by Shari Low
‘But she admitted it!’
‘She did not admit it! Roxy, you didn’t even give her the chance to speak or explain before you jumped down her throat and hung up. And have you spoken to her since?’
She popped a chip into her mouth and then held up her plastic cutlery.
‘I’d rather amputate my nipples with this fork.’
Mitch shook his head in despair, but Roxy didn’t notice, given that she was too busy tobogganing down the slippery slope to anger, homicidal urges and calorific excess.
This was bad. Negative emotions put years on your face and now she was eating items of food that had come into contact with a deep-fat fryer. She wasn’t sure what was worse: the overwhelming urge to murder her erstwhile best friend or the increasing desire to steal a local ned’s souped-up Corsa and ram-raid the local chippy for a battered saveloy.
But hey, if she did either of those things it would take her away from the sheer joy and delight she felt about the inescapable reality that she was lying on the floor in the lounge of a church-house on a Saturday night, eating carbohydrates and playing inane games with a grown man who was slouched on a nearby couch wearing the chichi combination of a Flintstones T-shirt and Birkenstocks. In winter.
She wondered how long it would take her to bleed out if she pointed the fork towards her heart then plunged it in really hard.
‘So where’s your uncle tonight then?’
‘Usual. Saturday-night mass down at the remand centre, followed by marriage counselling over in the church hall.’
‘No difference there then–they’re both serving custodial sentences. He’d be better just giving the marriage lot the number of a good divorce lawyer and telling them to run for their lives. Relationships are shit.’
Mitch nodded solemnly in mock acquiescence. ‘You know, you should definitely consider a career as a therapist, because those people skills of yours are going to waste.’
There were a few moments of silence while Mitch caught three more chips and Roxy tortured herself with the mental image of Felix and Ginny, toasting each other with Bollinger while travelling first class to Barbados for a five-star break of sun, sea and other activities that necessitated leg-waxing. That excruciating snapshot then slid into such a vivid, realistic daydream that she almost felt a twinge of sadness when Ginny was swallowed whole by a great white shark and Felix consoled himself with a three-day binge of debauchery that left him destitute, lost and suffering from several sexually transmitted diseases.
‘You’re smiling–what are you thinking about?’
‘Making amends with Felix by sending him on holiday. What brochure has those special activity trips, the ones where the plane gets hijacked on the way there, then there’s a bird flu outbreak and you end up quarantined in a disease-ridden prison cell with two lepers, three blokes with bagpipes and Paul Burrell?’
‘Are you always this happy-go-lucky?’ he asked with mock concern.
Roxy rolled onto her back and stared at the ceiling. ‘Nooooo! That’s the whole point! Mitch, do you know what I’d normally be doing right now? I’d be wearing Dolce & Gabbana, having dinner in an exclusive, Michelin-starred restaurant before being whisked by limo to a members-only VIP club where I’d fend off the Arsenal squad and David Hasselhoff before Felix and I left to spend the night in his squillion-quid penthouse flat overlooking the Thames. Look around you–are you getting what’s wrong with this picture?’
‘Can I just remind you that two weeks ago you’d had enough of London?’
‘Yeah, well, I understand now that that was a temporary blip with a sound scientific reason behind it.’
‘And what was that?’
‘PMT.’
She stuck another chip in her mouth. It was true that she still missed her life…but the truth was she missed Ginny more. The old Ginny, that was–not new slut Ginny who had apparently lost control of her values, her morals and her vagina.
And sure, she did miss the excitement and little luxuries of her London life, but yet…Well, somehow she didn’t quite feel compelled to go back there yet. Best-friend betrayal plus murderous urges should have had her on the first train back to Shaggerville Central, but for some reason she couldn’t quite fathom, she couldn’t face it. Could it be that fresh air and the heady country fumes of pesticide and cow dung had addled her brain? After all, weren’t those the very things that were responsible for beating the crap out of the ozone layer?
‘Okay, that’s it, Miss Prissy-Arse, moping over. Come on, we’re going out.’
‘Unless Gordon Ramsay and luxury transportation are involved, I’m not interested.’
‘Move!’
The ferocity of his tone made her take notice–for a whole three seconds before she plunged back into lethargy. Purleeze. This was a bloke who trapped spiders and released them into the wild without harming them; did he honestly think he could bully her into action?
‘Move right now or I’m calling Ginny and telling her that you’re desperate to speak to her.’
On the other hand, he did put up a good argument.
‘You wouldn’t,’ she dared him in her deadliest voice, the one she normally kept for telephone sales people and the legendary theatre actor who liked to be dominated and requested that he be treated with contempt from the moment he arrived at the Seismic. Oh, pang of homesickness–perhaps the cow-dung sensory overload wasn’t permanent after all. She missed the girls, she missed Sam, she even missed the legendary crooner who kept overdosing on Viagra and poppers and trying to dry-hump the vacuum cleaner.
Mitch got up, crossed the room to the huge black circle-dial telephone that was perched on a rickety tripod side table and picked up the receiver.
‘Watch me.’
‘Okay, okay, but this had better be good and there had better be a drink at the end of it. My new plan of escape from this hellhole involves excessive alcohol and rehab.’
As they passed the front door, she lifted her cardigan from the coat rack, and as she pulled it on she caught her reflection in the vestibule mirror: pink mohair, ankle-length, size eighteen, borrowed from her mother’s wardrobe. She looked like a cross between a furry beach ball and Elton John in his flamboyant phase.
They walked down the path and she pulled her collar tight around her neck as the cold air snapped against her skin, then pushed her arm through Mitch’s in the hope that some extra body heat might stave off a slow and painful death from hypothermia. She hated the cold almost as much as she hated Farnham Hills, Ginny, and any pursuit that resulted in perspiration. Other than sex, of course. Sex. Oh, don’t even go there.
As she and Mitch walked in silence, the mental image of Darren, dick dangling, flashed in front of her. She couldn’t deny she’d enjoyed their little encounter but the remorse had started to set in before she’d even climbed off her knees. Unfortunately, the initial remorse had been all his.
Was there kissing? No. Sweet words? No. Cuddles? Actually, given the destination of his ejaculation that one would have been decidedly unhygienic.
But there was absolutely nothing except a panicked expression (his), some stuttering (him) and then an excuse about having to go (his) before he pulled up his kegs and bolted, leaving her stunned, surprised and urgently in need of a shower.
She didn’t relish the prospect of meeting him again. Number one on her Things To Do List had gone from being ‘Take Contract Out On Felix’ to ‘Avoid Darren Jenkins’.
They were fifty yards away from the pub now, thank God. If ever she was in dire need of a cocktail it was now. She could almost taste the Cosmopolitan when Mitch suddenly steered her to the left and they crossed the road towards the community centre. Lights were flickering in the windows, and as they got halfway across the road she realised she could hear music.
She groaned and stopped dead, causing a pensioner in a Fiat Punto to swerve, take out three road cones and narrowly avoid a fatal collision with a give-way sign.
‘Mitch, if you’re taking me line dancing you�
�re going to have to kill me first.’
‘I promise it isn’t line dancing. Come on…’
He pulled her towards the door, and gestured to the hand-made sign beside it.
Oh no. This was worse than line dancing. It was worse than the pub. This was as bad as it got. It was probably on a par with watching Felix and Ginny stage a live sex show in the middle of Primark while Celine Dion’s Greatest Hits blared in the background.
She stared at the sign.
Farnham Hills Youth Club–
Here 2 Nite–£3 entry
Free Soft Drink and Crisps
NO ALCOHOL, VANDALISM OR
ROWDY BEHAVIOUR
‘Mitch, do you really, really hate me?’ she whined pitifully.
He leaned over and kissed her on the cheek. ‘Nope, I think you’re deceptively lovely. Now come on, it’s not so bad, I promise. I’ve been helping out every fortnight since I got here and I haven’t been seriously injured even once. And at least it’ll take your mind of all that other stuff. I’ll make them promise to be gentle with you.’
‘Are you taking the piss out of me again?’ ‘Absolutely. Come on, hurry up before the frost gets to my extremities.’
And with that and an unceremonious push he cannoned her inside. Right on cue, the banging of the door coincided with the record ending and forty teenagers turned to stare. There was a mixed reaction: disinterest, curiosity, and from some familiar faces in the corner there came the distinct vibe of hostility. Lip-reading might not have been a talent that Roxy listed on her CV, but she knew enough to recognise several pouting Aw, fucks when she saw them.
Roxy inhaled sharply, pushed her shoulders back and rearranged her face into ‘defiant and hard’. She knew that teenagers worked on the same principle as aggressive dogs–they could smell fear.
She tried to find the positives. First, at least there was no chance of an awkward meeting with Darren here, and second, she realised as she scanned the crowd, there had to be at least one reprobate with a stash of contraband alcohol. Or maybe some weed.
Her eyes fell on the fifth-year study group, four boys and four girls, sitting huddled around a table in the corner, all of them still giving her a look that indicated she was about as welcome as headlice and gainful employment.
‘Hey, Mitch, how’re you doing?’
And thanks to the gods of Embarrassing Situations and Shit Social Events for the latest contribution to the evening. Yes, the voice came from Darren Jenkins as he appeared from a side room and spotted Mitch.
The startled body language and horrified expression came straight after when he realised that Roxy was there too.
‘Roxy,’ he mumbled in the voice of doom with an accompanying nod.
Roxy just raised her eyes in disdain, causing Mitch to completely misinterpret the situation.
‘Come on, you two,’ he interjected. ‘Can’t you just put your differences aside and play nice for just one night?’
Cornered, trapped, a siege situation, there was only one way to handle this: Roxy’s inner child decided to come to the party.
She smiled her sweetest, most innocent smile. ‘You’re right, Mitch. Well, what do you think, Darren, babe–would you like to play nice?’
He stared at her for a second, then turned and walked off without saying a word. Roxy shrugged as she turned to Mitch.
‘Right then, Kofi Annan, shall we take that as a “no”?’
‘You know, I don’t understand why you two have to be so hard on one another.’
Roxy grimaced at the irony. ‘Yep, he’s definitely been far too hard on me. Okay, might as well go mingle with my public.’
She discarded the neon cardigan on a nearby chair and strutted over to her favourite fan club. They all tried to avoid eye contact, hoping that if they ignored her she’d divert over to the thirteen-year-olds applying temporary tattoos at the next table.
‘Hello, chums! Don’t worry about lavishing me with overly affectionate greetings, I know you’re choked and thrilled that I’m here,’ she baited. Her gaze rested on Romeo and Juliet, whose intertwined limbs could prove to be fatal should there be the requirement to move quickly in the case of a fire or flood.
It was strange to see the gang out of school uniform. The boys were all in similar baggy jeans, topped with an assortment of sports T-shirts and zip-up sweaters. The girls, however, were definitely channelling Girls Aloud–casually waved, long glossy hair, the kind of natural no-make-up look that required an hour of make-up application, false nails manicured into square white tips, skinny jeans, platform shoes and strappy smock tops that flowed over their size-eight hips. Although she’d rather eat her pink cardi than say it out loud, Roxy was actually pretty impressed at how well they scrubbed up–which was a sign that either they weren’t such country hicks after all or she was suffering from some kind of carbohydrate-induced delusional disorder.
Either way, she needed medicinal intervention.
She leaned in so that only they could hear her. ‘Okay, who’s got the booze stash?’
There was a ten-second silence, until Juliet finally spoke. ‘Is this so that you can confiscate it again, same as you did in the pub?’
‘Absolutely.’
Like the underage-drinking equivalent of an Olympic synchronised swimming team, their jaws all set into identical grim lines at exactly the same instant and stayed that way until Roxy spoke again.
‘But I’ll give it back right after I’ve sampled it and a tenner has found its way into your back pocket. Toilets?’
The four girls looked at each other, and then announced, ‘Twenty and it’s a deal.’
Roxy rolled her eyes. ‘Bloody hell, that’s scandalous. What’s happened to the youth of today?’
They pushed their chairs back, picked up their clinking handbags, and motioned to Roxy to follow them. Ten minutes and many swigs of vodka and ginger beer later, and with Roxy’s back pocket twenty quid lighter, they returned to the table. The boys had all shifted off to bring each other to a premature and gruesome death on the Xboxes set up in the far corner, so it was girls only, and despite their little illegal transaction they were still decidedly uncomfortable and eyeing Roxy with suspicion.
‘Look, peace, okay? I’m about as happy to be here as you lot are to have me, but since it’s here or freezing your hooters off outside, you’re as well making the most of it. So, come on then, let’s, er, chat. What were you talking about when I arrived?’
Glances shot between them again before one finally said, ‘Our physics prelim. It’s next week.’
This was met with a groan of derision. ‘Physics? Are you taking the piss? It’s Saturday night and you’re talking about physics? Aren’t you lot supposed to be in the middle of a teenage rebellion that involves hard drugs, violence, sex and shoplifting?’
One of the girls raised her eyebrow and sneered, ‘Could you be more, like, snide? You have, like, no idea what you’re talking about.’
Roxy matched the glare. ‘So go on then, educate me about the wonders of teenage life. Start with your names.’
They answered one by one. ‘Lindsay.’ ‘Carrie.’ ‘Saffron.’ Then it was the turn of Roxy’s arch nemesis–the girl whose antics were responsible for the unusually high condom sales in the village. ‘Juliet.’
‘You’re kidding me!’
‘Why? What’s so strange about that?’
‘Nothing. It’s a…lovely name. And what about lover-boy over there? Don’t tell me his name’s Romeo,’ Roxy shrieked, trying unsuccessfully to contain her mirth.
Juliet stared at her, her face blank, her voice deadpan, obviously aggrieved at being the butt of the joke. ‘It is.’
Roxy quickly stopped laughing. The atmosphere at the table had plummeted back to Arctic level and she could sense that the natives were getting restless. Okay, plan B was…nope, she didn’t have a plan B.
Suddenly all four girls dissolved into fits of giggles. It took a while until Juliet could stutter through the hilarity, �
�Kidding–it’s Ben. But your face was, like, so lame.’
Roxy slumped back in her chair. These creatures were one hundred per cent pure evil, and worse, they were laughing at her. She’d gone from being Miss Cool, Chic and Utterly Enviable to being target practice for Satan’s spawn.
She pulled her bag onto her lap and pulled out her cigarettes. Juliet took a sharp intake of breath when she spotted the familiar crest. ‘Wow, is that a Fendi Spy?’ she exclaimed, visibly awestruck as her eyes locked on the butter-soft nappa bag with the distinctive handles and the strange cylindrical bit at the top for holding your money/lippy/tampon.
With three excited gasps, her chums followed suit.
And that was the moment Roxy knew she had them.
Forty-five minutes of fashion talk later, with a quick five-minute break to hang out the bathroom windows clutching Marlboros, they were her new very best friends.
‘No way, the Paddington is, like, soooo over,’ Roxy declared in what she reckoned was her very best teenage-icon lingo. The girls were now hanging on her every word, giving her ego its first boost since she’d disembarked from that train a fortnight before. They’d done the pros and cons of every on-trend bag for the last two years, the merits of the new Dolce & Gabbana winter collection and discussed the moral and physical consequences of the size zero–a topical debate that would have been highly impressive if it hadn’t included Lindsay’s insightful, highbrow viewpoint that catwalk models were, ‘Eeeeew, totally skanky, man–must be like shagging a stick.’
Roxy took that as a clue that they’d exhausted that particular line of conversation. ‘Okay, enough superficial stuff–let’s talk serious stuff.’ She scanned the room. ‘Who’s hot and who’s not?’
Her gaze went to the Xbox corner and she nudged Juliet.
‘Ben?’
‘Hot!’ Juliet replied indignantly.
‘Not!’ chorused her pals. Juliet rewarded them with a bird’s-eye view of her middle finger.
‘Okay, who’s next?’
The girls got there before her.