The Feud

by James, Amanda

  Nearly two hundred years of hatred and loathing between their two families. Their parents didn’t speak to each other, and when she and Terry found themselves in the same class at school, the two sets of parents had forbidden the teacher to allow them to play together. Yes, what the Trevelyars had done was despicable, but wasn’t it time to put the quarrel to bed? Morvoren’s cheeks flare again and she hurries into the harvest festival dance.

  The village hall is swollen with what looks like almost the entire population of the village. Good. That will make her less noticeable when she sidles up to Terry. The young ones are jiving in the middle of the room while the older ones knock back the home-made cider and look on disapprovingly. There are some little kids playing with a pumpkin and racing about with a scarecrow, but as yet she hasn’t spotted the object of her desire. Oh. There he is by the apple bobbing barrel, pint in hand, leaning nonchalantly against a timber post. He’s chatting to a group of his mates and her pulse quickens at the sight of him.

  How to get near him though? The place is packed, but she can’t just wander up to him and chuck her potion in his drink, can she? He’d notice something like that. As she’s wondering, Elowen breezes through the door with her parents and bumps into Annie, spilling her sherry in the process. That’s it. That’s the answer. Thank you, Elowen! Morvoren takes a deep breath, smooths her purple taffeta skirt and sets a course for Terry. As she gets near him she trips and pushes him in the chest, sending his drink flying through the air.

  ‘What the bloody hell you doing, maid!’ he yells.

  ‘Sorry! Must’ve tripped over something. I’ll get you another.’ Morvoren dabs at a few spatters of ale on his jeans with a tissue and his mates guffaw.

  ‘Oooh, watch where you’re touching him, love. He’ll come over all unnecessary!’ one of them says, which sets them all off again. Terry’s not laughing.

  ‘Leave it.’ He brushes her hand away, anger furrowing his brows.

  ‘I’ll get you another. What you drinking?’

  ‘I’ll not take a drink from a Penhallow.’

  ‘Oh come on. Don’t be like that.’

  ‘No, Tewwy, sweetie pie, don’t be wike dat!’ the same joker says, and the rest fall about laughing.

  ‘Pale ale. A pint,’ Terry growls and turns his back.

  There’s a crush at the bar, which is just what she needs. Nobody sees her slip a vial of liquid from her pocket and tip it into the pale ale, give it a stir with her finger. Turning, she makes her way back to Terry just as Elowen spies her across the hall, yells her name and waves like a windmill. Shit. Go away. The last thing Morvoren wants is a vison in scarlet turning up just as she’s about to look into Terry’s eyes as he takes the first sip.

  ‘Mor! Mor! Hang on, I can’t get through!’ Elowen’s yelling as she threads her way through the dancers.

  Morvoren pretends not to hear and hurries the last few feet to Terry, holding the pint out to him like a trophy. ‘Here, Terry. And sorry again.’

  There’s only a couple of his mates here now – the joker’s dancing and Terry looks less furious. ‘Right. Cheers,’ he says, looking vaguely interested in her, but he doesn’t drink.

  She looks right into his eyes and gives him her best smile. He smiles back and raises the glass to his lips.

  ‘Bloody hell, that was a right squash getting through that lot!’ Elowen chimes in her ear. ‘Didn’t you see me, Mor?’

  Morvoren swallows a torrent of abuse, looks at her friend and through gritted teeth says, ‘No. I was getting a drink for Terry.’ She looks back at Terry. The glass is still poised but he hasn’t drunk, and her stomach rolls. He’s not looking interested in her any more. He’s not looking at her at all. He’s looking at Elowen. Or should that be drooling?

  ‘Elowen, isn’t it? Mark’s little sister?’

  Elowen turns pink and nods.

  ‘You’ve grown up, ain’t you?’ Terry gives her a heart-stopping smile and raises his glass to his lips again.

  No. Noo. Don’t drink it while looking at her. LOOK AT ME. Morvoren feels sick, weak-legged. ‘You still play football on Saturday afternoons, Terry?’ she says, putting her hand on the arm holding the drink, hoping to distract him.

  Terry shakes her off as if she’s an annoying fly. ‘Oi. You’ll spill my drink again.’ He barely glances in her direction. His eyes seem welded to Elowen’s.

  Elowen says, ‘Mark can’t play on Saturdays now as he works out at Perranporth, at the butchers.’ To Morvoren’s horror, she gives a little pout with her full pink lips and pats her blonde curls.

  Terry’s gaze shifts to Elowen’s ample bosom spilling over the dress and back up to her face. ‘Well, next time I see him I’ll tell him what a doll he has for a sister.’ Then he does the beautiful smile again and takes a long pull of his pint… and the bottom falls out of Morvoren’s world.

  She watches the two of them for a few minutes, chatting away as if they’re the only two people in the place. They might as well be for all the notice they take of anyone else, so wrapped up as they are in each other. Morvoren can’t stand it. She mutters something about getting a drink, but they don’t respond. They’re oblivious to her. To anyone. She turns and runs to the door, but before she goes through it, she takes a glance back over her shoulder just in time to see Terry kiss Elowen’s cheek. That’s it then. It’s worked. The strongest love potion she’s ever made is a huge success. Well done, Morvoren, you stupid cow! Running outside, she’s glad to find it’s raining. She never lets anyone see her cry.

  Chapter 12

  Tap, tap, tap. Matt’s at the bottom of a deep pit. It’s pitch-black; something’s holding him there. Tap, tap, tap. What’s that noise? It sounds like knuckles on glass. There’s no glass here. There’s nothing. He needs to get away, go up… There’s a light – just a pinprick so high… How will he get there? Tap, tap, tap. Then there’s a muffled voice. What’s it saying? He strains his ears.

  ‘Matt! Matt! Wake up!’

  Wake up? He is awake, isn’t he? Are his eyes open? He can’t tell, but he can see the light, so they must be. Matt looks at the light and pushes his feet to the floor, except he can’t feel a floor, but then he’s rising, drifting up to the light. The voice is getting clearer and the light’s getting brighter until it’s blinding. ‘Ow, fuck!’

  What the hell? Matt rubs his eyes and focuses… on a steering wheel. He’s been asleep in a car. His car? He rubs his eyes again and turns his head to look outside and sees Betty from the newsagents tapping on his window.

  ‘Matt. Thank God, you’re awake! Get out of the car!’

  He must still be dreaming. Must be, because he’s naked. Naked in his car with an empty whisky bottle on his chest. He shifts in his seat and the bottle thumps to the floor. Matt covers his modesty with both hands and stares at his lower body. Bloody hell… There are red lipstick marks all across his stomach and thighs.

  ‘Bugger off! I won’t tell you again!’ Betty yells.

  Matt’s head jerks to the windscreen. There’s a teenage boy crawling on the bonnet, pointing a phone at him, eyes alight with mischief. Betty cuffs him round the head and the lad jumps down, runs off laughing. Inside his stomach, a tide of nausea begins to rise. Shit. He needs to be sick. Matt’s hand shoots to the door handle but it’s locked. He flicks the central locking button and tumbles out into the cold air; his legs won’t support him. It’s too late. On his knees he’s helpless to move as he retches and vomits into the gutter.

  ‘Oh, God. What a state you’re in, lad,’ Betty says, and he feels material cover his back. ‘You’ll have to slip my coat on until we get you off the street. It’s too late to keep this a secret I’m afraid, cos there’s been three kids taking photos of you. I heard the commotion as I was walking to work just now.’

  Matt tries to say something, but his lips won’t move. He allows himself to be helped into the coat and led along the side street where he appears to have parked, and onto the high street and into Betty’s shop. In the back k
itchen, bewildered, he slumps onto a chair while she puts the kettle on. Resting his head in his hands, he says, ‘I… I don’t know what the hell happened, Betty.’

  ‘Hmm. Looks like you had quite a night.’ She sets a mug of tea down on the little table and sits opposite. ‘What were you thinking, lad? Getting in that state and driving? You’re a teacher, a respected member of the community. It won’t do. Look at the state of you.’ She shoves a small mirror along the table.

  With a shaking hand, he picks up the mirror and can hardly believe what he’s seeing. His hair’s wild, there’s more lipstick marks on his neck and his mouth and his eyes are bloodshot – haunted. Matt looks into Betty’s concerned brown eyes and feels tears push behind his own. What a fucking mess.

  ‘You have to believe me, Betty. I have no clue about what happened or how I ended up like this in my car. I feel like I’ve been drugged. When you tapped on the window I was having a weird dream and found it hard to open my eyes. And I never drink and drive. Ever. The last thing I remember is that I was at Lavender’s house for dinner. We had a nice meal and sat by her fire for a chat. The next thing I remember is you tapping on the window.’

  ‘Lavender Nancarrow asked you to dinner?’ Betty frowns, looks sceptical.

  ‘Yes. I know that sounds unbelievable given what she’s like, but she asked me. She’ll remember what happened.’ He stands up. ‘I have to go and…’ A pain blooms over his right eye and the room tips. He sits down again with a thump.

  ‘You’ll be going nowhere ’til you’ve come round and had a proper sleep. I’ll ring for my Laura to come in to take over the shop and then I’ll run you home.’

  Matt’s moved by this woman’s compassion. Not everyone would be so kind, considering how he was found. ‘Thank you, Betty. You’re a real friend…’ Then a thought occurs to him. ‘Did you see my clothes, or my phone, wallet?’

  ‘Didn’t have time to look. Might be in the car. You drink that tea and I’ll go and see.’

  While she’s gone, Matt examines his body. The lipstick marks are smudged mostly, but one or two are perfect imprints. Too perfect. It’s as if they’ve been stamped on his skin. He wets a paper towel, and he’s scrubbing at them when Betty comes back in.

  ‘Lucky for you your clothes were in the back seat, and your wallet and phone too.’

  ‘Thank God.’ Matt takes them from her and flicks through his wallet. ‘Nothing taken. Whoever did this to me wanted humiliation, not money.’

  ‘Did it to you? Haven’t you considered the possibility that you just got drunk, Matt, and you and Lavender had a bit of fun together?’ Betty crosses her arms and sighs.

  Matt considers this for all of two seconds. ‘There’s no way. She’s not that kind of girl, and even if it was true, how they hell did I come to be naked in a side street alone?’

  ‘Perhaps she woke up in a similar state, was ashamed of what she’d done and legged it.’

  ‘But why would we be in the village? Why didn’t we just stay at her house?’

  ‘No idea.’ Betty shakes her head. ‘Now if you’ll excuse me, I’ll open the shop. I’ll take you back when Laura gets here. It’s nearly eight o’clock on a Friday morning and we’ve been shut half an hour.’

  Eight? On a Friday morning… Realisation slams into Matt’s consciousness. ‘Shit, it… I should be at school.’

  Betty turns at the door. ‘Yeah, but you can’t go in today. Not in your state. I’d call in sick and do it now. They’ll not be too pleased you left it so late.’

  Matt gets dressed in the small toilet in the offshoot. Maureen, the school secretary, was not happy when he told her he’d felt unwell all night and had just thrown up – that was why he was so late calling in.

  But Betty is right. He can’t go in today. The churny stomach is calming down a bit, but his head’s throbbing and there’s a vile taste in the back of his throat. It’s a mixture of vomit and blackcurrants. He can’t remember eating blackcurrants.

  Ten minutes later, Laura, Betty’s daughter, arrives with Betty’s two-year-old grandson, Oliver. Betty picks him up and showers him with kisses. ‘He’s ’ansome, ain’t he?’ she says to Matt, her homely face beaming with pride.

  ‘He sure is, Betty.’

  Laura’s not beaming. The young mum hangs her coat up, eyes him with disdain and takes her phone out of her pocket. ‘I think you should know that the state you were in earlier is all over social media.’ She scrolls down the screen and holds it out to him.

  The churny stomach resurfaces and he takes the phone in trembling fingers. It’s Twitter… There are various tweets of photos of himself from different angles, asleep behind the wheel naked, the whisky bottle on his chest.

  @bigman21 OMG this is the new teacher!!

  @Mumofthreesprogs I’m gonna RT! Dirty bastard’s not going anywhere near my kids!

  @KLMorsley89 WTF?? If he’s not sacked I’m keeping my kids home. Fucking disgusting!

  The floor’s coming up to meet him and he hangs onto the back of a chair. Breathes in through his nose, out through his mouth. Laura takes the phone from his limp hand. ‘There’s more on Facebook. Wanna see?’ she snaps.

  Matt shakes his head. He has no words.

  ‘Matt says he can’t remember what happened, Laura,’ Betty says, obviously trying to smooth the situation.

  ‘Not surprised with a bottle of whisky down him!’

  Matt looks at Laura, sees a mixture of disgust and venom in her eyes. ‘It’s true, Laura. Someone must have done this to me… drugged me. I never get like this. I don’t even like whisky!’

  Laura holds her hands up. ‘Good luck with getting people to believe that.’ She turns to her mum. ‘Right, you’d better take him home. I have to be at playgroup with Oliver soon.’

  * * *

  Lavender’s not answering her phone. After the tenth attempt at calling, he chucks his mobile down on the bed. He’s not leaving a voicemail. No. He wants to gauge her reaction straight away. Matt decides to have a shower, but halfway through, he hears his phone ringing. Great. Wrapped in a towel, he hurries into the bedroom to answer it, hoping it’s Lavender. Just as he gets to it, it stops ringing. Matt thumbs to the missed calls. Shit. It wasn’t Lavender. It was Deborah. News travels fast. Matt sinks down on the end of his bed. There’s a voicemail. He can guess what the headteacher has to say will not be what he wants to hear.

  ‘Matt, it’s Deborah. I hear you’re sick. I’m not surprised, having seen your photos all over social media. Please call me immediately.’

  His finger hovers over her number but he can’t bring himself to call. Why would she believe him? Why would anyone? Throwing it down, he goes to finish showering, just as it rings again. Matt leans his head against the steamed-up mirror in the bathroom and lets it go to answerphone. When he checks, it’s Deborah again.

  ‘I’m assuming you’re home. I’m coming over… This won’t wait. I’ll be there within the hour.’

  Matt swears and throws the towel across the room. This is going to be bad. Very bad.

  Chapter 13

  The doorbell rings. Matt sets his coffee cup down and goes to answer it – the condemned man walking to the gallows. The hall mirror tells him he looks more human, but his brain and insides feel like alien territory. When he opens the door, Deborah looks at him as though she can actually see his insides and steps past him quickly. In the kitchen she whirls round, folds her arms and raises an eyebrow. She doesn’t need to say anything.

  ‘If I were you, I’d feel exactly the same,’ Matt says in a voice that sounds like he’s trying to talk down a suicide jumper.

  ‘Really? And how do you think I’m feeling?’ Deborah snaps.

  Matt pulls out a chair at the table, waves a hand at it, but she ignores him.

  He sits instead; he can’t trust his legs. ‘Angry, bewildered, disappointed, betrayed…’ He raises his hands and lets them fall with a slap to his thighs.

  Deborah leans her back against the sink. ‘Pretty much, yep.
Any excuses at all?’

  ‘Yes.’ Matt swallows and wonders how the hell to start. She’s glaring at him and he feels about five years old. ‘Look, I went to dinner with a friend last night. I had one glass of wine. The rest was non-alcoholic. The next thing I remember is waking in my car on a side street in the village… in the state you must have seen in those photos. That’s all I remember… I swear on my family’s lives and—'

  ‘A friend?’

  ‘Lavender Nancarrow.’

  Deborah rolls her eyes. ‘Might explain the lipstick, Matt?’

  ‘No! We did nothing like that. We aren’t even boyfriend and girlfriend.’ Now he sounds five years old too.

  ‘Right.’ She shifts her weight from one foot to the other, drops her hip. ‘And your explanation for it all is…?’

  He shrugs, looks away from her searching dark eyes and at his feet. ‘I was set up. Drugged, stripped and left on display for all of St Agnes to see on a Friday morning.’

  Deborah’s snort of derision’s followed by, ‘Why on earth would someone want to do that?’

  Matt looks back at her, keeps his gaze on hers. ‘Because they want me out of town. I didn’t tell you, but on my first day here I had a severed badger head left by my front door as a warning, and a sign telling me to fuck off back to London. Then not long after that, I had my car tires slashed, the paintwork scraped and the headlights smashed in. Now this.’

  Deborah’s mouth drops open and she pulls out a chair opposite. ‘Why the hell didn’t you tell me? What did the police say?’ She sits down with a thump, her expression much more sympathetic.