Fracture

Romantic love.

Carter’s spade sliced through the mud with a clean thud, reminding her she should be working.

With a sigh, she whacked the mud ineffectually with her shovel. Raindrops clung to her eyelashes and she studied him through the watery prism. His cheeks were red from the cold and he was soaking wet. He never looked up at her.

She hit the mud again. Harder this time.

With Carter things were always so complicated. His emotions were like a labyrinth of trust and mistrust, faith and doubt. One misjudged step and you were lost for ever.

Today, for example. Here they were, alone in the garden. They had a lot to talk about. She knew Sylvain would have told him about the key last night. They’d agreed he would let Carter know and Allie would inform the girls – she’d gone door to door in the dormitory wing to tell all three of them what they’d found.

Yet this morning Carter hadn’t said a word about it. In fact, he hadn’t said a word about anything.

They couldn’t go on like this. Something had to be done.

‘Are you going to ignore me all day?’ she said finally. ‘Or just when we’re alone in the pissing-down rain and stupid-arse mud.’

He didn’t look up from his work. ‘Language.’

‘Yeah, language.’ She made an angry, half-hearted attempt to chop at the soil. ‘It’s that thing you use when you talk to each other.’

‘Fine.’ Straightening, Carter leaned against his shovel, studying her guardedly. ‘Hi, Allie. How are you this morning?’

‘Brilliant, Carter. I’m just brilliant.’

Rain ran down her face, seeping beneath her scarf to her shoulders. It was too much.

‘I’m going to take a break and try not to die of pneumonia,’ she said, looking at him. When he didn’t respond, she tried again. ‘Want to come with me? I’m just going in there.’ She pointed her shovel at a small lean- to shed at the garden wall.

For a moment Carter didn’t look up and she thought he might refuse. But then he straightened and hoisted his spade. ‘I suppose I don’t want to get pneumonia either.’

The shed had no heat but it did have doors to shut out the rain and a bench in one corner to keep them off the cold floor. After hanging her dripping hat and wet scarf from a rusty nail jutting out of the wall by the door, Allie shook out her damp hair sending a spray of cold water around her. Her hair was getting longer; it hung below her shoulder blades in long, dark strands.

‘I kind of miss your red hair.’

Spinning around, she found Carter sitting on the bench watching her. When they’d first met she’d had dyed red hair. She’d let it go back to its natural colour months ago.

‘You do?’ She held up a strand, studying its darkness dispassionately. ‘I always feel weird when I dye it now. Like, I look in the mirror and it’s not me.’ She dropped on to the opposite end of the bench with a sigh. ‘Then again, maybe that’s not such a bad thing.’

‘Why?’ he said. ‘Don’t you like you?’

‘Sometimes,’ she shrugged. ‘Not so much right now.’

‘Why not?’ he said.

She gave him a look that said she was quite certain he knew the answer to that question already.

‘Oh,’ he said, dropping his gaze. ‘That.’

‘Yes. That.’ She crossed her arms tightly. ‘Can we talk about that?’

Carter made a noncommittal gesture.

‘Look, I just…’ Allie searched for the right words. ‘I feel really weird about what happened. And ever since then we’ve both been avoiding each other, and being all cold around each other. It’s like we were getting better at being friends and now we’ve taken this giant step backwards. And I…’ She sighed, her shoulders slumping. ‘I hate that.’

Carter shifted on the rickety bench and it swayed unsteadily.

‘I know,’ he said. ‘But I just… I guess I don’t know how to handle this.’ He was studying his hands intently. ‘You have this way of confusing me. I think I know what I want and then you come along and everything gets muddled up.’

Allie knew that feeling well. ‘You do the same thing to me.’

Carter rubbed his eyes. ‘The thing is – Jules and me – we’ve been friends since the first day she came to Cimmeria. Did I ever tell you that?’ Allie shook her head. ‘We were just kids. I was this angry, messed-up orphan. She walked in on her first day at Cimmeria with her expensive suitcases and her nanny, took one look at me and said, “My name’s Jules. I’m your new best friend.”’ He chuckled at the memory. ‘And she was right. We were always friends after that. She was so confident and determined. We studied together, grew up together, joined Night School together… I guess it was always sort of inevitable that we’d get together some time. But when it happened at the winter ball, it was an accident. We’d had too much to drink and it just… happened. The next day I thought it was a mistake. But then, as time went on, I thought maybe…’ He hesitated. ‘Maybe this is right. She knows me so well and… we get along. It’s different with her.’

She knew he didn’t mean to hurt her but his words cut with the precision of a razor blade. The one thing she and Carter had never done well as a couple was to get along. The idea that he and Jules didn’t argue – that they just understood each other – somehow felt like another indication of her own failure as a girlfriend.

‘Then, the other night, you and I were running through the woods together, and… it was like it used to be. And I just looked at you and remembered how things were between us – the good things, anyway. And then… I don’t know. I lost it. I messed up. I’m sorry, Allie, but I care about Jules. She’s important to me. I can’t…’ Spots of colour had appeared high on his cheeks. ‘If she ever found out what happened…’

This was the opening Allie had been waiting for.

‘She won’t,’ she assured him fervently. ‘Not from me. And you mustn’t ever tell her. I didn’t mean to kiss you either. It was an accident. Like a… a car crash or something. We were out there alone, it was dark and we’re used to kissing. But now we have to pretend it never happened and learn how to be friends. We were good friends once. Really good friends. I want us to be that again.’ Her voice was passionate. ‘I can’t lose you all over again, Carter. Please. Just… be my friend.’

Clearly surprised by the depth of her emotion, he turned to face her. ‘You never lost me, Allie. Not really.’

She knew that wasn’t true.

‘We lost each other. And if we ever get together I think it will happen again.’ Her voice was resolute. ‘Let’s just be friends for ever, Carter.’

He met her gaze. ‘I will always be your friend, Allie. For ever. I swear it.’

When her last class finally ended that afternoon, Allie hurried down the grand staircase, her heavy book bag thumping rhythmically against her hip with each step. She was nearly at the bottom when she heard someone call her name.

She turned to see Katie heading her way. Her hair hung in long copper curls that flamed in the afternoon light.

‘I’ve been looking for your… what should I call it? Gang.’ Katie said the word with obvious distaste. ‘I need to talk to you.’

Allie rolled her eyes. ‘Gang. Friends. Whatever. What’s up?’

‘My parents got in touch with me.’

Allie frowned – Isabelle hadn’t been around to take phone calls for students. ‘Got in touch? How?’

Katie gave her a bored look. ‘Seriously, Allie? They can do what they want. If they want to talk to me they talk to me. You know, it would help if you just didn’t argue with me for, like, once.’

Allie held up her hands. ‘So fine. You talked to them. Is everything… OK?’

‘No, everything is not bloody OK,’ Katie snapped. ‘Would I be standing here talking to you if everything was fine?’ She adopted a wheedling tone. ‘Oh, hi, Allie, I just need to tell you that nothing interesting happened.’

Allie fought to control her temper. ‘Jesus, Katie. Don’t have a breakdown. Just tell me what you need to tell me.’