Aiden sat at the head of my bed, leaning back against the mass of cushions and pillows, idly flicking through a lad’s mag he’d picked up on the way to mine.  He was my ex – the last guy I’d been with before I realised that guys just weren’t my thing.  He was my best friend though, and one of few real friends that I had.  We’d been through a lot together, and had come through it all much tighter than a typical split-up couple would have done.  I was glad we’d stayed so close despite everything.  It would have been easy for Aiden to have nothing to do with me due to him being a very popular guy, and due to hanging out with someone who was so unpopular, ie; me, not really being the done thing for school heart-throbs-cum-basketball-aces.  But he hadn’t ditched me, when I fell from grace, like everyone else had.  He was my boyfriend back when I was part of Madison’s crowd, and she subsequently ended up dating him once I’d well and truly crashed and burned from the top of the school’s social ladder.  I had to admit that the view was much clearer from the bottom, though; I could see the layers of bullshit that surrounded the ‘beautiful people’ and so stayed well clear of them.

“Guess who met someone new today!” I called to Aiden from inside my huge walk-in closet as I looked for something to wear out that night.  I was fussy, and always spent forever getting ready.  Aiden, on the other hand, could throw on a shirt and some jeans and look like he just walked in from a photo shoot.  Bastard.

“Congratulations,” he said flatly.  “She have a name?”

“Why do you automatically assume it’s a girl?” I asked, entering my bedroom to parade my outfit in front of him.  He looked me up and down and dismissed my clothes with a shake of his head before answering my question.

“’Cos the only guy you have time for at King is me,” he said, his eyes returning to his magazine.  I went back into my closet and started rooting through my tops once again.  “Plus, all the other guys are scared of you.”