Tender (17 page)

“Oh, for Christ’s sake, Catherine,” James said through gritted teeth, and she felt again the shock of it—that he seemed really, truly angry. Angry with her. Angry
at
her. But what had she done? All she was doing was trying to talk to him. Reason with him. He couldn’t just
stare
at people in this way. He couldn’t just talk at such an obvious volume about them, doing nothing to hide his interest. He just had to be more artful about these things. He had to be more discreet.

“I really need to get back to the library, I think,” she said, and she realized she was holding her breath as she waited for his response.

He looked at her for a moment as though he was about to really explode at her, really scream at her, but in the next moment, all the anger seemed to have gone out of him, seemed just to slide out of his shoulders and out of his eyes, and he nodded. “All right,” he said, tiredly, putting down the novel he had been holding. “Will we go?”

Relieved, Catherine led the way, but as she neared the exit, she glanced back to say something to him, something lighthearted, something on a completely different subject, and she stopped short, because James was no longer behind her. She looked around in confusion, back to where they had been standing, and then to the door, in case he had slipped ahead of her, somehow, but he was in neither place. She looked to the till; could he be buying something? But no, and he was not at any of the tables, either, and not on the stairs; he was nowhere to be seen.

Neither was the guy, she saw now, her heart thumping, her cheeks once more blazing; neither was the guy in the suit standing where he had been standing a few moments ago, looking at the new releases. She moved back into the center of the floor, looking left and right; the other customers seemed to swim around her, the shelves and the stacks of books and the crinkling green carrier bags. She pushed back further, to the section marked
TRAVEL,
the section hung with posters of beaches and skyscrapers and medieval side streets, with blue-bubbled maps of the world. She swept through it, her heart still clattering, in places the dampness of sweat on her skin, but she saw no trace of them, of James and the boy—the boy she had so stupidly, so cluelessly, pointed out to him. In a question, in a bewildered, injured question, she heard herself say James’s name aloud. A woman looked at her strangely.
Mind your own business, you old bitch,
Catherine thought, but already she had forgotten about the woman, and was looking again for James; why would he do this to her? Go somewhere without her—go with—

With a single step, she was into the next section, and James was standing right there, leaning against a display table, his thighs pressed against it, in his hands a book with a cover washed in bright, abstracted colors. It was
Birthday Letters,
Catherine saw; Ted Hughes’s new collection of poems about Plath. It was a book Catherine had been meaning all month to buy, and to read for her essay research; to now find James apparently immersed in it seemed surreal, like a jagged before and after in her life forcing themselves on top of one another as some kind of practical joke.

“Oh,” she said, working to steady her voice. “You found that.”

He blinked, seeming surprised. “What?”

“The Hughes. I wanted to buy that, actually.”

“I’ll buy it for you,” he said brightly, snapping the book shut, tucking it under his arm, but as he gave her a quick, strange smile, something in his eyes snagged her suspicion; something in the way his glance hovered over her shoulder. She turned, and there was the guy, standing maybe ten feet away, also holding a book. He was also leaning against a table, and one arm was slung over a low bookcase; he looked as though he had been precisely arranged for a photograph. Everything about him was studied, perfect. He did not look up as she stared at him—and as James, behind her, presumably stared too—but she felt quite sure that he knew they were watching him, and that he was enjoying it. He reached up, apparently absentmindedly, to run a finger over an eyebrow, and Catherine felt her throat close up—what was that? Did that mean something? Was that some kind of signal? She felt sweat bloom again in her armpits, and on the palms of her hands. The room felt as though it was at once coming towards her and rushing away. She put a hand to the table.

“Come on,” James said, from behind her, and he walked at a brisk clip to the till.

And she could have cried. She felt it like nausea. That something had tilted like this between them; that something between them was off. What had just happened? She could not even begin to put it into words, to try to understand it; what was this anger and distance that had come and unfolded itself in the space where her self touched on his? All afternoon as she tried to work in the library, her mind reeled when she thought of that moment: turning to say something to him and finding that he was not there, and seeing, then, that the guy, the stranger, was not where he had been either. What had she thought? What had she imagined? Body pressed to body, mouth to mouth, crotch pressed to crotch, in the poetry section of Hodges bloody Figgis? Had she honestly believed in any part of herself that that was going to happen? Had she honestly, worse still, feared it? And if she had feared it—for there could be little doubt, from the thumping and sweating and panic of her reaction, from the way that she had bolted through the shop, calling his name, like a mother suddenly finding herself without her toddler, that she had in some way feared it, dreaded it, dreaded even the thought of it, losing him to this guy, seeing him even just walking off to a café with him—then what did
that
mean? What did that say about her, about what kind of friend she was?

Nothing good, anyway. Nothing that could ever be allowed.

James was waiting by the railings of the arts block when she and Zoe came out of their Modern Painting lecture that evening; Zoe spotted him first, and ran over to him, waving and calling his name. Catherine held back, still shaken from what had happened that afternoon, still unsure of herself and of how James would be with her, but he was smiling, laughing as Zoe put her arms around him, kissing him; he looked at Catherine over Zoe’s shoulder, and winked.

“Surprise,” he said, as Zoe released him, and he stepped over to kiss Catherine.

“How was your day?” she said, too brightly, and she thought she saw a sneer or a smirk in his eyes for a moment, but no, she was imagining things; he was smiling just as before, and he was nodding.

“Good, good,” he said, indicating his camera bag. “I found myself a darkroom. It’s here on campus, actually. I bumped into your old flame Aidan this morning and he put me in touch with someone in the Photography Society.”

“
Aidan
did?”

“Yeah. He knows the treasurer quite well, apparently.”

“Don’t you have to be a student here to use the PhotoSoc darkroom?” said Zoe.

“
Well
…” James looked at her, raising an eyebrow. “Technically, of course. But the promise of sexual favors always opens a door or two, I find.”

Zoe screeched with laughter at this, grabbing James as though she had to hang onto him to stop herself from falling, and James, laughing himself, took in her reaction with obvious satisfaction. Catherine felt again the odd stab of jealousy she had felt in IMMA on Saturday, watching the two of them getting on so easily, so readily, but it was stronger this time, and it felt like real irritation; she had a sudden desire to step in and knock Zoe away from James, to turn the conversation around to something entirely different, something that was not fueled by this stupid, cheap innuendo. She hated the way Zoe fed on it, and asked with her eyes for more of it, as though that kind of talk was all that James was good for, the only language that he was capable of speaking—

“So I’m going to be on campus a good bit, that means,” said James, who had by now detached himself from Zoe anyway. “Which is good news, I think? Isn’t it?”

“Yeah,” Catherine managed to say.

“
Of course
it is,” Zoe added enthusiastically. “We can have coffee all the time! We can have lunch! I can introduce you to Simon!”

James raised an eyebrow. “Who’s Simon?”

“He’s my
gay friend,
” said Zoe, making a show of fluttering her eyelashes.

James shot a look at Catherine. “Oh, yeah?”

“He lives in England,” Zoe said, more bluntly. “But he sometimes visits! He might be visiting sometime this year!”

“Oh, goodie,” James said drily. “I’ll put it on my calendar.”

“Ah, come on,” Zoe said. “Don’t be like that. We’ll find you another man in the meantime. Won’t we, Catherine?”

“Yeah.”

“I mean, there’s always the LGB Society!”

“Oh, yeah.” Catherine turned to James guiltily. “I actually meant to say that to you. There’s a society—”

“Thanks, girls, but I’m all right for now,” James said curtly, and for a moment Catherine thought he was annoyed, but when Zoe cozied up to him again, he took her arm without hesitation, laughingly mimicking the purposeful face she was giving him.

“But first of all, James,” Zoe said. “Are you coming to the Buttery?”

“What’s in the Buttery?”

“Booze, at Tuesday night prices. And boys. Lots and lots of boys. Are you coming, Cits?”

“I have my meeting with Dr. Parker.”

“What meeting?” Zoe said.

“About the essay I want to write. About Sylvia Plath.”

Zoe grimaced. “Jaysus. OK, well, when you’re finished with your Dead Poets Society, you can catch up with James and me? OK?”

“OK,” Catherine nodded, and she watched them walk away.

“So, Citóg,” Conor said, coming up to her as she stood at the bar of the Buttery an hour later. “I hear you’re laying your pipe with The Doyle now. Jesus, there’s no stopping you.”

“What? Did he tell you that?”

“Sure he didn’t have to tell me. Sure the pair of you were spotted sneaking out of publications together yesterday evening.”

“For fuck’s sake! We talked for about a minute!”

“
Relax,
Cits.” He put a palm to her forehead. “You’re very agitated. A bit like your friend over there.”

He indicated the table at which James and Zoe were sitting; several other people had joined them now, including Aidan and Liam, a Northern Irish guy Aidan had befriended lately in the library, and James was being the life and soul of the gathering. He was describing something now, wildly gesticulating, his face frenetic with hilarity and excitement; he was almost shouting, breaking down frequently with laughter, and Zoe, too, was shrieking with laughter, which was only egging him on all the more. He had been high like this when Catherine had arrived from her meeting, and in truth, he was slightly getting on her nerves; she had come up to the bar not because she needed another drink, but because she needed some respite from the noise. Still, it was one thing for her to feel like this about James; it was quite another for Conor to comment on him. She looked at Conor warningly now, hoping that this would deflect him, but as usual with Conor, it had the opposite effect.

“I’m glad you told me he was gay,” he said, smirking. “Sure I’d never have been able to work it out for myself. Sure look at him.”

“Sorry?” she said sharply.

“‘Notes on “Camp,” ’ Citóg. Ever read it? ’Cause I’m pretty sure your mate has.”

She saw from his reaction then—his eyes widened, his mouth frozen in the act of saying whatever it was next going to say—that her face contained everything that she felt in that moment. She was shaking with anger, and she saw him take this in, too; saw his eyes read this and decide something about it.

“Fuck off, Moran,” she said, the words spitting out of her. “Fuck. Off. Do you hear me? Are you listening to me?”

He tried to laugh, but the sound fell out of him, hanging in the air awkwardly a long moment. “Jesus, Cits,” he said, and he reached for her. “Here. Listen—”

“No,” she said, pulling away before he could so much as touch her. “I will not listen. I will not fucking listen. You listen to me. James is my friend. James is my
best friend
.”

Conor’s expression changed then, hardening, mockery pinching itself into it. “Ah. That’s sweet, Citóg.”

“And you can take the piss out of anyone you want,” she went on, clenching her fists now, “but you will not take the piss out of him. Not like that.”

“I’ll do and say whatever I like, love.”

“No. Not when I’m around.”

He laughed; a single, shocked peal. “Cits. Get a hold of yourself, for Christ’s sake. This is just embarrassing.”

“I am not fucking joking, Conor. I mean this.” To her horror, she found that she was close to tears; they were there as a pressing, growing fullness at the back of her throat, and now they were pricking her eyes. Conor, she saw, had noticed them, and at the sight of them, his scorn slid into something else—not concern, but astonishment—and he glanced over to James and back to her.

“This is insane,” he said, and for a moment he looked as though he was almost going to cry himself, but that was not Conor, that would never be Conor, and instead he lifted his chin and gave a short cough. “Fuck this,” he said, and he shrugged on his rucksack.

“He’s not out, Conor,” she said, a whine in her voice. “He’s not—”

“I don’t give a shit what he is. What business is it of mine?”

“He’s not fair game for that kind of slagging in the same way that everyone else is. That kind of public slagging. Slag me as much as you want, and slag Zoe and Emmet and Aidan…”

Conor’s face creased with irritation. “I couldn’t be bothered slagging any of you,” he said. “I’m gone. I have better things to do than deal with this nonsense.” As he strode out of the Buttery, he met Emmet at the door, and Catherine saw Conor shake his head, and say something to Emmet, and in the next moment Emmet’s eyes shot to her; she leaned in to the bar and wiped, with her thumb and index finger, at her eyes. She had recovered by the time he reached her, and she was able to turn to him, narrowing her gaze with pretended displeasure at the sight of him, ready for whatever wisecrack he was getting ready to roll her way.