Undone(11)

‘And nothing, Little Miss Judgemental! It’s about time we did something different, don’t you think? Something WILD . . . not that this is a massively wild thing to do, but it’s a start, right? Say you’ll come! If you come, I’ll love you forever.’

‘You’ll love me forever anyway, doofus.’ I was on the verge of giving in, mostly just to shut him up.

He could tell victory was near, but was equally aware that anything he might say could mess it up. So he just looked at me, waiting.

‘OK, OK, I’ll go. But there are conditions. One: there will be no dancing. I do not dance. Two: don’t expect me to have a good time. Three: don’t expect me to be nice to people. Four: I’m allowed to leave whenever I want and you’re banned from using your pouty face to get me to stay. Five: you have to buy the booze. There is no way I can face this thing sober. Six: um . . . there is no six. Just stop grinning like the bloody Cheshire Cat, OK?’

Kai did a terrible job of stifling his grin. ‘I solemnly accept the aforementioned conditions in relation to the forthcoming gathering at Maxwell Miller’s abode. Miss Halliday, you’ve got yourself a deal.’ He held out his hand for me to shake.





chapter six


‘This is a terrible idea.’ A wave of nausea crashed over me. I wondered what kind of impression a slick of vomit down Max’s front door would make.

Kai hooked his arm into mine and leaned into me. ‘It’s going to be great, I promise. Don’t forget . . . I’m wearing my lucky shirt. When has the Shirt of Good Fortune ever let us down?’ He smelled so good. I breathed in the scent of him and it calmed me a little. That ‘lucky shirt’ chat was utter bollocks, but everything would be OK as long as I was with Kai. This would be over soon. I could go home at any point. I’d been reminding myself of these things all day, but it hadn’t done anything to ease my anxiety.

Max opened the door and smiled broadly. His teeth were incredibly straight and regimented – like little soldiers. ‘Hey! Come on in! Quick, Bugs is threatening to chuck Stu on the bonfire.’ Unsurprisingly, Max’s greeting was aimed at Kai, with barely a first glance (let alone a second) at me.

Kai led the way through the house towards the sound of some terrible bass-heavy music. We stopped by the fridge to drop off our beer. I grabbed a bottle and looked around for a bottle opener. Max was there, quick as a flash, brandishing one like he’d just pulled a rabbit from a hat.

‘Um . . . thanks.’

‘You’re Jem, right? Sorry, we haven’t officially met. I’m Max.’ He held out his hand.

‘Yeah, nice to . . . um . . . meet you.’ His handshake was firm but not overly macho.

Kai nudged me as we followed Max into the garden. ‘See? Told you it’d be fine!’ he whispered. Slightly prematurely, I couldn’t help thinking.

There were flaming torches dotted around the garden, and a massive bonfire smack bang in the middle. I wondered if Max’s parents would be pissed off when they came back to find a big scorch mark in the centre of their pristine lawn.

It helped to focus on the garden, the torches and the bonfire. It stopped me focusing on the people; the people really freaked me out. It wasn’t the number of them that bothered me so much, even though there were a lot of them. It was seeing people from school away from their normal environment. Everyone looked different . . . dangerous somehow.

I kept my thoughts to myself; Kai wouldn’t have got it. He would have nodded and been all understanding and stuff, but he wouldn’t have really understood. No one did.

Louise came rushing up and coiled her arms around Max. She wasn’t wearing a coat. In fact, most of the girls weren’t wearing coats, despite the fact that the temperature wasn’t exactly tropical. She kissed Max as if he’d just returned from a six-month voyage at sea. Why would you do something like that in front of your brother?

Max pulled away and said, ‘Easy, tiger!’

Louise pouted and it was almost exactly like Kai’s pout, but somehow a lot less attractive. For the first time she turned and looked at us. ‘Hey, brother dear. And hey, brother dear’s special sidekick.’ Her eyes looked weird – the pupils were massive. She must have been on something.

‘Be nice, sister dear. You promised,’ said Kai.

Louise shrugged, made a ‘W’ with her hands and said, ‘What ever,’ in a stupid Valley girl accent. She grabbed Max’s hand and dragged him towards the bonfire. I imagined her stumbling and falling face first into the fire.

*

One hour later and I was ready to bail. I’d necked two beers already, which was a lot for someone who didn’t really drink. Kai and I had managed to find a couple of non-awful people to talk to. Well, he was doing most of the talking. I was mostly nodding and sipping my drink and smiling at what I thought were appropriate points in the conversation. He kept giving me these looks whenever the talk strayed into a topic I would normally be interested in. I kept ignoring the looks.

My attention strayed towards the bonfire every few seconds. The strict social hierarchy from school was firmly in place. It would almost have been funny if it wasn’t so tragic. The most popular people were closest to the fire, bathed in its orange glow, which made them look extra-beautiful (except for Bugs . . . no one but a mother could ever describe Bugs as beautiful). Some of them were dancing. Sasha was grinding against Lucas in a way that gave me far too much insight into their relationship.