by Carmen Reid
‘Me?’ Niffy sounded hurt.
‘So you’ve not actually arranged to meet anyone?’ Min asked in surprise.
‘Well, not exactly, but I sort of know where some people might be,’ Amy replied defensively.
‘I hope this isn’t going to be a total waste of time . . .’ Min huffed. ‘I wish we were just going to the cinema.’
‘It’s a hunt, Min – thrill of the chase. Where’s your sense of adventure?’ Niffy asked. ‘Anyway, that film’s supposed to be terrible.’
‘Everyfilm dot co dot uk gave it three stars.’
First on Amy’s hit list were two cafés, one in a late-night bookshop. ‘We’ll just go in and look around. If there’s no sign of anyone interesting, we’ll head off,’ she told the others. ‘No point buying a coffee in every place. We’ll be wired.’
‘And skint,’ Niffy pointed out.
At the first café there was no one they knew and nothing happening, so they left just as quickly as they’d gone in. At the second, they were greeted enthusiastically by four boys crowded onto a small table close to the door.
‘Amy, Niffy and Min!’ one of them called out. ‘You’ve been sent by our fairy godmother to make the evening more interesting! Come over here and talk to us. It’s been ages! How were the holidays?’
‘These are guys from Jason’s year!’ Amy whispered to Gina as they went over. ‘They might have info! Might know where he is.’
Gina studied the group of boys. With their sleek hair, good teeth and big smiles, they looked just like the guys in the team photo. A very handsome gang.
‘Hello, you must be new. I’m Angus.’ The boy who’d called them over held out his hand to Gina, who took a moment or two to work out that he wanted her to shake it.
‘Hi there, Angus,’ Gina said, taking his hand with a smile. ‘This is very formal. We don’t really do this where I come from.’
‘You’re a Yank!’ Angus responded and stuck his hand in the air. ‘C’mon then, we’ll do a high-five. This is Pete, Milo and Jenks, by the way.’ He gestured to his friends. ‘They’ll probably want to slap your hand too.’
‘I like it!’ Niffy grinned and pulled up a sleeve. ‘Much better than kissing on the cheeks.’
‘Hey,’ Milo intervened. ‘Don’t knock kissing on the cheeks – it’s as close to snogging as Pete is ever going to get.’
‘Hey!’ Pete couldn’t stop himself from blushing.
‘Why is the scary girl rolling up her sleeve?’ Milo asked, pretending to sound frightened.
‘I think she’s going to go round the table and punch everyone hello,’ Min told him.
More chairs were brought over, until the eight of them encircled the tiny table.
‘We’d offer to buy you coffees, but we’ve all had grande lattes and paninis, so now we’re broke.’ Angus gave an apologetic smile.
‘Mortgaged!’ Pete added.
‘Oh, we weren’t going to stay long,’ Amy replied. When Angus pulled a long face at this, she added quickly to spare his feelings, ‘We’ve got a film to go to.’
‘We could come!’ he suggested brightly.
‘Rom com,’ Amy said quickly, to put him off.
‘And you’re supposed to be broke,’ Niffy reminded him.
‘Oh yeah – that’s a point,’ he said.
After some more chat, Amy, trying to sound as casual as possible, asked them, ‘So . . . who else is about tonight?’
‘Aha . . . And I suppose that means: where is the gorgeous Jason Hernandez?’ Angus understood straight away.
‘No!’ Amy insisted, but all four boys and Niffy began to laugh.
‘What you need to know,’ Milo chipped in helpfully, ‘is that Jason said he might go and catch something at the Filmhouse or he might just hang out at the Arts Café.’
‘Tricky.’ Jenks leaned forward to join in the discussion. ‘Those places are at opposite ends of town . . . so which one are you going to pick? Or would you like me to get out my mobile’ – he removed the phone from his pocket with a flourish – ‘and ask Jason directly?’
‘No, no,’ Amy insisted, imagining Jenks dialling Jason, then saying something as gruesomely embarrassing as: I’ve got Amy here – she wants to know where you are tonight . . . Why? Because she’s in love with you. Everyone knows that.
‘Well . . . we should be going,’ Amy said, taking a deliberate look at her wristwatch. ‘Our film starts at eight fifteen.’
‘Aha, and that’ll be at the Filmhouse, I suppose,’ Jenks teased.
‘No,’ Amy fired back.
‘You can’t go just yet,’ Angus pleaded. ‘I’ve not said one word to Nif.’ He turned towards her and said jokingly, ‘Hello, old girl. How’s your brother? And the dogs? And the horse? Tell me everything.’
Then, when Amy repeated that they really should be going, Angus turned to Gina. ‘And what about your new American girl?’ he complained. ‘I’ve not even had a chance to meet her. Where in the US are you from?’
‘California,’ Gina replied, leaning forward in her chair to get a little closer to him: he was definitely cute-ish.
‘Nice . . .’ Angus replied, then struggled for what to say next. ‘The Beach Boys!’ he blurted out.
‘The Beach Boys! Well . . . yeah . . . that was a while ago, I guess.’
‘We really should go.’ Amy stood up and gave Gina a nudge.
As the four girls started towards the café door, after high-fiving everyone goodbye, Angus couldn’t resist singing, unbelievably tunelessly: ‘I wish they all could be California girls.’
Once they were out on the pavement again, the girls set off along George Street in the direction of the Filmhouse, giving Gina a detailed commentary on the boys they’d just met.
According to Amy, Angus was ‘very sweet. He used to go out with some girl in Year Five’. Pete was ‘a little bit of an airhead, into playing the guitar’.
‘Milo’s nice,’ Min offered, and earned herself a round of laughter and whistles. ‘I didn’t mean it like that!’ she insisted, totally flustered.
‘Jenks is pug-ugly and more annoying than a rash,’ Amy stated.
‘That’s not very nice!’ Niffy argued, and started the laughs and whistles up again.
Gina decided to offer an opinion of her own. ‘I thought they were all kinda cute and kinda fun. Isn’t it just such a shame that they’re not at school with us? Don’t you think class would be so cool with them in it?’
But this was so way beyond the imagination of the three other girls that they couldn’t even reply.
At the end of George Street they walked through the kind of quaint black-stoned, brass-lamped Georgian square that Gina had only previously seen in costume dramas screened on the Public Broadcasting Service.
‘Wow!’ she kept saying, to everyone’s complete indifference. ‘Look at the lamps! And the railings! Wow! It is so beautiful here. So historical.’
Niffy began to giggle, then Gina made everyone laugh by declaring, ‘Wow!’ another three times and then finishing off with an enthusiastic ‘I’m all out of wows!’
They turned into noisy, lively Lothian Road, where groups of teenagers were shouting at each other, bars over-spilling onto the pavements and queues forming at the pizza takeaways and chip shops.
The Filmhouse bar was packed, every seat taken, the serving area two-deep with students in macs or leather jackets, glammed up schoolgirls and the grown-up culture-vulture types the place attracted.
‘I think we should have a drink here and just hang out a bit,’ Amy told them as she sidled through the crowd, scanning the room as carefully and yet as subtly as she could.
‘There on the left! Down near the bar! Look, Amy!’ Niffy hissed at her.
The girls all turned their heads and Gina saw, not the tall, handsome, raven-haired sixteen-year-old boy she’d been told to look out for, but instead the bossy sixth formers, Lucinda and Maxine, laughing over a joke with friends.
‘Duck,’ came the instruction from Min
.
Although they were still in a crowd and probably wouldn’t have been spotted by the Year Sixes, all four dropped to their haunches and began to back slowly out of the bar and towards the double doors.
They should have made a swift getaway, except the double doors flew open and Niffy, still hunched down, still moving rapidly backwards, crunched straight into someone coming in.
‘I’m so sorry,’ she apologized, turning round but not yet daring to stand up straight.
The sound of the voice that replied made Amy blush right from the balls of her feet up to the roots of her lavishly highlighted hair.
‘No problem – but what are you all doing down there? Oh hi, I know you, don’t I? Amy, isn’t it? From St Jude’s?’
‘Yes, hi . . . Hi, Jason.’ Amy swept her hair from her face, set her smile on full beam and stood up to greet him, wondering why she had to be doing something as stupid as crawling backwards out of a room just as she almost literally bumped into him. ‘Down here?’ she repeated, wondering what on earth to say. ‘We’re just, erm . . .’
‘Min’s dropped a contact lens,’ Niffy said as she began to pat gently at the carpet. At these words, Amy made a promise to herself that she would never say an unkind thing about Niffy’s hair ever again in gratitude for this sensational explanation.
‘Oh dear.’ Jason dropped to his knees and began to pat at the carpet as well.
All five of them were circling the space, as the girls sneaked little peeks at this current legend of the dorm. He was so good-looking – no doubt about it. Liquorice-black hair, the longish side of short, olive skin, thick eyebrows and full straight lips that led with a curve to a straight, slightly flared nose. He wasn’t just handsome though, he was also kind of fabulous. His scuffed leather jacket was cool, his shirt collars flopped just so and his caramel suede boots looked exactly right.
Amy wasn’t the only one whose heart was beating too fast. But they were all wondering who was going to call a halt to the contact lens charade.
‘You know, it’s not really a big deal – they’re weekly ones. I would have thrown it away in a few days anyway,’ Min said, finally releasing them from the pretence.
‘Oh, right . . . That’s probably a good thing then, because I think my film’s about to start.’ Jason turned his wrist to glance at an expensive-looking steel diver’s watch.
‘Oh!’ Amy gasped, and there was no mistaking the disappointment in that single syllable. ‘What are you going to see?’ She straightened up, no longer caring if Lucinda and Maxine could spot her.
‘Le Terminal – it’s a horror film set in an Algerian airport.’
A quick glance at her friends’ faces told Amy that no matter how deeply in love she was, they were not going to sit through a slasher flick in Algerian just so she could take furtive glances at Jason’s perfect profile.
‘Where are you headed?’ Jason asked. ‘Somewhere fun?’
‘Oh . . . erm . . . the Arts Café, you know . . . at the Institute?’ Amy said, making use of her inside information that this was one of his hangouts.
‘Yeah . . . well, never know, I might come along later. Right, well . . . see you.’ And with a turn of his handsome head, he was gone.
‘The Arts Café is miles away!’ Min hissed at her. ‘The other end of Princes Street! There’s no way I can make it there in your shoes. My heels are already bleeding!’
‘We’ll get a taxi and I’ll pay,’ was Amy’s solution. ‘We’ve got to get out of here asap,’ she added. ‘Year Six is on the move.’
‘So what can I get you girls?’ The Arts Café waiter was at their table with a notebook and pencil, smiling in a very friendly way.
‘Niffy, we’re having wine, aren’t we? Red?’ Amy asked with confidence. She might be a full three years below the legal age to buy drink, but this was a culture café – you could usually get away with ordering wine without an age check. That’s why so many of their friends came here.
‘Min? What would you like?’ she asked. ‘Gina?’
Both girls, much less willing to break the law as well as the school rules, plumped for cappuccinos.
‘Erm . . .’ The waiter paused. He didn’t look much older than sixteen himself: skinny, tall, with sandy hair and a white shirt so flimsy they could see clean through to his nipples. With his black trousers, he looked as if he was in school uniform, minus the tie.
‘I don’t know if I can do wine for you . . . erm . . . because’ – he leaned over the table towards them conspiratorially – ‘well . . . if you’re under twenty-one, and I’m not saying you are, I’d need to see some ID. And not everyone carries their passport around with them all the time these days.’
‘Fine, fine.’ Amy knew she was being offered the chance to back down gracefully. ‘Shall we have coffees too, Niffy?’
‘Irish coffees?’ Niffy dared him with a smile.
‘Two Irish coffees? Well . . .’ The waiter shot her a cheeky little grin back. ‘I don’t see the harm in that,’ he told them. ‘Medicinal purposes.’
‘Exactly,’ Niffy agreed.
When he’d hurried back to the bar with their orders, Amy told the group, ‘Ooh, I like him. I was just about to ask him his name, but—’
‘Let me guess,’ Niffy interrupted: ‘he’s wearing the wrong kind of aftershave? No, his shirt – it’s his shirt. You don’t go out with people in white shirts.’
Amy shook her head. ‘Nothing wrong with a nice white shirt, which isn’t see-through. No, it’s the trainers. They’re white. Completely white.’ She turned to Gina to explain while Min and Niffy just rolled their eyes. ‘White trainers are a no-no. I just don’t go there. It always turns out badly. But you know, if Jason doesn’t show,’ she added, applying lip gloss carefully with a little brush, ‘it’s good to have a back-up.’
‘If Jason turns up here when his film finishes, I’ll do all your dishwashing duty for the rest of the term,’ Min promised. ‘That’s how likely it is.’
Amy just sighed in reply, but cheered up a little as the waiter returned with a tray of coffees.
‘What’s your name?’ Amy asked him with her glossy pink smile in place.
‘Dermot O’Hagan, at your service. And ladies, what may I call you?’
‘Miss,’ Amy joked.
‘Oh, I see. It’s like that, is it?’ he asked, pretending to be offended. ‘You must be those upper-class private-school girls I keep hearing about. The ones who are used to having servants. And never leave a tip.’
‘Don’t be a twink,’ Niffy broke in, then introduced him to everyone round the table.
‘I’m sorry . . . a twink? What is that exactly?’ Dermot wanted to know. ‘Is that special private-school speak?’ He tapped the side of his nose.
‘Yeah, we made it up in our dorm, during a midnight feast,’ Amy teased, ‘while we were in our long white nighties . . .’
‘And night caps,’ Niffy added. ‘By candlelight.’
‘This is just too exciting,’ Dermot said, his elbows on their table as he looked ready to settle in for a cosy chat. ‘But you’re having me on. You’re not really at boarding school, are you? In Edinburgh?’
He was looking at Gina as he asked this, so she nodded at him.
They weren’t to find out what Dermot thought about this, because a loud voice called him back to work with the words: ‘Oi, Dermot! Table nine!’
By 10.15p.m. Amy had to admit that Jason wasn’t coming and it was time to get back to Mrs Knebworth before they were late. Min took her by the arm and led her out of the cafe with a face longer than a wet Sunday afternoon.
As the cab they’d hailed drove along Princes Street, Amy suddenly uttered a shriek. ‘Look, over there! Stop the car!’
‘What?’ Min, Niffy and Gina all asked together as the taxi sped on, the driver completely oblivious to his over-excited passenger.
‘I saw him! I saw him walking along in the direction of the café!’ Amy shouted, pushing down the window and craning her head out. ‘
We’ve got to turn back!’
‘No we do not,’ Min insisted. ‘We’re going to be late. It probably wasn’t him anyway.’
‘It was,’ Amy said, a big smile across her face now. ‘He was on his way. You see!’ She sank back into her seat in bliss. ‘He wanted to see me . . . he really did!’
‘I think the Irish coffee was a mistake,’ Niffy said, tapping the side of her head.
Chapter Eight
NOW THAT SCHOOL was into its third week, Gina was getting her written work back with marks and comments. It was obvious she wasn’t doing very well. The only subject she was remotely good at was English: her English teacher, Mrs Parker, was enthusiastic about her work. But biology was hard, maths and physics were even harder, and her French homework had come back covered in lines, crosses and Madame Bensimon’s neat handwriting: ‘Appliquez-vous, appliquez-vous!’ Even Gina could work out what that meant: nothing to do with embroidery, but ‘Try harder!’
Maybe she was never going to be allowed back home. Maybe her mother would make her languish here in Scotland for term after term.
History class was going to kill her. Was it possible to die of boredom? Gina, halfway through another lesson with Miss Ballantyne, was beginning to suspect that it was.
‘Why are we copying notes from the board?’ she’d hissed at Niffy.
‘Because that is all we do in this class,’ came the reply. ‘Facts, girls! History is all about facts, not guesses, not surmises and certainly not opinions!’ Niffy imitated Miss Ballantyne in a high-pitched whisper.
Gina had gone on copying laboriously in longhand for a few more minutes, then she’d stuck her hand up in the air.
‘Miss Ballantyne?’
‘Yes?’ The stern-faced teacher had turned from the board and peered at Gina over the top of her spectacles and the frilly blouse she wore buttoned up to the chin.
‘Wouldn’t it be possible for you to print out your notes and hand them out to us?’ Gina asked.
She felt something of a collective intake of breath in the room at this question.
‘These notes are not stored on a computer,’ came the brisk reply. ‘I can’t just print them out!’