Love Bomb (14 page)

‘So –’ I stare down at my feet – ‘when’s your mum coming back?’

‘Not for ages.’ He shifts closer to me. I don’t dare look at him because I can tell he’s staring at me, and I know I’m going red.

I search the room, desperate to find something else to talk about. Spotting the
Hunger Games
poster, I turn to him and say, ‘Did you –’ but Toby is suddenly in front of my face.

‘Shh,’ he says, leaning against me. I lose my balance and fall back on the bed. I go to laugh, but Toby presses against me and his breath is on my face and his lips are touching mine. I try to shift sideways because my arm is trapped under me, and then his tongue pushes into my mouth. Our teeth bang together, and I feel Toby’s heart beating fast.

Suddenly, I want to cry and as I’m pressed further
into the duvet I see Katniss over Toby’s shoulder shooting a flaming arrow right at me. Katniss is kicking ass. I’m just lying here having my face kissed, and I don’t like it!

‘Toby …’ I try to pull my arm out.

‘What?’ he says breathlessly, barely listening, his lips all over the side of my face.

‘Stop it!’ I say. I wriggle out from under him and off the bed.

‘What’s wrong?’

‘Nothing.’ I try to smile. ‘It’s just that my arm hurt and –’

‘God, Betty,’ he says, getting up. He glances in a mirror and sorts out his hair. ‘You,’ he says, laughing, ‘are just so weird.’ Then he pushes past me and walks towards the door, kicking a guitar out of his way. ‘Don’t hang around up here,’ he says. Then he’s gone.

Shame rushes through me. I pull my dress down and wipe my mouth where I can tell my red lipstick is smudged. I wait a few seconds, my heart pounding,
and then I creep along the corridor, down the narrow steps and the curved staircase. My hand shakes on the banister. Quickly, I grab my coat and bag from the pile in the hallway and let myself out of the house.

As I walk down the driveway, I start to cry, and then, when I get to the road, I start to run. I can’t go home. I never want Dad to know about this party or what just happened. Rain hits my face and I keep running, turning left, then right, not thinking about where I’m going or stopping when I get a stitch. I don’t care where I end up – I just want to get as far away from Toby’s house as possible.

It’s only when I stop running that I realise I’m lost. I wander around, trying not to panic, desperately trying to spot a street or building I recognise. Eventually, I realise I’m on the edge of town, somewhere I’ve never been before. I peer over a hedge into a sports field. The houses stopped a while back and I’m not even on a proper road any more. It’s quiet out here. And dark. Beyond the field, black trees bend in the wind. The drizzle hasn’t stopped so I walk towards a cricket
pavilion in the corner of the field. I can see a bench lit up by a blue security light.

I perch on the edge of the wet bench and try to open my bag. I need to look at my phone and work out where I am. It’s hard to do anything because my hands are so cold. Right at the top of my bag are my tub of Cheerios and Pingu pyjamas. They make me feel stupid all over again. I push them aside and feel for my phone.

Suddenly, I freeze. I can hear something: the purr of an engine.

I hold my breath and listen as it gets louder.

Then I see a van driving alongside the field, its headlights beaming over the top of the hedge. I pray for it to pass, but it gets slower and slower and then comes to an abrupt stop. The engine cuts out and for a moment everything is silent.

I hardly dare to breathe. Is someone in the van watching me?

Suddenly I feel very alone, sitting on this bench in the middle of nowhere. I find my phone, pull it out and turn it on.
Come on, come on
. I glance back and forth from the screen to the van, then, just as my phone finally lights up, the van door clicks open. I grab my bag, jump off the bench and run round the side of the pavilion.

Spotting two wheelie bins, I squeeze in between them. I crouch down and lean forward staring at the entrance to the field, my heart beating hard.

A dark figure steps through the gate. It’s a man, and he’s tall and wearing a big coat. He stands there, hands on hips, looking slowly from left to right, scanning the field. What’s he doing? He turns towards the pavilion and I shrink back. Did he follow me here? I feel sick with fear and clumsily tap my password into my phone, but my fingers won’t work properly and I keep getting it wrong.

Heavy panting comes out of nowhere and I drop my phone with a clatter. A fat white dog sticks his face
between the bins and stares at me, tongue hanging out, saliva dripping on my boots. A growl comes from deep in its throat. Slowly, I pick up my phone. Then I make my hand into a fist and stretch it towards the dog.

‘Nice doggy,’ I whisper, my voice shaking. It sniffs my hand then disappears as quickly as it appeared.

I sink back into the gap, but suddenly the drooling dog is back and this time it barks so loud I feel the vibrations in my chest.

‘Get here!’ shouts the man, and I hear him stomp closer.

I have to ring someone! I scroll through my address book, my thumb clumsy on the screen. The second I see Bill’s name, I hit call.
C’mon, Bill. Please have your phone on
. It rings once, twice, three times. I peer out. The man is standing in the middle of the field, staring in my direction.
Pick up, Bill!
I watch the man light a cigarette – the glowing tip waves in the darkness.

‘Betty?’ Bill’s voice is muffled, like he’s far away.

‘Bill,’ I whisper, relief flooding my body. As soon as I’ve said this, I put my hand over my mouth, trying to keep a scared sob inside me.

‘What’s the matter?’ He’s clearer now, more awake. ‘I can’t hear you.’

‘I’m in a field between two wheelie bins,’ I say, ‘and there’s a big man here and his dog and they won’t go away!’

‘Tell me where you are,’ says Bill. As quietly as I can, I describe the cricket pavilion, the woods and the dead-end road. ‘I think I know where you are,’ he says.

‘Thank you,’ I whisper, but the line’s gone dead. I make myself as small as possible and hug my knees. My heart is still pounding and I pray the shadow of the man doesn’t fall across the slice of sky between the two bins.

A few minutes later a low whistle cuts through the night air, followed by a scamper of legs. Then I hear the van door slam shut and the engine start. I listen as it reverses down the track, turns, then accelerates away.
I uncurl and peep out of the gap. That’s when I see Bill bombing across the field, standing up as he pedals, beanie pulled low over his ears. I’m so relieved I start crying all over again.

I crawl out of the space as he comes to a stop in front of me. ‘Hello,’ he says, peering down. He rests on his handlebars, trying to catch his breath. I stand up and his eyes widen. ‘What happened to you?’

‘I got lost.’ I wipe away my smudged make-up and peel a crisp packet off my leg. We stand looking at each other for a moment. More than anything I want to throw my arms round him, but this isn’t the sort of thing we do. Instead I say, ‘I’m so happy to see you,’ and try to smile.

He frowns. Bill frowns a lot, but this is a particularly long one. ‘Why aren’t you at the party?’

‘I didn’t like it,’ I say, tugging the pompoms that hang from my hat, ‘so I left, but then I got lost.’ Bill’s still on his bike, waiting for me to explain, like we’ve got all the
time in the world and it’s not one in the morning. ‘Can I stay at your place?’ I ask. ‘Dad thinks I’m at Kat’s. If I go home, he’ll kill me.’

He studies me for a moment longer. ‘OK,’ he says. ‘Climb on.’

I sit on the seat and put my arms round his waist. After a brief wobble, we set off across the field. As soon as we leave the wet grass and hit the road, we speed up. Houses and street lights flash past us and the air feels so good on my face. ‘You should be wearing a helmet,’ I say.

‘I left in a rush,’ he replies. I rest my head on his warm back and shut my eyes. I feel every bump in the road. ‘Where shall we go?’ Bill asks. I lift up my head and the street lamps make me feel dizzy. We’ve been playing this game since we were little. We’d be cycling through the woods, my dad trying to keep up with us, and we’d really believe we could just pedal up and away, and go anywhere we wanted.

‘The North Pole,’ I say to Bill’s back. Toby’s pale
chest definitely won’t be in the North Pole.

‘We’ll make an igloo,’ says Bill, puffing as we start to climb a hill.

‘And fill it with furs and light a fire right in the middle of it …’

‘… and toast marshmallows,’ says Bill.

‘Then,’ I say, ‘a talking snow monkey will knock on the door.’

‘Do igloos have doors?’

‘Do snow monkeys talk?

Bill is puffing now, but he never quits on a hill. ‘And,’ he says, ‘he’d have a bag with him.’

‘What’s in the bag?’

‘A Wii … and a generator.’ With a final push, we crest the hill. ‘Hold on,’ he warns.

‘What does the monkey say?’ We zoom down the other side, my hair flying back from my face.

‘Three-player Mario Kart, Betty? Mushroom Gorge?’

‘Bagsie I’m Toad!’

*

At Bill’s, I go straight to the bathroom, scrub my face and change into my pyjamas. As I pass Eric’s room, I see him flopped on top of his quilt, fast asleep, his arms dangling over the side of his bed. A dim orange glow comes from his nightlight.

I go into Bill’s room and find him pulling a sleeping bag out of a cupboard. ‘Nice jim jams,’ he says.

I look down at the tiny Pingus parading across my pyjamas. Suddenly, I don’t know what to do with myself even though I’m usually totally relaxed round at Bill’s. ‘I haven’t stayed over at your house for years,’ I say. ‘Do you remember when your mum let us sleep in the bath?’

‘Why did we want to do that?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘You can have the bed,’ he says. ‘I’ll sleep on the sofa.’

I climb into his bed and pull the duvet round my face. It is the nicest feeling.

‘Don’t go yet,’ I say.

He drops down next to me. ‘I think this is going to be a hard one to explain to Mum,’ he says. ‘You know, how you’ve suddenly appeared in my bed during the night.’

‘I’ll think of something.’

‘I’ve got something to show you,’ says Bill. Then he reaches up to his hat.

‘You haven’t!’

‘Yes I have,’ he says, pulling off his hat. All his crazy blonde hair has gone. Now it’s short. Very short. He runs his hands through it, messing it up. ‘What d’you think?’

‘I think,’ I say, reaching out and stroking his head, ‘nice.’ And it is. I tuck my hand back in the duvet, but I can’t stop looking at him.

‘What?’

‘Nothing. You look different.’

He leans on the bed and yawns. He looks exhausted. I guess he’s been windsurfing all day and then someone woke him up.

‘What happened at the party?’ he asks. ‘I thought you were all having a sleepover.’ I groan and wriggle down under the duvet, hiding my face. ‘What’re you doing?’

‘I can’t look at you if I’m going to talk about the party,’ I say. ‘It’s too embarrassing.’

‘It can’t have been that bad,’ he says. Because I’m hidden, I let a tear slip down my cheek. It wasn’t that bad, was it? Just a horrible kiss when I thought it would be an amazing kiss. Just the feeling that there’s something wrong with me because I didn’t like it. ‘Are you still awake in there?’

‘It wasn’t what I expected,’ I say. Now I’m under the duvet I don’t want to come out. ‘Will you talk to me until I fall asleep?’

‘What about?’

‘Tell me about Kat learning to windsurf.’

Somehow I know he’s smiling. ‘There was a lot of screaming and she had to be rescued by the speedboat a few times. But she was good for a beginner.’ And then
he tells me all about how she got out on the sea and about the barbecue and someone called Mikey who played the didgeridoo. It’s nice listening to him. ‘Syd got out her guitar and then Kat sang some song about a pencil.’

‘Who’s Syd?’ I’ve never heard Bill mention a Syd before.

‘Just a girl from windsurfing.’

‘Is she nice?’

‘She’s OK,’ says Bill. ‘But she’s a close talker.’

‘How close?’

‘Tonight I could see Pringles between her teeth.’

‘That’s close,’ I say, feeling better. Then I shut my eyes for a few seconds and I realise I’m falling asleep. ‘Give me another quote, Bill.’

‘What about?’

‘Love. Tell me something that’ll make me happy.’ I stick my arm out of the bed. ‘Write it on here,’ I say sleepily. ‘I’ll copy it down in the morning.’

I hear Bill looking for a pen and then there’s a pause. He holds my arm steady and starts writing at my elbow. It feels tickly.

‘Sorry,’ he says, ‘it’s quite long.’

‘Have you finished your essay?’ I ask. I close my eyes. Bill laughs and says something, but his voice slips away from me as I drift off to sleep.

The next morning, I wake up early and for a few seconds I can’t work out where I am. Then I see a windsurfing harness hanging off the back of a chair and I know I’m at Bill’s. Thoughts of last night flood through me. I see Toby’s hands on the hips of that girl, the way her playsuit sparkled and then Toby squashing me on his bed.