House of Windows

by Alexia Casale

  ‘Hey!’ Nick said, when Tim took his mug away to the sink.

  ‘Nick, this tea is some hours cold and dead.’ He swilled the dregs out and tossed in a fresh teabag. ‘And as for tonight, here’s a lesson for you: almost all good hangover cures have alcohol in them.’

  ‘Please tell me you’re going to get drunk in front of Gosswin.’

  ‘I said I wanted to cure my hangover, not get myself defenestrated, thank you very much.’ He thumped a fresh tea clumsily down on Nick’s coaster then groaned. ‘Please tell me you’re not going to study every day during the holidays too.’

  Nick cradled his tea between his hands, slurping a sip. ‘What else would I do? Get a job? Oh, right. I’m fifteen. Or I suppose I could get drunk and then sit about all day, moaning.’

  Tim, who’d pillowed his head on his arms, lifted one hand to flip him the finger.

  ‘Do you know what I should get Gosswin from Dad? He’s never very specific when he wants a present for someone. Usually Secretary Sandy takes care of it. I think he said to get some brandy or Scotch but—’

  ‘You know they’re not going to let you buy alcohol, right? If we walk down together instead of you haring off early for an hour in the library, you can pick something out and I’ll be the responsible adult. Well, let’s not stretch a point. I’ll buy: you pay. And in return for my being totally magnanimous and even-tempered in the face of great provocation over the light-bulb situation, you will clear the laundry racks and do some of that ever-growing mountain by the machine. Or do I have to play nanny and start telling you that you’re forbidden to do your homework until you’ve done your chores?’

  ‘Give me a break. It’s Dad’s laundry.’

  ‘Then tell him to do it. Come to that, why do you have to pick up Gosswin’s present anyway? You going to start buying your own next?’

  Nick shoved away from the table and poured the rest of his tea down the sink. ‘What’s wrong with helping out when he’s so busy?’ He stomped towards the stairs.

  Tim dragged himself to his feet and started upstairs as Nick’s door slammed above him. ‘I am far, far too young to be even partially responsible for a teenager in full strop,’ he told his bedroom door, resting his forehead against the wood for a moment while the stamping crescendoed in the attic. ‘This was not part of the deal.’

  Nick was toeing at the doormat when Tim came back down, pulling on his gloves and trying not to wince as his eyeballs protested the descent from one step to the next. Nick’s face brightened considerably when he saw Tim’s distress.

  ‘You are a cold and unfeeling human being,’ Tim told him.

  ‘Why did you get so trashed anyway?’ Nick asked.

  ‘Tough week to forget, friend’s birthday to celebrate. I would say you know how it is but—’

  ‘Is it worth forgetting for an hour or two when you’ll have even more time to remember the day after while you’re feeling rough?’

  ‘That,’ said Tim, yanking Nick’s hat down over his eyes, ‘is an astute and grown-up question. Please refrain from wisdom while I am in this fragile state. And stop mocking me: my hangover is not that funny.’

  ‘Says you,’ Nick answered, hunkering down into his coat.

  The pavement glinted like broken black glass, catching the light in sullen orange and vicious silver-white glints. Nick heaved a sigh of relief as he pushed his way into the warmth of the off-licence. He flinched out of the way as Tim moved him a step to the side so he could get past.

  ‘Chill,’ Tim said. ‘I’m too cold to chuck you through a window.’

  Nick made a sound that was probably meant to be a laugh, ducking away to prowl down the next aisle.

  ‘Give me strength,’ Tim whispered to the ceiling. ‘And now I’m doing it too. I’m talking to myself, and the furniture and the walls. I bet Gosswin knew this would happen.’

  ‘What are you mumbling about?’ Nick asked, popping his head around the corner of the aisle. ‘Aren’t you always telling me it gets up your nose when I do it?’

  ‘It does.’ Especially since you say all the important stuff under your breath, Tim added, under his. ‘Now, please, for the love of all that is good and decent in this world, Moderate Your Volume as you tell me how much your dad wants to spend.’

  Nick shrugged. ‘Doesn’t matter.’

  Well, it’s all right for some, Tim muttered.

  ‘Mumbler,’ replied Nick.

  ‘Pest!’ groused Tim, picking a bottle off the shelf. ‘Come on. This’ll please her.’

  Outside Tim shoved the bottle into Nick’s arms. ‘Your present, you carry.’

  ‘Why are you running?’ Nick panted, trotting to keep up. ‘And why’s it been such a bad week that you needed to blitz yourself? The coffee shop can’t be that bad with Ange there, but you said you had a “tough week to forget”. I know we’re not best mates or anything, but what’s the big secret?’

  ‘Broke up with my girlfriend.’

  ‘Oh. Sorry.’ Nick frowned up at him for a few paces. ‘Um … I thought you broke up with your girlfriend weeks ago. Isn’t that why Ange was cross with you the day you moved in? Or was there someone else and that other break-up was the reason for the argument you had that time I found Ange camped out on the sofa while you sulked upstairs?’

  ‘Does my pointed silence not give you the sense that I’d rather not talk about it?’

  ‘Sorry. Forgot we don’t actually talk to each other. I’ll stick to the snipe-and-banter.’

  ‘I like the snipe-and-banter,’ Tim said.

  Nick looked up at him solemnly, no humour in his sharp little face. ‘Don’t you ever get tired of it?’ he asked, then shouldered past Tim into the p’lodge before he could answer.

  Tim caught up with him at the bottom of the stairs to Gosswin’s rooms only for Nick to let go of the heavy wooden door before he was properly through it. At the top of the stairs, he snatched Nick’s hat from his head so that his hair stood up in all directions, grinning beatifically at Nick’s growl.

  ‘Already torturing each other like feuding siblings, I see,’ Professor Gosswin said, handing them each a glass of sherry.

  ‘The very thought causes me physical pain,’ groaned Tim.

  ‘Back atcha,’ Nick snarled. He held the bottle of brandy out to Professor Gosswin. ‘From Dad.’

  ‘And will your troublesome parent be gracing us with his presence?’

  ‘Bill’s bringing him … Or not,’ he added as Bill, but only Bill, appeared in the doorway and gave them an apologetic wave.

  ‘Should you be having that?’ Bill asked, eyeing the glass in Nick’s hand.

  Professor Gosswin fixed Bill with a look. ‘One very small glass of College sherry is de rigueur for all my guests, Mr Morrison. Go and find one for yourself forthwith.’

  Bill saluted.

  ‘Tim’s got a hangover. Make sure you speak loudly to him,’ Nick told Gosswin, as he followed his godfather.

  ‘Mr Morrison visits quite regularly, I hope,’ Professor Gosswin said, watching Nick and Bill bickering amiably over the drinks table.

  ‘He’s been once since I moved in,’ Tim said.

  ‘I suppose it is a start. And how are you finding life in the Derran household?’

  Tim shrugged. ‘Michael’s hardly there. Nick and I get on all right, I guess.’

  Professor Gosswin’s eyes narrowed.

  ‘I mean,’ Tim hurried on, ‘Nick can be touchy, but we rub along. I know you hoped I’d develop some sort of weird big-brother complex and take him under my wing but I told you I’m not up for that. And it turns out he isn’t either. He doesn’t ask me for anything, and I don’t boss him about. It seems to work. Anyway, Nick’s hard to get to know: he says all the important stuff in mumbles.’

  ‘He doesn’t mumble with me,’ Professor Gosswin said. ‘Not only do I refuse to tolerate it, I have brought Mr Derran to understand that I want to hear what he has to say.’

  ‘Look, it’s complicated. I can’t help knowing stuf
f Nick would rather I didn’t. I see how much time he spends alone. I know that even when Michael is around, he scurries into his study at the first available opportunity and barely emerges for meals – and even then he’s more focused on his phone than talking to me or Nick. Nick’s scarily patient with him: I know it’s not how I’d be if my dad told me he was coming home for dinner then showed up three days later. I don’t think it’s that they feel I’m intruding on their family life.’ He let the because there’s no family life to intrude on remain unspoken, though something in Professor Gosswin’s eyes told him she understood. ‘Nick’s … He’s just so … composed. Self-reliant. I figured maybe he’d be a bit freaked out underneath it all about the burglary, though I haven’t seen much sign of it. But there’s always this tension, like a tight little spring. He’s not exactly restful company.’

  ‘He throws himself into his work too much,’ Gosswin said softly, the tone bringing Tim up short. ‘There needs to be something else in life for a boy that age. He needs a role model who does not spend every waking moment working.’

  ‘You picked well with me.’

  Gosswin gave him a pointed look. ‘You, Mr Brethan, have a reasonable balance between your academic and social life.’ Her eyes travelled past him.

  Bill and Nick were laughing. There was colour in Nick’s cheeks. He looked like a normal teenager.

  ‘Now, Mr Brethan,’ Professor Gosswin said sharply, ‘you should go and speak with your former Director of Studies. He is lurking in my kitchen, devouring the olives. I have business with Mr Derran.’

  Tim watched the dignified, upright figure stride through the crowded room to stand next to Nick. They moved away to the window together. Gosswin took hold of Nick’s arm to settle herself into an armchair, then he sank on to the footstool beside her.

  ‘Thick as thieves. Would you believe it?’ Bill asked, coming to stand next to Tim. ‘Seems my godson has found a most unlikely kindred spirit.’

  By the time the taxi dropped them back at the house after the party, it was past midnight. As they shed coats and scarves and hats and gloves and shoes in the hall, Tim realised that the house had never felt so much like a home. Watching Bill drape an arm over Nick’s shoulders to propel him upstairs, laughing over his hiccups as he started to feel the effects of the second sherry Gosswin had slipped him, Tim had to wonder how often Bill wished he were Nick’s father.

  ‘Hey, do you want to get an almost-end-of-term coffee?’ Nick asked, as Frank closed the door on their last supervision of Term.

  ‘Busy,’ Frank grunted, pushing past.

  Susie hitched her bag up, looking weary and frustrated. ‘I’m sorry, Nick, but I’m skint. You won’t believe how happy I am that it’s the end of term. I just did the same as everyone else in Fresher’s Week – you know, bops and Cindy’s – and I didn’t drink any more than they did, but I guess their parents are loaded because I burnt through most of my loan for the term by Week 3. Nearly had to go and ask for hardship money.’

  Nick shrugged awkwardly. ‘I could get this one.’

  Susie smiled, reached out to pat his arm. ‘That’s sweet of you, Nick, but it wouldn’t feel right.’

  ‘’Cos letting me buy you a coffee is practically the same as taking candy from a baby, got it,’ Nick snapped, turning away.

  ‘Nick …’ he heard her call, before her voice trailed off into a sigh. ‘Have a good Christmas!’ she shouted just as the fire door slammed closed behind him.

  It was sleeting across Front Court, the wind driving the icy rain under umbrellas. Nick didn’t even bother with his. For a while he loitered under the arch by the p’lodge, watching the courtyard turn progressively greyer and dimmer, then hunched into his coat and hurried into the shelter of the corridor between the buttery and the dining hall, before lunging out again to hurtle around the path by Latham Lawn. He clattered through the doors into the library and up the wooden stairs. The cushioned window seats overlooking the river on the third floor were empty. He tossed his backpack and coat aside to drip on to the fuzzy squares of coarse carpet that captured dirt as if it were treasure. Shiny black patches of trodden filth shone under the lights.

  An hour later it was time to meet the crew down by the boatsheds, though they kept their outing short, keen to head back to their rooms for a hot shower as soon as they’d packed away.

  ‘See you for the Christmas party later,’ Brent said, stretching with a groan.

  ‘Are you sure the porters won’t just chuck me out?’

  Brent clapped him on the shoulder. ‘Trust your captain, kid. I’ve got it covered.’

  ‘You mean you’ll wing it.’

  ‘Well, it worked for the Formal Swap with Peterhouse: got you into a Formal Hall that way, didn’t we, even if it wasn’t at College. Besides, if they try to keep you out tonight, we can just decamp to my room, OK?’

  Nick grinned. ‘I’ll hold you to that.’

  But the barkeeper seemed willing enough to let Nick in, though he was presented, without being asked, with a series of lemonades while the others guzzled their way through an astonishing amount of ‘College plonk’, as Brent called it.

  ‘You OK, Nick?’ one of the twins asked, leaning against his shoulder.

  ‘Brilliant,’ he lied.

  ‘I’m sad,’ the twin confided, sniffing despondently. ‘I’m not sure why, but I’m very, very sad.’

  Nick tried patting him on the shoulder. This made the twin tear up. ‘Be right back,’ Nick said, slipping out of his chair.

  ‘You going to the bog? Gonna come too, like girls, always going in pairs.’ The twin giggled to himself for a moment before the giggles became hiccupy.

  Although Nick locked himself in a cubicle, when he emerged the twin was waiting for him, slumped against the wall, using the hand dryer for support.

  ‘It’s all just so …’ The twin took a shuddering breath. ‘It’ll all be gone soon. We’ll be old. Then we’ll be dead.’

  Nick slipped away while the twin had his face hidden in his hands. ‘Your brother’s in the loos. He’s a little … morose,’ he reported to the other twin, who just shrugged.

  ‘Always happens,’ Brent said. ‘Be in there for hours. You know, that’s going to be a problem,’ he added thoughtfully. ‘Need to have a slash.’ He made a face. ‘Last time he was like this, he cornered me against the sinks and told me about every girl who ever turned him down. Hugged me every time I tried to get past him, then threatened to cook himself to death with the hand-dryer if I didn’t promise to help him find a date by Valentine’s Day. I can’t face it again. Can’t you get him out?’ he appealed to the other twin.

  ‘Nope. Not his keeper.’

  ‘Suppose I could try the girls’ loo,’ Brent said dismally, then suddenly brightened. ‘Always wanted to see what it looked like in there. Yup. Going on an adventure to the girls’ loo!’ he announced to much cheering from the rest of the crew.

  Brent processed proudly down the corridor with the rest following. In front of the door to the ladies’, he turned and saluted his men then marched inside. The crew held their breath. A few seconds later, he came back through the door, pursued by two petite girls with worryingly determined looks on their faces.

  ‘Busted,’ Brent said. ‘But you’re welcome to punish me,’ he told the girls.

  One pushed him on to a barstool. ‘You will sit there.’

  ‘Anything for you,’ he said soulfully, staring blearily at her left eyebrow.

  For a while they clustered around him, digging in their handbags, soon joined by a chattering posse. Five minutes later they stepped back and presented Brent with a mirror.

  He squinted at his face. ‘I make a hot girl. But I’d have gone with the glitter purple not the blue,’ he added, poking at the eyeshadow compacts laid out on the bar counter. ‘Whatcha say, boys? Who wants a snog with your captain?’

  He spent the next five minutes chasing the non-crying twin around the bar, until the barkeeper chucked them out just in time for
both to throw up in a Front Court window-box. Nick used the opportunity to slip away.

  In Trinity Lane, he turned down towards Clare, wandering to the gates into King’s so that he could watch the light moving behind the stone tracery around the Old Schools windows. It didn’t look real. The intensity of the colours, the beauty of the shadowy buildings made it seem like something computer-generated: stronger, better, more vivid than the real world ever was. The cobbles were indigo and bronze under the lights, shining with the ground mist that crept up the lawns behind King’s Chapel from the river. He watched the windows again as he walked back the way he’d come, then turned away up Senate House Passage.

  Every step seemed to turn the world more ordinary, more real, comforting and sad at the same time, like he’d turned his back on the impossible because he didn’t have the courage to hold his ground.

  He yawned his way into the kitchen a little after midnight to find that Tim had covered the table with paperwork and was sitting, elbows braced against the wood, with his head in his hands. ‘Does getting drunk with people make you understand them better?’ he asked.

  ‘What?’ Tim looked up, shook his head. ‘No. Why would it?’

  ‘Everyone had a blast tonight except me. Either there were a bunch of in-jokes going on or I missed what was funny. Or maybe I am the most boring bookworm the world’s ever known and I really don’t know fun even when it’s puking on my shoes.’ Nick slumped into a chair, then got up again when he saw a flash of frustration cross Tim’s face. ‘Oh, don’t sulk. I’m not after a midnight heart-to-heart. I’ll go up as soon as the kettle boils: you only have to put up with me for the next two minutes.’

  ‘Did I say anything?’ Tim asked mildly.

  Nick looked away. He kicked lazily at a table leg. ‘Just … why does anyone bother? By the morning surely you know that you only had a good time because you were drunk. There’s no conversation to remember. There’s nothing interesting or important or … It’s just so pointless.’

  ‘The boatie scene not all it’s cracked up to be?’