My Heart Goes Bang

by Keris Stainton

  ‘I’ll come with you,’ Ella said.

  ‘Yeah?’

  ‘Course.’

  ‘We could go now,’ Lou said. ‘I’ve got a seminar last thing. We could go before that? Or after, if she’s not there.’

  ‘No problem.’

  ‘You’re not doing anything?’

  Ella had been planning on doing some revision and ringing her brother, but both of those things could wait.

  ‘Nope,’ she said. ‘I’m all yours.’

  MARCH

  Chapter 31

  Paige was running late. She’d spent the afternoon in the library working on yet another essay, but she’d lost track of time and now the only way she was going to make it to her pub shift was … well, she wasn’t going to make it. But if she hurried, at least she’d only be a few minutes late.

  ‘Paige!’ a voice called as she stepped out onto the quad.

  Paige stopped. It had sounded like her dad, but there was no way it could be her dad. He didn’t know where she was, she knew he didn’t.

  ‘Paigey.’

  He was there. Right in front of her. He was there and he looked so much better than the last time she’d seen him. He was clean-shaven and he’d had his hair cut and even his skin looked better – not as dry, not as florid.

  ‘Dad,’ Paige said. She was embarrassed to find that her throat felt tight. ‘What are you doing here?’

  ‘You didn’t want to come to me,’ he said. And then he shook his head. ‘I don’t blame you. Honestly. But I’ve got these forms and I need you to sign them.’

  ‘How did you know where to find me?’ Paige said. She still couldn’t quite believe he was there, was half wondering if she hadn’t fallen asleep in the warmth of the library and was dreaming right now.

  ‘The library? I guessed. I’ve been in that cafe over there.’ He pointed to the canteen.

  ‘No,’ Paige said. ‘The university.’

  Her dad looked confused. ‘I always knew you were coming to Liverpool. Did you think I didn’t?’

  Paige blinked back tears. ‘No. I knew you knew,’ she lied.

  ‘So, can you sign this stuff now? Have you got somewhere you need to be?’

  ‘No,’ Paige said. ‘I’m free.’

  All the way home from her day’s lectures at uni, Ella had been wondering whether she should call a house meeting. Yes, Lou would totally take the piss out of her control-freakiness and bullet journal, but it had been a while since they’d all hung out and things seemed to be falling apart a little.

  As much as she claimed to be OK, and as helpful as her student advisor had been, escalating it to the Dean of the School and referring Lou for counselling, Ella knew Lou well enough to know that it was stressing her out. Ella still hadn’t spoken to Paige about the missed payments, she’d just made the money up herself, but she knew she had to do that soon, before another month became due. And there was something funny going on with Issey and Liane; a weird tension that hadn’t been there before.

  Maybe she should’ve bought pizza and made everyone sit down together.

  Ella had just put her key in the front door and was muttering, ‘Turn, you stupid sticky bastard!’ – the new lock was as temperamental as the old one had been – when someone touched her arm and said, ‘Els.’

  ‘Christ!’ she said, yanking her arm away and then turning to see her brother tucked up in a coat with a fur hood, a beanie pulled low on his face.

  ‘You scared the shit out of me!’ she said, punching him on the arm.

  ‘Ow,’ he said. ‘Fuck. Sorry. But I’ve been waiting for fucking ages and I’m freezing.’

  ‘What are you doing here? Where’ve you been waiting?’

  Dylan pointed slightly further up the road. ‘Doorway. Three people tried to buy drugs off me.’

  ‘Jesus, Dylan!’ Ella said, finally managing to get the key to turn in the lock. She stopped before opening the door and peered at him. ‘Are you all right?’

  He nodded. ‘Better now you’re home. Freezing. Hungry. Tired.’

  ‘Shit. OK. I don’t know who’s in, so stay quiet.’ She opened the door and headed straight up the stairs, Dylan close behind her.

  ‘Hey, Els?’ Issey called from the kitchen.

  ‘Hiiiii!’ Ella called back, opening her bedroom door and pushing Dylan inside. ‘Nick’s with me. We’ll be in my room.’

  ‘Oh, don’t worry,’ Issey called out, faux-sweetly. ‘We won’t disturb you …’

  ‘We’ll let you have your pri-va-cyyyyy,’ Liane added.

  ‘Use protection!’ Issey yelled.

  ‘Fuck off!’ Ella shouted down the stairs and then shut the door, turning the key in the lock.

  ‘So that was horrifying,’ Dylan said. He was standing at the foot of her bed, his coat half off.

  ‘Serves you right for sneaking up on me,’ Ella said. She kicked her shoes off and dropped her coat over the chair in the corner of the room, gesturing for her brother to do the same.

  Dylan pulled off his beanie, his curly hair following it for a moment before falling back down, slightly enlivened by static.

  ‘It’s so good to see you,’ Ella said, pulling him into a hug.

  He rested his forehead on her shoulder and squeezed her back. His face was freezing against her neck and she could feel how cold his hands were even through her jumper.

  ‘You too,’ he murmured. ‘I miss you so much.’

  ‘Fuck,’ Ella said, pushing him away and then down onto the bed. ‘What’s wrong?’

  Dylan shook his head, the tears Ella had been able to hear in his voice welling in his eyes. ‘I’m tired and I’m homesick and I’m worried about Arthur and Mum and I’m just … sick of it.’

  ‘Have you –’ Ella crawled up the bed to sit back against the pillows. ‘Has something happened with one of the other boys?’ She knew that Dylan didn’t always get on well with Calum. And he and Noah had an intense friendship that sometimes crossed over into passive aggression.

  ‘No. The boys are fine.’ Dylan sat down at the foot of the bed, turning to look at Ella. ‘I mean, we’ve all been getting on each other’s tits, you know, but nothing bad. I’m just so sick of not having any freedom. I asked if I could come and see you. They said no. The other night I sneaked out of the hotel and walked around in the dark. And I couldn’t remember the last time I’d gone anywhere on my own.’

  ‘It was at home. Christmas,’ Ella said.

  ‘Oh, yeah,’ Dylan said, frowning. ‘It seemed like longer. But even so, that’s months. I haven’t done anything on my own for months.’

  ‘You used to hate being on your own,’ Ella said. When they were growing up, that had been the best way to get Dylan to do something for her – to threaten to leave him on his own. It used to make him cry and then actually beg her to do the thing he’d just been refusing to do. Ella would have liked to say she had been kind and gentle with him and not taken advantage of it, but that would have been a lie.

  Dylan flopped down next to her. ‘It’s too much pressure, you know.’

  ‘It’s the touring, I think,’ Ella said. ‘You’ll be fine when you stop touring.’

  ‘I don’t think we’re ever going to stop touring though, that’s part of the problem. They’re already booking the next one. It’s like I told you at Christmas, there’s always one more thing.’

  ‘That’s ridiculous,’ Ella said, turning slightly so she could look at him. She could see now how run-down he looked. His skin up close was pale and greasy and slightly unreal-looking. She reached up and tugged on one of his curls, letting it straighten and then coil up again.

  ‘I’m just so tired,’ he said again. ‘We do press in the day and then the show at night and we still have to record. The other night I slept for like forty-five minutes. That was it. None of it feels real cos I’m spaced out with tiredness.’

  And weed, Ella thought, but didn’t say.

  ‘I know what you’re thinking,’ he said. ‘But it helps me relax. That’s the
other thing – it’s really hard to sleep after being a performing monkey all day.’

  ‘Performing monkey,’ Ella said, smiling. ‘That sounds like Noah.’

  Dylan laughed. ‘Yeah.’

  ‘How is he?’

  ‘Furious. All the time. Hates management. Hates the record company. I’m worried about him actually. He’s smoking too much. And going out too much. I thought about bringing him with me. But I knew we’d be too conspicuous together.’

  ‘You’re pretty conspicuous on your own, dickhead.’ She kicked at his ankle. ‘I can’t believe you were hanging around waiting for me for so long.’

  Dylan shrugged. ‘People don’t recognise me so much when they’re not expecting to see me.’

  ‘Your life is weird,’ Ella said, dipping her head to rest it on his shoulder.

  Dylan rubbed his face. ‘I miss all of you. Everything. Just being at home, you know? I keep thinking about one day when I came back from school and you were already there and I think you and Mum were making something? Corned beef hash, maybe? And you had the radio on and you were singing along and the windows were steamed up and it was just nice. I think about it all the time.’

  ‘I remember that day,’ Ella said. ‘It was corned beef hash. Cos we fucked up the tin and Mum stabbed it with a knife. And you stood on Dipsy’s tail.’

  ‘I think that was a different day.’

  ‘Maybe,’ Ella said. ‘Ugh. Now I’m homesick too. When can you get back?’

  Dylan shrugged, jolting Ella. ‘No idea. They’ll probably have me on house arrest after this.’

  Ella lurched up to look at him. ‘They don’t know that you’re here?’

  Dylan bit his lip. Ella knew that look. ‘Fucking hell, Dyl!’

  ‘There’s no way they would’ve said yes. So I just left.’

  ‘Where were you?’

  ‘Manchester,’ Dylan said. ‘At the BBC. I got the driver to drop me here. He didn’t even question it.’

  ‘You got him to drop you where? At the house?’

  ‘No, I’m not an idiot. At the top of the road.’

  ‘And you didn’t tell anyone you were going? They’ll be worried. Fuck, it’s probably on the news –’

  ‘I told Noah. It’ll be fine.’

  Ella shook her head. ‘Knowing Noah, he’ll have told them you were kidnapped just to fuck with them.’

  Dylan snorted. ‘Actually, you might be right. Shit. I should’ve told Calum.’

  ‘How is Calum?’ Ella asked, her face warming. She’d had a huge crush on Calum when Dylan first joined the band. He was just so ridiculously handsome.

  ‘How’s Nick?’

  ‘Fuck off.’

  Dylan laughed. ‘I mean it, though. Tell me about him. Clearly you’ve brought him here and had him in your room with the door locked.’ He fake-shuddered.

  ‘He’s lovely,’ Ella said. ‘Honestly, Dyl, he’s so fucking lovely. I can’t even tell you. He’s just … I keep thinking it’s a trick. Cos it’s too easy. He’s just nice to me. And he likes me.’

  ‘And you like him?’

  ‘I really like him, yeah.’

  ‘That sounds good. That doesn’t sound like a trick.’

  ‘I know,’ Ella said. ‘That’s what I keep trying to tell myself.’ She ran a hand through her hair and said, ‘He asked me if I was related to you.’

  Dylan frowned. ‘Yeah? What did you tell him?’

  ‘I said no. I said people always ask me that. Which they do. But I said no. I didn’t want it to become a thing. It was early on. We were only just together. And I wanted him to know me, Ella. Not Dylan Jewell’s sister. But now … when do I tell him? And how do I explain why I lied? And also, it just feels shitty because I want to say “Hell yeah, I’m his sister!” cos I’m so fucking proud of you, you know?’ She punched his knee. ‘But … part of university for me is to, like, find out who I am. Or get to be Ella. Just Ella. Not Anne’s daughter or Arthur’s step-daughter or Dylan’s sister or Jake’s cousin. Just Ella.’

  ‘And then I had to go and get famous and fuck it all up.’

  ‘You haven’t fucked anything up, dickhead. It’s just … it’s made it a tiny bit harder.’

  Dylan grinned, his dimples showing, and Ella knew what he was going to say before he said it. And he knew she knew. But he said it anyway.

  ‘That’s what she said.’

  Chapter 32

  ‘Scandal, Grey’s or Murder?’ Liane asked Issey.

  Issey was sitting at the dining table, her laptop open in front of her and a pile of books on her left.

  ‘Hmm?’ she said, glancing up and then back at her screen.

  ‘When you’ve finished that,’ Liane said, gesturing at Issey’s laptop. ‘Do you want to watch Scandal, Grey’s or How to Get Away with Murder?’

  ‘Or maybe something not Shonda?’ Issey said.

  ‘I mean, I can see how you might think that would be an option, but nah,’ Liane said.

  Issey grinned. ‘Grey’s? An old one, though. One of the horrifying season finales.’

  ‘Plane crash? Shooter?’

  Issey frowned at her screen. ‘Plane crash, maybe? I feel like a good cry.’

  ‘Plane crash it is,’ Liane said.

  ‘Haven’t you got any work to do?’ Issey asked her after she’d typed six words into her own document.

  Liane was lying on the sofa, but she propped her head up on the arm. ‘We’ve got this seminar project, but I can’t get hold of the girl who’s meant to be doing the reading list, so I’m stuck until she calls me back.’

  Issey typed another few words and then Liane said, ‘I mean … I could probably start my statistics essay, but …’ She rolled on her back.

  ‘What?’ Issey said.

  ‘I can’t be bothered,’ Liane said passionately.

  Issey grinned. ‘I know that feeling.’

  ‘Can we go out instead?’ Liane said, rolling back onto her belly. ‘Do you have to finish that now? What if you just, you know, didn’t. And instead we go and get pissed.’

  ‘I really need to finish this,’ Issey said. ‘I’m sorry. We can have a bottle of wine with the plane crash though. If you like?’

  Liane groaned. ‘I guess. I just wanted to get out of here. I feel like I’m going stir-crazy.’

  ‘You’ve only been home a couple of hours!’ Issey said.

  ‘Feels like years.’

  Issey laughed. ‘OK. Just shut up for a bit, yeah, and I’ll finish this and it’ll be plane crash and wine time.’

  ‘Fine,’ Liane said.

  Issey tried to work on her essay, but once she started thinking about being on the sofa with Liane, drinking wine and crying over Grey’s, she couldn’t concentrate. She felt like she was just getting more and more confused. She thought maybe she wanted Liane to kiss her again. No. She definitely wanted Liane to kiss her again. But clearly Liane didn’t want that. But she still wanted to be friends. Best friends. And Issey wanted that too. She just wasn’t sure how that could possibly work.

  She closed her laptop.

  ‘I’m never going to get this done tonight.’

  ‘Yay!’ Liane said, waving both arms in the air. ‘Plane crash!’

  At work in the pub, Paige’s mobile hadn’t stopped ringing all night. Well, she’d stopped it ringing, but it was still buzzing on the shelf behind her. She’d ended up putting it face-down since every time she saw the notifications on the screen it made her stomach lurch. Her dad kept telling her the house sale was going through, everything was in order. He’d sounded good every time she’d spoken to him, but she was still waiting for the time he didn’t.

  ‘Boyfriend?’ Jonny asked, eventually. ‘Just tell him to do one. Easier.’

  ‘Not a fucking boyfriend,’ Paige said and then glanced round to make sure none of the customers were listening.

  ‘Girlfriend?’

  Paige shook her head. ‘My dad.’

  Jonny sucked a breath through his teeth, dragging a cloth
across the top of the bar. ‘Family are the worst.’

  Paige laughed. ‘No shit, Sherlock.’

  ‘Anything I can help with?’

  A customer came to the counter before Paige could answer and she served them, thinking about how maybe she should have asked someone – probably not Jonny, but someone – for help in the past. How her tendency to try to deal with everything on her own had never really worked for her. How, even though her dad seemed to be doing OK, she couldn’t let herself trust that he really was.

  The customer went to sit in what Paige now thought of as the girls’ snug – even though they hadn’t actually been in the pub for a few weeks; they were all too busy. Paige turned back to her boss.

  ‘There’s nothing you can do, no. But thanks for asking.’

  ‘No problem.’

  ‘But I do need money, so if you could throw some extra shifts my way?’

  ‘You’re already doing as many as I’ve got,’ he said, shrugging. ‘And I’m already worried about how you’re fitting your uni work in.’

  Paige smiled. ‘You’re not my dad.’

  ‘Shut it, you,’ Jonny said. And then went back to his office.

  Paige wasn’t really fitting her uni work in. She was squeezing it in last thing at night and between shifts. And she was skipping lectures and getting notes from a couple of different people on her course, but she could tell it was starting to piss them off. But there was no way around it.

  She just had to keep going until she didn’t have to any more.

  ‘Oh shit, who’s that?’ Issey said from the sofa, where she and Liane were gripped by McDreamy, his arm trapped in the detached plane door while Cristina searched for her shoe.

  Someone was ringing the bell.

  ‘I’m not getting it,’ Liane said. She was lying on the other sofa, her feet up on the arm.

  Issey laughed, swinging her legs down. ‘Maybe you should,’ she said, as she headed out of the room. ‘Stop them coming back again.’

  She could hear Ella and Nick’s laughter as she passed Ella’s room. Maybe she’d knock on the way back up. She hadn’t talked to Nick much and she thought he should come and meet her and Liane, tell them his intentions towards Ella. She grinned to herself at the thought. Ella would kill her.