I think Alex was still high on adrenalin from her party and excited about Ben. I couldn’t rest for all the competing thoughts in my head: thoughts about what had happened the night before, about having to deceive Alex and, most pressing of all, about Jack. Why had Jack rung Katie and, more worrying, what had she told him? When could I get away to call her? I didn’t feel comfortable lying (in both senses of the word) in a strange bed, in an unfamiliar bedroom. I looked over at Alex and acknowledged how little I knew her, and how she didn’t know me at all, and it made me sad. When you sleep alongside another person it creates a sense of intimacy, and this only served to make me feel more of a fake than ever. Pretending to be someone else is a lonely job, even though you do have two voices competing in your head. I wanted to be at home, in my own bed, where I could be Lily, just plain Lily. ‘Laura?’ Alex said quietly, when she noticed me stirring.
