‘What are you doing?’
I turn round very slowly. Adam’s face is upside down. ‘I thought I’d come and look for you. Are you all right?’
I sit up and brush the dirt from my trousers. ‘I’m fine. I was hot.’
He nods, as if this explains why I have wet leaves stuck to my coat. I look like an idiot, I know I do. I also have my hood tied under my chin like an old woman. I undo it quickly.
His jacket creaks as he sits down next to me. ‘Want a rollie?’
I take the cigarette he offers and let him light it. He lights his own and we blow silent smoke across the garden. I can feel him watching me. My thoughts are so clear that I wouldn’t be surprised if he could see them blazing above my head like a neon sign outside a fish and chip shop. I fancy you. I fancy you. Flash. Flash. Flash. With a neon red heart glowing beside the words.
I lie back on the grass to get away from his gaze. Cold seeps through my trousers like water.
He lies down next to me, right next to me. It hurts and hurts to have him this close. I feel sick with it.
‘That’s Orion’s Belt,’ he says.
‘What is?’
He points up to the sky. ‘See those three stars in a line? Mintaka, Alnilam, Alnitak.’ They bloom at the end of his finger as he names them.
‘How do you know that?’
‘When I was a kid, my dad used to tell me stories about the constellations. If you point binoculars below Orion, you’ll see a giant gas cloud where all new stars are born.’
‘New stars? I thought the universe was dying.’
‘It depends which way you look at it. It’s also expanding.’ He rolls over onto his side and props himself up with one elbow. ‘I’ve been hearing from your brother about you being famous.’
‘And did he tell you it was a complete disaster?’
He laughs. ‘No, but now you have to.’
I like making him laugh. He has a beautiful mouth and it gives me the chance to look at him. So I tell him about the whole radio station ridiculousness and I make it much funnier than it really was. I sound heroic, an anarchist of the airwaves. Then, because it’s going so well, I tell him about taking Dad’s car and driving Zoey to the hotel. We lie on the damp grass with the sky massive above us, the moon low and bright, and I tell him about the wardrobe, and how my name has gone from the world. I even tell him about my habit of writing on walls. It’s easy to talk in the dark – I never knew that before.
When I’ve finished, he says, ‘You shouldn’t worry about being forgotten, Tess.’ Then he says, ‘Do you reckon they’ll miss us if we go next door for ten minutes?’
We both smile.
Flash, flash, goes the sign above my head.
As we go through the broken bit of fence and up the path to his back door, his arm brushes mine. We hardly touch at all, but it’s startling.
I follow him into the kitchen. ‘I’ll just be a minute,’ he says. ‘I’ve got a present for you,’ and he disappears into the hallway and runs up the stairs.
I miss him as soon as he goes. When he isn’t with me, I think I made him up.
‘Adam?’ It’s the first time I’ve ever called his name. It sounds strange on my tongue, and powerful, as if something will happen if I say it often enough. I go into the hallway and look up the stairs. ‘Adam?’
‘Up here. Come up if you want.’
So I do.
His room’s the same as mine, but backwards. He’s sitting on his bed. He looks different, awkward. He has a small silver parcel in his hand.
‘I don’t even know if you’re going to like this.’
I sit next to him. Every night we sleep with only a wall between us. I’m going to knock a hole in the wall behind my wardrobe and make a secret entrance to his world.
‘Here,’ he says. ‘I suppose you better open it.’
Inside the wrapping paper is a bag. Inside the bag is a box. Inside the box is a bracelet – seven stones, all different colours, bound with a silver chain.
‘I know you’re trying not to acquire new things, but I thought you might like it.’
I’m so startled I can’t speak.
He says, ‘Shall I help you put it on?’
I hold out my hand and he wraps the chain around my wrist and does up the clasp. Then he threads his fingers with mine. We look down at our hands, together on the bed between us. Mine look different, entangled with his, the new bracelet on my wrist. And his hands are completely new to me.
‘Tessa?’ he says.
This is his room. With only a wall between my bed and his. We’re holding hands. He bought me a bracelet.
‘Tessa?’ he says again.
When I look at him, it feels like fear. His eyes are green and full of shadows. His mouth is beautiful. He leans towards me and I know. I know.
It hasn’t happened yet, but it’s going to.
Number eight is love.
Twenty-eight
My heart stumbles. ‘I can do that.’
‘No,’ Adam says. ‘Let me.’
Each buckle gets his absolute attention, then he slides my boots off and places them side by side on the floor.
I join him on the rug. I undo his laces, put each of his feet on my lap in turn and pull off his trainers. I stroke his ankles, my hand running under his trousers and up his calves. I’m touching him. I’m touching the soft hair on his legs. I never knew I could be so brave.
We make it a game, like strip poker, but without the cards or dice. I unzip his jacket and let it fall to the floor. He undoes my coat and slides it off my shoulders. He finds a leaf from the garden in my hair. I touch his dark curls, twine their strength through my fingers.
Nothing seems small with him watching, so I take my time with the buttons on his shirt. This last one condenses into a planet under our gaze – milky white and perfectly round.
It’s astounding that we both know what to do. I’m not even having to think about it. I’m not being dragged along. It’s not slick or knowing. It’s as if we’re discovering the path together.
I hold my hands over my head like a child as he peels my jumper off me. My hair, my new short hair, gets caught in static and crackles in the dark. It makes me laugh. It makes me feel as if my body is plump and healthy.
The backs of his fingers brush my breasts through my bra, and he knows, because we’re looking at each other, that this is OK. I’ve been touched by so many people, prodded and poked, examined and operated on. I thought my body was numb, immune to touch.
We kiss again. For minutes. Tiny kisses where he bites my top lip gently, where my tongue edges his mouth. The room seems full of ghosts, of trees, the sky.
Our kisses become deeper. We sink into each other. It’s like the first time we kissed – urgent, fierce.
‘I want you,’ he says.
And I want him right back.
I want to show him my breasts. I want to undo my bra and get them out. I pull him towards the bed. We’re still kissing – throats, necks, mouths. The room seems full of smoke, with something burning here between us.
I lie on the bed and buck my hips. I need my jeans off. I want to display myself to him, want him to see me.
‘Are you sure about this?’ he says.
‘Very.’
It’s simple.
He unbuckles my jeans. I undo his belt with one hand, like a magic trick. I circle his belly button with my finger, my thumb nudging at his boxers.
The feel of his skin next to mine, the weight of him on top of me, his warmth pressing into me – I didn’t know it would feel like this. I didn’t understand that when you make love, you actually do make love. Stir things. Affect each other. The breath that escapes from me is dazzled. He breathes it in with a gasp.
His hand slides under my hip, I meet it with mine, our fingers lock. I’m not sure whose hand belongs to who.