Influence

by Stuart Johnstone

  ‘Not in the mood today Little Dyke? Yeah we understand, these exams can be just murder.’ Lizzie stopped, a fire burned in her chest, she so badly wanted to turn around, but she dug deep and walked on.

  Lizzie entered the transformed dining hall. She reported to an exam invigilator at the front of the hall who gave her a seat number which Lizzie was glad to discover was right at the back. More grim, interested faces followed her as she found her seat. She kept her head down, sat and arranged her stationery; she hadn’t even noticed Amy at the desk next to her until she spoke. ‘Hey Lizzie.’ She said leaning over and talking in a whisper. ‘You’re probably sick of hearing this but I really am sorry about Robe. How are you?’

  ‘Thanks Amy, I’m ok thanks. Glad to be back actually. I take it you haven’t seen Vic today?

  ‘No, I was just about to ask you the same, I guess he’s not coming. Poor guy, how is he doing?’

  ‘Wish I knew. I feel like such a horrible friend but I haven’t seen him since… I went to the house a few days ago but it was a cop who answered the door and told me the family weren’t up to visitors. I’ve tried calling, but nothing.’

  ‘It’s understandable,’ said Amy. ‘And he’ll have his family around him.’ This made Lizzie feel twice as bad. She hadn’t properly considered how all this would affect Vic’s parents and how, as a family they might cope. ‘Listen’, said Amy laying her hand on Lizzie’s forearm. ‘I’m sorry if this is totally inappropriate but the offer for the end of exams still stands. I’m sure you won’t feel up to it now, and that’s totally alright, but if you did want to get out the house for a while then it would be great if you could come along’.

  ‘Oh yeah, your brother’s gig? I’ll give it some thought. Thanks.’ The noise in the room had been building slowly and Lizzie hadn’t quite realised how loud the accumulated roar of conversation had become until a stunning silence fell over the room leaving her ears buzzing. The exam papers were being handed out.

  ‘Students, while your papers are being distributed can I just remind you of some rules you should be aware of by now. The exam will last for three hours. If you finish before this time you may leave SILENTLY, but only after two hours have passed, you will be told when this period has passed. No technical instruments are permitted so if you have them with you please place them on the floor or within bags.’ Lizzie’s own paper landed on her desk with a thump, she arranged her stationary once again and selected her favourite pen. ‘Now if we are all ready? Good luck to you all; you may open your papers.’ The invigilator announced, and the students began.

  After two and half hours had passed Lizzie stretched her aching arm and looked around. Only a handful of students were still writing. Amy had already gone, she hadn’t noticed. Lizzie took ten minutes to read back over her answers making small adjustments here and there and gathered her things. Well, she thought, I can’t do any more and now it’s out of my hands. She handed over her answer paper to the invigilator and left the hall. Students gathered together asking one another what they had written for different answers, she was tempted to listen in, but had to remind herself that it would have absolutely no bearing on anything now, so she walked on. She asked the librarian-receptionist if she could use her phone which she was happy to allow. Despite the affluence of the majority of students at Queen’s Bitch Tits was probably the only person with his own phone, which Lizzie considered with some amusement, after all who on earth was he going to call?

  Janice appeared soon after. Lizzie was forced to abide by school protocol and wait within the building until Janice’s car pulled up outside. Her beat up mini petulantly weaved between a couple of four by fours and Lizzie hopped in.

  ‘Well?’ asked Janice making her way up the long drive, travelling far too quickly as always.

  ‘Well what?’

  ‘The exam, how did it go?’

  ‘Not sure,’ Lizzie lied, or at least held back. Her preparations, albeit thrown into chaos, had been well made. She was confident she had done well, but didn’t want to quite admit it to herself, just in case. ‘It went okay I guess.’

  ‘I’ll take that to mean you smashed it,’ Janice patted Lizzie’s knee enthusiastically and grinned at her.

  ‘Let’s just wait and see,’ Lizzie couldn’t help herself, she grinned back, the first smile in some time.

  ‘Hey, we should celebrate. How about we go out for dinner, my treat?’

  ‘That sounds great, but there’s something I really need to do. Would you mind dropping me off?’

  ‘Course, where to milady?’

  Janice waited in the car. It was getting dark and there were no lights on in the house that she could see. She rang the bell and waited, and waited. She was about to give up when a light went on in the hall. Mrs Adams appeared at the door looking like she had just woken up. ‘Hello Mrs Adams, I’m Lizzie, a friend of Vic… and of course Robe, sorry Rob. Um, I’m so sorry for your loss I can’t begin to-’

  ‘The boys are upstairs,’ said Mrs Adams. Lizzie noticed that she hadn’t even looked up to see who it was at the door. She looked awful, her cheeks sunken and her skin almost translucent. Her mind appeared to be fairing no better, she existed here only in some tenuous corporeal sense her brain running through familiar patterns on autopilot.

  ‘Thank you Mrs Adams,’ Lizzie turned to Janice and waved the signal that she could leave now, that she was in. She followed the frail woman into the hall. Mrs Adams turned off the hall light as she opened a door to a sitting room briefly illuminating Lizzie’s surroundings before closing the door and plunging her into darkness. Lizzie wasn’t sure where the light switch was that had been deactivated, she felt along a wall in vain before trying to picture her last visit. She wanted to call out for Vic but didn’t want to disturb his parents; she groped around and eventually found the banister that led her to the upper floor. She recalled Vic’s room being at the far end of the corridor but the only light came from a room half way along on her left.

  She opened the door to find Vic Sitting in an armchair within a bedroom which was the very antithesis of his own. She stepped into the room, Vic’s attention was elsewhere. Slowly his head turned to her, his eyes agape.

  ‘Jesus Liz. You scared the living shit out of me,’ He breathed out hard and then smiled at her.

  ‘Nice to see you too,’ Lizzie smiled back. She looked around the room. Blank walls encased an immaculately kept study. The only thing marking it as actually being a bedroom was the bed itself crisply made. Heavy set bookshelves lined one complete wall where intricate lines of books were organised in some order Lizzie could not fathom. Some half-filled cardboard boxes on the floor created the only disorder. Vic stood and Lizzie was shocked at how his face had changed. Crags and valleys had replaced the planes of youth. ‘Oh Vic,’ she said putting her arms around his shoulders.

  ‘Please Liz. Don’t…’ He said gently pushing her away. ‘I can just about hold it together until someone makes a sympathetic gesture, then I just lose it.’ Lizzie could understand that, what is about sympathy that pushes us over the edge?

  ‘So this is his room? Very, tidy.’

  ‘I know, creepy isn’t it? Vic looked around the room with a smile that was forced. ‘It’s so strange Liz, you know when you hear stories of people that have lost a limb in an accident or something, and they say they can still feel the arm they lost, like a phantom presence of it? It feels like that I think. He’s not here but I can feel him. Like a tingle, just out of reach.’ Vic shrugged and took a deep breath, pushing back his sorrow.

  ‘Have they set a date for the funeral yet?’ asked Lizzie. She felt she was walking on eggshells not sure just how much she could, or should, ask.

  ‘I’m sorry Liz,’ Vic suddenly looked ashamed. ‘The funeral was this morning. My parents just couldn’t handle any kind of ceremony. I really wanted you to be there, I really did.’

  ‘It’s okay Vic. I would just have wanted to be there for you, I’m sorry you had to deal with it on your own.
How was it?’ Vic thought for a second and blew out hard.

  ‘Horrible. Surreal. I don’t even think mum knew exactly what was going on. She just stood there like a statue Vic’s voice broke and caught in his throat. Lizzie made to place a hand on his shoulder but he blew hard once more, smiled and moved away. ‘I was just going through some of his stuff. My folks won’t do it so I just thought I would start boxing some things up.’

  ‘Are you sure you’re up to it? I mean there’s no rush is there?’

  ‘I guess not, but it’s better if I keep busy.’

  ‘Your mum doesn’t look too well. How are things here?’

  ‘It’s been difficult. The Police went through the house and this room a number of times and each time mum seemed to get worse. In the end the Police called the Social Work department and some busy-body came out.’

  ‘What’s going to happen?’

  ‘I don’t know. Apparently I’m at an “awkward age”, being seventeen. I’m an adult in some respects but not in others. If I’d been a kid I think they would have taken me with them, but as it is I think I’m going to board at Queen’s for a while. Give them a break. Mum keeps calling me Rob, I think she needs some space.’ Lizzie only just caught herself from reaching to his shoulder again and telling him how sorry she was.

  ‘If you’re at school at least I’ll get to see you,’ she said trying to find some slither of silver lining. ‘Alright, well,’ Lizzie looked around the room with no idea where to start, ‘can I give you a hand with this?’

  ‘Sure,’ said Vic. ‘I guess start with the book shelf.’ Lizzie took a box and tried not to let the surreal nature of the task overwhelm her. She looked along the shelves which seemed to be split between text and reference books and a number of unmarked jotters. The thick reference books spanned subjects from every conceivable sector of the intellectual spectrum. Science manuals, books on philosophy and a large number of foreign and ancient language books – Greek, Latin, Sumerian and Sanskrit along with a thick book on Papyrology, whatever that was, lined one shelf. She placed them neatly in a box and moved along the shelf taking out one of the unmarked jotters from the far end of the bunch. There must have been well over a hundred of them perfectly aligned. She checked to see where Vic was and saw that he was busy going through some clothes. She flicked open the front cover. Written in Robe’s handwriting was

  “Ledger 109”

  She flicked through the book quickly and saw that the entries were sporadic and lacking any real sense of order, which seemed odd given how fastidious everything else in Robe’s room was. Some entries were in English while others were not. Some entries were lucid, constructed sentences while others were incomplete indecipherable scribbles. ‘What are these Vic?’ asked Lizzie. Vic took the book from Lizzie and looked through it.

  ‘His journals. I don’t know exactly, there were some things he kept to himself. Actually there were a lot of things he kept to himself.’ Vic found a particularly messy page full of random words and scribbles and turned the page to Lizzie. ‘I think I know this, he talked about this technique. He said it was “Automatic Writing”. The idea is that you let your mind relax and just start writing or drawing and your subconscious takes over… something like that. He tried to get me to do it when I got stressed out, he said it helped him.’ Lizzie took the journal from him and saw that there were four pages of absolute scrawl with only a word or two here or there making any sense.

  Just then an almighty scream penetrated the floor beneath them.

  The sudden noise made Lizzie almost jump out of her skin. Horrified she looked to Vic, his chin was on his chest, hands on his hips looking so disappointed, angry even.

  ‘What the hell?’

  ‘It’s Mum,’ said Vic, ‘she has these moments.’

  ‘Should we help her? Is she in pain?’ Lizzie was terrified, the screaming continued, not letting up.

  ‘No. Look it’s complicated. Psychological problems. There’s nothing anyone can do, she has to scream it out, unless she starts-’ he paused awkwardly, ‘and we have to call… I’m sorry Liz, I think you better go.’ Vic half ushered, half pushed Lizzie from the room, down the stairs and into the hall. The screaming was so loud it made Lizzie’s ear drums feedback on themselves, they buzzed like crazy. Vicious thumps were now accompanying the din. ‘I’ll see you soon Liz, thanks for coming to see me,’ shouted Vic over the noise as he opened the front door, palmed Lizzie onto the front step and closed it again in one fluid movement.

  ‘Yeah, I’ll see you,’ she said to nobody at all. She made her way down the path to the gate listening to the screech barely muted by the closed door. Lizzie was surprised to see that Janice was still sitting in her car smoking a cigarette and looking out of the window with concern. Lizzie opened the passenger door and got in.

  ‘What’s going on? Is everything ok?’ asked Janice.

  ‘I think so. It’s his mum, let’s just go.’

  Janice pulled away as Lizzie reached for her seatbelt suddenly realising she was still holding the journal.

  Ten

  ‘Good morning students of Queen’s Grove House. I thank you all for joining me here in the assembly hall this morning, during what is an extraordinarily important few weeks in the school calendar. May I say, on behalf of myself and the rest of the faculty, how thoroughly impressed we have been with the level of maturity and respect you have, without exception, shown in the face of the most upsetting and unforeseen of circumstances. May I also say how proud we are of our students to see such an overwhelming display of mutual support from you all to one another in this monumentally difficult time.’

  Lizzie had seen neither these pride inspiring displays from her fellow students nor, in fact, Mr Pallister during this “monumentally difficult time”. Yet here he was addressing the school with a contrived hollow speech, which he had no doubt prepared well in advance and had held on to awaiting Vic’s return. It had been a further week and a half since Lizzie had visited him at home before he had returned to school. He had moved into the boy’s dorm and had been given a few days to settle and re-prepare for the exams. He had then been able to catch up on those he had missed with Mr Pallister invigilating himself on a one to one basis. Lizzie had to, begrudging, admire the old sod for that. The last of the exams were still in progress, the usual two weeks set aside for exams at the end of term now stretching to closer to a month with the set-backs.

  ‘Robert Adams was a young man of fathomless potential. An asset to his fellow students, to this school, and of course to his family, by whom I of course mean young mister Adams, erm, the other young Mr Adams. The surviving… um, Victor, here.’ Lizzie could just about hear Mr Pallister’s bottom clench as he fumbled through his speech. He gestured over to Vic who was stood as far back as he could get away with, Lizzie by his side holding his hand. She could only guess just how uncomfortable all this made Vic, but there didn’t really seem any conceivable way to avoid it.

  ‘Victor’s brave return to school today should serve as inspiration to you all. We are still in the midst of exams and the need for getting back to some semblance of normality has never been of more import.’

  Boredom was beginning to culture amongst the assembled crowd gathered within the dining hall, come exam room and now, apparently, assembly hall. They should just call it the Swiss army room and get it over with, Lizzie thought. The sixth formers typically formed the back row of the gathered students; it was, after all, the cool place to be. It was moments like this that Lizzie realised how much like her old school Queen’s actually was. On the surface they were worlds apart, but if you picked away the facade of wealth privilege you were left with a building full of children and young adults. Cliques, geeks, cool kids and outcasts were just as present as in her last school, here at Queen’s though, things were condensed and magnified. This room at lunchtime was the best place to study the tribal coalitions that formed. Bookish girls, in groups of three or four would huddle at a table giggling over a magazine. Rugby jer
sey wearing fops would spin a ball to one another, and the cool kids, Bitch Tit’s crowd, would normally be found making someone’s life just that little bit harder. The main difference was the loners. At her last school, even they had a clique, the irony that the propensity for solitude brought them together with like-minded people was not lost on Lizzie she had formed close bonds with her other hermits; unfortunately at Queen’s she had been the sole member of this particular club, which had been fine to start with. However after six months or so of sitting on her own in the library she had begun to feel a little too lonely. The occasional letters from friends back home had been getting further and further apart, and their contents had become less personal and more succinct like the writers were beginning to find it a chore, that they were merely replying to be polite. She couldn’t blame them, they had their own lives, boyfriends, exams and she was so far away. So when Vic had finally plucked up the courage to speak to her around this point she had found herself being less caustic than she otherwise might have been, and Vic had taken this as encouragement. That Vic desperately wanted more than friendship from Lizzie had been apparent from the start, but Lizzie’s signals that he was barking up the wrong tree had also been quite clear. Their friendship had settled into an amiable understanding, Vic seemed to enjoy the succession of rebuffed flirting and slightly awkward exchanges and Lizzie appreciated his odd company, even if it was largely for company’s sake to begin with. Robe had initially shied away from her, but because of his brother’s perseverance he had grown comfortable in her company, like a timid beast becoming accustomed to human presence over time, and a friendship had also formed, or at least whatever passed for friendship in Robe’s eyes.