‘Wow, this is amazing,’ I said as I looked around. The Abbey was an impressive building with enormous wooden doors, and to the left and right of them were tall ladders with statues of people, carved in stone, climbing their way to the top. In front, a crowd was watching a human statue that was sprayed from head to toe in silver paint. He was totally still despite having a pigeon balanced on his hat. A bunch of Japanese tourists took turns having their photo taken with him and even then he didn’t move. I took a quick photo on my phone to send to Allegra. To our right was a long line of tourists queuing.
‘Where are they going?’ I asked.
‘The Pump Room or the Roman Baths I guess,’ said Clover.
‘You get posh tea in the Pump Room,’ said Tasmin as we went over and looked through tall windows into what looked like a ballroom. It was filled with tables laid with white cloths and waiters in black-and-white uniforms rushing around carrying silver trays and serving customers. ‘The tourists love it.’
I glanced behind me to see if the group of boys and girls by the sausage stand were still there but they’d moved on.
‘Er . . . That boy next door to you. Who is he?’ I asked.
‘Boy next door? To us at home you mean?’ Tasmin replied.
I nodded.
‘Do you mean to the right? You must because there’s only a pair of wrinklies on the left – Mr and Mrs Carson.’
‘Yes, to the right.’
‘What does he look like?’
‘Tall. Brown, medium-length hair. Maybe about eighteen. I only got a glimpse of him.’
‘You must mean Niall Peterson. Have you met him already? God, he’s fast, but then that’s Niall.’
‘I haven’t met him. I just saw him yesterday when I was looking out the window. What’s he like?’
Tasmin raised an eyebrow. ‘Don’t tell me you fancy him?’
‘No way.’
‘Good, because he’s so full of himself. Thinks he’s so cool.’
‘You used to think so too Tas,’ said Clover.
‘Duh. Only about a million years ago. That was back in Year Seven when I didn’t know any better. So why do you want to know about him, Paige?’
‘Oh no reason,’ I said. ‘Just wondering who he was, that’s all.’
Clover and Tasmin looked at each other. ‘She fancies him,’ they said in unison.
‘I don’t,’ I said. ‘I can assure you he is about as far from my type as possible.’
‘Yeah right,’ they both said in unison.
I could see that protesting was only making things worse, so I decided to give up. They’d realise soon enough I wasn’t interested in the creep next door.
‘So what is your type?’ asked Clover.
I shrugged. ‘I . . . I’m not really into boys.’
‘You a lezzer?’ asked Tasmin. ‘It’s OK if you are. Susie Railston at our school is and she’s one of the coolest girls in our year.’
‘No, it’s not that. Just . . . I have better things to think about than whether some stupid boy has noticed me or not.’
‘Good for you, Paige,’ said Clover. ‘You’re very sensible. Boys mainly do your head in.’
Tasmin looked me up and down. ‘Yes. Sensible, that’s a good word to describe you.’ I knew she was talking about my dress sense as well as anything else. I wished I wasn’t. I’d like to be cool and stylish like Clover or a tad wilder like Tasmin, but I didn’t want to copy either of them. I wanted to be me, a new me, the real me – but I didn’t know who that was. ‘But there must have been someone in London? Some secret crush?’
I didn’t want to seem straight and boring so decided to tell her about Alex. ‘There was one boy. I really liked him. He never noticed me until recently. I’d just got the part of Juliet in the school play and he was going to play Romeo, but it never happened . . . because of the move.’
Tasmin and Clover looked at me sympathetically. ‘Oh bummer,’ said Clover and she put her arm around me and gave me a squeeze.
‘Lezzers,’ said Tasmin.
Clover let go of me, pursed her lips and went to kiss Tasmin but she ducked away.
I laughed and it felt good to be with them joshing each other and, for the first time in weeks, I felt myself relax slightly. Maybe it would be all right in Bath after all.
My spirits rose as we made our way further up into the town. There were some of the usual shops you see in every city – Next, BHS, Gap, Office shoes, The Body Shop –but as we went higher up the road and through a narrow lane, there were little boutiques, jewellery shops, all with windows full of knick-knacks, linens, soaps, bath gels. The area was heaving with people looking at the displays, and it was obviously a great place for shopping. I glimpsed a girl with blonde hair ahead of us. She looked exactly like Allegra from the back. I knew it couldn’t be her and felt a pang of missing her. I wish she was here, I thought. We could have explored together.
We walked into the square to the right of the Abbey, which was lined with benches, most occupied by people watching a couple with guitars in the middle. Some people were eating ice creams, others just sitting watching. To our right, I noticed a line of Italian-looking statues high above a wall.
‘What’s in there?’ I asked.
‘The Roman Baths,’ replied Clover. ‘Lots of bits of ancient stones and stuff and a huge pool full of water. It’s quite interesting but a bit hot and smelly. Bath water has sulphur in it and smells of bad eggs.’
Tasmin laughed. ‘Sell it to her, why don’t you?’ she said. ‘Actually it’s interesting in there if you like learning about history.’
We crossed the square, took a left down a narrow street and the area opened up again. Opposite were the green hills I’d seen from the bus and it looked like there were some lovely old houses there, all built in the soft honey-stone that I was beginning to see was typical of the area.
We crossed the road and watched tourists get on a red open-topped, double-decker tourist bus to our right. We leant against a wall and looked below where there was a sunken park and beyond that was a river with a weir. On the opposite bank, a couple of double-decked boats were filling up with more tourists.
‘This is a real holiday place, isn’t it?’ I commented. ‘I don’t think I ever realised when we visited you before.’
‘Understatement,’ said Clover. ‘The tourists are here all year round.’
‘To your left is Pulteney Bridge,’ said Tasmin putting on a loud tour-guide type voice, which caused some people to turn and look at her. ‘Famous because it has shops on it. Apparently there are only two others like it in the world.’
‘One is in Florence,’ I said.
‘Ooh, get you, clever clogs,’ said Tasmin. ‘Jane Austen lived here once so the tourists come to see all her hang-out places too, not just the Roman parts. There’s even a day when people dress up in clothes from that period and parade around like a bunch of tossers.’
‘Seriously?’ I asked.
Tasmin nodded. ‘It’s called the Regency parade. It happens every June. We should make sure we’re around this year so we can have a laugh watching everyone.’
‘Some of them look mad in the bonnets and the feathers, but those high breeches and long coats look pretty hot on some boys,’ said Clover. ‘Have you been to Italy, Paige?’
I nodded but didn’t elaborate in case she thought I was showing off. I’d been to Venice last year, Tuscany to stay in an old farmhouse the year before, Florence, Sicily, Sardinia, the Amalfi coast and Ravello in years before that. Mum and Dad loved Italy.
‘I’m going to go one day,’ said Tasmin. ‘I want to travel the world.’
I thought it best not to say I’d also been to India, Peru and the Seychelles. We’d had two holidays a year for as long as I could remember. No more of those either, I thought as Tasmin and Clover moved off again.
We walked up and down lanes, through an indoor market, then stopped for a cappuccino at a café at the top of the town where there were even more shops and c
afés. I couldn’t wait to report back to Allegra that first impressions were good. Very good. Bath was buzzing.
Along the way, I learnt that Clover was in a relationship with a boy called Chas who was at Bath Spa University. He was eighteen and a musician who played gigs and earned a fortune busking at the weekends. Tasmin had just broken up with a guy called Stu after three months because ‘the spark had gone’, though apparently he wanted her back. He was a musician too and played in the same band as Chas. Tasmin had had six boyfriends so far. ‘A sl-ut,’ said Clover, though none of them sounded that serious or like they’d lasted that long.
Clover seemed to have quite a relationship history too, with four ex-boyfriends, all who’d lasted about four months. I felt inexperienced and naïve as I listened to them talk about boys, school and future plans. Tasmin wasn’t sure what she wanted to do when she left school, but a gap year travelling in the Far East was high on the list, and Clover wanted to do something in fashion when she went to college and maybe have her own vintage clothes shop.
‘What about you, Paige?’ asked Clover.
‘I want to study literature or art,’ I said, ‘though I’m not really sure yet.’
‘Literature,’ mimicked Tasmin.
‘Don’t be mean,’ said Clover.
Tasmin rolled her eyes. ‘Sorry, Paige but you don’t half sound posh. Lit-er-a-ture.’
I ignored her. I was starting to realise she didn’t intend to be mean. She just said what popped into her head. ‘Not sure what I’ll do with it. Maybe write, but I’m not sure what yet, or paint . . .’
‘Write about us,’ said Tasmin. ‘Can we be in your first novel?’
‘Deffo,’ I said as we stopped to listen to a boy standing in the middle of the pavement at the top of town. He was playing guitar and singing his heart out.
As we stood there, I noticed a group of teenagers walk past. They stopped on the opposite side to us to watch, although I could see they were more interested in Clover and Tasmin than the singer. I also noticed another boy go to join them.
It was Niall, my new next-door neighbour. He was on his own this time. He listened for a few moments then started heckling the boy, then awoo-howling like a dog. The performer finished his song, glanced at Niall then moved off. How mean, I thought and I gave Niall a filthy look. He noticed me looking at him and winked. I rolled my eyes as if to say, ‘I am so not interested in you’. He clearly didn’t get the message because he came over.
‘Hey Tas,’ he said to my cousin. ‘Who’s your new friend?’
‘Someone way out of your league,’ said Tasmin. Her phone bleeped that she had a text and she pulled Clover over to look at the message.
Niall turned to me. ‘I’m Niall,’ he said and gave me what I presume was supposed to be a killer watt smile.
‘And I’m not interested.’
For a second, hurt registered on his face and I almost regretted my abrupt response. Then I remembered what I’d seen yesterday and today – three girls in under twenty-four hours and him heckling some innocent street performer. He was not a nice guy.
‘So you’re staying with Tasmin?’ he asked.
I nodded and looked away in the hope that he’d go away.
‘I saw you looking at me,’ he said.
‘I was not.’
‘You were. In the garden yesterday, then again today by the sausage stall, and if I’m not mistaken you were even spying on me from behind the curtains in Tasmin’s bedroom.’
I couldn’t believe it. The cheek of him. ‘As if. I was not spying on you. For your information, I’d just arrived in Bath and was looking out of the window to see where I was.’
Niall put his hand over his heart. ‘And then you saw me.’
‘Only by accident, I can assure you.’
‘So where have you come from?’
‘London. Not that it’s any of your business. And by the way, I saw you with three different girls, two yesterday and one today. Do they all know about each other?’
Niall raised an eyebrow. ‘Excuse me?’
‘Three girls in two days?’ I repeated.
‘Er . . . none of your business,’ he said, but his eyes were twinkling as if he found our whole exchange highly amusing. ‘So you were watching me then?’
‘I was so not watching you. I told you, I just happened to be looking out of the window.’
‘Ah, but maybe that was fate making you look just as I walked by.’
‘Pff,’ I said and wished I could think of some brilliant put-down.
‘So you’re a mate of Tasmin’s? You don’t look like one of her usual crowd.’
He was starting to annoy me. ‘And what does her usual crowd look like?’ I asked.
‘More glamorous.’
Insulting as well as full of himself, I thought. This boy really is something. ‘Well, your hair needs washing,’ I said.
Niall looked shocked. ‘Wow. What side of bed did you get out of ?’
‘You just insulted me saying Tasmin’s friends are more glamorous.’
‘I didn’t mean it in a bad way. You just don’t have Tas’s loads of make-up, hair-extension look or Clover’s vintage queen style—’
‘I don’t really care what you think,’ I said.
Niall sighed. I got the feeling that I was starting to annoy him too. Good, I thought. Boys as good-looking as he is think they just have to look at a girl and she falls at his feet. Well, not me.
He ran the fingers on his left hand through his hair. ‘Well at least I can do something about my hair needing washing, whereas you can’t change the way you look.’
‘That’s really rude.’
‘And so is telling me my hair needs washing. Actually, I’ve just been at the gym. It’s wet from the shower, that’s all.’
‘If you say so. Anyway, heckling that guy’s singing was really mean.’
Niall’s eyes narrowed and I felt as if I had hit a nerve. ‘You don’t know the whole story there,’ he said. ‘I guess it looked mean but . . . we have history.’
‘Like what? Tell me? I’d like to understand why you scared some kid off, then snogged three girls in less than twenty-four hours, and then insulted me.’
Niall sighed. ‘I didn’t snog three girls . . . er . . . only two. Look. I came over to be friendly. Clearly not a good idea. OK, just forget it. I think I’ll be going now.’
‘Me too,’ I said.
Niall turned to go, then turned back. ‘Just one thing before I go, Miss Judgemental. What you see isn’t always what’s going on.’
‘Meaning?’
‘Don’t make judgements until you know all the facts.’
‘You mean like what I saw with my own two eyes?’
A look of exasperation flashed across Niall’s face. ‘I give up. You’re obviously one of those stuck-up girls who thinks you know it all.’
‘And you’re obviously one of those boys who’s full of himself, insensitive and mean.’
I suddenly realised that Tasmin and Clover had finished on the phone and were listening in.
‘Ah love at first sight,’ said Tasmin.
‘As if,’ chorused Niall and I.
I turned and walked away. I couldn’t stand another minute with him. He was so annoying. Clover and Tasmin ran to catch me up as I hurried down the pavement. I’d never had such a horrible conversation with anyone, ever, and it had upset me.
‘Hey, slow down,’ said Clover. ‘Tasmin was only teasing and so probably was Niall.’
‘He’s such a creep,’ I said.
‘So don’t let him get to you,’ said Tasmin. ‘He loves winding girls up. He thinks it’s big. Don’t react. That’s what he wants.’
I nodded. I felt cross with him and cross with myself for giving my feelings away. There’s a good reason I’m so reserved usually – the less people know about what’s going on inside of me, the less they can be horrible, I thought.
Clover linked one arm and Tasmin the other. ‘Come on, let’s go home and
listen to music. Not all boys are like Niall, Paige. Honestly there are some really nice ones in Bath.’
‘And we just happen to know most of them,’ said Clover.
They were doing their best to make me feel better but it was too late. I felt exposed and insecure. One thing I do know for certain though, I told myself, and that is that I’m going to avoid Niall Peterson for the rest of my time in Bath.
Later that day, Tasmin went off to Clover’s house. I didn’t want to outstay my welcome and be a Miss Tag-Along so I went home and up to my bedroom. I noticed the Songs for Sarah CD lying where Tasmin had left it on her chest of drawers. I put it in the player and lay back on the bed to listen.
Sometimes on a crowded street, I see someone just like you.
I want to call out, ‘Hey, hello,’ though I know it can’t be so.
You’re far away, my lovely friend, the space between us never ends.
Allegra. She was my far-away friend. The words of the song brought tears to my eyes.
Chapter Nine
New school. New nightmare. April the eighth. It was a day I’d been dreading ever since I’d heard that I’d be changing schools, though part of me had blocked it out as far as I could because I knew it wasn’t going to be easy.
Tasmin and I got up the next morning, had breakfast, then got a lift with Uncle Mike who teaches music at the same school. Tasmin was in the black-and-white uniform of the school with her skirt hoiked short as usual. I’d been told I was OK to wear my own clothes until I got the uniform but I’d dressed in a pair of black trousers and white shirt so that I didn’t stand out as the newbie too much.
I felt removed from what was going on like it was happening to someone else and any moment I’d snap out of the numb state of mind I was in, wake up and things would be back to normal. The last few weeks would all have been a bad dream. As I sat in the back of the car and looked out of the window at the cars and buses filled with pupils heading for the same school, I felt my stomach churn with anxiety.
Once we’d arrived at Queensmead and Uncle Mike had dropped us off at the front, we saw Clover waiting for us at the tall glass door leading to reception. Even in school uniform, she managed to look cool with her hair pulled back flat on top of her head and rolled up at the back in a nineteen-fifties type bun. The style suited her and highlighted her lovely heart-shaped face. She linked arms with me. ‘You OK?’ she asked.
Playlist for a Broken Heart Page 5
