Page 13 of People Change

‘I didn’t see you there,’ she says.

He shrugs. ‘It was a long time ago.’

She knows exactly the day he is referring to. Just before she left to go off to Queen Mary’s to study History, she went to the country park by the Humber Bridge with her friends Phoebe and Carmen. They went there to get one last look at Hull before they left for university. Which was a bit dramatic, since Phoebe came back straight after her degree, and it wasn’t like they would never return during the holidays anyway. What Shirin didn’t tell her friends, though, was that it wasn’t solely for that reason that she wanted to go there. She didn’t even admit that to herself.

‘What you thinking about?’ Kian asks.

‘Not much.’ She stretches her legs and looks out the window, at the terraced houses they pass on their way, many with England flags on their windows. He makes a sound between a chuckle and a scoff, and she diverts her gaze from the passenger window straight to him. ‘What?’

‘I can still tell when you’re lying,’ he says.

She crosses her arms, relieved when they enter the supermarket car park. Because what Kian said isn’t right: he didn’t always know when she wasn’t telling the truth, and that was the problem all those years ago.

They walk in the supermarket at a leisurely pace, at first close together. But then Kian’s shoulder brushes Shirin’s and she takes a large step to the side, to prevent it happening again. The charcoal is at the front of the store, and next they make their way to the alcohol aisle. Overhead is a tannoy remindingcustomers of their offers on picnic food, beers and burgers, all perfect for the summer weather and the football.

‘Did you bring yourself a drink?’ Kian asks. ‘A soft drink, I mean.’

Her throat feels tight and she attempts to clear it, brushing her hand along the fabric detergents they pass on the way to their designated aisle. Instead of speaking, she nods a tad too enthusiastically.

‘Right, good,’ he says. She thinks that’s the end of it but he continues, ‘I know it’s rude to ask, but is there a reason you don’t drink? There doesn’t have to be, obviously. I’m just … Tell me to do one if you don’t want to say, and I won’t be offended.’

He is clutching the bags of charcoal to his chest and gives her a sidelong smile. Perhaps in other circumstances she would be annoyed by the question, but she chooses not to be and instead says, ‘I’m on medication that doesn’t go well with alcohol. I know, from experience, that it’s best when I don’t have it.’

‘Oh, I had no idea …’ His face is awkward, which makes her realise she has been more aloof than intended.

‘They’re for my anxiety.’ She cannot bring herself to say they’re antidepressants. It would signal, she realises, that while he has clearly progressed into a well-adjusted adult, she is exactly the same as she was at school: often sad – only now sad, worried and empty.

He nods like he understands. ‘I was on antidepressants at uni for a bit. I drank the same as I normally would, to begin with, and it completely wiped me out. So I get you.’

She really looks at him then. ‘You were?’

‘Yeah. I’m off them now, but they helped. And I stopped smoking weed – that really messed me up; I kept having panic attacks.’ He shakes his head as though to wipe away the memory and the overshare.

‘You don’t have them any more?’

‘No, thankfully. What are you anxious about?’ he asks. ‘If there is anything.’

It is so direct she is taken aback. She blinks and refocuses her attention ahead of her, on the various aisles filled with glossy goods that briefly divert her attention.

‘I don’t know,’ she says, though it’s a lie. Her issue is that she always thought once she got the things she longed for in life – to live in London and work in publishing, to be so far away from her sad life in Hull – she would be fulfilled and content. But she feels just as empty, though in a different way because she has nothing to hold on to, no imagined future to project on. This is it; this is life.

‘You can tell me, you know,’ he says, as though he is reading her mind.

‘Why are you being so nice to me?’ she whispers.

He stops walking, so she does too. They are down the snacking aisle, filled with various multipack crisps, nuts and chocolates. There is a woman and her small child at the far end, but it is otherwise empty. Kian looks down at her, his eyebrows furrowed.

‘Why wouldn’t I be?’

She clenches her jaw and breathes deeply through her nose. This is exactly the conversation she didn’t want to have,and yet she is the one who provoked it. ‘We stopped speaking … we stopped being friends.’ She hopes that he will understand what she means, that she doesn’t need to spell it out.

‘It was a while ago,’ he says.

‘I always thought you didn’t like me any more. And now you’re here, hanging out with my friends. It’s just weird.’

‘Maybe it’s fate?’ he says and she gives him a look. ‘Oh, come on, I’m joking.’

She picks up a packet of nuts next to her and weighs it in her hands, for something to do, something to distract herself with. ‘I don’t like to think about Hull or school. I know it makes me sound like a crazy person, and I want us to be able to be friends or at the very least friendly, but …’ She breathes out, accepting that she will have to sound like a crazy person. ‘On the condition that we don’t speak about school. Ever.’