Anyway, she got through the day okay without breaking down in floods of tears or running out of the classroom, so that’s something, especially when I remember what she was like on Sunday morning. I don’t want to sound like my parents, but, to be honest, going to school probably was the best thing she could do. I mean, otherwise she’d just have been at home crying and listening to incredibly miserable music again. And at least she’s eating properly now. Mum made a particularly delicious roast chicken in a cunning ploy to make sure Rachel ate, and it worked – no one (apart from vegetarians, obviously) can resist my mum’s roast chicken. Every time I have considered vegetarianism, I have just thought of that chicken. And sausages. And rashers. I don’t think I would be a good vegetarian at all, really.
Rachel is meeting Tom tomorrow. Apparently he agrees that they ‘have to see each other’. Maybe he has realised that he’s made a terrible mistake and will tell her he wants to go out with her again. People sometimes do stupid things and regret it afterwards. I mean, I once told Mrs Harrington that my mother was going to put her in a book. Obviously dumping your girlfriend is not the same as telling a pointless lie to a teacher, but surely it is possible to break up with someone and then regret it afterwards. Maybe he really was having some sort of life crisis about going to college next year, or something, and broke up with her in a moment of madness. I do hope that’s what it was. She is still so miserable.
And my parents aren’t helping. It was, of course, their musical rehearsal tonight and they almost didn’t go because they were worried that if they left the house, and Rachel wasn’t under their constant supervision, she would, and I quote, ‘sit around moping’ instead of doing her homework.
‘We do understand how awful it is for you,’ said my mother, though I’m not so sure about that. ‘But you’ll actually feel better if you sit down and do some work.’
‘Moping’ is possibly my least favourite word ever, because when I was so miserable after Paperboy went to Canada I got accused (by my own best friends, among others) of moping all the time and I hated it. And if anyone actually has an excuse for doing some moping at the moment, it’s Rachel. Not that I would call it moping. I would call it ‘being heartbroken’.
‘She’s not moping, Mother!’ I said. ‘It’s not fair to accuse someone of moping when they have just been dumped by their boyfriend who they were going out with for years!’
‘Thanks for the reminder, Bex,’ said Rachel, but she didn’t sound angry. In fact, for a moment, she almost sounded like her usual annoying sarcastic self.
Anyway, Rachel promised them she would definitely do her homework.
‘You can check it and sign it if you want,’ she said crossly.
‘That’s not necessary, love,’ said Mum. ‘We don’t want to nag you.’
Ha! News to me. Nagging both of us is their favourite thing to do after taking part in amateur musicals.
‘We just think you need to keep yourself busy,’ Mum went on. ‘And I know we keep going on about it, but you can’t let things slip this year. If you stay on top of schoolwork now, things will be much easier next June.’
‘Yes, yes, I know,’ said Rachel. ‘I’m going off to do it now.’
And she actually did. I thought I might as well show solidarity and do mine too. Also, I wanted to get it over and done with so I could laze around for the rest of the evening and watch whatever I liked on the big sitting-room telly before Mum and Dad came home and took it over with one of the ten million crime dramas they love so much (in fact, crime dramas are possibly their fourth favourite thing after musicals, nagging and going to garden centres).
Rachel eventually came down to join me and admitted that doing her homework had kept her mind off things.
‘It’s a sad state of affairs when I have to turn to Leaving Cert Irish to cheer myself up,’ she sighed.
And I had to agree. I do wish there was something I could genuinely do to make her feel better. I wish she’d taught me how to make her own famous special hot chocolate so I could make some for her, but she hasn’t, so I made her a cup of tea instead. And I made a peppermint one for myself. We both curled up on the couch with our tea and watched a reality show in which people had to make outlandish outfits which was quite fun.
When it was over, I said, ‘What do you think will happen with Tom tomorrow?’
‘Nothing, probably,’ she said. ‘He was pretty definite on the phone on Sunday. I just need to see him. I don’t think it’ll really sink in until I know what it’s like to see him when we’re not … when we’re not going out anymore.’
She looked really sad. I wondered if she was hoping he’d changed his mind. I know I would be, even if I knew it was stupid. Sometimes you can’t help how you feel, even if your brain knows it doesn’t make sense. I am hoping he made a mistake myself.
Anyway, that was when our parents came in, singing ‘On the Street Where You Live’ (even though neither of them are singing that song in the production). I must admit that even though they can be very boring when they start going on about what the director suggested and what song they learned that evening and all that sort of thing, sometimes it does make me a bit nostalgic for my own school musical days. I sort of wish we could do it again this year, but they don’t let people who have big exams that year take part.
Poor Rachel. Tom hasn’t changed his mind and he doesn’t think he’s made a mistake. He doesn’t want to get back together with her. I think a part of her really did hope this could happen, because she was so upset when she came home. It was like she’d been freshly dumped all over again. She went up to her room, looking like a ghost, and then she was on the phone to Jenny for ages. When the only thing I could hear coming through the door was miserable music I knocked on it.
‘I’m not really in the mood for talking’ came a leaden voice from within.
‘Okay,’ I said. I paused. ‘I hope it wasn’t too awful. Meeting him, I mean.’ I didn’t even want to say his name, because when you do she looks like she’s going to burst into tears.
I could hear Rachel getting off the bed and walking across the room. Then the door opened. Her eyes and nose were really red and it was obvious that she’d been crying.
‘It was pretty shit,’ she said. She leaned against the door frame and ran her hand through her hair. ‘He was really sad and upset and that kind of made it worse. I mean, it shows he really means it and he didn’t do it lightly, you know what I mean?’
I did. If Tom is really upset about it, he must have thought about it a lot. But then something struck me.
‘Is there a chance he’s upset because he realises what a terrible mistake he made?’ I said.
Rachel actually laughed, in a reluctant sort of way.
‘No, I don’t think there is,’ she said. ‘He’s upset because I’m so upset.’
‘But that shows he cares about you!’ I said.
‘He does care about me,’ she said. ‘But not in the right way. Not anymore.’
And she looked so sad I felt like I wanted to kill Tom.
‘I hope he gets run over by a bus,’ I said.
She almost laughed again. ‘I never thought I’d thank anyone who just wished Tom would be run over by a bus,’ she said. ‘But … thanks.’
And then she went back into her room and put the music back on. Music is very good when you’re miserable. There’s something about hearing someone, someone who might even be dead by now, singing about exactly the same things you’re feeling right now that makes you feel like you’re not alone. Like someone else gets you, even though you don’t know them and you never will.
I wasn’t in the mood for miserable music myself this evening, though. I needed some cheering up after talking to Rachel, so I went down to the kitchen and put on one of Mum’s Northern Soul compilations and had a bit of a dance. It was very cheering, even when Mum and Dad heard what I was playing and came in and started doing some ridiculous moves. They can actually be quite funny sometimes when they’re not b
eing annoying or embarrassing. I almost felt guilty strutting around downstairs when Rachel was up there crying along to the sound of miserable wailing, but her sad music was on so loudly she couldn’t have heard us.
Mrs Harrington started talking to me about her book after class today. Apparently she is sending the first few chapters off to an agent who she hopes will sell the book to a publisher.
‘How long do you think I’ll have to wait before I hear back?’ she asked, and I had to tell her I didn’t know. I think she thinks I am some sort of publishing expert because of my mum. It’s not like she’s looking for favours, or is trying to get my mum to read her book or anything, but she seems to think I know all about it. Which I don’t. I mean, if Mum was an engineer she’d hardly ask me about pipes and bridges and things, would she?
Rachel is still spending most of her time in her room. This evening I was putting stuff in the recycling bin in the utility room, and when I opened the bin I saw the giant Valentine’s card Tom gave Rachel back in February. It had been torn to pieces. It was weird to see it because I have very strong memories of when she got it – I felt all jealous that day because I was still really sad about Paperboy.
Anyway, I don’t blame her for taking out her sadness as rage on Tom’s card, but I can’t help thinking it’s a good sign that she went to the trouble of recycling the card. I mean, if she was totally deranged with grief she wouldn’t have thought of sorting her waste in a sensible, environmentally aware fashion, she’d have just chucked the bits of card in the general bin along with Bumpers’s old cat litter and stuff.
Vanessa’s ad is going to be on telly on Monday evening. It’ll be in the ad break during Fair City. We don’t always watch Fair City, but I will definitely be watching on Monday because – and I’m ashamed to admit it – I do want to see the ad. I know. But I can’t help it, even though she was being particularly sickening today. For some reason, she has started talking like a celebrity doing an interview. Maybe she thinks she is about to become really famous and is getting in some practice.
‘They say you should never work with children or animals,’ she said at lunch, supposedly to Caroline, but so loudly we could all hear it. ‘But Handsome Dan was a perfect co-star!’
I don’t know whether Handsome Dan is a child or an animal. You’d assume he is an animal with a name like that, but you never know these days. There’s a kid in Jessie’s little sister’s class called Sugar Poppy. Anyway, I wonder what the Bluebird Bakery would say if they knew Vanessa was giving so many hints about the contents of their top-secret ad? If I were a nasty sort of person, I would tell them and get her fired, but, sadly, I am not.
On the plus side, we’re going in to the Knitting Factory tomorrow for our first practice! And Ellie is going in to use the art studio. I wonder will Sam be there? It would be nice to see him. More importantly, I do still have one of his Neil Gaiman books and I have to give it back. I’d contact him online, but I don’t want him to read anything into it – me contacting him directly I mean.
What could he read into it? Why do I care? I’m being ridiculous. If I don’t see him tomorrow, I’ll send him a message.
Rachel is feeling even worse today. She and Jenny went out last night and she had a terrible hangover this morning. When I woke up, I could hear her getting very sick in the bathroom. It was pretty revolting. As she will be eighteen in a few months Mum and Dad don’t usually mind Rachel going to over-eighteens places and having the odd drink. Their theory is that if they trust her to behave sensibly, she will then actually behave sensibly because she knows that if she broke their trust and went out and got hammered she would get into loads of trouble and then she wouldn’t be allowed out at all.
So far it has worked (with one or two exceptions that Mum and Dad have turned a blind eye to). But they were very annoyed this morning and also a bit upset.
‘You can’t go drowning your sorrows,’ said Dad. ‘It’s not healthy and it doesn’t work.’
Rachel gave a miserable grunt in reply. Mum and Dad lectured her for another while, but eventually they seemed to decide that her puking all day was punishment enough, and she’s also not allowed go on any nights out at all for the next month.
I have to say she’s not exactly an advertisement for getting off your face. It makes me never want to drink at all (not that I really like the taste of any booze I’ve tried. Perhaps I am not a natural party animal). Apparently, she and Jenny went to a gig in a place where there was a late bar and were still there drinking shots at two in the morning. It was Jenny’s birthday last week and she basically spent all of her birthday money taking Rachel out on the town. Not sure it was worth it today, though.
Anyway, after a while I had to leave her lying on the couch in her pyjamas and go in to our first practice in the new studio space. It was totally brilliant! In fact, I felt a bit guilty being so cheerful when Rachel is still feeling so awful. But it was so good. The practice room we got to use was really nice – even better than the ones in the summer camp – and the drum kit was very cool. It was all red and sparkly (mine is just boring and dark green). And lots of our friends were there. Small Paula was working on something on her own in the recording studio (she is much more technologically advanced than Hey Dollface), and Richard and his band, the Wicked Ways, were in the practice room next to ours.
Even though Cass and I see Richard fairly regularly (and of course Alice sees him all the time), it was cool to see the whole band again. We went in to their room for a bit to hear them play their new song, ‘Pterodactyl’. It is all about how sometimes Richard feels like an ancient flying dinosaur looking down on the earth. I had no idea he felt like this, but like all the Wicked Ways songs ‘Pterodactyl’ is both very melodramatic and strangely impressive. Then they all came in to our practice room to hear our song ‘Pistachio’ (a very poetic title if I say so myself), which is about looking back at a long ago lost love (Paperboy, of course).
They seemed to like it (or if they didn’t, they are very good actors and should have been doing the acting part of the course instead of the rock camp). And the guitarist, Colin, had a useful suggestion about making the intro a bit longer, which we tried after they went back to their room and which worked really well. We are all giving each other feedback like some sort of cool artistic community!
When our studio time was up, we went back to the art studio space part of the venue to meet Ellie, and who should be there but Sam and Lucy! It was very cool to see them. At the end of the summer camp Ellie vowed that she was going to make all her clothes from now on (apart from bras and things) and she has finally finished her first ensemble. It didn’t actually look too bad. Well, the skirt was pretty good. It was a plain denim skirt and the only thing wrong with it was a slightly wonky zip, and we wouldn’t have noticed if Ellie hadn’t pointed it out. She was also wearing a top she’d made herself, but it wasn’t quite as successful as the skirt because the shoulders were about twice as wide as the rest of her put together.
‘I made a couple of mistakes,’ she said. ‘The sleeves should be a bit more gathered and a bit less puffy. But I thought I’d just go with it. I think I’ve made it work.’
I agreed with her because I didn’t want to rain on her clothes-making parade, especially as she’s just getting started. She needs lots of encouragement and she really can sew, so she’ll get better eventually. And, who knows, perhaps she’ll start a new trend? After all, huge poofy shoulders were all the rage back in the eighties. Maybe this is the beginning of a revival and we’ll all be wearing tops with giant sleeves soon.
Anyway, we were all hanging out chatting for a while, and eventually Cass went off to meet Liz – they were going out to Liz’s house. Lucy was going to visit her cousins in Rathmines, so she went to get the bus with them. Alice went off with Richard to have dinner in his house, and Ellie had to go home straight away, so basically I ended up chatting to Sam outside the venue for a while. I told him I still had his book.
‘I am going to give i
t back,’ I said. ‘In case you thought I’d stolen it.’
‘I think I can trust you,’ he said. ‘Just give it back whenever you like. You’re going to be here fairly regularly, aren’t you?’
‘Yeah, I hope so,’ I said. ‘Every week, I think.’
‘Me too,’ he said. ‘This place is great, isn’t it?’
And we talked about the Knitting Factory for a bit. We both agree that it makes a big difference when you have somewhere special to go and do something creative (making comics for him, band practice for me). Sam wants to go to art college and study illustration eventually.
‘I think my actual dream job would be sitting in a nice big studio and just drawing all day,’ he said. ‘What about you?’
‘Hmm,’ I said. ‘I think I’d like to spend half my time drumming and half my time writing stuff.’
‘Sounds doable,’ said Sam. I wonder has he grown since the summer? He looks taller. ‘I mean,’ he went on, ‘it’s probably more doable than my mate Daire’s dream of being a professional surfer.’
‘Is he not a good surfer?’ I said.
‘Well, he’s only done it once, in Donegal,’ said Sam. ‘So I’m kind of surprised he’s so convinced he could do it for a living. But he’s quite a good skateboarder, and he claims they use the same skills. I’m not sure how, though, apart from the whole “standing on a bit of board” aspect.’
We just stood there chatting about rubbish for a while. He is very easy to talk to. But eventually my phone beeped – just a text from Rachel asking me to get some milk on my way home – and I realised we’d been talking for over half an hour.
‘God, is it that late?’ said Sam, when I mentioned the time. ‘I’m meant to be going out for dinner for my dad’s birthday this evening. I’d better get home and change.’