The Secret Place полностью

‘I’ll sub you,’ Holly says, spiking the last ball at the bag and missing. ‘It’s not like I’m going to get any shopping in this weekend anyway.’

‘I want to rub it in, though. That smug bastard.’ Julia has just noticed how much she’s looking forward to seeing Finn.

‘He’ll be at the debating next week.’

For a second Julia considers going to the social on her own, but no. ‘I know, yeah. I’ll catch him then.’

They give the courts one more scan, and head off. ‘Water,’ Julia says, as they pass the tap by the gate, and peels off from the other three. Up ahead, Ms Waldron calls, ‘Chop-chop, girls! Hup, two, three, four, march!’ The others drift on, Becca spinning in circles swinging the bag of volleyballs, leaving Julia to catch up.

She drinks out of her hand, splashes her face and her neck. The water is underground-cold and gives her a quick, pleasurable shiver. A stream of geese pour overhead, honking, and Julia squints up to see them against the clouds.

She’s turning away from the tap when the Daleks march up. Joanne stops right in front of Julia, folds her arms and stares. The other three fan out and stop one step behind Joanne, fold their arms and stare.

They’re blocking Julia in. None of them say anything.

Julia says, ‘Are we doing something? Or is this it?’

Joanne’s lip curls – Julia figures she thinks it makes her look superior, but if she did it in front of a mirror just once, she’d never do it again. She says, ‘Don’t show off.’

Julia says, ‘Bored already.’

Joanne’s pale flat stare gets paler and flatter. Julia remembers – amused, like it was a different person, some small silly cousin – how a few months ago that stare would have had her zinging adrenaline.

Joanne says, ominously, ‘We want to talk to you.’

‘They talk?’ Julia enquires, nodding at the rest of them. ‘I thought they were your robot bodyguards.’

Orla does an outraged noise, and Gemma throws Joanne a slantwise look. Joanne’s face is pinching up. She says, tight as spitting, ‘You tell that fat slut Selena to stay away from Chris Harper.’

Which is not what Julia was expecting. ‘Loser say what?’

‘Don’t act innocent. We know all about it.’ Nods from the robots.

Julia leans back against the wire fence and blots water off her face with the neck of her T-shirt. She’s starting to enjoy herself. This is the problem with hoovering up gossip the way the Daleks do: every now and then, you’re going to end up having an eppy over something totally imaginary. ‘What do you care what Selena does?’

‘That’s not your problem. Your problem is to make sure she backs off, before she ends up in big trouble.’

Obviously this is meant to be terrifying. More impressive nods; Alison even says, ‘Yeah,’ and then cringes.

‘You fancy Chris Harper,’ Julia says, grinning.

Joanne’s chin jams out at a furious angle. ‘Excuse me, if I fancied him, I’d be going out with him? Not that it’s any of your business.’

‘Then why do you care what Selena does with him?’

‘Because. Everyone knows Chris Harper wouldn’t even look at someone like her if she wasn’t letting him do it to her. He is way out of her league. She needs to go find some spotty dickhead like Fintan Whatshisname who’s always drooling at her.’

Julia laughs, a real laugh, spontaneous, bubbling up towards the hanging grey cloud. ‘So you’re here because she’s getting uppity and she needs putting back in her place? Seriously?’

The more furious Joanne gets, the more bits of her stick out – elbows, tits, arse – and the uglier she gets. ‘Um, wake up and smell the coffee? We’re doing you a favour. You seriously think a guy like Chris is actually going to go out with a mess like Selena? Hello? The second he gets bored of shagging her, he’s going to dump her flat on her fat backside and send dirty photos to all the guys. Tell her to leave him alone or she’ll be sorry.’

Julia takes a swig of water and wipes drops off her chin. She’d love to bounce Joanne around for a while and then leave – Joanne is almost too easy to play with, once you notice that you’re not afraid of her – but if she doesn’t squash this before it takes off, they’ll be stuck with the Daleks going after them for weeks, maybe months, maybe years, needling on and on like a cloud of mosquitoes till Julia’s head blows off from the overload of stupid. ‘Chill,’ she says. ‘You need better quality tattletales. Selena wouldn’t go near that wanker if you paid her.’

Joanne snaps – she’s getting shrill – ‘OhmyGod, you are such a liar. Do you think we’re stupid?’

Julia raises her eyes to the thickening sky. ‘What, you think I’m saying it to make you happy? Newsflash: I don’t give a fuck if you’re happy or not. I’m just telling you. Selena doesn’t even like Chris. She’s hardly even talked to him. Whatever you heard, it’s crap.’

‘Em, Gemma actually saw them? Totally wrapped around each other? So unless you want to try and convince me that Gemma’s actually blind-’

Then Joanne sees something in Julia’s face.