My mouth tastes awful. There’s a glass of water on the step, so I pick it up and sip some, swilling it round my mouth and spitting it out, then take a proper drink. Although some dribbles out the side of my mouth and down the collar of my shirt, most of it makes it in.
“What are you doing here?” I ask Hannah. “I thought we weren’t talking. Are we talking?”
“You weren’t talking,” she says, frowning. “But you texted me. I called. I was worried.”
I shake my head. It’s not me she should be worrying about. She should worry about her. I’m dangerous to people who care about me.
“I killed him,” I say, letting her lead me away.
“Killed who?” Hannah says, patiently.
“Chris.”
“Yeah, so, I don’t know what you’re talking about.” She’s annoyed.
“My best friend,” I say.
“What?” She stops yanking at the stiff bolt on the back gate and looks up at me and I think how pretty she is when she doesn’t try. Her hair’s all scruffy and she’s wearing hardly any make-up but that just means you get to notice her eyes more. Even in orange street light.
“My best friend,” I say, echoing something I know I’ve just said. “You’re my best friend.”
“You’re mine too. Why d’you think I came out here looking for you?” she says and starts working the bolt loose on the gate. “Who’s this Chris you keep going on about?”
Chris. Oh God, Chris. I’m so sorry. I miss you, mate. I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to… I should never have… I wasn’t…
I slump down on the floor, my head folding into my hands and the tears coming so fast and wet that they almost choke me on their way out. I’m nothing but grief. It doesn’t hurt. It’s a cold, deep emptiness inside me and I want it to end. I can’t face this again. I can’t…
HANNAH
Shit. I have no idea what’s just happened, but Aaron’s gone into total meltdown on the floor. He’s making the most awful sound — like a wail — and he’s sobbing so hard his whole body is shaking. When he looks up at me his face is like one of those theatre masks with the mouth turned upside down and there are tears streaming down his face. It’s like nothing I’ve ever seen before and it scares me.
But it’s not about me, is it?
This is about my best friend.
WEDNESDAY 14TH APRIL
EASTER HOLIDAYS
AARON
I wake up in a strange house, in a strange bed in the middle of the night, feeling sick. There’s a plastic bucket next to me on the bed and I vomit into it then put it on the floor. That’s when I find that someone’s put out a bottle of water and a glass. I drink half the bottle and lie back, feeling like I’m on the roundabout in the park with someone spinning it faster and faster…
I wake up again, and there’s light at the window. Someone’s cleared the bucket away and given me a new one, and there’s fresh water beside me along with a packet of crisps. I scoff the crisps and gulp the water, although sitting up kills me. I feel weak with exhaustion and I need a piss, but… I collapse back onto the bed and pull the duvet up and around me. I can smell myself, which is not a good sign, but I’m past caring. I guess that’s not a great sign either.
When I wake up the third time I’m feeling a lot better. A surge of gratitude washes over me — the high the body throws up in relief that it hasn’t been annihilated by alcohol. There’s noise beyond my bedroom door and I can hear Lola running along the landing. I stand up and stretch then shuffle over to the window and look out. It’s afternoon. There’s a gentle knock on the door and Hannah’s there in tracksuit bottoms and one of her old vests that only just covers the bump.
“Mum wants to know if you’re hungry.” Her expression is completely neutral. It worries me.
“I could go another packet of crisps?” I say with a smile that is only half returned, before she tells me that I seriously need to brush my teeth.
“Use the green brush. There’s a towel and clothes for you as well.”
I take the hint and shower. After I’ve dried off, I pull on the shorts and faded Nike T-shirt she’s left out. Jay’s, but for me.
Hannah is waiting on the bed next to a tray of food: crisps, biscuits, cold pizza, slices of apple, a Mars ice cream and two cans. One Diet Coke, one lemonade. I don’t need to ask who the ice cream’s for as I sit down. That baby she’s brewing is made of the stuff.
“I’m so sorry. About last week.” I apologize from the pit of my very empty stomach before taking a slice of pizza. “And about last night.”
“You said some pretty scary shit,” is all she says in reply.
I don’t remember exactly what I said. I don’t remember much at all, only bits here and there, pieces of a puzzle that don’t give any indication of the whole.
“Like what?” I say, because it’s going to be the only way to find out. Not that I want to.
“You said you had no one.” She swallows, concentrating hard on finishing her ice cream. “That you killed your best friend, Chris.”
There’s a pause. I told her about Chris? I look down at the duvet cover, desperately trying to remember when I said that, wondering if I told her everything or nothing, or something hashed up and halfway in between.
“You said you wished you were dead.”
Hannah’s voice breaks and I look up to see that she’s crying. Grown-up tears that just run down her face.
I’ve never seen her look so sad.
“I’m so sorry, Hannah,” I say, shuffling closer and putting my arms around her. “I don’t mean that.”
“You did,” she says into my shoulder.
I think about lying to her, but how can I?
She squeezes into me so tightly I think she’s trying to climb into my soul. And I feel it coming, the choice between shutting her out and letting her in…
“Who’s Chris?” she asks.
I hold my breath and close my eyes. I think about a part of my life I’ve tried to shut away. But I let it out when I told Neville and now it’s here in this room, waiting to be shared with the person I most want to hide it from. I can’t afford to lose Hannah any more than she can afford to lose me, but if I don’t tell her the truth, then it’s over.
What the hell. Here goes.
HANNAH
And so I learn who Chris is — and what happened to him. It is the hardest thing I’ve ever had to hear, but I know it was harder for him to tell me.
It changes nothing. Aaron is still my favourite person in the whole world.
He is still my hero, even if he can’t see why.
AARON
Of the seminal moments in my life, Careers Day in the Autumn of Year 5 is my favourite. Everyone had to dress as whatever they wanted to be when they grew up. I had gone in a tweed jacket and a bow tie and when Miss Weston asked me what I wanted to be I told her that I wanted to be the Doctor.
“Shouldn’t you be wearing a lab coat and stethoscope like Paul?” She pointed to Paul Black, who was trying to strangle everyone with the stethoscope in question.
Before I could answer, a boy I didn’t know from the other class spoke up.
“Paul’s a doctor,” he explained, giving me a look of approval. “He wants to be the Doctor.”
“Who?”
“Exactly,” we said at the same time, relieved that she understood.