by Ali Cronin
‘So. Bad day?’ He took a campy slurp of tea à la old-lady-gossip.
I made a kind of huffy noise. Laughing without laughing. ‘You could say that.’ I twisted my hands in my lap and told him what had happened, and he listened without comment. ‘I’m such an idiot,’ I said, when I’d finished. I put my head in my hands. ‘I’m so stupid.’
Ollie looked into his empty mug. ‘Nah,’ he said. ‘You’re not an idiot.’
‘But everyone knew Joe didn’t give a shit about me.’
He shrugged. ‘We could have been wrong.’ He raised his eyes to mine. ‘And none of us will get any satisfaction out of being right.’
I smiled sadly. I was grateful to him for not pretending anyone ever thought there was any kind of future for me and Joe. He put his arm round me and pulled me to him. ‘Come here.’ I leant my head on his shoulder. ‘This is a shit thing that’s happened, flower. But you deserve … God, so much better than him.’ He sounded almost angry. I smiled up at him and he looked down at me, his chin wrinkling.
And then he spoiled it all by trying to kiss me.
I leapt up like I’d been stung. ‘What are you doing?’
‘Sorry. I’m sorry.’ He looked stricken. ‘Shit, Sarah. I totally misjudged that. Please, sit down.’
‘I can’t handle this.’ I picked up my bag and, for the second time that day, ran out of a boy’s house in tears.
I ran for a few minutes, then sat down on someone’s garden wall, both to get my breath back and get my head round things. Today was weird. And horrible. I had no frame of reference for today. I had never before walked in on the boy I loved to find him grunting away on top of the person I hated most in the world. I had never been kissed by someone I thought was my friend. Was this what life’s rich tapestry was all about? Broken hearts and betrayal and disappointment? I’d always sneered at those girls at school who get engaged to their boyfriends, which seemed to me not much more than a word and an Argos ring on the relevant finger, but suddenly I could kind of understand why they did it. It was like armour, albeit crap armour that doesn’t work. I’d only ever heard of one of these couples actually getting married – but they were Travellers and they always marry young.
‘Oi!’ An angry voice came from above me. I looked up to see an old man sticking his head out of an upstairs window. ‘You going to sit there all night?’
What did he think I was going to do – snort drugs off his wall? Wearily I stood up and started walking in the direction of home, not being quite desperate or melodramatic enough to wander the streets till dawn. And anyway, it was freezing.
Mum and Dad were on me as soon I turned the key in the lock. They must have legged it out of the sitting room, the better to be all righteously angry the moment I walked in.
Mum was giving me one of her patented Who do you think you are? glares while my dad was practically spitting with rage. ‘Where the hell have you been?’ he fumed.
Wow. Original. I rolled my eyes and pushed past them to get to the stairs, but my dad grabbed my wrist. ‘I don’t think so.’
I let my head flop back and sighed heavily at the ceiling. I so couldn’t be bothered with this. ‘Look, I just want to go to bed. Can we talk in the morning?’
‘No we fucking can’t,’ said my dad, who gets foul-mouthed when he’s really angry. It’s like: I’m laying down the law, but see how I swear and therefore treat you as an equal. Or some such bollocks.
Then my mum weighed in. ‘We do NOT deserve to be treated like this. You do NOT just go out without asking – not while you’re living here. Show us some BLOODY respect.’
And that was it. I’d had enough. I simply could not take them having a go at me on top of everything else today. I wrenched my arm out of my dad’s grasp. ‘Why don’t you just PISS OFF!’ I yelled and, for the first time in my life, stormed out of the house.
‘WHERE THE HELL DO YOU THINK YOU’RE GOING?’ he bellowed, giving the neighbours a rare treat. I turned round at the bottom of the drive.
‘I’m going to Cass’s, all right? Or do you want me to write a letter requesting permission?’
My mum shot me a disgusted look. ‘Let her go, Martin,’ she said. ‘Frankly, I can’t bear to have her in the house.’
‘You and me both,’ I spat.
So it looked like I was going to Cass’s. She only lived round the corner, or there’s no way my parents would have let me go. Whether she’d let me in was another matter. I got my phone out of my bag and scrolled to Recent Calls. She was way down the list. Until last week I’d spoken to her almost every day. I clicked on her name, but she let it go to voicemail. I wasn’t surprised.
‘Cass, it’s me … Please can I come over? I know it’s late, and you probably hate me, but I walked in on Joe in bed with that Mimi bitch and I can’t stay at home … or anywhere else …’ I closed my eyes in dismay. What the hell was Ollie thinking? ‘… So anyway. Please call me back when you get this.’
She rang just as I got to her house.
‘Where are you?’
‘Outside.’
‘I’m coming down.’
I don’t know what I expected, but if it was a joyful reunion with tearful promises never to argue again, I was wrong. Cass opened the door and just stood, kind of warily watching me. I honestly couldn’t remember what we were fighting about. Were we even fighting at all? Like, I hadn’t even spoken to her since I’d left her in town – it was Donna who’d told me she was upset. Putting my bag down on the step, I took a couple of steps towards her and put my arms round her. It was a massive gamble. If she’d not returned the hug I think I would have shrivelled up and died, right there on the doorstep. I’d have died of shit-day. But she didn’t. She hugged me back. Cue reunion.
‘Why are we even fighting?’ she asked, laugh-crying into my shoulder.
‘I was thinking the exact same thing.’ I stood back and looked her in the eye. ‘Cass, if I’ve been a crap friend, I’m really sorry. I didn’t mean to be.’
She shook her head earnestly. ‘No, I’ve been crap too. Let’s just forget it. It was a ridiculous moment in an otherwise model friendship and in thirty years we’ll laugh about it over tea and pineapple upside-down cake.’
I laughed. Pineapple upside-down cake was like our code for being old and senile, after Mrs Fieldhouse, our ancient Year Seven food-tech teacher who was obsessed with it. We must have made it four times in one year. ‘Nature’s healer, children!’ she used to say, brandishing a tin of pineapple rings. ‘All that lovely bromelain!’ (Fair play to her, though – if bromelain ever came up in Trivial Pursuit, we were laughing.)
Upstairs in Cass’s bedroom I put on my PJs – Cass had already donned her pristine night attire – and we got into bed. She had a white wooden double bed with crisp white covers and a giant canvas print of her and Adam taking a bite out of the same apple above it. Cass didn’t Blu-Tack her posters to the wall; she framed them and hung them properly. Her desk was immaculate, her PC monitor and keyboard free of dust and bits of old food, her floorboards shiny and her rug covered in fresh Hoover tracks. In short, she was a true list-maker. Fastidious was her middle name, or it would have been if it hadn’t actually been Marjorie (a top-secret fact only I knew – I think even Adam might have been in the dark on that one).
Cass turned out the light and we lay next to each other in the dark. It was a relief to be in a familiar situation. We’d shared this bed loads of times. There was a hard ball of grief and worry in my stomach and every time I thought about Joe, or Ollie, or Mum and Dad, I had to concentrate on not crying, but being with Cass was good.
‘Do you want to talk about it?’ she asked, her voice quiet.
We’d hardly said a thing to each other since the pineapple upside-down cake moment. I think Cass had been waiting to ask me about stuff under cover of darkness. She knew I hated crying in front of people, although blowing a snot balloon in a packed Tube carriage kind of puts blubbing with friends into perspective.
‘I do,
but can we do it in the morning?’ I yawned. ‘I just want to sleep.’
‘Course we can.’ She briefly tickled my forehead. ‘’Night, hon.’
I would have said goodnight back, but I couldn’t. I was trying to cry soundlessly. Joe used to tickle my forehead like that.
‘Sarah, honey. You OK?’
‘Uh-huh.’ I took a calming yet gross and mucousy breath in through my nose and out through my mouth, then gave in to the exhaustion and fell fast asleep.
19
‘Sarah, honey. I’ve brought you a cup of tea.’
I prised apart my eyelids. Cass was leaning over me. For a split second everything was fine, then I remembered, and the whole pile of crap came tumbling down on me.
‘Ugh, thanks,’ I said, pushing myself up into a sitting position and taking the cup. ‘What time is it?’
‘Nearly ten. You’ve slept for almost ten hours!’ She stroked my hair away from my forehead. ‘How are you feeling?’
‘Crap.’ I took a sip of tea and closed my eyes as the hot liquid warmed me from the inside. ‘But I suppose I’ll live.’
Cass smiled supportively and patted my leg. ‘Listen, I’ve called the others. We’re meeting on the beach in an hour.’
I grimaced. ‘How were they?’
‘Yeah, fine. Don’t worry about it.’
Hmm. I’d wait and see about that one. I nodded. ‘OK, but I’ll see you there. I have to talk to my parents.’
She stood up. ‘OK. I’ll leave you to get ready. Help yourself to the shower and stuff. I’ll make you some toast, shall I?’
‘Thanks, but I’m not hungry. I’ll grab something later.’
As soon as she’d left the room I pulled on yesterday’s clothes without bothering to shower, shouted a quick goodbye, and ran back round the corner to our house.
And there, swallowing my anger because I didn’t want them to get any ideas about banning me from going to Ollie’s bonfire party that night, I grovelled like a good ’un. I told them I’d had a huge row with the girls. I was confused and upset. It just felt like everyone was getting at me. I’m truly sorry, it won’t happen again. Blah blah. It was a virtuoso performance, even if I do say so myself.
My dad, who doesn’t bear grudges, was v. impressed with my new-found maturity and let me off instantly. My mum, who does bear grudges, was still a bit frosty. But she’d get over it. Anyway, I was allowed to go to Ollie’s party, which was the main thing. I told my parents I’d get ready at Cass’s but I’d be back home by midnight. Tick tick tick. All sorted.
Upstairs in my room I spent a few minutes standing in front of my wardrobe staring uninspired at the hangers of dullness that passed as my clothes, before remembering that – duh! – it was a bonfire party. Jeans, coat, scarf and hat were what I needed. And I had a gorgeous grey trilby that I loved, but hadn’t worn for weeks since Joe informed me that men’s hats on girls look stupid. But I knew it suited me. It was my magic hat, making my eyes look bigger and giving me cheekbones I never knew I had. I stood taller when I was wearing it, felt more confident.
Standing there, holding it in my hand, I realized what a total idiot I’d been.
I looked in the mirror on my wardrobe door and pulled an extreme duh face. I couldn’t even entirely blame Joe. Don’t get me wrong, I knew he’d been a dick. He’d totally used me for sex – and made me think he really liked me at Will’s party – but he’d also told me right at the beginning that he wasn’t looking for anything serious. If I hadn’t constantly texted him, he’d probably have let it go. And was it his fault I never wore my hat? I didn’t have to take one throwaway comment as some kind of commandment. Thou shalt not wear men’s hats if thou wants to be withst me type thing. For all her mental bitchiness – and she was a mental bitch, I was convinced of that – I couldn’t believe that Mimi would ever change anything about herself for anyone. I kicked the wardrobe door shut. It was so painful to think of Joe and Mimi together. Like, it physically hurt. I couldn’t bear it. The fact that I at least partly had myself to blame did not help, at all. In fact, it probably made it worse.
I lay on my bed and gave myself precisely five minutes to wail into my pillow. I even set the alarm on my phone. If I couldn’t make the crying stop – and it seemed pretty obvious that I couldn’t – then I wasn’t going to let it take over my life.
Sarah was back in the saddle. Well, nearly. I had a few things to do before I galloped off into the sunset.
For once I wasn’t the first to arrive. Cass, Ashley and Donna were already waiting outside The Pump Room cafe on the beach when, out of breath and apologetic, I finally got there. But they were fine with it. The universe didn’t implode because I was five minutes late. Who knew? And when Donna started to say something, I interrupted. ‘No, let me speak first.’ She stopped, looking surprised – but not angry.
I stood tall, my hands by my sides, flicking the thumb and middle finger of each hand together as a vent for my nerves. I cleared my throat. ‘You were right, I was obsessed with … the Joe thing.’ It was hard to even say his name. ‘I realize that now. And I’m really sorry if any of you felt like I was neglecting you.’ I looked at each of my friends in turn: Cass smiling encouragingly, Ash nodding sagely and Donna looking at the floor and rocking back and forth on her Uggs.
I swallowed. ‘But at the same time … I don’t think you needed to be quite so harsh with me. It’s not like I was being malicious. I was just a bit … I dunno, naive. Anyway, it’s all over now.’ I blinked back fresh tears. ‘And, if it’s OK with you, I’d really like to forget it and move on.’
Donna wrapped me in a huge hug. ‘No, babes, you’re right. I’m sorry too. I hated seeing you so into him when he obviously didn’t give a shit about you.’ I tensed, and she quickly added, ‘And maybe I was a bit jealous. Like, I haven’t had a boyfriend, or anything close, in months, and there you were – man-hater Sarah – all loved up with an older man.’
My eyes went all big and round. Wow. I hadn’t been expecting that. Then I felt Ashley’s arms round me. ‘I’m sorry too, babes. I think I got a bit freaked by the fact you’d, y’know, like saved my life and shit.’
And then Cass put her arms round all of us. ‘I’m so glad we’re all together again!’
We stood there for a few seconds in happy group huggage, until a bunch of lads swaggered past and one of them said, ‘Dirty lezzers.’ We pulled apart, giggling. Donna grabbed my face and moved her head towards me, waggling it from side to side so to the boys it would’ve looked like she was giving me a full-on tongue-pash.
‘Oh, baby, your bosoms drive me wild with desire,’ I fluted, while Ashley and Cass busied themselves with the mechanics of groping each other’s arses. I didn’t even know if the lads were still there. It was just so nice to be mucking about again. No drama.
A bit later on, when we were sitting in the cafe drinking hot chocolate, I told them about going to Joe’s, and about finding him and Mimi together. I cried, of course, but each time I told the story it got a bit easier.
Afterwards no one said anything for a few seconds. The girls looked shell-shocked. ‘God, Sarah. That’s awful,’ said Donna finally. ‘You poor cow.’ I chewed my cheek and nodded.
‘I can’t believe he got with that Mimi bitch,’ added Ash, shaking her head. ‘He has so bitten off more than he can chew. She’ll eat him alive.’
Cass raised her mug. ‘Nice mixing of eating metaphors there, lady.’
I thought of Mimi’s Facebook status: ‘I win.’ Could she have been referring to Joe? It was almost flattering to think that she genuinely saw me as a threat. It seemed glaringly obvious to me now that I really never was. Joe was just out for a good time, and a school kid from Brighton was only a very small and temporary part of it. I swirled my spoon in my cup, making foam figure-of-eights, and tried not to succumb to the blackness that was threatening to suck me under.
‘It’ll be OK, honey,’ said Cass, stroking my hair. ‘You’ll find someone else. Someone who deserv
es you.’
The events of last night came flooding back. I put my head in my hands and groaned. ‘Oh God, that reminds me … Ollie tried to kiss me last night.’
‘WHAT?!’ My friends spoke as one, all now sitting bolt upright with eyes like gossip-receiving satellites.
‘It was awful,’ I said. ‘I told him about Joe and he, like, gave me a comforting hug and then … oh God, he tried to kiss me.’ My stomach clenched at the memory. It’d been so embarrassing. ‘I couldn’t handle it. I just ran away.’ I peered up from under my hand. ‘Like, what was he thinking?’
The girls looked at each other and smiled. ‘Babes,’ said Ash gently, ‘he likes you. It’s blatantly obvious.’
‘No he doesn’t,’ I scoffed. ‘He’s like that with everyone. All that “flower” stuff.’
Donna laughed. ‘Sarah, you dick, you’re the only one he ever calls flower.’ I looked sceptical, and she said, ‘Think about it. Have you ever heard him say it to anyone else?’ I did think about it, really hard, and Donna was right. He called girls mate, or babes, but not flower.
‘Wow. Ollie …’ I tapped my nails on the side of my cup. ‘But I’m so not his type.’
Cass rolled her eyes. ‘Hello? Why do you think he’s never had a proper girlfriend before? They. Weren’t. His. Type.’ She punctuated each word with a light punch to the side of my head.
I thought about it for a moment. ‘No. Even if you’re right, I don’t fancy him. I can’t,’ I said decisively, leaning back in my chair.
‘Can’t? Or won’t?’ said Ashley, steepling her hands meaningfully.
I shrugged. ‘I’m over men, that’s all. I need time for myself. For you lot.’ And my friends all piled on to me again in another hug. Closing my eyes and laughing as I fended off their lung-bustingly tight squeezes, I thought, I might feel like crap, but at least I’ve got my friends to help me through it. All my friends.
I extricated myself from the girls’ grasp. ‘Listen, I need to sort things out with Ollie before tonight. Will you still be here in, like, half an hour?’ They looked at each other and nodded, and I bolted.
