Pretending: The brilliant new adult novel from Holly Bourne. Why be yourself when you can be perfect?

by Holly Bourne

  The table nod their heads heavily, giving him further confidence to continue as my stomach curdles with newly-arrived bile. ‘Having your arse pinched is not the same as being, like, violently raped.’ He throws his hands up. ‘Where’s the controversy?’

  My feet are on the ground because I’m standing up. I didn’t mean to stand up, but it appears to be happening. My mouth is open, with words tumbling out of it.

  ‘Pray tell me,’ I’m saying, loudly, sourly, ‘what a non-violent rape is please, Neil? I’d love to hear.’

  The energy switches within a millisecond. The table falls quiet. Mouths drop open. A tightness encompasses the group. Portcullises shut down. Neil and I size each other up and I put on a smile, like I’m asking the question innocently. A child who doesn’t know the answer: ‘What does Santa Claus do in the summertime? Why can’t I go to bed as late as I want? Why do I have to eat my main course before I’m allowed my pudding? What’s a non-violent rape? Can I have a cookie?’

  Joshua stiffens next to me. He and Neil share the smallest of looks. My malfunction is loud and aggressive and inappropriate and ruining everything. I should be panicking now. Trying to stuff myself back into my box, folding in my limbs like a rag doll at the end of her children’s TV show. Quietening myself, making it easy, smiling and nodding because it will make for an easier hour now, even though I won’t be able to sleep for the rage I’ll feel later. Gretel would laugh it off. Gretel would know maybe it’s not the time or place. And Gretel could handle this conversation anyway, without it setting off a thousand tiny landmines in her perfect trauma-free body. But April is too full from her class to back down. I can’t let this slide, not when I feel totally able to take him on.

  Neil turns so he’s fully facing me while the rest watch our stand-off. ‘I didn’t mean it like that.’ He may as well be holding his hands up and stepping away from his weapon. ‘I’m just saying, there is a spectrum to these things. You can’t lump in something like pinching an arse with something more damaging. That’s all he was trying to say, and I don’t think that’s an unfair argument.’ He sits back, puffing his chest, spraying his alpha scent over me like a skunk that’s been stamped on.

  ‘And you get to decide what’s damaging and what isn’t?’ I ask. ‘You don’t see a problem with a man who probably hasn’t ever been violated getting to decide what counts as a violation? You don’t see the problem with even measuring a violation in the first place?’ I shake my head, like he’s being stupid, because he is. ‘It’s the violation that’s the violence, don’t you see? It’s knowing your boundaries mean bugger-all that’s the trauma – that anyone can touch you, that how you feel about it doesn’t count. That’s the trauma. That’s the violence. Anything else that happens on top of that is additional.’ I’m darting my finger at him. The table looks utterly horrified. Neil’s doing his best not to snarl. ‘It’s not a spectrum,’ I continue. ‘It’s a line that shouldn’t be crossed. Ever. In any way. It’s all violence and it’s all traumatic. And, for someone who clearly has no experience of it, why do you feel like you’re the one who gets to decide?’

  Neil’s wife has got the alert. Husband under attack! Husband under attack! Must protect, must do my duty. Julia jumps in while I’m pausing for angry breath. She must defend her husband. ‘I don’t think that’s what he was saying …’

  ‘What are you saying then?’ I ask Neil, but now Joshua’s bumbling in.

  ‘Let’s change the subject,’ he says brightly, lifting his beer to his mouth. ‘No politics on a Friday night, eh?’

  I twist to him and shake my head, stupefied. ‘This isn’t politics, Joshua, it’s women’s fucking lives.’

  There’s a collective flinch at the table. A Mexican wave of friction to my inappropriate swearing.

  ‘Hey, hey, hey,’ Lucy’s saying, trying to keep the peace.

  ‘If we could all take a minute maybe, to calm down,’ Luke suggests.

  Nobody’s having fun all of a sudden and it’s all April’s fault. I’m breaking the rules. I don’t even care. I’m so bored of this sort of bullshit and I’ve finally got the confidence to say as much.

  Joshua is po-faced. His voice soft. ‘Gretel, I didn’t mean it like that. I just—’

  ‘I’m really sorry, but I have to go.’ I don’t care that I’ve made it awkward, and I don’t care that they’re all going to bitch about me, and right now I don’t even care that I’ve messed up my weird social experiment with Joshua. This is the time to end it, like this. With April’s energy soaring through my veins, finally having her say, revealing that even Gretel has some fucking limits. All I care about is leaving this table. Leaving this debate about something that is too painful to be debated.

  ‘Gretel!’

  ‘Sorry, it’s just, I’ve got this thing, early tomorrow.’

  I’m still making a polite escape considering everything. I’m letting the side down by not just storming out. My urge to be likeable, even when storming out of a curry house, still wins. ‘It was lovely to meet you all,’ I pretend.

  We even all kiss each other on the cheek before leaving. They tell me it was nice to meet me too. Joshua’s eyes are wide with drunken confusion. I kiss him on the cheek the same way I’d kiss my grandma. ‘Bye babes,’ I say, then I walk out of his life.

  I practically run up the stairs. If I don’t get out of this stuffy air, I will suffocate. I push past waiters and around tables of people eating. The concierge wishes me a good evening but I hardly hear him. I’m through the doors and outside, and yes yes yes, it’s raining! It’s finally raining! Sheets of it plummet from the sky, drenching me within seconds. I stop and stand in it for a moment, not quite believing it. I’m not the only one in wonder. Soon there are several of us standing there on the grey slippery pavement of Granary Square, staring upwards, our arms outstretched, like we’re in rapture. I throw my head back, open my mouth, and let the polluted raindrops fall onto my tongue. I will never see that table of humans again and they all hate me, but I could not care less. Gretel is gone, it’s over. It wasn’t quite the grand finale I wanted it to be, but I’ve still ended it. In fact, it’s even better this way. Because I ended it while standing up for myself. In this moment I’m everything I want to be. Strong, alive, not taking any more shit. In this moment I’m invincible. I never want it to stop raining.

  I duck into the Tube, shaking myself dry like a dog. My dress clings to my body, my feet slip in my sandals, my lungs feel clean from all the extra oxygen in the air. I don’t let myself think about it as the train rumbles through the darkness, its damp passengers dripping onto the filthy floors. I’m not ready to unpack the emotions, the fall-out. I just want to feel good that it’s finally raining, that I made some new friends earlier, that I stood up for something I believed in even though it was the harder thing to do.

  It’s still pissing it down when I get out at South Kensington. I have no umbrella. I’ve forgotten what it feels like to even consider taking one out. So I walk home with the fat rain splashing my eyelashes, taking it slowly as people dart past me, Evening Standards held uselessly above their heads. I savour each step. I know things will get complicated once I’m inside and fully alone. So slowly I go, skin soaked and puckering, jaw chattering from the damp, unable to hear the noise of the city over the din of so much water falling from above and the low rumbling of thunder.

  The flat is empty, once again. Megan merely a passing ghost these days. I stand dripping onto the wooden floorboards, laughing at how drenched I am. I peel my clothes off and carry the dripping bundle to the bathroom sink. I get my towel and rub myself vigorously, squeezing my hair until it doesn’t drip any more. Then I wrap myself up like a burrito and walk back out into the sitting room.

  I thought I would cry when I got in, but instead I just feel the vague sting of self-righteousness, burning gently like the first day of cystitis. I’m not embarrassed or ashamed that I stood up to that man, that I made the conversation difficult for him, although I do feel a tin
y pang for Josh, and his embarrassment at my behaviour. I expect he’ll call tomorrow, probably, after he’s cooled down. He’ll ask to meet for coffee and then make an excuse about why he doesn’t think we should see one another any more. His friends are probably going through his escape plan right now, reassuring him he’s making the right decision. Maybe he isn’t ready to date again after that last one, the girl he lived with. I pull up my phone to see the group chat’s been busy.

  Better Out Than In

  Hazel: How am I drunk after two glasses of wine? Why does this always happen to me? Especially when I see you lot?

  Steph: Because we’re amazing.

  Hazel: I mean, apart from that …

  I wish I’d stayed with them. I should’ve. Why did I even go and meet Josh’s friends? Considering I have no interest in him whatsoever, why did I put that above my healing and recovery?

  My phone rings in my hand, and my eyebrows furrow in utter shock when I see it’s Josh’s number. It takes three tries to accept the call as my fingers are still wet from the shower.

  ‘Hi Gretel.’ I can hardly hear him over the roar of the storm. ‘Whereabouts in South Ken do you live? I’m at the Tube station.’

  ‘You’re where?’

  ‘Are you OK?’

  ‘You’re at the Tube station?’

  ‘Yes, but I don’t know where to go next. Is it OK to come round?’

  ‘It’s pissing it down! Aren’t you soaked?’

  ‘Yes. Look, I’m sorry about what happened. Can you just give me your address and we can chat about it?’

  I’m too shocked to do anything other than give it to him.

  Unsure how to proceed next, I perch on the sofa, staring at the wall until the urgent trill of my buzzer makes me jump. I open the door, still wrapped in my towel.

  Joshua looks like he’s just clambered out of a swimming pool. His mouth is set in a thin line. ‘Hi,’ he says nervously, running a hand through his hair and dislodging a hidden tidal wave of water. ‘Can I come in?’

  I step to one side and close the door after him. ‘You’re drenched, I’ll get you a towel.’

  ‘Thank you. That would be great.’

  He’s balancing on one leg to take off his shoe, dripping more rain onto the floorboards, when I come back with a dry towel.

  He takes it wordlessly and rubs his face into it. ‘Do you mind if I take my clothes off? Not like that … it’s just, I really am soaked.’

  ‘No, that’s fine. The bathroom is through there.’

  I sit on the arm of the sofa again and it occurs to me that I should probably get dressed while he’s in there, but I don’t seem able to move. The noise of the storm pushes out most of my thoughts. The floor creaks and I look up. Joshua is back, also wrapped in a towel, like we’re on a couples spa holiday.

  ‘I’ve never been to your flat before.’ He’s looking around, digesting it. I’ve not had any time to Gretel it up in any way. It’s just my home. April’s. With the giant framed picture of Dawson crying that I got Megan for her thirtieth hanging over the sofa. The unwashed plates from this morning’s breakfast festering in the sink. The general mess caused by being signed off work for a week for stress.

  ‘Here it is.’

  ‘Your flatmate not in?’

  ‘No.’

  Silence approaches and stays put. I’m not particularly in the mood to be the one to break it. I’m still angry. Joshua shuffles over in his towel and lays a hand on my shoulder. I look up.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he says, like he might mean it, adding to my surprise. ‘I’m not sure what happened back there.’

  ‘Your friend was implying there’s a rape spectrum …’

  ‘Well that’s not exactly what he was …’ he sees my face. ‘He’s a really nice guy. There’s no way he meant it the way you took it.’

  ‘If you came over to defend him then you may as well leave. I know he’s your friend, but this is my job, Joshua,’ I say. ‘I deal with girls who have been victims of that all day every day. If you had any idea, any, of the damage it causes, the pain, the confusion, the ripples of shit …’

  What I don’t say is, ‘and I was raped. Me. Me! And it is something I can never take away. It’s something that will never not hurt whenever I think about it. It’s something I didn’t deserve or ask for and ouch it hurts, so much. Do you have any idea what it’s like to have someone fucking DEBATE your entitlement to pain? I WAS RAPED, OK?’ I don’t know why I don’t say it, but I don’t.

  ‘Things are so much worse than people think,’ I continue, staring right at him. ‘When you do the job I do, you see how widespread it is and it’s hard, and therefore it makes it impossible to listen when someone tries to diminish it in any way.’

  ‘He wasn’t trying to diminish it, he was just saying some things are worse than other things—’

  ‘You can’t quantify damage!’ I throw my hands up, almost losing my towel. ‘Do you have any idea of the privilege you must have to be able to debate sexual violence from a place of emotional detachment?’

  Joshua goes quiet because I’ve said the word ‘privilege’. They always go quiet when you bring that one out of its box. Not in a respectful way, but in a quiet, fists-slowly-curled, face-getting-red, feeling-like-it’s-not-fair way. I let him bathe in feeling silenced. I think, that’s how we feel every day Mister.

  ‘I’ve never seen you like this,’ he says eventually, gaze determinedly on his hands.

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘This. All … angry.’

  ‘And let me guess? You don’t like it?’

  ‘I’m not saying that …’

  I’m not Gretel right now, that’s for sure. I’m too fired up to be her. I think of the years of my life where I’ve doubted what happened to me and doubted the pain it has caused. That night, with the white wall, if I was asked to mark it on this ‘rape spectrum’, well, it would’ve been a two out of ten, I reckon. An SPF 15 kind of rape. A 12A kind of rape. A Nando’s lemon and fucking herb sauce rape. I wouldn’t be able to win rape top trumps with it, that’s for bloody sure. I wasn’t held down. I didn’t try to run and get caught and dragged backwards on my stomach while I dug my fingernails into the ground. There wasn’t more than one of them. I wasn’t too drugged to move. I wasn’t in a dark alleyway, crying for home, wishing I’d not taken that shortcut. I didn’t even bleed afterwards. I didn’t even cry. In fact, I lay next to him and stroked his hair after he fell asleep. I didn’t even think it was rape until a year or so later, after he left me for that other girl, when my body clamped shut and I couldn’t get tampons in, and the specialist at the hospital asked in the kindest voice if I’d ever experienced any sexual violence. Then the memories of that time with the white wall, and the other time, came screaming out of me, hitting me full-force, delighted and dancing in the wind that they had finally been allowed out of their container. Months of dabbing lidocaine on my vagina and sitting with my legs apart with a trainer shoved up it, mourning the loss of everything I was before. Thousands of tears. Hundreds of mini-breakdowns. Sex ruined, potentially forever. The fear, every single time, that my body wouldn’t let me have this part of my life again. All of it so awful, and yet the worst bit being the doubt that you deserve this trauma. Have I over-exaggerated what happened? Was it really that bad? Isn’t it much worse for other women? Why am I so fucked up about something so minor? Am I just weak? Am I one of ‘those’ women who over-dramatise for attention? The doubt is sometimes worse than what actually happened. I’ve sometimes wished for a fucking rape certificate. I wish I could’ve invited some independent rape adjudicator to join me on a jolly jaunt back in time to watch what happened and verify that it was what my trauma is telling me it is. So much pain and doubt and fear and confusion and shame … and then men, around a table, happy and glowing from alcohol, never worrying that this could happen to them, saying your worst thoughts out loud, debating the validity of your pain, then wondering why you cry or get angry. How unreasonable you are.
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  ‘What are you saying?’ I put both hands on my hips. He looks up at me, mouth wide, ready for all kinds of comebacks and defences and arguments, but his mouth closes again. It’s like he’s seeing me for the very first time.

  ‘I don’t know,’ he says. ‘I’m really sorry.’

  ‘Sorry why?’

  ‘Because you’re right. What Neil said wasn’t OK. I’m just trying to defend him because … OK, I’ll admit it, I’m embarrassed all right?’ Joshua runs his hands through his wet hair. ‘I mean, it’s the first time you’ve met my friends and Neil bloody starts talking about that? He knows about your job. I’ve told him. He’s always arguing about that kind of thing. He gets off on playing Devil’s Advocate. I worried he’d bring it up and then he did …’ He rests his face in cupped hands, shakes his head with them still there. ‘I’m really sorry, Gretel, it wasn’t cool.’

  There’s a crack of thunder. The rain drums even harder on the pavement outside. I don’t know what to do with this. This honesty, pure and white, spilling from his mouth. This genuine apology. It undoes everything I think I know.

  ‘Why would he deliberately bring it up?’ I sit next to Joshua on the sofa and the sinking cushion makes our knees fold in together.

  ‘Like I said, he’s antagonistic like that, always has been. You know what it’s like, with uni friends. You’re in these weird pre-set social dynamics that are hard to change. I’m really sorry he upset you.’ He takes my hand, laces my fingers. For the first time since I started this, my body craves him back, enjoys his touch.

  ‘I didn’t mean to make it awkward, I just couldn’t stay.’ I’m so proud of myself for not apologising back to Joshua. For not automatically replying to an ‘I’m sorry’ with an ‘I’m sorry too’. Though it takes considerable effort to override the urge.

  ‘I get that.’ He groans. ‘God, that could’ve gone better, couldn’t it? You don’t think I’m one of those old-fashioned men’s rights mentalists, do you?’