You Don't Know Me

by Sophia Bennett

  After another long tumbleweed moment, Janet takes pity on us and says with a sigh, ‘Well, that was very . . . er . . . Thanks for coming, anyway.’

  They turn the cameras off, at last, and kill the lights. Some of the tension seeps out of the room.

  ‘How’s the new song going?’ I ask Rose as we’re getting up to go. ‘The one for the ad?’

  She looks startled that I’m still talking to her. ‘Oh, it’s fine.’

  ‘Is Jim helping with it?’

  She glances at me, to see if I’m being serious or teasing her about her famous friends. To be honest, I don’t know myself.

  ‘Yes. He is, actually. As much as anyone can.’

  She sighs. She seems even more exhausted close to, and the smile she gives me is one of the saddest I’ve ever seen. Especially from someone in a cashmere jumper.

  Janet announces that our driver is ready.

  ‘Well, that was nice, wasn’t it?’ Jodie spits, as we’re led quickly down the corridor.

  It’s still early evening. Jodie’s mum invites us back to her place for a cup of tea and some much-needed food to recover. Homework will have to wait tonight. None of us can concentrate after that disaster.

  We take our drinks and pizza slices up to Jodie’s room. Her brother Sam pops his head round the door with an excited grin. Next to him is Elliot, in a World of Warcraft T-shirt. He gives me a quick, shy smile. I smile back. I’ve already texted him about the Michelle Lee thing, so he knows that went OK.

  ‘How was your meeting?’ Sam asks. ‘Did you see any other famous people? Are you seriously going to be on TV again?’

  ‘It was an epic fail,’ Jodie sighs. ‘I hope we’re not going to be on TV again. I don’t even know why she wanted to see us.’

  ‘Oh.’ The boys look disappointed and leave us to it.

  ‘We are, though, aren’t we?’ I say dejectedly, once they’ve gone.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Going to be on TV again. Looking like the three Wicked Witches of the West.’

  ‘Oh God,’ Jodie adds. ‘Wait till Ivan Jenks has finished editing us. Did you see how they set us up? With us three on one sofa and Rose all alone on the other?’

  ‘Well we did kind of choose our own places . . .’ Nell interrupts, but Jodie ignores her.

  ‘It’s going to be worse than last time.’

  ‘Oh, no,’ Nell objects. ‘It can’t possibly be worse than last time.’

  ‘She looked so unhappy,’ I say, still puzzling over it. ‘Like she didn’t even want to be there. And if she didn’t want to talk to us . . . why did she ask us to come?’

  That’s the biggest mystery of all. We sit around for ages, going over and over the weirdness of the meeting, but the only thing we can all agree on is that it really can’t go out on the Rose Ireland Special. We’re going to have to do something to get them to edit us out. We know we have no control over the TV company, because of those release forms we signed, letting them do whatever they wanted with the recording. We’ll have to appeal to Rose.

  ‘I’ll call her,’ I offer.

  Like it’s going to be that easy. Like she answers my calls any more.

  When I try, it goes to voicemail. Next day I message her on Interface and, as expected these days, we get no reply. I call her gran, and ask her to pass a message on. She promises she will. Nothing.

  After school, we call the hotel, to leave a message for Rose to get in touch, and we’re told that they have no record of a Rose Ireland staying there. We know that’s a ruse to protect celebrities’ privacy, so we explain that we’re old friends. (Not that you’d think so, if you’d seen the TV footage they just shot, but anyway.) Still nothing. So we call the TV company after all. They keep putting us on hold, or not getting back to us. Besides, we know they won’t help us. By now we’re beyond frustrated. We just can’t let #dropthefatgirl happen to us again.

  Stargazer

  Fed up, I’m surfing the web at home as usual. According to Rose’s Interface page she’s

  Livin’ the high life in the country!

  And there’s a picture of a pile of clothes strewn across a four-poster bed.

  Ew. Whoever Rose is now, she is not that girl. Why even have a fan page if it doesn’t say the truth about you? She’s turning out as fake as all the stars she used to hate, and I can’t bear it. I message Jodie, to share my disgust, but she’s busy revising. So is Nell. I should be too, of course, but I’m too upset to work. Too upset, even, to grab Molly and work on a song. Instead, I find myself messaging other people. Messaging Dan.

  How are you doing? Not feeling too musical tonight.

  He replies instantly.

  Got a problem? Need to talk? It must be bad if the music’s not working.

  Yeah, it’s bad. We chat online for a while, but he soon points out that he’s only ten minutes away by bike. He could pop over, if that would help. And yes, it would. I’m not sure what I dare to hope for, or what might happen, but I know that I really need his company.

  While he bikes over, I explain to Mum about him being a friend. She gives me her Oh yeah? look to let me know that she’ll be popping up to my room every five minutes to ‘check we’re all right’, but she can see that I need someone to talk to. She knows things didn’t go well with Rose. So all she says is, ‘He can’t stay late.’

  But when Dan arrives, he doesn’t even come through the door. He stands in the porch, his face glowing from the ride.

  ‘It’s beautiful out here this evening. Check out the sunset.’

  I look out at the last pink and orange streaks in the sky. The air is cool and fresh. Dan holds out his hand to me.

  ‘We could go for a walk,’ he suggests.

  ‘It’s getting dark,’ I point out.

  ‘I love it when it gets dark round here. The skies are best then.’

  ‘Good idea,’ Mum says, clearly preferring it to the idea of me and Dan in my room, unsupervised for up to four minutes at a time. Under the circumstances, so do I.

  ‘I’ll get my jacket.’

  We walk for miles. Down the track and up the path that leads to the ridge at the top of Crakey Hill. The sky turns from purple to inky blue, and then black, streaked with thin grey clouds that occasionally block out the silvery sliver of the new moon.

  I start to tell Dan a bit about the whole Rose fiasco, but it’s such a lovely evening that I give up. I’d rather enjoy just being out together. Dan quickly catches my mood. He sticks his hands in his pockets and glances round at the hills and valleys. We can see the lights from about three houses and a dim orange glow over Castle Bigelow, but mostly it’s just black. It could be scary, especially with the occasional bat swooping overhead, but actually – when you know practically every tree and bush, and you’re not on the lookout for a mad stalker lurking behind them – it’s peaceful.

  ‘I hated it when I first came here,’ he says. ‘We were in Cheltenham before. I thought that was a small town, but compared with here it was like New York. But Dad’s a stargazer. He wanted us to be somewhere they’re not hidden by the light. I was bored witless when he first showed me, but it gets you. See there? That’s the north star. That’s where you start. Underneath it – that shape like a saucepan – that’s the Plough. And over there, that V shape, that’s Taurus. I just think it’s amazing that we’ve been looking up at the same stars, in the same places, since before there were officially humans.’

  He leans in close so I can see exactly where he’s pointing. I lean in close back, because I can. I feel better already.

  ‘It’s a shame about the moon being so new tonight,’ I say, watching the silvery crescent slip behind another wisp of cloud.

  ‘No, that’s good,’ Dan counters. ‘You want it to be really dark so the stars show up more. Even moonlight can be a distraction. Tonight’s ideal, almost.’

  He sells his guitar to buy phones for girls he hardly knows. He talks about moonlight. He has those beautiful, curving biceps under his T-shirt, from all his
rugby and guitar playing. I remember them from when we practised together.

  ‘Uh huh. Right. Ideal,’ I murmur.

  He takes my hand to guide me along the path past a brambly patch of hedgerow. The starlight casts a faint silvery silhouette around his profile as he looks up to the sky again.

  ‘Out there somewhere is the perfect planet for us.’

  ‘What, us two?’ I ask, dreamily.

  ‘No!’ he laughs. ‘Everyone. When this one dies and we need a new one, I mean. I want to help find it.’

  Oh right. The end of the world: not quite what I was imagining. I try to focus more on what he’s actually saying.

  ‘So you want to look for planets? As a job, or a hobby?’

  ‘Both,’ he grins. ‘As a job, if they’ll let me. There are some great physics jobs working with telescopes. And they put them in places like South Africa and the Arizona desert.’

  ‘So you’d get to be a guitar-playing, travelling astronomer?’ I check, trying to keep my tone playful. Don’t let it sound as though you think this is perfect, perfect, perfect, Sasha Bayley.

  He laughs. ‘I s’pose so. You make it sound more romantic than it would be.’

  He stops and gazes at me again. We do one of those endless stares we seem to do. I am thinking about the word ‘romantic’, and I’m pretty sure he is too. If the boy doesn’t kiss me now there must be something seriously wrong with him.

  But he doesn’t kiss me.

  Then the other alternative occurs to me: perhaps there is something seriously wrong with me.

  The moment’s gone. We’re both embarrassed, trying to pretend it didn’t happen. As another cloud is blown past the moon, I briefly catch sight of the thin, bright ribbon of railway track far below us.

  Dan frowns and looks down the valley, following my gaze. He shudders briefly.

  ‘Are you OK?’ I ask.

  ‘Yes. Sure. It’s just . . . thinking of you sitting on the parapet like that . . . thinking you were going to . . .’ he sighs. ‘Anyway, I get it now. I was way off.’

  ‘You were right behind me!’

  ‘I mean . . . my fears were way off. You’re such a strong person, Sasha.’

  I laugh, surprised. ‘Me?’

  ‘Look what you’ve been through. Look at you now. You’re so . . . together.’

  ‘You should have seen me recently. You’re the strong one,’ I say. Because he’s so positive and optimistic, despite his silences and his unexpected awkwardness. ‘You’re not even too worried about the world ending!’

  He laughs. ‘Oh, for me it’s simple. Astronomy taught me that. Hey – lie down.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Seriously. It’s not so cold. There’s a soft spot here.’

  He chooses a flattish bit of grass and lies on it, patting the ground beside him. He looks at me innocently.

  ‘OK,’ I laugh, slipping down beside him.

  ‘Now look up.’

  I do, at the inky blackness of the night, speckled with tiny spots of light.

  ‘See those stars? This is what I think about. You could fit the Earth more than a million times into the Sun. And the Sun’s a pretty small star, in the scheme of things. Smaller than lots that you can see up there right now. It’s just a tiny part of the Milky Way, which is bigger than we can comprehend, and even that is just an outlier. I mean, we’re on, like, the third rock from the Sun in a totally non-impressive galaxy. With all of that going on, we’re tiny specks of dust, really. We’re only here for, like, a millisecond compared with the thirteen billion years it took to create all of this. So my concerns – anyone’s concerns – they don’t really matter in the general scheme of things. Don’t you think so?’

  I look up at the twinkling stars (they really twinkle – I’d never noticed) and nod. Dan sounds so reassuring. Thirteen billion years of history, and now here we are, two specks of dust, lying side by side, floating through space on our not-so-special planet.

  Except, no. Now that I consider it, that’s not what I think at all. I so want to agree with him, but I can’t.

  ‘I’ve never thought of myself as a speck of dust,’ I admit, staring back up at the sky. ‘I mean, you see the stars and I see the space between them. There’s this vast, empty universe and most of it is just . . . nothing. And yet, in the middle of all the nothing, here we are. Doesn’t it feel like a miracle to you? We may be specks, but we’re so complicated and amazing. It just makes me treasure each person more. I’m sorry, I—’

  Oh wow. I didn’t know I thought all that stuff until it came out of my mouth, but it’s true. I guess I think we’re miracles. I didn’t want to contradict him, but he cuts me off with a grin.

  ‘You’re cool,’ he says, sitting up now, and putting his arms around his knees. ‘I love the way you think.’ He turns to face me again and stares at me for a long time. I sit up too, so our faces are close in the cool night air, and I stare right back. Our breath forms little steamy clouds between us. His head dips a little towards mine. And then it stops. Again.

  ‘You’re shivering,’ he says, concerned. ‘It’s got a lot colder. Shall we head back?’

  He gets up and holds out his hand to guide me down the path, and it feels as though the crisp night air is sparkling with starlight. Was I cold? Was I really shivering? I’m not sure. As we tramp down the muddy path home, the warmth of his hand on mine gives me an inner glow. Still, I’m more confused than anything. Why didn’t he kiss me? What’s wrong? Is it to do with Cat? It doesn’t seem to be. She just annoys him. So what’s the problem? I really don’t want the George Drury fiasco to be my main experience of lip contact until I hit my twenties. Why did Dan take me up here at all, if not to kiss me under the stars? I mean, I love astronomy and everything but . . . I just don’t get it.

  Even so, I still have the tingle from being close to him. He keeps hold of my hand along the track, until we get back to the cottage door.

  ‘See you next Saturday?’ he asks. ‘For another session?’

  His eyes look into mine searchingly and he pulls my jacket more tightly round me.

  ‘Oh – music!’ I say. ‘A music session. Yes. Right. Of course.’

  Thank God I worked that out quickly.

  ‘Great. And don’t worry about the internet stuff,’ he says. ‘It will pass.’

  I grin at him. ‘Yup. Got it. Speck of dust.’

  He senses I’m teasing, and gives me an ironic salute. I watch him get on his bike and head for home, under his canopy of stars.

  Just Do It

  When I get in, I sit on my bed with the guitar on my lap, and a notebook beside me. Three scraps of songs come pouring out in quick succession. One about the expanding universe, one about the new moon over the valley, and one called ‘Out of Reach’, which has a minor chord change in the middle that I’m quite proud of. When I’ve written as much of them as I can, I set my phone to ‘record’ and put the finishing touches to ‘Get To Know Me’. It’s nearly ready now.

  By the time I turn my computer on, there’s a message waiting for me from Jodie. Apparently her brother Sam has an idea about how we can get to Rose.

  Sam, it turns out, has a friend who is a Directioner. In fact, he has several. They have what they call the ‘patented, approved method’ for reaching your ‘targeted celebrity’ in the hotel of your choice – in their case, One Direction members, wherever they happen to be. All it requires is transport, clothing, ingenuity, a little bit of acting ability, the absence of security guards, and the ability to get up very early in the morning. Apart from the last part, it sounds relatively easy to do.

  Over Interface, we talk through the details, deep into the night. Nell joins in. We don’t know about the security guards, but we didn’t see any. They seem unlikely. Rose is popular, but she doesn’t have a hundred screaming fans outside her window, like One Direction. Clothes will be easy and acting ability should be fine. Getting up early will be painful, but worth it. Sam has agreed to provide transport, in return for a blo
w-by-blow account of whatever happens, which Jodie has made him swear not to reveal to a living soul afterwards.

  We set the date for Saturday, when we’ll tell each of our parents that we’re visiting each other that day to do a homework project, and I’ll tell Mrs Venning I may have to miss Living Vintage again. I’ll have to miss Call of Duty too, but there will be other Saturdays. I realise that in the course of all the planning, I haven’t actually updated the girls on Dan, but that’s no bad thing. For now, the focus is on Operation Fix the Rose Ireland Special, and I don’t mind dreaming about him privately for a while.

  On Saturday morning, my alarm goes off at six-thirty. Fifteen minutes later, I’m creeping down the stairs, dressed and ready, careful not to wake Mum. Jodie and Sam are waiting outside in Sam’s old Subaru, with the engine running quietly. Next, we pick up Nell. Her house is on a modern estate, built on the edge of Castle Bigelow with views across the fields to the vast local Tesco. Like us, she’s wearing a black shirt and skirt under her jacket. She hops in enthusiastically, full of nervous excitement about the day. Jodie demands music and Sam finds a hip-hop station. We all rap along to Dizzee Rascal and Sebastian Rules.

  The countryside is at its best in the early morning light. The fields look almost blue under the uncertain sky. A pink glow is shifting to pale gold on the horizon. It’s funny, I think, how so many people who live here want to grow up and be celebrities and move away from here, whereas the ones who make it, like Jim Fisher, spend a fortune on coming back.

  Soon the road is winding its way towards the gates of Lockwood House.

  Sam pulls up a short distance from the front door. We get out and Jodie eyes the battered Subaru nervously. It looks very out-of-place in these grand surroundings.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ Sam says. ‘I’ll shove it round the back somewhere quiet.’ He taps his pocket. ‘Call me when you’re ready.’

  We give him one last nervous wave and he drives away across the gravel.