John was right. People didn’t change, their expectations did. Patrick was the same charming, selfish, sexy, intellectual, inconsiderate person he had always been and I was still the adoring, lovesick doormat I had always been. My expectations of him were so low, a worm could have cleared them without catching his belly. Now I understood what I’d really wanted from him, I realized I was never going to get it. I couldn’t change Patrick but I could change my expectations. My expectation of what I deserved.

‘You’ve lost the plot,’ Patrick grunted as I picked up the tiger mask, more backstreet moggy than regal feline at this point. ‘Go to your work thing and call me later when you’ve calmed down.’

‘No,’ I said, balancing the mask in my arms. ‘I’m not going to call you later.’

We stared at each other, each waiting for the other to speak, not knowing what we wanted them to say.

‘Then just go.’ Patrick’s body stiffened as he became a stranger. I looked at his rumpled blond hair, his light blue eyes, the lines of his face that I’d memorized while he slept. He was someone else now. ‘But don’t start sending me “group texts” six months from now when you change your mind.’

‘Bye, Patrick,’ I said, pinching myself together at the seams. ‘I hope your meeting goes well.’

‘This is usually the bit where I say it’s not you,’ Patrick yelled as I walked away, carrying my bloodstained tiger mask, quiet tears cutting a sharp path through my smeared makeup. ‘But this is definitely you!’

‘Oh, I know,’ I called back without turning around. ‘Isn’t it brilliant?’

CHAPTER THIRTY

The World E-Sports Championships was the last place on earth I wanted to be. After a very uncomfortable taxi ride, I finally arrived at the convention centre, less than an hour before the podcast was supposed to start, still in my filthy jeans and torn T-shirt, carrying the poor, mauled tiger head. After finally convincing a wary security guard to let me and my access-all-areas pass inside, I began to wish he hadn’t. It was like walking into a parallel universe – all around me were people speaking the same language as me but I only understood every third word.

The main foyer swarmed with kids in cosplay, screaming and shouting and, thankfully, paying me not a single sniff of attention. I couldn’t even begin to imagine how many hours they had spent putting together their elaborate costumes, although if that’s what they’d been doing while I was breaking my heart over Patrick Parker, they were one up on me. I made a mental note to buy a games console on the way home, it would be a better use of my time and energy.