Chapter 7

Tuesday

Marissa

I tried to tell her, tried to tell them all. I remember Andrew McBride. Andrew McBride's only there for one thing, and that's Andrew McBride. I did feel bad for her, even though Issy and Pete were brilliant about it. Even Kirsten got in on the act, and I think I've heard her speak maybe three times in the five years we've been at the school — two of them were today. After Connor finished there were only about three messages, and the class broke up into small groups to talk.

Pete made his way through Andrew's crowd unconcerned, and I found myself in the middle of Alban's little cluster of friends. I usually read through the rest of Tutorial, keeping myself to myself, but it felt good to see the banter going back and forth. I still wasn't really 'in' the group, they were just letting me sit with them because of the Programme, but it was a nice gesture anyway.

"Hey, Kelly," I managed, when Connor dropped her off in the seat next to me, immediately placing himself between her — and me, incidentally — and Andrew.

"Hey." She smiled, but her heart wasn't really in it.

"That was low." I commiserated.

"You tried to warn me yesterday, didn't you." I just shrugged, you don't need to rub that sort of thing in. I felt a little sorry for her, after all, but it's always awkward showing that to someone like Kelly, you don't want to seem like you're patronising her.

"He's a dick." Connor put in. "If you'd been generous enough to let me do it, I wouldn't have talked to you like that."

"Hey," Evan spun a chair round, flopping into like a rag-doll. "If you call again, in art, we can always try and break his record." He grinned, easily. He does that, he's always smiling. Pete's funny, but Evan's just... happy. All the time. It's weird.

"Like that'll do my reputation any good." Kelly muttered, playing with her hair. "Is that how I'm coming across? As a slut?"

"Not to me." I reassured her. Which wasn't entirely true... I mean, it did seem like all she wanted was to get felt up? That's what a slut is, after all, isn't it? I sort of understand, I want to be close to someone too, I get the little rushes and urges late at night, I sit wondering what's on TV on a Friday evening, wondering who's doing what to whom round the back of the Odeon cinema, but... I don't do anything about it.

"Who cares?" Issy leant back, putting her feet up on the nearest desk. "It's just a name. Doesn't change who you are, doesn't mean a damned thing. I'm sure he thinks I'm a slut, doesn't change who I am."

"You are a slut." Pete pointed out. "You'll do just about anyone, anywhere."

"True." She acknowledged. "I should have been born a guy, then I'd just be 'sowing oats'."

"Putting it about is putting it about." Kevin put in, and I looked up. I didn't really know Kevin that well. He hung around with Alban, but everything about him screamed that he should be in Andrew's crowd really: he did metalwork and gym and those sorts of things, he was on the school teams. He was muscular in a body-builder sort of way, although I seem to recall he was mainly a basketball player.

He wasn't clever, either, at least not like Alban and the others were. Maybe clever's not the right word — academic? He's not stupid, but he doesn't give the impression that he thinks about much, he just seems to go on instinct.

"So... is that she is a slut, and so's Evan, or neither of them are?" Kelly asked, confused, and he just shrugged.

"Yeah, I suppose. If you think one is, you think both are."

"How many have you had this year?" Andrew's voice cut over the group like a knife, and they all looked up over my head as his hand settled on my shoulder. I brushed it off, and Alban was suddenly stood there before he could put it back.

"You can't expect a gentleman like me to reveal those sort of details." Evan told him with a shrug.

"I don't think you could count far enough." Issy offered, her smile considerably more forced and with a lot more venom.

"Don't you have any friends of your own to talk to." Pete asked, and he left, trailing Phil and the rest of them behind him.

"Always the life of the party." I muttered, as they watched him go.

"What exactly is your history with him?" Kelly asked, and I froze. I knew they were looking at me, now, I could feel the gazes burning into the top of my head. Should I tell them? Could I?

"History is for the past." Alban cut in, rescuing me. "Let's just leave it where it is and agree that the guy's trouble." Was he rescuing me? I had this crazy urge to tell them, to get it out, to tell someone, but the class wrapped up, and everyone began to head off, and the feeling died.

Alban

Psychology seemed like an interesting choice when I was selecting options last year. We'd not done anything like it previously, so it would new and exciting... well, one out of two isn't bad. I don't know what sort of revelations I was expecting, but communication amongst monkeys wasn't high on the list.

The first module had been better, looking at some developmental disorders and what it meant about thinking processes... this was getting dull, though.

Not that I could really talk to anyone about it — the only person I really knew in the class was Kirsten, and she doesn't talk much. Nice enough girl, if a little distant. She could do herself a favour or two, really, dropping the goth stuff and lightening up a bit. It's obvious that she and Issy are trying desperately to differentiate themselves from each other, but I'm not sure either of them's really happy with what they've become — Kirsten more obviously, but... I just don't know what to do about this one. Psychology, at least at this level, isn't really helping.

So I was expecting a fairly quiet walk to class.

"You and Marissa, huh?" Kirsten asked, almost as soon as we cleared the rest of the group.

"Excuse me?"

"You and Marissa... how long's that been going on?"

"Nothing's 'going on'."

"If you say so." She smirked. It was so close to Issy's smirk it was weird. Kirsten didn't smirk, it just wasn't in the tortured artist repertoire she cultivated.

"Seriously. She's... I mean there's nothing wrong with her, but... there's just nothing there."

"Ah... won't let her in either, then?"

"What?"

"You, and your big wall of silence about yourself."

"Kirst, where the hell is all this coming from?" She just shrugged. "I don't keep any more secrets than anyone else."

"Right... no-one knows anything about you. You scurry about being everyone's hero, but... no-one knows what makes you tick."

"No-one knows what makes you tick, either." I pointed out.

"Yeah, they do, some of it. Music, art, angst-ridden poetry... Maybe not the specifics, but the generalities. No-one knows anything about you."

"There isn't that much to know." I was two steps on before I realised she'd stopped, tilting her head over to stare at me with narrowed eyes. "What now? Checking my aura?"

"Just thinking." She countered, and then started walking again. What was I supposed to make of that? She was obviously getting more out of A-level psychology than I was, that was clear. We didn't say much else until the class, and then we were busy working and I just let the conversation drift away from what I was concentrating on — there wasn't much point dwelling on it.

When we finally got out Kirsten was off to... wherever it is Kirsten goes for break, I'm not sure, and I made my way past the science building picking Connor up, and then onto the main school building where Kelly and Marissa were emerging from English. There was a slight crowd around them, but we quickly made our way through that — the bulk of them were third years, I think, so it wasn't difficult, and they didn't seem to mind us spiriting the entertainment away.

Our destination was one of the more obscure little out of the way cubby-holes — I'm not going to say where in the school, because then it wouldn't be quiet and out of the way any more.

"Ok," I turned, outside the door. "Listen, I know I said you could come around with me today, but I have to ask you something before you come in... nothing anyone says in here goes outside these four walls, OK. Nothing, nothing at all. Nobody's name, nobody's story, nothing." Connor knew already, he'd been here himself, but Kelly and Marissa appeared a little shocked. They agreed, after a few seconds, so we went in.

Kelly

That was serious! I mean, this guy's all of seventeen, and suddenly he's acting like James Bond with his little secret rooms and pledges of silence. You could smell the dust, the musty stale air of somewhere the doesn't get used much, but someone was here — you could hear a low muttering from the other side of the door. I didn't recognise anything in the area, so I knew I hadn't been here before, but it was somewhere on the third floor, and most of that hasn't been used since the nineteen-eighties during the baby-boom years.

Inside, everything suddenly went silent as we entered, save for a single gasp somewhere near the far side of the room.

"Good morning." Alban's voice made everyone jump, I think, so I didn't feel as bad, and Connor led me to a seat near the back. He'd remembered to bring a towel to sit on, I hadn't, so he shared, which was nice. I didn't hear Marissa sit down, but she might have done. A chorus of muted greetings came from in front of me, and Alban's light footfalls carried on forward, so presumably he was taking everyone's attention that way.

"We have a few visitors today, they've promised me they won't say anything about what happens here, and I trust them. I'd ask you to trust them too, but if you don't feel like talking it's just like any other day, no-one has to say anything if they don't want." There was an uncertain silence, a general shifting in seats — you can hear that, if you know what to listen for.

"What is this place, Alban?" Marissa's voice came from behind me

"Why are they here?" someone hissed nearer the front, and a small chorus of 'yeah' joined it.

"This is a place where kids who are being bullied come." Shit! "We meet here every Tuesday and Friday, check up on each other, try and figure out ways round what's happening. And they are here for much the same reasons you are — people are doing to them things they'd rather avoid."

"Like what?" It was a young voice, a girl.

"I don't tell anyone what happens to you, Alice, I'm not going to tell their stories either — if they want to share they will."

"If they don't want stuff done to them they should try wearing some clothes!" another kid tried.

"It's not by choice." Marissa told them, and they all shuffled round in their seats. "At least, for me it isn't. Didn't you guys get the leaflets about The Programme?" They generally assented that they had. "Well, this is what happens."

"Does this mean we're going to get someone in here every week? Everytime someone's in this Programme?"

"Maybe, maybe not." Alban offered. "Some of them I won't know well enough to ask, some of them — like Kelly — will have volunteered to be in the Programme." Which led me — and thankfully only me — to the though 'why the hell was I here?' I mean, Marissa was sticking around with Alban because he was keeping her away from everything — I didn't want to be away from everything. I was just letting myself be led around again. How the hell could I expect anyone else to treat me like I could deal with things when I didn't. Idiot.

Still, it was too late to just get up and leave now, so I sat and listened to it all. Some of them were, frankly, pissy little whinging idiots, whining because someone wouldn't talk to them; one kid was a mouthy little sod and wondered why people kept threatening to give him a kicking. One of the older girls, though, wasn't talking about school at all, she was worried about the gang of boys that hung around her estate and intercepted her on the way to school. Alban arranged for people to walk to and from school with her, and got them to share phone numbers and things.

The time flashed by, and they broke up to go their separate ways, leaving the four of us behind.

"You do this every week?" I asked, as he reached us.

"Yeah." He confirmed — no hint of pride or embarrassment, just... acceptance.

"Why?"

"They need it. For whatever reasons, and they differ, they don't feel they have anyone else to turn to for help or advice. Some of them just rub people the wrong way, some of them are isolated by circumstance or just by their own fears and insecurities.

I've been isolated like that, I remember what it's like. You're stronger than they are, but I think you've probably felt like that once or twice..." I could only nod. More than once or twice.

"And they just come?" Marissa asked.

"No, the kids look out for other kids they think might be in the same situation. It's not the sort of thing you can advertise — it would just put another stigma on kids who are desperately trying not to get noticed any more than they are already. So they tell me when they find someone, and I approach them. Quietly."

There's an irony. Here's me, getting naked to get attention, and here's this little crew trying desperately to get away from it.

Connor

Pete and I sat through Chemistry fairly quietly. The teacher wasn't that strict, and we're both good, so we can talk quietly in places. It's good to have one friend in one of my classes, this is the only one that I take with my own year group, too.

"So, did you enjoy that?" Pete asked, about half way through the experiment.

"It's litmus..." I pointed out, a little confused. "What's to enjoy?"

"I meant Issy. Tutorial."

"Oh... it was..." I knew there was a minefield here. This is Pete's sister, of course, and she's just... well, everyone knows what she's just done. What do you say? Yes? No? Change the subject? Say yes, he might get angry... I mean, it's Pete, and I don't think Pete does angry, really, but... you never know. I just stuck my thing in his sister's mouth... I can see how that would make some people angry. Of course, it's Issy, and you'd think she'd make him angry a lot more often than that, if that was the case. If I say no will he be upset on her behalf? Ask me what's wrong with her, get miffed about that?

"Come on, don't worry about it... it's not like she's not done it before or anything, you know."

"I... it was good." I finally offered. "I don't have a lot to compare it to, obviously..."

"I'm glad. She worries, you know. She doesn't show it, but she does."

"Worries? About that? She shouldn't." Oh... maybe that was too much? Pete's laugh seemed to signify it wasn't.

"If acidity is that amusing, gentlemen, perhaps you'd like to stay behind and do some more?" We let the conversation die down a bit after that.

I knew about Alban's group, I'd been a member once upon a time, but I soon realised that a few people calling me silly names that I didn't really care about wasn't bullying at all. I mean, it is, but... it's only a problem if it gets to you. There were kids getting punched, and having their lunch money stolen and stuff, and that's different, but... names? I don't understand how you can let that hurt you. It seems... I don't know what it's like, really, but Alban's more sympathetic than I am.

Kelly was interested, though. After Chemistry it all seemed rather dull, to be honest.

Marissa

So that was break, watching Alban perk these kids up, set up little support networks, help them out. I had no idea this place even existed, or that anyone did this sort of thing — I didn't realise there was so much bullying going on, really. Not that most of it was what I'd call 'bullying', but... it's not a huge school but I was amazed to see so many kids feeling set upon in various ways.

Then it was French, and not much happened there — not much ever happens there. There're only four of us in the class, and the other three are a year older than me, it's not a well-attended course, it seems. It's a shame, I love the language. There's a huge underswell of anti-French sentiment in England that I don't understand, it's such an incredible country. I remember going there, once, before Dad went away, we took a trip to Paris. That's my dream, really, someone taking me away to Paris one day.

Of course... it's just a dream.

Anyway, I emerged from French with only a slight embarrassment — I might not know James or Daniel well, but neither of them had been particularly restrained in their commentary on my nudity, even if it had been in French — to find Alban leaning gently against the front of the languages block talking quietly to two of the smaller kids.

"What was that about?" I wondered, when he sent them on their way.

"Naomi Keller," he pointed at the taller of the two girls, "she's one of the kids that used to come to the group. She doesn't any more, but she thinks the kids who used to pick on her have another target."