Aaron is in the middle of an endless account of some five-a-side footy match he played earlier. My mouth has frozen into a rictus smile, and my ears are starting to feel numb around the edges. Without warning, he leans in to nuzzle my neck, his breath hot and sticky, like Fred when he is snuffling around for a treat. I wish he actually was Fred because then I might not feel quite so alarmed. ‘Don’t, Aaron,’ I hiss. ‘People are looking!’
‘So?’ he shrugs. ‘You’re my girlfriend. It’s allowed.’
I pull away, embarrassed, and Aaron scowls. ‘You’re no fun, Summer,’ he huffs. ‘You’re so … uptight lately. All you think about is ballet and that stupid audition!’
‘That’s not true!’ I argue, but Aaron has a point. When we first started going out, I was flattered to have such a cute boyfriend. I loved the silk flower he left in my locker, ‘from a secret admirer’. I thought that dating Aaron would be full of things like that, sweet, romantic things, but he never even mentions the flower. I think it was just a tactic, a means to an end.
I fell in love with a boy who left secret presents in my locker and ended up with a boy who talks about football and Xbox games. I wanted romance and I got wet kisses and hands that try to stray to places I don’t want them to.
Across the flames of the bonfire, Alfie is watching me, his face thoughtful. There is just no escape from that boy.
‘Hey, Aaron!’ he yells. ‘I hear you were a legend today, in the footy match. Three goals!’
It’s an unlikely rescue, but Aaron abandons me to talk football with Alfie, Sid and Carl, and relief floods through me. I sit down on the cliff steps, hugging my knees, trying not to care that I have a boyfriend whose touch makes me shudder. It’s not Aaron’s fault. He hasn’t changed … he is exactly the same as always. Confident, good-looking, crazy about football in the same way I am mad about ballet. People say we’re a good match, but there is no spark, no energy between us.
I am not sure now if there ever was.
Alfie appears beside me, having abandoned Aaron to Carl and Sid. ‘You OK?’ he asks, sitting down beside me on the steps. ‘You look fed up.’
‘Thanks,’ I say crossly. ‘I’m just … tired. I’ve been practising a lot lately. It’s hard work.’
‘Ah,’ Alfie says. ‘The audition. Third Saturday in August, right?’
I blink. ‘How do you even know that?’
Alfie looks guilty. ‘Um … Skye might have mentioned it. Or maybe your mum told my mum, I can’t remember. We’re all rooting for you, y’know, the whole village. You’re going to ace it!’
‘It’s not that easy,’ I sigh.
‘I know,’ Alfie says. ‘Nothing worth having ever is. But you have a talent, Summer, and you’re determined … you’ll do it. Everyone thinks so. Well, almost everyone …’
I frown. ‘So … who thinks I won’t?’
Alfie backtracks. ‘Nobody,’ he says shiftily. ‘I mean, we all think you can do it, but I think he just doesn’t want to lose you, and that’s why he bet you wouldn’t get in. I said you would, and we put a tenner on it. My money’s safe, I reckon.’
‘You had a bet about whether I’d get into ballet school?’ I ask, horrified.
‘It was just a joke, seriously,’ Alfie hedges. ‘I was saying you’d pass with flying colours, and he was just arguing for the sake of it. It was nothing personal, Summer. He just doesn’t want to accept that you’re going away …’
I swallow. ‘Let me get this straight,’ I say. ‘You had a bet that I’d get into ballet school, and someone else bet I wouldn’t …’
‘That’s about it, yes,’ Alfie gulps.
‘Let me guess … that someone was … Aaron?’
Alfie pulls a pained face. ‘It’s not that he doesn’t think you can do it,’ he says. ‘He just says stuff, to be funny. Different. You know what he’s like …’
I look towards the firelight, where Aaron is telling Carl and Sid about his third goal of the day and how the team would have been stuffed without him. I can’t see a good-looking, popular boy who likes to be funny, just a boy who is self-centred and full of himself, with a mean streak mixed in for good measure. I see somebody I don’t like at all.
‘Unreal,’ I say.
‘Me and my big mouth,’ Alfie groans. ‘I’ve put my foot in it massively … boy, I bet you hate me now.’
‘No more than usual,’ I sigh, and Alfie puts his head in his hands. ‘Look, Alfie, it’s not your fault my boyfriend’s a creep.’
‘He’ll kill me,’ Alfie whimpers. ‘I am dead meat.’
‘I won’t tell him,’ I say. ‘Forget it. I guess you didn’t tell me anything I didn’t already know. It was never going to last.’
Alfie’s head springs up again, his eyes wide. ‘You’re dumping him?’ he asks.
‘I don’t know,’ I say. ‘I guess … we haven’t been getting on for a while. No spark.’
‘Really?’ he asks, his mouth twitching into a smile. ‘No spark? It’s not all my fault then? Cool. If you ever need to talk … about sparks … or anything … any time … I’m here for you, I promise. I mean it, Summer.’
‘No thanks,’ I say.
‘OK. That’s cool too,’ he shrugs. ‘Whatever you like.’
‘I’d like you to leave me alone now,’ I tell him, and I watch his face fall as he moves off towards the others.
Later, when the sky has darkened to indigo velvet scattered with stars and the bonfire has burnt down to a glow of soft embers, Aaron catches my hand as I dance with Tia, Millie and Cherry on the sand to the sound of Shay’s slow guitar.
‘Hey,’ he says. ‘How’s my gorgeous girlfriend?’
He pulls me close, and his breath smells of Coke and hamburgers, sweet and greasy at the same time. I turn my face away, up to the stars.
‘I’ve missed you,’ he says into my hair, dancing me away across the beach until the bonfire and the music fade into the distance. ‘You should have been at the footy match, to support me. You should have been here on the beach this afternoon, and at the party. You’re working too hard on this stupid ballet stuff. I called you, but you didn’t answer …’
‘I’m here now,’ I whisper, wishing I didn’t have to be.
‘Yeah. You’re here now …’
Aaron slides his mouth along my cheek, leaving a trail of damp like a snail. His hand slithers down to my bum and I wish I was a million miles away, far away from vain, selfish boyfriends who paw you like a piece of meat and make cheap bets that you’ll never make your dreams come true.
No spark. Is that a good reason to break up with someone? Tia and Millie might not agree.
Aaron’s hands slide over my hip bones. ‘Sheesh, Summer,’ he says into my ear. ‘You eat like a rabbit and lately you’re acting like a scared rabbit too. You’re getting thin – too thin. There’s nothing to hold on to!’
I grab his hands and pull them off me, the way I have wanted to for a long, long time.
‘So don’t then,’ I say. ‘Don’t bother.’
I turn and run, across the sand, past the bonfire, up the steps and through the midnight garden. People call after me, but I don’t listen. I keep on running until I am in my room, and then I throw myself face down on the patchwork quilt Mum made when I was tiny and cry until there are no more tears left.
15
I practise in the senior studio for hours on end, but my movements are heavy, clunky, clumsy, and my head feels fogged with lack of sleep. I lay awake last night crying – I don’t even know why. I wish Mum wasn’t so far away. She texted earlier to say she was thinking of me. I started tapping out a reply to let her know about Aaron, then deleted it. You can’t send a text full of gloom and doom to your mum, not when she’s on honeymoon and meant to be enjoying herself.
I bottle up the sadness and practise instead, even though there’s no chance today of escaping into the dance. I can’t get even the simplest moves right, and Miss Elise pulls me up on it in class.
‘Have you had enoug
h sleep, Summer?’ she asks, in front of everyone. ‘No more late nights – your dancing isn’t up to scratch and you look awful today. You can’t afford to party with that audition to work towards! Keep your eye on the prize!’
‘Yes, Miss,’ I whisper, the criticism twisting inside me like a knife.
If only she knew. The prize is all I think about, but the harder I work the further it seems to slide from my grasp.
I catch the afternoon bus home to Kitnor, get off and find I’ve walked straight into an ambush. Tia and Millie hook my arms while Skye and Cherry steer me into the Mad Hatter, ordering two strawberry sundaes to share. They want to know what happened last night, of course. I’d kind of like to know myself.
‘Is it really over?’ Millie asks. ‘Forever? For good? Because I thought you were the cutest couple ever! It’s so sad!’
‘We had nothing to say to each other,’ I sigh. ‘Nothing in common.’
‘You had loads in common,’ Tia corrects me. ‘You’re both popular and clever and good-looking, and both of you have a talent that makes you stand out from the crowd. On paper, you were perfect!’
‘In real life, we weren’t,’ I shrug.
‘He does go on a bit about football,’ Skye grins. ‘And I’ve always thought his eyes are just a little bit too close together …’
I love my sister, I really do.
‘There was no spark,’ I tell them.
‘Well,’ Skye says. ‘There you are then. You have to have spark.’
Millie just about chokes on her milkshake. ‘Spark?’ she splutters. ‘You’re a fine one to talk, Skye Tanberry. There were so many sparks flying between you and Finch last night I thought the two of you would burst into flames any minute!’
Skye blushes and shrugs. ‘I like him,’ she says simply, and I wonder if it really is that simple. You either like someone or you don’t, and at the end of the day I didn’t much like Aaron Jones.
‘Did you kiss him?’ Tia asks my twin. ‘Are you going out?’
‘Not yet,’ Skye laughs. ‘Honestly, I’ve only just met him! And I thought we were talking about Aaron Jones, not Finch!’
‘Aaron always seemed so nice,’ Millie says wistfully. ‘Who cares about spark? Who cares about whether his eyes are too close together? Not that they are, as far as I can see …’
‘He bet Alfie Anderson ten pounds I’d fail my ballet school audition,’ I reveal, and the girls look shocked. Even Millie throws down her straw in disgust.
‘Loser,’ Cherry says.
‘Idiot,’ Skye adds. ‘I hated the way he used to paw at you.’
‘I hated the way he used to leer at that awful Marisa McKenna,’ Tia chips in. ‘You’re better off without him.’
‘Spark,’ Millie sighs. ‘Maybe you do need it after all.’
The waitress brings our sundaes over and a clutch of long spoons to share. It looks fantastic, but I danced so badly today I know I don’t deserve any. I manage to avoid eating more than a single strawberry, and I don’t think anyone notices.
‘Carl likes you, I’m sure of it, Summer,’ Tia muses. ‘There are plenty more fish in the sea.’
I shake my head and sip my Coke Zero. Fishing … it’s just not my thing, and I am tired of feeling out of my depth.
Walking back up the lane towards Tanglewood, Skye and I spot Finch carrying a piece of painted scenery towards the field by the primary school. Instantly, Skye goes all mushy and starry-eyed, trying to hide under her straw hat.
‘Hey, Summer, Skye!’ Finch greets us. ‘We’re turning the school field into an Edwardian fairground for the film. It’s awesome – come and see!’
I try to make an excuse, but Skye tugs at my arm, her eyes pleading, and I shrug and follow. The field has been transformed. Workers are setting up swingboats, a helter-skelter, a roundabout with carved carousel horses.
‘The funfair’s going to be in lots of the shots,’ Finch tells us, dropping off his scenery at the gate. ‘The film is about the gypsy travellers who worked the fairs at the turn of the last century – this is where they’ll shoot most of the crowd scenes this weekend!’
Nobody challenges us as we wander past a hoopla stall, a coconut shy, a Punch and Judy show, a gypsy fortune-telling tent, probably because Finch and Skye are almost part of the crew.
‘It’s going to be awesome, Summer,’ my twin grins. ‘Millie and Tia are going to be extras at the weekend, definitely, and Honey and Cherry and Coco. I think you should too … it’ll help you forget about Aaron.’
‘He’s forgotten,’ I say. ‘And no thanks – I have ballet practice.’
‘Come on,’ Skye says. ‘You can take two days out, surely?’
I stare at Skye as if she’s on a different planet. Can’t she see how much this audition means to me? How hard I’m working? Is she really so preoccupied with Finch? Taking two days out is not an option.
‘I can’t,’ I tell my twin. ‘You know that. Dance comes first.’
‘Not all the time!’ she argues. ‘Everyone needs a break sometimes, Summer. I’ll be helping with the costumes, I’ll find you something cool to wear … you’ll love it!’
I feel torn. Skye must be worried about me because she wouldn’t normally push me this way, but she has it wrong – a weekend playing about on a film set is the last thing I need right now.
‘Give it a go,’ Finch chips in. ‘It’ll look good on your CV – shows you can be versatile. You know, something to tell them about at the audition. Dance, film … it’s all linked, isn’t it? Creative?’
I look at Finch, his eyes bright, kind. I try not to dislike him just because my twin is falling in love with him. He is trying to help, and I have to admit he has a point.
‘I hadn’t thought of it like that …’
‘Please?’ Skye says. ‘For me?’
‘Oh … All right then!’
‘Yesss!’ Skye takes my hands and whirls me round and round, and I can’t help it, I am laughing, letting go, perhaps for the first time in weeks. It’s August and the sun is shining and a TV film is being made right here in the village – I’d be crazy not to enjoy it.
Finch grabs Skye’s straw hat and races away, dodging among the fairground stalls with us following. We stop between the coconut shy and the Hall of Mirrors, catching our breath.
‘Wow,’ Finch says, stepping towards the shiny distorting mirrors. ‘Look at these! Hilarious!’
I look over at his reflection, tall, skinny, with giraffe legs in skinny jeans and a body squashed short with a tiny head. Skye finds a mirror too, one that buckles and turns her body into a swaying, undulating squiggle.
‘Freaky!’ Finch says. ‘I’m like a giant!’
‘Look at me!’ Skye giggles. ‘I’m like a concertina! Weird!’
We are laughing so hard the tears run down our cheeks, and then I step towards one of the mirrors and the laughter freezes in my throat.
I am not tall, I am not skinny, I am not rippled or wobbly or swaying. My legs are not giraffe-like, my head is not tiny, my face isn’t squashed into a frog-eyed whirl or stretched pin-thin. Instead, my reflection fills the whole mirror, like a big, billowing blob. My face is rounder than the moon. My body is square, solid, sickening, my belly is vast, my thighs are thicker than tree trunks and even my ankles look fat.
I know this is a fairground mirror. I know it isn’t true, but it feels true, it feels like the real me, exposed at last, huge, hulking, hideous. I am not the girl most likely to succeed, not even close. I am the girl who is fooling everyone, pretending she’s OK, working harder and harder to keep the mask in place. When it slips, everyone will see the real me. You’re useless, the voice in my head reminds me. A fat, lazy lump.
No wonder I can’t dance, no wonder I’m falling apart inside.
It feels like the end of the world.
16
I am surviving on lettuce leaves and apple slices, and the ache of hunger in my belly has faded to numbness, to nothing. I feel lighter, cleaner, buzzing wit
h energy. I spend my days at the dance school, practising in the senior studio. Hard work always pays off … eventually. You just have to keep the faith.
In the evenings, I watch online clips of Sylvie Rochelle in The Firebird, looking for inspiration, ideas, while my friends and sisters hang out on the beach or by the gypsy caravans in the woods with Finch and the boys from the film crew.
‘Ease up a little,’ Skye tells me. ‘You’re getting obsessed, Summer. It’s not healthy.’
But I can’t ease up, not if I am going to take two days out of my schedule to be an extra. I lie awake at night worrying about it, wide awake, my mind racing. Sometimes I get up and creep down to the kitchen to run through my barre exercises again because if you want to be perfect, you can never relax, never stop.
On Sunday morning I am standing in a marquee wearing a straw hat and a white cotton dress with a frilled hem. My long hair is plaited into tight braids, my feet are stuffed into worn leather boots and my face has been painted and powdered and highlighted as if I had a starring role instead of a tiny bit part in a crowd scene.
I agreed to come, but I am regretting it now. Already I’ve wasted a whole Saturday hanging around doing nothing, and Sunday seems to be going the same way. Skye is busy the whole time, styling and adjusting costumes, but the rest of us have been here for hours, waiting to be called down to the location.
‘It’ll take your mind off this whole Aaron thing,’ Millie says confidently, piling a paper plate with crusty bread and butter and soft French cheese from the buffet table. ‘Cheer you up after your heartbreak.’
‘I am not heartbroken, Millie,’ I say patiently.
‘Of course not,’ Tia agrees. ‘You’re better off without him. Oh, look, there’s Carl and Alfie and Finch!’
She drags me over. The three boys are wearing collarless shirts and waistcoats and fusty old breeches that button at the knee, and I have to admit that even if I had been pining for Aaron Jones, this would still have put a smile on my face.
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