Queer Enough by Megan Preston Elliott

Instalment 3: Daisy

Syd is standing next to a heap of clothes in her bedroom in a mismatched purple lace bra and grey cotton thong. She thinks all the outfits she has tried on are either too slutty or too boring. She'll be meeting Daisy, 27, a photographer from Leeds, at a small Clapham bar with live music in just three hours. She still hasn't told a soul that she's dating women and is starting to find the relentless questions running through her mind too much to cope with alone. Collapsing on her bed in despair, Syd grabs her phone and considers ringing her best friend Lucie to tell her. Now's not the time, she thinks, she'll be late for the date, but she wonders if there will ever be a right time. She can't convincingly imagine Lucie feeling differently about her since they've been friends for coming up to eighteen years, but a small part of her still worries that speaking her truth will irreversibly change things between them. She and Lucie have always been very tactile with each other, like sisters, holding hands as they walk down the street. Syd worries that telling Lucie will mean they won't be like that anymore, that Lucie might be afraid that she fancies her. She worries it will create a distance between them that will leave her feeling even more alone than she already feels.

Eventually, Syd climbs out of bed and settles on an all-black outfit: a low-cut chiffon blouse with balloon sleeves and flared jeans. She has tonged her long, chestnut hair into perfect loose waves and tinted her lips with a blush pink gloss. She takes it as a good sign that she has, for once, created perfect wings with her liquid liner to frame her olive-green eyes.

Clomping down the wooden stairs in chunky black boots, Syd disturbs her younger brother's Xbox trance, prompting him to poke his head out of his room, remove one earphone and ask where she's off to. Out, she tells him. He eyes her outfit and says she looks fancy and is she going on a date? He's teasing, she knows, but she feels hot panic burning through her veins. She snaps at him that she's just meeting friends and to mind his own business. He rolls his eyes and returns to his cave, immediately barking commands through his microphone to his online friends.

Reaching the kitchen, Syd opens the fridge and grabs the half-empty bottle of Rosé that's been sat in there for weeks. Swigging directly from the bottle, she feels a pang of guilt in her chest as the vinegary liquid hits her throat. She shouldn't have been so short with her brother. They're usually very close, but she has felt herself avoiding him recently because she can't handle lying to him. Her mind begins to play out how it might go if she were to knock on his bedroom door, apologise, and tell him everything. Not the time, she thinks, drowning her thoughts with as much sour wine as she can manage before heading out the door.

*

Forty minutes into the date with Daisy, the bar is packed and dingier than it seemed in the photos on Instagram. They've stolen a patch of floor space by one of the pillars near the bar and have dumped their bags on the sticky floor underneath a nearby table occupied by a pile of coats. Syd added her coat to the pile but Daisy didn't, insisting she roll it up and tuck it inside her bag instead, as it's cashmere so it can't get dirty. She's apologising to Syd for texting so much, but her housemate is on a first date nearby and needs guidance. Syd wonders if she should find it rude that Daisy has been thumbing away on her phone for a good fifteen minutes, especially considering she hasn't checked her phone once. As well as seeming distracted, Daisy is drinking with a fair bit of haste.

'Want another?' she asks as she stashes her phone in her bra and holds up her empty glass. Although Syd still has about a third of her drink left, she smiles and says yes. From the pillar, Syd watches Daisy push her way through a sea of rowdy men to the front of the bar. Her silvery bleach blonde hair is twisted into a low bun that rests on the nape of her neck. She's wearing a grey satin shirt dress, cinched in at the waist with a thin black belt with a silver buckle. The dress is paired with chunky white trainers, a choice that Syd feels is bold but works.