What You Become (9 page)

The all-American girls on the telly were neat and polished and attractive. It was the same way Alisha was attractive, in a manicured, careful way that took hours behind doors. It was nice – but could I
like
her? Could I kiss her and hold her hand and . . . I shook my head without meaning to, and Mum asked me what was up again, and I wanted so badly to tell her, to let her help, because she was wise, and open, and what harm could it do?

But then a gorgeous girl with lush auburn hair and expert make-up kissed a beautiful black-haired boy and I thought of Kiaru, and my nerves pinged, not because he was a boy, but because kissing
him
made sense. I could imagine it. I could imagine it so well. My eyes closed, then flew open, remembering I was lying beside my mum. I prayed I hadn’t sighed or anything, and as the screen kiss dragged on I had to work really hard not to fidget until, finally, the shot changed. Mum let out a breath and I realized I’d been holding my breath too.

Maybe we weren’t ready to talk about any potential lesbianism just yet.

The black-haired boy got on a motorbike and he was nothing like Kiaru really, except the way he put one hand in his back pocket.

Of course, he wasn’t interested in a girl like me! He probably wasn’t interested in any of the girls at our school. He probably liked older girls who knew what capoeira was and didn’t blush at the sound of their own name. He probably liked girls that had faces for television, girls like Charlie Fielding or Mia Lewis like every other boy in our year.

Charlie was his girl next door. Literally. The thought made my stomach roil with anxiety. How had he managed to escape the notice of the popular girls? And when were they going to claim him?

On screen the scenic fake-teen girls talked about being friends forever, and the thought of Monday at school heavied my stomach. When Alisha found out I wasn’t in the closet, would she stop talking to me? Would they let me finish the project with them, or was I back to doing a one-woman show?

‘Fidgeting hell, Rose. Can you stay in one position? I feel like I’m on a boat.’

‘I don’t feel well.’

Mum’s tone changed, and she shifted position so her hand could reach my forehead. ‘What’s the matter, baby? You don’t feel hot.’

‘I feel sick,’ I said in a small voice. Usually I told her off for calling me ‘baby’.

‘Do you feel sick or do you need to be sick?’ she said carefully, because as a kid, I used to have a problem recognizing the difference, resulting in gross carpets and car mats and on one occasion, a gross granny’s handbag.

‘I just need to lie still,’ I said, and after checking I was absolutely certain I wasn’t going to blow, Mum did what I had hoped she would. Lying just behind me she drew her cool hand over my forehead, until I began to calm a little.

‘Is everything okay, Boo?’ she said. ‘Did something happen at your new friend’s house?’

I closed my eyes.

‘You can talk to me. You know that don’t you?’ she said. ‘I miss our talks.’

There was a burning sensation in my nose because I missed our talks too, but I was so scared of getting it wrong again that I just gave her a cuddle and breathed in her smell, and it was almost, almost enough.

Eighteen

On Monday morning, after an awkward hello in our form room, Alisha linked my arm to walk to Drama. Kiaru strode off ahead, so it was just the two of us, and I wondered if they’d planned this or if he was naturally considerate. Alex and Charlie passed with their arms round each other, Mia tagging along at the side, tugging her too-short skirt down as she walked. Her legs were amazing, perfectly proportioned with lovely slender ankles.

Still it looked annoying, wearing a short skirt like that; trousers were more comfortable for sure. Mia always looked self-conscious. You could imagine her straight after school, taking off her tight shirt and short skirt, and putting on the biggest, baggiest pyjamas she could find. The three of them melted into the mass of navy-blue-clad kids making their way to first lesson.

‘I hope you aren’t offended that I thought you were a lesbian,’ Alisha said quietly, and I shook my head violently. We were going to discuss it? I’d assumed it would be this huge elephant following us around the school until we sat our GCSEs, and here she was just pulling me up on to its saddle with her. What new world was this?

‘It was just something about you . . . you know. You don’t wear make-up, and you leave your hair nice and natural, and you always wear oversized shirts and jumpers and pumps. And then you and Ti seemed basically married . . .’

‘I wasn’t offended,’ I said honestly. ‘It was . . . nice. It was just . . . unexpected.’

‘I hope it hasn’t weirded you out. I really do want to be friends.’

‘Me too!’

‘And I don’t want you to think I’m ashamed, because I’m not. I’m so not, it’s untrue. It’s just my mum is religious, and my sister’s still in sixth form, and so . . . I can’t really parade it.
Yet
.’

‘Okay.’

‘But I’m not going to be all lovesick over you or anything, I promise. I want a girlfriend. Like, an actual 100% lesbian who wants to lick my bits and everything. You know? I’m ready. I’m going to make it happen.’

I nodded, impressed, and again I thought of Ti. Her and Alisha would probably hit it off, if they ever got the chance to talk properly.

It was a nice walk on a clear day like today, because the Drama block was set a little apart from the rest of school, and so you had to cross the playing fields, and beyond those the common’s long grass rippled in the wind.

Kiaru was up ahead, with the rest of the class, waiting for Chase to come and unlock the building, and I noticed that he stood near Charlie and Alex, nodding at something Charlie said. I felt a spike of jealousy dig in between my shoulder blades.

‘How about Ti?’ Alisha said, and I tried to recall what she’d been saying. ‘Is she gay?’ she prompted, impatiently, and I realized it had never occurred to me. I assumed she liked boys, but she’d never really talked about it.

‘You don’t know?’ Alisha said, leaping on my pause. ‘Well, think about it. Has she ever fancied anyone? Does she talk about boys from school? Because if she doesn’t, maybe she’s like me. Or maybe she really is in love with you . . .’

‘Nooo,’ I said, drawing the word out as though the idea was silly. What a strange thought. I pushed it away. Ms Chase’s vintage high heels clicked on the path behind us, late as usual, and Kiaru was smiling at Charlie now. She bent her head forward and laughed, and my stomach rolled. Alex looked unclear on what was so amusing.

‘Did you think it was Kiaru that liked you?’ Alisha whispered, following my gaze, and I looked at the tarmac so my hair would hide my face.

‘Oh, Rosie, you’re so adorable,’ Alisha whispered. ‘If only you could see yourself.’

‘I should have thought about that,’ she said, sadly.

‘Sorry, sorry, sorry!’ Chase trilled unapologetically, overtaking us. She sounded so fake as she greeted her favourites, and I wondered if she was ever genuine. Maybe if you devoted your whole life to pretending, you forgot how to tell the difference between truth and lies. Maybe you spent the whole time in character.

Since Charlie got cast as Sandra Dee, she’d started wearing a red ribbon around her ponytail, and looking around wide-eyed, like she was shocked by everyday things like insults and wedgies and swearing.

Kiaru had pulled an extra seat over to their double table, and I placed my bag there shyly. Chase didn’t notice the new arrangement. There were only two weeks until show night, and some of her ‘stars’ were in this class, which made the rest of us invisible.

She opened a list of questions on the projector, and told us to get on with it, then went to sit with Charlie, Alex and Mia, talking intently as though plotting to save the world. The whole class started chatting, catching up about the weekend and who fancied who. Drama in the last weeks of term was a total doss. It was why me and Ti had taken it.

‘So, we still need to work on our Drama project,’ Kiaru said, and Alisha started laughing.

‘Yeah, what is it?’ I said, confused, and Alisha nudged me with her shoulder.

‘Silly, it was you.’

Kiaru smiled, and a warm volt of contentment spread through me: I had a force field again.

Alisha was listing every single famous and non-famous female she fancied when Will arrived in class. Chase waved him over, and he pulled up a seat with the chosen ones, vanilla hair flicked up like a Mr Whippy. I whispered his new name, and Kiaru laughed out loud for once, which sent a flush of glee through me.

Will pretended not to notice the girls elbowing each other. He was used to it by now. He played guitar and wrote his own songs, and when he occasionally busked on the pier girls from school would set up camp around him, singing along as though he were already famous. Everyone had been surprised when he asked Ophelia out because he was like a healthy clean-cut boy-band member, and she was the kind of teenage girl that scorns cheesy boy bands.

Kiaru and Alisha were confused when Will waved to me, and I explained how we’d played together when we were little, when I was still friends with Charlie, and then, seeing how interested they were, I told them about him and Ophelia reuniting and her suspicions about Chase, and they agreed to help me spy on him.

‘I’ll tell you if he takes any other girls back to his house,’ Kiaru said.

‘And I’ll flirt with him at rehearsal,’ Alisha said. ‘Test his resolve.’

By rights, Alisha should have been sitting with the chosen ones, seeing as she had a speaking part – she was the annoying preppy girl who befriended Sandy at the start of the story – but Chase hadn’t invited her to sit with them, and we could tell it stung. Because she told us, every three minutes.

She threw herself into watching Will instead, and I began to feel uneasy. Ophelia and Will were supposed to be a secret after all, and Fab would go all Godfather if he found out.

We watched as the cast listened rapt to Chase’s advice about singing and controlling nerves, and it was hard to miss the way Will looked at her. The word ‘enthralled’ wasn’t enough, and I wrote it on Alisha’s Drama book in capital letters.

Alisha underlined it about ten times. Kiaru drew lines coming off it, and an exclamation mark after, as though it were being shouted.

Will was talking now, something about authenticity and expressing maximum personality onstage, and we watched for Chase’s response, but she barely looked at him, choosing that moment to scan her noisy class instead. We ducked our heads, pretending to work.

PLAYING HARD TO GET
, Kiaru wrote when we felt her attention leave us.

A few minutes later, Will pointed to a note on his clipboard, and his finger brushed Chase’s as she leaned in to look. Alisha bashed her thigh against mine.

UNNECESSARY BODY CONTACT!!!!!
she wrote.
THAT’S WHAT I DID TO TEST YOU. (YOU LOVED IT.)

I guffawed by mistake, and Chase’s attention hurtled towards us. Coughing, I stared earnestly at the whiteboard, then scribbled in my book. I mouthed the words of one of the questions to myself, frowning as though I were trying to get to grips with it.

Consider how character can be revealed through action.

Me darting through the gap in Chase’s fence leapt into my mind. I pictured myself preparing Mum’s breakfast tray this morning instead.

Chase returned to her avid cast.

GUILTY!
Alisha wrote.

At break time Kiaru told me that Alisha had shifted her attentions to a tall, confident girl with purple hair called Ava Berry.

‘She falls in love a lot,’ he admitted, as we watched her beaming at Ava in line for the tuck shop. I felt a pang of something like foolishness or disappointment, but it vanished as quickly as it came because Kiaru leaned in to whisper in my ear, and his breath there sent a shiver all the way down my back.

‘There go the lovers,’ he said, and Will walked past the canteen with Chase. He handed a pile of books to her, and we watched as he laughed at something she said, before handing her a piece of paper. He looked at her in a slightly mooning way, and she smiled wide, and it looked for a second like maybe something really was going on between them.

As if sensing our scrutiny, Chase looked around. She dismissed Will with a curt nod, but the change only made it seem more suspicious. Scanning the books he’d left behind, with the piece of paper in her hand, she seemed overly aware of her visibility. It was a feeling I was familiar with, and I recognized it in the way that she held herself. Kiaru dug his elbow into my side, and I returned the motion, and we went back and forth like that, delighted with this new piece of evidence of the affair.

‘A love letter!’ I said.

It wasn’t until afterwards that I felt guilty.

The thrill of Kiaru’s elbow pressed against me had made me forget what an affair between Will and Chase would mean for Ti. Ophelia would be heartbroken if Will cheated with anyone, but she’d be suicidal if it was with Chase. And Ti had sworn me to secrecy. What was I thinking blurting it out to Kiaru and Alisha like it was all a game?

From: [email protected]

To: [email protected]

Sent: Wednesday, 21 March, 08:42:16

Subject: Re: re: Warfare

You’re totally gay! At least we know now, and you won’t have to spend your whole life in the closet. Tell Joey I can’t wait to see the jellyfish. Lion’s manes are the best. Maybe you can bring it to the café on Saturday? Mum got Dad to agree that if you pop by, I can have my lunch break with you. We can have the good batch of Parmigiana, before it all goes . . . Plus we’ve got that fancy lemonade in that you like.

Some brute punched me in the back of the head at school today. This horrible tall boy called Leon Woodhouse just walked up behind me and
wham
. He has a ratty moustache and lips that are always wet. I just want to wipe his mouth for him. How hard can it be? It wasn’t that bad a whack, but still. WTF? Everyone thought it was really funny, like this clever prank. God. So yeah. I now have a lump the size of an egg on the back of my head.