‘Em, not at this minute.’
‘How nice that you came, Ella. I do like your outfit. Very dramatic. I’m supposed to be in charge of drinks. Would you care for one?’
‘What have you got? I don’t want anything strong.’
‘It’s mainly wine. Fruit juice for you?’
‘Are they, like, alcopops?’
‘Good Lord, no. Absolutely no alcoholic content.’
‘What flavours do you have?’
‘Pineapple, orange, cranberry?’
‘Pineapple would be nice.’
‘Don’t move from here. I’ll be right back.’
One of the group she’d joined turned to look at her. More accurately, he looked down. He was a head and shoulders taller. She swallowed hard, not because of his height, but because she’d met another goth. Black leather bomber jacket over a shirt with a werewolf design and baggy trousers with loops of chain hanging from them. And she swallowed even harder when she recognised Geraint, the scary one who painted with knives.
She managed to say, ‘Hi.’
Geraint didn’t answer. His eyes travelled slowly over her figure. Unlike her, he didn’t need to wear make-up. The face was deathly pale and the eyes could have been drops of solder in black plugholes.
Under this withering scrutiny, she brought her left arm defensively across her chest and clasped her opposite shoulder. ‘Ferdie’s getting me a drink,’ she said, to make clear that she wasn’t available. ‘He asked me to wait. That’s the reason I’m standing here.’
Geraint muttered something she couldn’t hear clearly through the music that could have been ‘witch’ or ‘bitch’. In either case, Ella told herself, it didn’t matter because it would be a goth term of approval. Then he turned his back on her and she felt the rasp of studs from his leather jacket against her arm. She wasn’t sure if the contact was deliberate, but she suspected it was.
She took a step away and used her phone as a distraction: OMG just met geraint in goth gear.
Thankfully, Ferdie was soon back with a glass of pineapple juice. ‘Does Tom know you’re here?’
Her stomach clenched. She didn’t want to be taken to meet the person she’d most come to see. She’d rather approach him on her own terms.
‘I expect so,’ she said. ‘I’ve already spotted a few people I know.’
It came as a relief when he changed the subject. ‘You want to get some pictures with that phone of yours. Some of the guests look pretty wild.’
‘I don’t know if they’d like being photographed.’
‘Too far gone to care, most of them,’ he said. ‘Ginned up to their eyeballs. Want me to take one of you?’
Good suggestion. Proof positive that she’d been here.
‘Would you?’ she said. ‘I can show the other students.’ She touched the camera icon and handed it to him.
‘Smile, then.’
Smile? This old guy didn’t have a clue what the goth subculture was all about. Ella stared like a judge.
‘I’m not sure you’re going to like it.’
‘It’s cool,’ she said, checking. ‘It’ll do.’
‘Pity the others didn’t come with you,’ he said. ‘Bring down the average age. We could do with more young people to liven us up.’
‘It seems lively to me.’
‘It takes all sorts, I suppose, even among artists. We can’t all live bohemian lives like Francis Bacon, although some make a stab at it.’ He winked and tipped his head in Geraint’s direction. ‘But some are the opposite, rather staid, in fact. We had a teacher who was really prim and proper, but she stopped coming months ago.’
‘Yeah?’
‘The name’s gone. Don’t know why I mentioned her.’
‘No problem.’
He raised a finger. ‘Got it. Connie, her name was. In the drawing sessions she worked on large sheets of graph paper, measuring everything carefully.’
Ella almost gasped out loud. ‘Connie who?’
‘I never heard her surname. She taught art at your school, I was told — Priory Park, isn’t it? — before Tom started there. That’s what must have made me think of her.’
‘I think I know who you mean. We called her Miss Gibbon.’
‘Is that so? I’d better get back to the drinks table.’
Ferdie moved off and Ella whipped out her smartphone and texted her three student buddies: you wont believe this the Gibbon used to hang out here.
What a laugh.
She sipped the juice and considered her next move. She wasn’t comfortable so close to Geraint. Just because he and she were both goths it didn’t give him the right to hit on her. More and more she was wishing those wimps Jem, Mel and Naseem could have been here for support.
She decided to make for the far end of the room, but hadn’t taken a step when her arm was grabbed and gripped.
Geraint’s words were clear this time. ‘Where ya going, bitch?’
Her worst fear.
‘Let go of me. You’re hurting.’
‘What gives?’
‘Nothing gives for you, Geraint. If you don’t let go of me, I’ll scream.’
‘Be my guest.’ He was grinning at the prospect. He had horrible teeth.
But his grip on her arm had loosened and she jerked free and spilled pineapple juice down his trousers. She dropped the glass and left him swearing. In panic, she weaved between dancers without even looking to see who they were.
‘Ella?’
‘Oh my God!’
Face to face with Tom.
This wasn’t remotely what she’d planned.
He said, ‘It is you. I saw you from a distance and thought I must be mistaken.’
All she could manage was a stupid twitchy grin.
‘How did you hear about this?’
‘One of the class.’
‘And you thought...?’
She tried to make light of it. ‘Just for a laugh.’
‘A laugh?’ He rubbed his chin, struggling for words. ‘It’s not... I’m supposed to be... Did any of the others...?’
‘I’m here on my own.’
He looked at the phone in her hand. ‘But you’ve been texting.’
She bit her lip and said nothing.
‘You have, haven’t you?’
She nodded. ‘They won’t come. They’re too scared. Please don’t send me home.’
He placed his hand in the small of her back and steered her to a dark corner of the room where some of the easels were stacked. ‘The thing is,’ he said when they were as private as it was possible to be in that crowded room, ‘it’s a get-together for the artists and some other adult friends of ours. If I’d wanted you here—’
‘You’d have invited me,’ she said. She’d never stood so close to him before. They were practically touching. She felt a tingling sensation inside.
‘Have you been drinking?’
‘Ferdie brought me pineapple juice.’
‘Are you sure no one gave you wine?’
‘I know the flavour of pineapple, silly.’
‘Where is it now?’
‘I dropped the glass.’
‘You don’t look right. Are you feeling OK?’
‘Sure.’ She wanted to say she was feeling better than OK. The warmth inside was coursing through her and her head felt kind of weird, but pleasantly weird.
‘Have you taken something?’
She stared blankly at him and couldn’t stop her lips curving a little.
‘Ella, concentrate.’
There wasn’t anything better to say than, ‘It’s a free world.’
‘You have. Your eyes are huge. What have you taken?’
‘One teeny-weeny relaxer, that’s all.’
‘Christ almighty. Are you hot?’
She giggled. ‘Hot — you bet I am.’ On the impulse she raised her hands to his face to pull him closer. She felt incredibly confident. ‘How hot are you?’
He grasped her wrists and held them. So you want to play hard to get, she thought. She thrust her chest forward, but he swung her round and steered her between the dancers and towards the door. ‘You need to cool down. What was it — ecstasy?’