Post by Ensign Mandy Bergin on Mar 13, 2017 10:30:47 GMT -8
Earth, London; Spring 2407
Her feet clattered on the stairs as she came running down them, into the narrow kitchen that smelt like home and felt like childhood. Mandy took a deep breath as she fell into a chair at the table, pulling the pitcher of orange juice nearer before she'd fairly sat down.
"Ah, there's my little layabed!" A voice called, and her mother bustled into the kitchen, a concentrated bundle of energy that never stopped and never seemed to be going anywhere in particular. "Did you sleep well, darling?"
"It's rather quiet, isn't it?" Mandy asked, buttering a muffin.
"For you, I suppose, dear," her mother said, bustling over to the table, dropping a fresh plate of bacon. "Now save some for your father. Your brother might be in too, though God knows where that boy gets to. Did you know, he's got into a new club. Something about...oh, I don't even know, who can keep up with him? He's so much more social than you ever were, darling, though I suppose that's how it always goes. Annette says hers are the same way, of course you know their oldest, Jeffrey, I believe he was in your class in secondary, though he didn't go on to the Academy--he's in something else now, I think, something to do with the planetary energy grid or some such."
On and on she went, and Mandy found herself falling into the familiar habit of largely ignoring what her mum was saying. All of it eventually melted into a huge puddle, anyway, from which you could pick out key, grand ideas like: there are other people, somewhere, and she knows them, or, you are in trouble now, or, something big is about to happen and maybe you'll find out what it is eventually, if she ever gets to the point. Her thoughts made her smile, a tiny uptick of the corner of her mouth, an absent thing that formed itself around muffin and bacon and orange juice, the comfortable habits of home.
"Now, now, Moira, let the girl eat in peace," a deeper voice broke into the ramble, and Mandy's father ducked in, his jacket beaded wet with rain. "Good morning," he said, giving Mandy a wink. "Letting your mother talk your ear off, I see."
"Isn't that just what mums do," she said.
"I suppose mine did too, at that," he said, grinning at her. He sat down next to her in the tiny breakfast nook, dropping a PADD that probably contained the day's news by his side and picking up a piece of bacon between two fingers.
"I'm just trying to make her stay comfortable," mum said, coming to join them. "How are you liking the Constellation?" she asked, reaching out to squeeze Mandy's arm just below her elbow.
Mandy nodded, looking down into her eggs and turning them over with her fork. "It's...alright," she said. "You know. Not a lot of excitement in that run, but it's been interesting all the same."
"Mmm, mm," her mum said, and Mandy felt the conversation taking a turn. Something else was coming, some attempt at parenting that she'd felt only a few times before, usually after a particularly poor grade. "Well. Have you met, you know...anyone? Anyone special?"
Mandy, mentally sighing, looked up at mum, steeling herself for the conversation that was coming. "I don't know what you mean, mum."
"You know," she said, and scooted her chair a bit closer, a motherly smile on her face. "A boy, perhaps. Or a girl. We're not choosy, darling."
"I've not met anyone, mum," Mandy said, sitting back and trying not to smile. "It wouldn't be professional, for starters--"
"I've heard of lots of Starfleet officers who found love on their postings," dad said. "There are all sorts of stories--why, Jim, you know him, his daughter was in your class--his parents were Starfleet officers. Served on one of the Enterprises, I think. It's possible, and your mum and I...well, we just want you to be happy, little bit."
"I am happy, dad," Mandy said around a bite of bacon. "Perfectly happy, but thank you all--"
"It's just," her mum began again, and Mandy realized she was probably in this for the long haul, and wondered if she could manage to pretend she'd received some vital communication from the Constellation, "we got a call, you know, from your chief, the nice one, his name was something or other--Lieutenant Baxter, maybe, I can't quite remember--but he's the chief pilot, and he said you'd been sort of, well--"
"Rather quiet and withdrawn," her dad chimed in, the easy back-and-forth of experienced parental interventions. Mandy considered whether shouting at your superior officer was as dreadful a faux pas as regulations would tend to suggest.
"Yes, withdrawn, that's a good way to put it," mum went on. "And we know you've always been a very quiet girl,"
"Very quiet," dad said.
"And of course, dear, that's just fine. It's only that Lieutenant Baxter is rather worried that you're having trouble, you know, adjusting. And he--we--thought that if you perhaps, you know...made a friend. Or met someone special, you know, that perhaps it would help."
"I don't need a partner, mum," Mandy said. "And I have...friends. Sort of. There's Adam, he's the other helmsman. We're friends. Sort of." The look her mum gave her spoke volumes. "We talk, over dinner in the mess sometimes. And when our shifts change. We say, you know, hi."
"I don't think, Mandy, that that's particularly what we mean when we say 'friends'," dad said, and Mandy sighed out loud then, because she really did not want to have this conversation. Not here, not now. Probably never, actually. She'd suffered through multiple sex talks and one embarassing almost-boyfriend spectacle, and she'd really hoped they were past this.
"Fine, I'll make...friends," Mandy said. "But I do have some."
"Of course, dear," mum said sweetly. "We just want you to be happy, you know, and to be making, well, real connections with real people, not just reading your books and spending time on the holodeck, you know." There was a pause while Mandy considered whether defending herself against this last charge was worth it. She did real things. Sometimes. Occasionally. You know. Like people did. "What about that Adam fellow? I remember him, he's the red-headed one, yes? He seems a nice boy. Or your roommate?"
"She's Bolian, mum," Mandy pointed out.
"Well yes, but it's the 25th century, darling," mum said. "All sorts of people date all sorts of people these days."
"Just count your lucky stars your great-gran isn't still about to remark upon it," dad said, and returned mum's look with a jaunty grin.
Mandy sighed. "That's not what I meant, mum. It's just...there's no one about who is...well, that I feel that way about, and I'm not going to make myself just so Lieutenant Baxter will feel better. I'm quite alright, I promise."
Her mum continued like she'd not said a word. "Or that girl who works on the bridge, we met her when we took you aboard. She lives just down the hall, you know. What was her name? Casey, I think. She's a sweetheart, you could talk to her. She's very pretty, too."
"Very pretty," dad said, nodding solemnly.
Mandy glanced from one of them to the other, trying to sense the trap hidden in the conversation. "Wait," she said, slowly. "You all do know I'm not a lesbian, right?"
"Are you not?" Mum said. "That's odd." Her dad grunted in agreement.
Mandy leaned forward, dropping her head into her hands. "Mum," she groaned. "The only person I've ever been interested in was a boy. Liam, you remember him?"
"Oh, of course dear, but it ended so quickly, and he was so strange,"
"Seemed more like a girl to me, anyway," dad said, and Mandy was pretty sure that if she rolled her eyes any harder, they'd disappear into the back of her skull.
"So we just assumed, you know, that it must be girls you were interested in. There's nothing wrong with it, of course,"
"Just be glad your great-gran isn't alive."
"It's the 25th century, you're free to be who you want to be, even to us darling."
"I don't want to be a lesbian, mum. I don't even know if I want to be with anyone," Mandy said, spreading her hands out for emphasis, trying to get them to understand because oh god I'm 22 years old, I can't be having this conversation with my parents. "I'm, you know, trying to figure out my life, and how my career is supposed to go, it's not like I have an incredible amount of time to just...go about kissing people."
"There's so much more to interpersonal relationships than kissing, Mandy," dad said, leaning toward her like he was imparting some deep mystery of the universe.
"And Casey is such a nice girl," mum said. "And I mean, if she wanted to go out with you, you could at least, you know. Go see if she's a pleasant girl, talk to her for a bit, have some cake."
Realization dawned, and Mandy felt her stomach sink out from under her. "You asked her to go out with me."
There was a long, awkward silence. Mandy felt rather than saw the look her parents exchanged, the way they communicated very parental things in a single glance, and knew she was doomed. "She ased us, darling. You know, just to see how you felt about it, and if you'd like to meet her tonight at that little place on St. John's. Your favorite, they serve that--"
"You set me up on a date," Mandy said, "with one of the most intimidating security officers on board."
Another silence, only her mother recovered more quickly from this one. "You see? You already have something in common with her! She thinks you intimidating! Isn't that funny? That's why she called us, because she wanted to find out more about you, whether you liked seafood, that sort of thing, and we said, well dear, no need to just ask, we'll tell her to go to that little place she loves so much, and you can meet her there, and it'll be grand! I even pulled that blue dress you wore to graduation, you remember the one, that one you wore to the little party afterwards, from storage and had it cleaned. It looks so fresh, even now, and I think it'll suit you just right."
Mandy knew her fate was sealed. There was no way to escape from this without irreperably harming her professional relationship with a woman who, quite honestly, scared her a lot. She also really didn't want to go on a date with her, but...well. Maybe it would be fun. Lieutenant Casey Byrne did know how to laugh, after all--Mandy had seen her making jokes with her actual friends--and she wasn't an unpretty woman. It was just...she was scary.
But Mandy went, anyway. She found herself, clad in the blue graduation party dress, deposited by a taxi down the street from the restaurant on St John St at seven o' clock precisely, with a storm in her stomach and more than a little shakiness of the nerves. She'd been stupid to agree to this--or, rather, not to refuse to go. She should've said no and...she didn't know. Go back to San Fransciso and hope somebody pitied her enough to let her sleep on their dorm floor until the Constellation returned for her in the morning?
Only, suddenly, somebody was coming up to her, and Mandy realized it was her. Casey Bryne, smiling from ear-to-ear in what, on anybody besides Mandy, would probably have been a desperately bashful smile. Mandy's bashful smile wasn't a smile at all, as she would consider later, but all she could manage to do was surrender her hand and let herself be pulled along by the inexorable force of the security officer's enthusiasm.
She let Casey talk, and talk, and talk--talk about the Constellation, and how scared Casey had been to talk to her, Mandy, because "you're always just off in your own little world. I never wanted to shake you from it, because you seemed so," a hefty, romantic sigh, "so happy." After that, they talked about piloting, Mandy thought, and she managed to say several things about being a helmsman and how much she loved to fly, and about how small the quarters were on the Constellation, and then they were walking along the Thames, a perfectly normal night in Mandy's life...except for the fact that she was hand-in-hand with a woman who, until two hours ago, had frightened her out of her wits, and she wasn't entirely certain how she'd gotten here.
Casey insisted upon calling a taxi and taking her home--a sweet gesture, Mandy thought, though she was pretty sure it was just because Casey wanted to sit next to her and hold her hand a little longer. It would've been sweet, if Mandy's palms hadn't been sweaty and she hadn't felt like her entire dinner was about to come back up. This was, she supposed, why she didn't go on dates, and she was so glad she'd discovered it before it was too late.
They climbed out in front of Mandy's house, and Mandy had a brief moment of panic when she realized that, maybe, Casey would want to come inside. She couldn't take her inside, because then her mum and dad would be there, and they'd want to talk to her, and she'd never get a word in edgewise, and tomorrow morning Mandy would have to go back to the ship and know that everything about her life had been spoiled because her parents had spent the evening planning their wedding.
"I'm sorry, my parents are probably headed to bed, and my brother has school in the morning," she offered as an excuse.
Casey nodded, easily, a smile playing at the corners of her mouth. "Of course," she said. "I won't impose. I've got to get back to the ship early, anyway, so..." Silence settled between them far too fast, thick and full of some sort of expectation Mandy couldn't figure out. There was something that was supposed to happen, she thought, but she couldn't--or didn't want to--think about it. "So, I'll just go. And see you tomorrow, maybe? Or maybe next weekend, when our duty load lightens up. We can...I don't know. Have dinner together or something again?"
Mandy felt herself nodding, heard herself saying something sweet and trying not to stammer too much. Casey's smile filled her vision, her fingers brushed against Mandy's cheek, and suddenly Casey's lips were against hers, a soft, tiny kiss that swallowed everything else up. "See you later," Casey breathed, and then she was gone, tripping lightly down the steps and down the street. Mandy felt like her head was somewhere up near the stars, and everything was spinning, and she was pretty sure she was going to be sick.
She should've never agreed to this. She got the door open and ran up the stairs as quick as she could, ignoring the questions mum shouted at her. Everybody needed to be quiet, because didn't Edwin have school or something? She had to be up early, and they knew that, and Mandy felt irrationally angry at everyone and everything, and everything clamored for attention, and she was upset at herself, and at Casey Bryne for putting her in this position, and tomorrow she'd have to go back to the ship and...deal with all of that....
She threw herself face-down on her bed, breathing in the scent of home and soakng up the feel of childhood. The door opened softly, and her mum came in, sitting down gently on the end of the bed. "How did it go, darling?" her mum asked, for once managing to be succinct.
Mandy sighed and said, into the pillow because she didn't dare lift her head, "I don't know, but I think I probably have a girlfriend now."
Her feet clattered on the stairs as she came running down them, into the narrow kitchen that smelt like home and felt like childhood. Mandy took a deep breath as she fell into a chair at the table, pulling the pitcher of orange juice nearer before she'd fairly sat down.
"Ah, there's my little layabed!" A voice called, and her mother bustled into the kitchen, a concentrated bundle of energy that never stopped and never seemed to be going anywhere in particular. "Did you sleep well, darling?"
"It's rather quiet, isn't it?" Mandy asked, buttering a muffin.
"For you, I suppose, dear," her mother said, bustling over to the table, dropping a fresh plate of bacon. "Now save some for your father. Your brother might be in too, though God knows where that boy gets to. Did you know, he's got into a new club. Something about...oh, I don't even know, who can keep up with him? He's so much more social than you ever were, darling, though I suppose that's how it always goes. Annette says hers are the same way, of course you know their oldest, Jeffrey, I believe he was in your class in secondary, though he didn't go on to the Academy--he's in something else now, I think, something to do with the planetary energy grid or some such."
On and on she went, and Mandy found herself falling into the familiar habit of largely ignoring what her mum was saying. All of it eventually melted into a huge puddle, anyway, from which you could pick out key, grand ideas like: there are other people, somewhere, and she knows them, or, you are in trouble now, or, something big is about to happen and maybe you'll find out what it is eventually, if she ever gets to the point. Her thoughts made her smile, a tiny uptick of the corner of her mouth, an absent thing that formed itself around muffin and bacon and orange juice, the comfortable habits of home.
"Now, now, Moira, let the girl eat in peace," a deeper voice broke into the ramble, and Mandy's father ducked in, his jacket beaded wet with rain. "Good morning," he said, giving Mandy a wink. "Letting your mother talk your ear off, I see."
"Isn't that just what mums do," she said.
"I suppose mine did too, at that," he said, grinning at her. He sat down next to her in the tiny breakfast nook, dropping a PADD that probably contained the day's news by his side and picking up a piece of bacon between two fingers.
"I'm just trying to make her stay comfortable," mum said, coming to join them. "How are you liking the Constellation?" she asked, reaching out to squeeze Mandy's arm just below her elbow.
Mandy nodded, looking down into her eggs and turning them over with her fork. "It's...alright," she said. "You know. Not a lot of excitement in that run, but it's been interesting all the same."
"Mmm, mm," her mum said, and Mandy felt the conversation taking a turn. Something else was coming, some attempt at parenting that she'd felt only a few times before, usually after a particularly poor grade. "Well. Have you met, you know...anyone? Anyone special?"
Mandy, mentally sighing, looked up at mum, steeling herself for the conversation that was coming. "I don't know what you mean, mum."
"You know," she said, and scooted her chair a bit closer, a motherly smile on her face. "A boy, perhaps. Or a girl. We're not choosy, darling."
"I've not met anyone, mum," Mandy said, sitting back and trying not to smile. "It wouldn't be professional, for starters--"
"I've heard of lots of Starfleet officers who found love on their postings," dad said. "There are all sorts of stories--why, Jim, you know him, his daughter was in your class--his parents were Starfleet officers. Served on one of the Enterprises, I think. It's possible, and your mum and I...well, we just want you to be happy, little bit."
"I am happy, dad," Mandy said around a bite of bacon. "Perfectly happy, but thank you all--"
"It's just," her mum began again, and Mandy realized she was probably in this for the long haul, and wondered if she could manage to pretend she'd received some vital communication from the Constellation, "we got a call, you know, from your chief, the nice one, his name was something or other--Lieutenant Baxter, maybe, I can't quite remember--but he's the chief pilot, and he said you'd been sort of, well--"
"Rather quiet and withdrawn," her dad chimed in, the easy back-and-forth of experienced parental interventions. Mandy considered whether shouting at your superior officer was as dreadful a faux pas as regulations would tend to suggest.
"Yes, withdrawn, that's a good way to put it," mum went on. "And we know you've always been a very quiet girl,"
"Very quiet," dad said.
"And of course, dear, that's just fine. It's only that Lieutenant Baxter is rather worried that you're having trouble, you know, adjusting. And he--we--thought that if you perhaps, you know...made a friend. Or met someone special, you know, that perhaps it would help."
"I don't need a partner, mum," Mandy said. "And I have...friends. Sort of. There's Adam, he's the other helmsman. We're friends. Sort of." The look her mum gave her spoke volumes. "We talk, over dinner in the mess sometimes. And when our shifts change. We say, you know, hi."
"I don't think, Mandy, that that's particularly what we mean when we say 'friends'," dad said, and Mandy sighed out loud then, because she really did not want to have this conversation. Not here, not now. Probably never, actually. She'd suffered through multiple sex talks and one embarassing almost-boyfriend spectacle, and she'd really hoped they were past this.
"Fine, I'll make...friends," Mandy said. "But I do have some."
"Of course, dear," mum said sweetly. "We just want you to be happy, you know, and to be making, well, real connections with real people, not just reading your books and spending time on the holodeck, you know." There was a pause while Mandy considered whether defending herself against this last charge was worth it. She did real things. Sometimes. Occasionally. You know. Like people did. "What about that Adam fellow? I remember him, he's the red-headed one, yes? He seems a nice boy. Or your roommate?"
"She's Bolian, mum," Mandy pointed out.
"Well yes, but it's the 25th century, darling," mum said. "All sorts of people date all sorts of people these days."
"Just count your lucky stars your great-gran isn't still about to remark upon it," dad said, and returned mum's look with a jaunty grin.
Mandy sighed. "That's not what I meant, mum. It's just...there's no one about who is...well, that I feel that way about, and I'm not going to make myself just so Lieutenant Baxter will feel better. I'm quite alright, I promise."
Her mum continued like she'd not said a word. "Or that girl who works on the bridge, we met her when we took you aboard. She lives just down the hall, you know. What was her name? Casey, I think. She's a sweetheart, you could talk to her. She's very pretty, too."
"Very pretty," dad said, nodding solemnly.
Mandy glanced from one of them to the other, trying to sense the trap hidden in the conversation. "Wait," she said, slowly. "You all do know I'm not a lesbian, right?"
"Are you not?" Mum said. "That's odd." Her dad grunted in agreement.
Mandy leaned forward, dropping her head into her hands. "Mum," she groaned. "The only person I've ever been interested in was a boy. Liam, you remember him?"
"Oh, of course dear, but it ended so quickly, and he was so strange,"
"Seemed more like a girl to me, anyway," dad said, and Mandy was pretty sure that if she rolled her eyes any harder, they'd disappear into the back of her skull.
"So we just assumed, you know, that it must be girls you were interested in. There's nothing wrong with it, of course,"
"Just be glad your great-gran isn't alive."
"It's the 25th century, you're free to be who you want to be, even to us darling."
"I don't want to be a lesbian, mum. I don't even know if I want to be with anyone," Mandy said, spreading her hands out for emphasis, trying to get them to understand because oh god I'm 22 years old, I can't be having this conversation with my parents. "I'm, you know, trying to figure out my life, and how my career is supposed to go, it's not like I have an incredible amount of time to just...go about kissing people."
"There's so much more to interpersonal relationships than kissing, Mandy," dad said, leaning toward her like he was imparting some deep mystery of the universe.
"And Casey is such a nice girl," mum said. "And I mean, if she wanted to go out with you, you could at least, you know. Go see if she's a pleasant girl, talk to her for a bit, have some cake."
Realization dawned, and Mandy felt her stomach sink out from under her. "You asked her to go out with me."
There was a long, awkward silence. Mandy felt rather than saw the look her parents exchanged, the way they communicated very parental things in a single glance, and knew she was doomed. "She ased us, darling. You know, just to see how you felt about it, and if you'd like to meet her tonight at that little place on St. John's. Your favorite, they serve that--"
"You set me up on a date," Mandy said, "with one of the most intimidating security officers on board."
Another silence, only her mother recovered more quickly from this one. "You see? You already have something in common with her! She thinks you intimidating! Isn't that funny? That's why she called us, because she wanted to find out more about you, whether you liked seafood, that sort of thing, and we said, well dear, no need to just ask, we'll tell her to go to that little place she loves so much, and you can meet her there, and it'll be grand! I even pulled that blue dress you wore to graduation, you remember the one, that one you wore to the little party afterwards, from storage and had it cleaned. It looks so fresh, even now, and I think it'll suit you just right."
Mandy knew her fate was sealed. There was no way to escape from this without irreperably harming her professional relationship with a woman who, quite honestly, scared her a lot. She also really didn't want to go on a date with her, but...well. Maybe it would be fun. Lieutenant Casey Byrne did know how to laugh, after all--Mandy had seen her making jokes with her actual friends--and she wasn't an unpretty woman. It was just...she was scary.
But Mandy went, anyway. She found herself, clad in the blue graduation party dress, deposited by a taxi down the street from the restaurant on St John St at seven o' clock precisely, with a storm in her stomach and more than a little shakiness of the nerves. She'd been stupid to agree to this--or, rather, not to refuse to go. She should've said no and...she didn't know. Go back to San Fransciso and hope somebody pitied her enough to let her sleep on their dorm floor until the Constellation returned for her in the morning?
Only, suddenly, somebody was coming up to her, and Mandy realized it was her. Casey Bryne, smiling from ear-to-ear in what, on anybody besides Mandy, would probably have been a desperately bashful smile. Mandy's bashful smile wasn't a smile at all, as she would consider later, but all she could manage to do was surrender her hand and let herself be pulled along by the inexorable force of the security officer's enthusiasm.
She let Casey talk, and talk, and talk--talk about the Constellation, and how scared Casey had been to talk to her, Mandy, because "you're always just off in your own little world. I never wanted to shake you from it, because you seemed so," a hefty, romantic sigh, "so happy." After that, they talked about piloting, Mandy thought, and she managed to say several things about being a helmsman and how much she loved to fly, and about how small the quarters were on the Constellation, and then they were walking along the Thames, a perfectly normal night in Mandy's life...except for the fact that she was hand-in-hand with a woman who, until two hours ago, had frightened her out of her wits, and she wasn't entirely certain how she'd gotten here.
Casey insisted upon calling a taxi and taking her home--a sweet gesture, Mandy thought, though she was pretty sure it was just because Casey wanted to sit next to her and hold her hand a little longer. It would've been sweet, if Mandy's palms hadn't been sweaty and she hadn't felt like her entire dinner was about to come back up. This was, she supposed, why she didn't go on dates, and she was so glad she'd discovered it before it was too late.
They climbed out in front of Mandy's house, and Mandy had a brief moment of panic when she realized that, maybe, Casey would want to come inside. She couldn't take her inside, because then her mum and dad would be there, and they'd want to talk to her, and she'd never get a word in edgewise, and tomorrow morning Mandy would have to go back to the ship and know that everything about her life had been spoiled because her parents had spent the evening planning their wedding.
"I'm sorry, my parents are probably headed to bed, and my brother has school in the morning," she offered as an excuse.
Casey nodded, easily, a smile playing at the corners of her mouth. "Of course," she said. "I won't impose. I've got to get back to the ship early, anyway, so..." Silence settled between them far too fast, thick and full of some sort of expectation Mandy couldn't figure out. There was something that was supposed to happen, she thought, but she couldn't--or didn't want to--think about it. "So, I'll just go. And see you tomorrow, maybe? Or maybe next weekend, when our duty load lightens up. We can...I don't know. Have dinner together or something again?"
Mandy felt herself nodding, heard herself saying something sweet and trying not to stammer too much. Casey's smile filled her vision, her fingers brushed against Mandy's cheek, and suddenly Casey's lips were against hers, a soft, tiny kiss that swallowed everything else up. "See you later," Casey breathed, and then she was gone, tripping lightly down the steps and down the street. Mandy felt like her head was somewhere up near the stars, and everything was spinning, and she was pretty sure she was going to be sick.
She should've never agreed to this. She got the door open and ran up the stairs as quick as she could, ignoring the questions mum shouted at her. Everybody needed to be quiet, because didn't Edwin have school or something? She had to be up early, and they knew that, and Mandy felt irrationally angry at everyone and everything, and everything clamored for attention, and she was upset at herself, and at Casey Bryne for putting her in this position, and tomorrow she'd have to go back to the ship and...deal with all of that....
She threw herself face-down on her bed, breathing in the scent of home and soakng up the feel of childhood. The door opened softly, and her mum came in, sitting down gently on the end of the bed. "How did it go, darling?" her mum asked, for once managing to be succinct.
Mandy sighed and said, into the pillow because she didn't dare lift her head, "I don't know, but I think I probably have a girlfriend now."