Solitaire, Part 2 of 3 (10 page)

We wind through corridors that seem to materialise in front of our feet. Michael starts whistling. Truham boys give us a lot of funny looks, particularly Michael. One group of older boys shout, “Oi – Michael Holden –
wanker
!” and Michael spins on the spot and produces a strong double thumbs-up in their direction. We pass through a set of double doors and find ourselves in a large maze of lockers, not unlike our own Higgs locker room. It seems empty at first. Until we hear a voice.

“What the
fuck
did you say to them?”

All five of us freeze.

The voice continues. “Because I don’t remember saying that you could spread
lies
about me to your retard sister.”

Whoever else is there murmurs something inaudible. I already know who it is. I think everyone already knows who it is.

I spot Becky’s face. I haven’t seen that expression on her for a very long time.

“Do
not
make me
laugh
. I bet you couldn’t wait to run and tell someone. Everyone knows you’re just an attention-seeking prick. Everyone knows you’re doing it for the attention. And you’re telling your sister lies about us so she can spread shit around? You think you’re so much better than everyone because you don’t eat, and now you’re back at school and, even though you haven’t even
looked
at me since you hooked up with that rugby gay, you think you can spread shit about me that isn’t even fucking true.”

“I don’t know what you think you’ve heard,” says Charlie, louder now, “but I literally haven’t told
anyone
. Anyway, I seriously can’t believe you’re still
terrified
of people finding out.”

There’s a sharp smack and a crash. I start running towards the voices before I realise what I’m doing and I turn the corner of a locker row and Charlie is crumpled on the floor. Ben Hope is in some kind of rage, just hitting Charlie’s face, and there’s blood, and Nick tackles Ben in his side and the pair topple down the row and into the wall at the end, and I’m kneeling down by Charlie and I’m holding my hands up by his face, not daring to touch him, but his eyes are barely open, and I think I’m shaking and everything seems a bit I don’t know and Nick is screaming, “I’LL KILL YOU!” over and over and then Michael and Lucas are dragging Nick away and I’m still just sort of sitting there with my little brother with my shaking hands, wishing that I hadn’t woken up this morning, I hadn’t woken up yesterday, I hadn’t ever woken up—

“That dick deserves it!” Ben shouts, panting. “He’s a fucking liar!”

“He didn’t even say anything to me,” I say, calm at first. Then I’m screaming it. “HE DIDN’T EVEN SAY ANYTHING TO ME!”

Everyone is silent. Ben is breathing heavily. What I thought was attractive about him has now died and been cremated.

Michael kneels down with me, leaving Nick in the care of Lucas. He clicks his fingers lightly next to Charlie’s ear. Charlie stirs and his eyes open.

“Do you know my name?” asks Michael, not Michael any more, someone entirely different, someone serious, someone all-knowing.

After a pause, Charlie croaks: “Michael Holden.” Then he grins manically. “Holden … funny …”

Something changes in Nick and in one swift movement he’s down on the floor with us. He takes Charlie into his arms. “Do we need to take him to hospital? What hurts?”

Charlie lifts his hand, waves a finger at his face, then drops it. “I think … I’m fine.”

“Maybe he’s concussed,” says Nick.

“I don’t want to go to the hospital,” says Charlie firmly. His eyes have focused.

I look around. Becky appears to have vanished and Ben is struggling to his feet and Lucas doesn’t seem to know what to do with himself.

Charlie stands up surprisingly quickly. He wipes away a smear of blood. He’ll have bruises, but at least his nose is still straight. He looks at Ben. Ben looks back and that’s when I see it in Ben’s eyes.

Fear.

“I’m not going to tell,” says Charlie, “because I’m
not
a dick like you.” Ben scoffs, but Charlie ignores it. “But I think that you should at least try and be honest with yourself, even if you can’t be honest with everyone else. It’s just sad, you know?”

“Get away from me,” Ben snarls, but his voice wobbles, sort of like he’s on the verge of tears. “Just fuck off with your boyfriend, for fuck’s sake.”

Nick very nearly lunges for the second time, but I see him fight to stop himself.

Ben catches my eye as we leave. I stare at him and his expression changes from hatred to what I hope might be regret. I doubt it. I want to be sick. I try to think of something to say to him, but nothing summarises it. I hope I’m making him want to die.

Someone places a hand round my arm and I turn my head.

“Come on, Tori,” says Lucas.

So I do.

On our way out, Lucas with a hand on my back, Nick and Michael supporting Charlie who is still a bit wobbly, we pass Becky, who has for some reason pushed herself to the end of another locker row. We lock eyes. I know she’s going to break up with Ben. She has to break up with Ben. She must have heard everything. She’s my best friend. Charlie is my brother.

I don’t understand what has happened.

“Should we feel sorry for Ben?” someone asks, maybe Michael.

“Why are there no happy people?” someone else asks, maybe me.

SOMEONE CALLS ME
on my mobile at 9.04am, but I’m in bed and my phone is more than an arm’s length away so I just let it ring on. At 9.15am, someone rings the house phone and Charlie comes into my room, but I keep my eyes closed and pretend I’m still asleep and Charlie goes away. My bed whispers at me to stay. My curtains block out daytime.

At 2.34pm, Dad throws my door open and huffs and mutters and I suddenly feel sick so after another five minutes I go downstairs and sit on the sofa in the living room.

Mum comes in to get some ironing.

“Are you going to get dressed?” she asks.

“No, Mum. I’m never going to get dressed ever again. I’m going to live in my pyjamas until my death.”

She doesn’t say anything else. She leaves.

Dad comes into the living room. “Alive then?”

I say nothing because I do not feel alive.

Dad sits next to me. “Are you going to tell me what’s wrong?”

No, I am not.

“You know, if you want to be happier, you have to
try
. You have to put in the effort. Your problem is that you don’t try.”

I do try. I have tried. I have tried for sixteen years.

“Where’s Charlie?” I ask.

“Round Nick’s.” Dad shakes his head. “Still can’t believe Charlie got himself hit in the face with a cricket bat. That kid really does attract misfortune.”

I do not say anything.

“Are you going to go out today?”

“No.”

“Why not? What about Michael? You could spend the day with him again.”

I don’t really reply and Dad looks at me.

“What about Becky? I haven’t seen her round here for quite a while.”

I don’t reply again.

He sighs and rolls his eyes. “
Teenagers,
” he says, as if the mere state of being a teenager explains every single thing about me.

And then he leaves, huffing and puffing and sighing.

I sit in my duvet on my bed, a diet lemonade in one hand and my phone in the other. I find Michael’s number in my contacts and press the green button. I don’t know why I’m calling him. I think it might be Dad’s fault.

It goes straight to voicemail.

I drop the phone on the bed and roll over so I am completely under the covers.

Of course I can’t expect him to just show up any old time. He has a life after all. He has a family and coursework and stuff. His entire existence doesn’t revolve around mine.

I am a narcissist.

I rummage around the sheets and eventually locate my laptop. I flip it up. If ever in doubt about anything, my first port of call is always Google.

And I am certainly in doubt. About everything.

I type ‘Michael Holden’ into the search bar and press Enter.

Michael Holden isn’t an overly uncommon name. Lots of other Michael Holdens show up, particularly Myspace pages. Since when was Myspace still a thing? Lots of Twitter profiles also show up, but I can’t find my Michael Holden’s Twitter. He doesn’t seem to be the sort of guy who would have Twitter. I sigh and close my laptop. At least I tried.

And then, as if I’d summoned him with the closing of my laptop, my phone begins to ring. I pick it up. Michael Holden’s name glares on the screen. With a kind of enthusiasm entirely unknown to me, I press the green button.

“Hello?”

“Tori! What is up?”

It seems to take me longer than necessary to say something in reply.

“Erm … er, not a lot.”

Behind Michael’s voice, the low chatter of a crowd can be heard.

“Where are you?” I ask. “What’s happening?”

This time it’s he who pauses. “Oh, yeah, I didn’t tell you, did I? I’m at the rink.”

“Oh. Do you have practice or something?”

“Er, no. It’s, erm … I’ve got a sort of competition today.”

“A competition?”

“Yeah!”

“What competition?”

He pauses again. “It’s, er, it’s kind of … it’s the National Youth Speed Skating Semi-Finals.”

My stomach gives up.

“Look, I’ve got to go. I promise I’ll call you when it’s finished, yeah? And then I’ll see you tonight!”

“… yeah.”

“Okay, talk later!”

He hangs up the phone. I remove it from my ear and stare at it.

National Youth Speed Skating Semi-Finals.

That’s not just some stupid local competition.

That’s—

That’s
important.

That’s what he was going to invite me to today, but I’d said no, I’d said I was hanging out with
Lucas
. And then I decided to avoid Lucas anyway.

Without any further hesitation, I leap out of bed.

I park Charlie’s bike outside the rink. It’s 4.32pm and dark. I’ve probably missed it. I don’t know why I even tried, but I did. How long are speed-skate races?

Why didn’t Michael tell me about this before?

I run, yes, actually run, through the empty foyer and the double doors into the stadium. A scattering of supporters fill the stadium seating around the rink and, to my right, psyched-up skaters sit on benches. Some of them could be sixteen, some could be twenty-five. I am not good at judging boy ages.

I walk closer to the plastic casing of the rink and make my way around until I find the gate where the casing isn’t so high. I stare over.

There’s a race going on. For a moment, I don’t know where I’m looking or who I’m looking for because they all look exactly the same in these ridiculous suits that are like catsuits and rounded helmets. Eight guys blast past me and the rush of air tears at my face and my hair that I definitely forgot to sort out before I left the house, and they lean round the corners of the rink, so close to the ice, brushing it with their fingertips. I don’t understand how they don’t just fall over.

When they pass me the second time, that’s when I see him; he turns his head, showing me his bulbous eyes behind large goggles and a ridiculously concrete expression. The eyes find me and his body turns, his hair swept backwards, and his face, beyond surprised, stays parallel to mine. I know instantly that something has changed.

He stares. At me maybe. His whole face expands, it illuminates, and all else seems to fade into fog and I place a hand against the plastic casing and everything inside me rushes to my feet.

I’m not sure if he really sees me. I don’t cheer. I just stand there.

He pulls out in front. The crowd screams, but then some other blur of a boy flies from the group, and he’s reached Michael, and he’s passed Michael, and I realise that the race is over and Michael has come second.

I back away from the rink and shelter myself slightly behind the stands as the skaters make their way to the gate. Older men in tracksuits greet the boys, and one of them pats Michael on the back, but something is wrong, something is very wrong, something about Michael is wrong.

He’s not ‘Michael Holden’.

He’s removed his skates and goggles. He takes off his helmet and gloves and drops them on to the floor.

His face contorts into a kind of scrunched-up snarl, his fists curl so his skin drains of colour, and he storms past the man and tramps over to the benches. He reaches a row of lockers and looks into them, blankly, chest visibly expanding and contracting. With an almost terrifying malice, he throws a crazed punch at the lockers, wailing a subdued howl of rage. Turning, he hurls a kick at a pile of racing helmets, scattering them about the floor. He clutches his hair, as if trying to pull it out.

I’ve never seen Michael like this.

I know I shouldn’t be so surprised. I haven’t even known Michael for three weeks. But my perceptions of people rarely change and, when they do, it’s never this drastic. It’s weird how you see someone who smiles all the time and you assume that they’re happy all the time. It’s weird how someone is nice to you and you assume that they’re a wholly ‘good person’. I did not think Michael could be so serious about something, or so angry. It’s like watching your dad cry.

What scares me the most, though, is that absolutely no person in this entire swarm of human beings seems to notice.

So I barge my way towards him. I’m furious. I hate all these people for not caring. I’m hurling them out of the way as I walk, Michael Holden never leaving my eyesight. I reach him, breaking out of the crowd, and watch as he begins to manically attack some piece of paper that he had in his pocket. For several seconds, I don’t really know what to do about it. But I then find myself saying:

“Yes, Michael Holden. Tear that fucking paper.”

He drops everything, spins round and points directly at me.

The anger softens into sadness.

“Tori,” he says, but I don’t hear it, I only see his mouth form the words.

He’s wearing a catsuit and he’s quite red and his hair is slick with sweat and his eyes are spinning in an electrified fury, but it’s
him.