Can't say I've ever gone on a date where we sit across from each other on the floor dressed in our boxers but Joe's smile don't need long to ease me into it. I'm just high enough that my attention span allows me to forget this isn't real seconds after each time I remember it. Why get your heart broken once when it could happen three times a minute?

'Tell me about yo–' Joe interrupts herself by blowing a raspberry. 'Okay no, that sounds too much like a job interview. I've not been on a date since 2013.'

My chin drops to my chest, cheeks aching with my grin. 'What good am I getting out of you then?'

'I'm going to be a sex and relationships therapist, sir.' Grimacing, she lifts a hand to stop me before I can speak. 'That was weird. I am very much indeed high. Anyways, you're the one who keeps telling me I'd be a "mint therapist", so let me put my knowledge to some use!'

Timid suggestion: She might have a point; I do keep telling her that. This might actually be helpful for me—it can't be pure coincidence I keep finding people like Michael and Aziat and... everyone I've gone on more than one date with. But here's a new drinking game: Take a shot every time I have the chance to tell Joe about my parents and decide not to take it.

Joe pulls the bowl of crisps we forgot about approximately an hour ago to her side and chews one as she comes up with a question. 'Let's start easy: what is your favourite film?'

'Princess Mononoke. And White Chicks.'

'Your favourite film of all time is White Chicks?'

'It's dead hilarious, it is!' I drag the crisps in front of me instead, grabbing a handful. Is this a second wave of the munchies or am I stress eating? 'Also anything with Angela Bassett. She's my hall pass. I'm not usually into feminine people but Angela...'

'Isn't she sixty? You could literally be her grandson.'

I stare at Joe as I chuck crisps into my mouth one at a time. 'I'm waiting for you to arrive at a point.' My deadpan façade crumbles instantaneously. 'You?'

'Cate Blanchett.'

'No, I–' I bite down my laugh. 'I meant your favourite film.'

'Oh.' Joe starts to giggle and once she starts it takes her until she's gasping for breath to get it under control. 'To be honest, I don't really watch films. I'm a telly person.'

'Favourite series then?'

'I wanna say Insecure but probably BBC Merlin.' Seeing my expression, she jumps to her own defence: 'At least it's not BBC Sherlock. Elementary all the way! I'm so gay for Lucy Liu as Watson, that was the best casting decision ever made.'

'I think I've figured out the problem. We're both supposed to be going for women at least twice our age.'

'Probably would be the solution.' Joe pulls the crisp bowl closer but leaves it halfway between us. 'Oh, also Bake Off. Who doesn't like Bake Off?' I nibble on my crisps and her jaw falls to the floor. 'You don't like Bake Off?'

'Everyone finds it so bloody soothing but it stressed me out too much. My cortisol levels are high enough without worrying that someone's pastries won't rise or that they'll drop their cake on the floor. And I feel bad when someone gets bad critiques.'

Joe continues to stare at me like I've just tossed all her sex toys in the bin. 'Do you at least watch Strictly?'

'I'm not a complete barbarian.'

Lips pursed, she evaluates my position. Then she shrugs and moves on to the next question: 'What do you think about therapy?'

'How'd we get from Bake Off to therapy?' I baulk. 'Is this summat you often ask on first dates?'

'Yes! I mean, if I was going on dates, I would ask. Cause if someone says it's stupid hippie bollocks, I'm not going on a second date. So–' she narrows her eyes in a bad imitation of a TV cop—or, in a champion imitation of an over-played and/or satirical cop '–do you think it's stupid hippie bollocks?'

'No, I think it's mint. I can't afford it,' I add, '...but mint as a general concept. I did try to go, at uni, to the councillor but he more or less said that I weren't suicidal enough so they've got more urgent cases to deal with.'

There's a sting in my gut. I get it. If it's between me or someone like Cece, the decision is an easy one. But still sucks, innit.

I cast my eyes back onto Joe. 'Do you go?'

She drops her attention to her hands. 'My parents got us all therapy when my grandma passed.'

'I'm sorry.'

'Thanks.' Her hand lifts to fidget with her necklace. 'In general, my parents are "dental health before mental health" sort of people though they offered to get me a therapist up here after Tamsin but they already help me pay rent so, like... be a fucking adult, Joe.'

She busies herself by pouring the last crumbs of crisps into her palm and swabbing out even the dust of flavour adhered to the bowl. I watch her, debating whether it's better to speak or to avoid possible discomfort or the possibility that she finally kicks me out and revokes our agreement.

Speak, I decide: 'I dunno... Unless the offer were that either they pay for your therapy or they donate the sum to a children's hospital, you ain't doing owt by refusing that. You say no, your parents keep the money in their bank account—the middle-class guilt ain't gonna help anyone.' Okay, too far. 'Sorry. I didn't mean to be harsh–'

'No. You're right.'

At some point during the conversation, the sun slid out of sight and Joe's face is illuminated only by the dancing flames of the candles that she took with her from the bathroom. They're only stumps in a pool of melted wax now, different colours swirling on the tray. As I watch the gold glow on her rounded cheeks, the final blurs of my high fade from the periphery.

'So: what are your hobbies?' Joe asks.

'I don't have any hobbies.'

'Nikki! You–'

'I'm not avoiding attention,' I whine. 'I just don't have hobbies.'

I push my locs from one side of my head to the other. My hobbies are: crying in my car, staring at my phone, and falling down Reddit rabbit holes so I can avoid thinking about my own failures by judging people online.

'I used to read, I guess. I were a Percy Jackon tween. Were dead into Lord of the Rings for a bit there. Dunno, I've just not found the time since, like, GCSEs. I mean, I read all the time, about parenting and the environment and OCD. But when did I last read for pleasure? I can't remember that.

'I like plants. I love my friends. I love hanging out with my friends. I enjoy crafts when I get the time and the money. I go to the gym. I like cooking, I suppose, but I like cooking for other people, not because I like cooking... I just don't ever find the time to like properly learn summat.'

Hanging her head, Joe presses her left thumb into the web of her right and then alternates. She continues the movement, her thumbs twisting into an infinity sign, almost like she's having a thumb war with herself.

After she has kneaded out whatever discomfort I've inspired in her, she perks up again. 'You work in IT, right? What do you like about it?' Her smile slides off as she drops her head back and groans. 'Okay, before I apply for this internship I definitely have to learn how to ask questions without it sounding like an interrogation.'

'You're alright,' I say and mean it. Maybe it's just having been in a queer and heavily neurodivergent friend group for years, but I don't think her questions sound owt like an interrogation. 'They're just questions. You have to ask people questions to get to know them.'

'And you have to answer them,' Joe prompts.

The blossoms her presence grows in my ribcage are struggling under the tyranny of the elements. Each time new ones bloom, the wind whips them right out of the ground. There's not gonna be any wedding, you idiot. I have no long-term potential as a partner.

'IT...' I lift my hair back to the original side. 'That were meant to be temporary. I wanted to be a software developer but then I deferred my masters' and then I dropped out and, I dunno, with everything going on, I've just not had the energy to start job hunting. My current salary ain't amazing but it's far higher than it should be considering how little work there is. My boss is old money; the company's like a hobby to him.'

'So why did you want to go into software developing... -ment?'

'Pays well.'

'That's it?' She's asking the question earnestly, not as practice or part of an act. It must be pity that brims in her eyes. Is that better or worse than disgust? 'So what's your dream job?'

I look down, inspecting the dark grouts in my palms as though I'm searching for a cactus fibre spine, a kind of needle that's too small to see but that manages to inflame a wide radius of flesh. 'I don't have a dream job.'

Though Joe remains silent, my brain fills it in for her—You have to let people know you.

'I grew up, like, below the poverty line. We ain't got savings to fall back on and I have to support my brother, I've always known that. So I went into tech cause it's easy to get work and the salary's good. And I won't be replaced by a computer in 2030 cause they'll need someone to program the computers that are doing everyone else's jobs.

'I started teaching myself when I was twelve. I guess people thought that were passion but...' I drag my stare to meet hers though can't stop rubbing my wrist. Don't recall when I started. 'I know it's shallow. But I ain't really got the luxury of "not caring about money". Especially now; I don't really know if my brother will be able to work. Like, ever. Not full-time anyway.'

Joe's brows knit. 'What about your parents?'

I shrug. I don't wanna lie but I've already told her far too much. Take a shot.

A laugh chimes out of her. She's laughing. Just as my brain has concocted a theory about how she's so horrified to have spent a second of her time on me that she can only laugh, her gaze locks into mine and the way she looks at me... The way she looks at me is the opposite. Like every second is a gift.

'You're an actual saint, you know.'

I shake my head. 'My brother–' I cut myself off. I'll chase her away the way I do everyone else. Inbox: One-star Bumble review. 'Sorry, I'm talking about my brother again.'

'You're allowed to,' Joe says. 'They're a big part of your life. Talking about your brother shows that you're caring and responsible and reliable. That you're nurturing, patient, selfless, and... As long as you don't use them as a shield to avoid talking about yourself, I don't see how anyone would not want to hear about him.'

She must be saying that to appease my anxiety. She has to be. Because if she actually means it, my heart will decide she's my soulmate even if I don't intellectually believe in owt of that.

'I think it's cute.'

This is hopeless. If we keep doing this, I'll be unavoidably in love with her by the end of the week.

And that's exactly why we will keep doing this.

Joe won't notice; she wouldn't ever entertain the idea of someone like me with her, and I'll take any opportunity to be with her even if it's fake. Joe smiles again, her tooth gems glinting in the candlelight, and hammers the final nail on the coffin I've willingly lied down in.

Trolley Problem: Oh no! You're tied to the tracks and a trolley is approaching. You can pull a lever to turn the tracks into a loop and the trolley will drive over you infinitely.

Notes

Bake Off: The Great British Bake Off.

Strictly: Strictly Come Dancing.

GCSEs: General Certificate of Secondary Education. As the name suggests, these are a set of exams that result in a person's secondary school qualification in England, Wales, and Northern Ireland. They are externally set and assessed by an examination board. GCSEs are done in year eleven, so at the age of 15/16.