“Yeah, sorry, that really got me.” I ran a finger under one eye to demonstrate my recomposure.
“Do you mind if I ask,” he said, as we walked and he pointed to his own eye, “what did you do to your eyebrow?”
“No, it’s fine,” I said. “I had a cyst removed. It weakened the muscle and made that eyebrow droop.”
“It’s nice,” he said.
In an American high school we’d have dated, right? As it was, I usually walked with Jon between lessons. And, I promise, I really honestly did get something in my eye. The wind funnelled between temporary school cabins and picked up crisp bags and leaves. Something slapped into the corner of my eye like a tiny fly, just wedged against the bridge of my nose. It was my bad eye, the one with the scarred lid, and I felt the separated muscles in my brow buckle. It felt perfectly normal to hold my face in Jon’s direction, eyelids lowered, and he carefully and surprisingly gently flicked it away.
That was a moment, wasn’t it? Or it would have been for a normal girl. But already I was feeling stupid and there was a welling resentment that something trustful was forming, some dependence on another that exposed me and took account of his place in the world.
And that’s what I don’t understand. I can’t even ask myself why. I don’t have the answer, but I don’t have the right question either. If I knew where you were, Jon, I’d say sorry. Not because I am, in truth, sorry at all, but because I carry this burden of self-loathing for having led you to believe you were my friend in the first place. It would be easier to say sorry to you, Jon, if there was some way to explain the way I am. Maybe it has something to do with the woodwork project in my father’s shed. I don’t know.
There was a hoodie playing an orange and white traffic cone like a clarinet in Leicester Square once, slow jazz between his knees, and I gave him a two-pound coin because it could have been you. He made me think of you anyway, Jon. I let you into a bit of my life, so I had to make you suffer, you see. It’s the way it works in my world. Maybe it was because you made me laugh like a girl.
It was a sunny afternoon around exam time. We walked down the grassy banks beyond the hockey pitches and into the woods, where the less self-assured went for cigarettes they didn’t know how to smoke properly. I sensed a new nervousness in you, like you were assimilating the real circumstance with an idea. So I pushed you up against a tree and kissed you hard, a long slippery one with teeth grinding together. When I broke away and looked at you with that expressionless passion I’d seen girls do at dances, your breath had quickened in little pants and you’d hardened against me.
I rolled a kiss around your cheek to your ear, which I nuzzled in my mouth like a calf on a teat, and then I started to whisper clearly and deliberately: “I’m not going to let you, Jon, I’m not going to let you, and you know why? Because you’re pathetic and you make me sick. You’re pathetic, you hear?”
Then I broke away completely and stood in front of you with a calm and conclusive defiance. You were doing the bewildered expression, half-smiling, because this was a joke, right? And you hadn’t asked for any of this. You shook your head slightly and tried a laugh, one eyebrow dipping quizzically, and for a moment I considered accusing you of mocking my disfigurement. But no, this wasn’t a catty row, it was a statement.
So I said, “I don’t want you Jon, so leave me alone, you creepy cock. You’re pathetic.” And I slapped your crotch, where you were still tight against the cheap school nylon. And then I turned and ran, ran up the banks like a warrior princess, and across the fields to school, hardly touching the ground. I could have run for ever, free and exhilarated again.
As I burst through the swing doors of our block, ribcage heaving to supply me with the power I craved to kick and yell, I didn’t know who I wanted to see or what I would do next. But I wanted someone, a witness, anyone with whom to dance and shout.
The hallway was empty, but for one presence. Sarah was sitting in her wheelchair, looking at me intently. And she was smiling, just faintly.
*
Towards the end of the afternoon, it had become apparent that there was no more to be done at Botolph’s. Those coming in and out now were firemen and police looking to use the loo, and the demand for tea and food had disappeared. We could leave it to the incumbent clergy and their staff. So they thanked me and I left.
The sun was lower, winking between the high-rise office blocks, and it was peaceful as I headed for the top of Fenchurch Street again. A quick word with the officer at the tapes – the one who had laughed at my identity card earlier, but he seemed bored now – and I stepped out of my parallel universe.
The office workers were finishing for the day and were tripping out and on to the street. Some of the younger ones held squash racquets or bike bags. The transport links were down, but the sense of apprehension of the morning had gone and the City had moved on.
I felt invisible, as I sometimes had when I’d returned from an aid trip. I could stare at people without feeling that they could see me. But down by the Bank of England, it was if I’d never been away. I checked my phone. A load of missed calls from numbers rather than names in my contacts list.
But there were two names there.
