Ashton laughed. The sound mingled with the echo of his footfall and trickled hollowly to where I stood. ‘Since when did you start using my name as an insult?’
Since you started acting this way, I thought, but said nothing out loud. I knew it wasn’t true. He hadn’t changed, at least not much. The problem wasn’t what he did but what Ididn’tdo.
I had forgotten how to fit in. With my family, my world, my… life. And I had no one but myself to blame. A part of me had slipped through my fingers. The shard that had bound me in some fundamental way to Ashton and the others.
I knew he felt it, too. It was why he kept insisting all the more resolutely that we stick together, planning one evening after another. ‘Give it time’, he’d said the other day, patting my shoulder reassuringly. ‘Tempus curat omnia.’ As I turned to go, his words came back to me.Tempus curat omnia. Time heals all.
Wherever that lost part of me had gone, I wasn’t going to find it here. And although I didn’t dare say so in front of Ashton, I doubted time would make much difference.
Chapter5
Mabel
The Cam was criss-crossed by bridges, and in summer there was an endless stream of punts passing underneath. Zoe had talked me into doing a tour with her during freshers’ week, even though I wasn’t particularly keen on water. In the end, though, I had to admit it was worth it. Being carried past the colleges, seeing all the students sitting on the banks, letting my fingertips graze the slate-blue water and the low-hanging bellies of the bridges–it lent the university an even greater magic.
At night, however, I found it hard to see anything more than a chilling warning in the black river. Perhaps, in part, it was the people. It wasn’t just their presence there. In summertime, themeadows around the Cam were crowded well into the evening. But in autumn, most of the students retreated to thepubs in town. It was also themannerof their presence. Most of the bridges were on college grounds, and students weren’t usually allowed to gather there after dark. Parties would be rudely broken up by the porters.
Just like the week before, however, these students didn’t seem to care. There were fewer than last time, about fifteen or so, but they made no effort to be quiet. Or inconspicuous. A speaker was playing somewhere, Edith Piaf’s voice drifting out across the water.
As Zoe and I stepped onto Clare Bridge, my eyes were drawn to the riverbank below. A group of students were sitting on the grass, which must surely still be damp with rain. Four of them were distinctly underdressed. While I was shivering in my layers–shirt, sweater dress and coat–they weren’t even wearing jackets. Only two of them had pulled the sleeves of their coats down over their hands, their rapt faces turning from one host to another.
I grimaced. I knew that look. It was the same one that appeared on Zoe’s face as soon as we laid eyes on Ashton, standing halfway across the bridge. We were late, because Zoe had kept changing her outfit. I had simply reapplied my lipstick: a deep, gleaming red called ‘Deep Wish’–ironic, because my only wish was to get through the evening in one piece. Davie’s words kept playing in my head, overlaying the scene with a dismal grey pall. I had no idea what he’d meant when he said these people were ‘bad news’, but I was feeling in pretty bad shape myself by the time we reached them.
‘There you are.’ Ashton drew Zoe into a half-hug, planting a kiss on her cheek.
Even in the dark I could see her blushing. I was only half-listening as she explained why we were late, my eyes sweeping across the people gathered on the bridge. A couple of them I thought I vaguely recognised, although I couldn’t put names to the faces. Well, only two. I felt a tiny stab of disappointment, and despised myself for it. I folded my arms and took a step closer to the balustrade. On the bank below, a few party-goers were dangling their feet in the water–just watching them made my own toes feel like ice.
The girl next to Ashton was pouring herself a glass of wine. ‘Every time I come here I feel like the whole thing is about to collapse beneath our feet. I mean, when was this even built? Like in the 1800s?’
‘1638,’ I corrected her automatically. ‘Clare Bridge is the oldest surviving bridge in Cambridge.’
Zoe smiled at me in a way that made me feel embarrassed. ‘Told you she was smart.’
The girl twisted a finger in her black bob, murmering something that sounded a lot like ‘smart-arse, you mean’, but it barely registered. I’d been called a lot of names in my life, and ‘smart-arse’ or ‘know-it-all’ were among the more polite ones.
Zoe’s eyes narrowed, but I broke in before she could say anything. ‘So… your event’—I cleared my throat to get rid of the gooseflesh—‘it’s taking place on a bridge, is it?’
The girl surveyed the run in my tights, then the fraying hem of my coat. ‘Would you feel more comfortableunderthe bridge?’
I almost let out a groan. Not because she’d hit a nerve–‘poor’ was also one of the more pleasant words I’d been called over the course of my life–but because I knew not everybody present would take it lying down. As if on cue, a jolt ran through Zoe’s body, and she took a step forward. ‘Excuse me?’
I reached for her hand, trying to defuse the situation. ‘It’s fine, leave it.’
‘No.’ She tore her hand away, still bearing down on the girl. I didn’t know anybody else for whom loyalty was so closely intertwined with impulsivity. ‘If she’s got a problem with you then she’s got a problem with me.’
‘Hey, relax. I don’t have a problem with your friend.’ The girl shot me a look that added:She’s not worth the effort.
Zoe planted a hand on her hip. ‘Oh, really? Because I could have sworn that being around someone three times cleverer than you are was making you feel threatened.’
Now it was the girl’s turn to take a step forward. ‘Are you calling me stupid? That’s a bold thing for a naïve kid like you to say,moth.’
Soft creases furrowed Zoe’s brow. ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’
‘Enough, Clementine.’ Ashton gave her a warning look. ‘Behave yourself.’
‘You forget–you’re not in a position to order everybody else around,’ she replied dryly. Her eyes darted from Zoe’s face to mine, before she turned away and stalked off.
Ashton ran a hand over Zoe’s tense shoulders, bringing it to rest on the back of her neck. I thought of predators grabbing their prey by the scruff, and suddenly I felt queasy again. ‘Sorry about that,’ he said, once Clementine was out of earshot. ‘My friends can be a bit weird about meeting new people. They don’t mean any harm.’
