The Love of My Afterlife(4)

“My god,” Merritt says, pressing a hand to her cheek. “I thought I was a teen nerd, but you are something else! So cute.”

Celine Dion’s “All by Myself” starts to play as the video transitions into a clip of me sitting alone at the dining table of our home—the flat I still live in—in West London. I’m carefully cutting out pictures from the TV Guide magazine and arranging them into collages. At the time I thought my collages were super cool and artistic. I see now they were actually rather odd.

I have all the accoutrements of an awkward teen: the rashy face, the thick glasses, the braces, and a wad of cotton wool poking out of one ear on account of the chronic ear infections I couldn’t seem to shake off. The clips fade into each other—me at the kitchen table making my collages, drawing soap stars, wincing as I put in my eardrops, tucking myself into bed. Night after night.

“Sad.” Merritt shakes her head.

She’s right. It does look sad. It didn’t feel sad at the time, when I was drawing and collaging alone. Did it?

The video melts into my time at Bayswater High School. I shrug off the furry blanket as my entire body immediately goes hot. The back of my head starts to thump.

“Can we fast-forward this bit, please?” I ask, knowing that every single memory of that time is a bad one. Those same memories still keep me awake at night.

“?’Fraid not,” Merritt says. “Once it’s on, it’s on.”

My chest tightens as the screen flickers onto an image of fifteen-year-old me. My skin has cleared up now. The thick jam-jar glasses have been swapped for something lighter, and the braces have successfully straightened out my wonky teeth. My wavy red hair fans out over my shoulders, pretty against the bottle green of Bayswater High’s uniform.

I’m pencil sketching in an empty classroom, occasionally taking bites of the cheese sandwich I’d made myself that morning. And then, there she is. Gen Hartley. My childhood best friend, the girl I loved the most, the primary architect of pretty much all my trauma. She slams into the classroom accompanied by her boyfriend Ryan Sweeting. It’s almost comedic how on the nose they look, Gen with her shiny curtain of golden-coloured hair, thick layers of blue mascara, tiny skirt. Ryan, handsome and tall for his age, wearing the school rugby kit, his blond hair shaved close to his scalp. If this were a teen movie you’d immediately identify them as the mean kids. Although they look smaller on the video than they did back then. Back then they seemed like giants.

“Hey, Delphie!” Gen says sweetly, wandering over to me and pressing both her hands onto my desk. Ryan follows her and swings both arms around her waist. Gen smiles at me. “Me and Ryan had a question and we were hoping you’d help us to answer it.”

“Sure,” I say eagerly, putting down my pencil and pushing my glasses up my nose with a grin. “Is it about the chemistry test? It’s gonna be a tricky one, but I’m happy to help you if you need it. Do you want to borrow my revision notes?”

Gen laughs, a bright xylophone of a laugh tinkling a melody that belies its intention. “Nah, Delphie. Our question is…why is your hair so…GROSS.” She grabs a handful of it. You can see the shock on my face. “Honestly it feels like wire wool. Don’t you even use conditioner?”

My eyes fill with tears as Ryan comes around to the other side of the desk and musses his hand roughly through my hair. “You’re right!” he grunts, wiping his hands on his jeans like they’re covered in dirt. “It’s like pubes.”

Gen shrieks with mirth. I jump up from the desk, the motion making my drawing slide onto the floor. I hurry to pick it up, but Ryan gets there before me. He glances at the picture, his mouth curling up into a nasty grin. “Oh. My. God.”

“Give that back to me.” I reach out to snatch it back, but Ryan dangles it in the air.

Gen gasps, grabbing it from Ryan. “Is that Mr. Taylor?” she squeals. “You’ve drawn Mr. Taylor? Do you fancy him?”

I remember wishing at the time that I was a better liar, but my red cheeks gave it away. Of course I fancied our art teacher. All the girls did. He was gorgeous with his bright blue eyes and spiky hair the colour of toffee. He was kind too, never too busy to talk to me about composition and light and the importance of daily creative practice—a concept I’d never heard of before.

“She does! She’s gone beetroot red. She wants to fuck Mr. Taylor. She wants to fuck him and then afterwards she’ll draw him naked with his willy flopping out.”

I watch from Merritt’s desk chair, my heart pounding thickly the exact same way it had then.

“Ha! No-one will ever fuck Delphie,” Ryan snickers. “Jesus, they’d have to be desperate.”

“Yeah, she’ll probably be a virgin forever,” Gen adds.

“Can…can I have my drawing back now?”

“You can have it back tomorrow,” Gen says as she and Ryan saunter out of the room.

“Please don’t show it to anyone!” I call after her as she leaves, the tears in my eyes now plopping onto my cheeks.

“Promise I won’t!” she singsongs, folding up the paper so that there would be a crease right across Mr. Taylor’s forehead.

Merritt gasps and presses pause on the tape.

“Oh no. She totally showed everyone, didn’t she?”