Good Girls Don't

by Claire Hennessy

  At about two o’clock I get a text message telling me there’s a message left on my voice mail. The message is from last night. You have to love their punctuality; it closely resembles mine.

  Drunken, angry voice. “Thanks a lot, Emily.”

  That’s it. The whole message. I’m surprised. Drunken messages are usually a lot more rambling and drawn-out. It sounds like he accidentally hung up before he meant to, but I can’t tell what he was about to say next.

  So Lucy ended up telling Andrew after all. Well. I think I can honestly say that this is not good.

  I turn off my phone and sit on my bed biting my nails. I don’t realise, until I’m called downstairs for dinner, that I’ve been sitting there, barely moving, just thinking and biting, for nearly two hours.

  Chapter Sixty-Nine

  It started with Hugh.

  It’s hard to trace things back to their origins. I mean, you can look at your life and say, well, it started when I was born. But it didn’t, really, it started when you were conceived. Or maybe it really started when your parents met for the first time, because if that hadn’t happened, you wouldn’t be here.

  But I think – I think it started with Hugh. I don’t mean being friends with him, or having a crush on him when I was younger – do I? – but going out with him.

  Because at the beginning, I was so crazy about him. I really did care about him, and everyone knew it. I thought, I really thought that we were going to live happily ever after.

  And then because I was experienced and he wasn’t, because I had my sordid past, the things I’d done because I wanted to impress Lucy’s friends, and he didn’t. He was waiting for the person he loved, he was waiting for the right time, and I just didn’t get it. And I didn’t see us drifting apart, and I didn’t realise that things were eventually going to crumble.

  I shouldn’t have let him manipulate me the way he did, though.

  You want to know why I was crying? Okay, then, I’ll tell you. Because I was angry, that’s why, because I felt used and sick and dirty and disgusting and a common tramp, and most of all a victim.

  A helpless scared little girl who lets men do whatever they want to her. And God, I hate myself for it, I hate feeling like that, I hate the fact that I let it happen, that I didn’t say, “No, Hugh, you asshole, I’m not going to buy into your ‘you’re such a tease’ bullshit, and that’s what it is, bullshit, so go home, okay?” That’s what I’d advise someone else to say, that’s what the characters in my movies would say, and instead I fell for it and I gave him exactly what he wanted.

  And then I didn’t want to be a victim anymore.

  And then there was the rebound girl, and then there was the misguided-attempt-at-comfort guy, and then there was the best friend, and then there was the ex-obsession . . . and now there’s me.

  Just me, left with one hell of a mess and a considerable number of friendships in tatters.

  Not to mention one hell of a headache from figuring all this out.

  Chapter Seventy

  I hate Mondays.

  I really, really, really hate Mondays.

  We have three and a half weeks of classes, our end-of-year Mass and our summer tests left until the holidays.

  I work out the hours left in school. Then the minutes.

  How the hell is anyone supposed to listen in Maths when their life is in ruins? A little consideration would be nice, you know. The teachers go easy on the students if they know there’s someone sick at home, or if their parents have split up or something. But everything else you can handle, apparently, because it’s just stupid teenage stuff.

  I hate all grown-ups.

  I quite possibly also hate all men.

  And most of the women on the planet, too. Including myself.

  When I check my phone at break-time I have a text message from Declan. He’s bitter and hates me. Or something. It’s the same old story, and I start to feel angry. I want to scream and shout at him, but seeing as he isn’t here, and I have no intention of walking out of school again for his benefit, or yelling down the phone, I text him back. I have quite a lot to say, so it spills out into several messages. That’s probably the last of my credit for this week gone, I think.

  ***

  I am so sick of your shit, Declan. You’re self-absorbed, you get attention any way you can without thinking about the effect it has on people who care about you, and you don’t appreciate anything in your life. If you’re really depressed then go see someone who can really help you, don’t use the people who are trying to be your friends as therapists. Personally I think you’re just a spoiled self-pitying brat. I’m sorry you think I was playing with your mind, because I wasn’t. You know me, you know what I’m like, and it was downright arrogant of you to think that I was going to make an exception for you. I really am sorry if I hurt you, but what you’ve put me through all the time I’ve known you, under the guise of ‘friendship’ is just as bad, if not worse. It’s been nice knowing you.

  P.S. Life is an amazing thing – do yourself a favour and appreciate it instead of moping.

  ***

  And, you know, I think I might even take some of my own advice myself.

  Chapter Seventy-One

  Roisín and I are walking to the shop at lunch-time when we pass by Lucy with a couple of girls from her class.

  Lucy and I avoid each other’s eyes, and continue walking.

  Roisín smiles at her, looks at me in confusion, and as soon as we’re out of earshot asks, “Emily, what’s going on?”

  I shrug. “It’s nothing.”

  “The same nothing that’s had you depressed all day?” she asks.

  “Yeah,” I say.

  “Okay,” she says, and she takes a deep breath, like she’s about to make a big speech, “I know I’m not as ‘cool’ as most of your friends, and I haven’t done all the things you guys have done, but it doesn’t mean that you can’t talk to me. I mean, you’re probably the closest friend I have, and I – I just wish you’d tell me things.”

  “You’d be shocked and appalled,” I say, trying to make a joke out of it. Maybe not a joke. She does get shocked.

  “I wouldn’t,” she says.

  “Yes! You would! You do. You think I’m a slut.”

  “I don’t think you’re a slut, Em,” she says.

  “Oh, really?” I say, not believing her for a minute. “I slept with Declan, did you know that? And guess why I’m not talking to Lucy? Same reason! Now what do you think of me?”

  She takes a moment to answer. “I’m worried about you.”

  “You’re worried? Why?” I’m confused. This isn’t what I was expecting.

  “Because I don’t think you’d have got involved with either of them unless there was something wrong. I mean, Declan? You hate him. And Lucy’s going out with Andrew, they’re engaged, for God’s sake . . . and what about Barry?”

  “I broke up with him,” I say.

  Her eyes widen in surprise. “But –”

  “If you mention that ‘spark’ thing again, I will hit you,” I say firmly.

  She wisely decides not to mention it. “Is there something wrong?”

  “No. Not really. Just my bad decision-making skills. And then – I don’t know, there was the whole thing with Hugh, and that’s sort of had me messed up for the last while and doing stupid things.” She thinks I mean the break-up. I’m not going to correct her. It’s that too, it’s the entire situation.

  Roisín is quiet for a while. I look at her impatiently. “Come on, say something,” I say.

  “I can’t believe you slept with Declan,” she says eventually, wrinkling her nose in revulsion.

  I burst out laughing, and then hug her tightly.

  Chapter Seventy-Two

  Andrew and Lucy have broken up and called off their engagement. I learn of this on Tuesday evening, when I’m over at Shane’s house. His band are having a practice, and they wanted a few honest critics there. Fiona, Abi and I are sitting around li
stening to them, but they only play one song before we end up all gossiping.

  “What did you think?” I murmur to Abi while Fiona is praising Hugh excessively.

  “They have potential,” she says diplomatically, smiling.

  I grin. I must admit I entertained vague hopes of them being brilliant, so that they could do the soundtrack for my first movie or something, but it’s not looking like such a possibility anymore.

  “Hey, Emily, did you hear about Lucy and Andrew?” Shane asks me.

  I shake my head. “I haven’t been talking to them in the last few days.”

  “They broke up,” he says.

  It takes me a moment to absorb this. When I do, my internal response is short and simple: Oh, crap.

  Fiona frowns. “Weren’t they, like, engaged?”

  Hugh seems surprised by this too. “Yeah, they were. What happened?”

  “Lucy cheated on him,” Shane says, clearly enjoying being the centre of attention now.

  “With you?” Hugh and Caroline ask at the same time. Sarah doesn’t look too thrilled at the fact that they suspect her boyfriend right away.

  “No, not with me,” he says, exasperated. “But that’s what Andrew thought. He picked a fight with me.”

  “Hold on, when did this happen?” Fiona asks. We’re all listening to him attentively now, even though I’m not sure I really like discussing this topic. Shane must know it’s me. I’m going to kill him for bringing this up.

  “Saturday night,” Sarah fills in. “We were all at Philip’s house, and Lucy and Andrew were upstairs in one of the bedrooms –”

  “– and naturally, we all thought they were just enjoying themselves,” Shane grins. “But then they came downstairs, and Lucy was crying, and Andrew just walks over to me and says, ‘I want to talk to you’ and looking like he’s ready for a fight, and I say I don’t know what he’s talking about, and he moves like he’s going to hit me, but I block it, and then I –”

  Shane goes on about his heroic role in the fight for a while before getting back on topic. Why is it that guys always boast about these things? Don’t they realise that any sensible person just tunes out?

  “– but then Lucy says that it wasn’t me, and she yells at him for picking on me, and then he starts shouting at her for the time she met me, and then she says that they’re leaving, and that she’ll tell him who it was on the way home.”

  I let out a quiet sigh of relief. He doesn’t know.

  “And then he said that couldn’t ever get married to someone who treats him like that,” Sarah continues, “and she said she couldn’t ever get married to someone as irrational as he was, blah blah blah, and we could still hear them screaming at each other as they were walking down the road.”

  “I wonder who it was,” Hugh says.

  “Might have been someone from school,” Sarah muses.

  The blonde girl, Caroline, looks up in surprise. “Is Lucy bi?”

  “No, Lucy’s an opportunist,” Shane grins.

  Hugh and Abi look at me to see how I’ll react to this. I shrug. “It’s true, she is.”

  “Have you any idea who it might’ve been, Em?” Hugh asks.

  “No, would you stop pestering me? It’s none of your business,” I snap.

  Silence.

  Nothing says ‘I probably do know and I just don’t want to talk about it, quite possibly because it was me and I’m terribly sensitive about this and to make matters worse I have issues with you, Hugh, so I’m going to lash out at you over something trivial’ like what I’ve just said, I think. And they all know it.

  I try a weak smile. “Sorry. Just – it’s Lucy’s private life, you know?”

  Hugh nods. “Yeah. Sorry, I didn’t mean to –”

  “It’s okay,” I say quickly.

  Oh, the awkwardness. So much for being over the break-up with Hugh.

  Sarah intervenes. “So, great weather we’ve been having,” she grins.

  We all start laughing.

  “Hey, you guys should play the song Hugh wrote,” Fiona suggests.

  I hope it doesn’t involve him trying to sing. Of course, Fiona seems to think he’s wonderful at everything. She’s such a devoted girlfriend. Or a groupie. Whichever way you want to look at it.

  “Maybe later,” Shane says vaguely. I can’t help but smirk.

  Everyone starts leaving around ten. I’m getting my coat when Shane says, “Hey, can you hold on a sec?”

  “Sure,” I say, waving goodbye to the others. “What is it?”

  “Everything okay with you and Hugh?” he asks.

  I shrug. “Yeah, it’s okay, I just overreacted earlier.”

  “He said the two of you haven’t talked properly ever since you broke up.”

  “Nope, we haven’t,” I say.

  “You should,” he says.

  “Don’t even try lecturing me, Shane,” I grin.

  He laughs. “Okay, I won’t. Hey – it was you, wasn’t it?”

  “With Lucy?” Well, since everyone already suspects it, I nod. “Yeah.”

  “I probably would have done the same thing,” he says.

  I roll my eyes. “Yeah, you would have, I’m sure.”

  He shrugs. “She’s hot.”

  “Does your girlfriend know that you think Lucy’s hot?” I say pointedly.

  “Don’t even try lecturing me, Emily,” Shane smirks.

  I hug him. “I’ll see ya.”

  “Yeah, see ya,” he smiles.

  Chapter Seventy-Three

  I see Lucy at lunch-time on Wednesday and call out, “Hey” and wave her over.

  “I heard you and Andrew broke up,” I say. “I’m sorry.”

  She bites her lip. “Well, it was never going to last forever anyway, was it? It was stupid of us to think that it would.”

  “If you need to talk –” I say.

  “Yeah, thanks,” she smiles, but I have a feeling she just wants to get away from me. In a way I’m relieved when she goes back to her friends. I’ve done my duty. I think spending time with her right now would probably make the situation worse, anyway.

  Now that the initial stage of self-loathing has passed, I find myself feeling guilty about not feeling as guilty as I think I should about my contribution to their break-up. It’s silly, I suppose. It’s okay to think that it’s mostly her fault, isn’t it? I mean, she’s the one in the relationship, and I didn’t force her to do anything. Her decision, not mine.

  Some part of me is even happy that they’re not engaged anymore, because I don’t think they were ready for it. And I have a feeling that their break-up isn’t going to be permanent, because they care too much about one another to let it be.

  I go over to Barry’s house in the evening with Bring It On under my arm. “Peace offering,” I say when he opens the door. “Cheerleading fun?”

  He sighs. “Emily, I really don’t want to talk to you right now.”

  “Do you hate me?” I ask quietly.

  “No,” he says after a moment, “but I need some time.”

  “Okay,” I nod, and I try to hug him. He lets me, and I hold onto him for a while before letting go.

  Chapter Seventy-Four

  Lose yourself in the beat. Lose yourself in the music and you can forget that your boyfriend’s checking out another girl, I thought to myself.

  What did I care, anyway, if he liked Fiona? I didn’t want him to be with me if he didn’t want it, out of some sense of duty. I could have a good time even without him. There were a couple of girls from school there and there was a group of us dancing together, just enjoying the music. I pulled Hugh closer and whispered in his ear, “Look, just do whatever you want, okay?”

  He looked confused. “What are you talking about?”

  “You’ve been staring at Fiona all night. If you like her, just go for it. I don’t care anymore.”

  He stared at me for a moment. “Are you mad at me or something?”

  “No,” I said patiently, and then contin
ued to dance, watching Abi and her boyfriend out of the corner of my eye.

  ***

  Somehow, even though I’m not really talking to Barry, I feel better just knowing that he doesn’t hate me. Everything’s going to be okay, it’s not the end of the world, my friendship with him isn’t ruined forever.

  It makes me feel like I can face – well, maybe not anything, but some things.

  And so I’m waiting at Hugh’s door. His dad answers and lets me in, calling Hugh from upstairs.

  I feel weird being in this house, like I don’t really belong now that Hugh and I aren’t going out, even though it was almost like a second home to me when I was younger.

  “Heya,” he says, looking startled to see me.

  “Hey,” I say.

  He hovers for a moment, not sure whether to sit beside me on the couch or take the armchair. In the end he opts for the armchair. “So . . .” he prompts.

  I give him a small smile. “I just wanted to apologise for last night,” I start. “I was –”

  “Nah, I shouldn’t have asked, don’t worry about it,” he says.

  We sit there awkwardly for a little while before I ask, “So, how are things with Fiona?”

  “Great, great,” he says. He senses this is his cue. Good boy. “I’m sorry, Em. About Fiona, I mean. I know you said it was okay, but I still feel shitty for going off with her.”

  “It’s okay,” I say, because that’s what I’m supposed to say. It’s amazing how finally hearing those words can make a difference, though.

  “And we haven’t really talked, and – I miss you,” he says.

  “I miss you too,” I smile, and I get up and hug him.

  “I’m sorry for the other thing, too,” he says, and I inhale sharply. I didn’t know he even realised that that had been an issue.

  “It’s okay,” I say again, because that’s as much of an apology as I’m going to get out of him, but it’s enough. Enough for me to let go. Forgive but not forget.