When I Was Invisible (20 page)

‘It simply would have been nice to have some notice if Veronica wasn't in for dinner and she wasn't going to cook as planned.'

‘Have you had some sort of knock on the head?' Dad asks Mum. He holds his paper away from his face, which is corrugated with confusion. ‘Since when was it a plan that Veronica cooks? It's been lovely of her to do it these past few weeks, but you're the one who won't usually let anyone into the kitchen. If I try to so much as boil water for pasta you're telling me off.' Dad shakes his paper out again with a stern look at my mother. ‘Go on, Veronica, have a lovely evening.'

‘Thanks, Dad. Thanks, Mum,' I say. I shouldn't laugh, but when I step out of the house, I can't help but have a little giggle.
‘Have you had some sort of knock on the head?'
That makes me want to laugh and laugh and laugh.

The Forbidden Grape is a dark pub, lighting set to ‘intimate'. I realise my mistake the moment I enter.
Cliff is going to think all sorts
, I tell myself.

He can think what he likes – doesn't mean he'll get anything out of me
, I reply to myself.

I am here early because the pub is a bit of a walk from my parents' house. I choose a table near the bar, then decide a booth at the back might be better. Then I question what sort of message that might send. I do not want Cliff to think this is anything more than a drink or two. I have never been on a proper date, and if that becomes obvious to him, which it probably will, I do not want him to take advantage. Or think about taking advantage. Leaning over and kissing me without permission would certainly be seen as taking advantage. That is far more likely to happen, though, in a booth. I slide myself out, and move back to the table near the bar. It's got a distinctive wobble and a rickety frame; the backless stools aren't much better. I feel on display here, as if I am trying to make a ‘NOTICE ME' statement. I move to a table near the toilets, but it is too near the toilets and there's a waft of tangy toilet cleaner every time the door opens, plus the table is too big for two. I move to the other side of the bar, near the exit to the beer garden. Smoke from the smokers' area is blown back inside, though. I go to move again, when I spot Cliff arrive. He's quite handsome away from school. He isn't much taller than me, and his hair is nicer when it's not slicked back, he has glasses on that seem to have been made to emphasise his bone structure, and he is no longer dressed like a teacher: jeans, white shirt and pinstripe suit jacket. No, he's not dressed like a teacher – he's dressed like me. The absolute blessed shame of it!

‘Hi,' he says, and he colours up a little; obviously our twin-like dressing faux pas has mortified him as much as me.

‘Hi.'

‘What would you like to drink?' he asks. When I was younger and used to go to clubs, someone buying you a drink meant one thing and one thing alone. The world must have changed since then … although I'm not so sure sometimes. If I allow him to buy me a drink, expectations may arise …

‘An orange juice and soda, please. In the same glass,' I say.

‘Do you mind if I have a pint?' he asks.

‘No? Unless you're expecting me to pay for it, which may change my answer slightly.'

He laughs gently. ‘I mean with the …' He waves his hands around as though they are meant to speak for him but they don't, not effectively anyway. ‘You know, the whole …'

‘The whole …?'

‘The whole … G. O. D. thing.' He whispers this. I'm certain God will hear him no matter how quietly he talks, but he seems tense enough so I don't tell him this.

‘Are you thinking God will mind if you have a pint? Because I'm told that Jesus once turned water into wine. I mean, I wasn't there so I can't say what colour wine it was or if, indeed, it was something like Prosecco or champagne, since it was at a wedding, but that's what I'm told. From that, I'm guessing God might overlook the odd pint or two.'

‘You don't drink, so it's easy to assume that you might disapprove if I do.'

‘I don't drink because I spent most of my teenage years falling down drunk every chance I got. I don't think I could drink any more even if I wanted to.'

The tension binding Cliff's shoulders and pinching his face melts away and he seems happier now to go to the bar.

‘Why didn't you tell your parents, Roni? You said you would.' Nika wasn't cross with me, she was sad if anything. She was sad because if I had told my parents like I said I would, then they might have told her parents and maybe they would have believed her. They still didn't believe her and the thought of that happening to me made me feel sick. Nika was brave and strong. She could talk and say the truth and she kept saying the truth even when no one believed her.

It must have killed her soul every time when it happened, when she was sent back to him, and he probably said to her what he often reminded me: ‘No one will believe you if you tell, everyone will think you're a dirty little liar.'

‘I wanted to,' I said to her, ‘but I was too scared.'

‘I would have come with you.'

‘Don't be angry with me,' I said to her. ‘Please. I was just too scared.'

‘I said to my parents I wasn't going back to the ballet lessons. They told me if I wanted to carry on living in their house, I had to do what I was told.'

‘I don't think they mean that, do you?'

‘My parents always mean what they say.'

I took her hand. ‘Do you want to come out with me on Friday night?' I asked her. I hadn't told anyone about what I did at the weekends. It was my little secret, my chance to escape. Nika needed to escape, to let go of the noise and find silence like I needed to; she might find that in the way I did.

‘Where are you going?'

‘You'll see. Just tell your parents you're sleeping over at my house and then I'll show you a night you'll never forget. Honest.'

Cliff and I have managed to make some pretty pleasant small talk so far. Which means, so far, I like dating. If it entails this sort of thing, then I like dating very much.

‘Did your superiors at the convent mind that you had such a colourful past?' Cliff asks. He's got
that
question there on his face, in his eyes, teetering on the edge of his tongue. I guess this is his way of working up to it.

‘I didn't say my past was colourful, I was saying I used to drink a lot when I was younger.'

‘Didn't they mind?'

‘They at the convent, you mean? Not especially. I wasn't exactly going to be recreating it in the convent environment, and besides, you have to confess all before you can enter a convent. The confessional is binding so nothing could be mentioned again outside of it and once you say your Hail Marys, and complete your act of contrition, you can walk away with the means to atone for your sins.'

‘Did you really believe you could do that?'

‘Are you asking me as a former nun or a woman you are sitting in a pub with?'

‘Both.'

‘Why don't you ask me the real question you're dying to know the answer to, Cliff?'

Dipping his head, Cliff scratches a little at his ear, runs a hand through his hair. ‘I'm not sure which question you're referring to.'

‘Have it your way. But I won't be answering it unless you ask me outright. You won't be able to con me into it.'

‘Wouldn't dream of it. If I knew what you were talking about. Drink?'

‘Another orange juice and soda, please.'

‘Sure thing.'

‘Please don't do this.
Please
,' Nika shouted at me.

‘It won't take long,' I said with a giggle.

Nika hadn't wanted to wear as much make-up as me, she'd refused to use the same dark kohl pencil on her eyes or my thick mascara on her lashes or my red lipstick on her mouth. In the end, I'd told her to at least put on some lip gloss and wear my heels because we wouldn't get into any of the clubs we were heading for.

We had been in the club about an hour when he approached me. He'd bought me two drinks – one had been for Nika but she'd refused to drink it. Spoilsport. He was a lot older, and a bit big around the middle, but he liked me, had kept patting my bum and telling me how sexy I looked. When he'd asked me if I wanted to go outside so we could be alone, I'd said yes. He wanted to and that meant I probably should. Nika had asked where I was going and I'd just pointed in the general direction of the exit. My hand had disappeared in his thick, meaty grip and he'd practically dragged me outside. Nika had been right behind us. ‘We're coming back in,' I'd heard her tell the bouncer, who'd grunted in reply.

The meaty grip tightened around my hand and it hurt a little as he pulled me towards him. He slapped his spare hand on my bum and squeezed, hard. Probably hard enough to bruise. That made me laugh. How was I going to explain
that
to Mum? He laughed too, then he was pulling me along again, down the street, and then he was pushing me towards the cut by the club, not very far in.

I wasn't thinking very much, but I thought he might kiss me then, now he'd shoved me against the wall. I'd had too much to drink too quickly, I could barely stand. This probably wasn't a good idea. His meaty hands, which had been sweaty and a bit cold, were suddenly up my skirt, his fingers ripping at my knickers.

Whoa!
I thought as I swayed again.
This really isn't a good idea
.

‘Don't do this,' Nika called to me again. Nika. My lovely Nika. I turned my head towards her voice and saw she hadn't left me alone. She was standing there, waiting for me, telling me not to do it. This was a usual Friday night thing. It meant nothing.

He snarled at her, and I could tell by the look on her face that his eyes were probably threatening her to shut up. Go away.

‘Don't,
please
. We can just get the bus home.' She was so brave. So strong. She didn't need to drink, she didn't need drugs, she didn't need to do this to stop the noise in her head.

He growled at Nika, showing her all his teeth, and she took a step back, scared suddenly of what he might do. I knew what he was going to do. It was always the same, they always did the same. ‘It's OK,' I told her. But my words sounded all blurry. ‘It doesn't mean anything. It never means anything.'

His hands had freed my knickers, his thighs were pushing mine open, he was doing something to himself, his meaty fingers bumping against me as he moved. I turned to look at Nika again and she was facing the other way, obviously didn't want to see what would happen next – how roughly he would enter me, how hard he would move. The guttural
gnnnrrrr-gnnnrrr-gnnnrrr
of his grunts mingled with the music spilling out of the club and pouring into my head.

Silence. There was silence.

Silence.

Silence.

Silence.

Silence.

Silence.

‘You really wanted that, didn't you?' My vision focused on him.
Who was he? Why was he talking to me? Why was he saying those awful words to me?

I stood still while he tucked himself away, zipped himself up, buttoned at the top. He sniffed; his bulbous red nose seemed to glow in the dark of the alleyway. His small, piggy eyes were turned up like his lips were in a hideous, nauseating leer.

‘I've never seen a girl want it as much as you.' His laugh, nasty and rancid, joined the noise in my swirly, blurry head. ‘You coming back inside?'

I shook my head.

‘Sound.' He left the cut after giving Nika a filthy look.

Nika averted her eyes while I pulled up my knickers, and then waited for me to join her on the pavement. She had her arms folded around herself against the cold and she had that look on her face. She'd had it the very first time at the ballet studio when Monsieur Armand had said he'd given her new material and new moves to try.

‘Let's go home,' she said.

‘No, no, I want a few more drinks,' I told her.

‘Roni, no.'

‘Nika, yes. I just want to have some fun.'

‘That didn't look like fun,' she said.

It wasn't. Of course it wasn't. But for a moment, there was silence. I would do almost anything to get some more of that silence. To find time away from the loudness lodged permanently, maddeningly, in my head.

‘Come on, Nika, come back in and have a drink. Everything is so much better with a drink.'

She didn't agree with me, she didn't drink with me, but she never, ever left me.

‘Is it OK if I kiss you?' Cliff asks as we stand on the pavement. We've had a nice evening. Once he knew I wasn't going to answer his question unless he asked, he seemed to relax even more. All pressure and expectation to try and trip me up gone.

‘I'd rather not, if you don't mind,' I say to him. He's nice, he's very good-looking, and I haven't been kissed in a million years, it feels like. But I'm not sure he's the one I want to kiss right now.

‘Is it because I didn't have the courage to ask the question?' He's disappointed, but not overly so. He certainly will survive.

‘No, it's because I met you for five minutes earlier today and three hours now. I don't want to rush anything.'

‘Does that mean you might possibly think about seeing me again?'

‘Yes, I might possibly. Let's talk about it at school tomorrow and set off lots of gossip about whether you managed to bag yourself a nun.'

Cliff laughs and I laugh. ‘I'll see you tomorrow,' we say at the same time. Which reminds us that we're wearing the same clothes.

‘Let's never speak of this,' I say to him before we wander off in different directions.