The Exclusives

by Rebecca Thornton

  Freya gets up to help. The movement alerts dreadlocked guy to me. I feel a steel boot in my groin. I don’t see what happens next, but Freya falls.

  Then Freya’s skirt goes. Denim. Glint of the skulls and crossbones. Sparkles. Beautiful. Shimmering. My skirt goes too. Torn down my leg. Pain. Then my cheek is being rhythmically squashed into the wall. Back and forth. All I can think about is that my neck feels like it’s going to be cricked. I feel my head smash further and further into the wall and then I see Freya standing behind dragon guy, leg in the air, and she’s kicking him. I can hear music. Roar of the crowd. Whistles. Voices at the top of the stairs, funnelled by distance.

  ‘You dirty little bitch,’ someone says. I can feel something thwack my skull. Blood. The dripping sensation makes the drugs kick in again and I begin to rush.

  I turn my head and I can see Freya, she’s also now on all fours. Man behind her. One hand wrapped tightly around her mouth, the other squeezing her neck. I can see her neck, bulging out of those hands. Her eyes, shivering inside the sockets. She is moving, back and forth back and forth. There is blood pouring from her nose. Blood red, like my Head Girl badge, I think. Pain. Pleasure. Pain.

  Freya is now cheek on floor, arms forward like a cat stretching. Her eyes are no longer moving but the pupils are black. Endless. Zipping sound. Another zipping sound. Then a clapping above our heads. Boom. Doof. Boom. Doof. Thick curtain is pulled back and we are left alone. I wipe my mouth.

  ‘Shall we go?’ Freya whispers. She is crying, haloed in an eerie green glow. I can see the tears in the dark. I reach out and touch them and my fingers come away wet and then I realise it’s mixed with blood and I wipe my hands on the wall. We hug and she leads me out of the club. The cool air blasts on our faces and we remember we’ve left our coats in the cloakroom.

  ‘I can’t.’ She shakes her head.

  ‘Let’s go then.’ We leave. Nose still bleeding, Freya runs into McDonald’s and picks up some napkins. She cleans us up and we get a taxi home. The next morning, Freya is curled up at the end of my bed. Father is still away and Amy hasn’t come back. Freya is holding my foot and there’s half a cigarette stubbed out in an ashtray by her head. I lean over and stroke her hair.

  She looks up at me and gives a half-smile and then frowns.

  ‘What happened?’ she asks.

  ‘We’re OK,’ I reply, sliding off the bed and patting my stomach. ‘Shall I cook bacon and eggs?’

  ‘No thanks. Jo, I need to speak to you about . . .’ And then Freya’s crying so much she can’t get any words out.

  ‘Come on. I’m going down. I’ll meet you in the kitchen.’ The eggs and bacon are cooking and Freya comes down and goes to the CD player. She puts on Nirvana, Nevermind, and the bass line echoes around the kitchen and she’s crying. And she looks so pretty, despite the smudged make-up, the smears of dirt, the black round her neck and the grazes. So pretty, still.

  2014

  Freya’s pushing my head down between my knees. ‘Sit down like that,’ she’s saying. ‘You look like you’re going to pass out.’

  I sit like that for at least ten minutes, neither of us speaking and then I throw up, all over the ground. I’m shaking, my legs are jerking, just like Freya’s did that night, and I seem to have lost total control of my body.

  ‘What’s happening?’ I ask Freya. She rubs my back and pushes my head back down. We sit like that for about half an hour. I’m shaking and sweating and very breathless.

  ‘I think I need to go to a doctor,’ I say.

  ‘No, no. You’re fine. It’s just a physical reaction. It’s what I had. The day after. Do you remember?’

  I do, but I’m too ashamed of myself to admit it. Ashamed that I didn’t help her. Ashamed that those marks around her neck were bruises and all that time I had convinced myself it was dirt. Those hands around Freya’s neck. Squeezing. Flesh bulging. And I’m sick again. Freya hands me a hanky. It’s embroidered with her new initials. I take it, wipe my mouth and I want, more than anything, to lie down.

  ‘Josephine? Are you feeling better now?’

  ‘I’m fine,’ I say.

  ‘I thought you’d say that.’

  Freya pulls something out of her bag. I lift my head and have to drop it again. ‘Are you alright?’ she asks again.

  ‘I’m fine. Just give me a moment. Thanks.’

  I can hear Freya humming very softly. It’s that hum she does when she’s getting trying to fill a silence. I know the exact notes she’s going to sing and it’s reassuring to hear that even that hasn’t changed.

  ‘You’re doing that hum, you always used to do,’ I say, when I’ve caught my breath.

  ‘Hum?’

  What was meant to be a fond reminiscence sounds like a recrimination. There’s silence again, and it grows. It’s been eighteen years and, on the surface, nothing’s changed: the intonations and the flickers of her features. The way her hands rest lightly on her thighs. She probably thinks the same of me, the tight way in which I hold my arms to my sides, my straight back and the impenetrable force around me that Freya used to laugh at, preventing people from standing too close. I make a concerted effort to sit in a more relaxed way but it feels so odd and Freya gives me a funny look. I can tell she knows what I’m doing.

  Neither of us talks for about five minutes. We watch the people walking past us. A fat woman struggling to pull a large suitcase behind her. A small child throwing his toy teddy on the grass. A group of young men who wolf-whistle at Freya, aimlessly high-fiving each other. My legs have stopped shaking and my stomach has settled but, if I stand up now, I’m pretty sure I’d fall. We wait another twenty minutes or so and then Freya motions to another bench, away from my vomit. I manage to stand up and stagger across to it. When I feel like I can talk, I can’t think of anything to say. The boys have caught sight of Freya again, walking. Another wolf whistle sounds.

  ‘Men never did notice me when you were around,’ I laugh.

  ‘You think they didn’t. But they did. Anyway, the teachers never noticed me when you were around,’ she says with a small smile.

  The old joke between us brews and turns slightly hostile, despite the earlier forgiveness. It’s all still so precarious.

  ‘Here,’ she says, pulling something out her handbag. ‘It’s my daughter.’ She holds out the peace offering and I smile and take it.

  There’s a little creature who looks exactly like Freya did when she was young, except she’s absolutely covered in freckles. The sunlight bathes her mini arms and blonde hair and she looks like one of those kids in those aspirational clothes adverts. The ones in striped dungarees that you think couldn’t get more perfect.

  ‘Evie,’ she says.

  ‘She’s lovely.’

  ‘Kids?’ Freya asks me, as she strokes the photo before returning it to her bag.

  ‘No.’

  ‘She’s just like me,’ Freya says.

  ‘Really?’ I don’t know what else to say.

  ‘Yes. She’s going to be like me as a teenager. Which is why . . . Which is why I needed to see you and to sort this thing out. And why I need to clear everything up. Everything from that night. I need some sort of closure. Don’t you?’

  ‘I guess so.’ I laugh inwardly. If only she knew where I’d been for the past week.

  ‘We’ve done well, so far, haven’t we?’ she asks. I nod my head, wondering what she means by ‘so far’ then I remember she said she had something to tell me.

  ‘There’s just a bit more, though. Some stuff I need to talk to you about. Stuff I need to tell you.’

  In truth, I’m worried about how I’m going to react to whatever it is she’s going to say. I wasn’t expecting to feel so physically bad when thoughts of that night came back to me. I wasn’t expecting an iron weight across my chest that made me think I was going to die.

  ‘Go on then. What?’ My voice comes out all constricted.

  She looks down and then up at the sky. Her lip is moving to t
he side and I know she’s dreading telling me whatever it is.

  ‘I’m so sorry,’ she says, closing her eyes.

  ‘So am I. About the whole thing.’ The words surprise me and she takes my hand again.

  ‘It was something that just happened, wasn’t it? I mean neither of us could do anything about it. Isn’t that right? Even though we were both high?’

  I nod my head.

  ‘Look, J, you know how much you meant to me.’ Even after all these years, the past tense of her words hurt me. ‘I wanted so much for you to be happy. To have a good time. To enjoy yourself, even with all the pressure you put yourself under.’

  I don’t know what she’s getting at, but I sit and listen.

  ‘You know, with Head Girl, your mother. Everything like that. I just wanted to you to loosen up sometimes, you know?’

  I don’t know but I turn and look at her and she’s gone a weird colour. A chartreuse tinge is spreading across her face.

  ‘That night. That night . . .’

  ‘Go on.’

  She opens her mouth to talk and the words freeze somewhere between her throat and the air.

  Her eyes, they are all shaky and they’ve gone a weird black colour. What, just what on earth could be that bad that her eyes have turned black?

  1996

  Verity, Sally and I are all in Mrs Allen’s study. There’s a lacrosse game going on just outside the big window against our biggest rival, St Margaret’s.

  ‘It’s good to have you all back here. To maintain some sense of normality,’ says Mrs Allen. ‘I wanted to have a meeting with you to discuss Freya.’

  ‘I spoke to her,’ Verity says, looking around the room, all pleased with herself. ‘Yesterday. She’s doing much better. Said she was with her father and brother. And of course, as I’m sure you all know, her father is due to go away again so she’s thinking about coming back to school . . . I think she’s got to have some . . . treatment or something at some point, but hopefully she’ll be able to see us all before that.’

  ‘Verity, thank you for that info,’ says Mrs Allen. ‘As Verity has filled us all in I won’t bother to repeat it but we’ll have to see what happens.’ A distant cheer comes from the lacrosse field. Mrs Allen turns her head and looks through the glass, to see who has scored.

  ‘Iris Delamere,’ she whispers, turning back to us, rubbing her eyes beneath her glasses. ‘Right, as I was saying. Freya. She’s much better. Now, I’ve spoken with the school governors, who have come to a decision. If this gets out, it’ll be a disaster. As you all know there’s The Times Good Schools Guide coming out soon so we need to be top of our game. Keep our number one spot . . . So, I’m really sorry to say, and this has been a very, very hard decision to make, given that it might affect the league tables. And our reputation. But we realised we would do even more damage if this got out and we’d done nothing. So, again, I’m sorry to say but it’s been decided that if none of you comes forward, you’ll all be expelled and your universities informed. They can make the decision as to whether you’ll still be welcome.’

  Verity jumps up. ‘That’s not fair, though, Mrs Allen. I wasn’t involved. It could have been absolutely anyone.’

  ‘Verity, sit down. That may be the case but as you three are the only people who could have possibly been involved, we have to take due action, unless something drastic happens and someone else turns up with some evidence.’ My skin feels as though it’s burning up. She’s bluffing, I think. I’m sure she’s bluffing, in the hope that one of us will come forward and save the day.

  ‘Girls?’ Mrs Allen is looking at Sally, then me.

  ‘And what about Freya and Mrs Kitts?’ I say. It’s the first time Mrs Kitts’s name has been spoken in a while.

  ‘We’re conducting a final investigation and, whilst it continues, Freya will be allowed back at school, if she’s up to it of course, and until then, everything carries on as normal. When the governors file their reports, we’ll work out what comes next.’ Another cheer. Iris again. I can see her from a distance, lacrosse stick bobbing up and down.

  ‘All four of you. I can’t believe it,’ says Mrs Allen. ‘Four of Greenwood’s star pupils and this is what happens.’

  ‘Nothing’s going to happen, Mrs Allen. We’re all going to be fine,’ says Sally, looking flushed.

  ‘Is that so?’

  ‘Yes. I’m going to Oxford whatever happens. My father will be sure of it.’

  ‘Let’s hope that’s the case,’ Mrs Allen replies. We all wait for the game to finish. Greenwood Hall win, by the sound of things, and Verity stands up and does a falsetto cheer. I feel like kicking her. It dawns on me, as the sun retreats into cloud, that if Freya comes back none of us will know how to behave. Will she talk to me? Will she even look at me? Mrs Allen wraps up the meeting and asks me to stay behind in her study.

  ‘Josephine, I need to speak to you alone please. Head Girl matters. Girls, thank you for meeting me. Now get back to work, you’ve got lots of revision.’

  She waits until they have both left. ‘I’ve spoken to Freya’s father. He rang last night. Late. She’s made a good recovery but, of course, she’ll be feeling . . . out of sorts for a while. Mrs Kitts. All that business. Will have scarred her.’ Where is she going with this?

  ‘And so Mr Seymour thinks it’s best if you two don’t talk whilst the investigation is going ahead. In fact, he’s requested that if she does decide to come back, Freya moves boarding house. So she’ll be down in the main school, near the san.’

  ‘So you don’t want me to communicate with her if I see her? Is that right?’

  Mrs Allen wipes her nose with a lace hanky. ‘That’s right. I’m sorry, Josephine. I know that must be a bit of a blow.’ It’s not. It’s a relief. The possibility of awkwardness has been taken from me.

  ‘That’s OK. I’ll stay away from her. What about classes? Oxbridge lessons?’

  ‘We’ve sorted this all out. Don’t worry. Freya will have separate classes. There was talk of her going to a different school if she’s up to studying at all, but her father thought it would be even more disruptive for her to be away from her friends at this time.’ I wonder what it would have been like if it had been the other way round, given that my only real friend was Freya.

  ‘Right.’

  ‘Josephine, is there anything else you’d like to tell me? Anything at all?’ Mrs Allen starts so stand, as though she’s expecting me to say nothing at all.

  ‘No. Ask Verity the same question,’ I reply. My head fills with thoughts, all jostling for attention, and my scalp starts prickling.

  ‘Josephine?’

  ‘I’m here. Sorry. Right. I’d best get going, Mrs Allen.’ My voice is crisp.

  ‘Right you are. Please do come to me if you need anything.’ The study is hot, sunlight streaming through the windows. I’m dripping cold sweat.

  The next day Freya’s back. I don’t see her but I can tell by the high-pitched chatter around the school. Girls nudge each other when I walk past and bury their heads down, as though I won’t notice. I walk past them, back straight, books under my arm. Sally catches up with me on the way to History.

  ‘Have you heard?’ she asks.

  ‘No,’ I reply, looking out the window, pretending not to care.

  ‘About Freya?’

  ‘No,’ I sigh, as though her silly gossip means nothing but I’m covered in goosebumps.

  ‘She’s leaving. Was here for three seconds apparently. She’s packing.’

  ‘Where’s she going?’ I’m still looking outside the window.

  ‘Don’t know. Home again, I suppose. To that psych place she was meant to go to? Don’t know. But do you think that means all this will blow over?’

  ‘I hope so,’ I reply. ‘Oxford.’ Sally links my arm.

  ‘Hope so too. Want to come and stay next weekend?’

  ‘OK.’

  ‘OK?’ she replies, extracting her arm from mine in disbelief.

&nb
sp; ‘I said OK, OK?’

  ‘Are you serious?’

  ‘I’m serious.’

  ‘That’s . . . that’s amazing. Cool!’ She turns, giving me a huge grin.

  For a moment, I feel I’m being disloyal to Freya. It’s replaced by a cool relief that I won’t need to be on the constant lookout for her presence sliding around the school corridors. The whispers of girls. I’m so happy she’s alive that all the guilt, resentment and hurt over recent events floods back.

  ‘So, I’ll organise something fun, yes?’ Sally says.

  ‘Sorry?’ I reply. ‘Oh . . . yes. Sorry, that’ll be great. Just something low-key. Cinema or something would be great.’ I smile. I need to keep Sally onside, but more than that, I’ve grown rather fond of her. She’s not a replacement for Freya, but her presence is comforting. Labrador-esque. I think of Freya and what she would say if I told her that.

  2014

  ‘You remember you hadn’t wanted to take anything that night? I mean, you said no to any drugs?’ Freya says. She’s squeezing my hand. ‘I think you wanted to keep on the straight and narrow as Head Girl and you were frightened by your mother. I had pretended not to understand why you were freaking out at the time. Always felt bad about that. I knew perfectly well you were scared that it would trigger something that meant you would get ill like your mum. I saw the report too, the one you mentioned. That drugs cause mental health problems. Anyway . . .’

  I wonder how many other times Freya played dumb with me.

  ‘I felt things were going to change when you were made Head Girl. Like you wouldn’t be able to mess around with me. I was scared. I was scared we would drift apart.’