Hollow Pike (8 page)

‘Are you sure you’re all right?’ Max asked, his big blue eyes prying for information.

‘I’m fine. Promise.’ She managed a feeble smile.

‘OK. Have a nice day.’ Her brother-in-law gave her a kiss on the forehead before she flopped out of the vehicle.

Once again the school was wrapped in a veil of fine drizzle guaranteed to turn her hair into a frizzy mess by the time she reached the safety of the corridors. She murmured a solemn farewell to
Max and dragged her feet towards the entrance.

The huge ancient clock that dominated the main hall told her that at eight fifty-five she’d probably already missed the warning bell that prompted students to get to their form rooms by
nine. She swung her bag onto her shoulder and wearily started for G2.

Her spider sense flickered. Something was
not quite right
. It was exactly the same feeling that had blighted her first day of school. But this was odd. The new-girl sensation should have
left her by now, so why were people staring at her? Her hair couldn’t be
that
frizzy! She’d left the party on Saturday night soon after Laura and Kitty had fallen down the
stairs, so she was certain she hadn’t done anything to embarrass herself.

Increasingly aware of others pointing her out or whispering, she hurried to G2 and settled herself into her seat next to Harry. To her horror, the hushed voices and sideways glances continued.
Lis turned to Harry, who seemed to be masterfully avoiding eye-contact. The paranoia boiled over.

‘Harry, what is going on? Do I have something weird on me?’ A sense of dread rose in Lis’s gut and she started to wish she’d played sick for Sarah.

‘Nothing, babe.’

‘Then why is everyone staring at me?’

Harry shrugged and tried to pull an innocent expression. The effect was cartoonish and fake. ‘I have no idea, babe. People must be talking about what happened at the party.’

Lis scanned the classroom. In their usual spots at the back of the class sat Jack, Delilah and Kitty, who sported a nasty yellowish bruise under her eye. No one was paying them any more
attention than normal. This was ridiculous.

‘Harry, nothing happened at the party! I was there for the fight, but that’s it.’

As the 9 a.m. bell sounded, Laura and Nasima sauntered into class in their usual catwalk formation: Laura slightly ahead, flanked by her sentry. On passing, Laura gave Lis the most hateful look
she’d seen in a long time.

Lis was baffled. What had
she
done to upset Laura? The strangest part was, despite the way Laura had behaved at the party, Lis hated the idea of Laura being mad at her. A tiny, residual
desire to belong, to fit in with the popular girls still glimmered within her. Lis pushed that thought out of her head; she was so over that crap.

‘Look, Lis,’ hissed Harry. ‘Laura told me what happened with Danny.’

‘What do you mean?’ Lis demanded. ‘Literally nothing happened! I talked to him for, like, a minute.’

Harry scowled at her and turned away.

‘Jesus, Harry,’ Lis whispered emphatically, ‘it’s not my fault if Danny Marriott doesn’t fancy Laura!’

With a sharp flick of her hair, Harry whipped around to face Lis, a nasty grimace on her face. ‘Whatever. You’re a liar and a slag and I don’t like liars and slags. Now could
you please stop talking to me or I’ll tell Mr Gray you’re bullying me?’

As Harry pushed her chair back to seek counsel with Laura, Lis felt herself gawping. What on earth had she done to deserve that?

Throughout Maths, Lis desperately tried to motivate herself by pretending she was some sort of future scientist who would one day need to know trigonometry. It didn’t
work. She still couldn’t shake the feeling that the whole class was talking about her. She’d tried so hard since arriving in Hollow Pike, genuinely thinking she hadn’t put a foot
wrong, and now Harry’s comments proved that she may as well not have bothered.

As her teacher spoke, she fought to hold back both tears and swear words. Was this what she’d moved away from Bangor for? More of the same? At least in Wales she’d held her head high
right up until the end.

Slipping her homework into her bag, she rushed out of class the second the bell sounded. Following instinct, she ducked past Fiona and Nasima and headed straight for the outside quad, no longer
caring about the rain’s effect on her hair. She cursed her earlier vanity as if she’d somehow been infected by the values of Team Laura.

A new determination burned in her chest. She’d gone beyond feeling tearful and just wanted to know what the bloody hell was going on. She spotted her target under the shelter and marched
over to where Jack Denton was sitting next to some of the other ‘geek’ males, peeling a satsuma.

‘Hi, Jack,’ she said, smiling broadly despite her rising fury. She reminded herself that Jack hadn’t done anything wrong. Jack eyed her suspiciously and conversation in the
group ceased entirely.

‘Hello,’ he replied, gentle as snow.

‘Where are Kitty and Delilah?’

‘I dunno. Loo maybe?’

She’d barely chatted to Jack. His softly-spoken nature made him almost impossible to read. Could she trust him? Something about his huge chestnut eyes reminded her of autumn and suggested
a warmth inside. She looked around, only to see Harry coolly observing her as she moved across the quad.

‘Could I have a word, please?’ she asked Jack, unsuccessfully trying to keep a pleading tone out of her voice.

‘A private word?’

‘Please.’

The pair moved to the farthest corner of the rain shelter, and Jack continued to eat his satsuma as Lis explained her morning of paranoia. When she’d finished, Jack smiled and sat her on a
damp wooden bench.

‘OK,’ he started. ‘Well, the good news is you’re not completely paranoid.’ He had a light, almost musical voice and an accent, though, like hers, it wasn’t a
Yorkshire accent. Maybe he was from Newcastle? She wasn’t sure, but she could see where the gay rumours had originated. Jack’s voice was different enough to cause comment.

‘Why not?’ Lis asked.

‘And if it’s any consolation, it’s all clearly made-up crap . . .’ Jack continued.

‘What is?’

And then he told her . . .

Exactly two minutes later, Lis stomped to the edge of the trees. Although her shoes sunk into the mud of the rugby pitch, her single-mindedness blinkered her. She smoothed back
her hair, readying herself for a battle. Voices raged in her head, telling her to turn back, to avoid a confrontation, to seek the help of Kitty or Mr Gray.

Regardless, she powered on. They were sheltering under the trees, although none of the boys were there as far as she could tell, which suited her fine. It was just the four nasty bitches who
weren’t going to get away with it this time. She’d already left one school, and she wasn’t about to let history repeat itself.

‘Oh, fabulous!’ sneered Nasima. ‘Look who it is!’

Lis continued towards the girls. She paused just before them and drew a deep breath of humid air into her lungs. She was determined not to scream or shout, besides, she knew from the fight on
Saturday that she didn’t stand a chance against Laura.

‘Laura. I want a word with you,’ she said calmly.

Laura smiled and whispered something in Nasima’s ear, causing the taller girl to giggle cruelly.

‘I mean it, Laura. Do you need your cheerleaders for backup?’

Throwing her cigarette into a ditch behind her, Laura stepped away from the others.

Lis began in a low, even tone. ‘You’re making up rumours about me? How old are you, seriously?’

‘You’re well weird.
You
e-mailed
me
, you freak.’ Laura was deliberately loud for the benefit of her audience.

‘You’re lying.’

‘Poor cow. You must be bipolar or something.’ The others were all staring now. Laura reached into her Louis Vuitton bag and withdrew a slip of crisp white paper. She handed it to
Nasima who cast her pretty eyes over it while Harry and Fiona sniggered quietly behind their hands.

‘Oh, you muppets can shut up!’ snapped Lis. ‘Give me that piece of paper, now!’

‘You trying to start something?’ asked Fiona.

Lis suddenly felt that coming to the most remote corner of the school grounds alone could have been an error. ‘Just give me the piece of paper.’

‘Do it,’ said Laura. ‘She sent it, anyway.’

Nasima held it out, then snatched it away when Lis reached for it.

‘Seriously? Has it come to that?’ Lis asked, rolling her eyes.

Nasima smiled and handed her the document. It was exactly as Jack had described. An internet print-out. An email from one [email protected] to Laura’s account. It wasn’t even
her email address, but Lis guessed it had been enough to fool anyone seeing it this morning. She read on.

‘No one believes this,’ Lis said coolly.

‘You tell yourself that, Lissy love,’ Laura said sweetly and snatched the paper out of Lis’s hand.

Lis shook her head almost pityingly. ‘Laura, that is the worst rumour I’ve ever seen. You’d think such an accomplished bitch might have been able to do better. I gave my baby
up for adoption? How long did it take you to come up with that? What, you couldn’t spell chlamydia?’

Harry stepped forward. ‘You sent it, Lis. You can’t deny it now.’

‘Really? You fell for this? Laura sent it herself. That’s not my email address, and she didn’t even spell my name right!’

Laura’s smirk slipped. A new strength blossomed inside Lis; Laura had apparently expected her to crumble a lot sooner than this.

Her rival took a cigarette lighter out of her bag and burned the paper by a corner until it fell to the floor as a black cinder. ‘Who do you think you are anyway?’ Laura’s
voice now quavered with fury. ‘You think you’re dead funny and clever. All shy and sweet. All “don’t look at me; I’m just little Lissy the new girl”, when
you’re actually a boyfriend-stealing whore!’

‘That is total sh—’

‘Really, Lis? So you
don’t
think you’re better than us? You
don’t
think we’re just all hair and boys?’

‘That is exactly what you are!’

Laura laughed, a new, almost demonic quality to her now. Just for a second her eyes seemed jet black. She jabbed a pointed finger squarely into Lis’s chest, pushing her backwards. ‘I
think you should shut your mouth. You are a stuck-up little snob and you have no idea who you’re dealing with. I run this school, you got that? Now listen very carefully . . . I am going to
make you wish you’d never set foot in this school. You are going to have to come here every single day and I will be waiting for you. Every. Single. Day.’

Speechless, Lis shied away from the intensity of Laura’s stare. Behind Laura, even her winged monkeys had been stunned into silence.

Laura seemed to have surprised herself. She stepped back, taking a breath and smoothing her blazer out. ‘Better run along, Lissy. You don’t want to be late for Spanish.’

Without another word, Lis turned and headed up the slope towards the rugby pitch.

‘Oh, by the way, Lis, say hi to Mr Gray . . . I told everyone you’re in love with him.’

Lis closed her eyes and started to jog. She would not cry in front of Laura.