Lottie pushed the plate back towards me.
“Which is why you must have restorative meat and friends who won’t let you talk it over on a loop.”
“He’s an arsehole though, right?”
“We’ve already agreed that he is.”
“And, he’s not really a sex addict, is he?”
“Evie!”
“Okay, okay.”
My appetite for discussing Ethan was still vastly undented, but Lottie had just used the word “friends” and it made my stomach goo more than Ethan’s smile ever had.
“Let’s change the subject. How’s the smoking going?” I asked Amber.
She shook her head and swallowed. “It’s not. I gave the rest of the cigarettes to my stepbrother.”
“AMBER,” we both yelled.
She didn’t even try to look guilty. “What? He’s the Antichrist. I’m doing the world a favour.”
“How old is he anyway?”
She blew a wisp of reddish hair out of her face. “I dunno. Ten, maybe younger?”
“AMBER!”
“He’ll be fine.” She batted our protests away with her fingers. “I don’t want to talk about him. So, you two… How did you become friends?”
Lottie and I looked at each other. “We went to the same primary school,” I said.
“Yeah.” Lottie smiled at the memory. “We had to do extra lessons after school together because we weren’t challenged enough in the classroom.”
Amber pointed an accusing finger at me. “Wait, you didn’t tell me you’re a genius too, like Lottie here.”
“I…”
I had been. Clever, I suppose. Once. Now I had barely any qualifications to my name, and I’d ruled out almost all A level subjects based on their potential to trigger a relapse.
A levels I couldn’t do
Geography – Out of the question. Learning about volcanoes? And earth crust? And ice ages? And all the other geological phenomena I couldn’t control and could kill us all dead? Are you kidding?
Biology – Oh, cancer. Let the person with diagnosed Generalised Anxiety Disorder and OCD learn about cancer? Next!
French/Spanish/German – Why bother learning a language when it’s highly unlikely you’ll ever be well enough to leave your own country? I’d barely left the county… Only that one time for a cousin’s wedding where I completely lost it at the finger buffet and Mum and Dad had to drive us home through the middle of the night…
Philosophy – Don’t even get me started on what existentialism does to my mind.
Psychology – We’ve already discussed this.
And so on and so on and so on, until I took sociology, film studies and English language. Nice and safe. No scary ideas.
“She’s well clever, aren’t you, Eves?” Lottie asked, disrupting my inner ramblings.
“I’m okay. I guess.” Sarah once said it takes quite a high level of intelligence to dream up every worst-case scenario for every situation. Ever. Like I can…
Amber mopped up her beans with her stiff triangle of white toast. “So did you guys not stay in touch when you were at different secondary schools?”
“I…”
Lottie interrupted. “I tried. But after Year Eight, Miss Snooty Knickers here fell off the planet and stopped answering my calls.”
She said it friendly enough, but a bit of hurt was there.
“I…I… Sorry, Lottie. Secondary school kind of swallowed me up whole…”
“And spat you back out again?” Amber finished for me. “That’s what happened to me. I hated school so much. I’m so glad I’m at college. You two are the first people I’ve met in a long time I actually like.”
We all beamed at each other, though inwardly I felt queasy with guilt…and grease. I hadn’t meant to ditch Lottie. I just…ditched life, and Lottie was part of that. What was I supposed to do? Answer her calls and say “Sorry I can’t come out tonight, I’m writing the sell-by dates of every food item in my house into my special OCD diary”?
She wouldn’t have understood. Or worse, she would’ve pretended to understand but then got annoyed when her support didn’t magically cure me and buggered off.
Just like Jane.
“Right, I’m stuffed,” I announced. “And film studies beckons.”
Amber narrowed her eyes. “Lottie. You said the girl was smart. And she’s off to film studies?”
“Hey! I’ll have you know we have to write essays!” I protested.
“Yeah, yeah. About what?”
“Casablanca and stuff?”
“Cassawhatta?”
“I’ll pretend you didn’t just say that,” I said.
We all chucked our money on the garish tablecloth and scraped our chairs back to leave. An autumn chill hit us as we trundled back to college.
Guy was just leaving as we got to the gates. He was smoking a suspicious-looking roll-up, his hair stuffed into a grey beanie hat.
“Evie,” he said, far too pleased to see me. Definitely a suspicious cigarette. He held out his hand for a high-five. “How was your date in the end?”
I high-fived him back unenthusiastically. “Not great. He went upstairs and shagged someone else.”
Guy tried and failed to hide a burst of laughter. “On your first date?”
“He’s a sex addict,” I explained. “Well, that’s what he told me anyway.”
This time he didn’t even try to hide his giggles. He bent over, clutching his ribs. The roll-up dropped out of his mouth onto the pavement. Guy didn’t notice.
“Seriously?” he asked, his head still upside down.
I looked to the others for support. They just gave me “we’re talking to this loser again?” looks.
“Seriously. That was my weekend.”
“Christ, you make me laugh.” He got himself upright again, realized he’d dropped his joint, and ducked to pick it up off the floor.
“Yeah, well, at least I’m not plucking a soggy roll-up out of a gutter with an indeterminate tribal scar forever etched onto my body.”
“Fair enough.” Guy was waterproof against insults once he’d had a smoke. “Anyway, you got class now? Bye, ladies.” He re-lit his smoke and sauntered off.
Amber didn’t look impressed as we watched Guy cough his way down an alley. “That’s the guy from the kitchen, right?”
“Yeah, Guy. He’s okay really. He’s Joel’s best mate.”
“And Joel is?”
“Jane’s boyfriend.”
“Ahhh, Jane.” Amber gave Lottie a knowing look. I tried to read into it but the bell went.
“See ya,” I yelled behind me and I ran off to class and Casablanca.
“See ya.”
Seven
I was almost late for film studies and sat down all a-bluster, grabbing my notebook out my bag and rushing to get to the right page. My rush was wasted though as our teacher, Brian, walked in wearing shades and bashed his head face-down on the desk.
“All right, class? I’m hung-over as sin,” he told the wood. “Take it easy on me today.”
From what I could tell, Brian was a frustrated director with a drinking problem. Yet he was worshipped by the rest of my class for his tendency to yell “NO YOU’RE WRONG” and smash the table if you dared suggest Forrest Gump deserved that Best Picture Oscar over Pulp Fiction.
“So…” Brian continued to address the desk. “As I need to spend most of the next hour focusing on not vomming my guts up…” I felt sick, instantly sick. “Here is a very easy task for you. For some unknown reason, the examining bastards have decided to add noughties films to the exam syllabus. I haven’t read which ones they’re testing you on yet, so turn to the person next to you and discuss your favourite three films since 2000. Then report back at the end of the class. GO.”
I counted around the circle of desks to work out who I was paired with.
One…two…one…two…one… I looked to the left of me, and found myself staring into the most impressive pair of cheekbones the world has ever known. They were attached to this guy, a smiling guy, as he’d already worked out we were partners.