The Secret Place

Chapter 24

One of Julia’s more impressive talents has always been the ability to barf at will. It was cooler back in primary school, before anybody noticed that public puking might not be particularly dignified – it even earned her a decent chunk of dosh, one way and another – but it hasn’t totally lost its usefulness since then. She just saves it for special occasions, these days.

Tuesday morning, April 23rd, Chris Harper has just over three weeks left to live. Julia eats the biggest and most varied breakfast she can handle, because an artiste has her pride, then waits till the middle of Home Economics and barfs pyrotechnically all over the classroom floor. Orla Burgess is within range, but Julia resists temptation: her plan doesn’t include Orla being sent back to the boarders’ wing to change. As Miss Rooney shoos her towards the nurse’s office, Julia – clutching her stomach – catches a flash of Holly and Becca baffled, Selena gazing out of the window like she hasn’t even noticed anything happening; Joanne’s flat-eyed smirk while she plans how to spread the word that that slut Julia Harte is pregnant; and Gemma giving her a look like a wink, amused and approving.

She does wobbly legs and some mild gagging for the nurse, answers the usual questions about her period – you could break your leg and the nurse would still want to know when your last period was; Julia suspects that being a day overdue would get you ratted out to the nuns for interrogation – and a few minutes later she’s all tucked up in bed with a glass of flat ginger ale and a pathetic look. And the nurse leaves her alone.

Julia works fast. She has it planned out: first Selena’s part of the wardrobe, then her bed, if she doesn’t score there she’ll pop out the bottom of Selena’s bedside locker – they figured out how to do it last term, when Becca lost her key – and if she still comes up blank then she doesn’t know what the fuck she’s going to do.

It doesn’t get that far. When she slides her hand along the side of Selena’s mattress, between the bed and the wall, she finds a lump. Neat little slit in the mattress cover, and inside, surprise surprise, a phone. An adorable itsy-bitsy pink one, just like the one Alison bought off Joanne. Chris must have stocked up by the armful, one for each of the lucky babes he was planning on honouring with his glorious dick. Up until she saw that phone in her hand, Julia still thought there was a chance Gemma was lying.

Selena hasn’t put a lock code on it, which might give Julia a flicker of guilt if she had room for that. Instead she goes to Messages and starts reading.

Still thinking abt the dance wd love to see you again– It punches a hiss of breath out of her. She’s been wondering when and how Chris ever hooked Selena, been going over every trip to the Court, looking for just ten minutes when Lenie was unshielded, but it’s actually almost creepy how close the four of them stick together; she couldn’t put her finger on once when anyone even went to the loo alone. And all the time: the fucking Valentine’s dance. While Julia was outside, getting reckless on rum and Finn’s grin and the sparking cold-air newness in every breath, Selena was exploring a little new territory of her own. And something watched and – without any anger, or any mercy – started considering what their punishment would have to be.

She keeps reading. Chris is excellent; Julia is almost impressed. He had Selena sussed dead on, right from the start. One sext, one hint of romance even, and she’d have been gone; so smart boy Chris never went near there. Instead he went for long texts about his emo sister’s problems, or how his parents didn’t understand him, or how it wounded him that he couldn’t show his true sensitive self to his shallow friends. Julia is glad she’s already puked herself empty.

Selena is a sucker for anyone who needs her. Maybe some people would call it arrogance, thinking she’s so super-special she can help where no one else could, but the thing is sometimes she can. Julia should know. You can say anything to Selena and she, unlike apparently everyone else in the world, will never come back with something that makes you want to hit her and yourself for having opened your big stupid mouth. So people who never talk to anyone talk to her. That’s what she’s used to. That’s what Chris Harper smelled off her. And that’s what he used to wiggle his way close enough to shove his hand down her top.

Because Selena was talking to him, too. Yesterday there was this drawing i wantd to show my dad when he dropd me off at my mums and he wouldnt even come inside for 1 sec to see it, he waitd in the car while i got it. Sometimes i feel like they wish i didnt exist cause then they wouldnt have to see each other.

She has never said anything like that to Julia. Julia never had a clue that she felt that way.

They’ve been meeting for more than a month. It gets more obvious with every text that Selena is gaga about Chris, gooey, stupid in love. Julia has a hard time deciding who is the world’s biggest moron: the one who’s fallen in love with Chris the Sleaze Harper, or the three who pranced along next to her while she did it without noticing one single thing. She grits her teeth and mashes her elbow along the wall next to her till it’s scraped raw.

And then Julia gets to this morning. No wonder Selena looks spaced out. She just dumped Chris’s nasty arse.

The rush of relief almost throws Julia flat on her back on the bed, but a second later it drains away. This won’t last. Selena can’t even get through the dump text without babbling about how much she loves Chris, and he’s already come back with a wild text demanding to know WTF and begging her to meet him tonight. Selena hasn’t answered, but another few days of oh-please-I-need-you-so-much and she will.

Julia hears it clear as tapped bronze. Your chance. Your choice.

It takes her a long humming minute to understand what that means. To hold in one hand what will happen if she does, and in the other what will happen if she doesn’t.

Julia can’t breathe. She thinks like a howl: That’s not fair it’s not fair it’s not fair, whatever I do I’m going to get– I didn’t get off with Finn. I barely fucking touched him. I didn’t do anything I should have to pay for. The silence that meets her teaches her: this is not McKenna’s office. You don’t get to play with nitpicks, dodge whining around the edges of But-Miss-I-never-exactly-actually, not here. Unfair means nothing. She has been weighed up and the decision has been made. She has these few days before Selena takes Chris back, one last gift, in which to choose.

Julia thinks about throwing the phone at the wall and lining the pieces up neatly on Selena’s bed. She thinks about going to Matron and telling her she needs to swap to a different room, today. She thinks about getting under the covers and crying. In the end she just sits there on Selena’s bed, watching the sunlight slide across her lap and her arm and the phone in her hand, waiting for ringing bells and brisk feet to make her move.

‘So?’ Holly wants to know, tossing her bag on the bed. ‘What were you doing?’

‘What did it look like? Puking my guts up.’

‘That was for real? We thought you were faking.’

Julia glances at Selena before she can stop herself, but Lenie doesn’t look suspicious; she’s flopped down on her bed, still in her uniform, and is curled up staring at the wall. Julia is obviously the last thing on her mind.

‘What for? So I could be bored off my tits all day? I have a virus.’

Becca is pulling clothes out of the wardrobe and singing to herself. She breaks off to say, ‘Want us to stay here with you? We were going to the Court, but that was ’cause we thought you’d come too.’

‘Go. I’d be shit company anyway.’

‘I’ll stay,’ Selena says, to the wall. ‘I don’t want to go anywhere.’

Holly makes a face at Julia, tilts her head: What’s with her? Julia shrugs: How would I know?

‘Oh, yeah, I meant to ask–’ Becca’s head pops out of her uniform jumper, flyaway hair everywhere. ‘Tonight?’

‘Hello?’ Julia says. ‘I feel like crap. Remember? I just want to sleep.’

Please can we meet tonite, Chris texted Selena. Same time same place I’ll be there.

‘OK,’ Becca says, not bothered by the edge on Julia’s voice. A year ago she would have flinched like she’d been hit. At least that, Julia thinks. At least one good thing. ‘Maybe tomorrow?’

‘I’m on,’ Holly says, throwing her blazer at the wardrobe. Julia says, ‘Depends how I feel.’ Selena is still staring at the wall.

That night Julia doesn’t go to sleep. She curls up in a loose ball the way she usually sleeps, keeps her eyes shut and her breathing long and even, and listens. She has the back of her hand up against her mouth, where she can bite into it if she feels herself drowsing off.

Selena isn’t asleep either. Julia’s back is to her, but she can hear her moving around, restless. Once or twice her breath has a wet sound, like she might be crying, but Julia can’t tell for sure.

After a few hours, Selena sits up, very slowly, one move at a time. Julia hears her hold her breath, listening for the rest of them, and forces herself to stay slack and easy. Becca snores, a tiny delicate noise.

After a long time, Selena lies down again. This time she’s definitely crying.

Julia thinks of Chris Harper waiting in their grove, probably throwing rocks at rustles and pissing on the cypress trunks. She wants to pray for a tree to drop a branch on his head and smash his slimy brain all over the grass, but she knows it’s not going to work that way.

On Wednesday afternoon, as they get their books ready for study period, Julia says, ‘Tonight.’

‘You’re over your virus, yeah?’ Holly asks, tossing a copybook on her pile. The sideways slant of her eye says she’s still not convinced.

‘If it comes back, I’ll make sure and aim for you.’

‘Whatever. I just don’t want you puking your guts when we’re right outside Matron’s room and getting us all caught.’

‘You’re all heart,’ Julia says. ‘Becs, you on?’

‘Course,’ Becca says. ‘Can I borrow your red jumper? I got jam on my black one, and it’s going to be freezing out.’

‘Sure.’ It’s nowhere near cold, but Becca loves borrowing things, lending things, all the small rituals that blur the four of them into one warm space. If she had the choice they’d all live in each other’s clothes. ‘Lenie,’ Julia says. ‘Tonight?’

Selena looks up from her study schedule. She’s shadowy and thinner, the way she’s been all the last two days, like she’s in dimmer light than the rest of the room, but the thought of a night has raised a spark of what looks like hope. ‘Yeah. Definitely yeah. I need that.’

‘God, me too,’ Julia says. One more, she thinks. One last night.

They run. Julia takes off the second her feet hit the grass below the window, and feels the rush of the others build behind her. They stream down the great front lawn like wild birds thrown across the sky. In front of them the guardhouse glows yellow, but they’re safe as houses: the night watchman never takes his eyes off his laptop except to do his rounds at midnight and again at two, and anyway they’re invisible, they’re soundless, they don’t cast shadows; they could sneak up close enough to touch him, they could press their faces against the glass and singsong his name, he’d never blink. They’ve done it before, when they wanted to see what he did in there. He plays online poker.

They swing right, white pebbles fly up under their feet and they’re in under the trees, faster and faster down the paths, chests burning, ribs aching, Julia running like she wants to take them skimming right off the surface of the path and up, into the cartwheel moon. By the time they collapse in the clearing, she’s run everything else out of her mind.

They’re all laughing, with what little breath they’ve got left. ‘Jesus,’ Holly says, doubling over with her hand pressed to a stitch. ‘What was that? Are you, like, going out for cross-country next year?’

‘You just pretend Sister Cornelius is coming up behind you,’ Julia says. The moon is almost full, just one blurred edge for the next night to fill in, and she feels like she could leap the waist-high bushes from a standing start, up and over with her feet pedalling slow underwater circles in midair, down on her toes as light as a dandelion seed. She isn’t even out of breath. ‘“Girls! I have told you and informed you and let you know that you should never run on grass and herbaceous plants and – and verdant pastures–’

That explodes them. ‘“The Bible tells us that our Lord Jesus never ran or jogged or galloped-”’ Becca is helpless with panting and laughter.

Holly stabs a finger. ‘“-and who are you to think or believe that you are better than Our Lord? Well?”’

‘“You, Holly Mackey-”’

‘“-whatever class of a name that is, there’s no saint named Holly, I think we’ll have to call you Bernadette from now on-”’

‘“-you, Bernadette Mackey, stop running this instant-”’

‘“-and moment and minute-”’

‘“-and tell me what Our Lord would have thought of you! Well?”’

Julia realises Selena hasn’t joined in. She’s sitting up, with her arms clasped round her knees and her face tilted up to the sky. The moonlight hits her full on, burning her out to something you can only half-see, a ghost or a saint. She looks like she’s praying. Maybe she is.

Holly is watching Selena too, and she’s stopped laughing. She says, quietly, ‘Lenie.’

Becca props herself up on one elbow.

Selena doesn’t move. She says, ‘Mm.’

‘What’s wrong?’

Julia throws it at the side of Selena’s head like a rock: Shut up. This is my night my last night ever don’t you dare wreck it.

Selena turns her head. For a second her eyes, still and tired, meet Julia’s. Then she says, to Holly, ‘What?’

‘Something’s up. Isn’t it?’

Selena watches Holly tranquilly, like she’s still waiting for the question, but Holly is sitting up straight and she’s not backing down. Julia’s nails dig into the earth. She says, ‘You look like you’ve got a headache. Is that it?’

Those tired eyes move back to her. After a long moment: ‘Yeah,’ Selena says. ‘Becs, do my hair?’

Selena loves having someone play with her hair. Becca scoots over behind her and carefully takes out her elastic; hair spills down her back almost to the grass, a hundred kinds of white-gold, glinting. Becca shakes it out like delicate fabric. Then she starts running her fingers through it, in a steady, confident rhythm. Selena sighs. She’s left Holly’s question behind.

Julia’s hand is clamped around a smooth oval pebble that her nails dug out of the ground. She rubs damp dirt off it. The air is warm, flickering with tiny moths and with smells: a million hyacinths, the deep-water tang of the cypresses, the earth on her fingers and the cold stone in her palm. By now they have noses like deer. If someone tried to sneak up on them, he wouldn’t get within twenty metres.

Holly has lain back, one knee crossed over the other, but her hanging foot is bobbing restlessly. ‘How long have you had a headache?’

‘Jesus,’ Julia says. ‘Leave her alone.’

Becca stares over Selena’s shoulder, big-eyed, like a little kid watching her parents fight. Holly says, ‘Well, excuse me. She’s been like this for days, and if you have a headache that lasts that long, you’re supposed to go to a doctor.’

‘You’re giving me a headache.’

Becca says, in a too-loud burst, ‘I’m scared of the exams!’

They stop and look at her.

‘Duh, you’re supposed to be,’ Holly says.

Becca looks like she half-wishes she’d kept her mouth shut. ‘I know that. I mean really scared. Like terrified.’

‘That’s what the Junior Cert’s for,’ Holly says. ‘To make us so scared that we’ll behave. That’s why it’s this year, right when everyone starts going out and doing stuff. All that blahblah about how if you don’t get all As you’ll be working in Burger King for the rest of your life? The idea is, we’ll be so petrified we won’t do anything like have boyfriends or go to discos or for example get out at night, in case it distracts us and oh noooo! Whopper with fries please!’

Becca says, ‘It’s not Burger King. It’s… Like, what if I fail, I don’t know, Science, and they won’t let me do Honours Biology for the Leaving?’

Julia is surprised enough that she almost forgets about Holly and Selena. Becca’s never said anything about what comes after school, ever. Selena’s always wanted to be an artist, Holly’s been thinking about sociology, Julia likes the idea of journalism more and more; Becca watches those conversations like they have nothing to do with her, like they’re in a language she doesn’t speak and doesn’t want to learn, and is prickly for hours afterwards.

Holly is thinking the same thing, apparently. ‘So?’ she wants to know. ‘It’s not like you have to have Honours Biology because you want to do medicine or something. You don’t know what you want to be. Do you?’

‘I don’t have a clue. I don’t care. I just…’ Becca’s head is down, over her hands moving faster and faster. ‘I just can’t be in all different classes from you guys, next year. I’m not going to be stuck in, like, Ordinary Level everything when you’re all doing Honours and we never see each other and I have to sit next to Orla Stupid Burgess for the rest of my life. I’ll kill myself.’

Holly says, ‘If you fail Science, me and Lenie are too – no offence, Lenie, you know what I mean.’ Selena nods, carefully so her hair won’t tug. ‘We’ll all be sitting next to Orla Stupid Burgess together. It’s not like we’re all smarter than you.’

Becca shrugs, without looking up. ‘I practically failed it in the mocks.’

She got a C, but that’s not the point. She’s electric because there’s something in the air, scraping at her even though she can’t figure out what or where it is, and she needs to feel the four of them holding tight because she believes that’s what will make everything OK again. Julia knows what she wants to hear. It doesn’t matter what marks we get. We’ll pick our subjects together, we’ll pick ones we can all do. Who cares about college? That’s a million years away…

Selena is the one who says stuff like that. Then Julia tells her to quit being such a sap and anyone who fails English is on her own, because personally she’d rather snog Orla Burgess with tongues than do Ordinary Level English and be forced to listen to Miss Fitzpatrick sniffing up her nose-drip every ten seconds like clockwork.

Selena says nothing. She’s drifted away again, eyes on the sky, swaying with the rhythm of Becca’s fingers.

Julia says, ‘If you fail Science, we’ll all do Ordinary Level together. I’ll survive without my world-famous-neurosurgeon career.’

Becca glances up, startled, looking for the snide edge, but Julia smiles at her, a real full-on smile. One confused second and then Becca smiles back. Selena’s swaying eases as her hands gentle.

‘I don’t want to do Honours Bio anyway,’ Holly says. She stretches her legs out luxuriously and clasps her hands behind her head. ‘They make you dissect a sheep heart.’

‘Eww,’ all round, even Selena.

Julia tucks the pebble into her pocket and stands up. She bends her knees, swings her arms, and leaps; hovers above the bush for a second, arms outspread, head back and throat bared to the sky; and floats down to land, one-toed like a dancer, on the grass.

On Thursday Julia barfs at the beginning of Guidance, right when Sister Cornelius is winding up for a long bewildering rant involving nightclubs and self-respect and what Jesus would think of Ecstasy drugs. She figures she might as well get something out of all this.

Selena’s phone is still in the same place. Chris has been sending her predictable texts. She hasn’t answered them.

Julia texts him: 1 o’clock tonight. Usual place. DON’T text me back. Just come. Once the text has gone through, she deletes it out of Selena’s Sent box.

She’s planning to lie in bed and study, because the real world still exists, whether that prick Chris and that fool Selena like it or not, the Junior Cert is still going to need taking, and today that actually feels comforting. Instead she falls asleep, too instantly and intensely even to fight it.

She wakes up because the others are banging into the room and there are people shrieking in the corridor. ‘Oh my God,’ Holly says, slamming the door behind them. ‘You know what that’s about? Rhona heard that somebody’s cousin queued up somewhere for something and the one with the stupid hair out of One Direction touched her hand. Not, like, married her; just touched her. That’s it. I think my ear died. Hi.’

‘I had a relapse,’ Julia says, sitting up. ‘If you want me to prove it, come over here.’

‘Whatever,’ Holly says. ‘I didn’t ask.’ This time she doesn’t sound like she cares. Her eyes are on Selena, who is rummaging in the wardrobe, head down so that her hair hides her face. Selena’s hands move through the drawer in slow motion, like this is taking almost more concentration than she’s got.

Holly is no idiot. ‘Hey,’ Julia says, shaking her arm that’s gone to sleep. ‘If you guys are going down to the Court, can you get me earbuds? Because I’m going to die of boredom if I’m stuck here any more without music.’

‘Use mine,’ Becca says. Becca is no idiot either, but all this is zooming straight past her; it’s outside her horizon. Julia wants to shove her deep into bed and tuck the duvet tight over her head, stash her in a warm safe place till all of this is over.

Holly is still watching Selena. ‘I don’t want yours,’ Julia says – there’s nothing she can do about the leap of hurt on Becca’s face. ‘They hurt. My ears are the wrong shape. Hol? Will you sub me that ten squid after all?’

Holly wakes up. ‘Yeah, sure. What earbuds do you want?’

Her voice sounds fine, normal. Julia holds on to the thread of relief. ‘Those little red ones like I had before. Get me a Coke, too, OK? I’m sick of ginger ale.’

That should keep them busy. There’s only one place in the Court that carries the red earbuds: a tiny gadget shop at the back of the top floor, last place the others will look. With any luck, they’ll be back just in time to grab their books for study, and Julia won’t have to see them for more than a few seconds.

The realisation that she’s trying to dodge her best friends slams her with another tsunami of sleep. Sounds spiral away from her, Holly saying something and the slam of Becca’s locker, Rhona still gibbering far away and a song playing down the corridor, sweet and light and fast, I’ve got so far, I’ve got so far left to– and Julia’s gone.

That night, after lights-out, Julia realises what the knockouts were for: now she’s wide awake, couldn’t doze off if she tried. And the others, wrecked after last night, are out for the count.

‘Lenie,’ she says softly, into the dark room. She’s got no clue what she’ll say if Selena answers, but none of the others even move.

Louder: ‘Lenie.’

Nothing. Their breathing, rhythmic and dragging, sounds drugged. Julia can do whatever she wants. No one is going to stop her.

She gets up and gets dressed. Jeans shorts, low-cut top, Converse, cute pink hoodie: Julia does drama club, she knows about dressing the part. She doesn’t bother to be quiet.

The corridor light gives the glass panel above the transom a faint grey glow. Julia flares it to a blaze and looks down at the others. Holly is sprawled on her back, Becca is one neat curve like a kitten; Selena is a whirl of gold and a loose curl of fingers on the pillow. Their steady breathing has got louder. In the second before she opens the door and slips out into the corridor, Julia hates all of their guts.

Outside is different tonight. The air is warm and restless, the moon is enormous and too close. Every noise sounds sharper, focused on her, testing: twigs crack in the bushes to see if she’ll jump, leaves rustle behind her to make her whip round. Something is circling among the trees, making a high rising call that runs down her spine like a warning – Julia can’t tell if it’s warning something about her, or the other way round. It’s been so long since she was afraid of anything the grounds could hold, she’d forgotten it was possible. She moves faster and tries to tell herself it’s just because she’s on her own.

She is at the grove early. She slides behind one of the cypresses and leans against it, feeling her heart pound at the bark. The thing has followed her; it lets out its rising call, high up in the trees. She tries to get a look, but it’s too fast, it’s just the shadow of a long thin wing in the corner of her eye.

Chris is early too. Julia hears him coming a mile away, or at least she hopes to Jesus it’s him, because otherwise something else the size of a deer is crashing down the paths like it doesn’t care who hears. Her teeth are in the bark of the cypress and she tastes it on her tongue, acrid and wild.

Then he steps into the clearing. Tall and straight-backed, listening.

The moonlight changes him. Daytime, he’s just another Colm’s rugger-bugger, cute if you have cheap chain-restaurant tastes, charming if you like knowing every conversation before it begins. Here he’s something more. He is beautiful the way something that lasts forever is beautiful.

It goes through Julia like the punch off an electric fence: he shouldn’t be here. Chris Harper, half-witted teenage tit-hound, could come here and do his half-witted teenage tit-hound stuff and wander away safe and oblivious, no different from a mating fox or a spraying tomcat; the grove wouldn’t shift a twig to take notice of something so small and so common, just doing what its kind do. But this boy: the grove has taken notice of him. This boy like white marble, lifted head, parted lips: the grove has a part for him to play.

Julia understands that the only smart thing to do here is get the fuck out. She is way out of her depth. Head very very quietly back to her bed, hope Chris thinks Selena was messing him around and flounces off in another snot. Hope the grove will allow him to walk back to his daytime self. Hope it all goes away.

It won’t. What got her here hasn’t changed: if she doesn’t do this tonight, Selena will do it tomorrow, or next week, or the week after that.

Julia steps out onto the grass, and feels cold moonlight pour down her back. Behind her, the cypresses shiver into readiness.

Her movement sends Chris whirling towards her, bounding forward with his hands out, his face blazing up with what looks like sheer joy – the guy’s even better than she thought, no wonder Lenie fell for it. When he sees who it isn’t, he screeches to a stop like something in a cartoon.

‘What are you doing here?’ he demands.

‘That’s flattering,’ Julia says, before she can stop herself. She knows better than to be a smart-arse tonight. She knows exactly what to be; she’s watched enough girls force themselves into the right shapes, pull the strings tighter till they can barely breathe. She does a lash-bat and giggle that’s pure Joanne. ‘Who were you expecting?’

Chris shoves floppy fringe out of his face. ‘No one. None of your business. Are you meeting someone? Or what?’

His eyes are everywhere but on her, leaping to the path, to every rustle. All he wants from her is a fast exit, before Selena comes.

‘I’m meeting you,’ Julia says, ducking her head coyly. ‘Hi.’

‘What are you talking about?’

‘Hello? I’m the one who texted you?’

That gets Chris’s attention. ‘Are you fucking serious?’

Julia does some combination of a shrug and a wiggle and a giggle.

Chris’s head goes back and he moves, a tight fast circle around the clearing. He’s furious with her, for not being Selena and for seeing that look on him, and Julia knows she should have planned for this.

She sends her voice up an octave, coaxing little whine, good and submissive to the big important boy. ‘Are you mad at me?’

‘For fuck’s sake.’

‘I’m sooo sorry for… you know. Fooling you. I just…’ Julia tucks her head down and looks up at him sideways. Itsy-bitsy voice: ‘I wanted to meet you. In private. You know what I mean.’

And just like that, Chris has stopped moving and he’s looking at her. The edge has fallen off his anger; he’s interested now.

‘You could’ve just come up and talked to me. At the Court, or wherever. Like normal people do.’

Julia pouts. ‘Excuse me, if you weren’t so popular? There’s always, like, literally a queue to get near you.’

And there’s the beginning of a gratified grin, at the corner of Chris’s mouth. This is so easy, Julia can hardly believe it; suddenly she can see why everyone else has been doing it all along. ‘Sooo,’ she says, doing a boob-stretch. ‘Can we, like, sit down and talk?’

Chris says, suddenly wary, ‘How did you…? That phone you texted me off. How did you…?’

He wants to know if Selena was in on this. For a second, Julia considers letting him think she was. But then he might go off on Selena about it, and that would complicate everything. She goes with the truth, or part of it. ‘Me and Selena share a room. I found her phone and I read your texts.’

‘Whoa,’ Chris says. He steps back, hands going up. ‘You know about us?’

Julia does a winsome giggle. ‘I’m smart.’

‘Jesus,’ Chris says, face curling up in undisguised disgust. ‘Isn’t she your friend? I mean, I know girls can be bitches, but this is, like, something special.’

‘You have no idea,’ Julia says. She doesn’t bother to put a cutesy twist on it, and for a second Genius Boy’s brow furrows, but before he can start to wonder if this is some elaborate scheme to take the piss out of him, she takes a condom out of her hoodie pocket and holds it up.

That knocks everything else out of Chris’s head. His eyes pop. He was expecting a snog and a bra-based struggle. This never entered his mind.

After a moment he says, ‘Seriously? I mean… like, we’ve talked, what, three times?’

Julia manages a giggle. ‘Come on. James Gillen must’ve told you about me. Right?’

Chris shrugs uncomfortably. ‘Well. Yeah. But James talks a load of bullshit. I thought you’d told him to get lost, and he was just being a prick.’

For one second, Julia feels that shake her. Here she thought everyone believed shitty little James Gillen, and all the time Chris, the last guy she would ever have thought of– The creature calls a warning in the cypresses again and things pelt at her, if Chris was actually serious about Selena, meant the things he texted, if he was someone she might actually like instead of– They’re chipping her away, battering her soft. Another second and she’ll be cracking apart, gone.

She says, ‘James is a total prick. But he’s not a total liar. Hello, it’s the twenty-first century? Girls are actually allowed to like sex too? You’re a babe, and I heard you’re a great kisser. That’s all I need to know. I’m not looking to marry you.’

And Chris can’t have been all that in love with Selena, after all, or else the condom has him hypnotised. He steps forward.

‘Whoa, slow down there,’ Julia says, and flat-palms him, giving her nose a cute little scrunch to soften it. ‘Just one thing. I’m not sharing a guy with my best friend. I don’t care who else you want to do, but starting now, Selena’s off your menu. Deal?’

‘Wha…?’ Most of Chris’s mind is still on the condom, but his eyebrows pull together. ‘You said you didn’t care that I was with her.’

‘Hey. Pay attention. I’m serious. If you try to play us both, I’ll find out like that. I’m going to be watching Selena and watching that phone – I’ll keep texting you off it, just so you know I’m not kidding. If you try anything cute, I’ll tell Selena, and you’ll never get another shot with either of us. But if you leave her alone – like, alone alone, no texts or anything – then every time we get a chance…’

Julia shakes the condom, dry little rattle in the air. In the end it turned out to be easy, getting away from the others down at the Court, where all the toilets have machines covered in pregnancy-related posters and graffiti. Just going to the jacks back in a sec, already moving away from the fountain, and gone before any of the others could stand up. Easy as that, escaping, if you wanted to. Just none of them had ever wanted to before.

Chris hasn’t moved. Julia says, ‘Hello? Is there a problem? Because the only reason a guy’s going to turn down a deal like this is if he’s gay. Which I don’t have a problem with, but you could at least tell me, so I can find someone else to play with.’

He says, ‘I’m just not sure this is a good idea.’

He knows something’s wrong here. The poor bastard probably thinks he’s going to figure out what. There aren’t enough small words in the world. ‘Who cares?’ Julia says. ‘It’s not like you’ve got anything to lose: Selena doesn’t want to see you ever again, or she’d have answered your texts. And anyway, even if you turn around and go home right now, I’m going to tell her we did it. So we might as well.’

She gives Chris a big perky smile and unzips her hoodie. She can read every thought scrolling through his head, clear as print. She can see all the red-raw places where Selena used to be, the bruise-black hole where he thought she was going to be tonight, the bright flashes of him hating Selena and every girl he’s been with and Julia most of all. She can see the moment when he decides. He smiles back at her and reaches out a hand for the condom.

Julia knows what to expect. The wind in the cypresses rising to a roar like a hunting pack, the warning call screaming across the black sky. The clearing heaving and rolling under her. The moon smashing to shards, the sharpest of them all arrowing down to rip her open from groin to throat, the smell of hot dark blood spilling from deep inside. The pain, bright enough to blind her forever.

Nothing happens. The clearing is just a patch of prissily trimmed grass; the cypresses are just trees that some gardener figured would be low-maintenance. The calling sound is still circling, but all the spookiness has leached out of it; it’s just some bird, yelping mindlessly because that’s all it knows how to do. Even the pain is nothing special, just a dull unemphatic rasp. Julia shifts her arse off a sharp pebble and grimaces over Chris’s bobbing shoulder. The moon has flattened to a disc of paper pasted to the sky, lightless.