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Danny’s nose is almost pressed against the video. He seems fascinated by it. “What are you gonna do with it?”
“Still thinking. But I think I’ll start taking my phone with me everywhere I go.” Rory rotates his phone to watch the clip the right way up. “I’m going to record every jumped-up Antiro weirdo in this school and let them hang themselves with their own stupidity. Arabella’s down and Hodgson’s next.”
Softly, as though double-checking, Danny says, “Itwasinsane though, right? What she was saying? I wasn’t imagining her entitlement…”
“She was as entitled as a two-year-old at a ball pit convention, D-boy. It was breathtaking. ‘Bow down to my superior political opinions or I’ll scream and I’ll scream.’ Fine. Off you go. Don’t wear your lungs out with your public tantrum — it’d be a shame not to hear you scream anymore.”
“I don’t understand,” Danny murmurs. “She was so… absolutist. Either you’re with us or you’re a mean nasty fascist and I’m telling on you. No wonder people are tricked into supporting Antiro if they believe those are the only options.”
“It’s evangelical. The thoroughly ordinary view that maybe books shouldn’t be incinerated for existing? No. Fascism. Meanwhile, real fascism — not the ‘I don’t like you’ variety — is currently sitting on the throne and tearing up our laws.”
Still, Danny looks troubled. He’s been trying to apply logic to Arabella’s argument and maybe that’s the problem: logic causes it to crumple under scrutiny. “But I don’t agree with Antiro and I don’t think I’m a fascist. I’m just… me.”
“You worry too much about what others think,” Rory notes, giving Danny a soft look. “They can call me a fascist. See if I give a fuck. Because I know what I am and all they have are lies. This isn’t about you, D-boy, or any of us they callfascist. It’s all her. Her projection is off the scale. The whole philosophy of this deranged movement is to accuse those who question it of fascism, which is completely absurd if you look at reality for one single second. She’s letting the world know, very very loudly, just how disturbed her mind is. I mean, look!” He pauses the running video, freezing the frame on Arabella holding the book about the Queen flat against her face. “Here she is, pretending to be a talking book. She’s lost the plot. It’s brilliant! She’s made an utter tit of herself.”
Rory traces his lower lip with the pad of his thumb, ruminating. “Would be a shame if others saw this,” he remarks ominously. “The Head Girl of the esteemed Lochkelvin Academy acting so inappropriately. Very embarrassing for her aunt if this were to get out…” He stretches his arms over his head, suppressing a large yawn, and glances at each of us. “What about you, D-boy,” he tosses out suddenly. “You said you wanted the saint when she was sucking me off in the library. How about it?”
This seems to startle Finlay awake. “When… whenwhit?”
I don’t know who’s redder — Danny or me. Finlay glances between the three of us and blows out a frustrated breath. “Cannae believe I missed this. I demand an action replay.”
“Course you would, you fascist,” Rory says breezily, which earns a small laugh from Finlay.
I raise my eyebrows at Finlay. “Thought you weren’t turned on?”
“Well, I amnoo. Fuck’s sake,” he mutters with a roll of his eyes, like it should be obvious. “You three gettin’ yer jollies wi’oot me? Fuck that. I demand compensation.”
A smirk flickers across Rory’s mouth. “Danny?” he prods.
Danny is so stunned, it’s as if he’s been turned to stone. He doesn’t move. I’m not even sure he’s breathing.
Rory waves a hand in front of his face, causing the candlelight to flicker, enlarging shadows across his skin. “D-boy?”
“I, uh—” He glances across at me, and I give him a small, encouraging smile. “In front of you?”
“You know we’ve all seen each other naked, yeah?” Rory asks dryly, his hands delving into his dressing gown pockets as if to restrain himself from wringing Danny’s neck.
“Yes, buthere?” He glances around the library like he expects a line of teachers to be eavesdropping on the other side of the shelves, preparing to seize us. He mouths the next words as if sensors might pick them up: “In the library?”
“D-boy,” Rory drawls patiently, “the saint went down on me in daylight, with others in the room, and Arabella chatting shit in front of us. How about you try to bring your A-game and be half as magnificent as her?”
Finlay’s eyes widen. His mouth drops open. “Ye didwhit?” he asks, gazing at me in astonishment.
“It passed the time,” I remark lightly, shrugging. In all honesty, I still can’t believe we got away with it. Seems like it wasn’t just Arabella who lost her mind in the library this afternoon… “Meant I managed to escape hearing that I’m a fascist.”
“Well, if that’s whit it takes tae no’ get called a fascist,” Finlay murmurs with the ghost of a smirk, and turns his attention onto Rory, “I’ll happily go doon on ye. Any time. Just say the word. You too, sassenach.”
“And me?” Danny asks archly after a moment of lingering silence, looking put out as his name remains unsaid.
“Ah… I dunno,” Finlay says in a slow, careful voice, sounding awkward as he mulls it over. “Ye’re mair, uh…endowed, than I’m used tae.”
“Thanks,” Rory remarks dryly.
“No — no, ye’re big an’ aw. It’s just, he’s got fuckin’ Nessie in his pants.”
Finlay looks so uneasy at the prospect that I burst out laughing. I flatten my palm against my mouth, glancing around to make sure no one’s dashing into the library to check our stifled laughter, because it’s not just me who’s laughing. We all are. It’s one of the funniest things I’ve heard in so long, and it feels so good to justlaugh, as smothered and as secret as it is in the depths of the small dark hours, as if laughing powder had scattered around the table to momentarily lighten the mood.
When our laughter subsides, Rory informs Danny, “The saint’s up for it.” His eyes linger on me briefly, as though to check the accuracy of this statement. I don’t know how he can tell but he’s right. “You want it and so does she. Be as quiet as you must and hold in those moans — it’ll only make it hotter.”
