You Against Me (30 page)

No one else seemed to be having trouble concentrating. She looked around at all the heads bent over tables, at all the pens feverishly scribbling. Statistically, there were kids in this room who cried themselves to sleep because of exams. They were exhausted, they had terrible headaches. They woke in the mornings feeling they’d had no sleep at all. Their eyes were itchy, their stomachs ached. These were her classmates, thirty of them, and she barely knew them at all.

What was it she’d said to her dad?
None of us knows each other
.

Question: If a room has thirty people in it, how many secrets are in the room?

Answer: Infinity.

She had a sudden and overwhelming desire to stand up and confess her own, like some kind of truth Tourette’s. She’d march up to the front of the class, knock Ms Farish out of the way of the interactive whiteboard and write:
I made love with Mikey McKenzie in front of a roaring fire and I never imagined love could be so good
. Inspired by her bravery, everyone would share their secrets. Ms Farish would tell them why she left her previous school, Joseph would show them the cuts on his arms and explain his compulsion, Alicia would give her reasons for spending every lunch break in the toilets. On and on, round the whole class. Maybe she’d even get a second turn. She’d write:
My brother is guilty
. Ellie wondered if you would use a bar chart, a pie chart or a histogram to describe the data you gathered.

Outside, spring clouds bowled along, the grass continued to wave, the river flowed as it always had. She wrote a poem:
We are naked. You are tender. Your hands know exactly where to be
. She ripped it from her notebook, crumpled it into a ball and put it in her pocket. Ms Farish came over and stood at her table.

‘Problems?’ she said.

Ellie shook her head. Ms Farish went away. She tried aversion therapy. Every time she thought of Mikey, she pinched the soft skin on the back of her hand. Concentrating on the whiteboard now, she wrote down the words
dependent variable, independent variable
as instructed, and began to draw a graph using the data supplied. Within five minutes her hand hurt so much from pinching that she had to stop drawing. She tried to think of horrible things about Mikey, but she couldn’t think of any, and in realizing there were none, she realized how much she wanted to see him again. But if she saw him, she’d have to do something about Karyn. She’d have to get a lawyer like Barry had suggested, make a new statement, get a new family to live with, because hers wouldn’t want her any more.

She drew a cold shower. A shoe. A car crash. She chewed the end of her pen for a minute, then started a new list,
Being good
. It entailed revision (a lot of it), not eating anything with sugar in it, being nice to her family, dressing virtuously and not contacting Mikey. This immediately made her think of all the opposites – no revision, undressing. Calling him …

Yesterday, on the rug in her grandparents’ cottage, she’d traced kisses along the base of Mikey’s spine and told him, ‘I’ll always have seen you naked.’

He’d turned over to smile at her, his eyes never leaving hers as he mapped a line from her belly to her breasts. He said, ‘I can feel your heart.’ His fingers marked her pulse. He said, ‘Now, now and now.’

How had she ever thought she’d be able to forget him?

She sank her head onto the desk. Images swam into her mind – her mum fanning herself at breakfast and saying
I can’t breathe in this house
, her dad’s weary smile and barely concealed irritation, the constant fear in Tom’s eyes, the way her mum wouldn’t meet her gaze in the car on the way to school when Ellie said,
Shouldn’t we talk about what I said in the garden?
, Mikey’s cigarette lighter hidden in her school bag, the knowledge of Karyn McKenzie wounded on a sofa …

‘Ellie?’ Ms Farish stood over the desk frowning. ‘You all right?’

She nodded, startled. Everyone around her was gathering their stuff together and heading out of the door.

Ms Farish said, ‘You can stay here if you want, Ellie, but I suggest you take the opportunity to get some fresh air and come back after lunch for part two.’

The corridors were crazy, as usual. At break time, the teachers disappeared into the staffroom for sugar and caffeine and left the kids to roam like wild buffalo. This was the time of day you were likely to get casually shoved against the lockers, to get your phone nicked, your bag rifled through, chewing gum chucked at you, your dinner money hijacked. The boys gave each other brutal and meaningless thumps. It was survival of the fittest, and the trick was to keep your head down, look no one in the eye and walk purposefully.

At least Ellie wasn’t the centre of attention any more, not since Keira in Year Ten had got pregnant and the gossip machine had turned its attention to who the dad was and if Keira was keeping the baby and why hadn’t she got the morning-after pill in the first place, blah, blah.

It was warm outside and quieter. Ellie walked the edge of the playground looking for somewhere to sit. Her favourite bench had been commandeered by Stacey ever since she realized it was the place Ellie liked to be. She waved at Ellie now, as she did every time she saw her.

‘Hey, bitch.’

‘Leave it, Stacey.’

‘You leave it.’

‘I’m not doing anything.’

‘So you say.’

It was ridiculous that they did this every day. Maybe they’d even miss it if one of them forgot. It was something they both understood, almost routine.

Ellie found a place to sit on the low wall by the fence and turned her face to the sun. Vitamin D was most easily absorbed through the eyelids and Vitamin D was the one that made you happy. She had forty-five minutes to get there.

Mikey opened one eye to Jacko, crunching across the gravel towards him. He had his arms up, palms flat, like he was surrendering. It wasn’t funny.

‘I’m sorry, man,’ he said when he got close. ‘About last night, I mean. Serious, I didn’t think it would blow up like that.’

Mikey shook his head and looked back down at the sand, at the boats marooned down there.

‘I had to tell Karyn before someone else did.’

‘Who are you kidding?’

‘It’s true. When I came to pick you up and saw you get on that bus, I knew I wouldn’t be the only one who clocked it. Imagine if some random stranger told her. Imagine how that would feel.’

Mikey glared at him. ‘I haven’t got time for this.’ He scrolled through the texts on his phone. Maybe he’d missed something from Ellie or Mum earlier. Nothing. He checked his voicemail. No new messages.

Jacko sat next to him on the bench. ‘Any news?’

‘Like you care.’

‘I do, actually.’

Down on the beach, a little kid was running with a kite snapping on the end of a bit of string. Funny how when life was that simple, you never realized how lucky you were.

Jacko nudged Mikey’s foot with his. ‘So, is this an official break you’re having out here?’

Mikey shuffled away, opened his phone again, texted Karyn,
Hurry up
.

Jacko said, ‘Listen, man. I know this is none of my business, but I don’t think you should push it with Sue. She went nuts yesterday when you didn’t come in. You want to keep your job, don’t you?’

Mikey texted Mum,
Call me NOW
.

Jacko sighed. ‘Maybe one day we’ll look back at this and laugh.’

‘I doubt it.’

‘You never know.’

Mikey pretended to think about that. ‘No, Jacko, I really don’t think that’s going to happen. You know why? Because when this kicks off, Ellie’s never going to speak to me again.’

‘Two months ago you never knew her and she didn’t speak to you anyway.’

Mikey sank his head into his hands, dizzy with how far away he and Jacko were from each other.

‘Blame me if you like,’ Jacko said. ‘I don’t mind.’

‘Yeah, maybe I’ll do that.’

The trill of his phone made them both start. His fingers were clumsy. He scowled at Jacko. ‘Do you mind? This is private.’

Jacko shrugged, moved away to the end of the bench and pretended not to listen. Mikey sat on the harbour wall and looked down at the boats.

‘Mum?’ he said. ‘What’s happening?’

‘I can’t speak for long, Mikey, we’re right in the middle of things here.’ She sounded sober, wide awake, oddly calm.

‘You called Gillian then?’

‘I wasn’t going to sit around waiting to see what happened next.’

‘Yeah, well, thanks for that.’

‘I’ve got a daughter here who needs me, Mikey. I told you that last night.’

I need you too
, he thought, but he didn’t say it out loud. He’d brought this on himself and now he had to take it.

‘So, what’s the news?’

‘Gillian said it’s good we told her, and she phoned the detectives in charge of Karyn’s case and let them know.’

‘And what did they say?’

‘They’re going to go round and pick your friend up.’

A pulse banged in Mikey’s head. ‘Round where?’

‘I don’t know – her house, I suppose.’

‘She won’t be there, she’ll be at school.’

‘Well then, I expect they’ll go there.’

‘You can’t send cops round the school!’

‘For goodness’ sake, Mikey, they only want to talk to her. It won’t hurt her to tell the truth, will it?’

He cut her off, didn’t want to hear any more. He turned to Jacko. ‘I need the car.’

‘No way.’

‘You owe me.’

‘I don’t.’

‘Come on, man, you heard that. You’ve got to help.’

Jacko got out his tobacco and strapped a rollie together, slowly, deliberately, as if time was something there was a lot of. Mikey tried to hold his anger down, knew he didn’t stand a chance of the car if he pushed too hard.

Jacko said, ‘Why do you like her so much?’

‘I don’t know, I just do.’

‘Very descriptive.’

Mikey kicked the wall with his foot, scuffing up sand. ‘What do you want me to say?’

‘I want you to say why you like her.’

Jacko seriously wanted him humiliated, that was obvious. It was going against every rule, every part of the male code. But it was worth it for the car keys.

‘I can’t help it, it’s as simple as that. I can’t do anything to stop it.’ He took a breath. ‘Like you can’t help being addicted to your car.’

Jacko frowned. ‘She’s like a car?’

‘No, man. She’s – I dunno …’ He ran a hand through his hair, tried to think exactly what it was that Ellie did to him. It felt important to get it right. ‘She shines.’

‘Like a car?’

‘Stop taking the piss.’ He sat on the bench and looked Jacko in the eye. ‘When I was growing up, I had this fantasy of a perfect girl. She never really had a face, but she had a great body and she liked everything about me.’ He felt himself flush, but knew it was important to carry on. ‘When I first saw Ellie, I knew it was her – she was my fantasy. I didn’t want it to be true, but every time I met her it was obvious, and the funny thing was that she was better than the fantasy, like I got more stuff than I’d imagined.’

Jacko blew smoke out in a long thin line towards the harbour. ‘Like what?’

He listed them on his fingers. ‘She makes me laugh, she knows stuff, she listens. She surprises me, you know – like, she can be calm one minute, then totally out there the next? What else? She’s drop-dead gorgeous, she’s a mystery. I dunno, man, this sounds like bollocks.’

Jacko’s eyes softened slightly, and Mikey dared to carry on.

‘I thought I could keep away from her, but I couldn’t. Whenever I wasn’t with her, I’d think about her. I tried fancying other girls, and couldn’t. I mean, I’d literally walk down the street and try and imagine other girls naked and it didn’t do it for me, I didn’t want them. And when I thought Ellie set me up for a kicking and when I didn’t see her for ages and thought she didn’t care, I went nuts. I didn’t want to get up, or go to work or anything, and I’m sorry about that, mate, I can see how crap it was for you, but I was terrified I’d never see her again. I like her that much.’

There, he’d said it out loud and Jacko could think what he wanted. But instead of yelling at him, or taking the piss, Jacko grinned. ‘Thank God for that.’

‘What?’

‘That’s the first time you’ve told me the truth in weeks.’ He reached into his pocket and pulled out the car keys. ‘Here. Don’t scratch it and don’t say I never do anything for you.’ Their fingers touched; Jacko didn’t let go of the keys. ‘I’m here for you, man. I’ve always been here for you, it’s just you stopped knowing it.’

Mikey threw an arm round him and gave him a thump on the back. It was exactly the right thing to do, he could tell by Jacko’s smile. ‘Tell Dex I’m sorry.’

‘You’re going to have to do that yourself.’ Jacko nodded towards the entrance to the car park, where Dex was striding over. He looked weird outside, with his apron flapping in the wind.

‘You need to come back inside,’ he called. ‘Both of you, now. Sue’s on the warpath.’

Mikey couldn’t look at him as he got close. He took off his own apron and passed it to Jacko, put the keys in his pocket.

‘The car’s round the back,’ Jacko said, ‘in the yard.’

Dex put his hands on his hips. The disappointment in his eyes was horrible. ‘Where are you going, Mikey?’

‘I’m really sorry.’

‘If you leave again, I can’t help you.’

‘I know.’

‘It’s urgent,’ Jacko said. ‘I’ll cover for him. You won’t even notice he’s gone.’

‘No,’ Dex said. ‘If he goes now, that’s it, there’s nothing I can do.’

He had a wooden spoon in his hand, some kind of paste clinging to it in a sticky lump. And, weirdly, it was the spoon that was hard to turn away from.

It was crazy, Mikey thought, the things your body could do when you didn’t want it to. The heat spreading from chest to face to eyes, blood racing, the mad adrenalin surge. Even his voice became hoarse and faltering as he saw Ellie through the school fence and called her over.

She frowned at him like maybe it was a trick, then picked up her bag and walked towards him. Just looking at her hurt.

She said, ‘Aren’t you supposed to be at work?’