The Boy I Loved Before Read online

  Why couldn’t I have been popular this time round? This wasn’t in my plan. In fact, of course, in my plan, such as it should have been, I was on the way to Paris by now, surrounded by people who wanted to make me their muse.

  Instead I had some witch trying to make my life hell. The first time round it had been Sheena. She’d ended up working on a supermarket counter, getting pregnant to a succession of guys then dropping off the radar all together. That was meant to happen to the bad girls.

  But Fallon didn’t look like Sheena. Sheena always looked vaguely fashionable, but it was always the cheap, Netto end. She didn’t always smell fantastic and there were rumours of a horrible home life, which, in retrospect I’m sure were true. My mother was right: she did deserve sympathy more than fear, not that I could find it in me at the time.

  Fallon was dressed more expensively than I did as a grown-up. You can always tell, can’t you? You don’t always care, but you can always tell. I was sensing Nicole Farhi, Ralph Lauren, all just for the very plain components that make up a school uniform. Her hair was glossy and carefully dried. This wasn’t skeggy little schemie bully. This was big-time cheerleader style. Well, she wasn’t going to intimidate me, jumped-up little brat. I’d let this happen to me too many times as a child and it wasn’t going to bother me now. I swallowed my fear.

  ‘Fuck off, boring person,’ I said.

  ‘Ooh!’ went her almost as well-groomed acolytes.

  ‘What’s that? Are you telling me to – what?’ said Fallon in seeming disbelief.

  ‘Let’s go. I’m very bored here,’ I said to Constanzia.

  ‘Oh, the little swot’s bored?’ Fallon’s eyes were flashing.

  ‘What’s the matter? Not enough swotting around for you? Or – don’t tell me – there are too many people talking. Makes you feel like you’ve got friends. Good party by the way?’

  ‘I’ve got friends,’ I said, shocked despite myself.

  ‘I can’t believe you invited us!’

  I didn’t. Mind you, I’d invited Sheena the first time round. For fuck’s sake.

  They giggled loudly.

  ‘Anyway, it’s party season – you must be going to Ethan’s party tomorrow? After all, you invited him.’

  She said this to Constanzia. Constanzia shook her head.

  ‘Really? What a shame. Of course it would be too boring for you – they’ve got a swimming pool. And a wine cellar. Everyone else in the class has been invited. Never mind, you two.’

  I couldn’t believe this. I was feeling terrible about the fact that I wasn’t invited to a party by someone I didn’t know. Who cared?

  ‘Just the two of you staying at home then? On your own? No, that’ll be much more fun. Much less boring.’

  And they strode off.

  ‘Christ. Has she always been like that?’

  Constanzia looked at me. ‘Erm, remember when you got that scar?’

  Sure enough, looking down on my arm I saw a scar that I hadn’t noticed before.

  ‘She pushed you off the climbing frame.’

  ‘Witch.’

  ‘Head witch,’ Constanzia agreed. ‘And you know, yesterday, you leave me to face the witch all alone. You do this if you want a friend dead, yes? There, see – go into the gingerbread house by yourself, stupid child.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ I said.

  ‘Buy me a Twix,’ she said.

  ‘No!’

  ‘I’ll share it.’

  God, it’d been a long time since I’d eaten a Twix. Chunky Kit Kats are a much more adult snack, I believe.

  ‘All right,’ I said.

  ‘Why are we so unpopular, Stanzi?’ I said, as we sat on the wall and licked toffee off our fingers. For a second I forgot I was thirty-two, that I had a mortgage and a near-fiancé and had been chairman of our university leaving ball committee. I was just at school, sitting on the same wall near the science lab I always used to sit on, staring at the same sad windows and dripping brickwork, tasting chocolate and caramel on my tongue and utterly absorbed in the universe that was school.

  Constanzia stared at the floor and ate her last piece of Twix. ‘Because you’re a swot and I’m the smallest minority in the whole school, remember? And I used to have a moustache. And you never have any tits.’

  I looked at her. True, she did have a very heavy line of yellow hair on her top lip.

  ‘And they just decide they didn’t like us and that was that. Anyway, why is this worrying you now? It’s always been like this.’

  I swung my feet. ‘I don’t know. I’m just getting sick of the whole thing.’

  ‘Don’t worry. Just hold on for two years and we can go to college. Yay! Hooray! Sex and boys all night long.’

  ‘You’ll be surprised how quickly that gets old,’ I said, and then did a double take. ‘Two years?’ What if I couldn’t get out of here? No way was I staying two years.

  ‘Well, you have to. You leave now, it’s all over for you. “Big Issue?”’

  ‘Look, I’m not going to leave school, OK?’

  “‘Big Issue?”’

  ‘Stop that, it’s not nice.’

  The bell rang.

  ‘I can’t remember a thing. With this new timetable, the school has deliberately set out to destroy me.’ Constanzia pulled out a crumpled piece of paper.

  I pounced. ‘Me neither. Let me see.’

  ‘Why are you looking at mine?’

  ‘Oh, yeah.’

  ‘Yesterday, when you having such a great time without your best friend, you fall down? You get hit on the head?’

  ‘Kind of.’

  ‘Your Italian e schifo.’

  ‘Is that good?’

  She smiled at me. ‘You have to go be maths idiot now, yes? Run along, piccolo rana.’

  I’d managed to raise Tashy on the telephone, sneaking out at lunchtime and buying an incredibly expensive top-up card for my mobile.

  ‘It was all a dream?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Oh God. I can’t believe it … I just can’t. Oh God, Flora. What the hell are we going to do?’

  ‘Look, look …’ I almost laughed as I watched two boys in the middle distance have a fight. Everyone else immediately swarmed over and started screaming their heads off.

  ‘Oh God,’ I said. ‘OK, I’m in hell.’

  ‘Really? Hell exists? Is this what this is?’

  ‘No, I mean. I’m back at school. On top of everything that’s happened I’m back at school. It’s like – after my terrible party.’

  ‘Oh,’ said Tashy in a small voice. ‘So it’s not any better this time round?’

  For some reason, the kids watching the fight had started chanting the ‘c’ word very loudly. Mr Rolf had come out of the main school building, but even he looked in two minds at approaching the roaring throng. I hoped nobody had a gun.

  ‘I wouldn’t say that,’ I said, and started to snivel.

  ‘No, no, don’t cry!’ said soft-hearted Tash, diving in. ‘I mean – you’re in hell? Ha! I have six meetings double-booked for this afternoon, I can’t get caterers to fold napkins into roses instead of swans – fucking swans – we have twenty-nine days to the wedding and you can still get into children’s clothes and not pay any VAT on them. How can that be hell?’

  ‘School’s SHIT!’ I said.

  ‘Oh, petal, it must be easier this time round. Think of all the clever stuff you know.’

  ‘I’m the most unpopular girl in the school!’

  ‘No! Don’t they still have those kids who have glasses stuck together with Elastoplast?’

  ‘Don’t think so,’ I sniffed. ‘And I have a suicidal mad best friend.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘My best friend. She’s a bit …’

  ‘I’m your best friend.’

  ‘I know that,’ I said slowly. ‘I mean, in this new world.’

  ‘Do you like her better than me?’

  I cried harder.

  ‘I mean, I know I’ve been
very busy with the wedding and everything, but—’

  ‘No no no no. Stop. Shut up. You’re my best friend. This is just a weird creature who follows me about, OK?’

  ‘Is she pretty?’

  ‘She looks like a cat who has evil powers.’

  ‘Yeah?’

  ‘She has a voice like a fire in a pet shop.’

  Tashy sounded less suspicious. ‘OK. Look, sit tight, and I’ll come and get you tonight, OK? Can you hold on till then?’

  ‘I can’t come out tonight.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Tashy! I’m grounded. And I have detention.’

  ‘Well, duh. Don’t be stupid. Skip it.’

  ‘They’ll send me to borstal!’

  ‘You know, you sound just like yourself on the phone,’ said Tashy musingly.

  ‘I am myself, OK? We have to get control of the situation. I am myself. I just can’t do anything.’

  ‘Were we really not allowed out when we were sixteen?’

  ‘Yes, but only under laboratory conditions.’

  ‘Can’t you say you’re staying at your new best friend’s – whatever her name is?’

  ‘Constanzia.’

  ‘Con-what?’

  ‘And anyway, no, because I don’t know her phone number or where she lives. And I’m grounded.’

  Tashy heaved a sigh. ‘This is terrible.’

  ‘It’s hell,’ I said. ‘Are you sure I haven’t actually died in a terrible tragic accident and you’re being too nice to tell me about it?’

  ‘If this is what’s at the other side, I bloody hope not.’

  I’d never had detention first time around. Yes, I was one of those kids. And now, watching every other kid skip, laughing and screeching, down to the gates where the cars and buses clustered, I could see how it worked as a punishment.

  Of course, most of those kids wanted to go home. And so did I. But my home didn’t exist.

  Sighing slightly in the mild September afternoon, I stomped off to where I did remember the bad boys hanging out the window in detention and whistling at the girls like men in prison (where, indeed, many of them now are).

  Mr Rolf was patrolling up and down outside the room, which was filled with boyish shouts and retorts. He smiled, very unpleasantly, when he saw me coming and my teacher’s sarcasm radar started bleeping urgently.

  ‘Ah, Miss Scurrison. So glad you could make it on such a glamorous evening. I know you’re a newcomer to our esteemed great social occasions of the top wits and charmers of the cultural elite that is Christchurch Secondary. I imagine you’ll fit right in.’

  I walked in, my heart filling with trepidation. All the boys here looked exactly like any group of lads you’d cross the road to avoid, full of the usual combustible mix of teenage fear, bravado, hormones and cider. Who’d be a teacher, I thought, not for the first time. At what point did that job get fun? Give me my boring, safe desk, computer, long lists of papers, any day. I can’t believe I was getting nostalgic for strip lighting and quarterly VAT returns.

  A collective ‘wooah’ went up from the room as I went in. Obviously they knew who I was and I doubted very much whether I’d been seen in here before. This was nuts. I couldn’t believe a bunch of complete strangers with a shared IQ of about forty-five knew more about my life than I did.

  ‘Hey, sexy baby. Wanna get some ed-u-cation?’ said one pimple-faced giant, slouching next to me and carving ‘FUCK’ slowly and methodically on the desk.

  ‘Yeah,’ shouted another one. ‘I’ll make you stay late … very late …’

  I raised my eyes. Soon they’d start boasting to each other about made-up sexual experiences and move on.

  ‘Haven’t seen you round here,’ said one skinhead.

  ‘Fresh meat!’ yelled someone else from the back of the class, to general amusement. Unbelievably, fucking Rolf stood by and just watched this happen. If this had been the office, Olly would have slapped the whole damn lot of them with a sexual harassment suit within fifteen seconds.

  I sat down. On the board, it said, ‘Essay topic: the usefulness of nothingness.’

  ‘Hey, baby, now you’re in with us, do you think you’ll be … letting it all hang out a bit more, yeah?’ whispered one sweaty voice behind me.

  ‘Get fucked,’ I said.

  There was a definite wooh. My heart was beating really hard. This was horrible. I couldn’t believe they would let people be so intimadating. It felt dangerous.

  ‘Are you swearing, Miss Scurrison?’

  Immediately I lost all the sympathy I had for this broken man of a teacher and indulged a quick revenge fantasy that involved prison and limitless penance. And kicking.

  ‘No, sir,’ I said quickly, like a cowed dog.

  ‘Yeah, she was, sir.’

  ‘Do you want to pay a speedy return visit?’

  ‘No, sir.’

  He nodded and pointed to the board. ‘Better get on with it, then.’

  He left the room – the school had clearly deteriorated if they had to split detention in two. My face burned bright hot with fear and a sense of injustice; a whispering started up.

  ‘We’re going to get you, whore.’

  Jesus.

  Suddenly, there was a cracking noise. It sounded like somebody smacking somebody else hard on the knuckles with a ruler.

  ‘Fuck,’ said the same voice.

  ‘Shut the fuck up,’ said another, near-familiar one. ‘Do you want to get done for sexual harassment, or just spend the rest of your life here?’

  ‘Wot?’

  ‘Just shut it, OK?’

  I risked a look behind me, and nearly had a heart attack. When I’d come in I hadn’t even raised my eyes from the floor and taken the first seat at the front. Which was why I hadn’t noticed the boy currently holding another boy by the ear and threatening to swat him with a ruler.

  ‘Fucking lanky bastard,’ said the lout, but he returned quietly to his reading.

  Justin Clelland’s eyes met mine. He betrayed – of course – no knowledge of me, beyond me being some girl he’d seen around. There was no interest, no enquiry, suspicion or flirting. I, by contrast, knew I was gawping. This boy looked so like Clelland in his school uniform I wanted to throw up.

  ‘Thanks,’ I said.

  He shrugged and retook his seat directly behind me.

  ‘Flora,’ I said, putting out my hand. He stared at it. Maybe handshaking doesn’t start till later.

  Eventually he took it. ‘I know,’ he said. ‘You hang around with that dark-haired crazy girl.’

  I nodded. ‘And you’re Justin.’

  He nodded politely. Of course, he must be a year ahead of me. Oddly, and I guess perhaps it had something to do with my being a couple of inches shorter, he didn’t look quite the droopy, grumpy teenager he had at Tashy’s wedding. Compared to the rest of the greasy Neanderthals whose features hadn’t dropped into place yet, he was tall, smooth-skinned, with soft, baby-fine curls, and calm grey eyes just like his brother’s. On the whole, I suspected he was a bit of a school heart-throb.

  ‘What are you in for?’ I whispered.

  ‘I protested against another year where they refused to order recycled textbooks. They didn’t take it too well.’

  Awww, Clelland II.

  I decided to get a bit cunning.

  ‘Don’t you have a brother who’s in Africa?’

  He immediately looked frightened. Oh, crap. I’d just revealed myself to be one of those terrifying teenage stalkers who write names all over their textbooks and fill their diaries with ‘I love you, John Bloggs, and we WILL be married’, over and over again.

  He coughed.

  ‘Are you talking, Miss Scurrison?’

  This bastard moved on oiled wheels of silence, I swear to God.

  ‘No, sir.’

  ‘You haven’t got the hang of this at all, have you, Miss Scurrison?’

  ‘No, sir.’

  ‘I think that’s why we’ll be seeing you on Monday.’r />
  At least this time I managed not to swear.

  My parents looked like they were sitting shivah for me as I peered in the lighted windows through the oncoming twilight. They probably were: mourning the studious, well-behaved daughter who had woken up yesterday morning and would never be the same again.

  ‘I was in detention,’ I said, hanging my coat on the wall.

  ‘We know,’ said my dad. ‘We asked for you to have it.’

  ‘Thank you,’ I said. ‘I’m sure you’ll be pleased to know that my essay on “Nothingness” was a great use of my time during my AS level year.’

  My mother put dinner on the table in silence. Ooh! Nobody had made me a proper dinner since – well, she’d pretty much given up cooking for herself after Dad left. Just didn’t care any more, I suppose. I had to make sure she was stocked up with Marks and Spencer’s stuff, and that she knew how to heat it up.

  That was a shame, because she was a great cook. I tucked into the sausages and mash with gusto. Olly and I usually went out or ordered in, and I’d forgotten how good a well-made onion gravy could be.

  ‘This is really, really good. Isn’t it, Dad?’ I said enthusiastically.

  They both looked at me.

  ‘Um, yeah,’ said Dad.

  ‘Thanks for cooking, Mum.’

  My mother looked amazed. ‘Just the same old—’ she started.

  ‘Yes. Thanks, Joyce,’ said my dad, embarrassed, as if I’d shown him up. My mother blinked and fluttered.

  I stared at my plate and went back to eating in silence in case I said anything else completely stupid. Then I remembered my mandate to get them back together and started racking my brains to think of some nice friendly family conversation. Which, looking back, I couldn’t actually remember much of from this part of my life first time around.

  After a hundred years, my mother piped up, ‘You’re not going round to Stanzi’s tomorrow night.’

  ‘We weren’t going to do anything,’ I said sourly, thinking of the unknown Ethan’s party.

  ‘Well, you can go to work, and that’s it.’