Begin Again | ongoing

twenty-five

When Sunny gets home at one forty-five on Monday morning, Fenfen is standing outside in a dressing gown, leaning against the wall with a cigarette held loosely between two fingers. She takes a long drag before she notices Sunny, and then exhales in the opposite direction, stubbing out the fag and flicking the butt away.

"Hey, Tenny," she says, sounding tired. Sunny checks her watch in case she's slipped through another crack in the universe because Fenfen is never usually around at this time – she's usually out, or out cold.

"Are you okay?" she asks, stifling a yawn. It was a long and quiet shift, one of those that feels endless because there's not enough going on to fill the time. "What're you doing out here?" She peers at Fenfen, trying to figure out if she looks upset, if she's been crying. In all their time as friends, she's not sure she's ever seen her cry.

"Post-shag smoke," Fenfen says. She tucks a pack of Marlboros and a lighter into her pocket and pulls her long ponytail over her shoulder. Sunny's totally discombobulated and it strikes her that it's because she so rarely sees Fenfen like this – no make-up, no going out clothes. Pyjamas and a bare face, and a man upstairs.

"Is it Luke?"

"Yeah. Ugh. It's horrible." She wrinkles her nose and fiddles with her lighter, her flip-flopped foot nudging a sodden clump of moss.

"What? The sex?"

"No! God, no, the sex is amazing. The feelings are horrible. I'm not used to actually liking a guy but, ugh, my fucking head and heart are like this is a nice guy, Fen, we really like him and want to see him more."

"That's ... good? Isn't it?"

"It's fucking strange." She kicks the moss to the gutter and almost loses her flip-flop. It's way too wet out here for flip-flops. Sunny's wearing her black work trainers and she can feel the rain seeping through the sides, even though it isn't actively raining anymore.

"You've just got to roll with it," she says. "He seems nice"—from the one semi conversation they've had, at least—"and you shouldn't run just because it's new."

As the words leave her mouth she hears how pertinent they are, how much she has needed to hear them this last week. Apparently she knows the answers to her problems, but only if she has to deal with them as other people's issues.

Fenfen sighs. She pushes away from the wall and digs a key out of her pocket. "I know, I know. And I am. Giving him a chance. This is, like, the fifth time he's stayed over."

"Whoa. You're basically married."

She harks a laugh and slings an arm around Sunny's shoulders, pressing a smoky kiss to her cheek, which she only manages because she's on the second step and Sunny's on the pavement, closing their seven-inch height difference. Sunny doesn't mind the waft of tobacco. She's used to it. Her mother's been trying to quit for thirty years, never quite managing to fully kick the habit she developed in the sixties.

"You can talk, Tenny. I was starting to think you'd ditched me for your lady friend. I've seen you more this week than I have in the last few months put together." She jams her key into the lock and twists hard. Holding the key in place, she leans against the door with her shoulder and hip and pushes hard until it pops open. It's the only way to get the door open when it's been raining, the damp swelling the door until it tries to burst out of its frame. Everyone in 3 Jupiter Court knows the ways of the tricky lock, which claims several keys each year.

"Really?"

"Yeah. I know our schedules are pretty conflicting anyway but you spend so much time with lover girl, you've practically moved in with her." She hangs back in the hallway until Sunny's by her side and she loops her arm through the crook of Sunny's elbow. "It's been nice, seeing more of you."