There’s a ghostly calm in the chapel, purple uniforms lined up in silence across the pews. Only the altar is lit, shimmering with tiers of candles that make shadows of the choir next to them. The darkness in the nave is softened by torches wrapped in colored tissue paper, blooms of soft pastel petals that glow in the hands of each of the girls. I could almost lose myself in the luster of it if my heart wasn’t drumming a beat in my head.
I know I’ll be noticed if I walk down the aisle and push into a bench so I take the stairs to the organ loft and squeeze in at the edge of the balcony that overlooks the rest of the chapel. Someone hands me a torch, a glimmer of pink that I hold tight as I listen to the choir sing the “Ave Maria” and scan the silhouettes downstairs. I find Melissa on the right, a glint of soft blue torchlight in her corkscrew curls. I need to keep her in my sights so I can sneak out without her later.
The priest talks of Holy Mary and the sheer purity of her immaculate conception and I wonder how many of the sixth-years are still the untarnished virgins we’re supposed to be. I know Carol’s allowed to stay over at her college boyfriend’s house, and it’s an open secret Stephanie spent the night with Ian Hardy after the Rockdale social. Everybody’s at it, but nobody’s confessing.
As we prepare to leave the chapel and parade our radiance around the school, Carol steps up to the pulpit to lead us in the “Salve Regina.” It’s a revelation, her voice so pure I want to believe it comes from deep within her and not just years of expensive vocal training.
We sing the refrain as we file out through the neo-Gothic archway of the chapel entrance into the darkened corridors of the school. As the procession rounds a corner, I flick off my torch and slide into the passageway that leads to the rear staircase. The air is cold and still and I move slowly through the blackness, feeling my way along the wall as the voices fade to a distant hum. When I get to the stairs, I grip the banister and place my feet lightly on each of the wooden steps. I’m halfway down the second flight when I swear I see a flash of light above me. I freeze but when I look up, there is nothing, only shades of black.
Unease follows me down the stairs and along the narrow corridor by the assembly hall. I stop every time a floorboard creaks and I feel the air twitch in sympathy. I turn the corner and don’t look back, even when I hear the groan of timber and see the shifting shadows on the home stretch to the back door. I burst out into the raw and bitter cold and pick up pace, and I’m almost on the gravel path when I hear the door slam behind me.
“Where do you think you’re going?”
She’s lit only by a pale haze of stars flushed across a black sky and the muted blue of her torchlight.
“Oh, hi. I … I just felt claustrophobic in there,” I say. “It was too dark and creepy.”
“I would have thought that was right up your alley,” says Melissa. “You know, weird and black.”
“I’m not really the religious type.”
Melissa cackles like a cartoon villain.
“Too many sins? Or is it all those skeletons in your closet?”
Her caustic tone unsettles me and I try to think what I might have done. Then it hits me, that she has spoken to someone in Shauna’s house today, that she could already know I spent the night there.
“Look, I don’t know what you’re getting at, but I’m tired so I’m going to go now.”
“Of course you are,” she says. “I’m going to hang around for a while. Maybe pay a visit to the pool.”
A rash of panic prickles my skin but it’s anger that comes to my rescue.
“Seriously? You’re going to do that to her with the whole school watching? Come on, Melissa, you’re supposed to be her friend.”
She hesitates and I know my words have hit the target.
“Sorry, I forgot you’re the world expert on Shauna.”
“I’m not,” I say softly. “I know you know her way better than I do. I want to help, but not tonight. Please.”
I need to make sure I get to Shauna before Melissa does, to explain everything she will tell her. But I need to be her savior first.
“Wednesday,” I say. “When there’s nobody else around. I’ll bring my camera. You confront them and I’ll take a photo. I’ll give you the film and you can do what you like with it. You can be the hero. I’ve had enough of all of this.”
She peers at me with doubtful eyes and I can only hope she has no other options.
“Ten to seven on Wednesday, at the grotto,” she says. “If you’re not there, I’ll do it on my own.”
She walks back into the school and the door bangs shut behind her. I look at my watch; it’s ten past six. The grotto seems as good a place as any to hide out for the next fifty minutes. I just hope Melissa and everyone else will be long gone by then.
FROM THE DISTANT SECLUSION OF the grotto, Highfield rises above the cedars, stretching into a sky gauzed with stars. An austere darkness glowers from the school, the latticed sash windows silver mirrors in the haze, and the only sign of life comes from the checkerboard of light in the neighboring convent. The clock tower shows five to seven, almost the end of Shauna’s private half-hour lesson with McQueen and the start of her ordeal. I have ten, maybe fifteen minutes before it will be over.
A thin mist hovers over the path before me, blurring the winter-green borders on either side of it. As I walk through the icy silence, I hear each piece of gravel crunch underfoot, feel every heightened thud of my heart beat against my ribs. My stomach clenches with the reality of it all, what’s happening to Shauna at this moment, the confrontation that’s ahead. I wrap my frozen fingers around the camera in my gabardine pocket, the Agfamatic primed and ready for action.
Beyond the cedars, I see a latent blue glint and I wait for it to fade out of sight, the last of the embellished torches to leave. A car engine fires up, and I dart behind a tree as headlights flood the bike shed and a lone cyclist pulls out onto the path around the front of the school. I wait there until they are gone, and my jagged breath is the only perceptible sound.
The pool lights are off, but his black Saab is still there, parked beside the entrance like a getaway car. I can’t even look at it as I walk past and I try not to think of his clammy hand on my thigh, his grubby fingers probing my crotch. This feels like a very different mission to the one I attempted with Melissa last week. This time, everything is at stake.
I push the door slowly, listening for the usual swollen sounds from the pool, the sloshing of water, the echo of voices. There is nothing but the steady purr of the pump. The air is heavy with chlorine, and I breathe through my mouth as I feel my way through the entrance, past the noticeboard, the front desk, into the changing rooms. Shauna’s satchel sits on a slatted bench, her sports bag and tasselled loafers below it, and I shudder because now I know for sure that this is real.
I move past the toilet cubicles, the row of showers opposite, and stop in front of the foot bath that leads to the pool. Beyond that, every step is crucial, each one bringing me closer to his covert hideaway. I hold on to the walls as I stretch over the water, past the point of no return. A glimmer of night passes through the domed roof, outlining the pool and the door behind it, the one that separates me from Shauna. I slink slowly along the poolside, past the stands, stopping every few steps to listen, until I hear the first sounds of muffled breath. I’m just feet away and I hear the blood pumping in my ears because I have him now, the callous power that he wields, the cocksure arrogance that he is untouchable.
As I reach for the door, I hear his strangled, hungry moans, and I waver, as if I had a choice. I’m caught in the jolting rhythm of his groans until it’s all too close, too palpable, I just want it to …
Stop.
The door opens a crack, enough to see his hand on Shauna’s wet, tangled hair, her face squashed against the wall as silent tears roll down her cheek.
“Shauna.”
My voice is a whisper, frail with her pain. Then, his face on hers, that wiry mustache furled across her wet skin as he swaddles her from behind, his possession absolute even as his eyes flare with confusion first and then realization.
“What the fuck’s going on?” I say meekly, trying to stick to the plan, the notion that I have simply walked in on them. But there is no remorse, no guilt, just a slow smirk spreading across his face.
“Really, Shauna?” he says, his mouth against her ear. “You’d throw everything away for that cunt?”
He places his palm flat against the wall and pushes into her.
“No,” I scream. “What are you doing?”
He is punishing me, for Joe’s article, for telling Sister Shannon, for daring to challenge a man like him. He’s showing me he can do whatever he wants and nobody of any consequence is ever going to ask him to stop. He keeps his eyes on me as he pulls back Shauna’s hair, kisses her neck and pushes into her again. She grimaces and shuts her eyes tight. I feel in my pocket for the camera, slide it open and put my finger over the shutter release button.
“It’s like we’re having a threesome,” he says, his face warped with a joyless grin.
There’s a fury that swells with time, smoldering inside, rising and falling, instinct versus conditioning. It can blaze right through you, and I feel it now, the furnace of my rage and the frenzied pleasure at the fear in his eyes as I push open the door. The camera flashes onto his bare chest pressed up against Shauna, anguish etched into every crevice of her face.
As soon as I’ve taken the photo I know I should run. I only need to get to the front door; he’s hardly going to follow me through the school grounds in his swimsuit. He knows this too, and instead of giving chase he puts one arm around Shauna’s neck and pulls her tighter onto him until she starts to splutter. He holds the other arm out to me.
“Give me the camera.”
I look at the exit and then back at Shauna, grasping at his arm, struggling for breath. I can’t leave her.
“Let go of her first,” I say.
He loosens his grip on her neck and she sucks wildly at the air, but her body remains slack in his grip.
“Step away from her and I’ll give it to you.”
His lip curls in disgust at this shift in power, but he takes his arm from around her neck and slowly pulls himself away from her. She doesn’t move, her crumpled shape still pressed against the wall. He is languid, standing impotent behind the door with his hands in the air as if I’m wielding a gun. He reaches out and I hold up the camera, fingers wrapped tight around it.
I slide forward and then, when the door is within my reach, I hurl my shoulder against it. It slaps against him, throwing him backward onto the storeroom floor.
For a moment, I think I can grab Shauna and run, but he is on his feet, coming at me with his hand raised high and then sharp against my cheek. I stumble and he is on me again, hands hard against my chest, and the legs go from under me. The side of my face smacks onto the tiles and blood fills my cheek as the camera skates across the floor to the edge of the pool.
“Did you really think this would work?” he says, standing over me.
“Fuck you,” I scream, spluttering blood onto the floor. “You’re a rapist and a murderer, and I’m gonna make sure everyone knows about it.”
“A murderer? I haven’t heard that one before.”
“Tina would still be alive if it wasn’t for you.”
“Tina?” He puts his hands on his hips and laughs. “Tina couldn’t handle it when I dumped her for Shauna. That’s all there was to it.”
“She was pregnant. Because you raped her.”
Behind him, Shauna shivers in the doorway, arms wrapped around her chest like a straitjacket.
“Believe me,” he says, “you don’t need to rape a slut like that.”
I’d always thought, if he knew, if he was confronted with the stark truth of it, he’d show some regret, a crumb of humanity. But isn’t that the problem? Everyone gives him space to change but he uses it to keep doing what he’s always done. I want to destroy him.
“She told me everything.”
I expect him to falter, to fear or loathe me, but he just shrugs.
“Nobody’s ever going to believe a little skanger like you,” he says. He steps over me and walks toward the camera.
It’s not just that word, it’s all the put-downs and insults Highfield has layered upon me, all the times I was told it was just a bit of banter, that I couldn’t take a joke. The anger flies out of me and I’m up, running at him, arms wrapped around his legs in a rugby tackle that lifts him right off his feet. He falls forward as I let go, arms flailing as his forehead smashes onto the edge of the pool with a single, violent crack that reverberates around the room until I can’t tell if it’s just the ringing in my head.
He lies still as blood seeps from his hair. We watch a black pool of it bloom slowly onto the tiles and drip into the water. We wait, until we are sure, until he can’t touch us anymore. Shauna walks across the floor and stands over him.
“You’ve killed him,” she says.
I fall to my knees. It’s over.