Under My Skin

by Juno Dawson

  He turned and she saw he looked shattered, like he hadn’t slept a wink. That morning, he’d forgotten to put any product in his hair so it was fluffy like a baby owl or something. ‘Oh. Hi,’ he said, a little impatiently.

  Sally caught up with him at the exit. ‘Are you OK?’ She followed him out onto the path. It was quiet at this time of day; students weren’t allowed to eat lunch out there.

  ‘Honestly, no. I’m really not.’

  ‘How is she?’

  ‘A mess. She’s stable, but she’s a mess. I went to the hospital last night but I wasn’t allowed to see her. They took her into surgery just as I got there.’

  ‘God, I’m so sorry.’ Sally slipped her hand into his but he pulled it away at once and checked if anyone was looking.

  ‘What are you doing?’ he snapped.

  It hit Sally like a fist. ‘Nothing … I … wanted to make you feel better.’

  ‘I’m fine. I just need to get to the hospital. OK?’

  Sally nodded, feeling a lot like a crumpled, discarded tissue. ‘Sure. I hope she gets better.’ She was dying to hug him, to recapture the closeness they’d had at the lake. She longed to grab him and scream ‘WHAT ABOUT ME?’ but knew she couldn’t. All Sally could do was watch Todd walk away.

  Oh wow. It turned out there was something stronger than guilt after all … and it was envy. It punctured her chest in red hot needles. Great! I’ve driven Todd back towards Melody! The sheer wickedness of the thought, and the readiness at which it entered her head, shocked her. Melody was broken, maybe even dying, and all Sally wanted was her hands back on Todd.

  ‘Relax, darlin’. Just give him a little time.’ She felt Molly Sue slink around her torso. ‘And if that don’t work, we can always put Melody out of her misery.’

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Guilt is such a heavy thing to drag around. Rehearsals carried on, now with Sally filling in for Melody and Eleanor thrilled to be Chiffon, but she was wading through glue. Every time she closed her eyes, Sally saw Melody’s tangled body at the foot of the stairwell. It was like wearing chains and it was affecting her performance – she could already see Mr Roberts starting to fluster. He was pounding coffee after coffee and creeping out every twenty minutes ‘for air’.

  She was getting to grips with the accent (she had, after all, watched enough American TV) but she couldn’t remember her lines at all. It was embarrassing. ‘Sorry,’ she said. ‘They will sink in, I promise.’

  ‘Don’t worry, it’s a lot to remember. Stick to the script for the next couple of rehearsals,’ Roberts said. No one else was still using their script. ‘Let’s call it quits there for tonight.’

  There were cheers as the rest of the cast climbed down off the stage and started collecting their bags and jackets.

  ‘Hey.’ It was Keira. She fell into step alongside Sally. ‘We’re gonna head to the diner and get chilli dogs or something. Wanna come along?’

  Whaaaaaat? Sally’s immediate response was wondering if this was a practical joke. They’d probably lead her there and then lock her in the toilet or pour pig blood on her head or something. Only then she reminded herself that she was now the lead in the school play and Keira had been nothing but nice for the last few weeks. ‘Erm … who’s going?’

  Keira fluffed her hair. ‘Oh, only cool peeps. Me and El, Duncan … and I think Todd.’ Well, that made all the difference. ‘Come, come, come. It’ll be fun.’

  Sally looked around the hall. She couldn’t see Stan or Jennie anywhere – they were probably painting the set walls in the art room. The coast was clear. After the rubbish rehearsal, she could use cheering up. ‘Yeah, OK. Why not?’

  She, Keira and Eleanor walked to the diner together. This was surely a parallel world. There were still six legs parading down the path out of Saxton Vale High School, but now two of them belonged to her. Sally wondered if it always felt like this when they moved as a pack, like they were supermodels in a personal slow-motion catwalk show. As awful as it was to admit, walking alongside Keira and Eleanor made her feel prettier than she ever had before.

  Sally saw a few students filtering out of other after-school clubs. And they were staring at them. They were staring at her. Something became very clear to Sally. It wasn’t that these girls were intrinsically powerful, it was that the rest of the school gave them power. And it felt nice.

  A pair of tiny Year Seven girls struggled with cellos as they emerged from the music room. Their sweet, opal eyes followed Sally as they crossed the courtyard.

  Molly Sue chuckled. ‘They wanna be just like you when they grow up …’

  That didn’t make Sally feel as good as it probably should have done. They wouldn’t if they knew, she thought.

  ‘Oh, girl, can’t you lighten up for a single cotton-pickin’ minute?’

  When they reached the diner, Todd and Duncan were already seated in one of the vinyl booths. It was busier than ever, the air thick with grease and Elvis. Once more, as she, Keira and Eleanor strutted across the restaurant there were awed glances – the A-List had arrived. Sally knew she wasn’t truly A-List; she was an infiltrator, bound to be exposed at any moment. Salanora was not going to be a thing.

  ‘But it could be …’ Molly Sue told her.

  ‘Hey!’ Duncan said, shifting over to make room for them. Duncan was one of those simply lovely guys who traversed the social ladder with ease. He was as well liked by the geeks as he was the music crowd as he was the football team. He’d won the Head Boy election in a landslide last October.

  Keira slid into the booth next to him and Eleanor next to her. That meant Sally had no choice but to sit next to Todd. ‘Hey,’ she said.

  Todd looked up at her from under his brow. ‘You OK?’ he said.

  ‘I’m fine.’ This was awkward.

  ‘Look,’ he said, under his breath. ‘I just wanted to say sorry for the other day. I was pretty stressed out and I shouldn’t have taken it out on you.’

  ‘That’s OK.’ Sally’s mouth was dry.

  ‘No, I was a dick.’ Under the table, Todd rested a warm hand on her thigh. Sally shivered, but a good shiver. Which version of her did he want today? The vamp from the gig or the virgin from the lake? He ran his hand higher up her thigh until she halted its progress with her own. Sorry mate, virgin today. It was too much for her.

  There was a warm, amber glow in her chest, but she fought it. This wasn’t fair when Melody was laying in a hospital bed across town. ‘How is Melody?’

  Everyone at the table stiffened slightly. Perhaps they were all feeling guilty hanging out in a diner when they should have been visiting. ‘I heard she’s doing better,’ Eleanor said, twirling a lock of hair around her finger un-ironically.

  ‘Have you been to visit her?’

  ‘Not yet …’ Keira said. ‘I didn’t want to get in the way, you know.’

  ‘Or,’ Eleanor added, ‘if we, like, went and gave her a cold or something, she might die. We’ll go when she’s a little better! You guys, do you think we should share nachos?’

  ‘Chilli nachos!’ Keira exclaimed.

  Sally couldn’t quite believe what she was hearing. All talk turned to food and Melody was conveniently forgotten.

  But Sally couldn’t forget. After they’d finished at the diner, Sally boarded a bus to the hospital. She had no idea why, but she just needed to see what she’d done. If she was honest, she reckoned she didn’t feel bad enough about it. Apparently the dentist wasn’t the only sadist in the play and she craved a little salt for the wound. Seeing would be believing.

  ‘I get it! You’re guilty! Do we really have to do this?’ Molly Sue complained.

  It’s the right thing to do.

  ‘Why put yourself through it? Heavens to Betsy, you’re a real downer, ya know that?’

  The hospital was a grey, pebble-dash cube with rows and rows of uniform square windows. It had an almost military feel to it and was a labyrinth. It took Sally almost half an hour to find the correct entrance to the i
ntensive care unit.

  Sally bought a card at the gift shop, knowing that flowers were a banned infection risk. It was such a feeble gesture and Hallmark don’t make an I’m sorry I almost killed you! card. Visiting hours were on, and an orderly showed Sally where she had to go. The fourth floor smelled so much of alcohol hand gel it caught in the back of her throat. Her footsteps were accompanied by arrhythmic bleeps from competing heart monitors. It was robotic, sterile.

  As she walked away from reception, the ward grew eerily still; no doctors or nurses bustled around the long, empty corridors. The orderly had told her Melody was in Room 412. Sally found the correct door and tapped gently. It swung inwards and Mrs Vine’s head turned to see her. Melody’s mother was Melody in twenty-five years’ time – same hair and, with the help of a lot of botox and a rumoured brow lift, more or less the same face. ‘Hello?’

  ‘Hi. My name’s Sally. I just came to drop off a Get Well Soon card from the Little Shop cast.’

  Mrs Vine was immediately disinterested. ‘Oh. Thank you. Would you like to leave it with the others?’

  ‘Thanks.’ Sally entered the room properly. It was a twin room, with stations at both sides of the room, only, the opposite bed was empty and stripped.

  Edging closer, Sally got a proper look at Melody and flinched. Melody was in a bad, bad way. Her eyelids were taped shut and a tube curled out of the corner of her mouth. Her face was grey, squashed up by the neck brace. She was a far cry from the invincible goddess who’d stalked SVHS; she was a broken doll that glue and sellotape weren’t going to fix.

  Sally swallowed back tears as reality finally hit her. This knife to the gut was what she’d come for. What have I done? I’m so, so sorry. This disgust, this repulsion, she felt at herself was never going to go away and she deserved nothing less. Her bottom lip trembled.

  ‘Get it together, you goddamn pansy! You want her mama to get nosy?’ Molly Sue barked. ‘Get. It. Together.’

  ‘I’m so sorry,’ Sally muttered to Mrs Vine, her voice unsteady.

  ‘Thank you,’ she replied. ‘She’s comfortable. She’s not feeling any pain.’

  That didn’t matter. It would be a long, long time before Melody was a triple threat again. ‘Is she going to be OK?’

  Mrs Vine let out a long, shaky breath. ‘Yes, thank God. The swelling in her skull is going down and they’ve put pins in her neck. They think she’ll be fine. They’re waking her up tomorrow or the day after. My poor baby … you know, she had cancer when she was a little girl. She’s a fighter.’

  Sally breathed her own sigh of relief and released some of the guilt from an imaginary valve deep inside her. ‘Oh, thank God.’

  ‘What did you say your name was?’

  ‘Sally.’

  Her eyes narrowed. ‘I don’t think Melody’s ever mentioned you.’

  ‘We’re not really that close.’ They’d been in the same class for ten years, she’d just never been invited to Melody’s birthday parties. ‘We’re in the play together.’

  ‘Would you do me a favour? Would you watch Melody while I nip to the ladies’? I don’t like to leave her alone.’

  Sally hesitated. ‘I …’

  ‘In case she stirs? If she does, just press the button for the nurse.’

  How can I refuse? ‘Sure. No worries.’

  ‘You’re a star.’ Mrs Vine planted a tender kiss on Melody’s forehead (that nearly floored Sally) and hurried out of the room.

  The second the door closed, Molly Sue spoke. ‘OK, we need to finish her off. I mean how hard can it be? She’s pretty much a cabbage.’

  What?

  ‘God, you really are as dumb as a soup sandwich. What happens when she wakes up and tells someone what happened?’

  Sally hadn’t thought that far ahead. ‘I … I don’t know …’

  ‘You gotta finish the job. Just put a pillow over her head. It’ll take less than a minute.’

  ‘But … but …’

  ‘Oh, if ifs and buts were candies and nuts we’d all have a merry Christmas! Get on with it! Her mama’ll be back in a second.’

  ‘I can’t! They’ll know it was me!’

  ‘C’mon! Take a look at her, a sneeze’d kill her right now. They’ll think it was natural causes or whatever.’

  ‘No!’ Sally said through gritted teeth. ‘I won’t.’

  ‘And just what makes you think I’m giving you a choice?’

  Sally’s hands reached out for Melody’s pillow. They moved of their own accord, out of her control.

  ‘Stop! Molly Sue, stop! Please!’

  Her hands wouldn’t listen, they carried on towards Melody.

  ‘No!’

  Her feet, however, did obey. Sally turned and ran for the door. She swung it open and collided with Mrs Vine.

  ‘Is everything OK?’

  ‘Yeah. Yeah, fine. I just have to go …’

  ‘Oh, OK. Thank you for coming.’

  Sally was already pelting down the corridor, far, far away from where she could do Melody more harm.

  That evening, Sally lay on her bed and cried. There was nothing left to do. She couldn’t talk to Todd, couldn’t talk to Stan, couldn’t talk to Jennie. She was repulsed by the thing on her body and however far or fast she ran, she couldn’t get away from her. She thought of that episode of Satanville, the one where the guy had the parasitic demon on his back. How was this any different?

  She wished she could float up out of her body, and go to live inside someone else’s skin. Everyone else made it look so easy. What would it be like to be certain like Annabel Sumpter, or vibrant like Keira Stevens or respected like Duncan Curtis? An awful thought occurred to her – what if wherever she went, whoever she was, she felt this loathsome? I was miserable before Molly Sue, I’m miserable now. Sure, the outside shell was looking prettier than ever, but below the surface she was festering. A peach with maggots at the core.

  As dusk fell, she could no longer abide the noise in her head. She shoved some shoes on and told her mother she was going to Stan’s. She didn’t, though, and carried on walking past that traitor’s house. When it started to rain – dots on the pavement quickly turning to puddles – she still didn’t stop walking, even though she didn’t have a coat. It was good. The rain hid her tears.

  By the time she reached the rough part of town, she was soaked. Her stripy T-shirt clung to her body and her hair swung around her face in dripping rat’s tails. Her socks squelched in her trainers, but she didn’t care. I deserve worse.

  When she saw there were still lights on in St Francis De Sales church she almost cried anew. A tiny ember of hope glowed in her heart. She ran up the slick stone stairs and threw herself at the doors.

  Inside, votive candles flickered in their waxy jars and it smelled thickly of incense. Sally wondered if a service had just finished. She scanned the chapel for Sister Bernadette. There was no one else she could talk to. It was time to tell the whole truth, whether the nun thought she was insane or not.

  She couldn’t see anyone around. ‘Hello?’ Sally walked down the central aisle towards the altar, checking the pews. ‘Is there anyone here?’ There had to be someone around, surely.

  Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the font standing to one side of the altar and approached it. It was a grand marble basin, intricately carved with leaves and cherubs. Sally saw it was full. ‘Worth a try,’ she murmured. She scooped her hand into the font and brought the water to her lips. She swallowed a mouthful and waited. She wasn’t sure what she’d been expecting – to burst into flames? Foam at the mouth? Dissolve into a heap like the Wicked Witch of the West?

  None of those things happened.

  ‘Thirsty?’

  At the voice, she whirled around, almost tripping over her feet. She turned to see an old priest with leathery olive skin. In his day he must have been devastatingly handsome, in a George Clooney way. ‘Oh, I’m sorry!’

  ‘That’s OK. I’m Father Gonzales. Are you lost?’ He spoke with a light Span
ish accent.

  Sally realised she must look like something that had crawled up out of a drain. ‘No. I … I was looking for Sister Bernadette. She, she knows me. I need her help.’

  Father Gonzales frowned. ‘Sister Bernadette?’

  ‘Yes. Is she here?’

  He could only shake his head. ‘I’m sorry, dear, you must be mistaken. There is no Sister Bernadette at this diocese. There never has been.’

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Sally’s harsh laughter echoed around cavernous church as Father Gonzales’s eyes bulged in shock. ‘Well, of course!’ Sally giggled, fully gripped by hysteria. ‘Why would she be real? What was I thinking?’

  Judging from his face, Father Gonzales must have thought she was an escaped mental patient. To be honest, she didn’t feel far off it. She couldn’t stop laughing, although she wanted to cry. ‘Are you all right, my child?’

  Sally pulled herself together, although her skin still tingled. Sister Bernadette was as impossible as Molly Sue. She should have seen it coming. ‘I’m so sorry,’ Sally said. ‘I should have never come here.’

  ‘I could check at the convent … it’s possible they have a new member.’

  ‘No. No, it’s fine. I’m sorry I bothered you.’

  ‘Would you like me to call someone? Is there someone who’s taking care of you?’

  Sally was already backing towards the door. ‘It’s fine. But thank you.’ She turned and ran out of the church.

  It was still raining, but not as ferociously as before. Sally clung to herself for both warmth and sanity. One of two things was true – and she was more certain of this than she had been of anything in weeks. Either she was entirely insane – seeing and hearing multiple people – or there was something incredible going on. Not incredible like good incredible, but like … unfathomable, uncanny.

  As she walked through the rundown streets of Old Town, Sally felt tiny. She was the smallest thing in the world. Molly Sue and Sister Bernadette, Rosita and Boris … somehow Sally knew they were older, bigger, greater than she was.

  I am a pawn, Sally thought. I’m being used. She was nothing more than a host body for something far more powerful.