by Beth O'Leary
‘Let’s step into my office,’ he says. ‘I’ll ask Jamie to see to your lot – 10B, is it, this afternoon?’
I nod, snuffling into my sleeve as he ushers me through into his office and closes the door gently behind me. I stand there in the middle of the rug and sob until he returns.
‘All sorted. Please, sit down,’ he says. ‘Tell me what’s wrong.’
‘God, I’m so sorry,’ I say, reaching for a tissue from the box on his desk and wiping my face frantically. I’m red with shame.
‘Boyfriend?’
I nod, sitting down in the chair he’s indicated.
Etienne shakes his head. ‘Well. It’s not my place to interfere. But nobody’s boyfriend should make them cry in the toilets. It’s what I’d say to a student. I’m sure it’s what you’d say to a student, too.’ He meets my eyes then. ‘You deserve better, Addie.’
That makes me cry again. He moves around from behind the desk, rubbing my shoulder, ducking down to his haunches so he’s at my level. My body reacts to his touch, something flaring shamefully in my belly.
‘Take the afternoon off.’
‘I can’t – what about – Battle of the Boyne,’ I manage.
He smiles. ‘If necessary, I can step in, or Moira can. There’ll be someone who can stick on a DVD of something vaguely educational.’
I’m still crying. He’s still rubbing my arm, his hand warm and reassuring.
‘If you ever need to talk, Addie, I’m here. Anytime. OK? You have my mobile number. Just call me.’
I don’t go back to my parents’ house, in the end. Instead I lie in the bed I share with Dylan and stare up at the ceiling and think of Etienne. My skin feels too hot, like my body is too big for it. I touch myself and imagine my hand is Etienne’s, firm and steady. I feel sick afterwards. I can’t seem to forgive myself, and I pace around the flat, scratching at my arms, wishing I could go back in time to last summer, when everything was perfect.
By ten o’clock, Dylan still isn’t home. He’s stayed with Marcus all day. I wonder for the first time if that’s where he really is. What if Marcus is a cover-up? What if Dylan’s met somebody else? Someone who’s as perfect as he expects them to be. Someone clever and posh and poetic, someone who would never feel jealous of Dylan’s sick best friend.
My phone buzzes in my hand. I’ve been staring at it vacantly, with no clear idea of what I want it to do.
‘Hello?’
‘Wow, hello,’ Deb says. ‘That was prompt. So, can I get your take on an ethical conundrum?’
‘Sure?’ I say.
I’ve forgotten to eat. I get up and head to the fridge, scanning it for something in-date.
‘So if I know I want to have a baby, and I’ve thought of someone who is very willy-nilly with sperm distribution . . . Can I just have sex with him and get pregnant and then never tell him he’s the father?’
I blink at the lump of cheddar I’m examining.
‘Umm,’ I say.
‘It’s Mike,’ she supplies helpfully. ‘That bouncer I went back with after your birthday night out.’
I try to compose my thoughts.
‘He’s not big on condoms, basically,’ Deb says. ‘Hello? Are you still there?’
‘Yes, sorry,’ I say, closing the fridge. ‘Just absorbing.’
Deb waits patiently.
‘I think that might be really wrong,’ I say. ‘Yes. I think that’s one of the bad ones.’
‘Oh,’ Deb says, sounding crestfallen. ‘But if I’d done it by accident, it would be fine.’
‘Yeah, true. Only it wouldn’t be by accident if you did it now.’
‘Who’s to know?’
‘Well, me. You told me.’
‘Damn it. Why did you have to pick up the phone?’
I sigh. ‘Why don’t you ask Mike if he minds?’
‘He’d probably say he doesn’t mind,’ Deb says. ‘But then there’s the risk that when my child is seven or something and functioning really well in my lovely single-parent household he’ll come sweeping in demanding rights.’
It’s still so strange hearing Deb talk about having a child. I really thought she’d never come around. I should have known there’d be no grey area, no umming and ahhing. Deb is a yes-or-no sort of woman.
I wonder what she would do if she were me. Deb would never cry on the toilet over any man, and I feel a twinge of shame.
‘Why don’t you just get a donor? Aren’t there private companies that do that sort of thing for you?’ I ask.
‘That sounds complicated. And much less fun than having sex with Mike.’
‘Why Mike, just out of interest?’
‘Hmm? Oh, I told you, he doesn’t like condoms.’
I wait.
‘And I suppose he’s quite a good specimen. Tall, handsome, kind, funny, that sort of thing.’
‘Sounds like a catch.’
‘What? Irrelevant. I’m after a sperm donor, not a boyfriend.’
‘Would it be such a bad thing to get one of those too?’
‘You tell me,’ Deb says dryly. ‘You’re not the best advertisement for relationships at the minute.’
I rummage in the cupboard for a loaf of bread. Stale, but it’ll do for cheese on toast.
‘I’d say being in a relationship with one person is great,’ I tell her. ‘The trouble is, at the moment I feel like I’m in a relationship with two people.’
‘Dylan and Etienne?’
I freeze, holding a slice of bread hovering over the toaster.
‘What?’
‘No?’ Deb says, sounding uncertain.
‘Why did you say that?’
‘Sorry, did I upset you? I thought you fancied him.’
‘I meant I felt like I was in a relationship with Dylan and Marcus.’
‘Oh, of course. Right.’
My heart is beating too fast. Deb knows me better than anyone. If she thinks I fancy Etienne . . .
I mean, don’t I? A little bit? What have I just spent my evening thinking about? I rub my belly, feeling nauseous again. I love Dylan. I love Dylan.
‘Sorry, Ads.’
I push down the toaster. I need to eat. It occurs to me as soon as I’ve done it that I should have put the bread under the grill, with the cheese.
‘It’s OK,’ I manage. ‘It’s just . . . weird that you said that. I didn’t realise I’d even talked about him.’
‘You talk about him quite a bit, actually. But that’s probably just me getting the wrong end of the stick.’
There’s a long silence.
‘Not . . . totally,’ I say in a small voice.
‘Oh. So you do fancy him?’
‘Sometimes. I don’t know. Oh, God, I’m an awful person. I’m a cheat.’
‘Addie! Please. It’s not cheating to fancy someone else a little bit. Do you like him more than Dylan?’
‘What? No! Of course not! It’s just . . . I guess things are so – so fraught with Dylan. So it’s like an escapist thing.’
The sound of keys in the lock. I spin, guilty. The toaster pops and I jump.
‘I’ve got to go. Love you, Deb.’
‘What if Mike was the one who decided not to use a condom? Then it would be a known risk he was taking on his own.’
I close my eyes. ‘Bye, Deb.’
‘Oh, fine. Bye.’
Dylan looks exhausted. All the anger evaporates as I watch him stagger to the cupboard and pull out a glass, fill it with water, down it and pour another. I step towards him to hug him but he backs away.
‘I stink of vomit,’ he says. ‘I need a shower. Sorry.’
My stomach twists. ‘He was really bad?’
Dylan just nods. As he makes his way to the bathroom I stand there, sick with guilt and shame, because Marcus is unwe
ll, and Dylan is helping him, and I am the most unreasonable girlfriend there has ever been.
The first text from Etienne comes ten days later, on a Saturday night.
How are you doing, Addie? I mean, really. I know it can be hard to talk about at school. X
I leave it sitting in my pocket, determined not to reply. It isn’t professional of him to text me about personal stuff outside school. But then I think, I wouldn’t find it strange if it was Moira. Or even Jamie, and Jamie is a single guy my age too. It’s me who’s making this unprofessional. Etienne’s just being a polite, supportive colleague and manager.
Dylan’s looking after Marcus again. We’ve had a good week – we had a proper conversation about Marcus and how he’s got this history of going off the rails. I promised to be more understanding.
Doing much better, thanks. Really appreciate you stepping in to sort cover for me the other day. Addie
There’s no reply. I begin to wonder if I’ve been too abrupt. But when I see Etienne on Monday he smiles at me, a supportive, I-know-you’ve-got-this smile, and I feel better.
It’s like this for a month or two. The occasional text – nothing flirtatious or inappropriate. Just ever so slightly friendlier than we are in person. As Dylan’s Masters begins to eat into his time even more, and as he takes more shifts at the bar, I’m alone a lot. Some nights I stay late at school. Etienne’s often around, and we have quiet chats over evening cups of tea. Nothing more than that.
But I can’t deny that it excites me. Nothing’s happening. On paper, nothing’s wrong. But I know otherwise.
I know Etienne wants me. Sometimes, I want him too.
It’s two days before the Christmas holidays, and late – nine at night. Nobody else is around, not even the caretaker. Etienne has keys. He’ll lock up.
‘Addie?’ he says, poking his head around the door to my classroom. I’m taking down a display that Tyson raked his fingernails through, Wolverine-style. ‘Fancy a nightcap?’
It takes me a moment to realise he has a bottle in his hand. Red wine, by the looks of it.
‘It’s nearly the end of term, and we’ve both worked ourselves to the bone this year,’ he says, waggling the bottle. ‘We deserve a treat.’
I say yes to the nightcap. I follow him to his office. I fetch us glasses from the kitchen, and we drink the wine out of water tumblers. I’m wearing lipstick, and I leave a pink kiss on the edge of the glass.
We talk about work stuff, mostly. Laugh about the kids that do our heads in, complain about the ever-changing government guidelines, compare our least favourite parents. My cheeks are flushed pink and I’m drunk on half a bottle. Maybe a little more than half. I don’t keep track of how often he tops up my glass and his.
It happens very naturally. His hand on my thigh. It takes me too long to realise it’s strange.
I stand, move away. He follows me.
‘Addie,’ he says.
‘I should go,’ I say.
I turn towards the door.
He pushes it closed, over my shoulder, his body against my back.
‘This has been such a long time coming,’ he says in my ear. ‘Hasn’t it?’
There’s a cold sort of dread in my stomach. He’s right, I knew this was coming. What else had I expected? I feel like I’m slipping, or perhaps like I already slipped and now I’m falling, fingernails grasping for something to hold.
His lips are on my neck. I can feel desire, quiet and low, but above that I feel desperate disgust. At him? Myself?
I know when he pulls me back against him, against his hardness. I don’t want this. Fuck. I can’t do this, the thought makes me feel sick, the wetness of his mouth on my neck is like a tarantula across the skin.
‘No,’ I say.
I say no.
Dylan
Luke calls me around seven, and he tells me that my father is cheating on my mother.
I sit, slowly, on the edge of the sofa. For a long while I say nothing at all.
‘Dyl?’ Luke says. ‘Dyl, I’m sorry. I can’t tell you how much I’ve been dreading this phone call.’
I feel like my head is full of whiteness; I’m not exactly surprised, but it’s horrifying, like being told you’re not who you think you are at all.
‘She knows?’ I manage.
‘I told her before I told you. I thought – I guess I thought she should know first. She was totally in denial. I couldn’t convince her.’
I’m only half listening – a sudden rage is rising up my body, freezing hot, like ice burn. I’m so rarely angry that I hardly know how to hold the feeling: it seems to have found its way into my throat, my ears, the little capillaries spreading through my lungs.
‘I don’t think she’ll ever leave him, you know,’ Luke says. ‘She just didn’t want to hear it.’
A message comes through from Marcus; I check it abstractedly, hardly seeing it at first.
You need to come to Addie’s school. She’s there with Etienne, and . . . it doesn’t look good.
The picture comes next. Through the window, the warm glow of the office inside, with the two of them sitting side by side, drinking wine out of tumblers, his hand resting on her upper thigh.
‘Luke?’ I say. My voice is strangled. ‘I have to go.’
I press the off button to turn the screen black, then sit with the phone cradled between my hands, staring down, heart big and sick in my chest. The phrase seeing red has never meant anything to me before, but now I understand. I saw the image for less than a second but it’s drawn on the inside of my eyelids like sparklers in the night.
Eventually, after those long, stifling seconds of stillness, I grab my coat and pull on my shoes – so slow, so mundane, as if my world isn’t ending – and I run for the car.
Addie
He nips me with his teeth.
I turn in the cage of his arms. It’s worse. He pushes up my skirt, hand running up my thigh, pulling my leg so that the muscle along the back of my thigh wrenches with a shot of pain, and I’m bunching my fists now, trying to turn my head aside, and I’m clear, I couldn’t be clearer. I’m pushing his chest. I’m talking, I think – Stop it, please – and our teeth clatter, a dull thud inside my head as he keeps pushing his lips down on mine.
‘I know you want this,’ he tells me. ‘Don’t you?’
It’s a sound outside that makes him turn his head aside for a moment. We can’t see the window from here; he takes half a step back, then pauses, unsure. I remember something from long past. Self-defence classes in school, maybe. The fist that was pushing at his chest unravels and I grab his shoulder while he’s unsteady and my skirt is already up around my thighs so I can bring my knee up hard between his legs and watch him fold over, letting out a noise like an animal and – finally, as I sob – letting me go.
I run. The door isn’t locked. As I sprint down the corridor to the back exit, through the staffroom, I feel bone-cold with the fear that he’s locked up the school, but he hasn’t. He wasn’t afraid I’d run. He knew I wanted it, he’d said.
I run all the way home. At least ten kilometres. My feet bleed. When I take my shoes off inside the flat I flinch when I see them. I’m shaking so hard I can’t use my fingers properly. I sit on the floor and weep like I’ll never stop crying. I claw at my skin. I dig my fingernails into my arms. I remember all the times I smiled at him when he smiled at me.
Dylan
I get there just as Etienne is coming out of the building; he turns, carefully locking up behind him.
‘That’s him,’ Marcus says, suddenly at my shoulder. ‘There. That’s him.’
I know. I saw the photo. That split second of the image on the screen was more than enough for me to memorise every line of that bastard’s face.
I run at him. Marcus calls to me – he sounds surprised. He’s been drinking, and he isn’t fast eno
ugh to catch me. My fist hits Etienne’s jaw just as he turns. There’s a hot pain in my knuckle, a jarring shock in my elbow. He doubles over.
‘What the—’
‘What the fuck were you doing with my girlfriend?’ I say, realising with shame that I’m crying.
Etienne looks up at me, eyes wide. ‘It’s not what you think,’ he says.
‘No? Looked pretty cosy to me,’ Marcus says.
Etienne looks at him quickly, eyes narrowing. He stays low, crouched. I keep my fists bunched at my sides and wish I wasn’t sniffling and shaking like a child.
‘She’s . . . intense,’ Etienne says. ‘She’s been coming on to me all term, finding reasons to spend time alone with me, staying late just to try and . . .’
‘Shut up,’ I say, wiping my face hard. ‘Shut up, shut up, shut the fuck up.’
‘No, go on,’ Marcus says. He steps forward. ‘Go on.’
‘Look, I tried to be a good guy. But she’s – I had a moment of weakness. She said how badly she wanted me and . . .’
He darts backwards as I move towards him again, but Marcus puts his hand out to stop me.
‘I’m sorry,’ Etienne says. ‘I’m really sorry.’
‘What happened?’ Marcus asks. ‘Where is she now?’
‘I stopped her as soon as I realised what was happening,’ Etienne says, eyes flicking between me and Marcus. ‘She got mad and left. I didn’t mean for anything to happen with her. She just . . . got in my head. I can’t think straight around her.’
Marcus is nodding. ‘Yeah,’ he says. His voice slurs. ‘Yeah. That sounds just like Addie.’
Addie
I call my sister. I will never be grateful enough for Deb. I barely have words to say it, but she never says, I thought you fancied him. She never says, You wanted that. She turns up at the flat and she undresses me like I’m made of something precious, then gets me in the shower. After I’m clean, she wraps me in my old threadbare dressing gown and holds me very tightly. It isn’t a hug – she’s holding me together.