The Deviants (23 page)

‘Yeah,' said Max, as he crunched through the gears. ‘Hey, Ells, there's a chocolate fountain on every table tonight.'

‘Cool,' I said, looking out my window at the green fields rolling by. Neil was egging Max on to speed up through the gears. There didn't seem to be a problem between them. Maybe Max hadn't read the notebooks, hadn't seen the drawing of Rat Man hanging. Maybe it was all in my mind him acting strangely over lunch. I wanted to believe it was anyway.

‘Max, there's blind bends all along here,' Jo mewled, loud enough for me to hear but no one else. Neil just whooped encouragingly. I clung to my seat and closed my eyes until I felt us start to slow, eventually turning onto the sweeping gravel drive of Michaelmas Manor.

Max parked up on a grassy patch in front of a box hedge. I couldn't wait to get out into the cool evening air but Neil had to let me out and linger around the car as he
did so; there were smokers outside watching and he wanted everyone to know whose car it was.

Michaelmas Manor was the dream place to have any sort of party. It was a sixteenth-century stately home and hotel complex on the eastern slope of Brynstan Hill, with acres of space – lawns, walled gardens, fishponds. There was even a flock of peacocks around, pecking at the gravel and making strange wailing noises every so often. There was something going on at Michaelmas most weekends. Weddings, proms, parties. I'd been a few times – first for Prom, then for Uncle Paul's 50th and again last Christmas. It was always the same. No expense spared. Superstar DJ. Ice sculptures. And Neil always footed the bill.

We walked through the main entrance and Neil presented the invite to the guy on the door who looked like a giraffe in a suit. ‘The Rittmans and Estella Newhall, my good sir,' he said proudly. ‘You'll know her as our Volcano Girl, of course.'

There was a horrible silence as the giraffe guy studied my face. Then he said, ‘Oh yeah! I saw you in the papers.'

‘You did indeed,' said Neil, his grin so Brie-sy I could have hit him. ‘She's gonna be a big star one day. Blows Jessica Ennis out the water, she does.'

Oh God, kill me now,
I thought, pretending to read the buffet menu by the door as Max headed straight for the food. Artisan pastries, breads and dipping oils, blocks of cheese, platters of sea bass, poached salmon, glazed hams and joints of pork so large they looked like they were on steroids. In a room to the right the walls were swathed with white silk so it looked like an igloo. There was a dance floor and all around were tables with complimentary wine and small chocolate fountains in the centres. The place was
packed. Most were standing at the bar, around which hung silver and mauve banners and balloons.

‘Do you wanna go and find our table, princess?' said Neil, his hand on my waist as he guided me towards the igloo room. Max didn't see me shrink away from his touch as he was already talking to a couple of his football mates – local hottie Craig Wilkins, whose sister had been on my relay team, and some knob head called Nick Parsons. Jo was talking to a woman by the buffet, so Neil went to join her. I walked into the function room alone.

Shelby herself was on the door to the main function room, welcoming people in and handing cards and gifts to two large suited minions, Uncle Paul and some starter-kit-boy-bander with almost-stubble and pure white trainers, their tongues sticking up over his black suit trousers. Parcels were stacking up on the table behind her (parcels that I was going to demolish during the superstar DJ's turn).

‘Thanks so much! Aww, thanks for coming – I'm so glad you could make it!' she was saying to each person she greeted. ‘We've arranged some entertainment in one of the other function rooms for the kids, a clown and a juggler and a bit of a disco, so we'll be taking them through in a minute. Aw, thanks so much, you're so kind! Lovely to see you!'

I stood watching her, kindling my own internal flame and looking for weak spots – praying for her to trip over her dress. Hoping a waiter would spill a whole tray of drinks down her. Boys flittered around her like moths. She was so beautiful, it almost hurt to look at her, with her long braided blonde hair draped over one shoulder and her halter-neck pearl-beaded dress skimming her curves and fanning out like a fishtail. That dress cost over £600 – Neil had mentioned it loudly during Sunday lunch. A ‘pre-birthday present' he
said. This was the dress I was going to drop invisible ink spots on when no one was looking.

She smiled across at me.

I had to smile back.

I
had
wanted to destroy her. I had wanted to destroy her party. She'd lured Max away from me with her big eyes, C-cup boobs and big lips. Big, red, wet lips. I reached into my handbag for the ink and held it tightly in my fist. I couldn't do it.

I headed for an empty table in the far corner of the room, beside a potted monkey puzzle. Everyone not dancing on the large hardwood floor to the deafening ABBA medley was either at the bar or at the buffet. The sign on the table said ‘
Neil, Jo and Max Rittman, plus Estella
'. I sat down, took the lid off the ink and poured it into the soil of the monkey puzzle. Then I reached for one of the complimentary bottles of white wine and a glass.

The lighting was low and had a purple tinge to match the balloons so not only could I not hear or talk properly, I couldn't see anything either. I needed to find the cake – this was the target for the liquid laxative, and then I needed to find the toilets – these I would block up once the speeches were underway. I was poised to do it – I could feel the super-size Laxolot bottle in my bag. I was going to do it. I just couldn't find the will to actually get up and start.

My problem was that this wasn't about Shelby. Shelby might have been a boyfriend-blowing bimbo, but she didn't deserve the humiliation I had planned. I watched Max at the bar. He was talking to his football team crowd, miming headers. He looked like a stranger.

Neil appeared through the tables like a shark cutting through murky water, bringing over a plate of chopped fruit on long cocktail sticks. He set them down on our table.

‘Joelle's met up with some of her WI lot,' he said, with a smile. ‘You OK over here?'

‘Yeah,' I said.

He sat down and we both watched the dancing. ‘You want anything from the buffet?'

‘No,' I said.

‘I brought you some fruit for the chocolate fountain.'

I necked my glass of wine in one go.

‘Should you be drinking that? You've got training tomorrow, haven't you?'

‘It's my night off.'

I stared at the dance floor. Shelby had been dragged up there for a smooch with some lad. I caught her eye and instinctively looked away. I waited for Neil to say something else. To make some spine-chilling comment like the one he'd made the other day. But he didn't. And when I looked back, he was gone, slinking into the crowd to play the benevolent host again.

‘Prick,' I said, loudly. But no one heard me over the music. ‘Pervert,' I said again. Still, no one looked. ‘Paedophile.'

I poured myself another drink and sat there at that empty table, scratching a new patch of hives that had flared up on my upper thigh, my only companion the chocolate fountain bubbling in the centre of the table like an overflowing sewer pipe. I was forcing Fallon to stay silent when I knew she was right. We
should
tell everyone what Neil was like, what he'd done to us. We should light him up like a Christmas tree. We
should
.

But I couldn't.

I looked at the tray of fruit and swiped it to the floor. It landed everywhere.

The music pumped through my head. All around me were people who looked like they could just die laughing
cos their lives were so damn fun. I necked my wine. Then two more. The effects were welcome. It coated my rage in a cool, numbing blanket. I felt like laughing. I felt balanced. Easy. My resentment began to fade until I felt deadened to everything, even physical pain. I pinched the skin on top of my hand. I couldn't even feel that. Every sip I took dragged me a little bit further away from my scalding anger, until my vision started to blur.

I carried on, listening to the music, watching people – grinding on the dance floor, pulling purple and white crackers, stuffing forkfuls of sea bass and couscous salad into their gobs. I listened in on conversations – women moaning about their diets while troughing mountains of bread; men chuntering out boring conversations about loft conversions and how they would have got the sitter Jamie Hardy or Jack Vardy missed and blah blah blah.

And all the while I sipped and I watched them.

Shelby Gilmore moseyed around the tables, making sure everyone was having a good time, chomping on fruit kebabs and flirting with the waiters. The table of presents she'd been standing guard at was gone, and so had both her henchmen. They'd been taken to a back room already. All the guests must have arrived. I looked at her, waiting for her to catch my eye. And she did. We held each other's gaze for a few seconds before she looked away. Why was she so damn interested in me? Maybe it was guilt.

As soon as she looked away, I stood up, afraid that if I didn't I'd lose my nerve. I made my way through the maze of white-clothed tables, past the buffet and through a long corridor where waitresses were all bustling about with trays of glasses and platters of sliced meat. Nobody noticed me and, if they did, they didn't say anything. I clocked a
door at the end of another longer, quieter corridor marked ‘Morning Room', and slipped quietly inside.

Presents for any occasion were always kept in here. I fumbled along the wall for a light switch until I found the panel and flicked them all on at once. It was a large lounge area, all yellow silk sofas and ugly chintz ornaments. There was a wide snooker table across the room and on top of it sat a mountain of wrapped boxes. I walked over and just sort of stared.

I reached for the biggest present on the pile, a large pink box with a thin shiny purple ribbon around its middle.

I shouldn't be here. I just shouldn't be here
, I kept thinking. But the longer I stood there thinking about it, the quieter the voice became.

I swallowed once. And then I just sort of did it.

I trashed that room. All over the ornate wallpaper, the silk yellow sofas, the cushions, the rugs, the carpet. Three large vases. The big pile of presents. That room went from top end to dog end in about three minutes flat.

And do you want to know what I was thinking about the entire time? As I was tearing open gifts with someone else's name on them and snapping DVDs in half and smashing iPhones and laptops and watches?

As I squirted ink up and down that billiard table, soiling and tearing expensive gowns and shoes and cards full of money?

As I tore open boxes – hover boards, cameras, Nutribullets, make-up palettes, and perfumes, perfumes, perfumes, smashing the bottles and fouling up the room with their acrid, overpriced stenches?

Neil. That's who I was thinking of, not Shelby. Not Max.

It was all about him.

I left the room in the dark, as quietly as I'd entered it. I headed back to the main function room. A stab of guilt hit my chest.

They weren't his presents.

People were still dancing. Eating. And I was still sitting on my own with only a chocolate fountain to talk to. I poured myself another wine, right to the top of the glass.

After a Maroon 5 medley and a truly toe-curling ten minutes of Dad Dancing when everyone got to their feet for ‘YMCA', Max eventually appeared and took the seat next to me.

‘Where've you been? I came over just now but you'd gone.' He was shouting over the music, looking at the mess of chopped fruit on the carpet. ‘What's happened here?'

‘Waiter dropped it.' I sipped my wine, concentrating on not looking as drunk as I was.

‘What's up?'

‘Nothing. I'm happy.'

‘Ella – are you drunk?'

‘Bit.' I sipped. ‘It's all right. I don't even care about you and Shelby banging each other's brains out any more, I truly don't.'

I wanted to laugh so badly. His confused little face and big eyes were making me laugh. I was on the knife edge of hysterics for no reason at all.

Max sat down, going into lip-rub overdrive. ‘What are you talking about?'

‘I'm not stupid, Max. You should go and dance with her,' I leaned in to him and shouted. ‘Grind on that. See how she likes it.'

‘Ells, let me explain.'

I snorted, reaching past him for the bottle and filling my glass again. ‘You don't have to. Honestly. I couldn't be more
fine. I just want to sit here with my wine and not care. OK? I'm sick of feeling stuff, so I'm not going to. I don't want to think about you or Shelby or your dad. Or my mum. Or Zane. Or the Shaws. And this is helping a really lot.'

Max snatched my glass out of my hand. ‘You're not having any more.'

‘Yes, I am. You can't stop me. You're not my best friend any more. I'm going to find a new friend, OK?' I grabbed the other wine bottle on the table. ‘Here she is. Here's my friend. She's called Blue Nun.' I laughed again. ‘God, I'm so funny when I'm drunk.' I dropped the bottle on the floor. ‘You should be writing some of this down.'

‘I hate seeing you like this.'

‘Like what? I thought you'd like me better like this – all loosened up and joining in?'

He watched me pour myself another glass. ‘What about your training?'

‘I don't care. I am fearless. I'm in the Fearless Five. I have no fear.'

‘Ella, for Christ's sake, you're shouting!'

I glugged my wine and looked at him. His face whirled in and out of focus.

‘We didn't have sex. Just – other stuff. We don't even kiss. I feel terrible, Ells.'

‘You poor soul. I wonder if there's a helpline you can ring?'

I amazed myself with how calm I felt. I watched a tear fall onto his lapel and, for some reason, found it incredibly funny. I laughed in his face.