‘Yeah, sure,’ Holly agreed.
‘Great,’ Suzie said, heading for the stairs. ‘Make yourself comfortable while I get changed. I’ll be back in a minute.’
Alone, Holly put her glass down on the laptop table and quickly rummaged through the bag. There were several sets of matching bras and panties in it and they were all gorgeous, but she especially liked the red satin ones that looked like the ones Suzie had been wearing in the photo on the living room wall. She hoped they would fit, because she was looking forward to wearing them to school. She had double PE on Monday afternoons, and she usually got changed in the toilets rather than risk the other girls seeing the state of her underwear. But now she had these she wouldn’t need to hide away, and she was looking forward to showing Bex that she wasn’t such a scruffy embarrassment after all.
Suzie was wearing her dressing gown when she came back down to the cellar, and she’d applied fresh make-up and brushed her hair so it hung in a glossy curtain around her shoulders. After fiddling with the light for a while and running backwards and forwards to the camera to get the focus right, she told Holly to sit on the floor in front of the screen and snapped a series of shots of her from various angles.
Unlike the previous week, when she’d felt awkward and self-conscious, Holly floated through the session. She didn’t know if it was the wine, or the sensation of being cut off from the rest of the world down there in the cellar, but she enjoyed following Suzie’s directions and striking poses she would have been way too embarrassed to attempt in front of anyone else.
The nerves didn’t kick in until her session was over and she swapped places with Suzie behind the camera. Suzie had made it look easy, but there were loads of buttons and levers, and Holly prayed that she wouldn’t accidentally press the wrong thing and delete everything.
When, at last, Suzie said, ‘OK, let’s wrap it up at that,’ Holly was only too happy to call it a night. The temperature in the room had plummeted by then, and goosebumps had sprung up all over her body.
‘Hey, you’ve done a great job with these,’ Suzie said, scrolling through the last few images after unhooking the camera from the tripod. ‘I think I’ll put myself on the beach at sunset in this one.’
She showed Holly a shot of herself lying on her back with one knee raised and her arms stretched out above her head. Her glossy lips were partially open and she had a sultry look in her eyes. It was gorgeous, but Holly was confused.
‘How will you do that?’ she asked. ‘It’s just green.’
‘Wait and see,’ Suzie said, smiling as pulled her dressing gown on and switched off the light. ‘By the time I’ve finished, you’ll think we were actually there.’
Doubting that, Holly followed Suzie up the stairs and said goodnight before heading home with the bag of underwear stashed inside her jacket.
Relieved to find that her mum hadn’t come home early, Holly stuffed the bag under her mattress and then changed into her pyjamas before climbing into bed.
15
Things didn’t go quite as planned on Monday, and Holly sensed that something was wrong as soon as she walked into her form room and saw Bex, Leanne and several of their classmates huddled around a desk. They had all been laughing, but they abruptly stopped when they noticed her in the doorway, and she wondered what was going on when she saw Bex and Leanne exchange a hooded look.
Making her way to her own desk on the other side of the room, Holly had just sat down when a shadow crossed her face, and she looked up to find Leanne looming over her.
‘You make me sick,’ the girl hissed. ‘That shit might be acceptable in the slum you come from, but we don’t tolerate that kind of thing round here.’
‘What are you talking about?’ Holly asked, nervous because the girl was taller and a whole lot heavier than she was.
‘I’m talking about your prozzy mum,’ Leanne spat. ‘No wonder you always stink of fish. I bet she’s got you at it an’ all, hasn’t she?’
‘What?’ Holly drew her head back and screwed up her face. ‘You’re talking rubbish!’
‘Hey, Bex, come here a minute . . .’ Leanne called out. ‘She’s trying to make out like she doesn’t know what I’m talking about.’
Bex walked over and peered down at Holly with a pitying look in her eyes. ‘Sorry, Holls. I know you asked me not to tell anyone, but I don’t see why I should keep your dirty little secrets.’
‘Why are you lying?’ Holly spluttered, staring up at her in disbelief. ‘You’re supposed to be my best mate.’
‘Ex mate,’ Bex replied coolly. ‘And you can deny it all you like, but we both know it’s true.’
‘Dirty bitch,’ one of the other girls muttered. ‘You should be ashamed of yourself.’
‘Fuck off!’ Holly spat, turning on the girl. ‘None of you have ever bothered with me anyway, so I don’t give a fuck what you lot think.’
‘Yeah, ’cos you’re a scruffy little weirdo and we can’t stand you,’ sneered Leanne.
‘I’d rather be a weirdo than a fat slag,’ Holly shot back, too angry by then to hold her tongue. ‘What was it you said about her, Bex? She’s a greedy bitch who’d probably weigh twenty stone by now if she didn’t burn it all off shagging Gary Mottram?’
A collective gasp went up among the other girls, and Bex’s face drained of colour when Leanne glared at her.
‘I never said that,’ she spluttered.
‘So how comes she knows about Gary when you’re the only one I’ve ever told?’ Leanne hissed, whacking her in the shoulder and almost knocking her over.
‘I don’t know!’ Bex flapped her hands helplessly and edged behind the desk. ‘She must have been listening when we were talking that day. You know how
