had taken many months of her smiling at me and talking to me to get me to this place of trust. But in the last couple of weeks, just in that tense, hot summer full of study and pressure and intense concentration, I had started to wonder if she was attracted to me. Once I’d got the idea into my head it wouldn’t leave again, and I started to try and interpret everything she said, all the little comments, the laughs, as maybe her way of trying to flirt with me.
It made no sense to me, the complicated system of interaction between the sexes. The way the girls stood, the way they moved. Apparently you could tell if someone liked you by the way they behaved towards you when you were near.
It was Helen’s last day at school. Exams ended, she had no reason to be there any more and the rest of her summer would be filled with lazy days sunbathing and shopping, going away with her parents and going out in the evenings with her girlfriends. This would be our last walk home together. And my last chance to decide whether there was anything in it.
‘You should ring me,’ she said, as we walked along. ‘We could meet up, you know. If you felt like it.’
‘Or you could ring me,’ I said, already knowing she wouldn’t.
‘Write your number on my bag,’ she said, fishing a black marker out of her canvas satchel and pulling off the lid with her teeth. I had no choice but to comply. There was a small unadorned patch of canvas on the inside of the flap and she flattened her palm beneath it to provide support while I wrote my phone number, followed by my name in neat capitals. The ink bled into the canvas and I wondered whether she would be able to read it. Her head was close to mine, the sunlight shining on her hair. I gave her back the pen and we continued walking.
‘Helen,’ I said, as we got towards the end of the alley.
‘Mm?’ she said, stopping too. She looked sleepy, her eyes half-open, shading them against the bright sun with one hand as she tried to look at me.
There was nothing I could think of to say, so I kissed her. I pushed her gently back against the wall and kissed her. Even now I don’t know what I thought it was going to be like, but I was unprepared for her to respond, and when she did I made a sound that seemed to alarm her and she pulled away from me.
‘Colin? It’s alright.’
So I kissed her again, and this time it was still uncomfortable. I was much taller than she was and my neck was bent at an awkward angle to facilitate the kiss.
When it was over I remember walking home feeling – not elated, not at all, but disappointed. Was that all there was to it? I remember thinking? That hot, slimy feeling of someone’s tongue against yours? The taste of spearmint gum and the beer she’d been drinking… it was all I could do not to shudder.
The final paper was the one that pulled my grade down from an A to a B, and effectively lost me the chance to enjoy an Oxbridge place. I never saw Helen again. She never phoned me, of course, and possibly this came as something of a relief.
As I talked to the woman earlier this evening, standing outside the funeral place in the precinct, I looked down – just once – at the satchel she carried and wondered whether, if I lifted the flap, I would find my name printed there in felt tip pen, along with a phone number, faded into the canvas.
Anyway – Vaughn has had contact with Audrey, so all’s well in his little world. I don’t know if he’s made the decision about proposing to her. I find it amusing, however, trying to picture them in different situations and which one he might select to do the deed… on one knee, in the cinema? Scuba-diving? Watching television with a microwaved meal on a matching set of his-and-hers fold-up tables?
I’m being unkind. The meal they served was perfectly acceptable, and I am really glad for them both, despite Audrey’s flirtatious boldness with me that evening. She was, as I believe they say, a little minx.
I am looking forward to reading tomorrow’s edition of the Briarstone Chronicle. I am planning to collect a copy on