Chapter 12
Henry
It’s the way things always are at the start of a new school year.
Everything happens at once and at megahigh speed.
The days fly by, and I love it. The feeling of having so much to do and being absolutely where I’m meant to be.
Mind you, it doesn’t feel quite the same on evenings like this, when I’ve got rugby training and two hours of death stares from Valentine Ward, but that’s what I wanted, so hey.
I don’t know if my training with Emma has had any effect yet, but at least it means I’m completely knackered by the time I drop into bed every night.
Even now, I’m shutting my laptop on my Netflix series right at the start of wing time because I can’t even keep up with the plot.
Although, for once, that’s not because I’m too tired.
My thoughts keep wandering. To Emma and her fingers between my shoulder blades when she says, Stand up straight, Henry.
To her slender neck and the sweat on her smooth skin.
I didn’t know that could be a turn-on, but what can I say?
When I shower after a run and taste my own salty sweat on my tongue, I find myself imagining it’s hers. I have to. There’s no other option.
I push the laptop aside, turn off the light, and roll onto my back.
My head is heavy, but I don’t shut my eyes.
I stare into the darkness and think about her body.
I imagine putting my hands on her waist and feeling that line of supersoft skin.
Because her top’s ridden up and she hasn’t done anything about it.
Like she’s OK with it. I think about her pink lips and her cheeks, which flush the same color once we’ve run for long enough.
I wonder if that would also happen if she were lying underneath me, my mouth exploring her body.
If her lips formed my name, which sounds so sweet the way she says it.
If she put her head back and arched up toward me.
It’s enough to make my breath come harder and my boxers tighten. I shut my eyes as an imaginary Emma’s fingers push downward over my belly—then open them with a start.
“Hi,” whispers Grace, shutting my door behind her. “I know it’s wing time already but . . .” She stops as I sit up and fumble for the light switch. I blink and pull the duvet over my crotch. “Oh, did I wake you?”
“No, I . . .” I cough, but my voice is still hoarse. “I was just so tired after training.” There’s a throbbing between my legs. Liar, liar, liar. “Is everything all right? What are you doing here?”
Grace is still standing by the door. I’d get up and go over to her, but I’ve got this boner, and it’s nothing to do with her. “I was round with Olive, and I thought . . .”
She doesn’t say it out loud, but she doesn’t have to.
I know what she wants to tell me. That nothing’s happened between us since I got back, and things used to be the exact opposite of that when we hadn’t seen each other for ages.
Back when I spent the whole return flight thinking about how I’d kiss her and press her into the mattress.
But that was then. Secret nights together, forbidden touches.
Our first times, in beds that were way too narrow, and I don’t know exactly when all that stopped.
It wasn’t a conscious decision, more of a gradual process.
I should say something. Ask her if she wants to stay over, for example. I should do it, but it wouldn’t be right. I don’t want to admit it, but it’s true.
“Anyway, sorry, I didn’t mean to wake you,” says Grace.
“You didn’t,” I answer, and that part’s even true. I was still awake because I’m an arsehole who was thinking about another woman.
“I think I’d better get going, then.” She reaches for the door handle. And I say nothing. I just wait as she turns around. Slowly, as if she wants to give me a chance, an opportunity to use. But I don’t take it. Her eyes come back to me again.
“Text me when you’re home,” I say, and I hate myself for it. “Will you?”
“Yes.” Grace forces herself to smile. “Sleep well, Henry.”
“You too,” I whisper.
Grace walks away. My girlfriend, I sent her away. I wait till she’s closed the door behind her. I listen out in the silence. I let myself fall back; I press the pillow into my face so that nobody can hear the sound of frustration that escapes me.
Emma
What am I doing here? I haven’t the faintest idea.
All I know is that it was somehow way nicer walking down these empty corridors in the middle of the night when Henry was by my side.
I didn’t notice then how dark and creepy it was.
But maybe that’s down to the rain that’s now beating against the windowpanes and the wind whistling around the walls.
Every time I hear some other weird noise, I jump and whirl around, praying that nobody will catch me.
It isn’t quite as late as last time, when I was out with Henry, but I doubt I’d get into any less trouble for that.
It’s long past wing time, and I’m meant to be in my room, but my mind kept racing, always coming back to that shelf of yearbooks.
When I was in the school library this afternoon, I soon realized that flicking through those books in the daytime is not an option.
Not while Mr. Elling, the librarian, is wheeling his little trolley up and down the aisles and my fellow pupils are sitting at the tables, reading.
You can’t borrow the yearbooks, so I took out the three novels we’re going to be reading in English over the next few weeks.
And wondered when would be the best time to come back here, undisturbed.
I don’t know what I think I’m going to get from this.
It’s quite likely that I’ll find a photo of my parents in one of those books.
But what good will that do me? I’d just torture myself looking for similarities, then have to remind myself that I’m not one step further on in my pointless quest. But what can I say?
My gut instinct is telling me that I have to do this, so I’ve got no choice.
When I make out the big double doors at the end of the hallway, I sigh with relief. They open with a quiet squeak.
I don’t know what it is about rooms full of books, but somehow, you feel safe inside them. My footsteps aren’t echoing anymore. The sound is swallowed. There’s a different smell too, of wood and paper, dust and promises.
The candlestick is in the same place as last time, but I don’t dare light the candles.
Instead, I pull my phone out of the kangaroo pocket on my hoodie.
The cold light of the torch doesn’t fit the vibe, but I can’t risk accidentally knocking into a candle and setting the whole school on fire.
That’s totally the kind of thing that would happen to me. So I’d better not.
I walk along the shelves until I reach the yearbooks. My eyes hurriedly flick over the dates.
1994. My heart thumps when I find the right spine.
I reach out my hand, but hesitate as my fingertips touch the smooth binding.
It’s not like I’m expecting much from these yearbook photos.
I’ve seen pictures of Mum and Dad at my age before.
But somehow, looking at them in our cellar is different from doing so here in the library of the boarding school whose walls could tell me the stories that no one else will.
I pull down the book. It’s heavier than I expected. I put my phone on the shelf so that I can hold the yearbook with both hands and blow the thin sheet of dust off the top edge.
Class of 1994. I run my thumbs over the inscription, then open the book.
There are lots of pages. So many that at some point I sit down on the old wooden floorboards and use my phone torch to light them.
I go through the list of names and hold my breath when I finally find the ones I’m looking for.
Laura Beck.
Jacob Wiley.
Laura and Jacob. Mum and the man who could’ve been a father to me, if he’d felt like it.
And then I read the name two lines above my father’s.
Alaric Ward.
Is that him? Mr. Ward? Were they in the same year?
I flick on. There are group photos from the junior school. Ten or fifteen children at most per photo, and I have to analyze them all. Not to find Mum, no. She didn’t start here until the second form, but my father must have been here from the start. And maybe Mr. Ward was too.
I’ve gone through almost all the photos, and I’m just wondering whether to start again at the beginning, when I stop.
It’s the eyes that make me think I’m looking at myself as a child. The pale-blond hair that eventually darkened on him. But not on me.
It’s my dad, and he must be eleven, twelve at most. The tip of my nose is almost touching the paper, I’m leaning in so close to the book, but I can’t tell whether or not Mr. Ward is among the other pupils.
It’s not until I get to the second senior form that I’m sure.
He’s standing next to my dad and not looking anywhere near as bitter as he does these days.
More like mischievous. Rather like that Valentine when he happens to be looking less arrogant than normal.
Then I spot Mum. Of course. Second form, her first year at Dunbridge Academy.
She’s standing in the back row, looking kind of uptight and shy.
Not at all the way I know her. My dad’s hair is a bit longer than everyone else’s, and he looks sort of rebellious, even though he’s wearing the uniform.
But the school uniform doesn’t suit him.
He’s staring into the camera and not smiling.