I cleaned myself up as best I could in the toilets, all the time knowing I could get rid of the smell, but I would never rid myself of the humiliation. No matter how hard I scrubbed.
The door of the toilets squeaked open and I held my breath. Was this someone else to torment me? I dried my eyes quickly with a paper towel and swung round to face whoever it was.
It was Diane.
She stood at the door, one foot casually crossed over the other, her arms folded, just staring at me.
Diane hadn’t been one of those at the school gates, but was she going to throw something at me now? I couldn’t have borne that.
‘You’re in a mess,’ she said. She kept staring at me. The suspense was awful. What was she going to do? Finally she let out a long sigh. ‘You didn’t tell on me, did you?’
‘Of course I didn’t,’ I said at once.
And then she smiled. Or did the sun come out? At that moment they seemed like one and the same thing.
‘I knew you wouldn’t.’ She came toward me and started brushing down my blazer. ‘Well, that should prove to you the kind of people who are in this school. Not our kind of people at all.’
She linked her arms in mine. ‘Come on. We’ll show them. We don’t need people like that.’ She laughed loudly and wrinkled her nose in disgust. ‘Scum of the earth.’
Everything was all right again. Diane was still my friend.
And did I need her! Because no one else was talking to me. As we walked along the corridor, anyone we passed turned away from me. They hardly looked, they never smiled. That was to be my punishment. Every one of the pupils in the school was a part of it. No one was to talk to me. I was to be ignored. ‘Sent to Coventry’ I believe is the stupid expression.
I didn’t care. I had Diane. We walked to each of our classes, arms linked, while she whispered insults about them all and made me giggle.
Murdo’s class was the one I was dreading most and as we filed in they all turned from me one by one.
Murdo was at his desk, and despite my efforts I was still in a mess.
‘What on earth happened to you?’
I sensed they were all waiting for me to tell on them. They were expecting it. I hesitated, wanting them to worry for a bit.
‘There’s such a lot of rubbish in this school, it’s very hard to avoid rubbing against it.’
Diane giggled, and so did I. The rubbish I was referring to was the rest of my class.
He didn’t answer that. He knew what had happened. He most probably thought I had got everything I deserved.
What surprised me was that he didn’t mention the collage or me, or Ralph Aird. He went through his lesson as he always did and when the bell rang he dismissed us. All of us except Diane and me. He motioned to us to stay behind and we stood at his desk while everyone else filed out.
‘Why me?’ Diane mouthed. I shrugged. After everyone had left he closed the door quietly and came back to where we stood at his desk.
‘What you did to Ralph Aird was despicable, Lissa. But I know you weren’t alone.’ His angry eyes turned to Diane. ‘And you’re too much of a coward to even admit it. Well, I’m going to tell you thisss, Misssy!’ Now his spit was directed on Diane. She sucked in her cheeks and I could see how angry she was too.
‘You don’t have the right to reprimand me. I haven’t done any –’
Murdo’s hands gripped the desk lid and I saw his knuckles grow white. ‘Don’t you dare interrupt me, girl!’ And with that he lifted the lid and smashed it down so hard even the glass in the windows shuddered. ‘I want you both to know that I will be watching your every move from now on. Now get out of my sight before I get really angry.’
I didn’t want to see him really angry. So I was off, pulling Diane behind me.
‘I hate that man!’ Diane said as soon as we were safely out in the playground. She was shaking with fury.
I was angry too. ‘I hate him as well.’ He would never let me forget what I’d done, and I hated him for that.
Diane pulled me round to face her and stared so hard at me that I blinked. ‘No, Lissa. You don’t understand. I really hate that man.’
And she said it with such venom I was afraid.
Chapter Twelve
May 10th
Here I am writing in my diary again when I swore I never would. But I have to. I don’t know why but writing things down seems to make them clearer to me. And so much is happening. Only now, I’ll keep my diary well hidden. I won’t ever risk J.B. finding it again.
He’s been acting very suspiciously, since the business with me which he caused, no one could deny that, and not getting that job, which I also got the blame for by the way. He also lost his job in Burgers A GoGo. He didn’t fit in, the manager had told him. I could have told him that ages ago. He’s ancient compared to the other waiters. He’s just been moping around the house since then. I heard Mum trying to talk to him the other morning before she went off to work. Her voice was filled with worry. Snatches of, ‘You can’t go on like this.’ And, ‘Something else will turn up.’ And most significantly, ‘You can’t go on blaming yourself.’