Chapter 2 #2
‘No, that’ll only lead to trouble.’ And I know what to do.
Omar budges up as I perch next to Sinclair on the bed. He’s leaning with his back against the wall now.
‘Hey.’ Great. He’s not reacting. But at least he groans quietly when I press the wet towel onto his forehead. His head sinks into my hand. ‘You’re a right eejit,’ I mumble. I mean, what the hell? What’s he gone and fucked himself up like this for?
‘I think he blacked out for a bit, Tori.’ Emma’s voice is shaking. I get that. It’s rough to see something like this for the first time, but so long as you take care of a few things, it’ll all turn out all right.
‘If he’s whiteyed, he should be feeling better soon.’ I put my fingers under his chin. His head is heavy, but his skin is soft. When Sinclair blinks, I feel kind of jittery. His eyes are blue and drunken. I get goosebumps as he mumbles my name with a heavy tongue.
‘So,’ I say, putting the cold towel on the back of his neck, ‘what the hell?’
‘What?’
‘All this. You’re steaming, and you’re ruining everyone’s evening.’
Sinclair leans his head against the wall as I loosen his tie. Bet he didn’t even hear me.
‘Was a shite evening anyway,’ he mumbles.
My fingers turn to ice. He looks at me but his eyelids are heavy. I undo his top buttons and lob the tie at Henry. He hangs it over the back of the chair and puts an arm round Emma.
‘You guys can go. I’ll stay,’ I say.
‘Are you sure?’ Henry asks quietly.
‘If I need help, I’ll get you,’ I promise.
‘We’ll only be next door,’ Emma says right away.
I grin despite myself. ‘I know.’
Henry studies me. He seems to be torn because he wants to be a good pal, but then he turns and follows Emma out. Gideon and Omar look more relieved to be able to leave the room. And suddenly it’s just Sinclair and me.
‘Why was it shite?’ I ask, once they’ve shut the door.
Sinclair’s turned away again and he jumps. ‘Hm?’
‘The evening,’ I repeat. ‘Why was it shite?’
‘Women,’ he mumbles. ‘I’m tired . . .’
‘I know but you have to drink this water before you can go to sleep.’
‘Tori . . .’ He sighs.
‘No, not open to negotiation. Sorry, but you should have thought about this before drinking your brains out.’
He groans but takes the bottle. Less water ends up on his shirt than I’d been expecting.
‘Clothes off!’ I order, as I notice the vomit on them.
‘I’m drunk,’ he grumbles.
‘Exactly.’ I stand up and walk over to his wardrobe.
Sinclair actually raises a hand to catch the T-shirt I throw to him, but he misses.
It takes him half a lifetime to unbutton his shirt and pull it off.
When he stands up to take off his trousers, I really try not to look, but I can’t help seeing the way his shoulder blades move, and what that does to his back muscles.
At last, he’s slipped on the T-shirt, and I take the chance to pull back his duvet.
He has to cling to my shoulder. For a moment I’m scared as he stumbles forwards, and I’m only too aware of the weight of his body.
Sometimes I forget that Sinclair’s almost head and shoulders taller than me.
That happened kind of overnight. Before the summer holidays at the end of the fourth form, we were almost the same height, but by Hogmanay in the fifth, he could suddenly put his chin on the top of my head when he hugged me at that party in Edinburgh.
I feel Sinclair’s forearm, hard beneath my fingers, as I hold onto him. My mouth goes dry. Where the hell did all those muscles come from?
I steer him back onto the mattress by the shoulder and step between Sinclair’s legs.
I guess he’s feeling dizzy and needs to hold onto something, because I suddenly feel his fingers on the back of my thigh, his hot hands through the thin fabric of the dress he picked out for me, and suddenly I wish he’d pull it off me.
When he looks up at me, I get butterflies.
His blond hair falls into his face. How does he manage it?
Even pissed out of his mind, he looks hot.
Sinclair’s jaw muscles twitch; he gulps.
His fingertips stroke my leg very gently for a second.
Then he pulls back his hand. My heart thumps nervously.
I don’t have to tell him to lie down – fortunately, he works that out for himself.
‘So, what’s it like?’ he asks, as I turn away again to chuck his clothes into the laundry basket.
‘What?’
‘Being noticed by the person you want to kiss . . .’ He sounds tired, his words are slurred. ‘Must be a great feeling.’
And, zap, I’m freezing.
What does he mean? Is he talking about Val?
Who else, Tori?
But why does he sound so reproachful? What’s it to him who I kiss or don’t kiss? Sinclair’s had hundreds of opportunities to do what Val did. Seriously, maybe even more. I can’t remember when I stopped counting. Hundreds, thousands, and he didn’t take one of them.
Luckily for me, Sinclair doesn’t seem to expect an answer. He’s too drunk. Probably forgot his words the second he uttered them. I haven’t, though. He sinks onto the pillow, eyes closed. How can he just fall asleep?
For a moment, I stand uncertainly in his room. I’m longing to get out of here, but I stupidly promised Henry and everyone that I’d stay with him.
I suppress a sigh. I’m conscious of standing barefoot in the middle of my drunken best friend’s bedroom, wearing a long evening dress. On the night of the New Year Ball. Wow.
And yet I’m kind of glad that I’m now getting undressed in Sinclair’s room and not Val’s.
Sinclair blinks.
‘Shut your eyes,’ I order, as I reach for the zip. Luckily, it’s on the side so I don’t need any help.
‘I won’t look,’ mumbles Sinclair. His eyes are heavy. They close. ‘And if I did . . . I know what you look like naked.’
‘This may come as a surprise to you, but women’s bodies change between the ages of twelve and eighteen.’
‘You were thirteen,’ he slurs.
Damn it, he’s right. But it was dark that night in the second form when we went for a swim in the loch near Ebrington. Skinny-dipping. No one could have seen a thing.
Sinclair’s window is on the latch and a slight breeze catches my shoulders as I slip out of the dress.
It falls to the floor around my feet. I’m not wearing a bra – it has that low back and the bust is tight-fitting enough to hold everything in place.
I step out of the circle of fabric on the floorboards, turn aside and pull another of Sinclair’s T-shirts from the wardrobe.
It’s the one from the charity run last summer and it reaches to my thighs.
‘OK,’ I say, turning back to the bed.
Sinclair doesn’t respond. He’s lying on his back, his head slumped to one side. Towards the wall. His heart-shaped mouth is slightly open, his chest rising and falling evenly.
Well, I guess he really wasn’t looking. Well done him.
The weird silence is oppressive as I slip into the tiny bathroom and use his shower gel to clean the make-up off my face.
I gargle with his mouthwash, which will have to do for the time being, and drink ice-cold water out of my hands.
When I straighten, my eyes look back at me in the mirror, red and tired.
Luckily, I find one of my hair elastics in his bathroom cupboard – I leave them all over the place.
When Sinclair’s hair is as long as it is just now, he sometimes puts his fringe into a wee topknot.
I have a bit of a soft spot for that ‘hairdo’, but there’s no need for him to know that.
I skilfully tie up my long, copper-red hair into a bun because every time I’ve shared a bed with him, he’s managed without fail to roll over and lie on it in the night. It’s amazing how painful that is.
Sinclair’s still out for the count when I come back into the room. Just to be on the safe side, I put the bathroom bin at the head-end of the bed. You never know. Then I climb over his sleeping body. He twitches as I squeeze between him and the wall.
‘Hm?’ He blinks.
‘Budge up, chicken.’ I shove him towards the edge of the bed. I’ll never stop calling him that. Not since the time in the juniors when we went on a trip to an organic farm in Highbourne and he panicked at the sight of the hens running everywhere.
‘I’ll fall out,’ he moans.
‘No, you won’t. I’ve got you. But I don’t want to be in the way if you boak. There’s a bucket next to you.’
‘Don’t need it,’ mumbles Sinclair. He shifts half a centimetre to the side, and his body is heavy next to mine. I keep my promises, so I roll up next to him and put an arm around him. He immediately grabs my wrist and hugs it to his chest.
‘Feel sick?’ I ask, as he groans quietly.
‘Dunno . . . The bed’s moving.’
I hold him tighter. ‘You sleep now. I’m here if anything happens.’
‘Victoria,’ he mumbles after a while. He’s so drunk. He never uses my full name.
‘Charles?’ And I never call him by his. It feels strange on my lips. Exciting, but not unpleasant. Nobody at this school calls him that. Well, apart from his mum and the teachers. But it sounds kind of soft. Charles. Charlie. Hmm . . .
He sighs and sinks more heavily into me. ‘You smell nice.’
My belly starts to tingle treacherously. ‘I’m very sorry, but I’m afraid I can’t say the same of you tonight.’
‘Should I shower?’ He tries to pull away but gives up after precisely four seconds. His muscles soften as he falls back into my arms.
‘No, I don’t need any more drama if you collapse in the bathroom.’
‘I won’t collapse.’
‘You could hardly sit.’
‘It’s not spinning so badly now.’
‘Wait till you shut your eyes.’
He groans hideously – he must have done just that.
I lift my chin a little. Sinclair’s hair doesn’t smell of cigarettes. But that’s no surprise. Unlike Val, he didn’t spend the whole evening smoking with his pals.
Sinclair doesn’t speak. I shut my eyes. If I lean forwards a little, I could touch his hair with my nose . . .
‘Tori?’ Sinclair’s voice is quiet.
‘Yes?’
‘You’retoogoodforaguylikehim.’ Words like chewing gum, heavy tongue. Sinclair swallows the end of it, but I got the gist. Unfortunately.
I’m cold. I don’t move and I don’t reply. If I just ignore it, it’ll be like Sinclair never said that. He didn’t. It was just his brain fog. But they say drunks and small children always tell the truth.
Sinclair gives a tired sigh and the sound of it shoots straight between my legs. It’s a deep, relaxed sound. I feel the gentle tremor that runs through his body, as it always does when he falls asleep. His head sinks forwards. His hand doesn’t let go of mine.
Luckily for me, he can no longer hear my groans of frustration.