Behind the modest red-brick facade, Melissa’s house is a Tardis of corridors and high ceilings. She has the room at the top, sloped walls, purple chenille and a window that looks out over the evening hum of Donnybrook village.
Melissa is head-deep in a wardrobe, a leather pencil skirt tight across her bum as she rummages behind a large shoe collection. I take two cans of Coke from my satchel and scan the room for a glass. A collage of photos frames a floor-length mirror and I look at tiny Melissa in a pink tutu, Melissa and Shauna on Santa’s knee, Melissa and Shauna in bikinis on a pedal boat. They can’t be more than fifteen there and I don’t see any more recent pictures of the two of them.
“Ta da!” Melissa emerges triumphant, a bottle of vodka raised like a trophy. I wonder why the big secrecy; we’re both practically eighteen already. Or maybe it’s just my house where alcohol hangs around casually like a perpetual guest.
“Did you buy it?” I ask.
I still find it hard to get served. I’m small and skinny with short hair and an aversion to heels that does me no favors in the maturity stakes, no matter what my fake ID card says. It’s the girls with curly bobs and clothes from Next that get past the bouncers, but nobody round our way wants to look like that.
“Rob did.”
Melissa’s older brother, a second-year at Trinity, is an absolute ride, according to Aisling.
“Is that him?” I ask, pointing to a photo of a Matt Dillon look-alike, all moody with dark hair and upturned lips.
“Yep. He has his uses.”
I’ve assured Aisling I’ll keep my hands off Rob, but honestly, I’m not sure I could muster the energy if Matt Dillon himself was in the house. Sex has been disappointing, certainly not the explosion of fireworks I’d been led to expect. All that anticipation for a quick fuck in the park that lasted barely five minutes, and no better after that. For a long time I thought that being wanted was what mattered. Boys were attracted to me and I loved the power of that. But it was never enough, Tina helped me to see that.
There are no glasses in the room and Melissa’s parents are in the kitchen so we drink half our Cokes and top up the cans with vodka. I’m all on for a bit of drunken camaraderie but I’ll need to take it easy; I can’t afford a nasty hangover for my match in the morning. And I’m not one to lose control of the situation anyway, a consequence of watching Mam drink herself to sleep for so many years.
We sit on the edge of the pastel-pink duvet on her double bed and clink cans and Melissa takes several large gulps before she surfaces, face full of divilment. Her hair is pulled back with a large bow, two ringlets falling onto her cheek, and her brown eyes pop with shades of pink and brown. I’ve taken it easy on the eyeliner and fishnet but I’m still head to toe in black, fitted skirt and mesh top. This is a moment I want to capture so I reach for my bag and take out my camera, an Agfamatic so small I can fit it in my coat pocket. I slide it open and Melissa blows me a kiss as the flash lights up her face.
“C’mere,” she says, “let me have a go.”
I hand it over and she runs her finger over the buttons, trying to work them out.
“It’s the black switch to open and the red button to take the photo.”
I raise my can to her as she clicks.
“I want one of me and David together later,” she says as she hands me back the camera.
Melissa refills her drink, but when she tips the vodka in my direction I put my hand over the can.
“Can’t we bring it with us?” I ask.
She puts the bottle on the bedside table, swings her legs onto the bed and leans back onto a pile of pillows.
“Yeah, OK. I’ll stash it in the bushes before we go in,” she says. “We can sneak out when they play ‘The Birdie Song.’”
“They won’t.”
“They will.”
“Will they inflict the slow set on us too?”
“Don’t knock it,” says Melissa. “That’s the highlight of the night. Dancing at arm’s length with the boy who expects to finger you on the rugby pitch after.”
“Oh,” I say with a grimace.
“Oh god, you’re not allergic to sex too, are you?”
“No, don’t worry,” I say. “I’m a fully paid-up slut. But yeah, what’s the story with Shauna and Aisling?”
“Swimming, swimming and swimming.”
“What does swimming have to do with sex?”
Melissa swigs her drink and considers her answer.
“Well, Shauna wasn’t always like this. She used to be wild when we were younger.”
“Oh yeah?”
“She had loads of attention—you know, blonde hair, big tits. She was always going out with someone. And breaking it off and going out with someone else. And then at the start of last year, she stopped going anywhere except swimming. No more drinking, no more boys. I mean, she’d always had training before but she’d still want to go out whenever she could. That all stopped practically overnight and every time I tried to talk to her about it she got all defensive, like I just wouldn’t understand.”
“All because of swimming?”
“I dunno. Yeah, maybe.”
“Do you think there’s something else going on there?”
Melissa keeps her eyes on me as I try to drink casually from my can.
“Hold on a minute,” she says, “did your friend from your old school say something?”
“No,” I say quickly. “I barely knew her. Ah, I’m just being a nosy cow. Forget about it.”
“OK,” she says, with a look that means she definitely won’t.
STREETLIGHTS GLISTEN AGAINST A BLUE-BLACK sky and chill air shimmies between us as we dance through the village on our way to Rockdale. Melissa pirouettes at the pedestrian crossing, twirling sideways into the street, and an Austin Maestro swerves and hammers on the horn. I reach out to catch her and we laugh and hug, immune to the earthly hazards around us. The night is ours to lose now.
Rockdale is every bit as grand as Highfield, only bigger, stronger, faster. It has more Senior Cups than any other school and that doesn’t come without top facilities, serious commitment and plenty of money. I get a sense of it in the long, imposing driveway to the school, pitches lined up on each side as far as I can see. It’s as if us girls are only playing at hockey while the boys get to tackle the serious business of rugby.
“Vodka storage,” says Melissa as we round the corner to the stately castle of the main school building. The driveway curves around an area thick with trees and shrubs and we take a final swill before stashing the bottle under a cascade of flowering fuchsia.
We’re bursting with bravado as we enter the hall, arm in arm, strutting through the double doors to the steady shuffle of UB40. The lights are dim but still alert to the teen temptations that could huddle in darkened corners. Bunting of blue and yellow, Rockdale colors, drapes across the stage, and priests and lay teachers stand behind parallel rows of Formica tables laid out on either side of the room, a design that keeps us in the center where they can see us. Jugs of orange juice and plates of custard and bourbon creams are undisturbed by the groups already here—boys in cargo pants and boat shoes, polo shirts with upturned collars, and girls in fishtail and puffball skirts, posturing in stilettos, feigning disinterest in the whole setup.
Carol and her jet set are at the back of the hall, Stephanie and Eva and a couple of other clones in designer blouses and skirts, and pearls that must surely belong to their mothers. I don’t get it, their inherent desire to conform, unless it’s us they’re rebelling against by aligning themselves to the wealth and status of their parents.
They’re sniggering at the DJ on the stage, a balding man wearing a silver blazer and a bored expression as he flicks through a box of singles. In defiance, we take to the center of the floor, moving our hips as the reggae beat fades out and gives way to the opening vocal of Bon Jovi’s “You Give Love a Bad Name.” In a moment of synchronous rock irony, Melissa and I punch the air with our fists and leap as the guitar riff kicks in. That gets the party started and a few of the lads join us on the makeshift dance floor, their air guitars betraying their own inebriation.
By the time we’re dancing, arms raised Madonna-style to “Into the Groove,” it’s the jet set that are the odd ones out, peering miserably from the sidelines. Melissa gyrates up to me, puts her arms around my neck, and it’s only when I feel the weight of her slump against me that I realize she’s drunker than she looks.
“Vodka time,” she says as she plants a kiss on my lips before grabbing my hand and leading me outside.
“So he’s not here yet?” I say as we retrace our steps in the sobering chill of the night air.
“No he fucking well isn’t,” she says. “I can’t believe it. Especially after last time.”
“Wait, there was a last time?”
“Um, yeah. He was all over me at Bective last month. I had to drag him out of my pants.”
“So he, like, owes you or something?”
“Let’s just say he better be coming or I’m going to have to hop on one of his teammates.”
She stumbles sideways and I grab her arm.
“The blond one,” she says. “No, the one in the stripy top.”
“The one with the gammy nose?”
“Which one has a gammy nose?”
“I dunno. All of them? They’re rugby players, aren’t they?”
We explode with laughter, and we’re still doubled over with it when three lads strut around the corner, chests out, collars up.
“Hi, Melissa,” says the cutest one, chestnut hair gelled up at the front.
I’m impressed at how quickly she affects a polished smile and I know this can only be the man himself.
“Hi, David.”
“I’ll see you inside,” he says.
“Oh. My. God,” says Melissa as soon as they’re out of earshot. “Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god. Did he see me?”
“It’s fine,” I say. “You were just having a laugh with a friend. He said he’d see you inside, right?”
“He did, didn’t he?” she slurs. “OK, I need another drink.”
WE ARRIVE BACK TO THE Communards, “Don’t Leave Me This Way,” and I move through the room carving out shapes with my hands. The flashing lights on the stage fill the fringes of my vision with a gauzy haze so I don’t see Melissa fall, only the scatter of bodies as they clear the dance floor. When I look down, she’s sprawled on her back, skirt riding up her thighs and a nervous grin on her face. I bend down, take her hands and hoist her to her feet, and she’s shouting fuck, fuck, fuck in my ear as David Sharkey makes no attempt to hide his laughter and another boy slaps him on the back.
“Let’s go and sit down,” I say.
As I guide her to the seats at the end of the room I see Shauna and Aisling standing at one of the tables, plastic cups in their hands, and the room lights up. Shauna’s wearing a gold lamé skirt, cinched at the waist, and all I want is to bask in her radiance. I’m about to go over when I clock the disapproval on their faces and the wary look of the priest behind them. We make a beeline for the chairs instead, and I’m wondering how I’m going to deal with Melissa when the opening sax of “Careless Whisper” signals the start of a slow set and she is alert with expectation.
“Where is he? Is he looking at me?”
David Sharkey walks toward us with intent. He takes her hand and leads her to the dance floor, and I put on my best sober face and join Shauna and Aisling.
“What have you had?” asks Shauna.
I inhale the floral scent of her and gaze at the glow of her skin, blond hair soft against it.
“Just a teeny-tiny bit of vodka. We’ve got some hidden outside if you want some.”
“No, thanks,” she says. “But keep an eye on Melissa. She’s in a right state.”
The boy in the stripy shirt asks Shauna to dance, and I’m right, he does have a gammy nose. I sit out the rest of the slow set in the toilet and when I get back Melissa has disappeared.
“Have you seen Melissa?” I ask Aisling, still on her own at the side of the room.
“Yeah, she left.”
“What do you mean? She never said anything.”
“I think she was preoccupied,” she says with an awkward grin, and I realize Melissa’s got what she came for. I hop onto the dance floor and force the moves out of me, but the rush of it all has departed and my limbs are heavy and tired. I’m just going through the motions when Shauna comes up and leans into my ear.
“Can you show me where that vodka is?”
The thought of getting drunk with Shauna catapults me straight out of my slump.
“Yeah, definitely. What changed your mind?”
“Oh, no, I don’t … I just want to find Melissa.”
“Oh.”
I’m so crushed by the letdown, I don’t even think about where Melissa might be.
“I don’t trust David Sharkey,” says Shauna as we leave through the double doors.
Outside, a chill and bitter air pricks my skin and low-hanging clouds have captured the sky.
“I think Melissa can look after herself,” I say.
Shauna’s eyes cut through me and I want to take it straight back.
“Are you sure about that?” she says. “When you’ve only known her for a month?”
I want to tell her she’s wrong, that we have become close, but I say nothing.
“It’s a defense mechanism,” she says, “all that bravado.”
“Defense against what?”
“She has a tough time. At home.”
“Her home looks all right to me.”
“Yeah well, things aren’t always as they seem,” she says.
“What do you mean?”
She sighs, caught between clarification and loyalty.
“I’m not just being nosy,” I say, even though I am. “I really like Melissa, I want to help.”
“It’s her parents,” she says. “They have a really fucked-up relationship.”
“But they’re still together?”
“Yeah, they’re together. In an open relationship that suits her dad just fine and who cares about anyone else.”
“Jesus, that’s … heavy.”
“Look,” says Shauna. “Don’t tell her I said anything, I’m sure she’ll tell you herself. She treats it like it’s no big deal.”
“OK.”
“But it is a big deal. That’s why she’s so needy.”
I’m about to say I haven’t noticed Melissa is needy at all when Shauna puts a finger to her lips. We’re almost at the turn in the driveway and she points into the undergrowth, beyond the hanging fuchsia. I can’t see anything and I’m starting to wonder what right we have to stalk Melissa like this, if Shauna’s concern is more about control. I hear it then, a whisper of leaves, a low shush and then nothing but the distant rumble of bass. We don’t move, just wait and listen.
It starts as a rustle, shoes or hands dragging across the dirt, slowly at first, then rough and repeated, and a feeble moan of protest. Melissa. Shauna turns to me, eyes wide and searching, and I don’t know what else to do but shrug and throw the decision back at her. Another scrape and a groan, louder this time, and Shauna can’t wait any longer. She pushes past me into the bushes.
“What are you doing?” she shouts, and from behind her I see a pair of boat shoes, soles up, scrambling to one side.
David rolls off Melissa, her skirt hitched up at her waist, tights around her knees and the empty vodka bottle at her feet. I’m still not sure if we’ve just caught them in the act until Melissa’s head rolls to one side, eyes closed, and I see her face is black with dirt.
David makes a half-arsed attempt to pull up her tights, but Shauna waves him away.
“I think you’ve done enough already,” she says.
“Suit yourself,” he says, standing up and brushing the soil from his chinos.
As he walks out of sight, he says, “I’d have had more fun fingering a corpse.”
“Bastard,” says Shauna, but her attention is on Melissa. She kneels beside her and lifts her head gently into her lap.
“Melissa, can you hear me?”
Melissa opens her eyes and smiles weakly.
“Where’s David?” she says.
“Forget about him,” says Shauna, and she takes a tissue from her gold clutch bag and gently wipes Melissa’s face.
There’s no anger or disappointment in her, only love and concern as she pushes the curls out of Melissa’s eyes and runs her fingers along her cheeks, and right now all I want is for her to touch me like that too.