‘Video games?’ Lori’s dad says.
‘Or else be a scientist, you know like the kind that discover the cures for diseases?’
‘What kind of console do you have? Nintendo or Xbox?’
Lori’s dad turns out to know quite a lot about video games and they have a good conversation about that. After a little while Lori stops crying, and the black-clad woman brings in a lemon meringue tart on a tray. ‘So who’s knocking around Seabrook these days?’ Lori’s dad asks. ‘Is Bugsy O’Flynn still there? How about Big Fat Johnson? And Father Green, is he still dragging lads out to the ghetto? Ha ha, I remember carrying boxes around some kip, scared the life out of me. Didn’t forget to keep my arse to the wall, though. Old Père Vert.’
‘You and that school,’ Lori’s mother laughs, and as the woman comes in again to clear the dishes, she says to Lori’s dad, ‘Do you think our daughter could have Daniel back for an hour before she starts her homework?’ Lori’s dad grins and says, ‘I suppose so – okay, scram, you two.’
Lori and Skippy go back into the living room. This time Lori cosies right up next to him on the couch. ‘My parents love you.’ She smiles. Her legs are curled up and her toes wiggling against his hip.
‘They’re really nice,’ he says.
An old film is on the TV, the one about the guy in high school in America who finds out he’s a werewolf. Skippy has seen it before but it doesn’t matter: his hand is in Lori’s and her little finger is absently stroking his little finger and the whole universe is centred in those two little fingers. On the table her phone starts to ring, but she silences it and turns to him again and smiles. After a long time debating whether to put his arm over her shoulder he finally decides that he should, and he is just lifting his elbow onto the top of the couch when the doorbell goes. It makes both of them start. Lori jumps up on the couch to peek out through the curtain, then – does he hear a little gasp? – she runs to the door, shouting, ‘I’ll get it!’ down the hallway.
While she is gone, Skippy tries to focus on the film, where the guy is discovering that when he is a werewolf he is really good at basketball. But although he can’t make out the words, he can hear her voice – muffled, urgent-seeming – in the hall, as well as whoever is at the gate, the scrambling of the intercom making him sound ragged, angry…
Lori returns to the living room. ‘Just someone looking for directions,’ she says, wiping her hands on her jeans.
‘Oh,’ Skippy says.
She sits down next to him again, but this time with her feet on the floor and her body leaning forward, staring at the screen with her mouth tight shut. His hand now rests mournful and unloved on top of his knee. He pretends to himself he doesn’t notice the sick feeling in his stomach. ‘Do you want to start eating the chocolates?’ he asks her.
‘Actually, I’m on a diet,’ she says.
‘Oh.’
‘Don’t say it to my parents, I haven’t told them about it.’
‘Okay,’ he says, and then, gallantly, ‘I don’t think you need to go on a diet, though.’
She doesn’t seem to hear him; she is staring at the TV, where the werewolf-boy is having an intense conversation with the girl he is in love with.
‘Here, you know what you were saying, about quitting the swimming team?’ Skippy says.
‘What about it?’
‘Like, do you think I should? Just quit?’
She arches her back, wriggles her shoulders, first one, then the other, as though the cat is there clinging to her. ‘I don’t know,’ she says. ‘I mean, it just sounds so boring.’ She turns back to the TV. ‘Isn’t that the guy who was in that show and then he got that gross disease?’
Skippy doesn’t know what’s changed but everything has. They watch the rest of the film in silence. Then the door opens and Lori’s mum is standing there. ‘Homework time, missy.’
Lori looks up at her with a disappointed aw face.
‘It’s a school night,’ her mum says. ‘I’m sure Daniel has homework too.’
‘Can I just very quickly show Daniel something in my room?’
Her mum smiles. ‘All right. But be quick.’
Lori flashes a quick smile at Skippy. ‘Okay?’ she says. For a moment Skippy just stares at her uncomprehendingly like she’s a new letter of the alphabet. Then he remembers himself and mumbles something and follows obediently as she ascends the stairs again and leads him into her room.
This time the night framed in the window is utterly dark, and in the instant before she switches on the light the stars shine in on him deliberately like they’re trying to tell him something; then Lori draws the curtains and places herself in front of him. Her eyes are closed and she is standing there like a sleepwalker, her mouth slightly open, her hands slightly lifted. He tries to think of something to say, until the meaning of the closed eyes finally penetrates. At once it’s like some crazy carnival orchestra strikes up inside him, all the instruments playing at the wrong speed in the wrong key, everything whirling and toppling over, while outside him the room’s so quiet, not even the wind audible through the double glazing, and Lori so still, her lips parted. He leans into her and her mouth latches on to his, an alien being attaching itself to its host. But he can’t stop thinking of the voice in the intercom. Was it the same person that was on the phone? Who she was roaming the streets with? His eyes flick open and see hers, burning green and staring back at him, right up close like planets filling a Star Trek sky. Now they shut, her eyebrows furrowing momentarily – he shuts his too. She takes his hand and thrusts it under her shirt. His hand locks on her boob and squeezes, hard? soft? through raspy synthetic material. She makes small squirmy noises, her tongue licks his tongue. Why isn’t he happy? Why does it feel different?
A knock at the door. It’s already over. Lori walks away briskly to open it. Her mother is there with her hand raised to knock again. ‘Sorry, kids. It’s eight o’clock.’
‘Okay,’ Lori says. ‘Daniel was just about to go anyway.’ She passes under her mum’s arm to the landing, and now he is watching her shimmering black crown disappear down the stairs, chatting away to her mother as if nothing had happened at all.
In the kitchen, Lori’s dad sets down his PalmPilot and rises from the table. ‘Great to meet you, Dan.’ He outstretches his hand. ‘Give ’em hell at that swim meet, all right? Show them how we do things in Seabrook College.’
‘I will,’ Skippy says.
Lori sidles over to him and takes his hand. ‘Thanks for coming to see me,’ she says.
‘Thank you,’ Skippy says, meaninglessly.
‘Do you want to hang out again sometime?’
‘Do you?’ He is surprised.
‘Sure,’ she says, swinging his hand a little back and forth.
‘Oh, don’t the two of them look sweet!’ her mother sighs in a pouty baby voice.
‘Maybe we could do something on Friday? I’m not grounded any more –’ shooting a look at her dad, who pretends to be fixed on his PalmPilot.
‘We could go and see a film?’ he says.
‘Sure, and then we could go for ice cream,’ she says.
‘Too cute!’ Lori’s mum exclaims, hands to her cheeks. ‘I can’t look at you any more, I’ll just die!’
‘Mom,’ Lori blushes, but she can’t help grinning down at her shoes. Skippy grins too but does not know why. He feels like he’s inside a sitcom, but he can’t find where they are on the script. Maybe if he just keeps smiling no one will notice. Maybe nothing was wrong after all – maybe second kisses are always different to the first.
She brings him to the door to say goodbye.