22. Goldie
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
GOLDIE
“I know what you’ve been up to.”
I finish shoving the cans of cider into my backpack.
Patricia stands in the doorway, leaning against the frame.
Her arms are folded, and her mouth is doing a good impression of a wizened prune.
I have no idea how old she is, but she looks ancient.
Wrinkles around her mouth from smoking too many cigarettes, yellow skin, wiry grays in her mousy hair.
She’s strong though. I wouldn’t win in anything other than a verbal fight.
“What are you up to?” I ask. It is past midnight. She should be in bed by now, or passed out in front of the television. It’s not like she bothers to check on me when she eventually crawls to her room.
“Don’t try and avoid the question,” she snaps. “You’ve been doing God knows what on multiple nights, sneaking out of here.”
So she does know.
The old me might have been scared at this revelation.
Shoved the cider back where it came from, handed the carefully stowed Smirnoff to Patricia with a pleading apology.
The old me spent so many years trying to appeal to this woman’s good nature, which surely was hidden away somewhere and, if I capitulated long enough, would unveil itself.
But there is a new me now, and Patricia has no idea what I’ve done.
And so, despite myself, I can’t help smiling.
“Don’t you smirk at me,” she says.
“It was the last day of exams today,” I tell her. “It was always meant to be a big celebration. I’m just enjoying the day like I was supposed to.”
Not that I really care. I don’t need grades to be a successful model; exams weren’t about that for me. But it’s another blow to what we thought was meant to happen, the right order of things. We’ve learned there is no sense of justice other than the one we create.
That we can rely on. We’re getting rather good at dispensing justice of our own.
Patricia is wrong-footed; I think she was expecting a fight. She doesn’t understand how above her I am now, how insignificant she truly is in the face of everything else. But soon enough she sets her mouth in a thin line, and her eyes sparkle with triumph.
“When the modeling turns to nothing,” she says, “you’ll be glad this year went how it did. That you’re being handed predicted grades.”
“When the modeling makes me a star,” I say, “I’ll be sure not to give you a call. You can find me on the front covers of magazines instead, and my grades won’t matter.”
“What’s got into you?” she says, and God, she’s finally noticing something about me at last. “You’re normally so . . .”
Pliable, I think. Well-behaved. Pathetic.
The images rush back to me, dark and compelling: We’re stabbing him, our hearts are pounding, it’s electric, it’s insane, we are gods.
I finish packing my bag without waiting for her to finish her sentence.
“Hold on,” she says. “You’re not going anywhere.”
“Yes, I am.”
“Are you meeting your friends? Where are you going? Because you’re not heading out to be alone. Is it a boyfriend?”
A boyfriend? She has to be kidding.
“How do you know?” I snap. “You don’t know anything about me. And no, my friends aren’t involved. This is about me and my time. And I’m going out.”
“No, you’re not!”
“What are you going to do about it?” I ask. “Are you going to call the police? Have them whack a massive fine on you? You can’t stop me.”
She recoils, surprised. “You’re different. Nastier. What have I done to deserve this?”
I can’t help but laugh. “What have you done? Trick question, Patricia. It’s what you haven’t done. Haven’t ever tried being a mother figure to me, haven’t helped me with anything, haven’t loved me—”
“Loved you?”
My chest hurts as I process her confusion. The concept is foreign to her. I see it in her expression, pure bewilderment. There’s never any chance of it. I really am nothing to her.
Stop it. It doesn’t matter. She’s nothing, I am everything.
“You don’t care about me,” I say. “So why pretend?”
I push past her, not caring when my backpack hits her in the arm.
“Your dad,” she says, then stops.
I turn around. “Don’t you dare tell me what you think he’d say about this. If he was here, I wouldn’t be anywhere near you or this situation. And you know what? These past few weeks—yes, I’ve been sneaking out for weeks—have been some of the happiest of my life. So I think he’d be pretty glad.”
“I do care about you, I—”
I don’t wait for whatever else she has to say.
I take one last look at her, this angry, bitter woman who is only a league above my mother, and then I leave, slamming the front door behind me.
There’s no need for pretense anymore. I walk down the communal hall, breathing hard, and only out of courtesy for our neighbor downstairs do I shut the external door softly.
For Patricia, I would have slammed it twice as hard as ours.
I throw up a middle finger to our window, in case she is watching me, and then I carry on.
Not long. I’ll be out of here. I have to bear it until then.
By the time I reach the others, my panting breath has calmed. There’s no indication anything is wrong.
We meet at Bishop’s House, because of course we do.
It’s ours again. We don’t have to worry about Hugo buying it and spoiling everything.
The iron gate is as tall and imposing as ever, but I scale it no problem now, brushing cold, wet rain from my fingertips when I land on the other side with a gentle thud of my feet.
The path leading up to the house is still dark, the trees still cast even darker shadows, but I know this route implicitly.
This place can’t hurt me; it’s part of me now. It’s all for us.
My argument with Patricia has delayed me.
The others are all waiting, and they haven’t noticed me approach.
Maybe it’s from my love of modeling, but I adore people-watching, noting the intricate, unconscious poses they strike.
Starling has a hand on her slender hip, the other pressed at the side of her thigh.
She creates a triangle of shadow with her elbow, the darkness between it a stark contrast to the pale white of her skin.
Cuckoo is in motion; she shifts her weight from one foot to the other, bouncy and eager, great, expressive eyes blinking rapidly while she talks.
Sometimes I watch her and mimic the way she rolls them, squints them, lights them up.
It’s all good practice for the front of a camera.
Wren is Cuckoo’s opposite: She stands so still it’s like she really is waiting for a photographer, but she’s too stiff, too unsure.
She hugs her arms across her chest, her wispy hair falling in strands in front of her face, but she no longer looks toward the floor.
She holds her gaze confidently; she’s changing too.
Crow, who spots me first, always observant, her high cheekbones her most enviable feature, waves, and the others soon follow suit.
My glorious gang of murderers. I feel a warm rush of love for them and hurry over.
“Sorry I’m late,” I say. “But I’ve brought the drink.”
“Then let’s head inside,” Cuckoo says, and she’s the one who perhaps has changed most of all. There is a serenity to her now, an ease that was never there before however much she faked it.
We did this for her most of all.
The broken window is waiting for us, and we slide in one by one. We head to the ground floor, then into the room that was once a library. We arrange ourselves on the floor, sitting on a blanket brought by Wren, and I empty the drinks into the middle of our circle.
No crazy antics tonight. No targets.
“So why were you late?” Starling asks. “Is everything alright?”
I debate whether to tell them, then give in. “Patricia spotted me. We had an argument. She knows what I’ve been doing.”
“She knows you’ve been sneaking out?” Starling says, appalled. The others are just as horrified. “What? Not the Hugo stuff, right?”
“No! She must have heard me one night. She confronted me as I was stashing away our drinks, and tried to act like she had any authority over me whatsoever. Which I quickly corrected. I told her to fuck off, basically. And I walked out with my head held high, and the alcohol.”
Alright, I’m exaggerating somewhat. But that practically is what happened.
“Oh my God, I could never talk to my mum like that,” Wren says, and I scowl at her.
“Patricia isn’t my mum, remember?” I snap. “Absolutely, categorically, not my mother. Though they share similarities. I’d tell her to fuck off too.”
“Didn’t she wonder why you had so much?” Starling persists. “It makes it pretty obvious you’re meeting someone.”
Trust Starling to get so worried. Wren and Crow look scared too. “Guys, you don’t have to stress. We’re good. I said it was me and me alone out here tonight. She’s convinced I have some boyfriend. After everything we’ve been through, do you really think Patricia is a problem?”
“Exactly,” Cuckoo says. “Nothing to worry about. Now let’s have one of those ciders. We have the last day of our exams to celebrate at the minimum.”
After we each open our cans and take our first sips, Crow sighs. “I can’t believe it was the last day of exams today. I almost . . . forgot, actually. I have it marked on my calendar and everything. This day was . . . the most important day of my life, and I almost forgot it.”
“We’ve changed so much,” Starling murmurs. “It feels so . . . small now.”
“It’s just Results Day left,” Wren says. “And then that’s all of it. Finished for good.”
Crow closes her eyes. “I’m so scared about that.”
“Why?” I ask. “We’re getting our predicted grades. We’re going to be fine.”
“What if we don’t? They’re talking about some kind of external moderation. What if something goes wrong?”
“What if the government makes sure students like us don’t perform too well, you mean?” Cuckoo says.
Crow frowns. “No. This isn’t some conspiracy theory.”
“Can’t let our teachers actually believe in us and give us the grades they thought we deserved. We have to stay in our place.”