But when I get there, the door is closed, and locked.
Desperate, I bang on the door. “Hi, hello, anyone in there?”
There’s no response but I hear the toilet flush.Thank fuck.
I feel beads of perspiration break out over my forehead as I lean my body against the closed door and try to stay conscious and upright. If I fall over or faint — like I did once before when this happened immediately after football training — I don’t think I’d be able to get up and to the toilet in time and that…that doesn’t bear thinking about.
I thump my fist against the door again. “Please, can you hurry up!”
“Are you seriously asking a potentially disabled person to hurry up?” Comes a voice I recognise all too well.
D—.
I want to ask her whatshe’sdoing in the disabled toilet. I want to tell her to hurry the fuck up. I want to scream at her to get out of there now. But my hands are starting to shake and I have to rest my head on the door to steady my suddenly very weak legs.
But then the door moves. I manage to step back and stay standing as D— appears in the doorway.
“Seriously,” she says, still wiping her hands on her blazer. “Should you be using?—”
She stops talking as I push past her and slam the door shut, locking it haphazardly. It feels like a miracle when I crash down on the toilet, my trousers and underwear around my ankles.
And yet, I don’t feel good. Far from it. As my body does what it needs to do, I feel like I’m dying. It’s only becauseI’ve been here before that I know I’ll survive it. It’s only because this is now a regular feature in my life that I know it’s okay to groan and moan when I need to, that in some strange way, it helps. It’s only because it’s happened many times before that I know to wait and wait and wait until many minutes have passed without a spasm or another stab of pain. It’s only because this apparently is my life now that I don’t recoil with every horrific, disgusting noise my body makes.
When I’m done, I flush multiple times. I wash my hands for many minutes and with a lot of soap as if that will cleanse me of the pain and distress and shame. I start to pray that nobody is walking past when I open the door and leave because there isn’t a chance in hell that the smell won’t leave with me.
With my hand on the door’s lock, I take many deep breaths. I glance briefly at the mirror and see a little colour has returned to my cheeks when the last time I looked at my reflection I was ghostly white. Finally, I feel ready.
And when I open the door, I find D— Ravel waiting for me. My shoulders sink as I notice her arms folded with what appears to be impatience, but then I notice her forehead, which is definitely creased with something like concern.
SEVENTEEN
DION
NOW
The room is spinning.Of that I am certain as he stands in front of me, looking down at me with those criminally blue eyes. I should look away from them — even though they’re the colour of the summer sky they are too bright like the sun — but I can’t. I’m starting to think that him holding my gaze is the only thing that is stopping me rotate with the room.
“Did you hear me?” he asks when I don’t do or say anything for a long time.
“I heard you,” I reply, and I also hear an edge in my voice. A sharp edge.
His smile disappears, and who knew such a small change in his facial expression would have the ability to make my heart feel like it’s cracking open.
“But you don’t think it’s a good idea?” he prompts.
I want distance from him. I need space to think and to try and process what he’s just told me.
It was him. The Valentine’s card.
And it wasn’t a joke, when he asked me to the Leavers’ Ball.
Benji Smith liked me. Benji says hereally likedme.
This is revelation enough, but what’s completely throwing me off-balance is the realisation that I liked him too. I liked him then, even if I never admitted it to myself.
And I like him now.
Am I brave enough to admit it to him?
