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“WHAT A FINE FELLOW is Quincey! He bore himself through it like a moral Viking. If America can go on breeding men like that, she will be a power in the world indeed.”
Bram Stoker, Dracula
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THE FOLLOWING DAY DAWNED a bright and sunny spring morning. The whole school seemed in chaos, as it was a Saturday and the last day of term. Parents weren’t supposed to pick up their offspring until after four p.m. or on the Sunday morning, but quite a few had turned up early to watch the First Fifteen Team play a rugby match at three p.m. that afternoon.
Grace, Rose, Sophie and Diana met up with Alex and Leo in the West Tower Common Room and then the six of them walked together down to the school playing field. They were all muffled up warmly in the weak sun. Standing around on the edge of the pitch for eighty minutes in early April would get very chilly after a while.
Grace in particular was freezing. She wore two jumpers and a puffer jacket, but despite the hard chill in the air she had also donned the yellow and green kilt as promised. She wore it with thick black tights and an extra pair of socks under knee-high boots, but she could definitely feel the cold wind around the top half of her legs. She wished the skirt was made of wool like a traditional Scottish kilt, rather than just being a fashion item made of cotton. The silk lining inside did absolutely nothing to help either. She jumped up and down a few times to keep her circulation up.
A great cheer went through the crowd as the home team jogged onto the pitch. A more muted cheer followed as Clifton came out behind them. In rugby it was considered bad form to heckle the opposing team, and tries and conversions scored by either side were supposed to be applauded equally; not that they were, of course.
Beatrice and Jenna joined the spectators, right next to the West Tower group.
“Good luck, Ben,” Jenna shouted, with a side glance at Grace.
Torrin Frazer gave Sophie a little wave before taking his seat on the bench, then both teams lined up for kick-off.
Half an hour into the game, the scores were level, but it was obvious Compass Court had the advantage. Jerry Doury and his brother Ralph, who was in Year Thirteen, made up the formidable front row along with Dave Larimore, and their combined weight was obviously significantly more than Clifton, as they pushed their pack over time and again. But the grass was slippery from all the recent rain, and ball handling was clearly difficult for both teams.
The Compass Court supporters began to roar as Rohit Mehra took the ball up the centre, and made it almost the full length of the pitch before anyone caught up to tackle him. Rohit flicked the ball out to Owen Lang, and it should have been an easy Try for Compass, but Owen fumbled his catch and dropped it for the third time in a row. Everyone collectively groaned as it bounced over the touchline.
As both teams took their places for a lineout, Coach Webley called Owen off and put Torrin in as his replacement.
Everyone clapped Owen politely, as he stamped off to the bench looking livid.
The effort on the pitch ramped up as it drew close to half-time. Clifton were now leading by three points after a penalty kick and Compass were giving it their all to level the score.
Jerry caught a long kick and began a slow but steady move down the field. He didn’t try to run around the opposition but instead smashed straight through them, leaving a trail of dazed players behind him. An enormous Cliftonian finally brought him down only yards from the try line and Jerry spun the ball recklessly behind him, unable to check if he had any support. Putting on a burst of speed, Torrin picked it out of the air and flung himself over the line, sliding across the grass on his stomach as he hit the ground with forward momentum.
Jasper Clements converted the try as the whistle blew, and Compass finished the first half four points up.
Sophie screamed and jumped up and down, madly blowing kisses to Torrin.
Beatrice felt dreadfully sorry for Owen, who was clearly gutted that Torrin had scored. She bravely gave him a wave, but he just looked even more grumpy and turned away.
Grace watched Ben walk back to the changing rooms with a slight limp. He was sweaty and covered in mud, but she thought he’d never looked more gorgeous.
The second half was a mess. The wet pitch had been churned up so much in the first half that the players kept slipping over. Each time the ball went wild a maul would ensue and there were lots of injuries. Nate Naverly swore profusely as his handsome face became the recipient of a firm boot print, and Owen was called back off the bench as Rohit pulled a hamstring, an injury which looked incredibly painful.
With ten minutes to go and no further points scored, both teams began to get tired and desperate.
A scrum was organised on the half-way line and both sides heaved against each other. Mud flew and the scrum became a ruck. Ben, playing flanker, disappeared under a mass of bodies as players piled on; the ball was nowhere in sight and the referee madly blew the whistle.
As the players got to their feet it became obvious something was wrong. Coach Webley ran on to the pitch and everyone moved back.
Ben was lying on the ground unconscious.
Grace gave a scream, her hand flew to her mouth, and without thinking she ran onto the pitch.
“Grace, stop!” Rose yelled, grabbing her arm. “You can’t, sweetie. Just wait a minute. He’ll be alright.” Grace realised what she was doing and nodded. Rose led her back to the others.
Jenna tilted her head to one side looking at Grace. “Thought so,” she said.
Grace gave her a look of pure loathing, but Jenna had turned back to the pitch. Two men ran on with a stretcher and lifted Ben on to it. He sat up looking confused. Grace breathed a huge sigh of relief.
Ben tried to get off the stretcher but the coach could be heard shouting right across the field, “Are you mad? Of course you can’t play on, you were knocked unconscious, for Pete’s sake! Take him into the gym.”
Everyone cheered as the stretcher was carried off the field and Ben lay there waving like the Queen.
Grace bit her lip, looking from Ben to Jenna.
Jenna took pity on her. “Come on, we’ll both go.”
Grace looked uncertain but Rose gave her a push in the back. “Tell him we hope he’s okay.” Rose smiled encouragingly.
Grace nodded and followed Jenna towards the gym.
As Grace walked into the gym, she saw Ben was sitting up, and grinned with weak relief.
“Hey, gorgeous,” said Jenna. Grace stopped smiling.
Jenna sat down next to Ben and stroked the hair off his forehead. “That’s quite some bump you’ve got there.”
Grace shifted awkwardly from foot to foot. “I’ll go,” she said, “I just wanted to make sure you were alright.”
“No, wait,” said Jenna. Turning to Ben she continued, “Guess what Grace did when you were knocked out? She ran onto the pitch.”
Grace was mortified. How could Jenna expose her like that, what on earth did she have to gain?
“Did you really?” Ben asked, looking at Grace carefully.
Grace wished the ground would just swallow her up. She briefly closed her eyes then nodded. “I was worried about you.”
“Because of the play?” Ben asked cautiously.
Grace considered saying yes. She might have made a fool of herself but she could still bluff it out.
“No,” she said after a long pause, “not because of the play.”
“Because she has feelings for you!” Jenna was triumphant in her revelation. “Come on, Gracie, time to fess up, you do, don’t you?”
Grace considered just walking off, leaving them to their amusement at her feelings. Except that Ben didn’t look amused; he looked anxious. Perhaps all this was as uncomfortable for him as it was for her.
“So what if I do?” she said at last. “Is that what you want to hear, Jenna? Well, go ahead and have a good laugh, I for one have had enough of your silly games, and I thought better of you!” She turned on Ben; tears of humiliation stung her eyes.
“Told you it would work,” Jenna smiled smugly at Ben. “Nothing like a bit of healthy competition to get a girl to admit to herself how she feels.”
“What?” Grace was confused. She looked from Jenna to Ben, sure that she was missing something.
“Sit down, Grace, I’m getting a crick in my neck looking up at you.” Jenna’s voice was firm. “Don’t be mad at Ben, he didn’t want to go along with it, it was all my idea.”
Grace didn’t sit. She still wasn’t sure what was going on, but she couldn’t walk away until she knew. She paced up and down a couple of times, trying to understand what Jenna was saying.
“Please sit down,” Ben reached out and patted the bench next to him. “I really can’t get up just yet, but please don’t leave until we’ve explained.” His voice was nervous. She sat down.
“Let me,” Jenna put her hand over Ben’s. “The thing is, Grace, Ben likes you. More than likes you. He thought you might like him but you clearly weren’t going to do anything about it.”
“Because of Rose,” Ben clarified.
“You knew I liked you?” Grace put her face in her hands with embarrassment.
“I hoped you did. You seemed to go out of your way to see me sometimes.” Ben sounded equally embarrassed.
So much for being subtle in her stalking, Grace inwardly groaned.
“But you asked me if Rose and Leo were serious,” Grace ventured, “I could see how much you still cared for her.”
“Not like that. I was asking because I’m fond of Rose, I couldn’t ask out her best friend if she hadn’t really moved on. She already told me she had, but you still didn’t give me any sign of being interested. You just told me to move on.” Ben sounded almost accusing. “I wasn’t sure if you liked me that much or not.”
“That’s where I came in,” Jenna interjected, “I’d had a row with my boyfriend and was feeling angry. I decided to go and flirt with Ben to boost my self-esteem.”
Grace gave Jenna a nasty look, still not sure that Jenna wasn’t the villain of the piece.
Jenna laughed. “When I found Ben he was all depressed about you. You clearly weren’t ready to admit your feelings, so I thought I might help things along a bit. I explained to Ben that seeing him with someone else might stir you up and get a reaction.”
“Are you saying it was all a charade, for my benefit?” Grace couldn’t quite comprehend it. “What about the time I walked into the costume fitting and you were all over each other?”
“We heard you coming,” Jenna confirmed.
“I think I underestimated your acting skills,” Grace said, still feeling very unfriendly.
“It was no hardship, believe me.” Jenna gave Ben a warm look.
“You are quite some player,” Grace folded her arms defensively.
Jenna shrugged, “You could see it that way, but I’ve been with Nick for over two years. We’re still happily together, by the way. There’s not many who can make it work that long, so I don’t think I’m a player.”
“Well, you made a good game out of me.” Grace got angrily to her feet.
“Oh sit down,” Jenna flapped her hand, unconcerned. “It was my idea. Ben would have done anything to get you to go out with him, and you have to admit it worked; you were like a cat on a hot tin roof and now the two of you have admitted how you both feel you can get on with your relationship.”
Grace conceded that maybe Jenna had a point, if she hadn’t gotten so upset by their flirting then she wouldn’t have shared everything with Rose and got her blessing. Her reservations had always been about Rose. Ben’s too, by the sound of it. What idiots they had been. Grace still wasn’t sure she forgave Jenna just yet, but her anger dissipated and she sat back down.
“Let me get this straight,” she addressed Ben, “you like me, so you flirted with Jenna to try to make me jealous?”
“Um, yes.” Ben smiled weakly, “I thought it was a stupid plan, but Jenna said it would work. Sorry, Jenna,” he added after making her the scapegoat.
Jenna smiled. “I don’t mind, it was quite fun. Though I do owe you an apology, Grace, I’m not really a nasty person, I just thought it would help things along if I goaded you a little.”
Grace blinked a few times, unsure how to take her words.
“Well, I suppose it did help in a roundabout way,” she conceded.
Grace and Ben looked at each other with shy smiles.
Jenna got to her feet. “Well, I’m pretty sure this is my cue to leave.” She started for the door. “And for god’s sake, kiss her before she changes her mind!” she threw over her shoulder to Ben.