It made no sense to Ishaana that she was already halfway through her Easter break, the days flying by when she had thought that they would drag. For two weeks it had been since Casey and Bishop had left for America, she had spent each and every night at home and not a single message had been exchanged between them. Her phone had never buzzed with a message from cdsety, and she had never had Bishop's number in her phone in the first place: for fourteen days, her only focus had been Priya. Despite the proximity, she had only seen Melody twice and Pearl once, catching a glimpse of Oscar at one point.

She was determined to make good on her promise, and she had surprised herself by how easy it was to be with her family. They weren't there to judge her, or to hold it over her that she had not been so reliable in the past: Sunita had welcomed her back into the house with open arms in every sense, and even Saffiya had made the house feel like a home. Ishaana now had three new recipes stored in her memory, each of which she vowed to cook before she headed back to university in a couple of weeks. She only had two exams but she wouldn't be able to concentrate enough at home, relying on the campus library when it came to actually working, though that wasn't something she was used to yet.

When Sunday came, a day that Sunita was around the house without the beckon of work calling her away from home, Ishaana felt the need to get away. Not to go far; not to leave. But the urge to step outside of the house without worrying about her sister, without the constant need to keep an eye on someone other than herself when sometimes that alone was hard enough. As morning turned to afternoon, once she had whiled away the hours with a long bath followed by a lazy breakfast, she slunk into the conservatory where she knew her aunt was sewing while her sister was trawling her way through the unfair mound of holiday homework.

"Hey," she said when she stepped through the door, though she had spent much of the morning with her family. Sunita looked up with a soft smile before her gaze flickering back down to the impossibly fine needle and thread in her hand, the thin metal swiftly piercing the fabric over and over as she pieced together a patchwork quilt she had been working on for several more weekends than Ishaana had witnessed.

"Hey," Priya said. She was sitting at the table with her feet tapping along to the song on the radio, a pencil jittering in her left hand as her body unconsciously jived to the music. Her midnight hair was tied in a fat plait that snaked down her back, tapering to a waved point just above her waist, and she played with a few loose strands that she constantly wound around her finger before letting them spring free and repeating the practice over again.

Ishaana slipped onto a chair beside her sister, reading her geography textbook upside down. She hated the subject, one that she had dropped as soon as she had been allowed, and even the year eight work went over her head now, beyond what she could recall from those long and stuffy classroom days.

"What're you up to?" Priya asked, eyeing her sister as though she thought she was up to something, but Ishaana just shrugged.

"Nothing, really," she said, idly digging her nails into one of her sister's erasers until it was snatched away from her with a scowl.

"Hey, don't do that. I just had to get a new one. Don't ruin it." She zipped the rubber away in her pencil case and pulled her plait over her shoulder, lips pressed together as she fiddled with the end. "You look lost."

Ishaana hummed to herself. She felt a little lost, as though the two weeks at home after never having spent so long there at once had reprogrammed her brain to a version of itself that she didn't recognise. Though she was often bored at university, it never really got to her: sometimes she would just head to Melody's room and talk to her as she painted, or she would lie on the sofa and watch television until one of her flatmates came home and stayed to talk. Here, she wasn't alone, but she felt it in a different way.

Her family had learnt how to go about their lives without her, adapting to life without her. They were comfortable if she was there; they were comfortable if she wasn't. But she was still learning the former after living for so long as the latter.

It took a moment for her to build the confidence to ask her sister a simple question, and inside she scolded herself for building up a fear of the words that had never scared her before. Now they came with weight behind them, the load of broken promises and tested limits.

"Do you mind if I go out?" she asked, resting her elbows on the table before she dropped her hands down, the wood cooling her forearms.

"Since when did you ask permission?" Priya raised her eyebrows, turning the page to continue copying down a question that had been split overleaf.

"Since I promised I'd stay," Ishaana said, and she glanced over at her aunt who wore an appreciative smile, taking her glasses off her nose in a move that instantly softened her features. "I don't want to break a promise."

Priya laughed and shook her head, as though realising a misunderstanding that she would now have to unravel. "Your promise was to come home for the holidays. Not to stay by my side every waking minute," she said. "You can go out. Jeez, Ishy, you don't need to ask me." With a laugh, she nudged her sister's foot beneath the table, eyes moving down as she set to work on answering the question she had just written out. "I just didn't want you to say you'd come and then not come. Or only come for a few days." Her gaze returned to her sister's, holding it for a couple of seconds. "You've proved yourself. It's ok. And it means a lot."

A slow smiled tickled Ishaana's lips before it grew a little wider and she felt her cheeks warm. "Thanks, Pri," she said, crossing her arms on the table, and she looked over at her aunt. "Is it ok if I head out for a few hours? I'll be back for supper."

"Of course, Ishy," Sunita said. It was only in the past few days that she had begun to call Ishaana by her nickname, signalling a new stage in their relationship that had hit Ishaana harder than she had thought it would. "And if you want to stay out later, just send me a message."

"I will," Ishaana said, letting go of her angst as though she was seeing off a balloon into the sky, and she smiled at her aunt. "Thanks, Suni."

Sunita's attention had returned to her sewing, holding her needle up to the light to rethread it with a new colour, but the words didn't go unnoticed and nor did it slip Ishaana's attention when she saw her aunt smile and heard her say, "It's my pleasure."

Town was quiet. Sundays in Farnleigh often were, after Saturday monopolised the week as the busiest day and its successor failed to live up. Some of the shops were closed, taking the seventh day of the week off for a well-deserved rest: much of Farnleigh was made up of small, independent businesses run by families or friends, surviving off profits and little else. Holidays were sacrificed in favour of working for the money that would have paid for them, and Ishaana admired the tenacity of the people who had the motivation and determination to see a business idea to fruition. It was not something she ever envisaged for herself, with no idea how she would even begin to get a business off the ground.

What she would do after university, she had no idea. With a little more than a year left, so little time that it frightened her, she didn't think about her future as much as she ought to have done when it was approaching so fast and a seed of dread planted itself in her stomach as she wandered past shop after shop, trying not to lose herself too deeply in the worry that plagued too many of her friends. It was all well and good to get a degree, but she didn't know where she would end up once she had donned the cap and gown of graduation. She only hoped that she would have Melody by her side to help her find her way.

At that thought, as she reached the far end of town that was almost two miles from home, two miles for which she had walked solidly without stepping through a single door, she took her phone out to dial Melody without the waiting around involved with sending a text.

It rang for ten long seconds before there was a click on the other end, then a faint rustle before a voice.

"Hey Ishy!" Melody said, perpetually excited as though joy was the only emotion she knew. "What're you up to?"

"Just walking around town," Ishaana said, coming to a stop outside a bakery that was producing the most delicious smells. Her stomach rumbled, reminding her that it had been three hours since she'd eaten a meagre breakfast of toast and peanut butter. Not enough to sustain her for the day, she had decided, and her stomach agreed. "Are you around?"

"Yup," Melody said, her eternal happiness even showing through in the optimistic solitary syllable. "Ossie's just headed back to Edinburgh, actually. Pearl and I were gonna have a picnic at home; you're more than welcome to join. As always." Her smile shone through in her voice, calming Ishaana in an instant.

"That'd be awesome," she said, letting a glimmer of relief sink into her heart at the thought of spending some well-needed – and deserved – quality time with her two best friends. Although she and Pearl were chalk and cheese, virtual opposites in almost as many ways as it was possible to be different to someone, they had found a way to be friends despite everything that went against their favour. Ishaana had come to appreciate Pearl's quiet company over the years, even benefiting from her occasional gently sensible observations.

"Fab, see you soon?"

"See you soon," she said, and her smile returned to her lips. Sometimes she lost herself, dragged under by the waves of thought that crashed over her head and swallowed up the light, swimming in the wrong direction until someone showed her the right way. That someone was invariably Melody, who had been her rock for what felt like far longer than the time for which they had known each other.

Melody's house was a couple of miles away. A forty minute walk, or a thirty minute wait for a seven minute bus journey, or the sacrifice of a few pounds for a taxi. The latter option was easily the most favourable and Ishaana dug out a cherished five pound note from her purse, preparing to part with the hard cash as she headed over to the taxi rank. Money had been less of an issue than ever for the past two weeks, with Sunita providing every meal that she ate at home, working hard to ensure that there was food on the table every morning and every evening, and it cost nothing to wander into town every now and then.

There was a newfound freedom in living at home. Ishaana had forgotten how nice it was to be within a twenty minute walk of town, rather than having to cram onto a stuffy bus for just as long when she was at university. It made her shiver to wonder how many germs she came into contact with on those buses, countless coughs and sneezes and people of questionable hygiene, and she pushed that thought out of her mind as she raised her hand at one of the waiting taxis.

It only took six minutes to drive the two miles, even with a slight diversion around the one-way system, and Ishaana paid the four pound fare with a smile, instructing the driver to keep the change as a meagre tip when she slammed the door. The sight alone of Melody's house was enough to settle her spirits. Even from outside, it was evident that it belonged to an artist. Two artists, in fact.

The window panes were painted bright colours that contrasted against the red brick of the old town house and the small patch of front garden was dotted with flowers of as many colours as possible in April. The white railing was splashed with paint in an array of rainbow colours, handmade clay fairies and gnomes hidden amongst the growth in the bushes and the twines that wound their way around the metal rails. It was like something out of a storybook, Ishaana always thought, and it was impossible not to smile as she raised her hand to the stained glass window and knocked.

Melody answered, her hair flying in Ishaana's face as she hugged her. "Hey, Ishy! God, I feel like I haven't seen you in forever," she said, dramatic as always as she swirled her friend into the house and pushed the door shut with her foot. "What's it been, like, a week? That feels like way too long."

Ishaana laughed, relishing in the sweet scent of the Morley house. Like her own, it was a women's haven, devoid of men. While it was usually occupied only by Melody and her mother, Frankie's girlfriend, Mirai – who was practically her wife – spent as much time as possible there, when she wasn't stationed abroad. Her daughter Nora, whom Melody had adopted as the closest thing to a sister she would ever get, was only occasionally in the house. Like Ishaana, she seemed to prefer to while away her days at university with her friends as a substitute family.

The place always had a sweet aroma of lavender and incense mixed with the subtle scent of paint and the earthy richness of the clay that Frankie often worked with out of her home studio, the loft conversion she had worked hard to bring to fruition. It still felt more like home than her actual home, but Ishaana was determined to work on that.

"Come on, come through," Melody said. "Pearl's outside. The weather's actually nice for once so we thought it'd be cool to have lunch outside. I made a quiche and Pearl even bothered making sushi – which is to fucking die for, might I add – and there's potatoes and all that jazz." She grinned at Ishaana, her eyes sparkling behind her smudged glasses as she led her through the kitchen.

"Got the place to yourself?"

"Mmhmm." Melody nodded, her hair bouncing. She stopped off in the bright, airy kitchen to fill a neon blue jug with water and ice from the fridge-freezer, throwing in a handful of lemon slices that lay freshly cut on the counter. "Mum went to the base to talk to Mirai. They're on some kind of security alert or something, I don't know, but they can only talk on a secure line or, well, I don't really know the details, but Mum said she had to go to the base, so..." She shrugged it off, though Ishaana wasn't oblivious to the flicker of disappointment that shimmered through Melody: she loved Mirai as though she was her own mother. She practically had been for eight years.

"Sorry, Mel," Ishaana said, pursing her lips. "That sucks that you didn't get to go."

"It's fine." Melody smiled. "I've got you guys, eh? And Mirai will be home soon. She's due back next month." A smile lit up her cheeks at the thought. She nodded at the wide French doors that led out to the surprisingly generous garden. It wasn't terribly wide but it was long, deeper than the house itself. Tall fences guarded it either side from prying eyes, the wooden panels painted white to be the ultimate blank canvas. A gran oak tree dominated the far end of the garden, Melody's childhood treehouse still standing, but today's picnic was taking place in the middle of the lawn.

A blanket was laid out, in the middle of which was a variety of food. Pearl sat cross-legged to one side, lifting one hand to shade her eyes and the other to wave at Ishaana when she spotted her. Ice clinked in the jug as they made their way over to her, the quintessential sound of summer on its way, and Ishaana bent down to hug her friend before she took her own seat.

"You guys are so domestic," she said with a laugh, her stomach growling as she looked at the array of food that Melody and Pearl had cooked and bought. "In a good way. An awesome way. This is really cute."

"You can talk about being domestic," Melody said. "This is literally the longest we've gone without spending a night in the same house. Like, ever since I've known you. Don't think we've even made it a week before. What's going on with you?" she asked, though her tone was one of gentle teasing rather than genuine accusation.

"I've been with Priya," Ishaana said, lifting one shoulder and letting it drop as she filled her plate with the variety of goodies, taking a little of everything. Pearl really had gone all out with the sushi she had made, a favourite of hers with her pescetarianism, and Ishaana rolled her eyes at the first taste. "Oh my God, Pea, this is amazing."

"Thanks," Pearl said, with the same sort of understated pride that Sunita possessed. The two weren't dissimilar: quiet, accomplished cooks who went out of their way to fly under the radar. "It's nothing, really." She shrugged. "Easy when you know how."

"I could know how and I'd still fuck it up," Ishaana murmured, taking another piece of sushi and dotting it with soy sauce. Opposite her, Melody's eyes twinkled with a cheeky glint and she raised her eyebrows, wondering what was coming next.

"Speaking of fucking it up," Melody said, speaking slowly, "how're you coping without your fuck buddy?" Her eyebrows began to dance as though they had a mind of their own and Ishaana laughed, almost choking on the salmon and rice.

"Considering he's just a fuck buddy, I'm coping just fine," she said, shaking her head and issuing Melody the slightest of warning glances. For now, Pearl was in the dark with regards to what had happened the night before Bishop and Casey had left the country, and she wanted it to stay that way. "Having less sex. That's about it."

Melody chuckled as she continued to pile her plate high. "What about your feel buddy?" she asked. Ishaana frowned, the term going right over her head.

"What the fuck's a feel buddy?" she asked, eyebrows knitted above her nose.

"Bishop," Melody said. "You know, the guy who blatantly likes you even though you keep sleeping with his bandmate. And who I have a sneaking suspicion you like too. You can deny it all you want: I stick by my guns."

Ishaana snorted, shaking her head to herself. "Say what you like, Mel, there's nothing there," she said with a sigh, though she had grown more familiar with that flipping of her stomach that she'd felt for the first time two weeks ago.

"This is gonna get messy, Ish, I promise you," Melody said, controlling the conversation while Pearl listened on in mild fascination by the antics that her friend got up to, the kind of things she had never even dreamt off.

"It's so unfair," she murmured, biting into a salmon and cream cheese sandwich. "How come you have two guys and I don't even get one?"

Ishaana rolled her eyes and laughed. "Pea, I promise you, I don't have two guys. I have one guy I fuck and one guy I talk to. So really, I only have one guy when you put them together."

"Conversation and sex?" Pearl asked, one eyebrow raised, and she dropped her eyes to her food as she pierced a piece of quiche with her fork. "Bit ambitious for one guy, really."

The afternoon passed in the easy togetherness of the kind of friendship that lasted, the three of them having no trouble filling the gaps with conversation while some lay empty when they let the words settle. There was no expectation amongst them, no pretence between three people who had been through a lot together and apart and they had made it this far. Ishaana had felt utterly at ease as she had lain on the soft grass with the sun warming her cheeks, resting with her eyes closed and her arms behind her head. Those were the moments she valued most in a friendship, when nothing needed to be said.

Several hours passed before she made her way home on the bus, timing it perfectly so that she made it to the stop moments before it pulled up, and she was home ten minutes later. Just in time for supper. It had been a companionable day, sandwiching her friends between the moments she had spent with her family, and it was after eleven by the time she and Sunita headed upstairs, hugging in the hallway. Another weekend was over, the third that Ishaana had spent at home, and there would only be two more before she was gone again.

She was sitting in bed in a pyjama t-shirt and nothing else at two o'clock in the morning, watching a show on Netflix to accompany her into sleep, when her screen blackened for a moment before it flashed up with a video call. She never video called anyone. Especially not Casey. And especially not at two in the morning. But it was him on the other end of the line, and Ishaana felt that familiar squirm of the thrill of the unexpected as she swiped right to answer. Cdsety was replaced with Casey's face, his eyes drooping with tell-tale drunkenness. He didn't look any different. The fortnight he had been in America had yet to change him.

"Ishy?" he slurred, his eyebrows furrowing. "Why're you in the phone?"

"You called me," she said, holding the phone in front of herself at a mildly flattering angle. Her light was still on, highlighting every part of her for the camera.

"Yeah," he said, pushing dirty blonde hair off his face. "Shit. It's late for you, isn't it?"

"Only two," she said. "I wasn't sleeping. You ok?"

"Horny as fuck," he said, his voice low, and Ishaana laughed. She could see that: he had made no effort to hide his blatant erection. "We're in Florida. Too fucking hot. So fucking humid. God. I'm so fucking horny."

"I can see that," she said, keeping her voice down so as not to wake anyone else. Sunita was the lightest sleeper, but her room was the farthest from Ishaana's and the house was a modern build with thick, insulated walls. "You been thinking about me?" She winked and grinned, and Casey shrugged.

"Sometimes," he said. It was only nine o'clock at night for him, but he seemed pretty wasted and from the looks of it, he was in yet another hotel room. In the background behind him, Ishaana spied a guitar case and the usual debris scattered around his room. "Thinking about your tits. Thinking about fucking you. God, I wanna fuck you, Ishy."

"I want to fuck you too," she whispered, aware that the house was silent except for her voice. "Tell me what you want to do." She sat up a little straight, balancing her phone on cushion between her knees to free up her hands.

"I wanna fuck you hard," he slurred. His hand moved to his pants, stroking over his erection before he freed it from his boxers, lazily pumping his hand. "I wanna hold you down and fuck you in the ass. I wanna hear you scream. I want you to suck my dick and I want to come in your mouth. Fuck, Ishy, I want to fuck you so badly."

Watching him touch himself as he spoke, Ishaana felt that flood of warmth pooling between her hips that she recognised instantly as arousal, her skin prickling at the thought of what Casey wanted to do to her when she already knew so well what he was capable of. Not as much as Bishop, perhaps, but enough to leave her wanting even more. One hand trailed to her chest, and Casey groaned.

"Oh, yeah, I wanna see those tits. Fuck, I love those little tits," he said, his eyes fixed on Ishaana's hand as she squeezed her nipple through her t-shirt before she pulled it off. Sitting naked in her bed, Casey could see everything from her waist up and she thrived on the distance. He could see her; he wanted her, but he couldn't have her. Both hands massaged her breasts and Casey's lips loosened into a drunken grin. "Oh fuck, yeah, squeeze your tits, Ishy," he said. "I wanna fuck you hard and come on your tits and bite your fucking nipples."

"Mmm," she said with a smile as she thought about it, her skin tingling from the memory of all that he had done before. In her mind, she felt him fill her and her legs spread apart, one hand tracing down. "I want you to fuck me," she murmured. "I want you to come on me. I want you to come in me. I want you to pound my ass so hard. I want you to come in my ass. I want to suck you off and swallow every last drop."

"Fuck yeah, you do," he grunted, his hand moving faster. Ishaana knew that he wouldn't last too long, not if he was drunk and he had worked himself up already, so she slipped one hand between her legs and felt that in just a couple of minutes, she had worked up a slick arousal. Her fingers glided over her skin, slipping into herself with ease, and she angled her phone so Casey could see what she was doing. He watched as she explored herself with two fingers, staring as they disappeared inside her as deeply as she could push them.

"I want you to fuck me with your fingers," she said as she did the same to herself, her thumb occasionally grazing over her clitoris as she waited to tease the sensitive bud. Her free hand found her bedside table, pulling it open in search of a dildo, but this wasn't her university bedroom. She had brought home a couple of essentials but they were hidden in case of prying eyes, and she groaned at the inability to fuck herself with something thicker than her own two fingers. Her hand fell on her hairbrush, wrapping around the handle, and she inspected it for a moment before bringing it into view.

"Fuck yourself, Ishy. I wanna watch you fuck yourself. Fuck, is that a hairbrush?" He laughed a tipsy laugh and he groaned. "Fuck yourself with it. I wanna see you fuck yourself with the hairbrush."

She didn't need much encouragement. She didn't really need any at all when she was already working herself up, and she pushed the unrelenting handle into herself, shifting on the bed for a better angle as she held onto the head of the brush and pushed it in. Casey watched every moment, eyes locked onto her hand as he wanked himself off. Ishaana couldn't tear her eyes from him, drinking in the sight of him touching himself as he watched her, as one hand held the makeshift dildo while the other found her clitoris again.

Casey was pushing himself hard, his speed increasing as he chased after the orgasm he always craved, and Ishaana knew that if she rubbed herself while pumping the hairbrush in and out, she would be able to reach that peak within a couple of minutes. Her body was well trained and she knew exactly how to use it. Widening her legs, she arched her back a little to dig her hips into the mattress and give Casey an even better view. He grunted his satisfaction, his breaths quickening as he grew closer and closer to the edge.

Ishaana tipped her head back, her mouth hanging open as she fucked herself with both hands. It was always guaranteed to get her off, and quickly. She knew herself better than any guy, well versed in the art of masturbation, and she didn't need to watch Casey to maintain that image in her mind as she closed her eyes, increasing her own speed.

He grunted, breathing hard as he came, and the sound pushed Ishaana ever closer to her own goal. One finger rubbed her slippery clitoris, slick with her own juices, as she pounded herself with the hairbrush until that fire coursed down her spine to explode in her hips. Silencing her orgasm, she threw her head back and clenched her spasming thighs with a gasp, pushing the hairbrush out of her when her orgasm forced her muscles to tighten. It was a no-frills orgasm, the kind she was used to giving herself when she just needed to come, desperate to feel that release, but it never got old.

Coming down from the high of a quick climax, her eyes fell on her phone to see that Casey was no longer there. He hadn't hung up, but he had left his phone on with the call still running, and it was with a flicker of irritation that Ishaana realised he had probably left as soon as he had reached his own peak. He was drunk; she didn't blame him, but it irritated her. Letting her knees fall apart on the bed, she rested one hand on her bare stomach and took a moment to gather her breath, and her reaction was too slow when she saw a familiar figure on her screen. Not Casey this time: it was Bishop's hand that reached for his friend's phone, his shocked face that filled the screen for a moment before the camera turned away to face the wall.

"Shit," he said. "Sorry, Ishy. Hi. Sorry. I didn't realise you were ... shit, sorry. I'm sorry. Not being a perv. I didn't know."

Ishaana sighed, unfazed by the fact that Bishop had just caught an eyeful of her naked, post-orgasmic body on Casey's phone. She reached for her own. "It's safe," she said, and Bishop cautiously brought the phone in front of his face, smiling when he was faced with a different pair of lips.

"Hi, Ishy," he said, his face still laced with awkward embarrassment. "I don't know where Casey is. He just left a minute ago."

"It's fine," she said with a sigh. "Look, I'm gonna go to bed. I hope you guys are having a good trip. And that the rest of it goes well, too."

"Thanks," Bishop said with a smile. "It's pretty good, yeah. Pretty awesome, to be honest. I'll fill you in some other time."

She snorted at his accidental innuendo, and he only looked more embarrassed for a moment. "Awesome. Well. See you around," she said.

"See you around."

"Oh, and Bishop?"

"Yeah?" He brought the phone back up to his face, inquisitive eyes on her. That weird feeling was back again, and Ishaana quashed it with a swallow.

"Tell Casey he's a selfish wanker."

+ - + - +

sorry for the delay! i am now home from uni, which means an automatic dip in productivity (at a crucial time!). i am still aiming to finish this by april. that may be blindly optimistic; we'll see. i hope you liked this!