I find an empty table where I can sit and rest for a moment. Socializing is tiring.
A voice I don’t recognize says, “Hey,” far too close to my ear for my liking. Glancing round I discover Marcy sitting with one hip propped on the table. It’s easy to see why she’s a model. She possesses an angular, almost alien, beauty, all cheekbones and jawline — the kind with no warmth. As far from my type as it’s possible to get.
“Er, hi?” My voice sounds like it’s yet to break and I clear my throat.
Marcy edges close enough that she bumps her arm into mine. For an alarming moment I worry that she’s going to sit on my lap, but she doesn’t, for which I am grateful — Tyrone would have a hard time seeing the funny side of that.
“Just wanted to say hello properly,” she says.
I hadn’t been aware that the ones we’d exchanged three times already were inadequate.
“You’re cute.” Marcy is not the kind of girl that calls me cute. It unnerves me. I glance round, but the nearest person is Rex who’s too busy texting to notice I’m in need of rescuing.
“Thank you,” I say, then, stuck for anything more insightful, I smile and say, “So. I hear you’re a model?”
And that, it seems, is the right response. Marcy talks to me of the woes of modelling, brushing her fingers on my forearm to emphasize points barely worth making and flashing me too many dazzling smiles. Once she’s made me sufficiently uncomfortable with her attention, she leaves, blowing me a kiss over her shoulder.
I hiss Rex’s name.
“What?” He finally looks up from his phone.
“What was that all about?” I ask. He still looks blank. “With Marcy?”
“Oh.” Rex finally catches on. “Marcy. Don’t take it personally. She’s making sure you know how hot she is. Just tell her she’s gorgeous three times in a row and she’ll go away. Like the Candyman but in reverse. And fitter.”
For the first time tonight I laugh. I’m not sure about me, but Rex isn’t so bad. The table fills up as others take up my offer of free beer and there’s quite a crowd of us when Fletch comes over, looking alarmingly smug.
“Where’ve you been?” someone asks.
“For a walk.” Fletch retrieves a can of cider from his pocket and takes a slurp. Wiping his hand across his mouth, he says, “That’s better. Needed to get rid of the taste of pussy juice.”
I blanch. Who talks like that in real life?
“Take it you didn’t go for a walk on your own?” Rex says.
I know he didn’t — I walked past him and Hannah on my way to take a leak.
“I left alone, I return alone.” Fletch makes a zipping gesture across his mouth. Then he makes an unzipping gesture by his crotch and mimes pushing someone’s head there, laughing. It takes a moment for me to realize I’m the only one who isn’t joining in.
There’s a shout of “Bullshit!” to my right but whoever it is gets drowned out by accusations of jealousy.
“Hannah’s got standards you know…” Fletch says, swigging his drink.
“Low ones!” one of the basketball guys says.
“Not low enough for you, mate, given how far you got last term!” Rex shouts back and the pack laughs some more. It’s like watching a nature documentary.
“Careful, that’s Fletch’s girlfriend you’re talking about,” someone warns.
Fletch curls his lip. “As if I’d actually go out with a girl like Hannah!”
“But you’d let her suck you off and tell everyone about it?” I say, concentrating on the crisp packet I’ve just folded into a triangle. This has nothing to do with me. I have no idea why I’m so irritated.
“Eh?” Fletch looks at me, suddenly noticing the new guy. For a second, I wonder whether I’ve stepped over the line, but Fletch just laughs. “Man, I’ve done a lot more than that with her. It’s Hannah Sheppard — it’s what she’s for.”
I really do not like Fletch.
SUNDAY 4TH OCTOBER
HANNAH
Today sucked ass. I told Mum I’d get my homework done whilst I was at Gran’s but, when I got to the home, Gran was having a bad reaction to her new medication and wasn’t her usual self. It seemed better to chat with her and read out bits of gossip from the magazines I’d brought rather than haul out some French verbs. I know she wouldn’t have minded — she quite likes me doing my homework while she potters about in the little apartment — but family comes first. School work comes somewhere below taking my make-up off at night and exfoliating once a week.
When Mum picked me up she asked to see my homework and we had a fight. She told me if I couldn’t get my school work done then she wouldn’t take me to see Gran every week. I went mental until she said something about talking to Gran. I shut up after that — Gran would be on Mum’s side. Anyway, I’m doing it tonight whilst Mum and Robert are out and I’m babysitting Lola. We’re in the sitting room and I’m halfway through when the doorbell goes.
“Can I get it?” Lola asks, eyes wide and pleading. She loves stuff like that, answering the door or the phone and checking the mail. Sometimes I send her letters so she’s got something to open. I cut little windows in the envelope and make the letters look like bills. It means Lola can pretend to study her mail seriously, like Mum and Robert do, except I make the writing really big and decorate the paper with stickers and glitter.
“You can if you pull your top straight, Lolly,” I say and I listen as she runs across the hall and fiddles with the chain on the front door.
“Have you looked out of the side window to see who it is?” I call.
“Yes. It’s a boy.” Helpful.
She opens the door and there’s a murmuring voice that I can’t quite hear before she thump thump thumps back into the room.
“It’s for you.”
“Did you ask who it is?” Lola shakes her head. There’s a reason why you shouldn’t send a five-year-old to open the door.
I sincerely hope it isn’t Fletch.
It’s not.
“Hey, kitten,” says the boy on my doorstep. He’s not been here since he told me we needed to cool things off but, still, I’m not completely surprised to see him.
“Hi,” I say, trying not to give anything away.
“Can I come in?”
I’m not sure that’s such a good idea, but I step back and let him come as far as the doormat. I have to lean round him to shut the door, which isn’t a good idea either. He smells so good. A warm, clean sort of smell.
But he’s not warm. And he’s not clean.
“What you up to?” His eyes flash over to the other room, where Lola’s leaping around in front of the TV.
“I’m babysitting my little sister.”
“She’s cute.”
I say nothing.
“What’s her name?”
“Lola.”
He nods his approval. I guess it’s habit to think everyone wants his permission for stuff. His eyes turn to me and I feel my clothes stripping from my skin, my body opening up until he can see everything he wants. He knows I want him. He knows I’m no different from everyone else.
“You got a moment to chat?” he asks, his body turning towards the stairs. I get the impression our conversation might take a different path from last time — this time it will be one we follow all the way.
I want to. Oh my God, do I want to.