All That Glitters (36 page)

here have been a lot of embarrassing moments in my life.

The time I walked around the supermarket with my skirt tucked into my knickers until a sales assistant had to point it out to me. The time I had cinnamon powder on my top lip and everyone thought I’d grown a “little ginger moustache”.

Peeing myself during storytime when I was five because I got too excited about
The Faraway Tree
.

(I lied: it wasn’t milk.)

Lying flat on my face in mud in front of a field full of thirty students, my new nemesis and three teachers is an event now very much on that list.

“Crap, are you OK?” Jasper jumps forward. “You’re not hurt, are you? Nothing’s broken, is it?”

I stare coldly at the hand he’s holding out.

My palms are stinging, my knees are stinging, my eyes are stinging and my cheeks are stinging: all the familiar symptoms of humiliation and falling over.

In my peripheral vision, I can see groups around the field, starting to head in this direction.

Am I hurt? No. Am I angrier than I have literally ever been in my entire existence?

Absolutely.

“Oh you know me,” I snap, shakily trying to get to my feet. “I’m so
full of it
I can’t even stay upright.
Don’t
touch me.”

Jasper grabs my arm anyway. “At least let me help you up, Harriet. We don’t have to be friends, but I’m not a monster. Let me get you off the floor.”

“I said
do not touch me
.” I shake him off furiously. “
Ever
. The next thing you hold out gets bitten off.”

He laughs, and it takes everything in my willpower not to lean forward and scrabble at his face with my little dinosaur claws.

“Fair enough,” he says, shrugging. “Sorry. Maybe I should have put down that cloak after all. Could have provided a bit of padding.”

“
Ooh
,” I say, getting on to my knee. “I’ll get a bit of padding and stuff it right in your—”

But I don’t get any further.

My foot hits another slippery spot, and this time I slide backwards.

Into the mud again.

ou know what? I think I’m just going to stay here.

The universe seems to be strongly suggesting that lying on the floor, covered in 360 degrees of wet dirt, is exactly where I’m supposed to be.

The bell for breaktime rings.

With a clatter, people burst out of the sixth form doors, pause and then a large number start running towards me.

I automatically close my eyes and wait for the inevitable laughter.
Geek. Loser. Idiot. Why do you always make a mess of everything, Harriet?

“Oh my God, are you all right, Ret? What happened?”

“You poor thing, you’re totally
dripping
.”

“The biology department should be ashamed of themselves, sending us out in this weather. My parents are going to write in and complain.”

Cautiously, I open one eye.

Dozens of faces are now hovering over me, creased with concern. There isn’t a glimmer of laughter: not a single sign of a snort, an eye roll or a chuckle. Nobody’s whispering or taking photos and videos and then uploading them straight on to the internet.

Seriously?

I slipped over into wet mud
twice.
I’m one banana skin away from being a Charlie Chaplin film.

India silently helps me up.

“I … umm.” I wipe a strand of hair out of my eye, almost definitely making the mess worse. “I thought it was important to get a close-up view of our biology project. From … you know. Ground level.”

Everybody laughs.

A clomp of wet mud and grass falls off my knee with a
plop
on to the floor and there’s a sympathetic
awwwww
. Somebody hands me a useless but well-intentioned tissue.

“In fact,” I say, my cheeks gradually starting to return to their normal colour, “baby elephants have been known to throw themselves into mud on purpose when they’re having a temper tantrum. That’s pretty much what I was doing too.”

It’s not that far from the truth, in fairness.

There’s another laugh. I head towards the sixth form block to try and dry off, and the crowd begins to disperse. But just as I’m walking off, Liv arrives.

“What
happened
, Retty?” she says breathlessly, running to my side.

“She got pushed,” Ananya says, barging through. “I
saw
it. That
freak of nature
lost his temper and shoved her over, then he
laughed
.”

She points at Jasper, and some of the remaining students abruptly turn back towards him.

“Oh my God, what a
weirdo.
” “What is
wrong
with you?” “Douchebag!”

“Such a
mutant
,” Ananya says fiercely, crossing her arms. “Where did you come from, anyway? Is one of your eyes made out of glass or something?”

“
Yeah
,” Liv hisses. “Freakazoid
.
No wonder you hide in the art room on your own like a total loser.”

The sudden vitriol is so thick, so intense, it feels like you could open your mouth, take a chunk out of the air and swallow it.

African wild dogs are one of the most efficient pack hunters in the world. When working together, they have a successful kill rate of eighty per cent.

Some of my classmates’ ratio may be even higher.

I look in surprise at Jasper.

Is this what they’re always like to him? Is this why he’s in the art room all the time? Is this why he’s so angry and hostile constantly? How hadn’t I noticed?

Jasper lifts his chin, clenches his jaw and glares at me defiantly.
Go on then
, he seems to be silently saying.

Do it.

This is my chance, and we both know it.

All I have to do is say four little words – yes, he pushed me – and I’ll have the ultimate revenge. This horrible boy has insulted me, called me names, judged me and twisted my friend against me. Now it’s my turn.

After all, he
started
this, didn’t he?

Except …

Except as I stare silently at Jasper’s round face, with a lurch I suddenly recognise it all. The tenseness of his jaw. The too-brightness of his eyes. The twitch in the muscle next to his mouth. A group of people facing one way, and only one facing the other.

He’s pretending he doesn’t care, but he does.

I know, because eight days ago – and for eleven years before that – it was me.

“Jasper didn’t push me,” I say quietly, still looking at him. “I slipped twice because I’m an idiot, and he was just trying to help me. And he’s not a freakazoid, so please don’t call him that. The chances of having
heterochromia iridium
are six in a thousand, so – to quote Professor Xavier – it’s actually a very groovy mutation.”

Jasper blinks.

“Also,” I say, reaching firmly into my trouser pocket, “here’s your invitation to my party, Jasper. I’m sorry I didn’t give it to you earlier.”

I pull out a piece of muddy plastic and wipe it clean on my scarf.
Ha. Told
you laminating everything was a good idea. When you fall over as much as I do, you learn to take precautions.

Still dripping, I hold the invitation out and Jasper takes it in silence. His face is slowly turning from pale to a strange, mottled pink.

“
Well
,” Ananya says, uncrossing her arms. “We were only
defending
you, Retty. As long as you’re OK, that’s all that matters.”

“Definitely.” “We didn’t
mean
it. We were only
teasing
.” “He should
totally
come to the party.”

Jasper’s face still hasn’t moved.

We look at each other for a few seconds.

Then I resume limping soggily back to school.

The last thing on my list is
believe in yourself,
and this is exactly what it means, isn’t it?

It means knowing who you are, even when it’s incredibly tempting to be someone else instead.

I’m not Hook, or Khan, or Ursula, or Scar.

Maybe in another life, I might have been.

In an alternative universe – one where everybody always laughed at my jokes and invited me to parties and never hid my pencil case at the back of a toilet cistern – maybe it would have been harder not to hurt somebody who’s hurt me.

But for the first time in eleven years, I’m glad I’ve spent a lifetime with
GEEK
written all over my satchel. I’m glad I know exactly how it feels to always be on the outside, looking in.

I might finally be on the inside now.

But I am not – and never will be – the villain.

hich means there’s one more thing I have to do.

“Harriet!” A blue front door swings open and a face coated in thick brown gunk pokes out. “Darling! Just look at the two of us! Snap!”

Nat’s mum holds her hand in the air, so I high-five it.

It seems churlish to point out that only one of us is covered in mud intentionally.

“Hello, Miss Grey,” I smile, picking a bit of wet grass from my hair and flicking it into a bush. “How are you?”

“I’m just
dandy
, sweetheart
.
No botox in six months and I’ve got so many expressions I’m terrifying the postman.” She wiggles her face and grins. “I don’t think I’ve seen you since you got back from Nooo Yowwwk, darling. Are you
terribly
glamorous and sophisticated now?”