Another Life Altogether: A Novel - By Elaine Beale Page 0,72

been looking forward to the end of the day, when I’d get a chance to see Amanda again, and had spent much of my time planning what I might say to her when I finally saw her again. Unfortunately, I needn’t have bothered. When we got to the school gates, Amanda was there with a couple of her friends, smoking and throwing back her head to blow long puffs of smoke into the air between bouts of giggling conversation. I tried to catch her eye and even wiggled my fingers toward her in a feeble wave, but despite my efforts she didn’t notice me. What finally got her attention was the harsh buzz of a motorbike coming down Liston’s main street. As soon as she heard it, she turned toward the sound. “Oh, look, it’s Stan,” she said, waving an outstretched arm.

I watched the bike veer around an elderly couple who were in the middle of the zebra crossing. The woman’s coat lifted visibly in the bike’s wake, and the man’s flat cap was blown from his head. “That’s Amanda’s boyfriend,” Tracey said, tugging on my sleeve. “Frankly, I have no bloody idea what he sees in her.”

I remembered the evening I’d first met Amanda and the boy in the Ford Cortina who’d yelled at her from across the street. I’d already decided I didn’t like him. Now that he seemed to be on his way to interrupt my opportunity to talk to her, I liked him even less. “Does he always drive like that?” I asked. “It looks dangerous.”

“Motorbikes are dangerous,” Tracey said with unrestrained enthusiasm. “Really dangerous. Last year Larry Kirk came off his bike and had to have both his legs amputated. He’s in a wheelchair now.” She said this with delight, as if Larry Kirk had won some sort of competition. “You might have seen him; he works at the newsagent’s. It’s a bit weird, him with no legs and that. Can’t help feeling sorry for him. But don’t worry, nothing like that will happen to Stan.” I was about to tell her that it wasn’t Stan I was worried about as I observed the elderly couple, pale and open-mouthed, apparently immobilized by shock or fear or both, standing stock-still in the middle of the street. But Tracey continued. “Stan’s not like Larry Kirk. He’s a really, really good driver.” This, clearly, was a matter for dispute.

With Stan rapidly approaching, Amanda waved vigorously, while next to me Tracey patted her hair, pinched her cheeks, and smoothed her hands over her skirt. As the bike came closer, its rider didn’t reduce his speed, and, for a moment, I felt relieved as I thought Stan planned to continue right by us. At the last moment, however, he steered the bike toward our little crowd outside the school gates, mounted the pavement, and drove at full speed toward us. It was hard to take it in at first, but it soon became apparent that he really didn’t plan to stop and would inevitably hit us. Simultaneously, all of us—Tracey, Amanda, Amanda’s friends, and I—let out high screams and began running away like a throng of panicked mice. We were a mess of limbs, fast breaths, and shrieks scattering in front of the bike when, at the very last second, it came to a halt right in the spot where we had been standing.

“Ha, that got you good and proper, didn’t it?” Stan Heaphy was laughing so hard that the black full-face helmet he wore jiggled unsteadily. It made him look like a baby struggling to support its big, lolling head.

I leaned against the school fence and tried to get my breath. My heart was racing so loud and fast, it felt as if it occupied my entire chest. I was furious. He could have killed us, or left one of us with no legs like the unfortunate Larry Kirk.

“God, you should’ve seen your faces.” Stan slapped his thigh with a leather-gloved hand and looked around at all of us. “I wish I had a camera, I really do.” He was still laughing as he took off his gloves, unbuckled his helmet, and eased it over his head to reveal his face, smooth-skinned and angular, with a straight nose and large brown eyes. He had glossy blond hair that was long enough to rest below the collar of his studded leather jacket. That night outside the Co-op I hadn’t been able to see him in the rain and I’d imagined