Authors: Cathy MacPhail
‘Mrs Brodie, can I speak to Erin, please?’ Even I could hear the desperation in my voice.
I couldn’t miss the ice in Mrs Brodie’s. ‘You have some nerve phoning here. Call yourself a friend? Erin hasn’t stopped crying since she came home. Was that your idea of fun? Telling everybody such a thing? I know you’ve got a warped sense of humour, but surely even you know when to draw the line.’
I was so taken aback by the venom in her voice I couldn’t even interrupt to defend myself. And then, in the background, I heard another voice. Erin’s voice.
‘Is that her, Mum? Hang up on her. I never want to talk to her again.’
‘Erin!!!!’ I screamed it through the phone. ‘It wasn’t me.’ But by that time, the line was dead.
I was crying when my mum came home from work. ‘What on earth’s wrong with you?’
I wished I could have told her the whole truth, let it
all pour out to someone. But Mum was the last person I would confide in. ‘I had a falling out with Erin,’ was all I said.
She accepted it without a quibble. ‘Och well, give her a phone, apologise, make up. You’ll be friends again by tomorrow.’
And in a way, that made me feel better. Tomorrow I would make Erin listen. I’d make her see that I could never have broken her trust. I went to bed that night, but I didn’t sleep. I tossed and I turned and I prayed. I prayed that tomorrow I was going to be able to make everything all right.
I stood at the school gates waiting for her to arrive, but she didn’t come. Maybe, I thought, she wasn’t coming again today. Then another thought jumped on that. Maybe she was never coming back. She’d been transferred to another school, one that knew nothing of her ‘secret’.
But she did come. I was sitting in class when she arrived. She strode into the classroom, with Rose on one side of her and Heather on the other, for protection. I should have been there too, I thought. I tried to catch her eye, but she totally blanked me.
As soon as Erin sat down, Wizzie whispered, ‘
Pssshhhh
,’ and the whole class giggled.
Mrs Tasker, the teacher, yelled out, ‘If I hear anything like that again there will be trouble.’
And I realised then that the teachers knew the whole story. Erin was being ‘looked after’ by them as well. I knew too, by the way Mrs Tasker turned her eyes to glare at me, exactly who she blamed for it all. Me.
I looked away. I knew it made me look guilty but I couldn’t help it. Everyone was blaming me, and I hadn’t done anything.
At break, Mrs Tasker made us all stay in our seats until she’d escorted Erin and Rose and Heather out of the class. Wizzie couldn’t keep her mouth shut even then.
‘Ooo, have your friends fallen out with you, Driscoll? Cause you’ve got a big mouth?’
I squared up to her. ‘It wasn’t me and you know it.’
‘If it wasn’t you … who else could it be?’
It was Lauren who said that, poking her face in between us. Then she bellowed with laughter and grabbed at Wizzie’s arm and off they went.
I stood there watching them and I realised I knew the answer.
Lauren’s sister had been a waitress at the wedding.
She had glared at us all the time she was serving. She’d ignored Erin at the top table.
Lauren’s sister must have been listening outside the toilet doors while Erin was baring her soul to me.
Lauren’s sister was the one to blame.
All I could think about was telling Erin, but I couldn’t find any of them anywhere. It seemed the teachers had her well protected. It wasn’t until lunchtime that I saw them coming into the canteen. Erin had purple shadows under her eyes, as if she hadn’t stopped crying. Rose strode beside her like some fierce warrior guard, daring anyone to say a word to her. Heather padded behind them. She looked worried, as if she’d been crying too. The weakest link, that was Heather. Rose and Erin took their seats at our table. I knew I couldn’t get near Erin, but as soon as I saw Heather going up to the counter to wait in the queue I was there beside her. I felt as if every eye in the canteen was on us. I didn’t care.
‘I’ve got to talk to Erin, Heather.’ Her eyes darted across to the table where Erin sat with Rose. They were both watching us closely. I could almost feel Erin’s icy stare go through me like a dagger. I clutched at
Heather’s arm. ‘I’ve found out who spread that story, and she has to know it wasn’t me.’
Heather’s face went pale. She pulled away from me, but I had to make her believe me. ‘You must know it wasn’t me, Heather.’
She shrugged, didn’t even look at me, and I was sure then that deep down Heather did believe me.
‘It was Lauren’s sister,’ I said.
Heather’s eyes flashed at me. ‘Who?’
‘You remember she was there? She was serving at the top table, remember? She was a waitress. She must have overheard Erin. It was her!’
Heather stared at me as if she was taking it all in. Then, with a sigh, she actually smiled at me. ‘Of course. Of course. It must have been her.’
I smiled back. Friends again.
Just then Rose came up and tugged at Heather’s arm. ‘Don’t talk to her.’
Heather grabbed at her. ‘No, wait, Rose. You’ve got to listen. Hannah knows who spread it … and it wasn’t her.’
Rose wasn’t the one I wanted to convince and for once Erin was alone and unprotected. I pushed them both aside and ran to her table and threw myself on the
seat beside her. ‘It was Lauren’s sister!’ I said at once, terrified someone would stop me before I could get it out. ‘She must have heard you. Listened at the toilet door or something. She’s told Lauren and that’s how it got all round the school.’
I could tell Erin was trying to take all this in. She must have realised this was a much more logical solution than her best friend letting her down. Finally, she snapped at me. ‘You better not be making this up, Driscoll.’
I saw them coming into the canteen just then, Wizzie and the rest of the Hell Cats, pushing their way through the doors, taking up too much room.
I stood up, pulling at Erin’s sleeve. ‘There she is. There’s Lauren. Let’s ask her. She’ll have guilt written all over her face. She won’t be able to deny it.’
And I was sure no one would believe her even if she did.
Once again, I felt like one of them, a Lip Gloss Girl, ready to confront Wizzie with my friends at my back, afraid of nothing. It was all going to be all right. I balled my fist ready to punch Lauren. That’s how angry I was.
They stopped in their tracks as they saw us storming towards them. I only halted when I was inches away
from Lauren’s face. I spat the words out at her. ‘It was your sister, wasn’t it?’
Lauren looked at Wizzie as if I’d spoken in a foreign language.
‘At least have the courage to admit it was her. She was listening at the door of the ladies, wasn’t she? Heard Erin telling me. She’s the one who spread it, isn’t she? She told you, and you told everybody else.’ I hated the desperation and the anger in my voice. I couldn’t stop it.
Lauren took a step back and peered at me, her eyes half shut. ‘You think my sister told me that your pal, Erin here, pishes the bed … and I spread it about. Is that it?’
I had wanted her to look guilty. But she didn’t. Her kind wouldn’t. She probably thought there was nothing wrong in what she’d done. Lauren just looked amused. As if it was a great joke.
‘My sister?’ she said. ‘She heard you talking in the toilets? She was outside the ladies and you were inside and she was listening? Is that your story?’
Erin was right behind me. I could feel her tense herself. Ready for a fight.
I wanted to show her I was her friend, her best
friend. ‘Yes, your scabby sister. She was a waitress, and not a very good one.’ I tried to use some of my old boldness.
By tonight
, I thought,
we’ll all be at Erin’s house, laughing about this
. Everything would have been explained and I would have punched Lauren’s front teeth halfway down her throat. ‘She was standing at the door of the ladies’ listening to everything we said.’ I could picture it so clearly in my mind’s eye, it had to be the truth. ‘And then she couldn’t wait to tell you, because she knows you’ve got such a big mouth.’
Wizzie was sneering in what would have passed for her as a smile. There was a weight like a bowling ball in the pit of my stomach. Why couldn’t they just admit that was what had happened?
Wizzie turned to Lauren. ‘Will you tell her, or will I?’ she said.
‘Oh, let me, Wizzie.’ And Lauren looked at me and she smiled triumphantly. That’s the only way I could describe that smile. Triumphant. Then she went on. ‘My sister couldn’t have heard you if you’d used a megaphone. My sister’s deaf.’
Deaf.
From somewhere in the back of my mind flashed a picture of Lauren’s sister at the wedding. The way she stared at people, I had thought she was being so rude. Now I realised she had been reading people’s lips, studying their faces. And she hadn’t ignored Erin. She simply hadn’t heard her.
Deaf.
It hadn’t been her sister after all. Couldn’t have been. But who else?
I didn’t get time to think it out. I was suddenly punched in the head. It was Erin. ‘You lying cow! You nearly had me falling for that. I hate you.’
I tried to talk to her, but she spat in my face. ‘You’re worse than them,’ she nodded at Wizzie. ‘At least they’ve got an excuse for being retards.’
I expected Wizzie to leap at her for saying that. But
she didn’t. Instead, she settled herself on top of the table and crossed her legs. ‘This is so much fun. The Lip Gloss Girls are fighting amongst themselves.’ Then she laughed. ‘Better hurry, Erin. Those incontinence knickers only hold so much.’
She clapped her hands as Erin turned away from her, but this time Erin wasn’t crying. She was too angry to cry. ‘I’ll get you for that, Wizzie.’ Then her eyes moved to me and there was hate in them. ‘And I’ll get you as well. You wait and see if I don’t.’
I walked through the rest of the day in a dream. No, a nightmare. I couldn’t concentrate on anything. All I wanted to do was cry. How was I going to convince Erin that I would never have betrayed her? She wouldn’t even look at me, and I couldn’t get near her. She was always surrounded, not just by Rose and Heather, but by other girls on the edges of our gang. Geraldine Mooney, always wanting to be one of us, suddenly was. She stood in front of Erin, glaring at me.
I tried texting Erin, but she wouldn’t answer, and I knew when she saw my number coming up on her phone she would just ignore it.
I tried to text her again, at break, and for a moment, just a moment, I thought she was going to answer me.
We were in the English corridor, and she stared at my text and then she stared at me, and started walking towards me, holding the phone in her hand. She came so close to me, I thought she must have forgiven me, believed me at last. She stopped inches from my face and held the phone in front of me so I could see my message clearly on the screen. Then, with the press of a button, the text was gone.
‘Erased!’ Erin snapped at me. ‘Your message, and you. Erased from my life, for ever.’
She had erased me from her life. And not just Erin. All of them had erased me. That’s what made it so hard. I had no one to talk to, no one to confide in. And I so wanted someone to talk to. These were my friends, my best friends. Friends for ever. And now, suddenly, I had none of them in my life.
At home that night I didn’t eat any dinner and went straight to my room. Mum came in to see me before she went to bed. She couldn’t fail to see I’d been crying. The soaking pillow and puffy eyes were a dead giveaway. ‘Are you OK? Still not made up with Erin?’
I wished I could tell her, but if I did there was no knowing how she would react.
‘I was watching a sad film on TV,’ I said.
And she believed me. ‘You shouldn’t get yourself into a state about a film on TV.’ She shook her head. ‘Real life’s bad enough.’
I had never agreed with my mum about that till that moment. I’d always thought real life was brilliant. Now I felt like screaming at her, ‘Don’t tell me about real life. I know how bad it is.’
I woke up next morning and prayed it had all been a dream. Of course, it wasn’t. And when I went to school I found it wasn’t just my friends who were avoiding me. Everyone was – as if I had something catching. I had grassed on a friend. You can’t sink any lower than that. Even Wizzie and her scummy mates knew that. Every time I passed them in the corridor they taunted me. Until finally, I couldn’t take it any longer. I rammed Lauren against the wall before any of them could stop me. ‘OK, maybe your sister didn’t hear us, but one of the other waitresses did, and they told her.’
I’d had time to think about it and it was the only possible explanation. Grace and Sonya were on me in a second, dragging me off Lauren.
‘Still can’t admit you’re a grass?’ Grace sniggered. ‘I hate cowards.’
I threw them off me. ‘I’ll find out who it was, don’t you worry.’
‘Who cares?’ Wizzie sniggered. ‘But say another word about Lauren’s sister and you’re in even more trouble, Driscoll.’
Lunchtime was the worst. I waited in the queue, alone, and with my tray in my hand I walked the length of the canteen to our table. We always sat at the same table. It was the Lip Gloss Girls’ table and everyone knew it. No one else ever sat there. Our gang, our table and I automatically headed towards it. They saw me coming, didn’t take their eyes off me. They waited till the last moment when I was right beside them before spreading themselves out, making it impossible for me to sit anywhere. I stood there for ages, like an idiot. I heard the sniggers all around, heard Wizzie’s voice. ‘It’s not a tray she needs, it’s a begging bowl.’
And still I couldn’t move. ‘Please,’ I said, hating myself for sounding so pitiful. ‘You’re my best friends. Just let me sit down.’
Erin swore at me. I’d never heard her swear before. ‘You’re no friend of ours. Can you not take a hint?’ And then she told me exactly where I could put my tray.
My mother at last figured out something was wrong. Quick, eh? However, she thought it was a boy! ‘First love,’ she said. ‘I remember mine. The ugliest boy in the school. I was mad about him, till somebody pointed out he was probably the best I could get. And I realised she was right. I was going with him because I couldn’t get anybody better. Story of my life, eh?’