Bright Young Things (9 page)

‘But . . . ?’ prompts Anne.

‘But, well, with you lot here it’s not very scary, if you know what I mean.’

‘Am I the only one who’s scared then?’ asks Thea.

‘I’m sure we will feel scared,’ says Jamie. ‘You know, when they come.’

‘Maybe no one will come,’ suggests Anne.

‘Will you shut up,’ says Thea. ‘For God’s sake. This isn’t a joke.’

‘I wasn’t joking,’ says Anne.

Jamie’s trying to work out what it is about this place. It shouldn’t be relaxing, but it is. Accepting the fact that they are all trapped here, and that there are no shops or other people or any of that normality, then it sort of seems like a retreat or a health farm or something. And even the trapped feeling isn’t that intense, because they’re not properly imprisoned, and they have the run of this big house and the island. Jamie rubs his legs and tries to stand up. He feels wobbly from the drugs. Once on his feet, his legs feel too heavy to sit back down, so he walks over to the window.

Bryn’s smoking another cigarette, holding his head as if it hurts.

‘Can one of you come with me to the toilet?’ Emily asks Anne and Thea.

Paul laughs. ‘You need someone to go to the toilet with you?’

‘I’m not going upstairs on my own,’ she says.

Thea goes with her.

Outside it looks bright, and it’s probably still hot, although it’s hard to tell with it being so cool inside. There is a small orchard just beyond the window. The apples seem ripe. In fact, Jamie can see that some of them are too ripe and are rotting on the trees. He turns away from the window, crosses the kitchen and walks out into the hall.

‘Where’s he going?’ Bryn asks.

‘Dunno,’ says Paul.

Jamie had noticed a door before, under the stairs, and now he wonders if it’s a cellar door. Maybe there’s something down there, some clue as to what they’re all doing here. The door actually looked like it could be for a cupboard, but Jamie’s house in Cambridge has the same kind of door, and although visitors think it’s a cupboard, it’s a cellar. The door is on a small catch, which Jamie pushes up with his finger. Sure enough, the door opens and there are stairs leading down. It’s dark, and smells damp. Suddenly he’s scared. Maybe the others should come too. He walks back down the hall.

Paul, Anne and Bryn are still in the kitchen. There’s no sign of Emily and Thea.

Jamie clears his throat. ‘There’s a cellar under the stairs,’ he says.

‘A basement?’ says Bryn.

‘Yeah,’ says Jamie. ‘Shall we have a look?’

‘You know what they say about not going into the basement,’ jokes Bryn.

No one laughs. Maybe they think the
Scream
stuff is outdated. Or maybe they’re just more scared than they’re admitting.

It’s impossible to see what’s down there. There’s a light switch at the bottom of the basement stairs, which Anne flicks up and down several times. The clicking sound echoes in the cold room. The light doesn’t come on.

‘It’s busted,’ says Bryn.

‘Must need a new bulb,’ says Jamie.

‘I don’t think it’s going to come on,’ Paul says to Anne, who’s still flicking the switch.

‘There must be some candles somewhere,’ says Anne.

‘Shall I go and have a look?’ offers Jamie.

‘Good idea,’ says Paul.

Jamie doesn’t know where to find candles. He tries the kitchen first, assuming practical things would be kept in there. Then he goes through all the upstairs rooms. Emily and Thea are in one of the bathrooms. Jamie can hear them talking. He’s scared by the idea of two girls talking in a room, but he doesn’t know why. Eventually he finds a box of six candles in the bureau in the sitting room.

Back in the dark basement, Anne is singing something. It’s some pop song Jamie recognises; something he thought was marketed at teens and gay men. He lights one of the candles. He can just see Anne wiggling her small hips, still humming the bassline of the song. What the hell is the name of it? It’s by that American girl, the one in a gymslip. Jamie’s masturbated over pictures of her for God’s sake; you’d think he’d remember her name.

Anne’s voice echoes. Jamie holds up the candle.

‘Are there any more of those?’ asks Paul.

‘What?’

‘Candles.’

‘Yes. There are six.’ Jamie takes the box out of his pocket to show them.

‘Cool,’ says Anne. ‘Can I have one?’

‘I don’t think we should use them all up,’ he says. ‘We might need them.’

‘For what?’ asks Bryn, taking a candle from the box and lighting it.

When Jamie was about twelve, he went through a phase of reading what he called ‘island books’. The story was always basically the same: via a plane crash or a boating accident, a group of people would end up on an uninhabited island, having to survive against the odds. Someone would make a play for the role of leader – usually the coarsest, brashest person – but the heroic, quiet guy whom everyone respected would challenge him and ultimately lead everyone to victory over whatever obstacle was in the way.

Jamie wishes this was more like that.

Bryn’s gone on ahead with candle number two.

‘Hey, look at this,’ he calls.

The other three walk to where he is, by the far wall. The two candles illuminate a single bed. It’s rather more basic than the beds upstairs. It has a metal frame, a thin, dirty mattress, and no sheets or pillows.

‘Nice guest room,’ says Anne, wrinkling her nose.

‘This is horrible,’ agrees Paul. ‘Let’s go back upstairs.’

‘It stinks of piss down here. What are you doing?’

Jamie jumps. Emily has emerged from the shadows like a ghost. She’s obviously back from the toilet.

Paul’s walking away from the small bed.

‘What are you doing?’ Bryn asks him.

‘Going back up,’ he says.

The kitchen has become like a base camp, which is good. Jamie wants to suggest sealing the door or something, and formulating a defence strategy for when the kidnappers appear. All everyone else seems to want to do is just sit here. Well, everyone except Anne. She’s gone outside and Jamie can see her through the window. She’s just picked an apple, bitten into it once and thrown it away. Now she’s wandering towards the cliffs.

‘I’m just popping outside,’ he says to the others.

They ignore him. Emily’s giving Thea a pep talk on the importance of not behaving like a victim. Thea’s pointing out that for once she is a victim – specifically a
kidnap
victim – and therefore has every right to act like one. Jamie gets up and walks out of the back door, noticing that no one even looks up. This upsets him. His mother always told him not to worry about what other people think, but he always does.

Anne is sitting cross-legged on the grass.

‘Hello,’ he says, walking towards her.

‘Hey,’ she replies, without looking round.

He sits down next to her.

‘You like the company then?’ he says.

‘Sorry?’

‘That lot back there. Were they annoying you?’

Anne shakes her head. ‘No. They’re all right.’

‘Are you feeling scared?’ he asks.

‘Yeah, terrified,’ says Anne sarcastically.

‘So . . . ?’

She fiddles with her daisy chain. ‘What?’

‘What are you doing out here?’ Jamie asks.

‘Nothing. What about you?’

‘I’m, uh . . .’

‘They’re pissing
you
off, right?’

‘Not really,’ he says.

‘So you came out here to try to seduce me?’

Jamie blushes. ‘Of course not! How can you say that?’

Anne laughs. ‘I’m a virgin. We have special powers.’

‘You’re . . . Oh, never mind.’

As if a girl like Anne would be a virgin.

He pulls a packet of Marlboro out of his pocket. ‘Do you want a cigarette?’

‘No.’

‘Do you smoke?’

‘No.’

‘Do you hate me?’

She looks at him with her big brown eyes. ‘Of course not. Why would I?’

‘Because I’m a geek.’

She laughs. ‘A geek? What do you mean?’

Jamie sighs. ‘Never mind.’

‘Seriously. Are you into computers and stuff?’

‘No. I did maths at university.’

‘That’s cool. But really that makes you a nerd rather than a geek.’

‘Thanks,’ he says.

‘There’s nothing wrong with being a nerd.’

‘Yeah, right.’

‘I love nerds.’

‘Do you?’

She wrinkles her nose, as if giving the question a lot of thought. ‘Not really.’

‘Oh.’

She smiles. ‘I suppose they’re OK.’

‘Thanks.’

She studies him. ‘So, maths is pretty cool, right?’

‘Are you taking the—’

‘No.’ She shakes her head. ‘I love numbers,’ she explains.

‘I don’t.’

‘What?’ she asks.

‘Love numbers. I hate them.’

‘But you’re a mathematician.’

‘Yes, well, kind of.’

‘And you hate numbers?’

‘Yes.’

‘Wow,’ she says. ‘That is the coolest thing I’ve heard all day.’

‘What, hating what you do?’

‘No, I guess . . . just working with something as abstract as numbers but secretly hating them. Or even having the capacity to hate something like a number. I bet all the other nerds love them.’

‘I suppose they do.’

‘It’s like being an astronomer and hating planets.’

‘Mmm.’ He’s not that sure where she’s coming from.

They sit there for a few moments, watching the sea crash about below them.

Jamie’s still trying to feel like he’s been kidnapped. The weird basement helped.

‘So do you think zero is a number?’ asks Anne suddenly.

‘Sorry?’

‘Zero. Is it a number?’

‘Yes and no.’ Jamie rubs his legs. ‘You can say it is, because you use it as a number within number systems. Or at least, you use it in the same way as a number. For example, in the number 507, the zero acts like a number. It signifies that there aren’t any tens in the number, just hundreds and units. On the other hand, because the whole concept of zero is for it to indicate the absence of a number, it can’t really be one.’

‘Don’t you want to know what I think?’

‘Um, yeah, OK, if you find it that interesting.’

‘I think that zero isn’t a number.’

‘Great.’ He’d rather talk about something else, like escaping.

‘Do you want to know why?’

‘OK.’

Anne smiles. ‘People say that zero is the opposite of one, right?’

Jamie nods. ‘I suppose so.’

‘Because one is presence and zero is absence.’

‘That’s the idea,’ he says.

‘But it’s really minus one, though, isn’t it?’

‘What is?’

‘The opposite of one. If the opposite of something is its absolute reverse, like its image in a mirror or whatever, then the opposite of one must be minus one. Zero just sits between them both and gives them meaning. So I think that zero isn’t a number. I think zero is God.’

‘What did you do at university?’ Jamie asks.

‘English and philosophy,’ says Anne.

He smiles. ‘So I expect zero has a philosophical application?’

‘Yeah, in psychoanalysis, where the self is represented by one, and the other by minus one. The zero is the mirroring point and therefore the point of separation. It is also the point of identification, alienation and otherness.’

‘Where did you read that?’

‘I didn’t. I made it up.’ She smiles. ‘Do you still hate numbers?’

‘Of course,’ says Jamie.

‘What about zero?’

‘Zero’s all right,’ he concedes. ‘But then, it isn’t really a number.’

When Thea was in the Lower Sixth, there was a group of kids in the Upper Sixth who were really cool. They had these parties that you only got invited to if you were a real somebody, and although they knew the whole Lower Sixth because they all shared the sixth-form common room, only six or seven of them ever got invited. It was always the same lot: the corrupt Form President, the girl with the schizophrenic mother, the guy who always smoked dope in the common room, the girl who was admitted to hospital for overdosing on Pro Plus, and so on.

Thea never got invited. Maybe that was why she hated them.

Or maybe it was their sense of humour. Two guys in particular – Henry and Kenickie (Grease fan – how cool and ironic) – always upset her, however hard she tried not to let them get to her. She’d try to be friendly towards them, but conversations always went the same way. Thea would say something like, ‘All right?’, and they’d say, ‘Yeah, cool,’ or something like that. Then she’d ask if they’d seen Sasha or Mary or whoever she was trying to find. Thea remembers that sixth form was all about trying to find someone. You never went around on your own; you were always trying to find someone.