My Heart Goes Bang

by Keris Stainton

  He scanned the book through and it came up as twenty per cent cheaper than the marked price.

  ‘Is that … did you do your discount?’ Ella said.

  ‘Yeah. I said I would.’ He put the book in a bag. ‘Not going to charge you the five p for that either.’ He grinned.

  ‘But the discount was for the other book.’

  ‘Don’t worry about it,’ he said. ‘Perk of the job. If you maim a customer, you get to give them a discount. It’s written in the shop’s constitution.’

  Ella’s mouth twisted into a smile. ‘The shop has a constitution?’

  ‘Oh, yes. It’s there on the wall.’ He gestured across the room and Ella actually turned to look, before realising and looking back at him. He was grinning.

  ‘Made you look.’ He handed her the book.

  ‘Oh my god,’ Ella said, passing him her debit card.

  ‘I’m Nick,’ he said, as he pushed the card into the machine. He didn’t look up.

  ‘Ella.’

  ‘Could I have your number?’

  Ella turned the card machine towards her and tapped in her PIN. The screen flashed up that she should take her card and she took it and dropped it back into her bag.

  ‘Thanks again,’ she said, smiling at him. ‘And I’m really sorry again. About the book.’

  ‘I’m sorry about your head,’ he said. His cheeks were definitely pink.

  ‘It’s fine,’ Ella said, unconsciously reaching up to touch it again, forgetting the bag with the book was hanging on her wrist. It swung and hit her in the jaw.

  ‘Oh my god,’ Ella said. ‘I’d better go before I do actually brain myself. Thanks! Again!’

  She turned and headed for the door, praying she didn’t trip over her own feet or walk into a table or humiliate herself in any other ridiculous way.

  ‘Your hair really does look good,’ she heard him call as she was almost out of the door.

  Chapter 17

  Lou filled the kettle and switched it on, then remembered there was beer in the fridge. Beer would be better. She opened the beer, grabbed a bag of crisps from the house cupboard and headed upstairs. She’d been planning to take the tea to her room and maybe do some work, but she didn’t want to sit in there drinking alone, so she kept going up to the living room.

  Paige was sitting at the dining table in front of her laptop, her glasses pushed up into her hair, her face pale.

  ‘You OK?’ Lou asked her, flopping down onto the sofa.

  ‘Laptop’s dying,’ Paige said. ‘Just need to finish this essay. Please don’t put the TV on.’

  Lou had just picked up the remote, but she put it back down again. That was fine. She could go on her phone. It might actually be OK checking Kyle’s messages with Paige here. She didn’t want to tell anyone about them, didn’t want to talk about them at all, but she hated being alone with them too.

  Lou had turned off sounds and notifications when the ping of a new message had started to make her feel sick. She’d blocked Kyle’s number after the second text, but it didn’t stop him. After he’d sent five more photos using five different phones, she gave up blocking and started avoiding her messages.

  She was going to have to talk to him. It was the only way to get him to stop. Either that or she’d have to go to the police. But she didn’t want to do that unless she absolutely had to.

  She was surprised none of the other girls had noticed how little she looked at her phone any more. Especially Ella. Lou had been such a social media addict, but she hadn’t posted on Instagram for a couple of weeks now, hadn’t been on Twitter at all. She only kept up with Facebook because her mum would notice and worry if she didn’t.

  She tapped the messages icon and scrolled through Kyle’s latest series of messages. More photos of Lou sleeping. One of her awake that she remembered him taking – she was sitting up in bed, her hair in a knot on the top of her head, no top on, one hand covering one boob, but the other boob bare. She was looking straight into the camera and laughing. She remembered him taking that one: they’d just had really good sex. Kyle had been slow and caring and attentive, which he wasn’t always. He’d made her laugh and they’d been planning to go out after and get some food and maybe go on and meet her friends in whatever bar they’d ended up at. But in the end, they hadn’t. Kyle had decided he didn’t want to ‘waste’ time with Lou’s friends when he could be spending time just with her. And so she’d made herself some toast while he watched an old episode of Top Gear and fell asleep.

  Lou pictured the hot guy in the coffee shop, the one Liane was keen on. She bet he didn’t watch Top Gear (not least cos it was often racist). And he was a barista. He’d probably make her coffee and a panini in the morning. She wasn’t sure about the sex though. He seemed too nice. She definitely had to stop thinking that nice blokes wouldn’t be good at sex. That was part of what got her in trouble with Kyle in the first place.

  And maybe it would be good to just sleep with someone and tick them off the Fuck It List. She was probably the only one in the house who hadn’t yet. Apart from Ella. Obviously. She should go and check the list, but it was all the way downstairs and she couldn’t be bothered getting up now. She screenshotted Kyle’s messages and put her phone down on the coffee table, groaning as she stretched her arms over her head.

  ‘Fuck,’ Paige said, as an error message popped up on her laptop screen. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Lou sit up on the sofa, but she couldn’t look away from the screen.

  ‘FUCK!’ she yelled, tapping CTRL-S compulsively.

  ‘What’s happened?’ Lou said.

  ‘FUCK!’ Paige yelled again, standing up and pushing her chair back. ‘No. No no no.’

  ‘What’s up?’ Liane asked, coming to stand next to her. Paige hadn’t even known she was home.

  ‘Laptop crashing,’ Paige said, her breathing coming fast. ‘It did a thing earlier, but I thought I’d managed to – Fatal exception. Right. So that’s it. Dead.’

  ‘Shit,’ Liane said. Lou came over from the sofa and the two of them stood either side of Paige, all three of them staring at themselves reflected in the black screen.

  ‘Oh, fuck,’ Paige said, sitting back down. ‘I’m fucked.’

  ‘You can take it to that guy by the canteen,’ Liane said. ‘Don’t panic.’

  ‘I can’t afford it,’ Paige said. ‘I’ve literally got, like, twenty quid to last me ’til payday.’

  ‘I can lend it to you,’ Liane said. ‘I mean, depending how much it is. I think he charges thirty-five quid to look at it and do a diagnostic thing.’

  ‘I’ll go halves,’ Lou said. ‘Don’t worry.’

  ‘I don’t even know when I’d be able to pay you back though,’ Paige said. ‘Literally all that money is gone already. I mean, not gone. But I know where it’s going.’

  ‘The next one then,’ Liane said. ‘Don’t worry about it. You need a laptop.’

  ‘Yeah,’ Paige said. ‘Thanks. You’re great. I just hope they can fix it.’

  Liane shrugged. ‘If not, you can use mine. I mean, when I’m not using it. And I bet the other girls’ll say the same.’

  ‘Seriously?’ Paige said, pushing her chair back away from the table again. ‘You’d do that?’

  ‘Course,’ Liane said. ‘Obviously I need it, but you usually stay up later than me, so you can have it after I go to bed. I’ll set you up a login thingy. Need a cup of tea first. Want one?’

  ‘I do,’ Lou said.

  ‘That’s really lovely of you,’ Paige said. To her embarrassment, she was starting to tear up. ‘Thanks.’

  ‘S’just tea,’ Liane said, bumping Paige’s with her shoulder.

  Paige laughed again. ‘I meant the laptop. But the tea too. Thank you.’

  In the kitchen, Liane tried to remember what she’d done with her old laptop. The one she’d had before she’d come to uni. When they’d found out she’d got in, her dad had bought her a MacBook and she suspected she’d stuck her old Toshiba in a drawer and
just left it there. If she’d known Paige’s was knackered, she could’ve brought it up for her last time she’d gone home. Maybe she’d ask her mum to send it up, if she could bear to.

  She opened the fridge for the milk and, as she closed it, the Fuck It List fell off and skidded across the tile floor. Putting the milk on the counter, Liane picked it up and stuck it back on.

  She’d only ticked two off so far, but ‘someone with a tattoo’ had three ticks, ‘waiter’ had one, ‘someone in a band’ had one, and ‘someone in uniform’ had one. She didn’t know who’d ticked them off or if they’d put the tenner in the pot each time. They should probably have a house dinner and talk about it. She’d suggest it next time everyone was home at the same time.

  She wondered if Alfie had a tattoo. She thought probably not, but maybe he was really surprising under his clothes. She needed to find out. She needed to stop bottling it and actually ask him out. Although maybe she was putting off talking to him because of what had happened with Zack. Because she’d spent so long thinking she’d liked him and now realised she didn’t know if she ever really had. How did anyone know their own minds well enough to actually take action? Liane had no clue.

  Chapter 18

  ‘Do you ever see things in the ceiling?’ Liane asked. ‘Like shadows and cracks and stuff?’

  ‘Sometimes,’ Issey said.

  They were both in Issey’s bed again. Issey had been about to go to sleep – or at least to read some Bang! fanfic, have a wank, and go to sleep – when Liane had come in and just clambered under the duvet like it was her room too. Not that Issey minded. At all.

  ‘In my room, if a car goes down the street with the lights on, I get little light shapes on the ceiling,’ Liane said. ‘I like it.’

  ‘Once I saw a light darting around on my wall,’ Issey said. ‘And I couldn’t figure out where it was coming from. It was a reflection from my phone. I was watching it like a kitten. Dickhead.’

  Liane laughed. ‘Turn the fairy lights off.’

  Issey rolled over and reached down the side of the bed to click off the switch on the extension cord. Her room was completely dark – she had lined curtains, so once the lights were off that was it.

  ‘So dark,’ Liane said. ‘I can’t even see my hand.’

  ‘My room was like this when I was little,’ Issey said. ‘I used to wake up in the night and I couldn’t tell if my eyes were open or not. And then I’d start to worry I was trapped or dead.’

  Liane laughed. ‘I used to tell myself I’d been kidnapped and I was on, like, a tanker or something. And that once it was light I’d see that I wasn’t in my room at all, but in the middle of the ocean.’

  ‘I used to pretend I’d teleported. I would wake up in New York or Paris or somewhere. I used to lie there and plan the things I’d do for the day. First I’d get breakfast and then I’d go to the Empire State Building … And then it’d be morning and I’d have to just get up and go to school.’

  ‘Rubbish,’ Liane said. ‘I always wanted to just go to the airport and get on the first plane, no matter where it was going. Have an adventure.’

  ‘Me too,’ Issey said. ‘Or stick a pin in a map.’

  ‘Yeah,’ Liane said. She’d moved without Issey realising – her voice was closer.

  ‘Iz?’

  ‘Yeah?’ Issey put her hand on her own chest. She could feel her heart racing.

  ‘Can I ask you something?’

  Issey nodded, before realising Liane couldn’t see her. ‘Course,’ she managed to squeak out.

  ‘Have you ever kissed a girl?’

  Issey’s heart was thumping so loudly that she was sure Liane would be able to hear it.

  ‘No,’ she whispered. ‘Have you?’

  ‘No. But …’ Liane shifted on the bed. ‘I’ve been thinking about it. Lately. I don’t know if it’s just cos of living with Paige … I was thinking that … You know when you’re with a guy? Are you, like, always thinking about him? Like his body or whatever? Cos when I’m with a guy, I … I can’t believe I’m telling you this. It’s good and everything. I like it. And I get turned on. But then when I want to actually … you know? Get off? I think about girls. When I’m on my own too. I mean … is that normal?’

  Issey’s mouth was so dry she wasn’t sure she’d be able to speak. She licked her lips, but she still heard her mouth make a clicking sound. ‘I think that’s normal, yeah. I mean, I think anything’s normal really. It doesn’t necessarily mean you’re not straight? But maybe you’re not. And that’s OK too. Yeah?’

  ‘Yeah. I know that. I just … I don’t know if it’s, like, fantasy or if it’s something I really want to try.’

  ‘Right,’ Issey said. ‘Yeah. I get that.’

  ‘I haven’t told you about Zack, have I?’ It wasn’t really a question; Liane knew she hadn’t.

  ‘Not really,’ Issey said. ‘Only that he was your friend and he died.’

  Liane sighed. ‘We were really close for a while. And then he was out with some friends and they got into a fight with this group of guys. It wasn’t about anything big, I think they said they’d pushed into the taxi queue or something? It was just shouting, I think. And then one of them pushed Zack and he fell and hit his head on the kerb and that was it. Died instantly.’

  ‘Oh my god,’ Issey said, reaching out and wrapping her fingers around Liane’s wrist before she even had time to think about it and stop herself. ‘That’s awful. I’m so sorry.’

  ‘Yeah. It was … rough. But also … I wasn’t just friends with him. I was friends with his girlfriend too. Emily. And I thought I was in love with him. But … I don’t know. I’ve started to think maybe it was more …’

  ‘Her?’

  ‘Yeah,’ Liane said. She couldn’t quite believe she was talking about it. She probably shouldn’t have been.

  ‘Are you still in touch with her?’

  ‘No,’ Liane said. ‘And I wouldn’t … I mean, it’s not something I’d ever … I just wonder. You know?’

  ‘Yeah,’ Issey said, quietly. ‘I know.’

  DECEMBER

  Chapter 19

  ‘Have you seen the guy with the tattoos?’ Lou said, her mouth against Ella’s ear. ‘Might not have been such a bad shout after all.’

  It was the last night they’d all be at home before Christmas and they were in the club five minutes from their house. Lou had wanted to go somewhere else – she thought it was horribly cheesy with its LED lighting, exposed brick and chrome bar – but it was near, played decent music, and the drinks weren’t stupidly expensive, so she’d been overruled. Exams were over, uni was winding down for Christmas, and they’d all (apart from Paige, who was working, as usual) decided it was a good time to go out and get hammered.

  Ella shook her head and then tried to follow where Lou was pointing. Eventually she saw him. He was small and wiry, but hot, wearing a sleeveless black vest and with tattoos all down both arms and across his chest.

  ‘Will you be OK?’ Lou yelled.

  Ella glanced over her shoulder at Liane and Issey and then nodded at Lou. ‘Go get him, tiger.’

  ‘What?’ Lou yelled.

  Ella shook her head. She hated trying to have conversations in clubs.

  ‘Where’s she going?’ Issey yelled into Ella’s other ear.

  ‘Tick off someone with tattoos.’

  ‘Ohhhhh. He is HOT,’ Liane said. ‘Wish I’d seen him first.’

  ‘Let’s dance!’ Issey shouted, grabbing Ella around the wrist. Ella let herself be tugged out onto the dance floor and told herself to relax. And then she downed some of her beer to help.

  Issey danced like a toddler after too much candyfloss and before long Ella found herself letting go and letting the music take over. Liane was an amazing dancer and seemed to be somehow effortlessly sexy; she moved like a cat, Ella thought. A sexy cat.

  ‘Is Paige coming?’ Issey yelled after a few songs and another beer.

  ‘I don’t think so,’ Ella shouted back
. It felt wrong to have their last night out without Paige. But Paige had insisted she had to work; she needed the money. Which was fair enough. But still.

  ‘Get it, Lou,’ Issey said, pointing.

  Ella looked past her to see Lou and the boy with the tattoos. He had her pressed back against the railing of the raised platform, his hands on her waist, his mouth on her neck.

  Ella wondered what Lou had said when she’d gone over. And then she wondered what she would have said if she’d decided she wanted to get off with him. Probably something ridiculous and embarrassing. Or the way things had been going recently, she probably would have tripped up the step and headbutted him or something. She realised she was still staring at her best friend getting off with some random bloke, so let her eyes drift away.

  They landed on the boy from the bookshop – Nick – who was standing right next to them, holding on to the railing and looking directly at Ella.

  ‘Fucksticks,’ she said.

  ‘WHAT?’ Liane bellowed in her ear.

  Ella wanted to turn and leg it off the dance floor. Possibly out of the club. The city. The country. Instead she forced herself to look back at him again. He was still looking at her. She smiled. He smiled back and raised his hand.

  ‘Who’s that?’ Issey yelled. She’d actually turned all the way round to look at where Ella had been looking.

  ‘Iz!’ Ella hissed. ‘For fuck’s sake.’

  ‘He’s cute!’ she shouted.

  Ella shook her head. She should go over. Should she go over? Like Lou had done. Just walk over and say, what? ‘Fancy seeing you here’? ‘I’d really like to lick your face’? She was still staring at him, oh my god.

  ‘Go over,’ Liane said, giving her a little shove in the small of her back. Once they were home and sober, Ella was going to have to talk to her friends about appropriate behaviour, god.

  She took a couple of steps, but then realised Nick had disappeared from the platform. She looked around a little wildly and then spotted him on the dance floor. He was weaving between the dancers, but still looking over at Ella.