by Holly Bourne
I pointed to his page. “So what’s going on in the world then?”
He smiled. “Oh you know, the usual misery.”
“Glad to hear it.” I yawned and stretched. “I’m knackered. I’m going to bed. I’ve got Photography at nine. A boring theory lecture.”
“Make sure you take a candle with you,” Mum said.
“Oh right. Yeah. I forgot.”
I bent down to collect a candle that had been stuck in the top of an old wine bottle. Half of it had burned down, leaving ripples of red wax dribbled down the sides. Covering the flame with my hand, I took it upstairs and got myself ready for bed.
When I was all make-up-removed and teeth-brushed, I sat at my dressing table and stared at my reflection in candlelight. Did I look different? I felt different. I felt amazing. I turned my face from left to right. Maybe I wasn’t so unattractive after all. From the left I could definitely be considered an attractive person. Although candlelight is supposed to be flattering. I blew out the flame and my reflection disappeared.
I fell asleep quickly. Smiling.
Anita and Rain watched the screens in silence.
The lab was empty again. All the day’s mayhem, with important people running in and out for important meetings, had calmed. A clock ticked angrily, counting down the moments until the place would fill up again.
Code floated on both monitors in front of them, drifting down the screens aimlessly.
The pair sat close together, almost touching on the bench. Rain’s hand was a little bit too near to Anita’s. She pretended not to notice but had secretly never been so aware of her hand before. It twitched involuntarily, defying her brain and reaching out to Rain on its own accord. She imagined what would happen if her hand did take his. Would he take it back? Then what would happen? Her heart fluttered as she entertained the thought, then she shook her head. It was impossible. She’d never be with anyone ever again. How could she, knowing what she knew? It was just the lack of sleep getting to her.
She returned her attention to the screen, unaware that Rain had been watching her out of the corner of his eye.
What a strange woman, Rain thought. He’d never hated someone but also liked them so much at the same time. It had been a weird couple of weeks. He’d spent more time with Anita than he had with his family and friends. Most of the time, she was an emotionally-retentive bitch. She’d been in her element this week with all the drama, barking orders, firing everyone at least twice and making unreasonable demands. But then there was the time he’d made a silly joke after being awake for twenty-one hours and she’d giggled into her hair. Or when she’d flinched as their fingers met while he was handing her a cup of coffee, and she’d given him this look over the top of her mug. And then there was just now, when he’d been certain she was about to take his hand.
Every few moments or so, a green flicker would light the screen. When Rain had first seen it, weeks ago now, he’d jumped out of his skin with fear. He didn’t fear it as much now – not now they apparently had it under control.
Another flicker.
“I should have brought popcorn,” Anita said sourly, breaking the silence.
Rain laughed. “Yeah – it’s turning into a bit of a chick flick this one, isn’t it?”
Anita’s eyes stayed on the screen. “Definitely a chick flick. Let’s sell the script to Drew Barrymore and make our millions.”
She leaned forward and jabbed at the keyboard, taking another measurement, then straightened in her seat again.
Rain felt his throat go dry before he asked his question. “So we’ve found them…now what? I suppose it’s time for the separation?”
To his surprise, Dr. Beaumont slowly shook her head.
“No, not yet.”
Rain was flustered. “What? But people are in danger.”
She spun to face him, glaring. “Are you even considering telling me what I should or shouldn’t do?”
“No, of course not,” he spluttered. “But I thought…well…this match is a pretty big deal; I thought we would’ve sent out the collection team by now.”
She was still glaring at him. He couldn’t believe he’d been so sentimental about this bitch just a moment ago. Must have been sleep deprivation.
Anita managed to compose herself and turned back to the code. “This pair have managed to build a…tolerance towards each other. I’ve never seen it before but for the moment I think we’re safe.” She sighed and ran her fingers through her hair. “It’s just as well really, otherwise we’d probably all be dead.”
Rain didn’t know what to say. He was quite sure this wasn’t allowed.
“But isn’t it better for them? If we break them up now? I mean, if we are going to have to do it anyway. It’s going to be bad enough as it is. Why wait longer?”
Anita batted his concerns away with her hand. “Oh, it’s fine. Let them have their moment. It’s not going to last long, is it? And – it’s more fun this way.”
The traces of a smile were on her lips. Rain realized she was actually enjoying this, revelling in it.
“More coffee?” He needed an excuse to get away from her.
She nodded eagerly. “Yes please.”
He picked up the empty mugs and walked away. When he reached the door, he turned back and looked at her once more. In his absence she had leaned much closer to the screen, her eyes watching it greedily.
She was going to be trouble. He just knew it.
My alarm clock didn’t wake me – instead my anxious mother shook me into consciousness.
“Poppy, get up. Your alarm failed because of the power cut. You’re late for college.”
I jumped up and looked at the clock on my wall. It was bad. I grabbed a towel and dashed into the bathroom for a turbo shower.
Despite the pumping, urgent sensation you get when you’re running late, I couldn’t help feeling heavy with, well, happiness really. My stomach felt like it had a lead ball in it, like a python happily digesting a huge meal while basking in the sun. It wasn’t like anything I’d ever experienced. What made it odder was, at the same time, I was a ball of skittish energy, my mind flitting to Noah at any given moment. Was this love? Was it supposed to feel like good sick?
I turned the hot shower tap up and let the water wash away any last traces of sleep. As I shampooed, I thought of Noah. As I conditioned, I thought of Noah. As I shaved my legs and absent-mindedly cut myself with the razor and turned the bottom of the shower red with blood…I thought of Noah. I was only roused from my obsession when an even-more-anxious mother started banging on the door, telling me I was now horrifically late.
It was going to be a wet-hair-to-college day. I yanked on jeans and a T-shirt, madly dabbed mascara on my lashes and was out of the door within five minutes – a muesli bar clutched in my hand and my hair hanging around my face in clumps. I ran down my driveway and smacked right into Lizzie, who emerged from a bush like a spy.
“Douff!” I said, winded. “Lizzie? What the hell are you doing outside my house?”
She didn’t bother explaining. “Poppy! I’ve been waiting out here ages. You look like crap by the way. Why didn’t you dry your hair? So…? What the hell happened? Did you sleep with him? Was it amazing? Was it awful? Did it hurt? Did you cry? Are you seeing him again?”
I cradled my throbbing arm, which had taken the impact of our collision. “Lizzie. Ouch. Could you not have waited until college?”
She shook her head passionately. “Absolutely not.” She linked arms with me and frogmarched me down the street. “So what happened?”
I blushed and struggled to form a sentence. “Errr. Well. It was…good?”
Lizzie reached round with her spare arm and slapped my hand like a naughty child.
“Ouch!”
“Not good enough. I need DETAILS.”
I broke our link and used both hands to nurse my, now two, Lizzie-induced injuries. “Seriously, Lizzie, you can’t use physical violence to coax information out of people.”
“Yes I can.”
“Well, if you stop attacking me I might actually tell you something.”
Lizzie put up both of her hands, as if surrendering a weapon. “Okay. No more violence, I promise. I think I’m a little bit overexcited.”
“You think?”
“Sorry. Anyway. What happened then? Did you sleep with him?”
I cringed a little when I remembered yesterday’s freak-out. “No. I didn’t sleep with him.”
“You didn’t?”
I shook my head. A twinge of relief passed over Lizzie’s face, almost unnoticeable. I saw it and understood. She liked the fact that we were still on the same sexual experience page. I would’ve felt the same.
“So why did he want you to go round?”
“He wanted to talk.”
“Talk? Really? Is that it?”
I nodded. “Yeah. It got a bit deep and meaningful.” I paused. “But we did kiss.”
Lizzie whacked me again.
“Ouch? Why are you hitting me again?!”
“Sorry, it was involuntary. I’m just so excited.” She put her hands behind her back. “Look. Out of harm’s way now. So start from the beginning…”
I filled her in on the details as we walked. Lizzie seemed to be more excited by the whole affair than I was.
When I finished telling her everything she went quiet for a moment, her eyes wide.
“It sounds like it’s getting a bit, hmm…serious…a little quickly,” she said, almost to herself.
I couldn’t disagree. She was right. “I suppose.”
College beckoned to us from the end of the road. A figure, standing against the sunlight, was leaning casually against the gates. My heart started thumping. It was him.
Lizzie clocked him too. “Speaking of which,” she said.
Noah shielded his eyes and spotted us both. He waved and made his way over. I was suddenly shy, aware of my half-dry hair hanging limply and my crappy clothes. I also couldn’t help but perve a little as he walked towards us. It didn’t seem real that I’d been kissing that beautiful face less than twelve hours ago.
He caught up to us. “Alright, you?” he asked. He seemed uncharacteristically unsure of himself, which made me feel more at ease. He nodded towards Lizzie. “And hello, Miss I-Know-Everything. I’ve heard you’ve been delving into all kinds of secrets.”
Lizzie puffed her chest out. “The press always have a bad reputation.”
Noah showed off his amazing grin. “That’s because they’re always poking into other people’s business.”
“What sort of business do you mean, Noah? Why? Has anything exciting happened in the past twenty-four hours… oww!”
She clutched her ankle where I’d kicked it, hard. I smiled sweetly at both of them.
Noah burst into laughter. “I take it last night is no longer between just us then?”
I started shaking my head but it turned into a nod. “Sorry,” I said. “But she used physical violence.”
Noah crouched down. Lizzie was still nursing her ankle and evilling us both.
“Are you okay?” he asked.
“No. Your girlfriend is a psychopath.”
It felt weird to be referred to as Noah’s girlfriend by a third person. It also felt wonderful.
“Lizzie. I know it’s your favourite thing in the world to tell everybody everything,” he said. “But do you mind keeping this one quiet…” He saw her about to interrupt. “Just for a while…until things die down with Portia. I don’t want to hurt her feelings.”
Lizzie opened her mouth. “But Portia’s a cow! And she broke the drum.”
I giggled and saw Noah was trying to stifle a laugh too.
“That may be, but still. Please try to keep it to yourself for now. Do you really want your best friend to be thought of as a boyfriend-stealer?”
I hadn’t thought about that. Noah was right. I was suddenly very scared of Portia.
Lizzie was scowling but nodded.
“Okay,” she said, giving her ankle a final rub and righting herself. “But only for Poppy’s sake. If she’d asked me not to tell anyone, I wouldn’t have.”
“I’m glad that’s sorted. Now can I have a quick chat with Poppy, please?”
I gave Lizzie a silent Is that alright? look. She nodded and limped off to the college entrance to wait for me.
Noah wrapped his arms around my waist. He looked gorgeous, of course. He was wearing a faded white shirt that showed off his olive skin. Just the feeling of having his arms on me made me go a little weak.
“Hey, gorgeous,” he whispered, leaning in to kiss me.
I kissed him back briefly, aware that Lizzie was staring at us intently while pretending to be on her phone.
“I was just wondering what you were up to tonight?” he asked.
Coursework. Lots and lots of coursework.
“Nothing.”
He smiled. “Perfect. Can I meet you after college?”
I was aware of the fact I looked utter crap, and still would when college finished. “Can we make it five and you pick me up at mine?” I asked. “I just have a few things I need to sort out.”
“Five it is.” He gave me another deep look before walking away. “See you then.”
I called after him. “Oi! These things are much easier to organize via a mobile phone, you know? You don’t always have to surprise me at college.”
He looked me up and down. I felt exposed and shy.
Noah smirked. “Yeah, but that way I don’t get to see how beautiful you look.”
And, with that, he left.
I tried to compose myself as I walked towards Lizzie and the impending doom of my Photography lesson. She’d been sitting on the gate and jumped down.
“You’ve got it bad, girl,” she said, putting an arm around me. “You look almost sick.”
“I know. It’s pathetic.”
I snuggled into her and she steered me into the college.
Any attempt to distract myself from Noah was somewhat hindered by the intense boringness of my Photography lecture. The room was stuffy with the secreted heat of bodies piled into a small space. There were no windows, no air – just an interactive whiteboard showing one boring slide after another. I hadn’t done Photography for the academic side of things. It was the one A level I’d granted myself in which to be creative and have fun. And, to be fair, most of my lessons were spent faffing about in the darkroom. But every so often, in some sort of deluded determination to make the subject “academically stimulating”, I was forced to endure a lecture – much like today’s – about the origins of photography or some such nonsense.
Grim.
The problem was that whenever I successfully managed to not think about Noah, I would only worry instead. So in my Noah mental breaks, I tortured myself with feeling guilty about Portia, recapping yesterday’s awful session with Dr. Ashley and worrying about Ruth’s reaction to Noah news. Therefore I was relieved when the bell finally rang, signalling the end of my tedious lesson.
I made my way to the canteen and spotted my friends at our table. Lizzie looked almost purple and I knew it was killing her to keep such great gossip to herself. But I was not at all ready to face the Ruth and Amanda firing squad just yet. They were already playing cards, with Johnno sitting next to them, looking slightly bored. Ruth had done something dramatic to her hair. Again. She’d dyed it a deep vibrant red and cut it short. Nobody but Ruth could have pulled it off, but she looked amazing. Of course. She was wearing a bright red tight vest top that clashed spectacularly with her new do. It strained across her chest and, teamed with a pair of spray-on jeans, meant our table was getting quite a few looks. Ruth was pretending she didn’t notice and, to the unassuming eye, was just concentrating on her hand. But I’d known her since primary school and I could see her eyes flickering to each side to survey the reaction. She was also running her tongue along her top teeth – something she always did when she was happy.
I plonked my
bag on the table and sat myself in the spare seat.
“Morning, Team,” I said. “Loving the hair, Ruth. When did you get that done?”
She smirked at the compliment. “Thanks. Got it done last night. Luckily before the power cut kicked in.” She looked at my decidedly lesser-coiffed hair. “Hmm, Poppy. You’re having a bit of a special hair day yourself.”
Her bluntness stung. I ran my hand through my hair self-consciously. “My alarm didn’t go off this morning so it was a bit of a rush-jobby.”
“It doesn’t look that bad,” Amanda said. “It’s just not as perfect as it usually is.”
“Aww thanks.”
“It’s alright.”
I looked at the game. “So when can you deal me in?”
We played a couple of rounds of Cheat while Ruth gave us a rundown of exactly what she expected Will’s sexual reaction to be to her new hair. Lizzie had barely spoken. It was like she was too scared to open her mouth in case my secret came tumbling out.
Ruth laid down two cards and called two sixes.
“Anyway,” she said, watching carefully as Lizzie took her turn. “I think I need to give my new hair an outing. Who fancies a drink after college?”
Uh oh.
“I’m in,” Amanda said, surprising us. She turned to Johnno. “Fancy a drink? Make the most of this weird summer weather?”
I saw Johnno squeeze her hand under the table. “Sounds good to me,” he said. “I might ask some of the guys along as well.”
“How about you, Lizzie? Poppy?” Ruth asked.
I wracked my brains for an excuse. Any excuse. I couldn’t use the cherry pie one again. It wasn’t exactly effective last time.
“I’ll come,” Lizzie said. She gave me a small grin. “…But I think Poppy has other plans.”
In unison they all swung round to look at me.
“Plans? What plans?” Ruth asked, smelling gossip.
“Umm, coursework?” I ventured, wishing my face wouldn’t automatically turn red whenever I lied.
“You’re lying.”
“I’m not.”
“Yes she is,” Lizzie added.
I gave her what I hoped was a scary look. “Thanks a bunch,” I said.
