At Highfield, there are words that are missing from language, as if they have ceased to exist. The unspeakable shielded by silence. Deeds and symptoms cleansed from memory until we are all complicit in our collective amnesia. It’s just how things work here, and there is a kindness to some of it. How we never speak of David Sharkey to spare Melissa the shame and stigma. How the swimmers rarely mention Tina, lest they unleash her anguish. It goes against my instinct, this controlled restraint, and I struggle to read the space between the words and their absence.
I hear nothing more about Carol’s earrings and she starts to thaw out. Mme Martel has paired us in French and we’ve grudgingly bonded over a genuine love of the language and culture. My rapid move to the Senior B hockey team hasn’t harmed my image either and I almost feel sorry for Karina Kenny, slumming it down on the E team. I could love it here, if I didn’t already know too much. If I’d been bred to hold my silence like a true Highfield girl. I envy them, the certainty of their position, the rewards offered by the privilege of their birth, and at times it kills me to think what could be mine if I chose to play by their rules.
I take what I can when I can. Those quiet hours in the library, diving below the surface of the truths we’re taught in class, the alternative views of history and literature that open up the heart of them. The pure buzz of the hockey pitch and the camaraderie that goes with it. And the stolen moments with Shauna, each of us making time to chat about books and films and anything at all. I’d be lost without that intimacy, the simple joy of being around her, and I’m sure she feels the same way too.
The earrings return to class without fanfare. I notice them when Carol sits beside me in French, although she says nothing.
“Where did you find them?” I ask.
“What?”
“Eh, the earrings you accused me of stealing?”
She sighs heavily, as if I’m making a big deal out of nothing.
“I suppose I owe you an apology,” she says.
I keep looking at her for an explanation and she rolls her eyes.
“They somehow got from my locker into my bag, OK?”
“And you never thought to tell me?”
“For all I know, it was you who put them there,” she says, and even though I laugh, I know it’s a narrative she could get away with, given her standing at Highfield. It’s always the inner circle who’ll be believed, no matter how unlikely their story.
MCQUEEN PAYS ME NO SPECIAL attention for a couple of weeks until my next away match. He picks me up on a Saturday morning and delivers me without incident to Fairfield Grove in Enniskerry, just over the county border in Wicklow. It’s a school that has a long sporting rivalry with Highfield and we’re all aware of the weight of expectation. My precarious position at home and at school makes me all the more determined to justify my place on the team and I chase that ball relentlessly in pursuit of my first competitive goal. It comes with just five minutes to go, a solo run down the wing and a flick into the corner of the goal, giving Highfield a 2–1 lead. By the final whistle, we’re all bonded by adrenaline and I’m flushed with a rare joy as I follow my teammates back to the gym for refreshments and celebrations.
Mam will have to fight me if she thinks I’ll give this up for the Black Swan. It’s the challenge, the thrill, the simple fairness of it. Today, there’s been no aggro on the pitch, no impenetrable hierarchy, just the skill and collaboration of a team that’s worked hard and played hard. If only all of life was this rewarding.
It’s at least half an hour before I get back to the car, hidden down a side street, and he won’t even look at me when I slide into the passenger seat. We drive off in tense silence and I clench my fists for several minutes before he acknowledges me.
“I’m going to stop off at a café,” he says. “We can get some lunch.”
The very last thing I want to do is spend any more time than I have to with Maurice McQueen. The plan was to get close to him, lure him into a false sense of security and then have Joe and an unconnected third party discover him assaulting me. For that, I was prepared for small talk, suggestive glances, a hand on my knee. But this departure from the routine fills me with a sickening dread. I don’t speak until we get to the main road and he takes the turn for Greystones, the opposite direction to Ballybrack.
“Where are you going?”
“I told you, a café. It’s not far.”
I stare out the window at the stone walls and hedgerows, digging fingernails into palms until he pulls into Greystones village and the safety of others. The Copper Kettle smells of bacon and coffee but I’m riddled with unease so I settle for a chocolate éclair and a cup of tea, and take a table in the corner by the window. McQueen talks about music, seeing U2 play at the Dandelion Market, being invited to their gig at Croke Park. I pretend I’m not impressed but he carries on, stories of backstage and Adam Clayton’s twenty-year-old whiskey.
“You know the feeling when whiskey hits the back of your throat? I know you know what I’m talking about, Lou.”
I say nothing and he laughs.
“Well, imagine it doesn’t feel like you’re being cut by a knife. Imagine it’s the sweetest, smoothest feeling that grips your whole body like an orgasm.”
I wish I had the balls to look him in the eye but the blood rushes to my cheeks as I study my tea. He lets his words hang for an indecent amount of time while I breathe slowly and remind myself that I’m one step ahead of him. I know what’s coming and I’m prepared for it. That’s what makes me different to all the other girls.
“But you know what it can’t beat?” McQueen tucks into his bacon and fried eggs, swallowing a mouthful before answering his own question.
“Winning.” He points his knife at me. “You got a taste of that today, and don’t tell me you didn’t get the biggest rush from your goal.”
He’s not wrong, and I smile despite myself. It felt fucking fantastic.
“And believe me, there’s no greater feeling than representing your country. You’re talented, Lou, you could excel at any number of sports. Look how far you’ve come at hockey in just a few weeks.”
He mops up the egg with a slice of toast and pushes it into his mouth. The runny yolk smears on the bristles at the side of his mouth.
“I can see you wearing a green jersey one day,” he says.
“I dunno about that.”
“Stick with it and you’ll do us all proud, I’m sure of it.”
He wipes his mouth with a napkin but there’s still a glob of yellow in his mustache.
“I know a lot of people in a lot of sports, not just swimming—hockey, netball, tennis, athletics.”
I know he probably says that to all the girls, but still I wonder how much I can get out of him before I turn him in.
“It’s an honor most people only dream of,” he continues. “When I hear about athletes boycotting the Olympics and rugby players refusing to tour South Africa, I want to throttle the lot of them. If any of my swimmers tried any of that, they’d be out on their ear.”
“But by going to South Africa, you’re saying you don’t care about black South Africans. You’re supporting apartheid.”
“Oh, no, no, no,” he says, wagging his finger at me. “Playing a sport that you love, representing your country, that’s a personal privilege, and whatever you believe politically shouldn’t come into it.”
“Haven’t you heard? The personal is political.”
It’s Mam who taught me that if you don’t stand up and talk about the things that are important to you, the people in power are never going to know about them. But these days, I’m not sure what matters to her anymore.
“You’re not a women’s libber, are you?” He rolls his eyes. “Jesus, Lou, I never had you down as a militant lesbian, you’re way too pretty for that.”
There must be a sure-fire comeback for what he’s trying to do to me, pitting my looks against my brain, but I can’t think of anything that doesn’t sound as pathetic as I feel.
“I believe in basic human rights,” I say, my voice thin and strained.
“That’s nice,” he says, tapping his finger on the table. “But that’s not how the real world works, Lou. In the real world, these poor black South Africans you love so much are murdering whites and burning down their homes, did you know that?” He snorts and throws his arm over the back of his chair. “It’s very easy to be an idealist when you never have to make any of the big decisions.”
I want to lift my teacup, do something to dilute the tension, but my hands are shaking and I can’t let him see. Words are backing up inside me and I’m afraid if I release them, tears will follow.
“I want to make big decisions,” I say carefully. “That’s why I want to go to university.”
He laughs and shakes his head.
“I won’t say I told you so, but you’ll find out soon enough how the world works.”
There is nothing I can say to counter his bravado and by the time we get back to the car I don’t know if I can do it anymore. I’ve made sure to wear my tracksuit so I won’t have to feel his clammy hand on my bare skin, but it’s half an hour back to Ballybrack and if he tries something, I won’t be able to ignore it for that long.
We’re only a few minutes on the road when his hand lands on my thigh and he massages it through the jersey fabric of my tracksuit bottoms. I say nothing, although I’m screaming inside my head. He changes gears and his hand is back, higher now, his little finger pushed up against my crotch.
“What are you doing?” I say, my words catching in my throat.
“Do you mind?” He looks straight ahead as if nothing unusual is happening.
I hate it, I hate it, I hate it.
“Lou?”
All my words are frozen inside me and I can’t scream or move or think. He puts his hand back on the steering wheel and we carry on in silence. I pray that’s the end of it, but the indicator’s on and we’re turning into a country lane, twisting past woodlands and hedgerows. I bite down on the inside of my lip and the blood, sharp on my tongue, keeps me lucid until he pulls into a clearing and parks under a cloak of dark and heavy foliage.
“I can’t stop thinking about you, Lou.”
The metallic taste drips down the back of my throat and I swallow heavily.
“But I don’t want to do anything you don’t want to. I’m taking my lead from you.”
The air is taut with silence. His eyes burn a path through it.
“But … we’re not allowed,” I hear myself say.
I look away, at the trees behind him, sycamores or horse chestnuts.
“How old are you, Lou?”
“Seventeen.”
“You’re old enough to make up your own mind.”
He takes my hand between both of his. Horse chestnuts, I think, the leaves turning golden already.
“Lou, I couldn’t live with myself if I wasn’t honest with you. I think you’re extraordinary. You’re so different to all the other girls at Highfield. You’re mature and perceptive and you have life experience they can only dream of. I never meant to have feelings for you. How could I? I’m your teacher.”
I see his rueful smile in the corner of my eye while his devious fingers caress my wrist.
“But I won’t always be.”
I don’t know what I’m supposed to say or do so I don’t speak, don’t move. He puts my hand to his lips and my nail catches the egg yolk crusted in the hairs of his mustache and all I can think about is the filth festering in my finger. He unbuckles his seat belt and leans over and kisses me, stale coffee breath and wire hair rough against my lips and my nose, and his tongue is in my mouth and I take it, rigid and removed, until I can’t breathe anymore and I pull away, gasping.
All the way back to Ballybrack, I think about how I never said no. Whether everything I’ve done has invited this outcome from the moment I entered his office. I thought I’d be able to control him, manipulate him into a compromising position, but he is stronger than me. In the distance, the Wicklow Mountains float into the clouds, detached from the blurred and foggy earth below, and I wonder how far he’ll go next time.