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‘When was I mean?’
She scowls. ‘In the orchard? You pushed her over? The night of that shitty party?’
‘I pushed her? She pushed me! She?—’
Spanish snorts and I throw the bag at her.
Behind her, Princess exits the toilets and studies me before walking away. My heart pounds. I push past Spanish, into the toilets, and head for the third cubicle on the right.
I pull out the vent cover and trace my fingers inside over cool, rough bricks, hating myself for wanting so desperately to find something there.
And then I feel it: the edge of a piece of paper.
I scrabble at it, pushing it further into the hole, and I can feel tears starting. But then I have it. It’s written in Princess’s neat, rounded handwriting, like the good old days, except it isn’t just a stupid joke.
I’m sorry. Let me explain. Meet me in the fox field after school. xx
She’s drawn a heart around PD + BS 4 EVA at the bottom, which makes me pause because Don once drew that on one of her school books, teasing her about how close we were, but she had just told him to piss off and covered it in pink glitter.
I fold the note and put it in my wallet.
After school are the first of Miss Smith’s one-to-ones. Twenty minutes each, they start at four. I know Don and Princess have theirs tonight. So Princess will have to come out to meet me then hurry back.
Or maybe Miss Smith will come to her senses and cancel them. Already the gossips are wondering which scene she’ll do with Don. They haven’t stretched their imaginations: Romeo and Juliet, Act 1 Scene 5, with the kiss.
I guess I’ll find out after lunch. Or not. Maybe – obviously – I should just skip drama and go wait in the clearing. Because can I really face acting in front of anyone who saw those pictures?
Why am I even thinking about going to the fox field? About talking to her?
A normal person would probably go to their mum, explain how their former best friends decorated their common room with pornographic pictures, kind of but not quite of them, and ask for help. But obviously I can’t ask for my mum’s advice. It would break her.
I rinse my face and push back into the hallway, still bustling, and I feel like my knees are going to buckle – all these people looking at me, at my stupid hair – and I can’t take it. I hurry out, ignoring everybody laughing, pointing, a couple even following me, pretending to ask if I’m okay.
My back slickens with sweat, and as soon as I’m beyond the gates I slip into the trees and sit on the cool earth.
I don’t skip classes. Never ever.
What will Miss Smith say?
And then I feel sick because I know this means we’ll have to have a conversation. I can’t skive her class and expect not to be asked why.
I lie in the shadows telling myself I’m not going to meet Princess, but knowing I am.
I watch the shifting coins of sky between the leaves until I hear the final bell – school is over – and all the buses hum past and then the traffic starts to thin. I get up and start walking.
It’s only been three hours but it feels like years and my stomach aches. I wish I hadn’t tossed away the rest of my lunch.
I can’t believe I’m going to the clearing. What am I going to say to her? She can’t pretend there’s some reason for this, that it can all just go away.
But she’s my best friend. I sound like a whining baby but she is. I remember lying head to head in the long grass, staring up at the sky and saying that sometimes I forgot we weren’t the same person.
I pick up a long, thin branch and slash at the overgrown verge.
And then, like a phantom, a car rolls up next to me, its window rolled down.
Miss Smith leans towards me, over the passenger seat. I keep walking.
‘You want a lift?’ she says.
