This Is Not Forgiveness Read online

  My mother meets her friends here to drink wine and gossip. I don’t usually come with her, but tonight I couldn’t get out of it. She’s done something for me, so now I have to do something for her. Quid pro quo. She’s been with me to the new school I’ve got to attend. We’ve been to see the Principal: Armani suit, fancies himself. Fancies me, too, from the way he’s checking me out. And my mother. Bit of a sleazebag, then. Just a preliminary chat, see if we like each other. Cue: hearty laugh as his eyes switch from her legs to my cleavage.

  ‘I have to have a drink after that.’ She gives a mock shudder when we’re out of his office. ‘Let’s go to the Rendez.’ She says it like it’s an original and new idea. ‘My friends are dying to see you.’

  That’s what she says, although it’s not true. Her friends have no interest in me. She really wants me here because I can drive, so she can drink as much as she likes.

  My stepbrother is here, too. We picked him up from his after-school club. I’m sipping a Diet Coke. He’s working his way through a big bowl of chips. We don’t speak to each other and Mother and her friends ignore us. She’s got lots of friends. Networking, she calls it, and she’s good at it.

  All her friends are on my list.

  They hardly register my presence. They get on with the everlasting conversation about how crap their lives are, or their jobs, or their husbands, or their boyfriends, or any combination or lack of the above. That’s all they ever talk about. My mother is sitting in profile. She chats, laughing and smiling, or nods with her head on one side in listening mode. Every now and again she twists to check herself out in the mirror and sees me there.

  Mirror, mirror on the wall. . .

  Not you, Mother dear. Not any more.

  I catch her look: jealousy mixed with admiration. I’m also here as her appendage. She’s been toting me about since I was tiny – I was a cute-looking child. She likes to show me off to her friends. Not so much recently. She’s beginning to feel the competition. But I’m not looking at her, or even at myself. I’m looking at the two boys. The dark one is Jamie Maguire. Martha’s brother. I don’t know the other one but I’ve seen him around. Jamie isn’t bad in a dull kind of way. He’s wearing a blue pullover and jeans, like his mum still buys his clothes. I think that’s rather sweet. The waitress arrives with their coffee. I know her, too. Jesse. The blond begins flirting with her, looking up through his long lashes. Jesse smiles back, indulgent, but she isn’t having any. She’s more interested in Jamie, but the blond guy can’t see it. He’s not used to girls saying ‘no’. He looks like an Abercrombie and Fitch model. The jeans aren’t cheap, the rest of his outfit is High Street, but well put together. Tatty tennis shoes strictly model’s own. He rakes a hand through his dirty blond hair. It won’t be long before he checks himself in the mirror. There he goes, quick look to see that his hair’s OK. Boys like him are obsessed with themselves. More than girls. Narcissism repels me. He goes on my list.

  Jamie doesn’t. I like a plain canvas.

  He glances up, too, as if he senses my thought and he’s not looking at himself, he’s looking at me. Not for the first time, either, I’ve been noticing him, noticing me. The blond shifts his gaze ever so slightly, to check out what his friend is checking out, and then they are both staring. My mother catches them and thinks they are looking at her. She would, wouldn’t she? She kind of simpers and I think that she is going to wink, or wave, tip her drink, or do something equally embarrassing. I should be colouring, but I never blush. I just look away.

  There are girls outside the window. I know a few of them. The tall blonde peels off and comes in to join Jamie and his friend. Our Jamie looks pissed off. She doesn’t look too pleased to see him, either.

  I’d have liked to have watched them longer, I like watching people, but Roland has finished his chips and has started to complain. Roland, Rollo, the kid really lives up to his name. He puts up with all kinds of shit at school because of it, but he’s OK. He’s not on my list.

  The friends are set to make a night of it. My mother would love to stay, but knows she can’t. Her smile slips for a moment. There is a flicker of annoyance and resentment before she says, ‘Of course, sweetie. Time to go, anyway.’

  We get up to go and pay at the counter. My mother blows kisses and mouthes ‘Call me’, little finger and thumb extended towards her ear, but her friends have turned away to carry on their conversation. It’s as though we have already left.

  We wait while she orders stuff from the deli counter. Jamie is behind me; standing close, too close. I can feel his breath on my neck, but I don’t move away. He’s improved since I last saw him. Even though I know him, I blank him. He doesn’t say anything, either. That’s how it is in this town.

  A weird thing has just happened. I opened a drawer to put my notebook back, and there’s my pack of tarot cards. I didn’t notice them before. I didn’t even think they were in that drawer. I don’t believe in any of that stuff any more. All that divination crap belongs to my goth/emo phase. That was all just kids’ stuff. I’m into something much bigger now, swapped astrology for agitprop, but I used to be deeply into that kind of shit. I liked all the paraphernalia, the charts, the runes, the tarot, the crystal.

  My favourite thing was the planchette. I got it on a junk stall. Victorian, carved out of ebony. It is shaped like a heart and runs on three little casters. At the pointed end, there is a place to fix a pencil. So much better than a Ouija board but not enormous fun on your own. That’s one of the reasons I started the Circle. We used to meet at my house, paint our fingernails black, apply weird make-up, dye our hair indigo and dabble in the occult while listening to Bikini Kill, Beth Ditto, Free Kitten and Lady Gaga before anyone else liked her.

  The Circle didn’t last long, though.

  She will peak and she will pine . . .

  Those spells I found on the Internet were so cheesy. Never thought for a moment that they would actually work. You can get spells for almost everything. Martha’s spots and hair loss were a laugh, no more than she deserved, but Louise Simpson on life support? That scared the shit out of them. The Circle broke up after that. I was getting bored with it, anyway. At the moment when the spells we were weaving actually seemed to be working, I ceased believing. Ironic that. But then, that’s how I am.

  Occult paraphernalia, leached of their power, become mere knick-knacks. The planchette sits on my desk now – just an interesting objet. The rune stones look pretty on the windowsill. And the tarot? Doesn’t everybody own a pack of tarot cards?

  I take them out of my drawer. I have to admit that I still feel a bit of a tug. A little thrill.

  I cut, shuffle, cut again. Just for old time’s sake. I find him there. The Fool. It doesn’t mean bozo, just someone innocent but wise at the same time. The Creative Dreamer. It’s him. Got to be. I feel some of the old excitement stirring inside me.

  He was in my mind, I’d just been writing about him, so I would see him, wouldn’t I? That’s how it works.

  I cut again. The Knave of Swords. The Berserker. The archetypal warrior. That’s interesting. Now I’ve got the two of them. Jamie and his brother. I’m curious so I cut again. Queen of Swords reversed: devious, underhand, expert in the use of half-truths and slander. That has to be Martha.

  Chapter 5

  ‘Come in, if you’re coming in.’

  Martha doesn’t look round from where she’s wielding her hair straighteners. She has long hair and it takes her ages. She has to do it every morning. She sets her alarm an hour early just to get ready for school. One of the things that make me glad that I’m not female. Everything takes so long. I don’t know why she does that to her hair. Mum reckons it’s bad for it, making it thin. Martha was having problems with that a while ago, around the time of her GCSEs. The doctor put it down to stress. It seems all right now, although I prefer it when she leaves it curly. So does Mum, but Martha doesn’t take any notice of us. She thinks I’m clueless and that Mum just wants her to stay a little girl.
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  ‘Whatever it is, make it quick. I’ve still got my make-up to do and the girls will be here in a minute for pre-drinks.’ She puts down the straighteners and rummages through her make-up case.

  ‘I was just wondering. . .’ I wander in and start looking at stuff on her table, squaring up her books.

  ‘Leave it! Don’t touch! Sit!’ She orders me about as though I’m still six. There’s only a bit more than a year between us, but she acts like she’s the only one who has grown up. ‘You were wondering what?’

  ‘You know that girl, the one they call Caro? She’s got a tattoo here.’ I reach round and touch my shoulder. ‘Shaped like a star with squiggles in it.’

  ‘If you mean Vanessa Carrington, then yes, I know her. And that’s not a star. It’s a pentacle and those aren’t squiggles, they’re sigils. You’re such a dick!’

  I don’t know what sigils are but I’m not about to ask her and prove I’m even more stupid and ignorant than she believes me to be. I look the word up later – an occult symbol or device supposed to have magical powers.

  ‘What about her?’ Martha doesn’t look at me. She is applying mascara in careful, slow, upward sweeps.

  ‘Well, what’s she like? I mean . . .’

  ‘Why do you want to know?’

  ‘Oh, um, me and Cal saw her in the Rendez.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘We were just . . .’ I shrug. ‘You know . . . interested.’

  ‘Cal? I thought he’d got a girlfriend. Insufferable Sophie.’

  ‘Well, yes . . .’

  ‘He doesn’t want another one, surely? I thought they were in lurve.’

  ‘They are. He thinks, anyway.’

  ‘So, it’s you, then. You are the one who is interested.’

  ‘Er, yes. I guess. I was just wondering. I mean, didn’t you two used to be friends?’

  ‘Long time ago. Not any more, we aren’t.’ She puts down the mascara and swings round to face me, one eye big, the other one small. The effect is disconcerting. ‘So if you were wondering do I have her number in my phone, the answer to that is . . . no. Sorry to disappoint you, little bro. Don’t even think about going there. That girl is seriously bad.’

  ‘Really? She looked all right to me.’

  ‘You can’t tell by looking, can you?’ She starts on the other eye. ‘Not what you’d be looking at, anyway. She’s a real troublemaker – involved in some pretty bad stuff.’

  I’m even more intrigued, but she doesn’t go into exact details about what that ‘bad stuff’ might be. She’s keen to tell me something else. ‘She’s just been chucked out of school.’

  ‘Really? What for?’

  ‘For being an über bitch and über slag, quite apart from all her other misdemeanours, that’s what for.’

  ‘What’d she do?’

  ‘Had an affair with one of the teachers, who’s since been sacked. She’s got a thing for older guys. She’d eat you up, and not in a nice way.’ She smiles at herself in the mirror, as if that idea amuses her. She turns her head this way and that to judge how her make-up is coming together. ‘Now, how do I look?’

  She stands up, shimmying her hips to release the flimsy, shiny material of her dress. She’s got good legs. Long, slender and a golden brown colour. She’s been at Mum’s fake tan again. She’s not wearing so much make-up since her skin cleared up. I like that. The natural look. Suits her better.

  ‘Great!’ I smile at her. Not that there is a choice, but I do mean it. ‘You look pretty good.’

  ‘Pretty good! Is that all you can come up with!’ She turns back at herself in the mirror. ‘I look bloody fantastic! That’s the bell. It’ll be the girls.’ She’s trying to put in earrings and get into her heels at the same time. ‘You get it. Send ’em up. I’ve got some voddy, no, you can’t have any, and don’t stare at their tits when you let them in, or any other parts of their anatomy. Girls know what you are doing and it’s embarrassing.’

  It’s hard not to notice. They are dressed for going out, which means low-cut and very short, but I manage to let them in with eyes averted. They’ve been to the corner shop on their way and come in supplied with half-bottles of Smirnoff. Martha’s best buddies. Melissa, Sally and the other one, whose real name is Letitia but they call her Lee. She’s a recent addition. Part of Martha’s outreach work. She’s quiet, not as flamboyant as the others. She’s wearing ballet pumps and jeans, a white top and almost no make-up. The other two are tricked up like Pussycat Dolls.

  They all go upstairs and Martha shouts down orders for glasses and ice and cranberry juice. I go to the kitchen and fetch what’s needed: a bowl of ice, tall glasses, orange juice, cranberry and Coke, in case anyone wants a different mixer. I even find the packets of nuts, crisps and corn chips left over from the barbecue last weekend and shake them out into little dishes. I stack the lot on a tray, fold a tea cloth over my arm and mount the stairs.

  I’m happy to play barman and waiter. I want to know more about this Caro and if Martha won’t tell me, I’m betting one of the others will – especially after the hefty vodkas I’ll be pouring for them tonight. I consider going to get a baggie from the stash Rob kindly bequeathed to me and rolling a spliff or two, but decide against it. Might be too much with the vodka. I don’t want anyone passing out on me.

  I’m not wrong. It doesn’t take them long. All I have to do is say her name and they’re off. The girls love to gossip and it seems that she has given them plenty to gossip about. Besides, they like having me around. They think I’m kind of cute, but more important than that, I’ve got male friends. That’s enough for Mel and Sal.

  Mel starts. ‘Van the Maneater? She’s left our school. I thought she’d gone to yours. She missed her A levels, so she’ll have to repeat a year.’

  ‘I haven’t seen her about.’

  Mel shrugs. ‘Haven’t heard anything from Joss and the others, come to think about it.’ A lot of girls from their school transfer to ours. ‘She’s unlikely to have slipped under their radar. Maybe she dropped out. She doesn’t like school.’

  ‘Excuse me.’ I pretend to be insulted. ‘Sixth form college.’

  ‘Same difference. Why do you want to know about her, anyway?’

  ‘Just interested.’

  Martha gives a snort, but doesn’t interrupt.

  Mel takes a quick draw on the cigarette she’s holding and blows a thin stream of smoke out into the evening air. She and Sally have lit up and are puffing out of the window. I don’t know why they bother. Smoking is a pure waste of money and they don’t even do it properly. Martha doesn’t like this. She clicks her long polished nails on the desk. She doesn’t approve of smoking and she’ll be thinking Mum will smell it. Mum’s out right now. Gone to a barbecue with Jack, her partner. Martha is worried she’ll know. She can pick up smoke of any kind. They could use her at the airport, instead of sniffer dogs. That was one of the sources of friction when Rob lived here. He was always in trouble for lighting up in the house.

  ‘You watch yourself with her.’ Mel takes another quick puff. ‘They don’t call her maneater for nothing. She did for Charlie at school.’

  I look blank.

  ‘Just-call-me-Charlie Hands, the Art teacher.’

  I think I know who she means. He was part-time at our school for a while. Thirty-something but going for mid-twenties. Hair receding, what there is left in a bit of a fin, beard half a centimetre longer than stubble. Thinks he’s pretty alternative. Wears combat and T-shirts to school and gets away with it because he’s an Art teacher. Normal rules don’t apply.

  ‘So what happened?’

  ‘Well, he’s been sacked and she’s been expelled. Should have got rid of her ages ago, if you ask me, after she was suspended for wagging school to go on that demo –’

  ‘Day of action,’ Martha corrects.

  ‘Whatever.’ Mel carries on, eager to continue the gossip. ‘Anyway, the Head saw her on the news wearing a riot helmet and jumping all over a police van.’


  ‘And what about when she sprayed anarchist signs all over the language lab wall?’ Sal adds.

  ‘No one proved that was her,’ Lee points out.

  ‘Who else is it gonna be?’ Sal sneers back. ‘Banksy?’

  ‘What happened with this Charlie guy?’ I ask, trying to get them back on topic. That’s the story that interests me.

  ‘Well . . .’ Sal leans forward, eager to share. ‘She was shagging him and – ’

  ‘He deserves sacking,’ Martha says, ‘and she deserves expelling. Little slag!’

  ‘She’s not the only one,’ Mel points out. ‘Remember that girl – what’s-her-name Bridges? Went to Goldsmiths? He was doing her for years. Still is. Goes to see her in London. Her sister told me.’

  ‘Why didn’t he get the sack for that?’ I ask.

  Mel shrugs. ‘That time no one found out.’

  ‘This time?’

  ‘There was no hiding it,’ Mel continues. ‘There was this student teacher. Don. Gelled hair. Taught Geography. Fancied himself. He was hot for her as well. Hands totally lost it. They had a fight. A real brawl. In the dining room. Rolling about on the floor. Tables tipped up, plates flying, water jugs ditto, custard all over. The lot.’

  Mel’s eyes gleam at the memory.

  ‘I missed it! I had netball practice.’ Sally expresses real anguish.

  A fight between members of staff in the dining room? I don’t get why they dislike this girl. Members of staff fighting over her? At our place that’d be enough to make her legend.

  The other one, Lee, pipes up. ‘That wasn’t how it happened,’ she says. She’s not as gobby as the others. Not shy, just contained inside herself. ‘Caro wasn’t doing anything with that student. He fancied her, that’s all.’

  ‘That’s not what we heard,’ Mel and Sal say together. Lee is deviating from the script, spoiling the fun.