Small Blue Thing (3 page)

I needed time to think. I glanced at my watch again.

“Oh crap!” I exclaimed. “Grace, we need to leave now and make a run for it, otherwise we’ll have to pay for a taxi.” We grabbed our bags, threw down some cash to cover our share of the bill, and waved at everyone as we dashed for the door. At least I wouldn’t have to look at Ashley’s face when she finally reappeared. I wondered whether Rob would try to comfort her, and couldn’t work out why that thought didn’t bother me. Then all other thoughts went out the window as I ripped off the silly shoes and ran with Grace down the high street.

Vision

Grace and I didn’t get a huge amount of sleep that night. We only just made it to the last train, and spent the entire journey and the long walk deep in a dissection of the night’s events.

Grace was glowing. She had been longing for Jack to notice her for years, and now she was finally in with a chance. We discussed in detail her best approach to maintain his interest over the next few weeks. If she could keep the other girls off his radar until the start of the holidays, she would have a much better chance of hanging on to him longer term, we reckoned. There was so much to debate, and I encouraged the conversation along so that I didn’t have to spend too much time talking about Rob.

However, she wasn’t going to be completely deflected. “So, it looks like Rob’s finally taken the plunge and committed to taking you out,” she said, as we continued trudging up the road between the station and home, with me finally back in my Converse after a quick wrestle with her on the train.

“Yes, that seems to be his plan … but there is rather more to it than that: he wants me to go to Cornwall with him in a few weeks. His parents have rented a cottage.”

“That’s brave of you, volunteering to spend so much time with his family at this stage!”

“Ah, well, that’s the problem. You see,” I admitted, “his family won’t be there. It would just be the two of us.”

There was a sharp intake of breath, and I stole a quick glance at her face as we passed a street light.

“He’s a fast worker, isn’t he?” There was a pause. “Are you thinking of going?” she added, suddenly lightening her tone.

“How can you even think that?” I exclaimed. “It’s way too soon.”

“I know,” she agreed, “but sometimes even the best plans can just evaporate in the face of extreme temptation.” There was a far-off look in her eye as her voice faded away.

I spotted a weakness. “That sounds like something you might have been thinking about yourself,” I challenged. “Does this mean that you and Jack will be…”

“Huh, chance would be a fine thing. I was only thinking about the pact.”

Grace and I had made a pact a long time ago that we would look out for each other if either one was thinking of stepping over the line with a boyfriend. We had seen too many of our friends leap into disastrous, short-lived relationships during the last year, and neither of us wanted to be hurt as they had been.

In fact, earlier in the week I had been wondering if Rob might be the one, but I seemed somehow to be seeing him a lot more clearly now, and the whole thing just felt … wrong. I couldn’t work out why: he was gorgeous, popular, and available, and now he was interested in me. Why wasn’t I happier?

We couldn’t resist dropping into the little playground by the bridge and having a quick go on the swings in the moonlight. When we had first moved here, I was nine and had felt far too sophisticated to enjoy the equipment. Now, though, Grace and I regularly used the swings as a place to stop and gossip where no one could overhear us.

We talked about Ashley. I had known Ashley forever. We had been in the same school since reception, but not always in the same class. In a way we were too similar, too competitive, and we were never the best of friends. But we had shared some good times, like the trip to France in the junior school where she and I had led the raid on the boys’ dormitories, and the more recent choir tour. Unfortunately though, the situation with Rob had soured all that. As soon as I realised that we both fancied him it was clear that the fragile truce in our relationship was going to crumble.

Life with Grace was much simpler. We were quite different in our looks, outlook and cultures, but were somehow best mates. And luckily we never fancied the same boys. Instead we had shared catastrophic dramas and crushes over the last six years, then the traumas of being dumped at fourteen by boyfriends we never really spent any time with, and, throughout it all, the general irritating nosiness of our mothers. But by now we always knew when the other was in trouble, and had an uncanny ability to ring each other at exactly the right time. I trusted her completely, and I knew that she and I would be friends forever.

We were still laughing quietly about the boys as we finally crept into the house, trying not to disturb my parents too much. It was a shame that we had to be up early the next morning: we could have gone on gossiping all night.

I was thinking back over the day, and despairing over the state of my new jeans when I remembered the bracelet. I jumped out of bed and rummaged in my bag to find it. In the low light, the silver gleamed and the stone looked like a deep cobalt pool. I hadn’t realised that I had cleaned it so well earlier. It looked nothing like the blackened twist of metal I had fished out of the mud.

I slipped it on to my wrist to see how it would look. It
fitted really comfortably, as if it had been made exactly for me. As I looked at the stone, a soothing calm settled over me. It felt right, somehow, to be wearing it, and so wrong that it had spent so long lying under the gravel and dirt. I moved it closer to my bedside light to get a better look, and when the fire in the stone danced, it was breathtaking – almost as if it were celebrating its rescue. It was without question the most stunning piece of jewellery I had ever seen. I finally dragged my eyes away, promising myself that I would give it a really thorough clean the next day.

I was about to turn out the light when Grace started to cough.

“It’s nothing, just a tickle,” she protested.

“You’ll need a drink of water,” I decided. I didn’t want her keeping me awake. “I’ll nip down to the kitchen and get you a glass.” I had shared a room with her plenty of times before and knew the danger – she could cough all night in her sleep.

It was very dark downstairs, as everyone else had long since gone to bed. I got a glass from the cupboard and filled it from the kitchen tap, and walked back into the hall glancing down at the heavy band on my wrist. I touched the still-cold silver absently and my head was suddenly filled with the image of a gorgeous boy. It was as if he had appeared in front of me. It was so surprising that I jumped back, stifling a scream and dropping the glass. His face was noble yet fierce, with piercing blue eyes, chiselled cheekbones and a strong jaw. His skin was just perfect: smooth-shaven and lightly tanned, with a small mole just by the side of his mouth. He was, without doubt, the most dazzling person I had ever seen. He also looked puzzled and sad, his brow creased, and his perfect lips pressed together in a thin line.

The image stayed in my mind for just a second longer,
enough for me to register the dark blond hair, the tension in his shoulders, and that he was swathed in a dark coat or something, then, just as I started to reach for the light, as quickly as he had appeared in my head he was gone, and I was back alone in my dark hall, standing in a puddle of water.

“Crap,” I muttered under my breath as I realised that I was imagining things and that I had made a mess on the floor. I heard my mum open the door to their room, coming to investigate the noise. She was always very crabby if I woke her up.

I ran up the stairs to head her off.

“Sorry, Mum,” I whispered. “I was getting Grace a glass of water when I tripped over the shoes and dropped it.”

Mum was always complaining about the shoes left in the hall, so she was bound to believe that.

“Do be more careful, Alex. And make sure you collect all the broken glass.”

“OK. Sorry I woke you up.”

“Well, at least I know you are home safely,” she smiled. “Did you have a good evening?”

“It was OK,” I conceded. I didn’t want to start her off on one of her lengthy interrogations just now. Thankfully she got the hint.

“Tell me all about it tomorrow. See you in the …”

“… morning,” I finished for her, leaning in for a kiss.

She disappeared back to her room, and I ran back downstairs to turn my attention to the floor. I finally switched on the light and surveyed the damage. There wasn’t much mess, the glass had broken cleanly in two and I hadn’t overfilled it, so there was just a small puddle on the floorboards.

I searched through my memory as I wiped the floor. I couldn’t imagine where I had seen that face before. It must have
been somewhere – probably on the TV, I decided: he was far too handsome to be just my imagination. And such a blinding image too, as if he had been projected directly into my head. That was the really strange thing: somehow he didn’t just feel like the recollection of someone I had seen before; it was almost as if he was really there. I couldn’t make any sense of it at all, and in the end I gave up. It was late and I was tired – perhaps I would have a better idea in the morning.

I fetched another glass from the kitchen and went back upstairs, where I was expecting an interrogation from Grace. But it was late, and she had fallen asleep. It seemed like a detailed discussion about my weird experience would have to wait until tomorrow.

In the morning I realised that I was still wearing the bracelet. It was so comfortable I hadn’t noticed. I went downstairs to get a coffee for Grace and smoothed a minuscule mark off the stone while I waited for the kettle to boil. For the briefest of moments I thought that I could see a moving shadow flitting across its surface again, but as I did a double take there was nothing there. “I’m going mad,” I muttered to myself, thinking of the night before. “Bracelets can’t blink and pictures of strange guys can’t be projected into your head.” I had been hoping that it would all somehow become clear in the morning, but I was no further forward in trying to work out who or what had caused it.

As ever there was a last-minute scramble to be ready and Grace and I each grabbed a biscuit in place of breakfast and dashed to the bus stop.

The advantages of going to an all girls’ school that was right next to an all boys’ school were immense. It was possible to avoid the boys if you were feeling grumpy or had a bad hair day, but
easy to meet up at the dividing fence during break. We also had a joint coach service, so students from either school could get a bus in from their local area. The coach had been the hub of my social life since I was eleven, from the first week, when I’d learned every possible swear word in the language from the boys, to now, when it was where the girls discussed tactics for attracting the same boys.

Things had changed a little since we had moved up to the sixth form. Now we were officially seniors and no longer required to wear uniforms, we were able to watch the younger kids on the coach with an indulgent eye, occasionally wincing when we realised that we used to behave in exactly the same way.

My elder brother, Josh, at eighteen, was in his final year of school and had managed to spend most of the last six years ignoring me completely on the coach. But that too had changed in the last few months as he and some of his friends had got more interested in my friends, and very occasionally they acknowledged our existence.

The coach arrived, and there was time for some uninterrupted chat with Grace. I was about to tell her all about the whole thing when one of our friends dropped into the seat in front and started quizzing Grace about Jack: the grapevine had clearly been working overtime. It would wait, I decided. We had all day to talk on our day trip to London.

The school trip had been organised for those of us in the Art Club, an optional lunchtime activity. Most of us in the group were OK at art but didn’t have the talent or the dedication needed to sit the exams, and membership of the club allowed us to have a bit of fun. The project for the term was to look at art in public buildings, and that day we were off to St Paul’s Cathedral. My special interest was in the carvings of people and faces, and having
done lots of research on the Internet I was planning to draw the figures adorning the tomb of the Duke of Wellington, the famous soldier. Unfortunately I hadn’t done quite enough research before I submitted my plans, and found that all the angels were perched on the very top of the enormous monument. I was going to get a very hard lesson in foreshortening.

We were driven up into London in the school minibus by one of our art teachers. It was a subdued group as we had all been out celebrating the night before, and a few of the girls had been up really late. Unfortunately, Mrs Bell was a surprisingly aggressive driver, and some of us didn’t look good as the minibus tore around the one-way system south of the river. At one point I was sure that Melissa was going to heave. She went very pale and someone quietly handed her an empty carrier bag and opened a window. No one dared to ask Mrs Bell to slow down.

We finally made it to the city, where the great dome of the cathedral still managed to dominate the much larger corporate buildings nearby. The huge white stone edifice, recently cleaned of hundreds of years of London grime, seemed to glow gently in the sunshine. The two large towers that flanked the western entrance were dwarfed by the pale grey dome which sat at the centre of the building. As we drove up Ludgate Hill, I could see the sunlight glinting off the gilding on the tops of each of the towers, and catching the railings on the Golden Gallery at the top of the dome.