The Guest List(77)

‘Yeah,’ I say. ‘Yeah, that’s what I’ve told myself, all these years. I’ve repeated the story you created. It was the game. But we were the game, Will. He thought we were his mates. He trusted us.’

‘Johnno.’ Now he’s angry. He leans forward. ‘Get a fucking grip. I’m not going to let you ruin all of this for me. Because you’ve got some regrets about the past, because your life is a mess and you don’t have anything to lose. A little kid like him – he wouldn’t ever have survived in the real world. He was a runt. If it wasn’t us, it would have been something else.’

The term ended early, because of the death. Everyone turned their attention to the upcoming summer holidays and it seemed like the kid had never existed. I suppose he barely had for the rest of the school: he was a first year, a non-entity.

Except there was a grass. One pupil who sneaked on us. I was always sure it was Loner’s fat little friend. He said he’d seen us come into the dorm room, tie Loner up. It didn’t get very far. Will’s dad was headmaster, of course. He was a dick, most of the time – more to Will than anyone else. But for this, he had Will’s back and mine too.

And we had each other’s.

All these years we’ve stuck together – bound by memories, by the dark shit we went through together, the thing we did. I thought he felt the same way about it too, that we needed each other. But what the TV stuff shows is that all that time he wanted out of our friendship. I’m too much of a liability. He wanted to distance himself from me. No wonder he looked so fucking uncomfortable when I told him I would be his best man.

‘Johnno,’ Will says. ‘Think about my dad. You know what he’s like. That’s why I was desperate to try and get those grades. I had to do it. And if he’d found out the truth, how I hid those papers – he would have killed me. So I wanted to scare the kid—’

‘Don’t you dare,’ I say. ‘Don’t you start feeling sorry for yourself. Do you know how many free passes you’ve been given? Because of how you look, how you manage to convince people that you’re this great bloke?’ It’s only made me angrier, his self-pity. ‘I’m going to tell them,’ I say. ‘I can’t deal with it any longer. I’m going to tell them all—’

‘You wouldn’t dare,’ Will says, his voice changed now – low and hard. ‘You’d ruin our lives. Your life too.’

‘Ha!’ I say. ‘It already ruined my life. It’s been destroying me ever since that morning, when you told me to keep my mouth shut. I never would have stayed silent in the first place if it weren’t for you. Since that boy died there hasn’t been a day when I haven’t thought about it, felt like I should have told someone. But you? Oh, no, it hasn’t affected you in any way, has it? You’ve just gone on, like you always have. No consequences. Well you know what? I think it’s about time that there are some. It’d be a relief, as far as I’m concerned. I’d only be doing what we should have done years ago.’

There’s a sound in the cave then, a woman’s voice: ‘Hello?’

Both of us freeze.

‘Will?’ It’s the wedding planner. ‘Are you in here?’ She appears around the bend of the rock wall. ‘Oh, hello, Johnno. Will, I’ve been sent to find you – the other ushers told me that they’d left you in here.’ She sounds totally calm and professional, even though we’re all standing in a bloody great cave, and one of us is slumped on the ground tied up and blindfolded. ‘It’s been nearly half an hour, so Julia wanted me to come and … well, rescue you. I should warn you that she’s not—’ She looks like she’s trying to find a way to put it delicately. ‘She’s not as delighted as she might be by this … And the band are about to start.’

She waits, as I untie Will and help him up, watching over us like a schoolteacher. Then we follow her out of the cave. I can’t help wondering if she heard or saw anything. Or what I would have done if she hadn’t interrupted us.





AOIFE


The Wedding Planner


In the marquee the celebrations have moved into another gear. The guests have drunk the champagne dry. Now they are moving on to the stronger stuff: cocktails and shots at the temporary bar. They are high on the freedom of the night.

In the toilets in the Folly, refreshing the hand towels, I find tell-tale spills of fine white powder on the floor, scattered across the slate sink surround. I’m not surprised, I’ve seen guests wiping their noses furtively as they return to the marquee. They have behaved themselves for the rest of the day, this lot. They have travelled long distances to be here. They have come bearing gifts. They have dressed themselves appropriately and sat through a ceremony and listened to the speeches and worn the proper expressions and said the right things. But they’re adults who have briefly left their responsibilities behind; they’re like children without their parents present. Now this part of the day is theirs for the taking. Even as the bride and groom wait to begin their first dance they press forward, ready to make the dance floor their own.

An hour or so earlier, on a trip back to the Folly, I heard a strange noise, upstairs. The rest of the building was barricaded off, of course, but there are only so many measures you can take to stop drunk people going where they want. I went up to inspect, pushed open the door of the bride and groom’s bedroom and found, not the happily married couple, but another man and woman, bent low over the bed. At my intrusion they scrambled to cover themselves, she yanking down her skirts red-faced, he covering his bobbing erection with his own top hat. Only a little while later, I saw them both returning innocently to different corners of the marquee. What particularly interested me about this was that they both appeared to be wearing wedding bands. And yet – and I’ve probably memorised the table plan as well as Julia herself now – I happen to know that all husbands and wives are seated opposite each other.