Soulmates (18 page)

I woke up with the sun shining through my eyelids. I groaned and rubbed my eyes before slowly opening them. Forgetting where I was, I jolted with shock when I found Noah’s face in front of mine.

“Morning,” he said, a huge grin on his face. He was lying on his side, only about ten inches away.

“Have you been watching me sleep, you weirdo? Because that’s not romantic, you know. It’s just a tad creepy.”

He laughed and covered his eyes with his hands. “I’ve only been watching for a moment. And it wasn’t for creepy purposes, I just knew it would wake you up.”

I sat up, hoping my hair wasn’t too mad. “An alarm clock is less crazy-stalkerish.”

“I know. But it’s also less fun.”

The sunlight was streaming through Noah’s bay windows and specks of dust danced in the glow.

“The rain’s stopped then?”

“Apparently so. College is cancelled though. I rang and checked for you. It’s partly flooded. Not too bad, but enough to close.”

“Brilliant. That means I miss Psychology.”

Noah kissed my cheek, being careful not to breathe on me. “Breakfast?”

I nodded. “Sounds great.”

“Cool. I’ll make eggs.”

He climbed out of bed energetically, while I leaned back and enjoyed the relaxed relief you get when you don’t have to get up after all.

Noah stopped at the door. “Poppy?”

“Yeah?”

He looked down at his feet. “What I…we…said last night. Was it just a dramatic thing brought on by the apocalyptic-style circumstances?”

I smiled, enjoying his vulnerability. “It wasn’t in my case.” I picked up his abandoned pillow and threw it at him. “And it better not have been in your case either.”

He dodged the pillow, picked it up and chucked it back. I tried to duck but it hit the side of my head.

“Oooph.” I fell backwards on the bed and lay there, a little stunned.

Noah burst out laughing. “I completely, utterly, and totally love you,” he said, then bellyflopped onto the bed and gave me another big kiss, before running into the kitchen.

Twenty minutes later, we were eating scrambled eggs on toast contentedly in Noah’s posh kitchen. I was still wearing his oversized shirt and Noah was in boxers. We were sitting on stools pulled up against his beautiful charcoal countertops.

“So you can cook, apparently,” I said, shovelling down the eggs.

Noah poured me some orange juice. “It’s just one of my many talents.”

“Modesty not being one of them, though?”

He took a sip of his own juice. “Ha. You got me there.”

My mobile phone gave a muffled beep from Noah’s bedroom. I padded barefoot to get it and found a text from Lizzie.

Meeting for coffee and catch-up at 12. Be there.

“Who is it?” Noah called.

“Lizzie.”

“What does she want?”

“To meet for coffee later.”

I walked back to the kitchen. I was torn. Part of me longed to fill in my friends (minus Ruth) on last night’s revelations. But the other part didn’t want to leave Noah. It felt like it would physically hurt. I shook my head.

No. I was independent. I had a life other than a boyfriend…

“That’s a shame. I was hoping we could hang out today.”

“What about band practice?”

“I can cancel. The studio might be flooded anyway.”

I shook my head. “Nope. We’re not going to be one those THOSE couples.”

Noah looked confused. “What couples?”

“You know, the ones that stop having any sort of individual life once they get together. I refuse to.” I banged my glass down a bit heavily and some juice sloshed onto the counter. “Oops.”

Noah got a dishcloth from the sink and wiped it up. “Have you finished ranting?”

I nodded.

“Good.” He took my hand. “I have a life, Poppy.” I looked down at my half-eaten eggs, slightly embarrassed by my outburst. “I have managed to live a whole seventeen years without you. And yes, it’s been less fun, but I’ve done just fine. It’s just one day, one band practice.”

I continued staring at my leftover breakfast. “Sorry.”

Noah tilted my head up so I would look at him. “I do get where you’re coming from, Poppy. I know you’re your own person, which is why I love you. But you don’t have to be so scared about becoming a cliché or something…”

I couldn’t believe how well he knew me already. It was like he could look straight into my thoughts.

“I do have a little bit of a…thing about clichés,” I admitted.

“What is it? You’re convinced everyone else is one and you’re different?”

“Sort of.”

Noah stood up, gently brushed my hair to one side and kissed my neck.

“It’s just a relationship, Poppy. They’re all clichéd. There’s nothing special about us – apart from the fact it’s us. You and me. And I’m glad it’s you and me, because I feel like what we’ve found is pretty great. But I think this ‘falling in love’ stuff is just the same for everyone.”

I kissed him on the lips. “I do wish I could spend the whole day with you, you know that, right?”

“What about us having to lead individual and separate lives?”

“That was before you said all that nice stuff.”

“God, you’re a right little sell-out, aren’t you? A few compliments and all your morals go out the window.”

I got up and pushed him. “Oi. Take that back.”

He caught my hand as I went to push him again, smiling. “Never.”

One of Noah’s fingers tickled my waist. I batted his hand away but he caught it and wedged my arm under his armpit before tickling me again with his spare hand. I squealed and started hitting him over the head, trying to get him to stop. He laughed and blocked me easily. More tickling. It felt wonderful and terrible at the same time.

“God, is play-fighting our ‘thing’ now?” I gasped through another tickle onslaught. “This really is a stereotype.”

With that, Noah tossed me over his shoulder with ease. I screamed, upside down.

“Right. I’ve had it with you.”

He ran with me to the bedroom, as I continued trying to break free, and tossed me onto the bed. Before I had a chance to recover, Noah was lying above me, his hand on my leg, trailing up beneath my shirt.

“Here’s the thing about clichés,” he said breathily into my ear. “They might be predictable, but they still feel pretty good.”

And then he kissed me and I didn’t give a damn about anything for a good ten minutes.

A few hours, and several kisses later, we emerged from Noah’s flat to be independent and sociable. My dress had dried adequately overnight and Noah insisted I was pretty enough to meet my friends make-up-free. We were in such a loved-up bubble I’d forgotten the storm. I was crudely reminded the moment we stepped out of Noah’s flat.

“Oh my God,” I muttered, looking around me.

It looked like a mini disaster zone. Water was gurgling earnestly out of the drain, spilling out onto the road. Broken tree branches lay sprawled across the tarmac; one was sitting comfortably through someone’s smashed car windscreen.

“Well, this isn’t usual,” Noah said, taking hold of my hand.

We walked towards town in awed silence, taking in the unexpected devastation. It got worse the closer we got. A telephone pole had fallen down and smashed into a shopfront. The water got much higher. We managed to dodge most of the flooded bits but there were times Noah gave me a piggyback and waded through knee-deep water. He’d had the foresight to bring some spare clothes and said he would change at the studio.

If the studio wasn’t underwater.

When we eventually got to the town centre, despite seeing it on the news, it was still a shock. Sludgy-coloured water lapped at shopfronts, and retailers with saddened faces were sweeping out as much as they could onto the already saturated road. The place where Jennie the reporter had stood was occupied by a small child wearing waders and driving a remote-controlled boat.

“Well, at least someone is having some fun,” Noah commented.

“I’m not sure why Lizzie suggested meeting for coffee in town,” I said. “Surely the place is going to be closed?”

“Knowing Lizzie, she knows exactly where’s been hit, and is already getting quotes from her neighbours to flog to the local rag.”

He was probably right.

We continued dodging the worst bits until we arrived at the coffee shop. It was open and I could see Lizzie, Ruth and Amanda through the window.

I turned to Noah. “So I’m off to be a separate entity now.”

“Me too.”

We stood looking at each other.

“Is it really pathetic to say I’m going to miss you?” I asked, pulling at his T-shirt.

“No,” Noah said. “What’s really pathetic is that I was just about to say the same thing.”

“Oh God, we’re officially disgusting.”

Noah gave me a quick knee-buckling kiss on the lips.

“Totally disgusting.”

The girls already had cups of coffee and so I first went to the counter and ordered my customary banana milk.

Ruth eyeballed it when I sat down next to her. “You’re still five then?”

I took a sip. “Yup.”

I leaned back on the sticky leather sofa. None of them looked like they’d slept much.

“So what’s up?” I asked. “Are everyone’s houses okay?”

“Ours is a little flooded actually,” Amanda said, wringing her hands and looking upset. “Not badly, just some in the kitchen. But it’s wrecked the floor, so Mum is pretty stressed.”

“Aww, I’m sorry, hon.” I took a sip of milk. “I still don’t understand what’s caused it. It’s so totally weird.”

“Well, I think the world is ending,” Lizzie declared, looking positively delighted at the universe’s untimely death. “I know this girl in my English Language class who’s a Christian, and she says right before the world ends all sorts of crap happens. Apparently natural disasters are the warning signs.”

“And since when were you religious?” Ruth asked.

“It’s just a possibility. And you have to admit this is strange.”

I laughed. “Lizzie, you just want things to be strange because it makes a more interesting story.”

“Maybe so.”

“Well I think it’s just a freak thing,” Ruth said. “Although it was pretty scary. Will and I got caught out in it and I had to stay at his.” She shook back her new scarlet hair. “It was annoying actually. I was planning to break up with him but couldn’t because I needed somewhere to crash.”

She said it so casually, without emotion. So Will had reached his sell-by date then. To be fair, he’d lasted longer than others, but I still didn’t understand how she could be so cold. I’d only been with Noah, well, about a week really, and I already felt quite certain that ending things with him would tear my world apart.

“Woah, bombshell, Ruthie,” Lizzie said, springing into supportive-friend action. “Where has this come from? I thought you guys were getting on?”

Ruth shrugged. “We were. I’m bored. You know what I’m like.”

I tried to give her a reassuring pat but she recoiled away. “You wanna talk about it?”

“Not really. Not with you. No offence, but I don’t fancy discussing my failing relationship when you’re Mrs. Loved-Up over there.”

It stung. Especially as I had dutifully listened throughout Ruth’s numerous loved-up stages with different men.

“Hey come on, that’s not fair,” Lizzie said. I was surprised. She didn’t normally stand up to Ruth. “It’s not Poppy’s fault she’s happy.”

“I know, I know,” Ruth said, curling her lip. “Anyway, I can’t talk about love but I can talk about sex, right? How is he anyway, Poppy? Do Noah’s guitar-playing fingers hit all the right spots?”

I looked down into my drink.

Ruth picked up on my awkward silence. “Haven’t you slept with him yet?”

Of course I hadn’t. She knew this. She knew all the rest of us were virgins.

“Er,” I fumbled.

Then it was Amanda’s turn to stick up for me. Blimey O’Reilly. It must be a national holiday or something.

“You don’t have to tell us,” she said reassuringly. “It’s not any of our business. I don’t talk to you guys about me and Johnno.”

“That’s only because you haven’t even got past the kissing phase,” Ruth said, irritated at the sudden lack of patience shown towards her. “And you probably won’t until 2090.”

Amanda coyly took a sip of her coffee. “I wouldn’t be so sure.”

Well, that got the attention away from me. We all pounced on her, amazed.

“No way.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“Tell me everything.”

“How far have you guys got?”

“Was it any good?” (That last one was, surprisingly enough, from Ruth.)

But Amanda wouldn’t unleash any more information. She turned twice as red as me and stared at her coffee cup, mute, until we all shut up.

“Well, this is new,” Ruth said. “Amanda’s getting some, Poppy probably soon will be, while I’m going to be single.”

“Do you really think you’re going to sleep with Noah soon, Popps?” Lizzie asked. She sounded anxious. I wasn’t sure if it was out of concern for my well-being, or fear that if I did it would separate us somehow. Put us into two different categories.

“We’re taking it slow.”

“What? He doesn’t want to sleep with you?”

Thanks for that, Ruth.

“Of course he wants to sleep with me,” I snapped. “But we’ve only just got together, and, you know, I don’t feel ready.”