All These Perfect Strangers (12 page)

‘Bryan, look what you've done,' I heard Rachel say, delightedly.

The Sub-Dean coloured but tried to pretend it had nothing to do with him. Marcus took charge, neatly taking the petition from Leiza, saying he would ensure the Chancellor would receive it at an appropriate time. He then escorted the Chancellor away with promises of cognac in his office. Rachel, who had been splashed by the whisky, used that as an excuse to leave Kesh and me to finish the cleaning up, directed by a furious Sub-Dean.

·  ·  ·

It was at least another hour before we got to the Rec Room. This was where students usually hung out if they were staying in college for the night. Sparsely furnished with a handful of rickety tables, its main attractions were the TV perched high on one wall, and on the other side of the room, past the pinball machines, the small college shop which sold lollies and stamps and, after 6 p.m., beer. Rachel, back in jeans and a t-shirt, was perched up next to the counter, chatting to Toby who was on shop duty tonight. She was rolling cigarettes, tendrils of tobacco peeping from a bright yellow plastic pouch on the seat beside her, her tongue darting out to lick the edge of each tobacco paper.

‘All in all, a very interesting night,' she said.

‘Not if you had to actually work,' I answered.

‘I've been working hard as well, just more cerebrally than you minions. Look what I still have.' She shook a set of keys at me.

‘Do they belong to Marcus?'

She nodded. ‘Think of where I could get into with these beauties. Every room in the college.'

This didn't concern me too much as Rachel waltzed into my bedroom whenever she wanted to anyway.

‘I already had a snoop around Marcus's office. Checked out a few student files in Carol's filing cabinet. Very interesting. Do you know Michael's mother died when he was ten? I expect it was of disappointment in having produced something so weird.'

‘She died of cancer,' said Toby, sharply. ‘And if you say one more word about what you read, I'm taking those keys back to Marcus and telling him what you did. You could be expelled, you know.'

Rachel poked out her tongue, and then picked up her cigarette, which she started smoking with impatient gasps. Ignoring her, I looked around the room for Rogan. Small groups of people sat at tables chatting to each other. A tight knot of boys gathered around the pinball machine. In the middle of them was Joad. Michael was sitting on a chair at the edge of the group. The boys began to laugh, and I heard Joad say. ‘You're on, mate. I accept.'

‘Rogan here?' I asked Toby.

Toby shook his head. ‘Got some urgent message and headed off.' He pulled a couple of beers out of the fridge for us. ‘Here you go, on the house.'

‘That's very generous,' said Kesh.

‘Well, when I say on the house, I'll put them on Rachel's tab. Least she can do. One for Michael as well.' He frowned at Rachel, as if daring her to argue with him. But she was too busy tucking the keys away in her bag and looking as though she was about to leave. ‘And here's the party pooper.' Leiza stalked across the room towards us. A smattering of applause broke out from the handful of girls in the corner, but it quickly died away.

Toby stared at her. ‘Leiza, not one single thirsty academic have we had in here tonight. We were going to make a killing, but instead, thanks to your one-woman protest, they have all hightailed it out of here.'

Leiza was even more annoyed. ‘Don't you start. It took ages getting all those signatures and I bet Marcus doesn't even give him the petition. They think it will all be forgotten by the start of next term and they won't have to do a thing. Get me a drink and give me a break.'

‘Let me buy it for you,' said Joad, who came up to us, carrying empty bottles. ‘A beer?'

Leiza narrowed her eyes, obviously wondering what the catch was, but nodded her head all the same.

‘I thought that was courageous of you standing up to the Chancellor. To quote Dr McKillen: “Be brave, take action”.' He smiled at Leiza. ‘I admire you doing that.'

‘Me too,' said Kesh.

Leiza shrugged. ‘Don't know if the Sub-Dean will see it that way. He called it a career-limiting move, but then I think he was referring to his own. Apparently, we will be having a meeting tonight to discuss it.'

‘Talk of the devil,' said Toby quietly, for standing in the doorway was the Sub-Dean. ‘I'll keep your beer cold for you.'

The Sub-Dean blinked belligerently at us. ‘Ms Parnell, a word.'

Joad actually walked Leiza to the door, patting her on her arm as she left the room. Snorts of laughter came from Joad's table of friends.

Toby waved at Michael and pointed to the beer. Michael looked blank but came up to us and I passed it over to him.

‘For you,' I said.

Michael studied the beer, while I turned back and looked at Joad, who was still standing at the door, seeming pleased with himself.

‘What's he up to?'

‘It's for a bet,' Michael said. ‘I heard them before.'

Before I could ask any questions, Kesh continued talking.

‘What happened to Alice was dreadful. We should all be campaigning for better security cameras and more patrols.'

Toby shrugged. ‘I don't know, Kesh. Would it really make a difference? You can't put cameras everywhere. There's always going to be some danger. Don't people just have to be sensible?'

‘Are you saying it's OK women can't walk around campus by themselves?' asked Rachel. She was still annoyed at Toby. ‘Alice has been disfigured for life. I'm not saying Leiza isn't a pain in the ass, but this time she's right.'

‘I know the solution,' said Joad, who had swaggered over and rejoined the group. He signalled Toby for another drink.

‘What?' said Rachel.

‘Just say yes. There'd be no rape if you chicks put out more. That Marchmain pricktease got what she deserved.'

For one moment, the only sound was a series of descending pings from the pinball machine. Then Rachel walked straight up to Joad and smacked him as hard as she could. His head snapped back with the force of the blow. Fingermarks appeared on his face. He gaped at Rachel and then raised a closed fist to punch her, but Toby had already jumped the counter to get between them and Stoner stepped forward and grabbed his arm.

‘C'mon man,' said Stoner. ‘You don't want to do that.'

Joad swore as Toby told him he should leave. Some of the boys who were with him beforehand came up looking sheepish, and helped hustle Joad out of the room.

‘You need ice on your hand, slugger,' said Toby, heading back to the right side of the counter. He scooped up some ice from the freezer, put it in a tea-towel and gave it to Rachel.

She made a fist and then flexed her hand. Her palm was bright red. ‘Should have got in another one.'

‘You could be in a whole lot of trouble,' I said. ‘Maybe you'd better go to bed.'

Rachel pressed the ice into her hand. ‘Hark at you, Little Miss Bursary. Of course you'd never do anything that would get you into strife.' She gave me a knowing look before saying loudly, ‘You all know Joad had it coming to him.'

‘Here's hoping the Sub-Dean agrees,' Toby said. ‘C'mon, Rach, Pen is right. Head to bed.'

‘Are you kidding me? The night is but young.' Before anyone could stop her, she picked up her bag and walked out of the room.

*

Frank puts down his notepad. ‘I sense that you are not fully engaged with this process, Pen.'

‘What do you mean?' I slam the diary shut. The pages make a muffled slap. ‘That's what we agreed. I write what happened and you write my report.'

‘Do you view it like a bargain?' he asks. ‘A direct exchange?'

‘Yes, and I'm keeping up my end.'

Frank looks at me carefully. ‘You could think that. Tell yourself that you've arrived on time to our sessions and have mostly answered my questions. But still, I get the impression you are not engaging in the process because you don't believe you belong here. That you really don't need treatment.'

There is no answer to that because it is exactly what I am thinking. I guess a broken clock gets to be right twice a day.

‘Why did you choose to tell me about the Academic Night?'

I shrug my shoulders.

‘I think you did it because it allows you to blend into the background and instead gives me all these other people to think about and analyse. A maze of human behaviours to get lost in. I am getting a picture of everyone else but you. But what you need to realise is that you are my patient, not the others. I am treating
you
. So next time, I don't want to hear about what you did in term break, or the Sub-Dean's pettiness, or how you wrote an essay or attended lectures. Next appointment I want you to start with the Friday after term break. That's your real end of the bargain.'

Reluctantly, I nod.

‘Good. No more distractions then.'

But that's not right. What I read out wasn't a distraction.

Things don't go wrong in an instant. There isn't one single moment when the world suddenly splits in two. Rather, it begins with a minute crack, and then another and another, until they join together, getting bigger and wider and all the time you keep fooling yourself that this can still be fixed. That you can fill them in and everything will return to normal.

The Academic Night was the beginning. A hairline fracture, a fissure too small for Frank to notice. But I can hardly blame him; at the time I didn't see it either.

It was the Friday afternoon after term break and Rachel stopped talking the moment I knocked on Kesh's open door. She was lying cat-like across Kesh's bed, ash falling from her cigarette onto the faded pink ruffled cover that Kesh had owned since primary school. There was an ashtray on the table above her head that was solely reserved for her use. Kesh, who suffered from asthma, didn't smoke and wasn't supposed to be on our floor at all. An administrative error had meant that her non-smoking floor request had been overlooked but she didn't want to complain about it.

‘A gun?' asked Kesh, who had her back to me and was standing on a chair, tying a piece of string to a hook.

Rachel caught sight of me and her mouth curved into a thin-lipped smile.

Uncertain, I rapped my knuckles against the wood. Kesh turned and beamed. Her face was the equivalent of a poly-graph, unable to hide her thoughts or emotions.

‘Let me guess, the Murder Game?' I asked.

‘Well, no, not that Murder Game anyway,' answered Rachel.

‘Rach wants to know if I have ever used a gun. Have a look through my make-up, while I get this washing hung out.'

Kesh moved the chair across the room and clambered up, threading the string around a hook on the wall and then pulling it taut.

‘What are you doing here?' Rachel asked me. There was a barbed tone to her voice which I ignored. Ever since she had come back from term break there had been an amplification of her sharpness, as if just touching her could give you an electric shock.

‘Tonight's the big date,' explained Kesh. ‘I'm doing Pen's make-up.'

‘What date? Not with Rogan?' asked Rachel.

I said nothing, and walked over to Kesh's dresser. Kesh had spent a small fortune trying to get boys to focus on her face instead of her chest. She owned an impressive array of make-up pots, tubes and brushes. I concentrated on finding a lipstick I liked.

‘You're not really going?' Rachel asked.

‘Didn't you tell him to ask me out?' I replied.

‘Oh that. Well, now I know you better, I don't think it's a good idea.'

‘Maybe you don't know me that well, because I'm going,' I said, starting to get annoyed. ‘He bought tickets to see a band at the bar.'

Rachel snorted, dismissively. ‘The whole college is going to the bar tonight. That's not a date, that's a class outing.'

I shrugged in an offhand kind of way but there was a bit of a ‘fuck you' thrown in for good measure.

Kesh, sensing danger, tried to change the subject. ‘Pen, have you used a gun?'

I grabbed a handful of lipsticks and sat down on the floor, my back against the cupboard.

‘A country girl, course she has,' said Rachel. Her voice was a pretend sweet sing-song but I could hear the malice. ‘But then you don't seem to like the country much. Didn't go home for the holidays like the rest of us.'

I refused to answer her. Staying for term break had allowed me to catch up on my studies and write an essay. I had even tried to visit Marcus to find out if there was any paid work I could do during the holidays, but Carol told me he was away and the Sub-Dean was in charge. I didn't bother asking him. If I was careful, I could eke out my money until next semester. After that I'd have to look for waitressing work.

‘I'm from the country and I haven't,' said Kesh, stepping over my legs. She began pegging out wispy bits of bright material, lacy bras, lace undies, all belonging to Rachel, along the clothes line that cut the room in two.

‘Hippy communes don't count,' said Rachel. ‘So, Pen, have you?'

‘Sure,' I said, beginning to draw lipstick lines on the back of my hand and rubbing them in.

‘When?' Rachel pulled herself upright and, grabbing a pillow, placed it between her head and the lip of the window, positioning herself so she could see me clearly through a frame of a pink camisole and bright green French knickers.

‘One of my mum's boyfriends was a gun nut and I've been rabbiting on a friend's farm.'

‘Is that all?' There was something insistent about the way she spoke that made me more wary.

‘Why are you asking?'

‘Nothing important,' she said, and although her tone was casual, her eyes never left me. ‘Just, in the holidays I found this old newspaper article about a policeman who was shot with his own gun a few years ago by a teenage girl, and it got me wondering how many teenage girls know how to shoot guns, that's all. I mean, pretty embarrassing to be shot by your own gun.'