Poppy didn’t look casual. She looked terrified. ‘Hello.’

They headed upstairs to Norah’s bedroom. The first thing Poppy did was go into her bag and dig out Norah’s pencils. ‘You left these in my room.’

Norah took the pencils. ‘Oh yeah, thanks. That’s g-great because I’ll need those because I was just doing a panel, and I realised I didn’t have anything to work with, so I was staring at this panel and trying to draw with my mind, which sounds a bit crazy, like I know I wasn’t achieving anything, but it was still—’

‘I know you heard the song,’ Poppy said.

OK, so... Plan B.

Norah sat on the swivel chair at her desk and turned it to Poppy. ‘Yeah,’ she said with a lick of her lips.

Poppy plunked her bum on Norah’s bed, and they looked at each other nervously for some time. Each seemed to be waiting for the other to say something.

Norah chewed the inside of her mouth. ‘Play it for me.’

Poppy looked stunned. ‘What?’

‘I didn’t hear the whole thing.’

Poppy looked alarmed. ‘No, I can’t.’

‘Why not?’

Poppy was stuck for an answer.

‘Is it about me?’ Norah asked.

Poppy nodded.

‘All of it?’ Norah asked.

‘Yes.’

They sat in another thick silence.

Poppy took a deep breath. ‘I want you to know, I never meant for you to hear it. It was just for me.’

Norah wasn’t sure what to do with that. So she just waited.

‘I wish you had just knocked on the door,’ Poppy said eventually.

But there was no reproach in her tone. Only a longing for a time before this had happened. Norah felt for her. She was suffering, knowing the song had been overheard. It took the pressure off immensely. It wasn’t a declaration. It was a mistake.

‘I was going to knock,’ Norah said.

‘Then why didn’t you?’ Poppy asked.

‘Because I heard you singing. I’ve never heard you do that before. It stopped me in my tracks. You were really good,’ Norah told her frankly.

Poppy’s mouth pinched at the corners. ‘I’m not a singer.’

‘Bullshit,’ Norah said. Whatever else she felt uncertain about, it wasn’t Poppy’s singing.

‘I’m just an instrumentalist,’ Poppy said.

‘That’s weird,’ Norah told her plainly.

‘It’s weird?!’ Poppy said.

‘Yeah. I mean, you can do all of it. Why wouldn’t you want to?’ Norah asked her.

‘I just like the guitar, that’s all,’ Poppy said dismissively.

‘Then why did you write a song with lyrics?’ Norah pressed.

‘I... Well, I kind of thought... Look, I want to perform, but if that doesn’t work out—which, let’s face it, is very fucking likely—I’ve been working on my lyrics so I can maybe sell songs to other performers. I’ve heard you can make a good living doing that. But to do it, you have to perform a demo in the first place so they can hear how it roughly sounds. And I know I can hit the notes enough to be able to record demos, so that’s what I was doing.’

‘You want to sell the song?’ Norah asked.

‘Not that one,’ Poppy said quickly.

‘What’s it called?’

‘I don’t know yet. I’ve just been calling it “Norah’s Song”,’ Poppy said, looking at the floor.

Norah couldn’t help but smile slightly. ‘“Norah’s Song”?’

‘Shut up, OK? I know it’s silly,’ Poppy said.

Norah swallowed. ‘I don’t think it’s silly.’

‘What do you think?’ Poppy asked.

‘I don’t know,’ Norah replied honestly.

Poppy accepted that with sadness. ‘Right.’

‘Why didn’t you want me to hear it?’ Norah asked.

She felt nervous asking that question because it was the question. The answer was going to blow this thing wide open.

‘Because I wasn’t sure if I was ever going to tell you how I felt. So I told my guitar instead,’ Poppy said with sincerity.

Norah understood that completely. But what she didn’t understand was what made this whole thing so bloody scary to her. Why was she freaking out? Why couldn’t she just say, ‘Hey, it’s OK. I don’t feel that way about you, but we can still be mates.’ That was what she should say, wasn’t it?

‘You could have talked to me,’ Norah said.

‘You had enough going on. It didn’t seem right,’ Poppy said.