Unconventional

by Maggie Harcourt

  “No. Well, yes. Yes, I did.”

  “And you’re sticking to that, are you?”

  “I’m sorry?”

  “And now you’re apologizing?”

  “I…what? No. No, I’m not apologizing…”

  He grins at me and unfolds himself from the sofa, standing almost toe to toe with me. He’s taller than I am – my nose is level with his chin. This does not help.

  I am not going to look up at him. No. Not happening.

  “It’s fine. I got the message. But for the record, my publicist asked me to tag along with her to this, and then there was a mix-up with badges and—”

  I cut him off. “Who’s your publicist?”

  “My publicist?”

  “Yes. Your pub-li-cist.” I’m probably not at my most friendly. Across the room, Frazzled Assistant clears his throat. I turn and scowl at him. He immediately goes back to studying Bangle’s ear – which makes me wonder whether he is, in fact, the dog’s assistant.

  “Uh, Lisa? Lois? Louise? Something beginning with L. Shit.” The interloper frowns. He really can’t remember. Eventually, he gives up. “I’m new at this.”

  “You don’t say.”

  “You’re not going to let me off, are you?”

  “Sorry. Can’t. I don’t make the rules.”

  “But you do have the clipboard…”

  “You can’t let that go, can you?”

  “Shameless sucking-up doesn’t work on you either?”

  “No.”

  “Fair enough.” He reaches down to pick up a battered leather messenger bag from the side of the sofa, slinging it over his shoulder. A pair of glasses fall out, along with a vaguely familiar-looking paperback which he stuffs back in before I can clearly see what it is. “I’m Aidan Green, by the way.” He holds out his hand.

  “Lexi. Lexi Angelo.”

  One of his eyebrows shoots up. “As in Angelo Events?” He points at the floor as he says it. I guess he means, as in this event? Here, now, where I’m making your life difficult?

  “My dad.”

  “No wonder they made you High Priestess of the Order of the Clipboard.”

  “I beg your pardon…?”

  “See? You’re doing it again. Apologizing to me.”

  A dozen withering comebacks whizz through my mind – and I’m too slow to use any of them. I mean, maybe it would sound like I was pausing for dramatic effect…but more likely it would just sound like I’m thick. So I settle for, “Out.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” he says, throwing up his hand in a salute. It’s annoyingly close to what Sam did earlier. Maybe it’s the clipboard.

  It has to be the clipboard.

  I follow him to the door – just to make sure. As we step back into the corridor – now full of the audience from the panel discussion that just finished – he turns and gives me a broad, confident smile. “Nice to meet you, Lexi Angelo. Maybe I’ll see you around.”

  “Enjoy the convention,” I say – and I watch him lope off down the corridor until he is swallowed by the crowd.

  “Who was that?” Rodney asks, looking up from his newspaper.

  “Nobody,” I say.

  “Must’ve been somebody, or I wouldn’t have let him in,” he says, disappearing back behind the politics pages.

  “Funny.”

  If I squint, I’m sure I can just make out the back of Aidan’s head disappearing around the corner at the end of the hallway – and then I realize with a sinking feeling that the tapping sound I keep hearing is me drumming my fingers on the top of my clipboard.

  High Priestess of the Order of the Clipboard, I think.

  Nobody, I think.

  “Hello under there?”

  Sam’s face appears below the edge of the tablecloth.

  “Go away.”

  “Brought you a drink.” She hands me the bottle of water like it’s a peace offering. Or a grenade. I prop myself up on one elbow on the floor and lean forward to take it from her.

  “Thanks,” I say, hoping it sounds a little less grudging outside my head.

  She clambers in between the table legs, pauses, then steeples her fingers together and looks at me over the top of them. “And why are we hiding under the table?”

  “It’s my safe place. Safe. Quiet. Happy place,” I say between mouthfuls of water. Sam eyes me sceptically.

  “Not that safe, babe. You realize your dad knows you’re here, yes?”

  Of course he does. He knows perfectly well that under the table is my happy place – just like he knows that when I’m under the table, it’s best to leave me there. As for everybody else, the trick is making sure they never know exactly which table to look under. The hotel’s banquet room is usually one of the first places they check, but I really couldn’t be bothered to find anywhere more elaborate today.

  “How did you find me?”

  “I was going to go with a process of elimination,” she says as she folds her legs in front of her and settles into a pose that wouldn’t look out of place in an advanced yoga class. It makes the back of my knees ache just looking at her. “I did start with the registration desk, but Bede said that if he’d found you under there he would be kicking you already…”

  “He’s a bit pissed off, isn’t he?” I tip my head back and stare at the underside of the table. I already feel bad about poor Bede, left to handle the registration desk by himself while we were all off on a mad dog hunt, and now he’s having to cover for Eric from the art team – whose stomach is busy violently disagreeing with…everything. I am not Bede’s favourite person right now. Hence: table.

  “Almost made it through day one though, yes? That’s a good thing.” Sam grabs the water bottle while it’s halfway to my mouth – coming dangerously close to pouring what’s left all over my lap. There’s a loud gurgling sound, and she clamps a hand over her stomach.

  “Did you eat?” I ask. I haven’t. With the best will in the world, the idea of finding time for lunch and dinner went out the window the minute I heard Bangle’s name.

  Sam squints at the hem of the tablecloth. “I have a vague recollection of a handful of peanuts around four thirty?”

  “And that’s it?”

  “I did get Nadiya to bring some crisps from the green room when she went to check it earlier… Does that count?”

  “Stop stealing stuff from the green room, Sam.”

  “Technically, it wasn’t me. It was Nadiya, remember?”

  Green room.

  I snatch the water back and drain it. I’m thirstier than I realized. Or maybe I’m just hungry? I can’t tell any more. “That reminds me – we need to keep a closer eye on the green room. I found a complete random in there earlier.”

  Sam’s eyes widen in alarm; she takes the green room as seriously as I do – as seriously as my dad does – even if she doesn’t run it since the tray incident (of which we do not speak). “What was he doing?”

  “Just…sitting.” I realize this doesn’t exactly make him sound like public enemy number one, but it’s the principle.

  “Did he have a pass?”

  “Yes, Samira. Of course he had a pass, which is why I pretended not to know who he was and threw him out.”

  “Yeah, all right, Sarcasmo. What’s wound you up so much?”

  “He made fun of my clipboard.”

  Sam’s laughter fills the space under the table, fills the whole of the deserted banqueting hall around us. She keeps going way, way longer than I’m happy about.

  “You finished?” I mutter. Of course she’s too busy laughing to hear me. I think those are actual tears I can see.

  “He made fun of the clipboard? Oh my. What did you do to him?”

  “I told him he wasn’t allowed in there.”

  “But you did it with your characteristic charm?”

  I blink at her. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “You know. You can be a bit…” She stops. She considers. She is suddenly very interested in a loose thread dangling o
ff the tablecloth.

  “Go on…” The words come out with all the warmth and approachability of a cobra with a really bad headache.

  “A bit, you know, bossy.” Sam bites her lip and gives me the side-eye as she says it. I swear she’s actually scooted further back from me than she was a minute ago.

  “Bossy?”

  (Is that really my voice? I didn’t realize it went so high. I sound like an angry chipmunk.)

  “A little bit. When you’re stressed, I mean.”

  “A little bit?” I ignore the “stressed” comment.

  “A little bit too much, is what I’m saying.” She squeezes my arm. “I get it. You’re under a lot of pressure and you don’t want to let your dad down. I know. And I know you’re not okay with the whole ‘wedding’ thing yet – believe me, I do. And that’s okay.” She sighs. “But we’re your friends, Lex. Me and Nadiya – and, yes, even Bede. And you’ve been kind of snappy today. With all of us.”

  She won’t meet my gaze at all; I can see her looking at her shoes, at the carpet, the bottom of the table legs, the tablecloth. Anywhere but at me. Again.

  Sam is my best friend and she’s trying to tell me that I’ve been a bit of a bitch today.

  Sam is my best friend…and she’s probably right.

  The whole day plays back in my head on fast-forward, slowing down so I can get a really good look at all the times I’ve been crabby with my friends. Now I know what I’m looking for, there are more of them than I expected. Certainly more than I’d like. No wonder Bede’s pissed off with me.

  “Oh.” It slips out before I can stop it, and Sam panics. I can see it all over her face.

  “It’s not that bad. I mean, no one’s on the verge of walking out or anything.”

  “No, no. It is that bad.” I can see myself from outside, snapping at people for the slightest thing; running around like a headless chicken when what I really needed to do was stop and breathe and take a second to remember that it’s a convention – nobody’s going to die if a panel starts five minutes late.

  I’m being a drama queen. I don’t want to be that person – I’m not that person.

  I groan and throw myself backwards dramatically – and manage to smack my head against one of the table legs on the way down. There’s an almighty great clang that makes my ears ring and my teeth rattle.

  “Wow.” Sam leans over me. From my spot on the floor, it looks like she has tiny spangly little stars dancing around her head. Or maybe she’s got glitter in her wig. It’s hard to say with Sam.

  “So that’s what karma feels like.”

  She holds out her hand and heaves me up while I rub the back of my head. I can already feel the lump coming up under my hair where skull met table. They didn’t get along. “Ouch.”

  “You thought it wasn’t going to happen. The wedding. But it is.”

  “I never said that – not exactly…”

  “You didn’t need to. I know you, Lexi – and if you’d thought they were really getting married, we’d have had this conversation back in December when he told you. Except we’d be having it over Skype, not under a table.”

  “Sure. Whatever.”

  “You thought that because he didn’t give you a date, a seating plan and a minute-by-minute breakdown of his wedding day, there wasn’t going to be one…because how could a control freak like your dad even consider getting married without a million bits of paperwork, yes?”

  And although I pretend I’m not listening, I notice she lowers her voice to a whisper when she calls Dad a control freak. At an Angelo convention, you can never be sure if he’ll pop up from nowhere, having heard everything you just said.

  Or maybe it’s just me he does that to?

  Sam crawls out from under the table and stands up. She is reduced to a pair of boots and bright green tights – and a voice.

  “You know what you need?”

  “To be examined for concussion?” I say, crawling out after her.

  She ignores me. “The big book party’s on. Right now. It’s Saturday night, and we’ve officially clocked off for the day as of…” She looks at her watch. Like the rest of her outfit today, it is bright green. I don’t know how she does it. “Now!”

  “Lexi doesn’t want to go to a party. Lexi wants to go and lie down in a dark room. A dark, quiet room.”

  “There’ll be food…” she says in a sing-song voice. There will be. There’s always food at convention parties. Sometimes, it’s even stuff that isn’t crisps.

  And it is a while since I had anything to eat – I’m starving.

  The book party is always one of Dad’s favourite parts of the convention, and this one’s no exception – I can just about see him over by the coconut shy. The hotel’s ballroom has (for one night only) been turned into an old-fashioned fair – with candyfloss machines, hoopla games, hook-the-duck stalls and a fortune teller. Dad picks the theme, and all the publishers chip in. It’s meant to be relaxed; it’s both part of the evening entertainment schedule, and kind of a nod back to how these conventions all started. Everybody loves it – even the people who don’t care so much about books. There’s a New York Times bestselling author over there, handing out buckets of popcorn and signing books…while on the other side of the room, a couple of the hotel’s waiting staff are in a tight huddle at the end of the drinks table with two publicists, Nadiya’s uncle and Sam’s mum. Instinctively, I take a step forward – then stop myself. I am not working now – it’s the parentals’ shift. And besides, the parties, as Dad likes to tell me with a smile, are “out of my league” – like I’m seven, not seventeen.

  He never used to smile like that, slightly insincere and ever-so-superior. It’s a smile he’s caught from Bea; I recognize it. It’s not a real smile – it’s the facial expression equivalent of a sticker for opening your mouth wide at the dentist. And maybe it’s weird to notice it, but…he’s my dad. How can I not?

  I’m just helping myself from a passing tray of tiny, tiny pizzas when I spot him.

  Dark curly hair, wire-rimmed glasses. An air of smug self-satisfaction that wafts across the room like the smell of blocked drains.

  “Sam. Sam!”

  “Wha’?” She looks up from her candyfloss.

  “It’s him! Clipboard guy!” I hiss at her.

  “Where?” She’s beside me in a heartbeat, peering across the floor with absolutely no subtlety whatsoever. If he even slightly looks this way, he’ll see her staring and me trying to pretend I’m not staring and he’ll know that I was talking about him. Thinking about him.

  Which I wasn’t. Not at all.

  “So? Which one is he?”

  I’d forgotten Sam was there for a second.

  “There. With the dark hair. In the navy blue jumper.”

  “Talking to Lucy?”

  “I don’t know – I can’t see.” I lean sideways, but my view of whoever it is he’s talking to is blocked by a waiter with a tray of wine glasses.

  “Curly hair?”

  “That’s him. And the chin.”

  “Chin?” She peers at me, then at the figure on the other side of the ballroom.

  “You don’t think his chin’s kind of huge?”

  She pats me on the head. “I think you’ve had a long day.”

  “Yes, Mum… Oh, no.” I turn away quickly.

  “What?” Sam shuffles even closer. She’s actually standing on my foot, but I’m not going to draw any more attention to myself.

  “He saw me.”

  “Huh?”

  Because just as I stared at him the hardest, he frowned like something was bothering him…and then he looked straight across the ballroom and right at me. And to make it worse, he saw me watching him.

  And he smiled.

  “Move!” I try to hide behind Sam, or make myself invisible, or something – anything – to not be here.

  “I think he’s coming over!” Sam’s voice is suddenly far too loud. It’s like a foghorn, blasting through the music and the
voices that fill the room.

  “Shitshitshitshitshit. I’m not here. I’ve got to…” I eye the nearest table. It’s draped with a long white cloth, and I’ve never seen anything so welcoming. “You’ve not seen—”

  “Hello again,” says a familiar voice.

  Reluctantly, I turn around.

  He’s younger than I thought he was in the green room; maybe nineteen? And – irritatingly – he’s better-looking than I remembered him. He takes his glasses off and slides them into the back pocket of his jeans, and he’s studying me with eyes that are the same colour as clouds reflected in the sea. Maybe his chin isn’t so big after all.

  “Just to check, am I allowed in here? I wouldn’t want to get in trouble…” He flashes me a grin and pulls a standard membership lanyard out from under his jumper, letting it drop onto his chest.

  “The parties are open entry to members.” It comes out of me automatically, like I’m programmed to say it when someone presses my button.

  He’s pressed my button, hasn’t he?

  I can feel my teeth grinding against each other.

  Followed by a sharp elbow in the ribs.

  “Hi!” says Sam brightly. “I’m Samira. I’m one of Lexi’s staff.”

  “Aidan,” he says, smiling at her. “Nice to meet you.” He waves at the room. “So this party, this is all you guys, is it?”

  “God, no.” She shakes her head and laughs. “We’re the daytime grunts. Cannon fodder. The parties are mostly our parents, hers and mine.” She pauses, but then sees his blank expression. “Lexi, me, Nadiya, Bede – basically, anyone you see wearing one of these lanyards, we’re all staffing the convention.” She tugs at hers to make her point. “Some of our parents have been doing these for years, so we’re kind of keeping it in the family.”

  “I see.” He nods appreciatively. “I’ve never been to a convention before. I didn’t know what to expect.”

  It’s the strangest thing, because although he’s clearly talking to Sam, he’s looking at me. Not uncomfortably, it’s not like he’s staring or anything…but it’s like he’s curious. Like I’m some kind of display in a museum.

  They make small talk about the convention – which I mostly tune out of as I catch sight of my dad across the room. He’s having a whale of a time chatting to a guy in a leather jacket who looks like he might be an actor from last year’s big superhero film. Or maybe not. I’m not sure; it could be the light…