Cece crumbles into jitters when we cross into the parameters of the crowd. His hands are buried in his pockets, and though I can't hear the rhythmic clicking over the music and the chants, I'd be happy to bet they're fidgeting with their zippo lighter. I can't blame them—Pride is as close as you can get to taking ecstasy without, you know, taking ecstasy but it is also overwhelming, to say the least. People travel to Manchester Pride from all over the country and Cece don't know how to move with the ebb and flow of a crowd.

Cece has always been a proud Manc. He wears Moss Side like a service medal. But maybe they've already become a country boor. Oak Shaw Group Home might be a bit tight but I'm pretty sure there's enough space for six teens, no matter how troubled, on a three-acre land. Have they lost their city legs so quickly?

I duck closer so he can hear me over the music. 'You alright?'

They nod.

'Oh, there's Duchess!' Caleb pulls at my locs like a bridle to steer me left. We reckoned the easiest way to find the others were if I carry Caleb piggyback like a barrelman but he's a little too enthusiastic in the role. Caleb knocks his feels into my thighs. 'Giddy up, baby girl.'

I peer through the carnival feathers and waving pride flags. 'I can't see owt.'

'Just go this way.' He points aggressively and I weave through the crowd with Cece at my heels.

Duchess and Sarah come into sight from behind a group of women wearing Proud 2 b Parents t-shirts. Duchess has constructed a Georgian gown out of school skirts and old ties that I just know she is sweltering in, not that she'll show a sign of discomfort. At the other end of the spectrum, Sarah is wearing an American cheerleader miniskirt and crop top. I lower Caleb back to his feet and he showers them both with praises he probably already gave when they left Spectrum.

Cece hovers behind me. I grab his shoulders to display him. 'This is Cece,' I introduce. 'That's Duchess of Sassington or Rishi. And Sarah Tonyn usually Allan, our token cishet friend.'

Cece gives his best go at a wave. Looks like his hand is wired to the lining of his pocket and can only stretch so far before it's yanked back in.

'You can call me Cecilio if you want.' They glance at my confusion. They've been firm about not being called Cecilio as the only "fuck you" to Mamá and Papá in his artillery. He ducks from my attention. 'I'm fine with it now.'

'Nice to meet you finally, Cecilio,' Duchess says in posher English than the Queen would. The duchess persona lets Rishi satirise, notjust gender, but also the English. 'Though in a sense it feels as though we've known you for years.' She casts me a mocking look and my cheeks burn. They can't actually be the only thing I talk about.

Sarah bounces on her heels and I twist an ankle looking at it. 'Nikki said this is your first Pride. That's so exciting! I can't believe we get the honour of taking you to your first-ever Pride. Do you feel fabulous?'

Her brow scrunches as she looks over Cece's black outfit embellished with plenty of steel jewellery. He's wearing what I'm pretty sure are literal dog collars, one spiked, one choke chain—which ain't weird for Pride (we passed a whole group dressed in dog gimp suits), but the lack of latex or visible skin rules Cece out of the kink subculture. Caleb transformed their usual dramatic eyeliner into an illusion of spiders, so dark that with the full black lens, his left eye is entirely invisible even in daylight.

'Is that what you're wearing?'

'Coming from your Patrick Star-looking ass. You ever heard of sunblock?'

Duchess covers her smile. In accordance with her name, Duchess of Sassington is as glamorous as she is mean, which is only half as mean as Rishi is. The second the wig comes off, the Queen's English shade is switched to Northern Irish sarcasm. But when Cece, monotonous as ever, adds, 'Maybe your name should be Maya Nayze', Duchess shrieks with laughter.

She looks at me with sparkling eyes. 'Where've you been keeping this kid?' Her voice is uncharacteristically cushioned as she leans into Sarah. 'Darling, they'll have to invent an SPF 500 just for you.'

Caleb snorts. 'Need some SPF 69. That'll get ya Sarah Tonyn.'

Sarah laughs too, lifting her pom poms in surrender. 'You shouldn't use kettles in glass houses.'

Cece's eyebrows pinch but when no one else reacts, they let it go. Sarah Tonyn is Allan's alter ego who never got off the coke. She does a champion job at acting high all the time because out of drag, Allan still gives the vibe that he's high all the time. For the first year of knowing him, Caleb and I reckoned that's how people from Isle of Man are. Then we realised that actually, it's just how Allan is.

'I'm asexual, aromantic, agender,' Cece answers when Duchess asks. 'Nicolás told me to get straight A's, so...'

I smile with the others. So that's one A for every GCSE they didn't show up to.

'Oh, bless, more asexuals.' She forgets her regal manners in her excitement. 'All these people talk about is sex.'

'Where's Parker?' I ask, noticing his absence when he don't combat the accusation (all Parker does talk about is sex).

'He went to find more liquids.'

'I already brought water for everyone,' I say sliding my backpack from Caleb's shoulder. The convenience of a Class of 2017 theme is that the backpack goes with the outfit.

'Other liquids, darling.'

'Right, well–' I hook the bag onto my shoulder '–I got water for everyone. And protein bars, sponsored by NutriLents. And I do have SPF 50 when anyone needs to reapply. It's the spray you like so it's autism-friendly.'

Caleb beams. The rhinestones turn him into a second sun. As in, impossible to look at. 'Nice. Is the SPF 69 also autism-friendly?'

'You know, darling,' Duchess drawls, 'changing every number to sixty-nine does not actually make you a comedian.'

'Girl, I know you ain't tryna give me feedback on comedy, girl. You're so unfunny that instead of the library you end up at bingo. What a bore, thirty-four... twenty, ay!' He holds his palm up for me to high-five.

Eilidh, Caleb's girlfriend, is visiting family this weekend but his sister isn't here either. Daisy's absence is hard to miss; she's always been part of our Pride group. The very first Pride I came to with Caleb, Daisy held both our hands in the crowd (their mums were a little eager on the sangria). But after the Ariana concert, she don't do well with crowds either.

'Are your mums coming?'

Caleb curls his lip. 'Hopefully not. They'll start world war three.'

'That bad?'

'They might not be the first lesbian couple to get married in this country but they sure are the first to get divorced.' He lifts an ironic fist of resistance. 'Gay rights.'

Despite the celebratory spirit, I pull him into a hug and Caleb suffuses into it. His mums were always a second set of parents to me—first set, if we're being honest. Behati and Sachiko's home is so full of love, it spills out. They hand it to anyone who wants it. When queer marriages were legalised three years ago, it were a given that they'd do it; for all intents and purposes, they were already married. I still can't grasp that they're splitting up.

Caleb squeezes me for a few seconds before he forces himself to compartmentalise family drama somewhere to the back of his mind. 'It'll be–'

Cece nudges me side while typing summat on his phone, my old one. They cracked it a week after I gave it to them. A year later, the screen is shattered; he'll end up with bits of glass in his thumbs. 'Diwa said she's here somewhere.'

We leave the others to get to the bus stop they've determined as the landmark for them to meet at. Cece is back to fidgeting. It turns out the crowd isn't the source of his anxiety; he roots in the middle of it.

They squint at me. 'Diwa's bringing some of her... other friends.'

'Are you nervous to meet her other friends?'

'I ain't talking about my feelings with you, fuck off.' He rams his shoulder into me as he ducks past angel wings and protest signs but abruptly spins around to face me again. 'What if none of them like me?'

'Diwa likes you.'

'What if they're better friends than me?'

'It's not RuPaul's Best Friend Race.'

Cece don't as much as blink. Note to self: never make a joke again.

He looks away, watches the crowd though his mind has clearly drifted elsewhere. 'What if I get angry?' I think I read the words from his lips because he mumbles so quietly there's no chance I'd hear it over the chaos of Pride. The first questions were leaves; this is the root.

I strangle the urge to reach out, squeeze their hand, pull them into a hug. What I do is take a single step forward. 'We can leave at any point you want to. I'll be here, just phone me if you're starting to feel agitated. Take breaks, go walk Esther.'

Cece chews on his thumbnail but peels his stare from our trainers.

'Just remember to eat—food, not Monster Energy. If you and Diwa end up at a party, that's alright. Just stick together and remember you don't have to drink because everyone else–'

'Why have you made me a butty?'

I unzipped my backpack while talking and now hold out a bottle of water and a sandwich in a zip-lock bag. Cece stares at it like I'm offering him live dragonfly nymphs as a snack.

'So you remember to eat.'

'It's like it's your life mission is to humiliate me.' He grabs the bag, sarcastically holding it like a clutch purse. 'What am I supposed to do? Walk around carrying a piece of bread.'

'You've got five million pockets, haven't ya?'

'I'm not carrying a sandwich in my pocket.'

I curb the need to roll my eyes but the gesture ends up in my voice anyway. 'Eat it now then.'

Cece keeps glaring at me but even with the spiders Caleb has drawn on his face and one eye a black hole, the impact is dulled by him stuffing a peanut butter sandwich into his mouth.

'As I was tryna say, I'll be at Spectrum pretty late–' assuming nowt bad happens '–so I might only see you in the morning.'

This hooks Cece's interest. 'Can I come?' they ask through a mouthful of bread.

'No.'

He takes a swig of water to wash down the crumbs so he can slot his grillz back into place, "accidentally" flashing F-U-C-K at me in the process. '¿Por qué?'

'Porque tienes dieciséis años.'

'It's my birthday on Monday.'

'Mint. Unless you're turning twenty...'

'But you work there,' he whines. 'Can't you get me in?'

'Probably could.' He inhales, ready to get convincing. 'Cece, it's not happening.'

I'm not letting him around that much alcohol and... other things, which Spectrum is well lax on. I used to find it weird that Sasha puts so much of his time into raising awareness about addiction within the community when he's so lenient about it at his own club—sounds about as worthwhile as carbon offsets. But Allan explained that the only reason he ever got clean were access to harm reduction and low-threshold resources. So I guess it makes sense.

No chance I'm bringing Cece into a place like that, though. Not after he has just managed to be sober for a couple months.

He shoves the water bottle into one of the pockets of his cargo trousers, casting me a scowl. But someone calls his name before he can insult me. Diwa weaves her way through the crowd, left waiting at the bus stop for too long. Cece's jagged edges soften at the sight of her and they meet her halfway in a hug. My heart pinches.

No. No, it don't. I'm not jealous.

But why didn't he hug me?

They clash, Cece all in black and Diwa in her pastel pinks. She has plaited her sleek hair into two braids with lesbian ribbon and Cece don't complain when the glitter from her cheekbones rubs off on their shirt. Diwa has clearly heard about the broken wrist before because she don't react to the cast. Nor do she react to the bruises.

She waves in the direction where the rest of her friends wait with their various pride flags and Cece takes her hand, allows her to guide him through.

'Alright, have fun!' I call after them. 'Phone me if summat happens!'

Why didn't they hold my hand?

Notes

Llavero: (lit. 'keychain') Colombian slang for your group of close friends. You can call your friends "mi llaves" (lit. 'my keys') in a similar connotation to "my homies" in English. They're something you want to keep close and don't want to lose. If you have a friend break up, you can say you're removing them from the keychain.

Moss Side: A neighbourhood in Manchester that has a reputation for gang violence and high rates of murder. If you look it up in Urban Dictionary, you'll find people describing it as "British Compton" or "British version of South Central" (of Los Angeles, California). Moss Side was included in the parts of the city with the nickname 'Gunchester' in the 90s. It's a perfectly safe place to live today.

Manchester Arena Bombing: ISIS terror attack during an Ariana Grande concert on 22 May 2017. 22 died and 1017 were injured.  

The Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Act: Passed in 2013 and came into effect early 2014. Since this chapter is set in August of 2017, there have only been three years of (state-recognised) queer marriages in the UK.

The library: Reference to the documentary Paris is Burning about New York drag culture in the 90s. 'Reading' is the art form of insulting people, hence the library is where you metaphorically go to read. Reading in queer communities originated from wanting to reclaim the vitriol we face living in a queerphobic world. It's all in good fun. Reading is direct and blunt, which then evolved into 'shade' meaning to insult someone in a passive-aggressive way. 

RuPaul's Best Friend Race: Said by Lashauwn Beyond in S4.

Butty: Manchester slang for a sandwich.

Mint: Excellent.

¿Por qué?: Why?

Porque tienes dieciséis años: Because you're sixteen years old.

Harm reduction: A method of treating substance use disorders by providing addicts places where they can use drugs safely and with dignity. The goal is to reduce drug-related deaths, diminish stigma, and provide resources for recovery.