I’m just saying what a lot of people are thinking. You mustn’t go blaming Vicky for the party getting out-of-hand. It was Nic who invited half the island. And you should’ve guessed how it would end up. You are a grown-up, and grown-ups should know better.’
Dr S. sniffed in all of his nostril hair and stared at his pens.
‘Does it feel better to get things off your chest?’
I glared at him. ‘There’s a lot more I could tell you.’
He opened his palms. ‘By all means. Whatever you tell me is in confidence.’
How interesting. Dr Suck-Eggs-Know-It-All could keep all my secrets, just like he kept Dad’s secrets.
It was quite tempting, I’ll admit. I could’ve reached over the desk then and there, grabbed Dr S. by the collar and told him to listen carefully. Then I could’ve confessed to all sorts of grisly details about my big fight with Nic. I could’ve said that I’d followed her out of the Village after the party and watched and waited in the bushes. How I’d maybe LURED her away from all her little friends in the woods and made her come to the Batterie, before BLUDGEONING her to death with a bottle of homebrew, and pulling out some hair as a trophy. I could’ve claimed that I’d pushed her off the cliff on purpose. Yes. I could’ve invented any old detail knowing he couldn’t do a thing about it. Wouldn’t that have been something? To spill my guts to Dr Suck Eggs in his joy-of-beige office and then make him respect my privacy.
But I didn’t, and actually I didn’t need to. After half an hour he was telling Mum it wouldn’t be the end of the world if I missed the last week of school. He said Vicky had been sent home twice already.
‘It’s nearly Christmas and maybe we should all take some time out,’ he smiled. Then he lowered his voice, ‘And I do think Cathy would benefit from some sessions with a counsellor. It would help her process things, most definitely.’
Do you know what that means? I’ve got to go and see (drum-roll, please) Mrs Senner! Yes, Guernsey’s that small: our local loud-mouth is a registered psycho-whatsit and sits in a big room up at the hospital surrounded by abstract art posters and her certificates of depression. I was meant to go there once before to talk about what did or didn’t happen with Mr McCracken. Of course I got out of it, but afterwards Mrs Sigmund Suck Up was always round at our house, pursing her pink lips.
‘If you ask me,’ she’d say, ‘there’s no smoke without fire . . .’
In point of fact you can have smoke without fire, although it’s more accurate to call it gas. Chlorine gas is greenish in colour and poisons the lungs. It was widely used in the First World War and nearly killed my grandfather. It’s a pretty dirty weapon to use, but we all need good weapons.
I had to fight to keep Nic as my special friend, and I had Lisa, Anne-Marie and Shelley all yap-yap-yapping at my heels. Even Vicky wanted in. I always felt out-numbered. After the War was over the Channel Islanders were heavily criticised for not resisting the Germans. The thing is, people never realise how many Germans there were on the Island. In occupied Norway, there were about 1,200 Norwegians for every German occupier, and in France there was one German to 120 French people. In Guernsey the ratio was almost one to one! There was nowhere to hide or run to, and who was to know it wouldn’t stay like that for ever?
I wanted Nic to stay my friend and I would’ve done anything for her. I’m not just talking about the shoplifting and the drinking. She said that if I was serious about Mr McCracken then I had to grow up and get some Experience. This meant doing things with boys, more specifically Marc Le Page.
We therefore spent whole days at Pete’s house. It seemed so depressing to have the curtains closed in the middle of the day. Pagey and I would sit on the sofa and watch horror films while Nic and Pete disappeared upstairs. I generally liked horror films on account of the large number of cheerleaders who were beheaded. Pagey said he’d never met a girl who enjoyed scenes of dismemberment like I did. I suppose it took my mind off whatever was happening off the screen. I tell you, French kissing just