Gemini Rising (13 page)

‘Look, I know what you did to Elyse. I’m not sure I should even be talking to you.’

At this, inexplicably, he just laughs, confirming my suspicions that he’s the sort of callow boy who thinks upsetting girls is funny.

‘Oh, really?’ He grins. ‘You know all about me, then.’

‘I know enough. But I would like to know one more thing. Why do you hate Elyse so much?’

He leans in closer to me so that I can feel his breath. I suddenly feel very conscious of my entire body.

‘Because I’m the only one who can see right through her.’

Elyse is looking over at us; I really, really shouldn’t be talking to him.

‘Anyway,’ he says, pulling away, ‘it doesn’t matter now. She’s just somebody that I used to know.’

I try to bite my tongue, but I am really quite drunk and it’s almost impossible. I should cut this conversation off right now. I should not encourage him.

‘Just like the Elliott Smith song,’ I blurt out. ‘You know, “Somebody That I Used To Know” – it’s one of my favourite songs.’

‘Yeah… I don’t know who that is.’

‘A dead singer I like. They don’t know if he committed hara-kiri or if his girlfriend killed him. Personally, I think the second one.’

‘All my heroes are dead, too – Cobain, Hendrix, Jim Morrison, Ian Curtis…’

‘Except for Vincent August,’ I point out.

‘Exactly – Vincent August and Morrissey… Hey, how do
you
know about Vincent August?’

‘Trouble Every Day are my favourite band in the whole world. As well as some other weird old stuff. You know, like The Fall, Sonic Youth, The Smiths, things like that. And books. And films.’

I’ve always hoped that if I could just get the chance to talk at someone for long enough, then I might be able to wow them with my cultural knowledge and secret intelligence, until they stop noticing my imperfect face and general
gawk
. Now that I have overcome the initial hurdle of opening my mouth, it’s like I want to weigh him down with words until he can’t move and he is stuck with me for ever.

‘Cool,’ he agrees, looking surprised. ‘I really like Trouble Every Day; they’re definitely the best local band we’ve got.
Cut
-
Throat Queens
is amazing. You know, I went to see them at the Arts Centre not long ago.’

‘So did I! I was there! It was incredible. Elyse and I, and the rest of us, we all drank a bottle of wine in the bar, and then we were dancing, and…’

I stop for a second, revelling in being able to recount an anecdote that sounds this cool. I know that none of this would exist without Elyse; I would have nothing to talk about, and I wouldn’t be here talking to a boy in the first place.

‘Yeah, I know,’ he says. ‘I saw you there. You were dancing like no one was watching, and I thought, “What a cool girl.” Then I saw you were with Elyse.’

The air is punched out of my lungs.
I was right
. He just grins at me and, from this angle, I have no idea if he’s Prince Charming or the big bad wolf.

‘Sorana? Do you want to smoke some weed?’

Um, hello? Has he met me, the world’s most boring person? And then I remember: no, he hasn’t. It’s a revelation. It doesn’t even occur to me that I might be falling into a trap.

‘OK.’

The TV is flickering silently. As I open my eyes, I gradually register that the room is empty of people, except for Jago. He is leaning heavily on my left shoulder, in a state to rival mine. I don’t think I was quite asleep, but drifted off somewhere far away.

After a day of being someone who wasn’t quite myself, the sense of my own mortality hits me. What the hell am I doing here?

I am on my own and I have no idea what time it is. In short, I am, quite possibly, dead.

‘Jago? Jago! What time is it?’

‘Dunno. That weed was quite strong, wasn’t it? I didn’t realise; I just nicked it off Gareth.’

‘Great,
now
you tell me…’

I want to stay there and give him my full attention – I can feel this long-awaited and possibly one-off opportunity slipping through my hands like water – but I can’t. There are more pressing matters at hand, like where the hell my friends are.

I stagger into the hallway and, without thinking, burst in through the nearest closed door. The room where I saw Mel disappear without a trace, however many hours ago. It is empty. A messily unmade bed, an empty T-shirt and some mouldy socks – that’s it.

I make a dash for the only other closed door and crash straight in. At first glance, there is nobody here either. But as my eyes adjust to the half-light, I can make out a shape on the bed that I faintly recognise. I slam the door closed behind me in case Jago comes in.

‘Shimmi!’ I hiss, shaking her when there is no response. ‘Shimmi, quick! Get up, we’re getting out of here. Where are your clothes?’

Shimmi is sprawled out on the bed, completely naked but for her school socks. I try to avert my eyes as I gather her clothes up off the floor as best I can. She looks so vulnerable and exposed that I can’t stand it, and I can’t stand to think who else might have seen her like this. Worse, how she got here.

Later, later – I will think about it later. I have to get Shimmi dressed and out of here as quickly as possible.

‘Come on, Shimmi. Let’s get your shirt on…’

She’s not conscious enough to be embarrassed, or to co-operate. It’s like trying to dress a mannequin. I manage to get her covered up, in a vague approximation of what the uniform should look like – jumper pulled over an unbuttoned shirt, forgetting her bra that has disappeared entirely. I haul her arm up over my shoulder and pull her off the bed, the first step in propelling her as fast as I can out of this place.

As we pass through the sitting room, my eyes meet Jago’s for a long moment. I want to stop but I can’t. I am myself again. He stands up and I think I hear him say something, but by then we’re already out in the hallway and clattering halfway down the stairs.

The fresh air hits me as we make it outside into the street. It evidently hits Shimmi as well, because she lifts her head and mutters something before flopping back towards me. I’m still trying not to think about anything, but now that we’re outside it’s not working so well any more.

As I clutch Shimmi to my chest, I realise that she’s not crying but I am.

It’s selfish as much as anything. It’s no wonder I feel upset about what happened to Shimmi – but I have to confess, that’s not the whole story. I’m ashamed to admit that my memories of yesterday afternoon are hazy, but I am left with a feeling of unspecified dread.

I’m feeling so confused about Jago and I can’t get him out of my head. I’m clinging to the hope that he might find me on Facebook or get my number from someone, but so far there has been nothing. Telling myself that I did the right thing – that if he really likes me he’ll find me – is not really working. Neither is telling myself that Elyse was obviously right and I might have had a lucky escape.

I was awake for most of the night. Now that it’s morning, I feel sick with nerves at the thought of the day ahead. Last night, the walk home sobered me right up. When we reached her house, even Shimmi seemed in a reasonable enough state – she seemed more like she had a cracking hangover than that she was falling down drunk any more.

‘Shim, are you OK for us to knock and go inside?’ I asked, tidying up my own hair and attempting to look respectable. ‘I’ll tell your mum we stayed late at school for a project, and I walked home with you because you weren’t feeling well. All right?’

Shimmi paused for a minute, resolutely not looking me in the face.

‘Go home, Sorana. Just forget it. I’m fine.’

She barged past me and strode up the driveway without a backward glance, rummaging in her schoolbag for her keys and then slamming the door behind her. I stood there for a moment and stared at the closed door. Until, with nothing else to do, I did as Shimmi said and took myself home.

When I finally let myself in, my family were eating dinner, with a conspicuously empty place setting at the table.

‘Hi! I’m sorry I’m so late – I had this thing that I completely forgot about, for English and this extra reading I’m doing. I’d have called, but…’

I am the world’s worst liar; I wasn’t expecting to pull this off.

‘But – don’t tell me – your phone was out of credit?’ Mum rolled her eyes. ‘I’ve told you before – if you’re texting Shimmi and Nathalie non-stop, you at least need to save enough credit to ring me in an emergency.’

Pete winked at me when my mum wasn’t looking.

‘Good job you got home when you did – I convinced your mum to give you till half seven before ringing the police and sending out the search parties.’

‘Thanks, Pete. Sorry, Mum…’

‘We’ll let it go just this once, young lady. Now, eat – we started without you but we managed to hold Pete back and saved you a bit of moussaka.’

I think because I usually never lie or do anything very wrong, it probably didn’t occur to them that I was doing exactly that. Of course, this made me feel worse than ever but I managed to hold it together until after dinner. When I got upstairs, as soon as I was alone and had the door shut behind me, I burst into tears again and spent the night awake and fretting.

By this morning, I have whipped myself up into a sick panic. Most of all, because I still haven’t been able to get hold of the twins. In between panicking that the shit will truly hit the fan as soon as I get to school, daydreaming about Jago’s arms in that tight Trouble Every Day T-shirt, and contemplating suicide – I spent much of last night texting the twins. I haven’t heard a thing back.

‘Sorana, what are you
doing
up there? We’re late!’

That’s the least of my worries. When my mum drops me off at school, I can’t face going up to the common room. I wait until Daisy is out of sight before sneaking into the downstairs toilets. The chilly ones behind the sports hall that nobody ever goes in. I feel pathetically relieved as I huddle into the far stall. It reminds me of what feels like another life – of holing up in the pavilion at lunchtime and feeling out of place every morning as I sat there alone reading my book. Compared to this, for a minute I kind of miss it. I am overcome with guilt and a sort of unspecified sorrow for something that’s gone and probably can’t ever come back. As my brain is haunted by the image of Shimmi on that bed, I find myself just pointlessly wishing that it were possible to un-see things.

I nearly fall off my perch as I am startled by a loud knock. I glance down at the gap underneath the door.

‘Mel?’

‘Yeah, it’s me. I had this sort of weird feeling that you’d be in here. I told Elyse I had a bad stomach and I’d have to meet her up in the common room in a bit.’

‘You shouldn’t let her boss you around so much, Mel.’ My voice comes out as flat and sad as I feel.

‘Neither should you, but let’s forget it, OK?’ She smiles tightly at me as I open the door.

‘Where did you go yesterday?’ I ask her.

‘You need to ask Elyse, not me. She said she tried to talk to you, but you were busy with Jago, and then she said we should just go…’

‘So, you both just left me and Shimmi there, while you went home?’ I am not prepared to let this drop so easily.

‘I’m sorry, Elyse said it would be OK, but… You
were
both OK, weren’t you? You got home all right?’

I think of Shimmi brushing me off on her doorstep and telling me to forget it.

‘Yeah, we were fine…’

‘So, we’re all fine.’ She says it like it’s that simple.

‘What about you, Mel? What happened? Going off into the bedroom with that guy – it’s so unlike you. What did Elyse say to you?’

‘Let’s forget it, OK?’ she says softly. ‘Sometimes it’s just easier to do what she says, that’s all. Come on, it’s nearly time for registration – let’s go up there together.’

We slip in at the last moment, sneaking in at the back. Shimmi and Elyse are already there. I can’t see Nathalie anywhere, which is weird. I can feel the eyes of the whole room on me as I slide into my place and keep my head down. I can sense the whispering without hearing it. Elyse turns and smiles at me, but Shimmi won’t even look in my direction.

I don’t take in a word of what Miss Webb says, until right at the end of registration, when she asks me to stay behind – only me, on my own.

‘Sorana, what happened yesterday afternoon?’

I look down at the floor. Miss Webb sighs.

‘Fine, I see – you have the right to remain silent. So, I’ll tell you what I know – that you, Shimmi, Elyse and Melanie Johansson absconded from school yesterday lunchtime with several strange men in a blue car. Is that correct?’

I’m actually pretty shocked that Miss Webb knows this much. The only thing I know that our school has in common with every other school in the country, probably the world, is a strict ‘no grassing’ rule. It’s just not the done thing.

I knew that our absence would be noticed, but I didn’t think Miss Webb would find out any of the finer details – since if she did, it would be because someone from my class told her. Someone who saw us all escape out of the window.

‘Sorana, you don’t need me to tell you this is serious. You made a big mistake.’

‘I know. I’m…’

I
am
sorry but I can’t even say it. My head is too full of tiredness and the indelible memory of Shimmi lying on that bed – and the knowledge that Jago exists in the world and, in spite of myself, I’m always going to wonder about him.

‘Look, Sorana, you’re here on a scholarship and you’re set to get straight As at the end of this year. I don’t mean to be biased, but you’re one of the nicest, brightest girls in this class and I can’t stand by watching you blow it.’

I really don’t know what she is getting at here – other than to make me feel worse – so I stay quiet.

‘I’ll deal with the other three girls separately, but I wanted to speak to you alone because you’re the one I’m most worried about – and not just because you’re top of my English class. Do you realise what a stupid thing you did?’

I nod, actually relieved to admit it after trying so hard to act normally at home. In fact, I’m worried I might cry.

‘I know you do. You’re a sensible girl. You’re seventeen years old and this is the first thing you’ve done wrong since you’ve been at this school. Don’t blow it, Sorana; don’t allow yourself to be led astray. I do not want this to go on your permanent record, so we’ll call it a warning this time if you can
promise
me this won’t happen again. That nothing like this will ever happen again. Do you understand me?’

I understand her perfectly. The relief at this temporary reprieve is so great that I cannot tell her the truth. I should just be grateful – and I am – but the truth is, I know I can’t promise her that nothing like this will ever happen again. At the moment, I can’t promise anything.

‘Yes. I do. I’m sorry. Thank you, Miss Webb.’

‘I mean it, Sorana. This is the luckiest escape you will ever have. I am sticking my neck on the line for you. Don’t let me down.’

I nod and smile and don’t say anything.