Truth or Dare

by Non Pratt

  “Moz tweeted about –” Rich peers at the progress bar that’s come up on the screen – “twenty-three minutes ago that the chicken video would go live in half an hour.”

  “I didn’t know you were a Moz fan?” I wriggle my toes on Rich’s back in surprised affection, but he pushes my foot away.

  “I’m not, but I’m a Claire Casey fan and I knew she’d be stressing out over this. Which is why I suggested she came over to my house to watch a film.”

  Behind him, on the sofa, Seren and I exchange a smile and I hand her my phone with the timer set for seven minutes.

  “You can unpause the film, Denver Richards. Claire’s paying attention now.”

  Seven intolerably long minutes later, the timer on my phone goes and without me having to ask, Rich pauses the film and we all squash on the sofa as we gather round my phone.

  SEF

  If you could award Oscars to YouTubers, Moz would be a contender. The full-length video is nothing short of stellar and at the end, there’s a tiny post-credit take of Moz styled up in his “viewer” guise, glasses drawn on his face as he pretends to talk to someone off-camera.

  “Did you see that? Those guys are insane.” He turns back and reaches towards the end as if to press something on the screen. “Donating now…”

  I hadn’t known he was going to do that until he transferred it to me and for all the bravado, all the snark and the sarcasm and the squabbling, in that few seconds, I wanted to kiss him. For all his faults, I guess Moz is as much of a friend to me as he can be.

  CLAIRE

  I couldn’t watch it too many times at Rich’s or my friends would have stopped me. They were horrified enough watching it the first time, Seren with her hands to her face, whispering, “Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God…” through her fingers and Rich with his hand on my arm, squeezing tighter and tighter as we watched the seconds leading up to the moment Sef swerved.

  But at home, with my lights off and the glow of my phone hidden under my duvet, I watch it again, taking in the difference in tone between this video and the food fight. For all Moz’s whooping and Sef’s laughter, it’s not fun. Not just because of me, clearly out of my mind with fear in the passenger seat, but because of the manic edge visible in the way the boys are behaving, like maybe they too were scared…

  Onscreen the video cuts to a shot taken from the back of Mrs Bennet, the silhouette of me pummelling the driver picked out against the light cast from Moz’s headlights.

  He’s not used much of what happened afterwards, keeping the focus solely on him because none of what me and Sef said or did would be usable, but the viewers don’t know that and there’s a lot of concern in the comments asking whether Truth Girl is OK.

  I rewatch it one more time, asking myself quietly whether Dare Boy is OK.

  SEF

  When Claire’s name flashes up on my phone, it’s a sweet release of the tortured anticipation that’s been building since the video went up, because I know that she’ll have seen it. That for all she walked away, she’s still watching.

  The chicken video looks about as terrifying as I remember it. Three screaming face emojis.

  As you said, wouldn’t want you to nearly have died for nothing…

  That sounds so callous.

  Sorry. I know that wasn’t funny. I don’t know what’s wrong with me. Are you OK?

  Nope.

  She’s typing something else.

  You?

  Not really.

  Not about us, Sef. The money side of things…?

  You said you didn’t want to be involved with that.

  I said I didn’t want to watch you try and kill yourself. Doesn’t mean I don’t care about you. (Kind of the opposite, you doofus.)

  Despite everything, I smile at my phone.

  Did you just call me a doofus???

  Yes. Right there, in writing. Get it printed on a T-shirt.

  Even as I smile at the screen, I can feel my throat tightening, sadness swelling inside.

  I know we’re not together, but I want you to know we can still talk.

  What if I don’t want to talk?

  Then I’ll listen to your silence.

  I miss her so much that it’s a physical pang and little snippets of words only make it worse.

  I love you. I type. And then I delete it.

  Nothing I say can make her believe that any more.

  SUNDAY

  CLAIRE

  Although we started the week frosty after my revelation, Mum’s unbent enough to tolerate me eating Parma ham and cereal straight from the packet despite leaving half my dinner each night and on the way to the Recreare, she asks me how I’m feeling.

  “Sad,” I say, truthfully.

  “And you’ve not spoken to him since you broke up?”

  “A couple of messages, Mum. Nothing more.”

  “But you’ll see Seth in school?”

  “Sef,” I correct her. “It’s short for Yousef.”

  “Oh.” That single syllable packs in a large amount of re-evaluation.

  “He’s Kam’s brother.” I nod towards where we’re driving. “The middle one.”

  “Oh.” More frantic recalibrating.

  “That’s why we got talking in the first place.”

  “Will you tell Kam that you’ve broken up with his brother?”

  “I’ve never talked to him about it.” I shrug, not wanting to have to explain to Mum that the nature of Kam’s condition means all our conversations are focused on the things we do together, not apart. Time passes for him differently than it does for me.

  He’s not himself today. Or maybe he’s feeding off my mood – it’s hard to tell – but the closeness I felt last week has faded with the days that have passed and Kam is so withdrawn that he barely even looks at me.

  “Kam?” I try and draw his attention away from where he’s staring out of the window so I can ask if he’d like me to push him closer, but all he does is strain to turn further away.

  I let him, because this is the only way he has of telling me to leave him be.

  Instead, I open up the book and keep reading, assuming that his silence means this is OK. Afterwards, I lay a hand lightly on his arm to attract his attention as I say goodbye, but all Kam does is tug his arm away.

  “Can I have a word, Claire?” Nurse Goethe is waiting in the doorway and I follow her away from Kam’s room down to some chairs by the nurse’s station. Indicating that we should sit, she takes out a sheet of paper from the plastic wallet she has clutched to her chest. “I’ve been keeping a record of your visits and see that you’ve been reading to Kam since the thirtieth of September, but you need to keep visiting until the end of March to fulfil the requirements of this award, is that right?”

  “Yes,” I say. My blood has started to prickle, realization crystallizing inside me.

  “You’ve built a fantastic rapport with Kam in the time you’ve known him and I know you’d hoped to continue reading with him –” everything in me is about to break – “but I’m afraid arrangements are being made to move Kam elsewhere for his Level 2 care.”

  “No.” The word trembles out in a whisper. “Please…”

  Nurse Goethe sees my distress and places a hand on my shoulder. “I’m sorry, Claire, but his family…”

  And I’m too busy shouting at her inside my head to hear her excuses, as if this is a decision made on anything other than money. Money that Kam’s parents have stretched themselves to find, that his uncle’s travelled halfway across the world to make, that Sef and I have risked everything to raise…

  “… we need to look at you reading to someone else after next week.”

  SEF

  No one’s home. Mum, Dad, Amir, they’ve all gone up to see Kam this afternoon. They asked if I wanted to go with them.

  “Come and see him before he has to move,” Mum begged. “You won’t have many more chances, Sef…”

  “I know,” I said. And yet here I stayed.

  Dad
wouldn’t even look at me after I left the dinner table.

  In Kam’s room, I set up the camera, sellotaping a sheet of greaseproof paper on the window in an attempt to diffuse the overbright light beaming onto my face when I sit on the bed.

  There’s been backlash to the way we handled the chicken video. Some of our fans feel like we played them, abusing the relationship I’ve been at pains to build up over the last six months.

  “I owe you an apology,” I tell the camera. “For those of you who thought something serious had happened after last week’s video and who saw the teaser on MozzyMozzaMeepMorp.

  “I’m here to let all of you know that no one got injured when we did the dare.” I close my eyes for a beat, then, “But there are other ways to hurt the people you care about and me and Truth Girl, we…” I swallow back the memory of her fear, the way I’d been so caught up with the excitement of it all that I’d been stupid enough to think that there was a way to charm her out of it. “I really upset her with that prank and I don’t think she’s ever going to forgive me. Are you?” I wish I was saying this to her face and not to the lens of her camera. I think about her watching this, on her phone or her laptop.

  “She shouldn’t, either. Six months ago, Truth Girl thought of a way to help me, to help my brother – our friend – and none of this would have been possible without her. I owe her everything. She’s been my partner in crime, my best friend and my only hope.”

  I rub a hand across my mouth, hiding the way I’m struggling with all this.

  “You might think the worst thing to do is to break a person’s heart, but last Sunday I broke my best friend’s trust. First I let my brother down and now my best friend.” I sniff back the tears. “Everything I love, I ruin. I’m such a fuck-up.” I laugh at myself, bitter and hateful. “He was right. It should have been me. But it wasn’t. And now he’s … it’s … fuck.” It’s too hard and I have to stop because I can’t breathe. Seconds, maybe minutes of filming where I’m just crying on my bed until I’m sick from sorrow, pissed off at how pitiful I am. I need to get this video made, need to get it edited and uploaded.

  I start again, forcing myself to say what needs to be said.

  “I’ve got one more chance to make this right, OK? There isn’t anything more I can do to keep him after this week. We need the money and we need it now. Check out Moz’s channel on Wednesday for another teaser of what I’m going to do. The full thing will go live once we hit the target.”

  I watch myself point to the bottom of the screen where the link will be.

  “One last dare and I’m done. Stay tuned.”

  MONDAY

  CLAIRE

  I’ve been in a foul mood all morning. Something’s wrong with the Wi-Fi and my data ran out at the weekend. I want to know whether Sef has posted a new video on the channel. With all the anger directed at us from our viewers, I don’t see how he can’t…

  Not for the first time, I wish I hadn’t cut myself off from him over half-term. I want to be able to tell him about what Nurse Goethe said on Sunday. It still feels like we’re in this together, even though we’re apart.

  “Give me your phone.” I hold my hand out the second I sit next to Rich on the bus.

  “What? Hey!”

  I know his passcode – it’s the same one he has for his bank card and the alarm at his house. I tap through to our channel, tutting as the bus wobbles, making me clumsy, but there it is, a new upload.

  I take a moment to look at Sef onscreen, refreshing my memory, wondering how it’s possible for even a teeny-tiny thumbnail to give me that familiar gut twist.

  “Are you going to watch it or drool over it?” But Rich doesn’t even wait for an answer before he presses play.

  As I watch, leaning in close to hear the video over the rattle of the bus and the hum of the passengers, I start to get a slow, crawling sense that something is very, very wrong…

  The sixth-formers register at lessons and my best chance of finding Sef at this time in the morning is to go to the common room over in the annex. It is literally my idea of hell, squashing past people idling in the corridor, all of them staring at me as I pass, conspicuous in my uniform.

  I hear someone ask their friend if they know me.

  I hope they don’t.

  I lurk nervously in the doorway, scanning the room for Sef, hoping he’ll see me before I see him.

  “Hi, are you looking for someone?” The voice behind me is female and I turn round to come face to face with Laila.

  Most people look prettier in their selfies than in real life, but not Laila and the sight of her draws all my deepest insecurities to the surface. Why would Sef ever have wanted me when he can have girls like her?

  “Hi, um… I was looking for Sef Malik?” My voice rises too high at the end and I have to clear my throat.

  Laila’s smile falters a little. “Sef doesn’t usually show until his first lesson in second period. You’d be better coming back at lunchtime if you want to speak to him.” Her lips tighten a little. “Or I could pass on a message?”

  “No…” I duck my head forward in my years-old habit despite no longer having any hair to hide behind. “I’ll come back then.”

  My insecurities sweep me out of the room so fast I’m able to make it to my first lesson before the bell goes.

  Despite Laila’s suggestion, I can’t find Sef at lunch, either. I checked the car park on the way across, so I know he’s on the premises. The common room’s not so full this time and, after asking a couple of people who shake their heads and shrug me off, I’m on the verge of giving up until I walk out of the door and straight into Sef’s friends.

  For a moment none of us say anything and I’m certain from the look that crosses Finn’s face that he knows exactly who I am. Matthew Lund is harder to read.

  “Sorry,” I manage, like a damp squib.

  “No worries.” Finn moves to the side as if to let me pass and I’m so tempted to leave it there, to walk away from having to talk to people I don’t know, but: Sef.

  “I – er – you’re friends with Sef Malik, right?”

  Finn tips his head to the side like this might be the case, but it’s Matthew Lund who mutters, “If you can call it that.”

  Not sure what he means, I carry on cautiously, “I was meant to meet him here to collect, some, er, equipment I lent him.”

  “Claire, is it?” Finn holds up the bag I’d not noticed him holding. “Sef heard you were looking for him earlier. Said to give you this.”

  It’s my bag. My purse and my cardigan and … my camera’s in there too. What dare is he going to do that he doesn’t need my camera?

  I feel a fresh wave of panic wash over me. “I – er – thanks. Look, can you tell him to call me?” I don’t care what that implies. “I need to speak to him.”

  Matthew Lund raises his eyebrows and gives me a knowing smile that makes me want to scrub his brain clean, but Finn – the nice one – nods and says he’ll let him know. There’s nothing more I can say or do and with a crashing sense of disappointment, I turn away and head back to the main school.

  SEF

  The toilet door bangs open and I push up off the wall when Finn says, “She’s gone.”

  “Thanks, mate,” I say. “I couldn’t face it just now.”

  “Whatever.” He holds the door open for me. On the other side of it, Matty greets me with a frosty stare.

  “Secret relationship over?”

  I shrug, uncomfortable at how much of my life has suddenly become public knowledge.

  “Good to know you’re as much of a flake around your girlfriends as your real friends…” Matty turns away, shoulders hunched, and I want to yank him back and tell him it’s not like that. That they don’t want me really, that I’m broken and pathetic and not worth the worry.

  “Don’t ever ask me to cover for you again, Sef.” Finn’s looking at me like he doesn’t even know me any more. “That girl’s worried about you.”

  “She doesn�
��t have to be,” I lie.

  Maybe I don’t know me any more.

  CLAIRE

  Sef. Call me. Please. I saw the video. I’m worried about you. What’s this dare you’re planning to do?

  But I’ve already messaged him variations on that theme every chance I’ve had and he’s not replied to any of them.

  I try calling too, but there’s no reason he’d speak to me when he won’t even reply by text. There’s got to be something I can do to get through to him, but I can’t think what. Six months I’ve known Sef. I’ve licked toothpaste off his chest, had his toe up my nose and eaten his earwax. I’ve held him at his most vulnerable, kissed the tears from his skin and whispered comfort into his ears. I’ve bloody well had sex with him…

  And yet I don’t even know his address.

  How can I have shared so much of myself with someone only to come away knowing so little?

  Even though he doesn’t work Mondays, I try ringing the cinema and asking for him, then, as predicted, when I’m told he’s not there, I ask for Mia. She’s always there… But not tonight.

  I’m so frustrated that I actually feel like I’m going to explode.

  I try Moz again – although he’s so unreliable that when he actually picks up, I’m half convinced it’s his voicemail.

  “Hey hey, loser.”

  “Moz?”

  “Obviously.”

  There’s music in the background, so loud that I feel like I have to shout. “It’s Claire! What are you up to?”

  “My mate’s birthday – in some bar in Soho. Come join us!” I look at the time, confused as to how it got to be this late.

  “No – that’s not—”

  But there’s shouting and cheering at the other end and I doubt he can hear me.

  I message him instead. Tell me what you’re planning with Sef. It’s important.

  Moz replies with a ghost emoji.

  MOZ THIS IS SERIOUS. I’M REALLY WORRIED ABOUT HIM. TELL ME WHAT THE PLAN IS!

  But I don’t like his serious reply any more than I liked his silly one.