44

No more than ten minutes into lunchtime on Wednesday, Ms. King came into the year-eleven common room without knocking. It was raining outside, so the room was full. Pippa and Tiff flicked their cigarettes out the window and Holly swiped a saucer ashtray from a table in the kitchen area and dumped it in the bin.

“Get that down,” Ms. King said, referring to the tripod-and-stool arrangement. “And gather round.”

She wasn’t looking amused.

“Would anyone like to start?” she asked. “Or do we treat you like year eights and say, Nobody’s leaving this room until someone confesses?”

Billy was entirely unperturbed. “It was me,” he said, sprawled on a sofa, with his mouth full.

Ms. King gave him the unblinking arctic stare she saved for very special occasions.

Billy swallowed, stood up, and repeated the sentence in a more formal manner. “It was me, Ms. King.”

“And who are your henchmen?” She eyeballed a few of the guys she obviously considered to be the usual suspects.

Billy put up his hands, holding his wrists together. “Really, just me. Arrest me now. You didn’t find it even a little bit amusing?”

“This is deceptive behavior, and we don’t like it. It has led to further breaking of school rules, judging by the stench in here, and we don’t like that. As well, it took security a few days to figure out what was going on, so now we look as though our systems don’t work particularly well, and we don’t like that, either. Who else is involved?”

Nobody said anything. Vân Ước wondered if she could swallow her fear and speak up. She was petrified by indecision. If the school decided to make a big deal out of this, it could jeopardize her scholarship. But despite Billy’s offer to take the blame, she knew perfectly well what was required of her, because what would Jane do?

“Well? I’ve got all the time in the world,” said Ms. King.

“As if Billy could take a photo to save his life,” Holly muttered, staring at Vân Ước pointedly.

“Do you have something to say, Holly?”

“No, Ms. King.”

“Ms. King,” Vân Ước started. “I—”

Michael jumped to his feet and spoke over her. “Ms. King, I took the photograph.”

Billy and Vân Ước and Ms. King all looked at him, surprised.

“Are you sure, Michael?” Ms. King asked.

Michael continued calmly, “I borrowed Vân Ước’s camera, but she had no idea what I wanted to use it for.”

She was touched by how quickly Michael—thinking all the time that the scheme was stupid and her involvement in it risky—had come to her defense once he realized she was about to speak up.

Ben Capaldi stormed into the common room, pouring rain and sweat, saying, “Billy, where the fuck were you?” before he registered Ms. King’s presence and was also subjected to the snap-freeze gaze. “Apologies for the language, Ms. King,” he said.

“Where was Billy Gardiner supposed to be?”

“We just had some lunchtime ergos; it’s no big deal, we’ll have another session after school.”

“Well, immediately after school, he and Michael Cassidy will be in the principal’s office with me, talking about appropriate discipline for this potentially dangerous prank,” said Ms. King.

“How’s it dangerous?” Billy asked, incredulous.

“You could have broken your neck setting it up. People have been smoking in here—which is a health risk that contravenes the school’s clean air environment policy, and breaks the zero-tolerance smoking rule, and had there been a security problem with this room, no one would have known about it.”

Billy’s face showed his contempt.

Leaving the room with a final stern look at Billy and a puzzled one at Michael, Ms. King said, “Four thirty in Dr. Dryden’s office, both of you.”

“Big fucken deal,” said Billy. “Seriously.”

“You better not get kicked off the first eight,” said Ben.

“Or what? You sound just like my dad,” said Billy. He turned to Michael. “Thanks, man.”

“It’s for Vân Ước, not you,” said Michael.

“You should have told the truth,” said Holly to Vân Ước. “Dishonesty isn’t nice. But I guess it’s what you’d expect from a thief.”

“Shut up, Holly,” said Billy. “I told her not to. And stop saying she stole something.”

Vân Ước wanted to say, I’m not a thief, and, I tried to speak up about the photos. I was prepared to own my part of the punishment. But she said nothing.

She saw Michael’s eyes flick over to Holly and glance around the room. He seemed satisfied to see it so crowded. He loathed bullies, and hypocrites, and Holly had clearly been in his sights ever since he’d been collateral damage in her betrayal of Sibylla. He put his book down, stood up, and cleared his throat. “Dishonesty isn’t nice, Holly. You’re right.”

“Thank you,” said Holly, in the tone of someone who has finally been heard.

“In fact, it’s despicable. But it’s not Vân Ước who is dishonest. It’s you, isn’t it?”

Holly looked uncomfortable. “No.”

Michael pressed on, pinning Holly like an insect with the intensity of his look. “You stole the tag Vân Ước told you about. You took the evidence that she was telling the truth. You set her up. You deliberately tried to make her look bad in front of everyone else.”

Because Michael so rarely spoke to the gathered masses, everyone was listening, just for the novelty value. So everyone saw Holly’s face go pale under its tan and then flush bright red.

Michael smiled grimly. “The CCTV has its uses after all. Did you know there’s one by the lockers?”

All eyes were still on Holly.

“Why would you do that to Vân Ước?” asked Billy.

“For a laugh,” Holly said.

“You have a very ugly sense of humor,” someone said. It was Vân Ước. She’d said it out loud! She was gathering some looks of approval.

Holly walked out.

Michael wasn’t looking happy, but grimly satisfied.

“Thank you,” said Vân Ước.

“Yeah, good work, man,” said Billy. “Did you hack the CCTV file?”

Michael smiled enigmatically. “I didn’t need to.” He looked at Vân Ước. “Holly knew what was written on the tag, but you never told her what it said. I was just waiting for the right opportunity to denounce her.”

Vân Ước wondered about the coincidence of weather; rain was the only reason Michael was putting up with the common room noise to eat his lunch on this particular day. What would she be feeling right now, and what would be the consequences, had the day been fine and her confession heard? Not only had he saved her from possible expulsion, he’d also managed to exonerate her from Holly’s false charges in such a satisfyingly public way.

And for once, she’d managed to speak up.

She met Billy on the way out of school, after his session with the principal and Ms. King, and he walked a little way with her, debriefing.

Michael had got off lightly. He had a perfect record. He wasn’t a natural fit at school, but he put up with everything either stoically or, where possible, by taking the absentminded path of least resistance, not interested in exercising teenage rebellion, exerting his preference not to take part in certain activities in ways that were acceptable to the school. He was reprimanded. He apologized with apparent sincerity, and left. No punishment. She was touched that he had exploited his perfect record for her sake.

But Billy was another story. He was way down at the other end of the behavior scale. In fact, he was Mr. Final Warning. He was disrespectful to teachers. This wasn’t his first elaborate prank, and, according to Dr. Dryden, Billy had to learn that these pranks he considered to be so funny wasted valuable time and upset people.

He had been late more than a few times to rowing training as well as missing the lunchtime ergo today, and had already been the subject of conversation between Dr. Dryden and the rowing coach. They weren’t prepared to be lenient anymore.

Billy’s behavior, according to Dr. Dryden, was defiant, complacent, and arrogant. Didn’t Billy realize that there were other able rowers who were very motivated to make the first eight, who would turn up punctually, who would respect their fellow crew members?

“I’m so fucking sick of everything,” said Billy. “I just want the world to go away so I can spend some time with you.”

This was not comforting, nor was it romantic, as he had perhaps intended it to be, and it made resolving the wish investigation even more pressing. What if his “fascination” with her was at the expense of all the things that were formerly and should perhaps still be really important to him, like rowing? Was she unwittingly warping his worldview? Messing with his whole life trajectory? She didn’t want that kind of power.

“What did you say to Dr. Dryden?”

“Well—I probably shouldn’t have said what I said.”

She had to push him.

“Dryden threatened me. He said if I put even one hair out of place, I’d be off the crew.”

“And?”

“And I said, Consider me off the crew, then, because odds are I’ll have more than one hair out of place before too long.”

“And?”

“And then I didn’t say, Fuck you and fuck school—there’s restraint for you. I just walked out.”

“You didn’t!”

“It felt… great.”

“But you love rowing.”

“I have loved it, but I’ve been thinking about it since we talked on Friday—and, no kidding, this feels like a weight off. It’s just got so intense. Too important. And the Brown thing—sure, kudos, but do I really want years more of it? Right now—no. So, stand back and wait for the shit to start pouring down.”

“Did he call your parents?”

“He will have spoken to them by the time I get home.” Billy pulled the buzzing phone out of his pocket. “Yeah, right on cue: Mum, Dad, and no doubt they’ll get Harry—my sister—to call, too, but she’s in Boston, so I’ve got a few hours’ reprieve. Full family disapproval coming my way.” Billy kissed Vân Ước. “Wish me luck.”

“Luck. Will you call me?”

“Yep.”

He walked off, looking back with a rueful smile. She blew him a quick kiss and walked home alone, chewing it all over. She, enthralled with Billy though she was, had no wish for the world to go away. She was just hoping he could be fitted into the few spaces she had between all her other commitments. Maybe there’d be a time, sometime, when the other stuff would be finished and, sure, then she’d happily see the world disappear for a while.