‘That bell is a signal for me, not you,’ said Mr Williams, their History teacher.
Nobody paid any attention to him and headed for the door. Clive was there first. Out in the corridor he saw the door open to the neighbouring classroom. Clive hung back; he wanted to make it look as natural as possible, as if he’d bumped into her by accident. People spilled out into the corridor and it fizzed with chatter and gossip.
Clive caught sight of Rachel moving slowly out through the mass of people. She was trying to get through the doorway of the classroom. He timed his walk perfectly so he passed her just as she emerged into the corridor.
They hadn’t spoken properly since Rachel had left their writing session to meet up with Lewis. Clive had been seething ever since. Fortunately, time (with the help of a bit of inside information from Cassie) heals all wounds. Clive had assumed, wrongly again, that when Rachel left to see Lewis, they would become a couple. It turned out Lewis was having just as much trouble wooing Rachel as Clive was.
The thought that Mr Right was no nearer to going out with Rachel gave Clive renewed hope. It neutralised his bitterness and, now his confidence was restored, he decided to resume his attack. After being knocked off course, space ship Clive was fuelled up and ready to claim the star named Rachel.
‘Hi, Rachel,’ he said as casually as he could.
‘All right, Clive?’ Rachel replied.
‘Yeah, good thanks. You heading straight home?’
‘Yeah, got tons of assignments to do. Why? What are you doing?’
‘I was going to do some more to the story.’
‘Cool,’ Rachel said, still walking.
‘Want to help?’
‘No, I can’t I’m afraid.’
‘No, of course, you’ve got stuff to do. What about later in the week?’
‘I can’t really, Clive. But you go on ahead without me. After all it’s your story.’
‘No, it’s our story. We wrote it together.’
‘Well, not really,’ said Rachel. ‘You wrote it and I made a few suggestions, that’s all.’
‘Please. I really need your help on it.’
‘But it’s pretty much finished, isn’t it?’
‘No, I still want to try some different things.’
‘I wouldn’t change it anymore, apart from the odd tweak here and there,’ said Rachel, her pace quickening. ‘Look, why don’t you make the changes, print it out and I’ll have a read of it.’
‘I’d really like us to do that together.’
‘But we don’t need to be in the same room to do that.’
‘We could bounce ideas off each other.’ Clive made a ‘boing’ sound and pretended to bounce off Rachel’s arm. She didn’t smile or laugh at his feeble slapstick. She stopped and turned to face him.
‘Listen, Clive, I don’t think you need me on this and to be honest I don’t think us as a writing team really works.’
‘It does. We’re great together.’
‘No we’re not. We argue and fight. It’s not enjoyable. And even though I think the story is wonderful, I just don’t want to go down that road again. I’m really sorry, Clive.’
She continued walking to the school gates, faster than before. He trotted along beside her. Her last comment had caused a hull breach in spaceship Clive, but instead of air being sucked out, his confidence leaked uncontrollably into space.
Strangely, Rachel’s reaction didn’t make him angry. What she was saying made sense. The closer they got together creatively, the further it pushed them apart. If Clive was going to get it together with Rachel, it wasn’t going to be this way. He’d have to find another route to her heart.
‘It’s okay,’ said Clive. ‘You’re right.’
‘I’m so sorry, Clive.’
‘Don’t worry, honestly it’s fine. We’re still friends aren’t we?’
‘Clive, of course we are. Don’t be silly.’
‘Cool, listen I need to be somewhere so I’ll see you tomorrow.’ Clive didn’t really need to be anywhere, but he had to get out of there. It was an awkward situation and, even though he understood and agreed with what Rachel was saying, it still felt like she had split up with him in an odd sort of way.
He threaded his way through the throng of pupils until he was in front of the crowd making its way to the freedom of the school gates.
*
Lewis leant against a lampost outside Rachel’s school. The lampost was covered in marker pen graffiti. Out of the mess he could make out a piece of fresh scrawl, it read: SARAH SMEDMORE WEARS THE SAME CLOTHES. Lewis was reminded of just how cruel school could be and he felt instantly sorry for Sarah Smedmore, whoever the poor girl was.
He turned away and surveyed the building in front of him. It was called Kingslough Secondary School. The whole place looked tired and battered, like an old suitcase. It was nothing like the private school where he had enjoyed an expensive education full of privilege and opportunity. It had all gone to waste on him of course. Lewis looked at his watch just as the bell rang. Though he was supremely confident in his new guise, a small injection of adrenalin began to race around his veins. Soon he could hear hundreds of voices moving towards him as the classes emptied at the end of the day.
A sea of teenagers surged in his direction and he felt extremely conspicuous standing there. To Lewis’ relief, he saw a familiar face marching out of the school gates. Clive was walking fast with his head firmly focused on the pavement.
‘Clive,’ said Lewis.
Clive looked up and across the road. There was no recognition on his face whatsoever. He just stared without blinking. Clearly, Lewis’ new look was working a lot better than he imagined.
‘Clive, it’s me, Lewis.’
Clive’s expression remained unchanged. Then his eyes widened as he saw through the new clothes and haircut.
‘Lewis? Is that you?’
‘Yeah, it’s me. How are you?’
‘I’m, er, I’m fine,’ said Clive, as he examined him, taking in all the details of Lewis’ new look. ‘What are you doing here?’
‘I’ve come to meet Rachel. Will she be out soon?’
‘Are you going to a fancy dress party?’ Clive said. He made no attempt to hide the sarcasm. Lewis didn’t bite.
‘No, I just fancied a change of image,’ Lewis replied.
‘Oh, because it looks like you’ve hired an Edward costume or something.’ Clive was definitely mocking him, but Lewis didn’t react. He wanted to look like Edward Cullen. Anyway, Clive wasn’t worth it. He was more like an annoying little brother than a serious threat to him. So Lewis just smiled.
A small group of second-year girls gathered around them.
‘Could I have your autograph please?’ said a pretty little blond-haired girl with big eyes and a nervous voice. Lewis looked down at her with surprise.
‘What?’
‘Can I have it too?’ said her friend holding up a blank page of a text book.
‘What? No, I’m waiting for someone,’ replied Lewis.
‘Oh go on, Robert, give them an autograph,’ Clive said with a sickly smile on across his face.
‘I told you it was Robert Pattinson,’ said the blond-haired girl, nudging her friend. The girls giggled and moved in closer.
‘Look, I’m not Robert Pattinson,’ said Lewis. ‘I guess I just look a bit like him.’ This was an unexpected by-product of his new look - Twilight groupies.
A handful of slightly older girls joined the group. Worringly, Lewis noticed one girl take a look at him and immediately run away to tell another larger mass of girls who were coming out of the gates. They all screamed in unison and ran over to where Lewis stood. This new batch of girls were less restrained than the others and pushed past everyone to squash Lewis against the wall.
‘It’s him! It’s really him,’ someone said.
‘Can I have a kiss?’ said another.
‘Give us a suck,’ shouted a girl next to him and everyone squealed with girly laughter.
‘I’m not Robert Pattinson. My name’s Lewis, now please would you all go away.’
Lewis’ words had about as much impact as a feather made of air. All they could see was someone who looked like the guy on the posters in their bedrooms. It was enough to stoke up frenzied excitement. Lewis kept protesting his innocence and tried to calm everyone down, but being calm was the last thing they wanted to be.
As more people poured out of the school, they saw something going on. More boys and girls were lured into finding out what was happening. The crowd soon turned into to a mob, and Lewis began to fear they would soon start ripping his clothes off.
Lewis turned to Clive. ‘I might need your help.’
Clive didn’t say anything. He just stood there looking smug.
Lewis tried another angle: ‘Listen, if this turns nasty, we’re both going to have a problem.’
Clive looked back at the mob, which was getting bigger and more rowdy by the second. They were a threat to both of them.
‘Okay,’ said Clive. He leant in and whispered into Lewis’ ear, ‘You need to run. I’ll cause a distraction.’
‘Thanks,’ said Lewis.
Clive managed to climb up on the wall behind them and pointed. ‘Oh my God,’ he shouted. ‘It’s the guy who plays Jacob Black.’ The whole crowd swivelled around like automatons to see if it was true. At that point, Lewis ran like he had never run before. Fortunately, he was fit and got a big head start before everyone realised he’d given them the slip. As Lewis dashed towards his van he could hear the screams behind him. They knew they’d been duped and were now chasing him like a pack of hounds after a fox. The van wasn’t far away. As he got closer Lewis pulled his keys from his pocket and hit the button on the remote locking. The van greeted him with a tweet and flashed its lights. He knew he had seconds to get it started and get out of there. Otherwise they would surround the vehicle and tear him to pieces.
It started first time. He rammed the gear stick into first, stamped on the accelerator and wheel-spun away. He afforded himself a quick look in the rear view mirror. His pursuers came tumbling into view. He had made it with milliseconds to spare.
It had been terrifying. He now knew what it was like to be famous. His hands shook and his mouth was dry. Lewis let out a spontaneous laugh. For all its danger, the thrill was intoxicating. He could get used to this.
*
Katrina Wood was the school ‘it-girl’. If anything was going on you could be sure she was at the centre of it. If not, she certainly would be by the end of the day. Everything happened around her, and together with her fledgling entourage, she knew all the gossip. She was the fount of all knowledge but, more importantly, she used that knowledge to influence people’s opinion of you, for good and bad.
Her sharp eyes never missed a thing and she had a savage tongue. It was dangerous to know her and even worse not to. She wielded her omnipotence like a Greek god and played with people’s lives, whimsically building up their popularity, then tossing them away when she was bored of them.
A visit from Katrina was never a good thing, which was why everyone looked on edge when she and her cronies strode into Rachel’s form room the next morning. Katrina headed straight for Rachel and Cassie. She smiled at them both like a shark; her grin was wide but her eyes were dead.
‘Hi, Cassie. Hi, Rachel,’ she said in a voice that was sugar laced with arsenic.
‘Hi, Kat,’ Rachel and Cassie said together.
‘You two like Twilight, don’t you?’
‘Er, yeah,’ they both said.
Kat sat on the edge of their desk. ‘Well, did you hear about what happened yesterday after school?’
Rachel and Cassie shook their heads. Keeping words to a minimum was always a good idea when Katrina was around.
‘Robert Pattinson from Twilight was outside school.’
‘Yeah, right,’ said Cassie.
‘You don’t believe me?’ said Kat, dropping her smile.
Cassie immediately remembered who she was talking to. ‘Oh, it’s not that I don’t believe you,’ Cassie said. ‘But I mean, what would he be doing outside our crummy school?’
‘Apparently, he was looking for you,’ Kat said, looking at Rachel.
‘Me?’ Rachel replied.
‘Yep. So what’s it all about then, Rachel? Have you got some claim to fame you’re hiding from me?’ Kat said, with a poisonous smile.
‘I don’t know him. I wish I did, but I don’t. How do you know he was looking for me?’
‘Ask your friend over there,’ Kat said, pointing to Clive. ‘He was standing right next to him, see.’ She held up a shot on her mobile phone. The picture was a little blurred but sure enough there was Clive standing next to someone who looked a lot like Edward.
‘I asked Clive who he was but he said you knew him better.’
Everyone looked at Clive who had been trying to keep a low profile. Rachel threw him a furious look.
‘Clive, who is this?’ demanded Rachel. Clive walked over sheepishly.
‘That’s er … It’s Lewis.’
‘Lewis! You’re kidding me.’ said Rachel.
‘Yeah, he’s had a bit of an image change.’
‘Why didn’t you tell me he was looking for me?’
‘Er, dunno, slipped my mind.’
‘Really,’ said Kat, ‘and I suppose you forgot that half the school chased after him, thinking he was Robert Pattinson.’
Clive didn’t say anything. He just stood there like someone whose mum had found pornography under his bed.
‘It’s not important,’ said Kat, ‘What is important is my birthday next Saturday at Aruba’s. I’ve told everyone he’s going to be there, so you three just make sure he’s there looking like Mr Twilight, okay. Oh and you’re all invited. See ya.’
Once Kat had left with all her little wannabes, Clive and Cassie relaxed. Rachel didn’t. Her faced blushed with anger.
‘Clive, why didn’t you tell me? Didn’t you think it was important?
‘I suppose not,’ Clive replied.
‘Now I’ve got that witch, Katrina, on my back. You’ve really dropped me in it.’
‘That’s okay,’ said Cassie, acting as peacekeeper. ‘I’m sure Lewis will come along if you ask him.’
‘That’s not the point, Cassie. This means I’ll have to ask Lewis to the party. It’ll make me look like I’m chasing him. Plus, now I’m going to be Katrina’s little bitch.’
‘She’s only asked you to get Lewis to her party,’ said Clive.
‘Don’t be so naïve, Clive. This is how it starts with her. Then, before you know it you’re doing her homework. Thanks very much, Clive.’ Rachel grabbed her bag and left the form room, knocking into chairs as she went.
A storm of angry thoughts spun around inside her head, but at the centre of this maelstrom was a small sweet oasis of calm. It was an island of joy amongst a raging sea, and it made her feel warm and gooey inside. Even though she had been enlisted by Katrina as a flunky she was also intrigued by the image of Lewis. He had reinvented himself and it was entirely possible that she, Rachel, had been the catalyst.
The thought made her feel slightly pompous and bigheaded, so she tried to dismiss it. Getting her hopes up where Lewis was concerned was like playing Jenga, you built it up but it always collapsed in the end. It could just be that he’d become a big Twilight fan and wanted to look like his hero. But the idea that she might be the cause of his transformation kept coming back again and again, stronger each time no matter how much she pushed it away.
As the day wore on, she found herself getting drunk on the flattery of it all and she luxuriated in the feeling, hoping it was true. So, it wasn’t with any reluctance that she called him. When he answered the phone, Rachel spoke each word with a smile on her face, she couldn’t help it. The grin got even wider when he agreed to go to Kat’s party. He asked her if she wanted a lift, but Rachel managed to keep at least one foot on the ground and refuse the offer.
She agreed to meet him in town so they could walk together to Aruba. Rachel had to keep a lid on things. Even though she wanted to do cartwheels through the school she thought it best to hide her feelings but it wasn’t easy. Her mouth wanted to curve upwards every time she thought of him and the cloudy skies didn’t seem as cloudy as they were before. She realised she had been in this position before, only to have her hopes dashed at the last minute. This situation might go the same way. It could all be a big misunderstanding and Rachel kept telling herself the whole thing could dissolve quicker than a snowflake in the Sahara.
However, there was a difference this time, or at least the strong possibility of a difference. If he had made the change for her then it would put a completely new slant on things. Maybe, he did want to change his ways and this was his way of showing he was serious. It was a delicious thought.
A visit from Kat helped sober Rachel up. Her steely eyes remained emotionless when Rachel told her Lewis would be at the party. There was no smile, just the word ‘Cool,’ that forced its way past Kat’s thin lips. It seemed Kat was somewhat disappointed that Rachel had done as she’d asked. She was no longer in Katrina's debt. The school bitch now had no excuse to punish Rachel and start spreading malicious lies about her. Rachel was off the hook for the time being.
Chapter 14
*
Olivia was bored. Being a little rich girl was great but sometimes she ran out of things to do. Midweek was the worst - all her friends were at school, uni or work, which made her feel like a fifth wheel. It was depressing and the guilt was unbearable. She was contributing nothing and taking everything. To appease her conscience she worked part-time in a local charity shop. It raised money for cancer and was staffed by older ladies with a habit of speaking over each other. They loved having a pretty young girl around the place who listened to their silly stories and meandering anecdotes, mostly about bus passes and bunions. Olivia would make them tea by the gallon and treat them to cream cakes, which they would refuse at first and then devour like lions.
Faye Meredith - Becoming Edward Page 14