Becky is her Sherpa. There to hold the luggage when Mary summits.
It’s not that Becky doesn’t enjoy being part of this group of people who are increasingly the subject of scrutiny, what with their nice haircuts and confidence and how together they look like a sort of rock band. But there is a limit to how other Becky is prepared to become. She knows she isn’t girly and bubbly and entertaining, nor quite loud enough or tomboy enough or confident enough to be one of the lads. What then, does she bring to the party?
‘You look hot,’ Brendan says, and Becky is so caught up in her thoughts that she thinks he is talking to someone else. He is wearing black jeans and DM boots and a black ‘Lemonheads’ T-shirt. He jerks his hair clear of his face: there is something oddly flattering about the gesture, thinks Becky, like he can be bothered to clear the path for a conversation with her.
She realizes that Brendan has said these words too loudly, in earshot of the other boys – almost as if he needed one of them to hear him say it more than he wanted Becky to hear it. Is this how it’s done? Showing the world what you mean to do before you do it. Is this what confident boys do?
Very quietly she says, ‘Thank you.’
Brendan then turns away to talk to someone else and Becky knows that her subdued response hasn’t given him enough to get his teeth into. She has failed a personality test that she hadn’t chosen to take. Will he tell Mary? Will she laugh? What did he mean by it anyway? Was he just trying to be nice? Is hot a word that he uses ten times a day, for anyone, meaning anything?
Becky feels light-headed. She hasn’t eaten since lunch because her jeans don’t allow for anything other than a flat and therefore empty stomach, but until she can track down some booze to numb the hunger pangs, a cigarette will have to do. She slides one out of the box, suddenly feeling grateful for an action that allows her to bow her head and hide from Brendan and the rest of the room for a moment. She sparks it up, lighter metal scuffing her sore thumb pad, the smoke hitting the back of her throat. The unwelcome taste of coal. But she inhales deeply anyway, elbows bent in at the waist, one forearm slung protectively across her middle, watching Mary talk to the pink-lipsticked girl. The combination of nicotine and hunger is making her feel nauseous. Vomiting on the floor in front of everyone would be totally mortifying but at least it would give her a legitimate excuse to go home.
‘Having a shit time yet?’
She turns to find the speaker leaning back on the same bit of wall as her, grinning. Just the sight of Adam’s sweet smile and the radically diminished size of his otherwise egg-large eyes under the thick-lens glasses makes her feel instantly better. He is wearing a woollen sleeveless jumper, like he does whatever the weather, and the collar of his shirt is thin and un-ironed and poking out of the top. He is skinny and into computer programs and indie rock and there isn’t anyone else at their school much like him. Most boys at their school wear the same brand of everything, making choosing a different colour their sole mark of personality.
‘Sight for sore eyes and all that,’ he says.
‘And you. That’s a particularly thin collar you’re wearing this evening. I assume you’re on the pull?’
‘That’s a particularly large number of necklaces around your neck. Selling them for spare change?’
‘Bitch,’ she says, and they both laugh. ‘Seriously, why didn’t you tell me you were coming to this thing? You knew I was.’
‘Thought I’d leave you dangling over the abyss.’
‘The abyss sucks.’
‘Well here I am now. Massive party times.’ He says it deadpan and she laughs.
‘Who do you know here?’
‘Who don’t I know.’
‘Seriously?’
‘Natalie. We used to go in the paddling pool together. When we were five.’
‘And you swapped digits and stayed in touch?’
‘Actually we are still mates. She’s a gamer.’
‘Adam, you can’t use that word any more. She’s a homosexual.’
‘Well played, Shawcross. Got the gay/gamer gag in before midnight. Who did you come with?’
‘Mary.’
‘Yeah, I mean who does Mary know?’
‘A guy called Brendan.’
‘That prick?’ Adam nods toward Brendan, who is finding it a challenge to add an extra turn-up to the bottom of his jeans because his hair keeps getting in the way. ‘I don’t know why she bothers.’
‘You’re just jealous.’
She says it as a joke but a shadow passes across Adam’s face before his face breaks into a smile. ‘Yeah, you’re right. I want the floppy hair but sadly mine stays out of my eyes on its own.’
‘You can get hair products that’ll make sure it stays in your eyes.’
‘I’ve tried them all. They do nothing for me.’
Adam offers her a drink from a clear glass bottle. Becky sniffs it suspiciously.
‘It’s a bit of everything. A mongrel spirit, like myself.’
‘I’ll try anything once.’
Becky takes a swig, and then another. Any hunger, nausea and nerves dissolve like sugar in hot tea and soon she is smiling at Adam, thank God for Adam, feeling warmer, better, looser, so much more herself.
‘Technically you’re trying everything once, when you drink that,’ he says.
‘Did you put that orange one in there?’ She feels her fingers tingle and her spirits lift a little higher so she drinks more of this disgusting, glorious, magical medicine.
‘If it was in my mum’s cabinet, I decanted it.’
‘That’s genuinely the worst cocktail I’ve ever tried.’
‘That’s crushing, given you only usually drink in London’s finest cocktail bars. Another swallow? Go wild.’
‘I probably shouldn’t drink too much more. I said I’d take a pill with Mary.’
‘Oh my God, you’re
