Gemma's words, unable to stop the way they haunted her head.

"It's not. Gemma was out of line." George shook his head. "It's not. I promise you."

"Stop pretending, George." Matty finally pulled away, meeting George's gaze with a horrible kind of lost look set deep into her eyes. "Let yourself hate me. It's fine. I'm fine."

"I don't-" George protested: pulling all he had into proving this one point.

But Matty didn't even give him the time.

"You do." She whispered. "And if you don't you should."

Matty's words cut deep, and somehow, George let her walk away this time.

-

"You look lost, love."

George drew his eyes wide and blinked, focusing his gaze up away from the floor, and perhaps towards the midday sun streaming in through the kitchen window.

He gave a nod in response, holding an empty mug of tea loosely in his hand.

"Put that down before you drop it." His mother's tone grew condensing, looking at George as if he was eight not eighteen, and not just twice her size.

Slowly, George placed the mug down on the countertop beside him; there was something eternally sombre about his every move, like he just wasn't quite in connection with himself anymore. There was little way around the fact that it made her feel sick to stomach - watching her son like that, but as time dragged on, it just looked more and more like there was nothing she could do.

"Tell me what's up, please." She tried for what was easily the tenth time since George had made it back home. He'd left in a hurry that morning, with an almost furious kind of determination set deep into his eyes, but over the course of the morning, as he'd returned, that had fizzled out to a distant kind of sadness, as if he lived inside a world painted only in shades of grey.

George bit his lip, his gaze hugging his form back down to his feet. He gave a shrug, and wished he could just fade away into the floor.

"Do you want something, then?" George's mum continued in her desperate plight to extract any kind of response from her son. "Another cup of tea? A biscuit? I could make you something to eat."

Really, what George wanted was a spliff, but that wasn't the kind of thing he was going to so nonchalantly announce to his mother on a Saturday morning. Instead, George shook his head.

"George..." She trailed off, just watching him for a moment, perhaps all the concern in the world gathering in her gaze just to shower him with. Still, George didn't even do as much as turn his head. "You never get like this. What's wrong? I'm worried about you."

That was what did it.

"Matty." George let the name slip his lips with ease, pulling his gaze back up to finally meet his mother's. "Do you remember Matty?"

"The one with the curly hair? That you brought over once?" She raised her eyebrows in response.

"Yeah." George gave a nod.

"Course I remember him." She even went as far as to crack a smile. "Who wouldn't?"

George forced his most weak and pathetic smile. "I think he hates me. Or at least wants me to hate him. So maybe then he doesn't feel so bad about hating me. And I don't know what I've done. And he's in a right state, honestly. I think he hates me for worrying about him, but it's hard not to, because he won't talk to anyone, he's like... so distant, he's just drifting from person to person and place to place like it doesn't mean anything. And I wonder if it even does mean anything to him anymore. All his friends and family are worried about him too and he's just pushing everyone away. I don't want to watch him do that to himself, but he won't let me help him."

"Some people just aren't going to let you help them until it's far too late." She added, trying her best to twist her head around the whole Matty situation.

"And..." George continued, reliving their earlier conversation back through his head. "Gemma, his best friend. She told me that he's got something to tell me, but he won't, like it's the thing he's scared of most in the world - telling me. I think maybe that's what's... making him distance himself from me... this thing. And I don't think he's ever going to tell me. I don't even know if he's ever going to talk to me again."

"If that's what's causing all of this, and you know he's never going to tell you then..." She stopped herself for just a moment, holding George's gaze in silence for a brief while, as she found herself hesitant, and oddly nervous to continue. "You have to find out for yourself. And you then have to... you have to let him know that it's okay, and that it shouldn't make him push himself away from you."

"How am I supposed to do that?" George let out a pathetically desperate kind of sigh - one that seemed to fade out into a misplaced kind of breathy laugh at some point. "

"I don't know, George." She let out a sigh. "I don't know him, I don't know what it could be."

George just stood there and thought for a moment. "Could be anything. But I guess it has to relate to me... doesn't it? I mean, or at least... our friendship, or whatever, if it even is a friendship, anymore... our 'relationship'... acquaintanceship, whatever."

George's mum fell almost painfully silent for a moment.

"What?" He couldn't help but fixate on the sudden pressing look in her eyes.

She bit her lip. "George... I... I don't know him, I don't know you, but... from what I've seen... from what I've heard about him from you. You two are very... attached, aren't you?"

"Attached?" George raised his eyebrows - perhaps they had been, but that definitely didn't seem to ring true anymore.

"I don't mean to presumptuous, or anything, but... have you ever considered that he might... like you?"

George's heart stopped dead inside of his chest.

"Course he doesn't." He brushed it off: overcompensating, with exasperated, breathy laughter. "That's just stupid. Why would he like me?"

"Why wouldn't he?" She offered in response.

George rolled his eyes. "He doesn't. Alright. He's so... obnoxiously, loud, so over-confident, so blunt, brutally honest. He'd tell me. I'd know. If Matty liked me, he would have tried to kiss me by now."

"You know, George..." She continued, growing close to the point where she perhaps wondered if she should stop, but she couldn't quite help herself. "With people like that, the whole confidence thing is usually just an act. And when something's important and it matters, they'll want to hide it away forever. I think he has feelings for you. I really do."

-

"Fuck, I'm close."

Matty let herself fall in love with the ache of her knees, as she pressed her whole body weight into the floor: sheltered with one strong hand over her head, and back pressed against the living room wall, the other entangled tightly in her hair, roughly tilting her head upwards, keeping her eyes blown just as wide as her lips.

But she liked it like that.

With no feeling besides the ache in her knees and the butterflies in her stomach, coupled with the stretching of her lips as they curled tightly around his cock. And she gave in to the pressure, and let Charlie fuck her mouth, and let him smile down at her like she was the beautiful thing in the world.

Because it was a hazy Saturday afternoon, and she needed that.

"You want it in your mouth?" Charlie's voice crumbled in the moment, in the heat, in the pressure, in the connection of their bodies, but despite that, in the way, Matty felt so distant, drifting, almost worlds away.

But she needed it like that.

Matty mumbled vaguely around his cock, and really it could have been either a yes or a no - neither of them were particularly sure. But Charlie had let go before either of them could stop to think about it anyway.

Matty's body grew limp and fragile around him, shuddering slightly, as he pulled away, leaving Matty there to stumble without support. As Charlie struggled with his zipper, Matty did her best to swallow all she could, fighting down the feeling of nausea from somewhere deeper inside her than her stomach, and let her body slump down against the wall.

"You want me to help you out?" Charlie turned back to Matty, watching her carefully as she stretched her head back against the wall.

She shook her head, pulling her gaze down to the floor; she felt too sick to be hard anymore.

"Sure?" Charlie met her with an odd glance.

Matty gave him little more than a short nod.

"I'll get you some water." Charlie turned towards the kitchen, and Matty let him go without even a glance.

It didn't feel right anymore.

Matty wasn't quite so sure as to whether she was physically sick or just emotionally.

She'd fallen for the ache of her knees, for the living room floor, for the fingerprints left on her hips, and not the hand that had put them there. She'd fallen for the consequence and not the situation, for the place to stay and the warm look in his eyes, but really, it could have been anyone, this could have been anything.

But deep inside of her heart, there was the one thing she yearned for it to be. The one person she yearned to see smile at her like that again. But Matty had fucked that up too.

Matty didn't even properly process Charlie's return, just the glass of water placed beside her on the floor. She stared at it for a moment, before downing the glass in one go.

"You alright?" Charlie asked her, leaning down in front of her, just where she couldn't avoid him.

Matty shook her head, letting out a horribly pathetic kind of sob as she threw her head back against the wall. The last thing she wanted to do was cry in front of Charlie, to get emotional, and ruin this too.

"Shit, sweetheart, don't cry." Charlie reached forward to stroke her hair.

Matty slapped his hand away. "Don't call me sweetheart." The words had left her lips before she even knew what they could mean.

"Matty..." Charlie trailed off, getting to his feet, and doing his best to give her some space. "I'm sorry?"

"You've not done anything." Matty insisted, pulling her legs back up to her chest and curling in around herself.

"Then why are you taking it out on me?" Charlie's voice grew sterner, almost petulant. "That's not... fair, is it?"

"I can't help it." Matty choked out, reaching for Charlie as she stumbled to her feet. He held her there for a while - close to his chest, but never quite against it.

"Try." He told her, settling his gaze out on the horizon: the greying afternoon sky through the open window.

"I can't." Matty stressed, beginning to shake all over. She wanted Charlie's hands off of her, she wanted to leave. She didn't want this. She didn't want him anymore. She didn't want that look in his eyes like he knew her whole world. Because he barely even knew a fraction of it.

"You can." Charlie even laughed it off, smiling down at Matty as if the matter was even comical.

"Fuck-..." Matty choked on her words, pulling away from him and stumbling as she did so. "I'm... just... just leave it. I'm going." She found herself reaching the conclusion before she could quite finish.

"Where are you going to go?" Charlie looked at her like the idea was utterly preposterous. "You've still got cum on your face, love. Let me clean you up."

"Don't." Matty raised her voice almost in panic, crossing the room as quickly as she could. "I'm going." She repeated, sterner this time, wiping her face into her sleeve. She knew it was gross, and she already felt sick, but more than anything she just needed to leave.

"Okay." Charlie's voice was perhaps even overly calm, like a part of him didn't quite believe that she would.

And for the first time, Charlie let her go, watching her walk out into the hallway, and catching her out of the window, making sure she made it onto the street alright. Because he did care - if there was one thing that he could prove, it was that.

-

If Matty was being entirely honest with herself, she didn't quite know where she was going at all.

She guessed by that conclusion, that perhaps it hardly mattered just where she went at all. She just needed somewhere - she just needed someone. She didn't even ask for anyone to listen; she may not even say a word. Matty just needed somewhere to sit down, and someone to sit with her - accompanied by either endless silence or endless conversation.

Matty went perhaps the only place she could go. A far too familiar doorstep, a place she'd lingered for far too long, yet a place she hardly knew at all. She did consider the nature of the decision, and as to where it could do nothing but make things worse for her, but Matty had reckoned she'd reached a point in her life where things just simply couldn't get any worse.

Still, despite the odd kind of certainty in her mind, she hesitated for a good few minutes before she rang the doorbell. The moment she did so, the whole world seemed to split in two, bringing forth the final separation between what she wanted and what she needed. And as much as that hurt, it was a good thing. It had to be.

"Matty..." She was met by an almost elusive, drifting sort of vague introduction, as if the woman behind the door just wasn't quite sure what to make of her. Really, the situation was rather impromptu, and she hardly knew her at all, but still, she'd reached that awful kind of desperate by now.

"Sorry, I-" Matty blushed, stumbling to provide some sort of explanation to her situation. The woman, however, didn't quite let her finish.

"He's upstairs. In his room." She supplied, facing Matty with a small, somewhat forced smile, as she stepped aside to let her in.

"T-Thank you..." Matty trailed off, watching her for a moment, before accepting reality, accepting what had brought everything to be, what had brought her here, and found the guts to make her way up the stairs.

Matty stood, wordlessly, in the landing for quite some time. Eyes focused on one very specific door, and the slight crack between it and the frame: the small slither of light streaming out into the dimly lit hallway.

Matty stood there motionlessly and felt all the breath leave her body. She thought she might stand there and stare for hours, until they ran out of time, until they ran out of words, until she ran out of people to be. Until she ran out of people to love, and meaningless boys to fall for. Until she finally found that grip she thought she had on herself, until everything started to make sense again, and until she could do so much as touch herself without being drawn back to everything with a nauseating sense of guilt set firmly throughout her body.

But Matty simply stood there until George opened the door.

He looked a little startled, and really who could blame him. And together, they stood there - wordless, motionless, hopeless - until the world seemed to snap right in two.

"I..." Matty struggled for what to say: taking in George from the dark circles under his eyes to the blotchy red colour to his cheeks. She didn't like to consider the idea, to breathe life into the possibility, but she found very little way around the fact that George had been crying, and that likely, George had been crying over her.

And that made her sick much more easily than anything else had before.

"Hey..." George choked back, the corners of his lips turning up into a small smile in recognition of Matty, and the stupid, warm feeling that she brought about him.

"Hey." Matty added back: voice little more than a whisper.

"I'm..." George trailed off, gesturing awkwardly. "I'm gonna go piss, just, sit down or whatever, we can talk in a minute." He met Matty with a nervous smile. "If you want to."

Matty gave a nod, making his way inside of George's room as he left for the bathroom. She hadn't quite known what to do with herself - whether just to stand there awkwardly, or to sit down on the end of the bed, or whatever. She didn't quite get that far, however, as she looked around her, at those same bedroom walls, but so much emptier than before.

And Matty stood there - the same kind of still and silent she had been before. It just hurt her heart somehow, and she couldn't quite figure out as to why.

George appeared again soon enough, pushing his bedroom door shut behind him, before following Matty's gaze around the room. And really, it hurt him in quite the same way.

"You took them down." Matty uttered, as if in a state of total confusion. She turned, taking in the entirety of his room.

"Not all of them." George added, perhaps somewhat in his defense.

"Most of them." Matty clarified, letting out a sigh. "Why?" She couldn't help but ask - more than prepared to stand around waiting for George to tell her she was being impolite.

"I guess I realised that not all memories are things you really want to keep." George gave a shrug, sitting himself down on the end of his bed. He expected Matty to follow him, but instead, Matty still appeared to be far more absorbed with the empty space on his bedroom walls.

"Why?" Matty choked out: unable to stop herself.

George let out a sigh. "Because some memories make you feel shit."

Matty met him with wide, startled eyes.

"And I've felt like shit much more than I need to over the past few weeks." He added, unable to stop himself. It was too much, and they both knew it.

"I'm sorry." Matty slumped down next to him, and they sat together, perhaps entirely too close, but without even a single desire to move. "I'm shit. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."

"Not your fault." George assured her, like he even truly believed it.

Matty looked across at him like he was just plain stupid. "Don't lie to yourself."

"Don't tell me to hate you. Don't do that again." George's response was fast, spoken almost with a hint of malice behind his words. "Don't do that." He pleaded.

"I'm sorry..." Matty trailed off, because she really was, and there was this great ache in her chest like she just didn't know what to do with herself anymore.

"It's alright." George assured her, even meeting Matty with a small smile. "We're both in a bit of a state, aren't we?" He gave way to a laugh. "Do you wanna, just... put on a movie or something?"

Matty thought for a moment. The idea was perhaps the most tempting thing in the world: sat entirely too close to George, under blankets, with no need to do or say anything, just to exist, to co-exist, to share each other's space, and to share each other's smiles.

Matty wanted it more than anything. But it just wasn't what she needed.

She gave way to a sigh, unsure quite how to get the words out. "Actually... can we talk?" Matty dared to flash her eyes back up to George's. "I think I really need to."

George watched her for a moment, almost as if he wasn't quite certain of the truth behind her words. "Yeah..." He met her with a smile. "Course."

Matty sat there for a moment and just breathed, doing all she could to get her head in order, to pull her eyes away from that questioning, unspoken something, held so very tightly in George's gaze.

"You can." She uttered before she could quite stop herself. George met her with a look of confusion. "Whatever's on your mind. You can say it. You can talk as well. About you, about me, about whatever. This isn't just about me. You're... you're upset too."

George shrugged. "I don't know. I mean... I always... I always feel like I'm the one listening. I know how to listen, to give advice, just not... open up myself." He admitted, giving way to a nervous kind of laughter.

Matty offered him the best kind of comforting smile she could muster. "You should. I mean, I hardly know how to handle my own shit, so I don't know how good any kind of advice I could offer you could be, I just... I'd listen. I care. Funny that. I care. About you. Like lots. Like so much. Like a crazy amount. Especially since I fucked off. And come on, bitch at me for fucking off, do it, if you want to - please."

George didn't say a word.

Matty rolled her eyes. "I told you that you can."

George sighed, finally parting his lips to give way to a single word. "Why?"

"Why did I... go?" Matty trailed off, wondering just how she could possibly phrase that. "Because... I... I had a lot of shit. I have a lot of shit going on. And I was scared of... what you'd think... about this thing. About many things. I'm scared of what you'll think of me. And I thought distancing myself from you would make me feel better, maybe just be a bit more competent emotionally, but I still feel like shit. I felt more like shit, for just... ignoring you."

"Tell me if I did something." George insisted, meeting Matty with a look sterner than she'd ever seen before. "Because I need to know if it's my fault."

"George..." Matty trailed off, wide eyed, and almost dumbfounded by the notion. "You... you were just... you never did anything. You were just there. And I think you meant too much to me, out of nowhere, and I didn't know how to deal with that. Because there's this thing. This thing about me, and I'm terrified to let you know, because I'm terrified of what you'll say, but I found it so hard to live with you not knowing. Now... it's... I think... I don't know... everything's different."

"Everything's fucked?" George asked, raising his eyebrows.

Matty shook her head, laughing a little. "I mean, Gemma hates me, so Amber and Marika are going to be pissed at me, and my parents are pissed at me, and Charlie either hates me or he's pissed at me, and I..." She trailed off. "But you don't hate me. We're... alright now, this is... this is good. And Louis doesn't hate me."

"Who's Louis?" George asked, wondering if he even should.

"My brother." Matty supplied, a smile slipping her face. "He's thirteen."

"Didn't know you had a brother." George commented, trying to imagine a smaller, teenage version of Matty, and laughing a little in response.

"Yeah." Matty smiled back, giving way to a sigh. "I came out to him. This morning. Fuck..." She cursed. "Feels like the whole world's happened today."

George smiled. "What did he say?"

"Pretty much absolutely nothing. It was so weird. Like... it really just didn't matter. And he told me he'd already guessed, and I mean, really how effeminate am I?" Matty wasn't really sure whether that was supposed to be a rhetorical question or not.

George gave way to a smile. "Well you were wearing lipstick earlier." Matty blushed, bringing her fingers up to her lips. "Why did you wipe it off? Looked good." He added, doing the worst kind of things to Matty's insides.

"I didn't..." Matty trailed off, wiping at her lips in confusion.

"Well it got wiped off somehow." George gave way to a shrug, offering Matty a lazy kind of smile.

It was then that Matty realised why. And her heart dropped to the pit of her stomach. "I sucked someone off earlier. That's why."

George's eyes grew wide, wondering just at what point in her day Matty had found time to go around giving blowjobs.

"Oh." He muttered, finding that it was perhaps all he could say.

Matty didn't elaborate further, instead she reached into her jacket pocket for her lipstick and made her way over to the mirror on the other side of George's room: hastily applying the lipstick, as neatly as she could with George watching her from across the room.

"Suits you." George commented, meeting her with a smile as she sat herself back down beside him - somehow closer than ever before.

"Thanks." Matty smiled, her cheeks heating up to a colour to rival the bright red of her lips.

"It was weird." She began again, pushing away the silence that had settled in around them. It was, of course, the only thing on the both of their minds, and Matty had never been a prude, or had any kind of common sense.

"What?" George asked like he didn't already know.

"The blowjob." Matty spelled it out for him: bright red lips fitting around the word in way that could drive anyone dizzy.

"What do you mean?" He thought for a moment, wondering just how they'd come to such a subject quite so casually.

"This is going to make me sound all kinds of fucked up, like I have serious issues, and fuck, maybe I do, but... I really kind of like sucking dick. Like... it's sort of therapeutic. Maybe therapeutic is the wrong word. But like, calming... grounding. Being fucked as well. Like... not even just sex in general, but I don't know..." Matty gave way to a laugh. "Taking a dick."

George thought for a moment, trying to focus solely on the words leaving Matty's lips and not the images they tempted him to concoct. "Like... the whole submissive side of things? Having someone else being in control?"

"Yeah." Matty thought for a moment, figuring that had to make her sound even weirder, but still, George didn't seem to mind. "Like... yeah... like you don't have to think about anything or worry, because you're just... like someone else has got you. Even though they really haven't and there's nothing nurturing about being balls deep in someone's ass, but... yeah."

"It is a bit... unconventional, but I get where you're coming from." And Matty thought that George was so unconditionally understanding that he just had to be taking the piss now.

"Yeah." Matty continued regardless. "It wasn't like that today. It was weird. It kind of made me feel sick. Not even physically, I mean it... I mean... it sort of did, but that wasn't the issue, like I've sucked loads of dick before, that wasn't the issue, it was just... it didn't feel good. It made me feel weird. Like it was all wrong."

"Can you think why?" George stopped and thought for a moment.

"I think he loves me." The words left Matty's lips without warning. "The guy. He's Charlie. We have... a sort of... thing." Matty felt her stomach twisting into knots at the notion of directly telling George she had a boyfriend.

"And you don't love him?" George asked, stumbling over his words a little.

"Sometimes I don't even think I like him. He's just... he's just a person, and his flat is just a place, and his dick's just a dick. And it makes me sound... so shallow, but sometimes you need someone, you need somewhere. And he helps with that. I don't know if I can... keep lying to myself anymore, but I'm convinced I need him, that I need that. But I don't. I just want it. I don't need to feel loved, I just so desperately want it."

"Matty, look, if he's making you unhappy then you shouldn't... be with him anymore, alright?" George felt like he was suddenly so very under qualified with any kind of advice he could possibly offer.

"We had an argument." Matty continued, letting out a sigh. "After the blowjob. Because I felt like shit, I just... sort of sat there for a while, in a bit of a state, and he thought he'd done something, and I told him he hadn't, and then... he was pissed that I was taking my shit out on him, and then... then I just stormed out. And when I did he sort of looked at me and laughed, asking where I could possibly go, because I told him about what had happened with Gemma just before, and he knows how shit is at home. That made me feel weird."

George opened his mouth to speak but Matty didn't quite let him continue.

"I don't know why I came here. Honestly I... I thought everything was fucked between me and you, but I'm so thankful it's not, and you're... ridiculous, you know? Keeping listening to me, through all my shit, and honestly, George, I don't think I could ever thank you enough."

And George started to cry again. For the third time that day.

Funnily enough, so did Matty. And the two sat there, practically curled up together - two pathetic, weeping idiots, somehow treasuring each other above all.

They watched that movie in the end. In the late afternoon, with mugs of tea, and stupid amounts of chocolate that George had pulled out of the back of the cupboards. And with each other, far too close, but still so distant.

She thought about what Charlie would say if he could see her now. See them now. And she knew it was wrong. She knew it was fucked. But she decided that she didn't care, because if there was anything that really mattered to her in that moment, it was George. Without a question. Without a doubt.

And as the room grew dark, and the day faded away, Matty sat and thought about the empty walls, and all that she'd done. And wondered if she could just ever really fix it.

-

"For fuck's sake..."

George drew his eyes open slowly - as if a part of him was just so very terrified to let the morning let in, to let the world in, and to break the illusion of safety and perfection that had sank in around him last night.

Adjusting his eyes to the early morning light, he blinked rapidly, his vision blurring and fading out of focus despite his every desperate effort to properly fixate on the figure in the doorway - the one who had uttered the three words to wake him from his sleep.

"George..." The figure tried again, stepping a little way closer. It was as George managed to connect the voice to a person, that everything faded into focus; George lay there, blinking slowly at Ross, who was for some reason in his room on a Sunday morning.

"Ross..." George stumbled to sit up, attempting to get a better grasp on his situation as fast as he could. It was as he attempted to do so, however, that he became very aware of what had brought Ross' first three words to be. As unavoidably, and so very plainly, beside him lay Matty - still fast asleep and curled up into his chest.

"Fuck..." George trailed off, his eyes growing wide as he just stared at Matty for a moment.

"You forgot, didn't you?" Ross' tone was perhaps just far too nonchalant for the situation - spiked with a little dash of irritance, but it was almost as if he had expected this, well, eventually, at least.

"Huh?" George groaned, looking hazily between Matty and Ross.

"Those plans we ran over at least twenty times, George. About going into the city, you know? Early train ride, you know? Those plans we made like three weeks ago. Those plans that even your mum remembers, seeing as she let me in on her way out. But those plans..." Ross glanced down at Matty, who had somehow managed to sleep through their whole conversation. "You managed to forget about."

"Fuck." George groaned, throwing his head back down against the pillow.

"I'll give you five minutes." Ross rolled his eyes, making his way out of George's room, perhaps even over-emphasising the act of closing the door behind him.

For at least the first minute, George just lay there, staring up at the ceiling regretting his entire existence. And in the still, early morning silence, he could just catch the muffled sounds of conversation from out in the landing, because of course, Ross was calling John to make fun of his situation already.

"They're fucking spooning!" Ross' voice was raised, as if this was the most pressing matter in his life. George groaned.

George did try not to listen - for his own sake, really, but if he was going to lay there and not listen to their conversation, he knew he'd have to wake Matty up, and that was just a whole other something he didn't want to deal with.

"I don't care if you think it's cute, John, that's really not the point."

George decided that this was his breaking point. That this was just the point in which he wanted to go back to sleep forever. And really, it wasn't like he wanted to cancel the plans he'd made with his friends, but suddenly, with everything that had happened yesterday, especially with Matty, he'd sort of lost his head.

He looked back across at Matty - at the soft, peaceful look to her, with curls strewn out freely, and eyelids flickering slightly, and pink lips parted just a little way. George then looked at the way Matty's back was pressed firmly against his chest, and the way he had managed to curl his body in around Matty's. He let out a deep sigh, because really, Ross was right.

It had been a bit hazy last night; he wasn't exactly sure how they'd gone from watching a movie together to falling asleep in each other's arms. George then took a moment to remind himself that this wasn't even the first time this had happened. He thought back to Gemma's house - to the spare room, and to the odd nonchalance Matty had regarded it all with.

George then wondered if this really meant anything at all, or if it was just them - they'd both been in enough of a state yesterday to need a bit of a cuddle, after all. George then wondered if he was just making excuses. Just buying himself time before facing Matty, and then, inevitability, Ross again.

Matty stirred without George's help in the end, rolling over onto her back and accidentally elbowing George in the ribs, eliciting a rather loud groan from George as he struggled to pull away from Matty, rubbing his side in an attempt to relieve some of the pain.

Matty looked up at him with wide blinking eyes; as George had struggled to sit himself up again, he'd sort of ended up half hovering over Matty.

"Sorry." She met George with a lazy kind of early morning smile. "That hurt, didn't it?" She fell into a breathy kind of giggle, shutting her eyes again for just a second.

When she opened them again, George was no longer above her, but sat up against the wall - hair sticking up in all directions, and that distant kind of look in his eyes that told Matty he really was craving a cigarette.

"It's alright." He promised her, instinctively rubbing his side a little bit.

George sat and watched her for a moment, wondering just when Matty might acknowledge the fact that they were in bed together - that they'd fallen asleep, pressed closer together than he'd even thought possible. It didn't seem like she was going to, though, and really it was far too early for George to properly think about that and what it could possibly mean.

"Were you awake for any of that?" He asked - admittedly a little astounded as to how she'd managed to sleep through the whole of the mini fit Ross had thrown.

She gave a nod, stretching her arms out up towards the headboard. "I've been awake longer than you have."

George widened his eyes at that. "You what?"

"Not for like hours, but for like twenty minutes. Just thought you'd be better to deal with Ross walking in like that, I mean... I don't really know him all that well. I didn't want to make it any more awkward for him." Matty ran a hand back through her hair, pondering their situation - she knew well just how it had came to be, but she still couldn't quite grasp what it was inside of the both of them that had let it happen.

"You're the worst." George told her.

Matty didn't respond, only got to her feet, stretching a little as she made it across George's room, before stumbling off into the bathroom. George was at least pleased to see, through the open door, that Ross had moved from the landing finally. Still, he had very little idea as to what he was going to do in regards to their situation as a whole.

After a moment or two, he pulled himself out of bed, staring down at last night's clothes, and deciding he should probably try and get dressed while Matty was out of the room. He changed into a marginally different, slightly cleaner pair of jeans, and pulled the first shirt he saw over his head, taking a moment to contemplate the state of his life in general, before he really found the time to look around him.

There'd been something off since he'd woken up, but amidst the mess that was everything else, he hadn't quite been able to place it. It was then, however, that his eyes fell over the walls, on the photographs laid back upon them - every single one.

He stood there, flat-out astounded, heart beginning to hammer in his chest, as he took in each and every wall, and each and every photo. Finally, he drew his gaze to the open drawer at his desk - the one in which he'd stashed the photos, beside his lighter, his shitty little polaroid camera, and a little bag of weed right at the back of the drawer. However, as George approached it, he found that it wasn't quite so empty anymore.

Left beside his lighter, was a note in an all too familiar scrawled handwriting. George reached for it, heart pounding inside his chest.

'It was me, wasn't it? That made you feel shit. Not the memories. It was me. You don't have to lie to yourself - you don't have to lie to me. I'm sorry. You mean so much to me. Today meant so much to me. I can only wish that you'd feel the same... XX'

George glanced back down at the drawer, and beside his lighter, previously hidden beneath the note, was a photo - taken on the camera, just like the others, but instantly so very different, so very real, something that meant more to George than anything ever had before.

Scrawled in the space beneath the picture, were two words and a kiss - in the same handwriting, conveying more in just a handful of letters than George could ever begin to imagine.

'I'm sorry. X'

But the apology meant nothing close to as much as the picture itself.

It was taken late last night, perhaps in the early nighttime hours of morning - depicting him in bed, curled up, and likely asleep, and then Matty beside him, pressed up against his chest, but with one arm stretched out to take the picture.

George put the letter back into the drawer and closed it again, taking the photo in his hand, and tacking it up onto the wall, away from everything else - away from the pictures of his friends, away from the pictures of his old girlfriends. This was something else entirely. So George placed it somewhere new, in a world of its own, up on the wall near the window, where he could see it perfectly as he lay in bed.

But George didn't say a word when Matty finally got back from the bathroom - face all made up, and hair tied up elegantly. After all, he didn't think a single word could ever be enough.

-

And George just didn't stop smiling. Even as the five of them sat and endured the most awkward breakfast of their lives. George sat there without a doubt that Ross had told John and Adam his own assumptions about what had happened between him and Matty last night in levels of detail that George couldn't even imagine, but still, it didn't manage to bother him at all.

Even as Adam continued to shoot him odd, almost emotionally dead looks as he sat there and ate his toast. Even as he couldn't help but wonder just what it was that Ross had actually told him in the end, and just what that left Adam to think about him.

Even as John vaguely asked Matty how she was, and Matty began to relay her whole life story to the five of them. George zoned out, having heard it all before, and watched the amused looks on his friends' faces - they liked Matty, at least. He reckoned it could be worse - Ross could have found him in bed with someone all three of them hated.

Even as George began to wonder if Ross thought they'd had sex. Even as the worst kind of thoughts began to creep out of nowhere, and he found himself looking at Matty in a way he couldn't quite describe.

Even as Adam playfully pointed out the fact that Matty was wearing George's jumper. Something George had been yet to notice himself. Still, it made him smile more. And it made Matty blush too at least. He reckoned he liked seeing Matty blush more than he dared to admit.

Even as Ross casually invited Matty to spend the day with them, and Matty politely declined with a waffly explanation of getting home. And still, even as John invited Matty to the party they were planning on going to that Friday - something George hadn't managed to forget about amidst this all.

Even as Matty pulled her lips into a grin and agreed.

Even as George's stomach filled with an almost nauseating cluster of butterflies, he looked across at Matty, and physically couldn't stop himself from smiling.

He wondered if he'd really lost his mind last night, but for this, George decided he just didn't want it back.

-

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