and I walked back together that night, which I was happy about because the film made me feel funny. Lie was in the middle of us, holding both our hands and swinging enthusiastically, like a little child you see in a park with flowers in her hair or chocolate on their cheeks. “Standing in line to see the show tonight” she began to sing in the empty moonlight “and there’s a light on”. I love this song. Before I knew it, I was singing too, we all were, “heavy glow”. Lie looked up at me with all her teeth, in this light it looked like one was gold, but I knew it wasn’t. “By the way I tried to say I’ll be there”. I think I’ll always remember this night. Waiting for
4
The website had a different secret in the morning. Benjamin Slater gets off to animated pornography.
Ms. Sarry, my maths teacher is really nice, which is strange because previously I have only encountered the most horrible maths teachers, they were always fat and had facial hair regardless of their gender, and they all had the ability to smell the anxiety which comes from not knowing the answer, and they would go out of their way to pick you because of it. Ms. Sarry was different, she was pretty for a teacher and she put her hand on my shoulder when I asked her a question. She would lean down and almost whisper to me and not make me feel stupid or bad about not knowing. I never liked maths before but she is changing that and Mitty sits next to me, I didn’t even notice her before, because I was trying my best to be invisible for my first lesson. She was wearing flowers in her hair and had purple eye shadow on, but still looked subtle, I don’t know how but she did. She passed me a piece of paper, not taking her eyes away from the board as quadratic equations were being explained. There was a cartoon drawing of me, you know the kind, with a big head and small body, and I was holding a mic and rocking out, the speech bubble said I tried to say I’ll be there. I stifled me laugh and did my best to draw a cartoon Mittsu next to the cartoon me. I gave her a crown of flowers, holding up a peace sign up with one hand and doing devil horns with the other one. In the speech bubble I put I love you Rebi. I hope she thought it was funny. She did. She smiled and nudged me with her knee and we got on with our work. A boy walked in twenty minutes late shouting “it isn’t true” without looking at anyone as he found his seat, so I guess he was the one with the secret and I guess it was true.
“So what you got next rock god?” Mitty wrapped her hand around my arm as we left and I told her I had history, “with Mr. Payne?” I nodded and she grimaced. She searched in her fancy bag for a bit, the bag looked so out of place with her, she wasn’t wearing anything designer or high fashion, which I know stuff about because of my sisters and mum, so I knew that bag was really expensive and really designer. She handed me a pink hipflask with ‘Vagrant Vagina’ inscribed on the front beautifully, “you’re gonna need it! Get a drink from a vending machine and mix some of that in it kay”, she told me she had art class and flashed her peace sign at me as she turned the corner. I wondered if she was actually real for the rest of the day.
After History class, which I indeed needed to drink for, due to Mr. Payne’s strange persona, someone took my hand, I didn’t have to look because I knew by the way it fit my own hand, it was Lie. “To the library! Don’t worry about lunch I got you something already”.
“Apparently Tantalus has updated the site” taking out her laptop from her bag, she hands me sleek black box, “it’s a bento box, there’s a cool Japanese place off campus, I got you chicken, that’s cool right?”
“Yeah, thanks!” I almost shouted it; I just haven’t had someone buy me lunch before, especially not anything like this. “No worries” she was so cool about it, like it was nothing, but it was something, it was the nicest lunch I had eaten in forever and the nicest thing someone had done for me in forever. Maybe this was normal though, she acted like it was, I don’t know. “Oh. My. Goku.” Lie looked up from her laptop and held me in her eyes while I had a mouthful of Tori Katsu curry, she spun her laptop round to show me a video of a guy getting off to a cartoon, it was scary how clear the video was, I mean his face was uncomfortably clear as he contorted it. “This has escalated! This fuck has to go down! Come by room No.3’07 after dinner in the evening okay”, she slammed her laptop down and left me with my pretty bento box.
Room No.3’07 belonged to Mitty; I assume it was meant to be ‘3,07’, because that’s how everyone else’s room numbers were, there must have been a mix-up though. She had countless vinyl records that we played all through the night while drinking wine and then brandy when that finished. She had a Polaroid camera and took a few pictures of us, paying particular attention to me, ‘because you’re neeew’. One whole wall, the one closest to her bed, was completely just pictures. I love how Polaroid’s make moments look. On her desk she had a couple empty whiskey bottles that were now home to beautiful flowers- I wondered if those were the ones she put in her hair on mornings, or if she had a different supply for those. There was also a really happy Buddha in the centre of the room that we all sat around. The custom was to pat his head when you came in and pat it again whenever you laughed- ‘its good to be aware when your positive energies are at their highest’. Mitty’s room wasn’t as colourful as I thought it would be though, I guess she was all the colour she needed. “Look this guy or girl or group is fucking dangerous. The first secrets were kind of Good Samaritan but this one today is just a personal attack right, we’re all at risk. Noah Fletcher is a bookworm, Will Wiseman is school royalty and Ben Slater is part of the film clique- there’s no link, no one would go after those three, and so it must be random!” Lie was standing on Mitty’s bed while we all sat on the floor in a beautiful mess of vinyl, she held an empty bottle of champagne that was by Mitty’s bed and was using it like a microphone. “Well I spoke to Jaffer Choudary, you know the amazing computer guy who helped me with my blog, and he said he couldn’t trace it or anything, he said there was no way he could find out who was behind it, and if he cant, no one can, including us” Mitty spoke in a calming rhythmic voice, like she was talking to the song or something, “we shouldn’t worry about this website shit, I mean if we start to get paranoid and angry they’re winning right? That’s what they want- chaos and fear. But it all love, I mean I’m not going to judge anyone, I don’t care about that shit”. Lie seemed to be soothed by the music that was Mitty’s voice and put the bottle down and sat down on the bed, she kind of stared at me for a little bit and the music got louder all of a sudden, or maybe it didn’t. “You know Rebi, you would look super pretty with a little makeup…”
“YAY MAKEOVER” Mitty jumped over to me and squeezed my face gently.
Before I knew it I became a canvas being built up from every brushstroke. First concealer, I couldn’t see my own face but I could see Lie’s and Mitty’s and they were concentrating, maybe this was a bigger job than they thought. Then foundation, their brushes tickled, I couldn’t help smiling. “Oh my gosh don’t stop smiling- your cheeks!!” Mitty said as she applied blush, “not too much, subtlety is defo your look babe”. I didn’t know what she meant but thought she was right anyway. I held my breath as Lie told me to stay still as she did my liquid eyeliner- “the most crucial part” she whispered with my face in her hands. Then there was a pencil, an actual pencil! Then mascara, as both girls complemented my eyelashes, saying I didn’t even need fake ones. And then lip-gloss which felt sticky and out of everything, unnatural. Mitty put me in a loose-fitting flowing back dress and they both told me how pretty I was, “even like your hair, if we did that, it would so work” Mitty said as she took off my hat. Niche and Snakey both nodded their approval and told me I didn’t look bad either. Maybe I should start wearing makeup, I don’t know if it was just being in a room with my friends, or a really happy Buddha, but I felt okay. I felt like I didn’t mind eye contact or anything.
5
Robynne Bayers has three fake Facebook profiles, one fake Tumblr blog, 4 fake Twitter accounts and one fake Instagram account, all so she can stalk Liam Fergus online. She follows him on Thursday’s when
he goes off campus to work- the first time she followed him was to make sure he didn’t have a girlfriend. She has recently been on forums researching the best ways to take pictures and videos without people noticing. She calls him late at night sometimes, blocking her number, so she can climax.
My first lesson was IT; Lie is in the same class so I was going to meet her outside her building so we could go together. Just before I reached the main exit to my building I heard some whimpering, I followed the sound to find a small girl crying in the corner of a dead-end hall. I asked her if she was okay, she just stared at her knees that she held and said, “It’s not true…I just care okay”.
Lie was waiting for me outside her building, she was wearing a black dress and had some of her hair tied up, she looked like someone special. When I got to her she wrapped her arms around my neck and kissed me on her tiptoes. Her hips were warm. “Are you a bad boy?” she asked with a grin that sent smoke through my bones. I tentatively nodded with a