I’m trying my best to focus on Jack – the feel of his mouth on mine, his hand running up and down my spine, the promise of what could be about to happen. But I can’t. I keep coming back to Cass and Polly.
‘Jack … can I ask you something?’ It’s hard to talk in between kisses.
‘Mmm?’ His tongue delves into my mouth again. It’s nearly enough to kick any other thoughts right out of my head.
Nearly. ‘This is important!’
‘So’s this …’ Tiny feathery kisses down my neck and I almost lose all power of thought and speech and everything.
Almost. I push his chest, none too gently either. ‘Jack!’
He sits up, his face serious, his hair all over the place. His lips red and tempting. He rubs his chest. ‘Ow.’
‘Sorry.’
‘I think my heart might be bruised. You should probably kiss it better.’ He starts to pull up his T-shirt. I throw a pillow at his face.
‘Did you tell Polly Sutcliffe about us?’
‘Polly? Nope. Why?’ He props himself up on his elbow, finally ready to listen.
‘Are you sure you didn’t say something?’
‘Er … I’ve talked to the girl twice in my whole life – and that was only to sort out the gig.’
‘That’s weird, because she knows we’re seeing each other.’
‘And?’ The so-what look on Jack’s face could not be any clearer.
‘And … I don’t like people knowing my business.’ I sound like the rubbishest gangster in the hood.
‘You’re not embarrassed to be seen with me, are you?’ He’s laughing and then suddenly he’s not. ‘You are, aren’t you? It’s the age thing, right? God, I knew this would happen.’ He runs both hands through his hair and looks away.
Jack is precisely one month and four days younger than me, but he’s not in the same year as me. He’s right – some people might think it’s weird, me going out with someone who’s not even in sixth form. I couldn’t give a toss. But I’d rather he thinks it’s that than the truth – that I hadn’t wanted Cass, Polly and Rae finding out about us. Still, I don’t want to hurt Jack’s feelings (or his manly pride).
‘No, it’s not that …’ I say in a way that makes it clear that it is that.
‘Look, if you don’t want to go out with me, just say …’ His pout is so cute I want to take a picture.
I dive on top of him and straddle his legs. His face is a mixture of surprised, pleased and still a tiny bit pouty. ‘I don’t care what anyone thinks, Jack. I really … really … really … like you.’ The words are punctuated by kisses, and I can tell by Jack’s response that it’s working. His hands snake around my waist and pull my body closer to his.
Later we decide to go for a wander down by the canal. Dad’s due back in an hour or so, and I don’t think I’m quite ready for The Talk. A couple of years ago, he tried to talk to me about boys. I ran from the room with my hands covering my ears, shouting, ‘La la la, I’m not listening.’ I think he got the message. But now that there’s an actual real live boy on the scene, God only knows the heights of awkwardness Dad will be able to achieve. Best that I keep him in the dark about Jack for as long as possible. Hopefully for as long as this relationship lasts.
Jack and I sit on a bench watching the ducks dipping their heads in the water and waggling their bums in the air. I can’t even begin to imagine what they’re looking for. Hypodermic needles and broken shopping trolleys?
‘I never had any idea that it was possible to miss someone this much,’ Jack says quietly. I squeeze his hand and say nothing. ‘It’s overwhelming – the sadness. It’s there all the time. You’d think it would get better after a while, but it’s getting worse. Alice, how can it be getting worse?’ His eyes are imploring.
‘It will get better, I promise. But it probably won’t be anytime soon. You’ll still feel sad, but it’ll be a different kind of sad. Less painful, not so sharp. I’m sorry. I wish I could take away some of the hurt, even for a little while.’
Jack smiles sadly. ‘I wouldn’t want you to. Being with you is the only time things feel normal. Better than normal even. I know we haven’t been together all that long, but I … I don’t know how I’d cope without you.’
I hug him hard and I don’t want to ever let go. Maybe some of his sadness can seep into me if I hold him for long enough. I can handle it. Just add it to the guilt and worry and scrunch it up into a little ball. Store it somewhere so that Jack and I can be happy for a little while.
We sit in silence as a couple of sweaty joggers pass by. I’m hyper-aware of everywhere my body touches Jack’s. I’m hyper-aware of everything about him. The knees of his jeans are worn and faded. There’s some faint writing on the back of his right hand. He wears all these bits and pieces round his wrists. Strips of leather and fabric. I’ve never really looked at them before, but now I try to imprint them on my brain. Suddenly it seems vital that I memorize everything about him, and I can’t work out why until panic wells up in my gut.
I’m going to lose him. It’s unavoidable.
I lean into him and rest my head on his shoulder. His unruly hair tickles my forehead, but I don’t care. He leans his head towards mine, so now we’re basically holding each other up.
‘Why did you and Tara stop being friends?’
31
I was hoping it wouldn’t come up. It’s something I try not to think about. And definitely something I don’t want to talk to Jack about. There is no way to describe what happened without me sounding like a horrible person.
The truth of the matter is that I realized I didn’t want to be friends with her any more. My reason was simple: she was holding me back.
Tara was so quiet. A group of us would sit in the cafeteria at lunchtime and she would never say a word. If someone asked her a question, she’d mumble the shortest possible answer, hardly even looking up from her plate. Everyone stopped bothering after a while. I’d sit there watching her, willing her to say something, willing her to act normal.
It was fine when we were younger. I didn’t mind that Tara didn’t talk to anyone but me. In fact, I liked it a lot. But things were different at senior school. You had to fit in. Being weird was not an option – not if you wanted to survive.
The final straw was when I found out that Tara and I were the only girls in our class who weren’t invited to Stephanie de Luca’s birthday party. It wasn’t just any old party either. Her dad (who was loaded, obviously) had rented one of those old red London buses to ferry everyone round for the day. And his whole restaurant (well, one of his five restaurants) was closed to paying customers for the evening and the chefs cooked all of Stephanie’s favourite food. There were ice sculptures and an enormous chocolate fountain.
We heard all about it on Monday. Everyone went on and on about how it was the best day EVER. They didn’t even care that Tara and I were within earshot. They didn’t even notice.
At break, Tara and I meandered round the school playing field, exactly like we did every single break time.
‘I can’t believe we didn’t get invited! Even Maddie Fletcher got invited … Maddie Fletcher! Can you believe it?’ Now I was stomping rather than meandering.
Tara shrugged. ‘I’m not that bothered.’
‘What do you mean, you’re not bothered? Everyone was invited except for us – EVERYONE!’
Tara bent down to pick a dandelion. ‘So? Stephanie de Luca isn’t a very nice person.’ She twirled the dandelion between her fingers and I wanted to grab it and rip it to shreds.
‘It doesn’t matter whether she’s a nice person or not. She’s popular. As in “has more than one friend”.’
‘What’s wrong with having one friend?’ Tara was genuinely confused.
I would have pitied her if I wasn’t so angry. ‘God, Tara, don’t you get it? We’re the lowest of the low at this school.’
‘Why does it matter so much to you?’
I sighed theatrically. ‘Why doesn’t it matter to
you? You can be so weird sometimes. You know that, don’t you?’
Tara shied away. ‘Sorry.’
I rolled my eyes and sighed again. ‘Come on, let’s go back. We have to sit on Stephanie’s table this lunchtime though, OK?’
Tara smiled a very sweet smile through her braces and put her arm through mine. ‘OK. Did I tell you what Jack did the other day? It was sooo annoying …’ And she was off on yet another irritating-little-brother anecdote. But I was only half listening; I was already plotting.
The first step was to separate myself from her in everyone else’s eyes. I needed to not sit next to her in every single lesson. Ideally I needed to not sit next to her in any lessons. I didn’t want to hurt Tara’s feelings though (yeah, I was all heart). So I stayed behind after school one day and told Mrs Hodgson that Tara was distracting me and I was finding it hard to concentrate, but I didn’t know what to do about it because she was my best friend. Mrs Hodgson was brilliant. She arranged for us to sit apart in every single class. I’d really laid it on thick about wanting to study law at university. She didn’t seem to think it was weird that a twelve-year-old was worried about getting into uni.
When the desk move happened, I pretended to be as confused and hurt as Tara was. It was easy. After that, it was a simple matter of a gradual phase-out over the next few months. A few unreturned phone calls. Making up excuses as to why I couldn’t go round to her house after school. Trying to become Stephanie de Luca’s shadow. It was pitiful. Tara got the hint eventually. She never confronted me – she wouldn’t have dared. I felt guilty about the whole thing, but not quite guilty enough to change my mind.
Then one day it happened. Everything I’d ever wished for. Stephanie invited me to a sleepover at her house. I’d made it.
The day of the sleepover arrived and I was so excited I quite literally could not sit still. Mum had been out all morning. Dad was in the garage working on his bike. I was busy packing my bag and worrying whether my pyjamas were too babyish. Mum called me downstairs. She looked different, but I wasn’t sure how. She made me sit on the sofa, then sat down next to me, holding my hand. Bruno jumped up and tried to muscle his way onto my lap despite being at least three times too big. Mum pushed him off, none too gently. She said there was something she needed to talk to me about, something important, something serious, and there was no easy way to say it. Then she said the words. The worst words in the world.
‘The cancer’s back. It’s bad.’
I didn’t go to Stephanie’s party.
I didn’t infiltrate the in-crowd.
Mum died.
Tara transformed.
My mind has never been able to separate Mum’s illness from my treatment of Tara. It’s not like I thought the cancer came back because I’d been such a terrible person. OK, I did think that for a while. But near the end I knew it couldn’t be true. When I saw her ravaged by pain, her face pinched and sallow, her skin paper-thin, I knew. No God would ever inflict such suffering on her to pay for my crime. No God would allow such a terrible thing to happen to our family. God did not exist. Obviously.
I stopped blaming myself for Mum’s death; I didn’t stop blaming myself for the way I’d treated Tara. But by the time I’d worked up the courage to apologize, she was at least three rungs above me on the social ladder. Slowly but surely she’d reinvented herself. She’d stopped coming to school with wet hair (which was now streaky and blonde). Her skirts were shorter. She’d started wearing make-up. I swear she made one tiny change every day, so that no one really noticed what was going on. I noticed though. The transformation in the way she looked was enough to get her in with the in-crowd, and the transformation in the way she acted was enough to cement her place. They never even realized that it would only be a couple of years before the girl they’d so graciously invited into their hallowed circle would own them.
The reinvention of Tara Chambers was so dramatic, so all-consuming, that it erased the memories of the girl who’d been my best friend. I’d tried talking to Cass about it once, but she claimed not to remember a time when Tara hadn’t been the Tara she knew and hated.
Sometimes I feel like I created Tara the über-bitch. Then I tell myself not to be so egotistical. But there’s no denying the fact that Tara was a good person, a nice person, until I abandoned her.
In some parallel universe Tara and I are still best friends and neither of us cares in the slightest that no one else seems to like us. We’re both happy. And more importantly, we’re both alive.
I tell Jack that Tara and I drifted apart after we stopped sitting together. We both agree that it was a shame, but just one of those things.
I don’t feel bad for not telling him the truth. The truth would hurt him.
And it would hurt me.
32
It’s Monday morning and Mrs Cronin is subdued. Normally her energy levels are inexplicably high after the weekend, but today she puts on a DVD about Stalin and sits quietly at the back of the classroom (sparing us the usual running commentary).
That new teacher whose name I can never remember knocks on the door and scans the darkened room before spotting Mrs Cronin. Everyone turns and watches their huddled conversation, because anything’s got to be more interesting that whatever Stalin’s up to on-screen. I tell myself I’m just being paranoid when I catch Cronin and Teacher X glancing my way, but then they do it again and I know I’m right to be worried.
They know. Oh my God, they know. They’ve found the body. This is it. I knew it would happen sooner or later, but this is definitely sooner than I thought. Adrenaline shoots through my body and saliva floods my mouth. I fight the urge to bolt from the room, because what good would it do, really?
Mrs Cronin doesn’t even bother to pause the DVD. ‘Alice, please could you make your way to Miss Daley’s classroom?’ Daley’s classroom seems an odd choice for the interrogation. I pack my books and pens away with shaking, clammy hands and try to ignore everyone staring at me. My ruler clatters to the floor, but I don’t bother to pick it up. It’s not like I’ll be needing it.
Gemma stage-whispers to no one in particular, ‘Uh-oh … someone’s in TROUBLE.’ A couple of girls giggle. Danni tells her to shut up. I catch Danni’s eye and she actually looks sympathetic – the way a friend might look in this situation. She won’t be looking at me that way when she finds out what happened. I doubt anyone will ever look at me that way again.
The empty corridor stretches out before me and I walk on legs that feel like they don’t belong to me. I peer through the window of each classroom I pass. Rows and rows of normal girls, sitting at their normal desks, living their normal lives.
I turn a corner and someone’s coming towards me. It’s Cass. The tiny part of me that hoped this whole thing is unrelated to Tara is crushed.
Daley’s classroom is exactly halfway down the corridor, so Cass and I meet in the middle. I wonder if I look as scared as she does. I expect so. We don’t speak. There’s nothing left to say.
I follow Cass through the open door and Daley’s at the front of the room, pacing back and forth. The pacing stops as soon as she sees us. She beckons us forward but doesn’t say anything. Her face is red and blotchy and her mascara’s a mess.
Polly’s leaning against a radiator on the far wall, twisting her hair round her fingers. She doesn’t look scared; she looks like she’s waiting for a bus. Rae’s not here yet.
There is no one else in the room. Not quite what I’d expected. Maybe the police are going with a softly, softly approach, letting Daley explain the procedure before they swoop in with the handcuffs.
I drop my bag on the floor and slump into a chair in the second row. Cass takes a seat a couple of desks to my left.
Daley takes the deepest of deep breaths and lets it out somewhat shakily. She closes the door and Cass and I exchange confused looks. Why isn’t she waiting for Rae? A horrible idea creeps into my brain: maybe Rae told the police. Maybe she’s brokered some kind of deal to protect herself? We are
well and truly fucked.
Daley wipes away a tear and takes yet another deep breath. ‘Girls,’ she pauses to look at each one of us in turn, ‘I’m afraid I have some bad news.’ Yes. We know.
‘Rae Morgan … um … Rae passed away on Friday night.’
No.
Polly’s eyes widen. She stops twisting her hair.
No.
Cass shakes her head ever so slightly.
No.
And then I say it out loud. ‘No.’
Daley turns to me, pity oozing out of every pore. ‘I’m sorry, Alice.’
Polly speaks up. Her voice is strangely calm. ‘How did she die?’
Daley winces. She looks at the door as if the answer might come strolling in at any moment. ‘I … You have to promise me that this will stay between us. The family doesn’t want rumours flying around. I’m sure you understand.’ She waits for nods from each of us before continuing, ‘Rae took her own life.’
No. This cannot be true.
‘How did she do it?’
I want to strangle Polly for being so crass, but I want to know too. I need to know.
‘I really don’t think that’s important, Polly.’
‘I think we deserve to know.’
Daley’s eyes flick towards the door again. ‘She overdosed.’
‘So they don’t know for sure that she meant to kill herself? She could have done it by mistake,’ says Cass. There’s so much hope wrapped up in her words.
‘I’m afraid they do know – there was a note.’
I pray that Daley doesn’t notice the look of pure panic that flashes between Cass and me.
‘What did the note say?’ Again, Polly is the only calm one in the room, asking the questions that we so desperately need answers to.
I don’t breathe again until Daley answers. ‘“Sorry.” It just said, “Sorry.”’ She shakes her head at the tragedy of it all.
I can’t help but let a sigh of relief escape. Sorry. Sorry could mean anything. Sorry is vague, ambiguous. Sorry is whatever you want it to be.