The Boyfriend Bet (15 page)

“What are you doing back here?” I was in the middle of
trying to remove a monkey tail from the back of one of the five year olds. I
wasn’t expecting to see Bex here already. Hadn’t she said she was going to
watch the lads play football? I was glad about that. I’d given her express
permission to go to football, as I really didn’t need her here watching me
prance around with the kids. I glanced at my watch - there would be at least a
good fifteen minutes left of the football and that’s if it had started on time.

It was weird being at school on a Saturday, but Stella
had booked our school hall out and I just do what I’m told (mostly)! The show
had just finished and nothing embarrassing had happened to me yet. Ella had had
her head down the toilet all morning, so I guess she really wasn’t up to much
and when I‘d mentioned it to Stella she’d given strict instructions for those
at the door to not let anyone in without a ticket. She wasn’t going to have her
mini dance show ruined. I suppose I had Jay to thank but I really didn’t want
to be thinking about him today and I’d managed to push him out of my mind.

“I need to ask you something.” Bex said. She looked a
little confused, which was odd because Bex was never confused. She is the one
who is always so clued up.

“I thought you were gonna watch the boys play football.”
I ignored her previous comment.

“I did....Something happened at football.” Bex looked
more confused.

“Did you realise how cold and boring it is.” I laughed. I
didn’t think Bex would be one to appreciate football very much.

“Um no....there was a massive fight.”

“Really? Oh, I missed it!” I signalled for the next five
year old to come and have her costume sorted.

“Jay got sent off...” Bex wasn’t laughing about it or
even smiling. Normally she would have made a good joke or a sarcastic comment
about it that would leave me in hysterics.

“Oh,” I said, wondering why Bex seemed to think that this
concerned me all of a sudden. “And I’m supposed to be the pathetic one,
apparently,” I muttered. I couldn’t get the look out of my head that Jay had given
me last night when he’d found out about that stupid bet.

“Did you ever sleep with Sam?” Bex asked me, totally out
of the blue. I felt winded by this sudden question that seemed so unrelated to
what she had been talking about.

“Ssshhh!” I glared at Bex and signalled to the little
girl whose tail I seemed to be having such a hard job of unpinning.

“Well?” Bex demanded.

“Well what?” I stared at her, “What’s that got to do with
a fight at football?” I huffed.

“Have you or haven’t you?” Bex was relentless.

“Yes!” I blurted out, “But just once, it only happened
once. It was just before we split up, that’s why I never mentioned it.” I tried
to explain myself. Bex looked more than furious. “Don’t be angry with me! I’m
sorry I didn’t tell you!” I did a weak apologetic smile at her.

“I’m not angry at you, I’m bloody furious at him!” Bex
spat.

“What?”

“Wait till I get my hands on him!” Bex ranted and then
turned and started to march off towards the door. I was completely confused. Why
the hell was she so angry with Sam and what the hell was she going to do?

“Bex, wait!” I called but she didn’t look around. “Bex,
he didn’t make me sleep with him or anything, BEX!” I yelled because she just
wasn’t listening. Half a dozen parents who had come to congratulate their kids
were staring at me disapprovingly. I could almost sense their pity for my
mother and imagined them bringing it up in their conversations later on.

“Charley!” Stella was almost running over to me,
“Whatever is going on? First I’ve had people at the door to keep your sister
and her friends from ruining the show and now you’re shouting your mouth off
about your sex life in front of the parents who I might add, pay a lot of money
for their children to be taught by us!” Stella glared at me.

“I’m sorry,” I mumbled. I felt totally stupid, I was a
complete liability to her. I had jeopardised her dance school. Who would want
to pay for their daughters to be taught by a teenage slut? Come on, that’s what
they were all thinking.

“Is there somewhere you need to be?” Stella’s face had
softened into a look of concern and maybe a slight hint of amusement. “Go on,
you’re done here for today. You’ve done well, apart from the end.” Stella
smiled.

“Don’t you need me to help clean up?” I asked, shocked.

“Go on, I’ve been there. I was your age once, you know,”
Stella winked at me.

“Thanks!” I made sure I had no tails or anything monkey
like attached to me, grabbed my jacket and bag and practically ran out of the
school. I wondered if any of the boys were still about. I used to come and
watch Sam play the home games because his team always played them at our
school. Our school field is massive and it rents out the pitches at the weekend
to all sorts of teams - younger boys, a few men’s teams and occasionally a
ladies match would all be playing at the same time.

All the matches seemed to be finishing and a group of men
came clattering noisily around the corner, their studs smacking the concrete.

“Did you see that punch up on the pitch next to us?” One
of the men said to another.

“I’ve never seen a team fight each other before,” The
other one laughed.

So they’d all been fighting each other. The story was
just getting weirder and weirder. I could see Sarah still standing on the
sidelines even though most of the team had already wandered off to the changing
rooms.  “Charley!” Sarah spotted me and began to run over. “You’ve missed
one helluva fight!”

“I heard.”

“I think that Jay’s got a bit of a thing for you. All
that pretending you don’t like each other,” Sarah nudged me.

“What are you talking about?” I wish someone would just
tell me what was going on.

“I heard everything. It all kicked off right in front of
where I was standing.” Sarah was almost excited by this fact.

“What exactly happened?” I was desperate to know how any
of this concerned me.

“Well, it was half time and Luke was giving Jay some sort
of banter about you.”

“Oh?” I prompted her to carry on.

“He seemed to think there is something going on between
you and Jay. I was about to march over there and tell him he’d got the wrong
brother,” Sarah babbled. “There’s nothing going on is there?” Sarah’s bubbly
voice had become a bit more serious and I think my face was giving me away.

“No, well....no,” I stuttered. “Carry on.”

“Then Sam got jealous....I think...”

“Really? I butted in. It annoyed me that this excited me
so much.

“Yeah but then after a bit of pointless bickering over
you... Sam said something really nasty.”  Sarah enjoyed the suspense she
thought she was creating.

I wasn’t sure if I was all that bothered what nasty thing
Sam might have said to Jay, I was more interested in the bickering over me, but
I dutifully said, “What did he say?”

“Um....he kind of said that you were easy anyway....”

“What?” I spat. I was aware that Bex had now finally
joined us (hopefully she hadn’t found Sam and had calmed down).

“He said that all anyone would have to do is tell Charley
Wallis that they loved her and then she would sleep with them, ‘cos that’s all
he had to do. And then Jay smacked him right in the mouth!” Sarah said at a
hundred miles an hour.

“And that’s how the fight broke out.” Bex interrupted. I
stared at her. I felt like I was the one who had been smacked in the mouth.

“Don’t worry, I told everyone who was watching that he was
completely lying. I said Charley is not that stupid!” Sarah sniggered and when
she saw my face she slowly stopped. “Oh my god, don’t tell me you were that
stupid?”

“Sarah!” Bex exclaimed.

“God Charley, do you just lead this whole other life that
you keep a secret?” Sarah snapped at me.

“Sorry,” I muttered. It was all I seemed to be saying
lately.

“I don’t care if you’ve slept with him,” Sarah spat. “You
could have slept with tons of guys for all I care!”

“I haven’t, just him,” I barely whispered. I felt like a
complete fool.

“All I care about is that you didn’t tell me. I thought
we were best mates, I thought we told each other everything!” Sarah looked
genuinely hurt and I felt like shit. Sarah turned around and started to walk
across the field on her own. Bex looked at Sarah and then at me: she looked
torn.

“Go with her,” I said. “She looks upset.”

“So are you,” Bex replied.

“But it’s my fault, go.”  I told Bex, she nodded and
then ran after Sarah.

I didn’t know how to put everything right or even make
sense of my life. I stood in the middle of the open field, the cold wind
whipping around me. I knew it wouldn’t be long before the fight story was all
around the school (it was probably all over Facebook by now) and all the girls
would hear about what a gullible idiot I am. Meanwhile the boys would hear
about what a legend Sam is. Aha, I would be the laughing stock of school again.

I’ve heard about people who lose it, who no longer care
anymore. I’ve always thought it would be oddly brilliant to not care about
anything. Well that’s how I kind of felt, standing alone in the middle of the
cold and bleak school field. It isn’t as if I’ve never experienced people
laughing, talking or judging me before, is it?

I am done with all the bitchiness, I am done with all the
games and I am done with worrying what people think of me. I am ME, and if
people don’t like the real me then I have decided it is their problem, not
mine.

I walked around aimlessly for ages before I decided there
was nothing else for it but to go home. I trudged down my road as slowly as
humanly possible. I knew Ella was more than likely to be getting ready for the
party already - that’s if she’d managed to stop chucking up!

I didn’t know what to do about this damn party thing. I
didn’t want it but I didn’t exactly have anywhere to escape to either. I
couldn’t even face going inside when I got home, I could hear music filtering
out from our house and when I looked up at our bedroom window, I could see Ella
holding a dress up against herself and Aimie offering some sort of opinion. I
just sat down on the cold, damp doorstep. I couldn’t handle this at all.

I don’t know how long I just sat there watching my warm
breath hit the cool air. I was exhausted – mentally exhausted. I realised I
didn’t even know Sam at all. What was I - nothing more than a conquest? It was
nearly as bad as a bet and that thought made me feel even more depressed. I was
completely lost in thought until I heard next door’s garden gate creak open. I desperately
hoped people hadn’t started coming over already.

There had been people coming and going to the parent free
zone ever since my Mum had left with Simon on Friday night. I didn’t want to
have another crappy ‘flirty’ chat with Riley or one of his stupid mates who
thought I was ‘well fit’ apparently. Eventually I bothered to look up and I was
relieved to see it wasn’t Riley or one of his stupid mates or even one of the
dumb giggly girls who laughed at everything he said.

“Hey!” I said as I stood up. I was making an effort for
once and I felt awkward.

“Hey,” Jay nodded, a little less enthusiastically than
me. He had his footy bag slung over his shoulder. I guess he hadn’t been in a
rush to get home either.  He had his custom messy hair sticking up all
over the place and then I saw the fresh bruise appearing on his cheekbone and a
swollen lip.

“Thanks,” I finally brought myself to say what I had been
thinking, as I looked at his bruised face. What exactly are you supposed to say
in this situation?

“What for?” Jay said in the same tone as before. He
really was being hard work. I wondered if I was imagining it but I still
thought he was looking at me in disappointment and I hated it.

“Sticking up for me.... I guess?”

“He’s had it coming for a long time....it was nothing,”
Jay shrugged as if it really did mean nothing. I desperately wanted him to say
more, after all of this time trying to avoid him. I was suddenly desperate for
him to be nice to me - to be warm, not all cold and uncaring.

“Charley?”

I looked at him in hope. He was going to say more. He
didn’t really think so little of me, he couldn’t. “Yeah?”

“Can you do me a favour?” Jay said, as though he didn’t
really want to be asking anything of me at all.

“Sure,” I said. Of course I would do him a favour, it was
the least I owed him, right?

“Can you get Sarah round here early?”

“Sarah?....Oh.” I couldn’t hide my surprise or maybe it
was disappointment. What did he want Sarah for? She is SO not his type.

“I’ll try.” I finally answered. That was if Sarah was
ever going to speak to me again but I didn’t say that. I didn’t want Jay to
think I’m an absolute bitch to everyone.

“Cheers,” Jay muttered and let himself in. All at once I
felt really cold, I was actually freezing. I shivered and then I finally opened
my front door.

I sat at the bottom of the stairs and took a huge deep
breath. How was I going to make everything right? I pulled my mobile out of my
pocket and scrolled down to Sarah’s name. I wondered if Sarah would even bother
to answer. She had looked pretty upset earlier and could I blame her? We’d
always told each other everything since forever and I hadn’t told her one of
the major things in my life.

“Hello,” Sarah finally replied. She still sounded put
out.

“Sarah, I’m sorry!” I said quickly, I heard Sarah huff
but I carried on anyway, “I didn’t tell you right away because after ‘it’ had
happened, I didn’t hear from Sam all weekend and I knew what you and Bex would
have said about him...”

“We’d have been right!” Sarah butted in, even though I
was trying to explain to her at about a million miles an hour.

“....and then I hardly heard from him all
week....and....”

“And then he moved onto your sister.” Sarah finished off
the sentence for me.

“Well....yeah,” I sighed.

“He’s scum Charley, I’m furious....”

“I’m so sorry....”

“I’m furious with
him,
not you. I never could stay
mad at you for long, could I?” Sarah’s voice had softened towards me and I
breathed a huge sigh of relief.

“Come over then....someone’s been asking for you.”

“Who?” Sarah said. She sounded totally
confused.                    

“Ah, you’ll have to come over, but he asked me to get you
over here early.”

“Who is it? Please tell me it’s someone half decent!”
Sarah sounded excited now as she giggled down the other end of the phone.

“You could say that,” I said sadly, but Sarah was too
busy squealing in excitement to Bex, so I said my goodbyes and then headed
upstairs to tackle my next challenge.

“Ella, can I talk to you for a sec?” I interrupted Ella
and Aimie’s pre-party preparations and they didn’t look too pleased about it.
In fact they just stared at me as if I was a complete inconvenience by taking
up their precious time which they could have used to apply even more layers of
make-up.

“What?” Ella snapped as she stepped into the hallway.

“It’s about this dumb bet....”I started.

“Ha! You know you can’t do it! That’s it, isn’t it?
You’ve finally realised that someone like you could never get someone like
Riley to like you!” Ella was prodding me in the shoulder and it took all of my
strength to not slap her and swallow what I was about to say and carry on with
the stupid bet just to prove to Ella she was wrong! But I knew I couldn’t and I
shouldn’t and I really didn’t want to, it wasn’t right (even if Jay was right
and Riley was a creep).

“Um....I don’t like Riley anymore, so I want out of this
stupid bet.” I chewed my lip as I watched Ella throw back her head and roar
with laughter.

“You don’t like Riley? As if Charley! Just because you’ve
come to your senses and you’ve realised you don’t stand a chance, you want out
of the bet.” Ella was shaking her head in disbelief. “We shook on it and a bet
is a bet!” And then she just barged past me back into the bedroom, “You’re such
a loser, Charley!”  she said as she turned and slammed our bedroom door in
my face.

Realistically it went as well as I could have expected.
As if someone as shallow as Ella would understand? I knew there was only one
thing I could do now that would stop anymore bitchiness over the stupid bet,
but that would have to wait.

Obviously I wasn’t even welcome in my own room, so I ran
downstairs to the kitchen and hoped I was right in thinking my favourite skinny
jeans and top were in the tumble dryer. For once my luck was in. No need to barge
my way into Aimie and Ella’s make shift beauty salon. I got changed in the
downstairs loo away from the witches upstairs.

I retrieved my make-up from my bag and did it the way I always
liked it and I felt great that I actually looked like me again and not like the
‘someone’ I was pretending to be, the person that Riley liked.

“You’re wearing that for the party?” Sarah asked me when
they’d finally made it over.

“It’s very you,” Bex smiled at me. She gets it, she
totally gets it and I think maybe Sarah was beginning to get it too as she
nodded at me.

“You look nice,” I smile at Sarah. I can tell she’s made
a massive effort.

“Now tell me who has been asking for me!”

“Let’s go and find out,” I said as I slipped on my
leather jacket and put an arm around Sarah. I’m so glad she’s not still mad at
me. She wriggles away because I’m obviously messing her hair up that she’s
spent hours on but that’s just her! “Never change,” I laugh at her.

“You neither,” Sarah replies and I smile because I’m
never going to change for anyone ever again.

When I got to next door I didn’t even bother to knock, I
just pushed the front door open. I could hear that there were a few people
already there. I was right - I saw Riley’s stupid mates already drinking but I
didn’t see Jay. I pushed past them. They seemed to have taken a liking to Sarah
now, but I just carried on towards the kitchen.

“Hey,” I said as I spotted Jay raiding the fridge with
Luke. Jay looked up at me expectantly.

“She’s here,” I muttered and signalled behind me, Sarah
was just following me in. She started chatting to the boys and I helped myself
to a drink with Bex. It wasn’t long before the noise level began to rise and I
knew more and more people were turning up to take advantage of the parent-free
house. I had an overwhelming urge to leave because I so didn’t want to be here.

“Don’t go....yet!” Bex grabbed my arm as I’d already made
my way into the lounge.

“Ok....for a little while.” I nodded, I only agreed
because Bex looked so horrified at the thought of me leaving her here on her
own.

Riley was already in his element in the centre of his
dumb mates, swigging cans of lager and laughing too loudly. Bloody idiots, they
didn’t seem to have noticed me tonight, now that I didn’t have a tiny and
revealing dress on. They were all too busy leering over Zoe Ryan who had
successfully managed to wear less clothes than anyone else in the room, she was
with her little entourage, all faffing about round her.

I hadn’t seen Zoe this week at dance and she had been
missing from classes over the last couple of weeks. Even when she had been
there she seemed preoccupied and her usually gossipy conversation with some of
the bitchier girls had always been about Sam. Every time she’d mentioned his
name, I’d seen her shoot a dirty look in my direction.

I tapped my glass as I watched Zoe constantly check her
phone and she kept looking towards the door. I hoped Bex didn’t want to stay
too long, I didn’t know if I had the strength to endure this party.

“There you are babe!” Riley smiled a dazzling smile and
strode over to me, “Haven’t you been home yet?” Riley looked at my clothes.
Obviously he’d been hoping for an outfit repeat of yesterday. I didn’t know
what to be more annoyed about - that he’d called me ‘babe’ or the fact that he
was obviously dissing my clothes!

I barely managed a smile, this was awkward and all his
mates were watching too. “Do you wanna take this party somewhere else?” Riley
smiled confidently.

“Like where? I played dumb.

“Like, my room?” Riley grinned and one of his mates
slapped him on the back in approval.

“Nah, not really,” I said without even a hint of a smile.

“Why are you playing so hard to get?” Riley looked put
out, “We both know you like me.” He was back to his cocky self in a matter of
0.5 seconds!

“Not anymore.” I said and even Bex had her eyebrows
raised. I sensed people were trying to listen. Was this a momentous event not
to be missed, a girl turning down Riley Jackson? I could see Zoe was glancing
over in disbelief and I could hear Riley’s mates yelling stuff to Riley like
‘crashed and burned’ and ‘been shot down mate?’

Riley did actually look really pissed off and I felt
awkward because this should really be a private conversation and it was all so
very public. Even Jay was watching from the doorway, as were Luke and Sarah.

“Everyone, Riley’s just been turned down by a Year
Eleven!” one of boys shouted. I felt my face burn because if anyone had been
oblivious to it, they obviously weren’t now. “Found a better bloke, have you?”
The vile boy leered at me.

“As if!” Riley nudged his mate but not in an aggressive
way like he’d done to Jay last night, but more in a male camaraderie sort of
way.

“I‘m sorry, I like someone else.” I said, mainly because
I couldn’t bear to watch anymore of the male bonding as they all laughed and
swayed into each other, spilling booze all over Simon’s carpet.

“What?” Riley had stopped joking around and he looked
really pissed off. “God, I thought you were fun. I didn’t want anything
serious. I didn’t want to marry you or anything!” Riley spat, rejection
obviously didn’t suit him. “I didn’t even want you to be my girlfriend!” Riley
carried on his bitter defence. So that’s how Riley Jackson behaved when his
giant ego was hurt and it wasn’t nice. Actually it was pretty embarrassing.

“Whatever you say Riley,” I said in a very calm voice
considering the situation. “Then we’re good, we both don’t want anything from
each other.” That shut him up and as they all stared at me, I pushed my way
past. It really was time to leave.

“Oi!” Someone had grabbed my arm aggressively, I turned
around to see a sneering Zoe, still holding on to my arm.

“What?” I snapped.