French Kisses

Prologue

I still get nightmares about it.

Swimming had always been my solace. The pool was where I knew who I was.

The cool water around me, the ache in my muscles reminding me that I was exactly where I was supposed to be.

Heaven. And I was good. Not Olympics good, but the best in the school and probably the county.

Dad’s face when I won. Like I’d just taken away all his stress and there was nothing wrong in the world.

It was our thing. Mine and Dad’s. It used to be anyway.

‘We’ve got this, Margot.’ Priya squeezed a wet arm round my waist. She’d just finished her breaststroke, and she was out of breath, but still smiling.

Priya was the only person I knew who was capable of smiling while competing.

Even in the water, when we cheered before her turn for the next length, her toothy grin flashed white under the water.

‘Shit. I don’t know, they’ve got Paige Loughran.’ I nodded over to the group of Belfast High School girls beside us, and let my eyes settle on Paige, who was stretching her long, muscular limbs while she stared straight up the lane. Focused. ‘She’s a machine.’

And instead of using this to drive me, like I usually did, the sight of her filled me with doubt. Doubts that had been planted a few months ago and had grown like weeds, taking over my thoughts, distorting them until I didn’t know who I was at all.

Priya pushed my shoulder. ‘What’s got into you? You’ve got this. Now get warmed up, you’re next.’

She was right. I could do this. I’d beaten Paige before.

Twice. I could do this. I repeated it in my head over and over in the hope that it would make me believe it.

Priya was always there for me. And I was there for her.

We didn’t hang out that much outside of school, but during those early morning and after-school sessions, Priya was my ride or die.

There wasn’t much time for anything else anyway.

I watched Ruby butterfly her way down the pool and my stomach lurched. Because that meant I was next.

I glanced over at the stands, like I always did just before my race.

I scanned the crowd, looking for him. For Dad’s eyes and the smile that would settle my stomach.

But I couldn’t see him. My eyes darted up, down and across the steps frantically until my gaze was drawn to a commotion.

A crowd forming, around Mum, Dad and my sisters, Rue and Wren.

My eyes fixed on Rue. Her splint was caught in the fold-up plastic seat, and she was screaming in pain. I watched as a man helped Mum release Rue’s leg from its trap before she pulled her into a hug. Wren was crying while Dad thanked people around him.

‘Margot!’ Priya shouted in my ear. I looked down to see Ruby in the water below me, screaming something.

But I couldn’t hear anything. I couldn’t think. And I couldn’t breathe. Not properly.

All I remember is Priya’s mouth fall open in horror as I stepped back, away from the diving block. Our chance to qualify, and get a trip to Portugal, gone. Just like that.

All because of me.

I quit the team the next day. And I guess I quit Priya too, because we didn’t see each other any more.

She sent me messages, and I ignored them the same way I ignored Coach Nichol’s calls to see her in her office. The humiliation was too much.

Then I met Ari and Theo.

One Friday afternoon, when I’d usually be in the pool, I was walking home, and I felt a crushed can hit the back of my head.

‘What the hell?’ I spun round to see Ari and Theo looking at me.

Ari Hamilton, who practically lived in detention, and Theo Burns, who’d been in my English class a few years ago.

I wasn’t in the mood. And I surprised myself with my hostility.

It was something new. Something that started after I quit the team.

In those weeks that followed, when I didn’t know what to do with myself.

‘Oh, feisty,’ said Ari. Her black hair was slicked back from her elegant face, her shirt untucked and her school skirt rolled up so high that it looked like she wasn’t wearing one at all.

And even though it was Ari who was talking to me, it was Theo I was drawn to.

The sheer size of him. Wide shoulders. Tall.

Just standing there with his messy brown hair looking like he couldn’t give a shit about anything.

And it was that energy, the cool nonchalance that I’d grow to hate, that then made me say ‘yeah sure’ when Ari asked, ‘Want to come to a party, swimmer girl?’

And I guess that was the start of it. My downfall.

When Dad’s looks of pride turned to disappointment, and then slowly to nothing at all as he focused all his attention on Rue and Wren.

And it suited me. I started hanging out with Ari and Theo all the time, and it wasn’t long until Theo and I became more than friends.

I had an actual boyfriend. Even though I spent more time with Theo and Ari instead of just Theo.

Time spent at parties Mum and Dad didn’t approve of.

Time spent drinking alcohol and smoking whatever Ari handed to me.

I was happy.

At least, I thought I was.