What's a Girl Gotta Do?

by Holly Bourne

  “Lottie? What is it?” Amber asked. Both of them kicked into supportive-friend mode, their arms around me, cooing and asking and caring. The kindness in Evie’s eyes. The strength of Amber’s grip on my shoulder. It was the release I needed.

  I cried.

  There was snot. There was more snot.

  “I just…I should have said something… I should have stood up to those builders…” I stuttered as my shoulders rose and fell. “And…I wasn’t even wearing a short…skirt… and Megan…and Megan…and that fucking advert…that FUCKING ADVERT.”

  Evie had printed off the accompanying poster of the advert. I swiped it off the table, trying to rip it in two. But Evie, being Evie, had bloody laminated the thing. So all I did was bend it slightly and hurt my hand.

  “You see!” I yelled out. “That just represents EVERYTHING that I’m crying about… I try to rip that FUCKING ADVERT and I’M the one who gets hurt… It’s so pointless. Fighting… Trying… It’s all so FUCKING POINTLESS unless…unless…you fight all of it. And who has the strength to do that?”

  “Woah, Lottie. It’s okay. What builders? It’s going to be okay,” Amber said. I looked up just as she said it though, and she was making frantic eye-movements at Evie. I wasn’t usually the emotional one of the group. I think they were shell-shocked.

  “Amber’s right,” Evie soothed. “Just let it out.”

  They let me cry it out. Because they knew that’s what I needed. Because they’re awesome like that.

  My sisters who aren’t my sisters.

  My blood who aren’t my blood.

  My choice, my friends.

  They waited until I was done. Until there was copious amounts of snot trailing down my lacy jumper so it looked like the scene of a slug orgy.

  Eventually Evie said the words I needed to hear.

  “We need cheesy snacks. Come back to mine?”

  THE PLAN

  five

  After devouring three bags of Wotsits, I was feeling slightly better.

  Amber stared at me in disgust. “You’ve got an entire beard made out of cheesy neon goo,” she said. “If you hadn’t been crying uncontrollably for the past hour, I would take many a photo.”

  I put my hand to my face and it came back covered in orange stickiness. I licked my finger.

  “That’s disgusting,” Evie announced. “You’re triggering me by being so gross.”

  I smiled, then saw her face. “Seriously?”

  She nodded. “Seriously.”

  We both laughed, but I still grabbed a tissue from the box on Evie’s bedside and dabbed off my cheese beard. I took extra care to put it in the bin.

  “Would you judge me for ever if I eat a fourth bag?”

  “Yes,” they replied in unison.

  “But I’m upset!”

  Amber crossed her arms. “You still haven’t told us why.”

  I shrugged, not knowing where to start. I didn’t want to relive it. I looked around Evie’s room helplessly. It was less sanitized-tidy than it used to be – but still waaaaay neater than mine and Amber’s. Evie had explained that you can just be a tidy person without it having anything to do with OCD but we chose to ignore that. Her giant film collection dominated one wall – the shelves of DVDs towering up to the ceiling. Evie was the only person I knew who still bought DVDs. I stared at them vacantly, though I’d already borrowed the ones I wanted to watch.

  “How about,” Evie started, “you tell us why you’ve become sadness personified and afterwards I’ll reward you with more cheesy snackage?”

  I gave a small smile. “It will have to be one hell of a cheesy snack.”

  She levelled me with her deep blue eyes. “I have Boursin in the fridge.”

  I chucked one of her pillows in the air. “WELL WHY DIDN’T YOU SAY SO?”

  Evie went downstairs and returned with a stinky circle of cheese covered in foil and some posh crackers. My tummy lurched. All the Wotsits in my stomach recoiled at the sight of the Boursin – feeling all ashamed of themselves for not being proper cheese. Not proper stinky garlicky Boursin – with all its garlic and herbs and garlicky herbs of yummness.

  Evie wafted it under my nose, like I was a mouse in a cartoon.

  “Okay I’ll talk.”

  Amber gave me a look of utter disgust.

  “What?” I protested.

  “Never. Ever. Become a spy,” she said.

  We all laughed.

  I told them about the men. I told them about running away instead of fighting back. I told them about the fight with my parents – how annoyed I was at Dad’s pressure over Cambridge. His hypocrisy about wanting me to be a strong, educated and powerful woman…but also not wanting me to run FemSoc. I told them about Mike stealing my philosophy point and everyone reacting more when he said it. They already knew about Megan…

  “Essentially” – I sprayed more crumbs as I helped myself to my third lump of Boursin – “I hate myself. And I hate the world. I’m just struggling to work out which one I hate the most.”

  It sounded dramatic, but it was how I felt.

  Amber was eating her (respectable) first bag of Wotsits. “Why do you hate yourself?”

  I closed my eyes and pictured that morning again – the laughter, how it felt like victory laughter.

  “Those men…” I said, my garlic-filled stomach twisting. “I should have said something…”

  “Like what?” Amber asked.

  “I dunno…anything…I just let them do that to me… I didn’t fight back.”

  Evie laid a hand on my shoulder. “Lottie, it sounded more extreme than them just honking a horn as they drove past. I would’ve felt scared too.”

  I nodded. “They seemed…worse than most. I didn’t know what they were capable of. I just froze.”

  “Which is a totally natural response.”

  “Yes,” Amber butted in. “You were just protecting yourself.”

  “But what they did was wrong.” I was sure of that much. “I should have stood up to them. Now they’ll just think it’s okay to do what they did. They’ll do it to other girls.”

  “That’s not your fault.”

  “It feels like it is.”

  “How?”

  “I dunno. But it does…”

  Evie gave my shoulder a squeeze. “Lottie,” she said gently. “You don’t have to fight back all the time…”

  Don’t I?

  “Sometimes you need to just let things go. To know when it’s not worth the trouble. To protect yourself.”

  But who will protect people weaker than me?

  I shrugged again. Knowing I didn’t quite know what I felt yet, that I was only on the cusp of it.

  “What are we going to do about Megan?” I asked.

  Amber’s face scrunched up. “How was she?”

  “She was…okay. Well, that’s what she kept saying. It was clear she didn’t want to talk about it. I thought maybe we could try and include her in more stuff? Get to know her better.”

  Evie nodded. “That’s a good idea. To invite her to more things… She doesn’t seem to have anyone she really hangs around with since Max. I still can’t believe it though. I mean, Max seems so nice!”

  “That means nothing though,” Amber said. “You never know what goes on in people’s relationships behind closed doors. Besides, we can’t jump to conclusions about what happened between them. We have to let Megan tell us in her own time, if at all.”

  “I know something terrible happened.” I shook my head. “It was all over her body language, the way she held herself.”

  We sat there quietly, all of us depressed in our own ways. My brain was on a loop – playing the day over.

  Amber stood up.

  “Amber, you are standing up,” I said.

  “That I am.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I’m going to dance to Joan Jett.”

  “Why?”

  “Because we need cheering up.”

  And, before I had
time to compute, she’d put “Bad Reputation” on her phone and started dancing like a maniac.

  Amber doesn’t dance often. She is just under six foot, and all big of hair, so she’s usually too self-conscious. But when she does, it is a sight of a sight to be seen. She flailed her limbs in the air, she attempted to shimmy, she pogoed up and down.

  “Are you guys going to join in?” she puffed. “Or just watch me here making a huge tit out of myself?”

  Evie and I gave each other a look, then got up and joined her. Evie – all short and curvy – wiggled her shoulders and twisted herself in circles. I waved my hands over my head, grabbing Amber’s hands so we could twirl. They laughed and I smiled, and the beat of Joan Jett flowed through me and helped a little. But not as much as I needed it to.

  “See!” Amber yelled over the music. “There are some days you can fight, and there are other days when all you can do is pretend none of it is happening and dance and laugh and dance.”

  I twirled her under my arm again, still smiling, but my unusual bad mood wasn’t shifting.

  All I could think was, But, while we’re dancing, what unspeakably bad things are happening outside of this bubble?

  six

  My parents were waiting for me when I got home. Sitting patiently, the very painting of serene. Though I could see Dad’s inner turmoil from a mile off and knew Mum must’ve given him a talking to.

  Mum stood up to hug me. “Lottie, honey. You’re home.”

  I stepped through the annoying beaded curtain and made myself hug her back.

  “Hi,” I said, preparing for them to kill me with kindness – their favourite trick.

  Dad sipped on his herbal tea, his lips all pursed, but he stood and hugged me too when Mum gave him a nod.

  We were a family of huggers. Well, Mum was. Dad and I never had much say in the matter.

  Dad pointed to a chair next to him. “Come, sit.”

  It was like we’d never argued – which is how he always played it. Anger and strictness followed by niceness and we’re-only-doing-it-for-your-own-good.

  “You want a cup of tea?”

  I nodded. “Do we have any of the special flowering ones of Mum’s left?”

  Dad pulled one out of the special pot we had for them on the tea tray. He poured hot water from our ancient teapot onto a jasmine flower and I watched it unfurl slowly as the water hit it. I never got bored of this posh flowery tea.

  I slowly took a sip…waiting. Mum peered anxiously at me over her glasses. Dad kept running his fingers over the wrinkles around his eyes. He never wanted to fall into the pushy-parenting cliché; I think he thought he was above all that. He wasn’t. It’s like when it came to my education he couldn’t help himself. Even with Mum balancing him out. I guess that’s what it’s like if you’re a professor. Sometimes I wondered if he only wanted me to get into Cambridge and do well in politics because it would sound good in front of his elbow-patch lecturer mates.

  “I’m sorry I grabbed my crotch at you and yelled ‘Meditate on this’,” I opened, taking another small sip. “I’m still not sure what happened there.”

  They both smiled slightly.

  “We all lost control of our tempers,” Dad said. “And, yes, I’ll grant you. It was original.”

  “You can see why I was upset though, right?”

  They looked at each other, and I could tell then that they’d already planned what they were going to say. They had a script and I didn’t. All I had was a roundabout of emotions, and no inclination to let them bully me.

  “We’re just worried about you…your future,” Mum answered.

  I crossed my arms. “We went over this. College said four A levels are more than enough to get me into Cambridge.”

  “Yes. But in your interview, you have to talk about your extra-curricular activities…and we’re worried this…Spinster Club may…well…it doesn’t seem very Cambridge. Maybe if you just joined a debate team, or…something?” Mum’s eyes looked so small behind her thick-rimmed glasses.

  I levelled her stare. “I thought you raised me to want to make the world a better place?”

  “We did.” Dad was talking now. “You know we wholeheartedly support your ambitions. They’re our ambitions too… That’s why we’re having this chat. To try and work together to help you achieve them. And that may mean taking the more…umm…conventional route, so you can really change things later.”

  The conventional route…

  Here’s the embarrassing thing… I want to be the prime minister. I know that’s about as ridiculous as wanting to become a prima ballerina, or a professional footballer, or an astronaut or whatever – but think about it…someone has to be prime minister. Why can’t it be me? I am smart enough. I am strong enough. And I really, honestly, want to take this shitty world we live in and use whatever strength, intellect and passion I have to leave it a little bit better off than when I found it. I don’t just want to complain about the world, I want to change it.

  The problem is…I’m still not sure exactly where to start, what route to take, how to get there. I went to a Labour party meeting and didn’t like it. But weirdly my parents totally think I can be PM too – and they’ve drilled into me since before I can remember that prime ministers go to Cambridge or Oxford.

  “Why does the conventional route mean giving things up I believe in?” I asked.

  They shared another look. “We’re not saying you should give up things you believe in. Just maybe sort out your priorities a bit?”

  I stood up. “My priorities are to make the world better.”

  “Which you’re much better placed to do if you stick to doing five A levels to ensure you get a spot at Cambridge,” Dad insisted. “We already supported you when you decided to leave Heartly School, giving up an incredible once-in-a-lifetime scholarship, I may add.”

  I rolled my eyes. This again. “I didn’t like it there,” I said – for what seemed like the eight trillionth time. “Why would I want to carry on going somewhere I didn’t fit in?”

  Didn’t fit in was the biggest understatement ever – I was the squarest of pegs in a school filled with round holes. Especially as I was there on a scholarship and therefore couldn’t afford all the right “stuff” or to go on the two thousand pound Year Nine ski trip.

  “Because you know they have an excellent track record of getting their students into Oxbridge, for one thing?”

  I shook my head – so mad at them. They were such hypocrites. They drank herbal tea and Mum was a Buddhist, and they both volunteered to help with food banks, and we had freaking crystals all over the house…but the moment it came to me, their one and only child, they were willing to let a good few things slide to get me where we wanted me to be.

  I wasn’t ready to let anything slide. Not after today.

  “I got sexually harassed today,” I said, to try and shock them. “These guys in a van blocked my way into college and shouted abuse at me.”

  Mum was up, instantly at my side. “Oh, Lottie, honey. I’m sorry. Are you okay?”

  I shook my head, shook off her hug.

  “No. I’m not okay. And I won’t be okay until stuff like that stops happening. That’s why I’m in the Spinster Club. That’s why I started FemSoc. I can’t wait until I’ve decided which party I want to join, or I’m at Cambridge or whatever, before I change stuff. I have to do it now.”

  Mum hugged me again; Dad looked unconvinced.

  “Lottie, I’m sorry that happened to you, that sounds awful.” He paused, always unable to let go of a point once he’d locked down onto it. “But I’m struggling to understand why this is relevant.”

  “ARGH!” I threw my hands up in the air. The tears from earlier threatening to respill. “Don’t you see? It’s all relevant! It’s all linked.”

  I pressed my fingers into the pressure points either side of my eyes, taking deep breaths. Despite everything that had happened today, I was still in the same argument as this morning.

  I
took another deep breath and looked up, fixing Dad with my best ever glare. The one I’d learned from him. “I’ve told you,” I said, my voice so much calmer than I felt. “Four A levels is enough to get into Cambridge, college said so. And, if my FemSoc activities put them off, well then, I don’t want to go there anyway. I don’t have to get into Cambridge to get into politics…”

  Dad opened his mouth to interrupt.

  “Yes, I know it helps. But, look, I’ve not even joined a political party yet. I’m only seventeen. I’m not ready to make my mind up about that – it’s an important decision to get right. And I don’t want to start compromising what I believe in before I’ve even properly started.”

  We argued for another forty minutes, before I pleaded coursework. My magic word which always meant they left me alone. Mum went off to the centre to do her chanting, and it was Dad’s night for Professors Down The Pub. That’s what they actually called it – his colleagues’ Tuesday evening drinks. Though Dad usually drank orange juice and drove everyone home safely at eleven. I wilted up to my bedroom – feeling like today had been much longer than regular days.

  I had so much work to do. Four pages of art coursework, all the required reading for philosophy, an essay was coming up in politics and economics. It was almost nine already. It was going to be a long night. Luckily I’ve always been one of those people who can thrive on hardly any sleep – a secret weapon I’m terrified will disappear one day.

  After an hour of gluing in a few collage-y bits for art, I started on philosophy, considering I’d been too out-of-it to concentrate at study group earlier. I flipped open my course book, and looked at a practice exam question.

  A runaway train is heading towards a fork in the railway tracks. The tracks are set so that the train will veer left and kill five people stuck on the tracks. You have access to a switch that will cause the train to veer right, killing only one person stuck on that side of the tracks. Do you hit the switch?

  Explain what deontologists and utilitarians would decide, based on their methods of thinking.