13 Minutes (19 page)

Becca’s eyes darted upwards, no doubt to the curtains and the rigging and wondering what she can do with them. She’s actually quite creative in a very logistical way, and our theatre can cope with that. This is a Performing Arts school so the Music and Drama departments had a big influx of money. Local am-dram groups (and how tragic is that? Sad old wrecks of people clinging to dreams long gone) use the facilities for their summer shows when the school is shut.

When we had a break, while the others huddled together, I went and joined her. I said it looked good, although I wasn’t really sure what I was looking at. She was sketching in charcoal and it was a bit like seeing a designer’s drawing of a dress and trying to picture the real thing.

‘I’m thinking of doing it in the round,’ she said, ‘with the audience on all sides. Then the main cast could be constantly onstage, observing from the sides when they’re not in a scene.’

‘That’s really cool,’ I said, and I meant it, too. It’s clever. It feeds into the theme of a community that’s always watching each other.

She smiled. ‘Of course, Mr Jones still has to approve it.’

‘What’s that?’

We both looked up to see Hayley. Her tone was curious, though, rather than snipey.

‘That bit, there,’ she said, stepping a little forward and pointing at a sketch in one corner of the stage.

Becca explained, patiently, that it was the lighting rig. She darted a glance at me, a nod to our secret alliance. ‘It will need re-rigging for the square set-up. Shouldn’t be a problem – Casey can do it, she’s great with heights. And we can leave that first line of lights as they are – the Head might want to do something in here between now and the show.’

Becca was on a roll, at ease with her own subject, but I could see Hayley was at a loss. She’s not really logistical. It was just scribbling on paper to her.

‘I was going to have a quick smoke?’ she said. ‘You want to come?’ She didn’t look at me, but bright pink spots appeared high on her cheeks.

‘Sure,’ Becca said, after a minute. ‘Why not?’

She was good. She didn’t even glance back as they sauntered off. I looked over at Jenny. She’d locked eyes momentarily with Hayley.

Everything was in the subtext, there in the noise of the theatre. The secrets hummed inside us.

What web are you weaving?
I wondered as I looked from one of my perfect
Forever Friends
to the other. Jenny, nervous Jenny, rabbit-in-the-headlights, looked my way. I dropped my head to examine Becca’s drawings again.

‘They’re good, aren’t they?’ It was a voice like a leaking tap, wet and irritating. Hannah. I didn’t answer, just looked at her with disdain, let out a lazy sigh of a laugh and walked away. Hannah got her bag and left after that. I saw her texting someone. Probably telling Becca she was going. She was mad at me, but underneath it she was still Becca’s lapdog. She’s always been like that. Even since nursery. I remember her wetting her pants three times. She’d been
that
girl.

*

Finally rehearsals were done and our improvisations applauded. There was an excitement in the air, as if we all knew this play could be something special if we got it right. We had to be a team, Mr Jones said, but what he really meant is that we’re like a cheerleading pyramid. Those at the bottom must support those of us at the top.

Once everyone had taken their turn to drink a private mouthful from the well of Mr Jones and he’d left the theatre, the group fractured. Jenny muttered something about lockers and disappeared towards the main school building, and me, Hayley and Becca wandered outside, our casual strolls belying our internal tensions.

Becca was in the middle, a dark thorn between white roses, as we went out into the crisp night. It was gone half-five but it was still busy. Ours was not the only after-school activity and boys in dirty football kits climbed into the back of waiting 4x4s or headed off, laughing and jeering at each other, to the parade of shops where they would no doubt wolf down bags of greasy chips.

My stomach rumbled. How wonderful to be a boy, to be able to eat like that. For eating like that to be a badge of pride rather than a crime.

Someone called, ‘Natasha! Hayley!’ and a hand waved, and I frowned. I couldn’t make out the figure, only an outline against the glare of the headlights. A shape in the darkness. I wondered if it would whisper my name next. I didn’t count the line of cars. I knew it would be thirteen.

‘Is that your dad?’ Becca said. It was. Of course it was. I felt such a flood of relief and then silly for my momentary panic. I had nothing to panic about. (If Dr Harvey ever does read this, she’s really going to think I’m bonkers and will lock me up. I’d rather burn it first.)

Then Hayley asked, happy, ‘What’s he doing here?’ I think maybe she has a little crush on my dad, gross as that sounds. We finally reached him, Hayley first, then me and then Becca, the awkward tag-along. He must have finished early so come by to give us a lift. We three came down the last few steps to the road to find him smiling. Pleased with his surprise.

‘I could have walked, Dad.’ I sounded bored. His smile didn’t falter, though. He was determined to feel good about this.

‘Well, I’m here now. And it’s cold,’ he said. ‘Hayley – you can come for dinner if you want. There’s always enough to feed an army.’ He finally saw Becca, the afterthought, who half-waved and then went back to texting. Hannah, no doubt. Making their peace once my dad’s surprise to see her reminded Becca she wasn’t a Barbie. Whatever she is, she’s not one of us.

‘I’m quite tired, actually,’ I said. ‘And I’ve got some work to do.’ I smiled at Hayley as if butter wouldn’t melt and she instantly said it was cool, although I know she was smarting with disappointment.

‘Do you want a lift? I can drop Tasha then drop you after? It’s only an extra five minutes.’ It dawned on me, in a horrific moment, that maybe my dad fancied Hayley a little bit, too, and I could sense her hesitancy. It was cold and the buses are crap during rush hour. I gave her no hint which way to go, my face impassive.

‘No, it’s okay, Gary,’ she said eventually, coming up with an excuse about meeting Jenny. The second she did, I offered Becca a lift – sticking the knife in and twisting it a little.

‘No,’ she said. ‘It’s fine. Honestly.’

I didn’t argue. I actually wanted some quiet time in the car anyway, and it’s not as if me and Bex could talk about anything that mattered in front of my dad. He’d think we were crazy. What the hell does he know about anything, anyway? They think they understand us, but they don’t. We’re still children to them.

I hoped Becca wasn’t seeing Aiden this evening. Maybe he’d be too busy worrying about being arrested to want to meet up. Maybe he’d even been arrested. No. He can’t have. I’d know – they’d have told me. I am the golden thirteen-minutes-dead girl. It irritates me that he comes first with Becca all the time, though. I mean,
Aiden
? I just don’t get it. This is important. This really is life or death. This is me.

*

They’re wriggling like maggots on fish hooks, my best friends. That’s what I thought when I finished talking to Becca. I lay on my bed and tapped the phone against the duvet as I considered it all, my eyes wandering absently over the chessboard. Becca is good at reporting back. She gives pretty much every word – she knows what to remember. No vague,
Well, they kind of said this.
Or,
It was something like that.
The details matter and Becca knows it.

She said that when they went for a smoke, Hayley was curious. That’s no surprise. Wanted to know what I could remember. Becca said she had no idea. Hayley was doing her best to be nice to her, though. Edgy. Nervous. Apologising for being a bitch and reminiscing about the old days. Saying we should all hang out more. Becca played along – just enough but not too much. Nice but slightly wary. She asked Hayley if we’d really had an argument and Hayley denied it again but Becca said she was tense. Wouldn’t look her in the eye. So Becca changed the subject. Didn’t want to push too hard.

It’s interesting that their first move is to try and make friends with Becca, maybe thinking Becca will be so grateful she’ll tell them whatever it is I’ve ‘remembered’ (as if). It’s so transparent. Surely they must see that? But I guess they don’t have a choice. Maybe they’re desperate already, seeing the battle lines I’m drawing. My stomach tightens thinking about it. Everything is unsettled.

I checked Facebook on my phone. Neither of them were online and they hadn’t updated their pages. That’s weird, especially for Hayley. We like to collect our
likes
. Compare numbers. I know she loves it when she gets more than me. As if she can rival me.

I keep checking my notifications. My update when I got home, about loving the play and the people in it, already had more than forty likes and twenty comments, and the girls I’d name-checked had shared the post full of excitement that I’d mentioned them. I didn’t read the comments. Since my accident it’s become Facebook law to like whatever I say. It pretty much was before, to be honest. I’ve sent Bex an ‘add friend’ request. I should have done it already but some things can’t be rushed. This is the right time. We have secrets together now. We should at least be Facebook friends.

I looked up Aiden’s page, too, on a whim. It’s not public so I couldn’t really see anything except his profile picture, which was him playing guitar onstage in some dingy club somewhere, his hair sweaty over his face (
oh god of course it’s all the wannabe rock star pose clichés and oh god I’m such a bitch
) and his cover photo’s some band I’ve never heard of and never want to hear of, but it does say he’s in a relationship with Rebecca ‘Bex’ Crisp and that he’s a
full-time musician
. I remembered his face as I laughed at him on the ground and my fingers flew over the small keyboard. I hit ‘add friend’ and then I hit ‘message’.

Hey, I just wanted to say hi and I don’t think you had anything to do with what happened to me. Just so you know. Tasha xo.

My stomach fluttered when I sent it and I still worry that maybe I shouldn’t have messaged, especially since the police have been interested in him, but it’s done now. I did one more scan for Hayley and Jenny online but they were still silent.

When I glanced back at the chessboard, I could suddenly see my next move. Becca has taken a knight and two pawns, but we’d both played aggressively and she wasn’t without losses of her own. Suddenly I knew how to force her queen out of safety and take one of her bishops. I texted her the move.

And I sent Jenny a text to shake her up a bit and make them sweat over the weekend.

What did you do, Jen?

I know you and Hayley did something.

The phone buzzed at once but it was just Becca.

Good move! Cow!

It was, I decided, when I got no answer from Jenny. It
was
a good move. Were they in a panicked phone call now? What would they be saying? I imagined them wriggling on hooks again and slowly, in my head, they morphed into maggots, blind and stupid and desperate to be free.

*

I was still thinking of maggots when I went to bed. I didn’t want to be, but I was. I imagined them bubbling out of Nicola Munroe’s distorted, blue corpse. I imagined her loose skin sliding off her as they pulled her from the river, and maybe maggots or something wriggling free into the freezing water. It made me itch all over. I took deep breaths and tried to think of other things. The play. The uneven ground of my friendships. The clearing. I wished I could put my trainers on and go out for a run and not think about any of it, but then I’d have to explain my secret jogging and my muddy, sweaty clothes, and neither my mum nor my dad would understand my need for
privacy please
.

I turned the light off when I had to, after shouting my obligatory goodnight down the stairs and locking myself in so Mum couldn’t invade my space by checking on me. They used to get it, my need for space, but since the accident she’s become quite clingy. She touches my hair, like she used to when I was small, and when she lets her guard down – or maybe it’s when she’s had too much wine – I see all that fear in her eyes. The fear of what might have happened, what nearly had. I feel sorry for her, but I can’t help her.
I
survived it.
I’m
the one who was dead for thirteen minutes. If I can get over it, she can.

Dr Harvey suggested Nytol might help me sleep after I turned down proper sleeping pills. I didn’t want anything too strong. Nothing that could drown me in sleep. I have to stay in control. I’m not sure if they work or not but I took them anyway. I think maybe they do a little bit. I know my breathing slowed, even as I fought the encroaching darkness, me and my head full of maggots clinging to the driftwood of consciousness.

Eventually, though, the endless black claimed me. Perhaps part of me wants to go into the void. Terrified as I am, I’m also fascinated by it. It was cold. Vast. I heard the whispers again.

This time I listened.

When I woke up I didn’t remember what I heard, but I know, as I write this, that I was afraid. I am still afraid.

Thirty

10.14

Jenny

That’s what she just texted me. She knows. The fucking skank bitch remembers! I hate her. I fucking hate her.

10.16

Hayley

Doesn’t say she actually

remembers? Not properly.

10.17

Jenny

This is Tasha. Who the fuck knows? She must remember something! This is such a fuck up.