‘Is that Tristan?’ Lauren says, her voice filled with delight.

Jesse and I look at each other, properly, for the first time tonight. He looks as stressed as I feel. I have no idea what to do. Should we pretend as if we’ve broken up? No, that would be too sad for me—Dumped again, and so soon, I can imagine Tristan and Kendra whispering. But we can’t do another night of fakedating. Not now, not like this.

‘No one look at him,’ I say. ‘Huddle together, we’re deep in conversation, we can’t hear him.’

‘Brooke!!’ His voice is louder and more insistent. He sounds so excited to see me. That’s a win for me, surely. He texted me earlier in the week, telling me how good it was to see me.

‘We can still pretend we haven’t seen him and leave, as long as no one turns around,’ I continue, even though I know we can’t.

‘Harper!’ Tristan says, and Harper turns her head. She makes eye contact with Tristan and waves, and then turns back to us. ‘Look everyone, it’s Tristan,’ she says weakly.

‘Harper!’ I say, outraged.

‘I’m sorry, it’s a natural instinct to turn your head when someone says your name!’

We all look at Tristan and wave. He’s with Kendra and another guy.

‘Wait. That’s Henry,’ Penny says.

I can’t believe it, or maybe I can. Tristan and Henry had hit it off the other night.

‘You’re hanging out with Tristan again?’ Lauren says to me. ‘Things are worse than I thought.’

‘We are not hanging out again. He lives in the area, we bumped into him last week.’

‘Well he sure seems excited to see you.’

Tristan is already on his way over to us.

‘Join our team, we need some more people!’ he says.

All the other teams are at least ten or twenty years older. This is how Tristan and I were compatible. We are the kind of insufferable teenagers who derive great pleasure from trying to prove we are intellectually superior to a bunch of adult strangers.

‘Oh, we were just leaving,’ I say.

‘You just walked in. Hi, Lauren!’ he pivots to shake Lauren’s hand. God, why does he have to be so polite, so people-pleasing, so inviting? I admire it and I can’t stand it.

‘Hi Tristan,’ she says. ‘I haven’t seen you since you broke up with my sister.’ She’s using her don’t-mess-with-me tone.

I give her a warning look but I’m also secretly glad she said it. Everything else aside, Lauren always has my back.

‘Breaking up with Brooke was one of the hardest things I ever had to do,’ Tristan says earnestly.

For god’s sake. He always sounds like he’s a celebrity on a talk show carefully revealing some pre-agreed private detail of his personal life.