Festival Threesome

I could feel the excitement building in my stomach. My feet were uncomfortable in my wellies and they were squeaking as my legs twitched, but today I really don’t care. I glance at Liam and feel my smile widening.

“We’re almost there!”

“We won’t make it there if you keep bouncing around and distracting me...” I hear the laugh in his voice and bounce in my seat even higher.

“You mean like this?”

“You’re going to be the death of us both”

“Not before we get to the festival I won’t!”

“Great, so you’ll happily kill us later?”

“That depends, are you going to drive like an old man on the way home too?”

I hear him laugh as he speeds up, only a little though. I see the speed on his Sat Nav inch up a few miles an hour and chuckle. I squeak as I see the sign for our exit.

“We’re hereeeee!”

“Oh really? Was it the sign that tipped you off or the huge queue of people?” I could almost see the sarcasm dripping off of his tongue. I smiled in spite of myself. I’m so glad that Liam decided to come, I don’t know why I thought he wouldn’t – he loves the idea of adventure. We manage to spot our friends waiting at the gate, Liam had the biggest car so we put the seats and threw in everyone’s camping gear in ours to give the others so more room.

“What took you so long? I was worried we were going to have to sleep under a tree or something tonight” Karlie said making no attempt to hide her annoyance. God, I hated her. Liam had asked his friend Harper along, and she had heard. Luckily, she owns a ridiculous amount of tents, so maybe I shouldn’t be too hard on her. Although when her tone reaches a certain pitch I think I’d rather sleep under a tree than be within ten feet of her.

“We’d have been here sooner but Liam decided to drive like a grandad”

“Thank you Liam so much for driving me all the way to the festival and for putting up with me all the way here, I really appreciate your friendship” Liam makes his pitch higher in an attempt to sound like me. His eyebrow raises as we make eye contact.

“Okay, thank you for driving me.”

“You’re welcome”

“You did drive like a grandad though” I yelp and run to hide behind Harper as Liam attempts to pick me up.

“Okay, enough of being children. Can we go in and drink already? We’ve been standing out here for agesssss!” Karlie moans and wraps her hand around Liam’s arm. I see her attempt to flutter her eyelashes and have to stop myself from laughing. Harper catches my eye, shakes his head and rolls his eyes. She couldn’t be more obvious if she tried. At least it isn’t just me that finds her irritating.

“We probably should unload the tents so we can find somewhere to camp.” Angie chimes in but I mind less this time. I only met Angie last week but she’s really sweet. She’s dating Marcus, who is equally lovely. They’re standing together with his arms wrapped around her waist. I feel a momentary pang of envy but I push past it. I quite like being single anyway, although it’s been so long since I’ve been with a guy that I wonder if I still even know how to do it. I feel the panic spread through my chest. Jesus, what if I actually don’t remember how to do it?

“Hey, are you okay?” Harper whispers to me as the others begin walking to the car.

“Yeah, sorry – just in my own little world then”

“I don’t blame you. I’ve been best friends with Karlie since I was four and even I wish I could escape to another world sometimes. I promise, when she’s not got her eyes on a guy, she’s really nice”

“Oh, no. It actually wasn’t that, I was just-”

“Oi! How many tents should we have?” Liam’s shout cuts me off. Thank God, I have no idea how I was going to get out of telling Harper what I’d actually been thinking. I look over to count, Harper and Liam were going to share a tent. Karlie was supposed to be sharing with David but they broke up last week so he took his ticket and is going with some other friends. Angie and Marcus were sharing a tent, and then I had the joy of having a lonely night to myself. Karlie said that she’d bring all four tents because her family used to go camping all the time and apparently she refused to sleep in someone else’s in case “things happened in there” and they were “unclean”. No one else seemed to notice her underhand digs, which I’m pretty sure were directed at me but hey, I didn’t have a tent anyway so who am I to complain?

“Four I think, how come?” I answer to try to break the silence.

“Erm, there’s only three in here. I didn’t notice when I picked them up from Karlie’s earlier” Liam answers and looks at Karlie. She pretends to look surprised to find the rest of us looking at her too.

“Oh damn, I could have sworn I got all four out. It looks like someone will have to share my tent.” She twirls her hair around her finger and look pointedly at Liam.

“I’m already sharing with Harper though, we haven’t caught up in ages and I said we’d chill tonight” I can hear the panic in his voice and see him cast a look at Harper.

“Yeah, I need to talk to him about something important, but er, it’s guy stuff you know?” I almost laugh at the obviousness of the lie before I figure out what that means.

“Ah, I guess that means you’re sharing with me then Karlie.” I throw Liam a pointed look and he mouths a quick ‘sorry’ before she sees.

“Erm, no. I’m not sharing with someone I barely even know” she spits out, clearly angry that her plan didn’t work.

“Okayyyyy, no worries. I’ll sleep in the car or something, Liam could I take the keys?”

“Don’t be stupid. You’re not sleeping in a car, on your own, in the middle of a damn field. What if someone follows you back here?” Liam clenches his fists and his jaw sets. Damn, okay. I can’t help but glance at his arms as his muscles flex. Stop it, nope. You’re not finding your best friend attractive. I’m sure there are some kind of friendship laws against that.

“Well, where else am I supposed to sleep? At least the car will be dry if it rains”

“Why don’t you bunk in with us?” I hear the regret in Angie’s tone as she asks. I see Marcus look at the floor in defeat, clearly there had been a silent argument behind me.

“Honestly, it’s fi-”

“Just bunk in with us, one of us will sleep on the floor – it’s fine” Harper interrupts me.

“What about your guy talk?” Karlie doesn’t miss a beat. Bless her, apparently not only can she not be subtle to save her life, she also can’t take a hint.

“She’s my best friend. She’s practically a guy anyway” Liam chimes in.

“I don’t know whether to feel complimented by that or not Liam? I’m going to go with thank you I guess.”

“Then you’re welcome I guess” His smile is back on his face but I can feel Karlie’s eye burning into the back of my head. Well, at least I won’t have to share with her. She really only has herself to blame.