When we were silent, p.3
When We Were Silent, page 3
Sister Mullen, the English teacher, sits upright at the podium, white hair tucked into a dark gray veil. The way she looks out over the girls, beaked nose in the air, it’s not that she’s better than them, I think she wants me to know she’s one of them. Isn’t that the whole point of this place, that everyone knows it? Sure, why else would you spend so much money? Luckily, I am on a scholarship, so I don’t have to pretend to be on their level. I’m on the floor, blowing smoke up their skirts.
You’d swear they were saints, with their “moral values” and “inclusive ethos.” But beyond the braids of rain that trickle down the sash windows, past the tennis and netball courts, I see the cedars that shroud the grotto, a sacred shrine and the scene of Highfield’s summer scandal. Róisín Tunney, a third-year swimming champion, just fifteen years of age as she gave birth under the statue of the Blessed Virgin. They’d have kept it all quiet, only she was found by a visiting tennis player from rival Fairfield Grove and rumor has it you can’t trust those sneaky cows as far as you can throw them. Needless to say, Róisín hasn’t been welcomed back for fourth year.
I’m trying to suss out the lay of the land when Sister Mullen raises her hand for silence and the last few stragglers find their seats. She nods at me to begin and, in the hush, I’m half paralyzed by the glare of expectation and the smell of 4711 cologne. I focus on a lonely crucifix splayed across the back wall, a naked metal Jesus hanging from a wooden cross.
“I’m Louise Manson and I’m going to be here for sixth year.”
Sister Mullen rotates her hand impatiently and I shrug like I don’t understand.
“Tell us a bit more about yourself, Louise.”
“Like what?”
There are a few sniggers, and the aggro gives me something to work with. I throw side-eye across the room as if I’m the boss up here.
“Like where you come from and how many brothers and sisters you have.”
“I’m from Ballybrack and I have zero brothers and zero sisters.”
Whispers ripple across the back row and a hand goes up.
“Yes, Carol?” says Sister Mullen.
Carol has the look of someone who uses her cheekbones as currency. She’s smiling sweetly but I’ve known enough Carols not to believe it.
“Where’s Ballybrack?”
I look at Sister Mullen, but she’s waiting for me to answer.
“It’s beside Loughlinstown … Carol,” I say.
The hand is up again.
“Carol?”
“Where’s Loughlinstown?”
There’s a flitter of laughter around the room and it takes me a few seconds to realize it’s a badge of pride that they don’t know the working-class areas of their own city. I want to tell Carol where to go but Mam has warned me to keep my head down. She knows these people, grew up with them, she says. Before I came along and dragged her down to my bastard level.
“It’s near Killiney, isn’t it?”
At the end of the front row is a face I know from the school brochure: pale blue eyes and sun-kissed skin, white-blonde hair tied back in a high ponytail. Shauna Power, Highfield’s star swimmer and Olympic hopeful. She’s wearing the dark purple sash and implicit confidence of a prefect and she’s throwing me a bone.
“Thank you, Shauna,” says Sister Mullen.
I give Shauna a grateful smile and I’m edging away from the front of the class when another hand goes up, a girl next to Carol with thick wire braces and a fit of the giggles.
“Stephanie?” says Sister Mullen.
“Is it Lou-eez or Lou-wee-uz?”
I wonder if she has a hearing problem, or if the acoustics of the room have distorted my voice in transit. But the smirk unfolding on her lips leaves no room for doubt. I turn to Sister Mullen to protest, and I swear I see a conspiratorial glance flash between them.
“Give it a rest, Stephanie.” It’s the girl beside Shauna, all dimples and ringlets like a Billie Barry kid, and I wonder what her deal is.
“Melissa,” says Sister Mullen, “can you please watch your tone?”
“What?” says Melissa. “Me and not her?”
The three of them eye each other in a Mexican stand-off and you could hear a pin drop.
“It’s actually Lou,” I say. “I hope that’s simple enough for you.”
As I walk past Melissa to the spare desk behind her, she says, “Ignore Carol, she’s a bitch.”
When I think about everything that happened, when I wonder what I could have done differently, I always come back to this moment, the crumb Melissa threw that I devoured.
* * *
HIGHFIELD SITS ON A HILL of the same name, looking down on the rest of Dublin. It’s the sort of school that expects everyone to know it by reputation and, to be fair, I did. After all the trouble at my old school, Mam was ecstatic when I suggested repeating sixth year at Highfield. In a rare burst of optimism, she filled out forms and went to meetings. I did the tests and we both went to the interview and pretended to be devout Catholics, and they must have believed us, or else my results were too good to turn down. Whatever it was, I got a scholarship and Mam got a break.
I’m not sure what I expected. That it would be like my old school only grander? That I’d be left alone to observe from a distance? It’s not just the dim corridors with their dark wood paneling and checkered floor tiles, or the clocktower turret that rises into the clouds. Everything at Highfield is shade and shadow, forged by hidden hierarchies and unspoken rules as much as granite pillars and cedar boughs. Even the prefects, their privilege worn across their chests, are evidence of an inner circle within the elite. One that would never be open to me. But I haven’t come for any of that. I don’t want to stand up or stand out. I’m at Highfield to watch and listen and bide my time, until I’m ready to pounce.
I’m not here for prestige. I’m here for revenge.
6
We’re in the locker room getting changed for PE and Melissa’s making a show of chatting to me, and I’m happy enough to be a pawn in her power struggle with Carol and Stephanie and their bitch friends.
“So, where did you go to school before?” she asks.
Rich kids always wanted to know where you went to school. Tell me your school so I can know who you are. She couldn’t begin to imagine.
“Santa Maria.”
“Oh, which one?” says a girl with large welts of acne across her chin and forehead. “My cousin goes to Donnybrook.”
“I’m guessing it’s not Donnybrook,” says Melissa, “seeing as you live in Ballybrack.” She hoists her blouse over her head to reveal the sort of lace bra you’d see on a model.
“Where’s Ballybrack?” asks the girl.
“God, Aisling, it’s near Killiney,” says Melissa, rolling her eyes at me. “Don’t you know anything about Dublin?”
“Sor-ry,” says Aisling, rubbing a flake of dried skin from her chin.
“It’s the Sallynoggin one,” I say, yanking my unbranded polo shirt down over a gray-white bra.
At the end of the lockers, Shauna changes discreetly, face to the wall. As she bends over to tie her laces, I stare a moment too long at a narrow scar on her inner thigh, turning away as she catches my eye.
“There was a girl from your school in the swimming club here,” says Aisling. “Tina Forrester, did you know her?”
“Is that the girl who…?” Melissa stops as Aisling glares at her.
“I … I didn’t know her well,” I say, as dismissively as I can.
“So sad,” says Aisling. “She had a real chance at the nationals.”
“She had everything to live for,” I say. I just can’t help myself.
* * *
IT’S STILL RAINING WHEN WE get outside, angry droplets that spit against bare arms and legs. A sullen mist hangs low over the hockey pitches and I’m shivering when I see him. Mr. McQueen, with his feathered fringe and that thick bristle of a mustache, scooting across the pitch as he lays out the marker cones for class. You’d expect him to be taller, larger than life, the legend he’s built for himself. But he’s just a man, like one of the dads from the estate, with his electric-blue Adidas tracksuit and casual swagger. Maybe you’d find him attractive if you were the sort of person who fancied Magnum P.I., but that’s a no from me.
You can’t spend five minutes here without knowing who Maurice McQueen is. He teaches PE at the school and also runs the prestigious Highfield swimming club, and his photo is center stage in the vast echo chamber of the school’s entrance hall. He sent two Highfield swimmers to the LA Olympics two years ago and there’s already an expectation for Seoul in ’88. If you believed the hype, you might think he pissed rivers of gold.
Mr. McQueen’s ordered two laps of the pitches and you’d almost be winded by the batting of eyelids and pleas for clemency. Only Shauna is not amused, starting her run while the laggards are still trying to charm their way out of it. I follow behind, keeping pace with her when Mr. McQueen catches up with me.
“You must be Louise Manson,” he says. “Welcome to Highfield.”
“Thanks.”
“How’s your hockey?”
“I dunno. I’ve never played it.”
“Really? Well, we’ll soon find out,” he says, and he’s off, sprinting ahead to catch Shauna.
Mr. McQueen puts me on the wing, and I spend most of the match minding my own business on the sideline. It’s coming up to the end of class and I’m unmarked when the ball comes shooting toward me. I stop it dead and take off with no particular plan in mind, hurtling down the pitch toward the circle. Melissa’s in goal, looking like she’d rather be anywhere else, so I hammer the ball at her, and she kindly makes no effort to stop it. As the ball glides past her into the net, an unexpected rush of joy lifts my hand above my head and when I turn around I see a chorus of fists in the air behind me.
Afterward, we’re walking back to the sports center, sodden and muck-splattered, when Mr. McQueen calls me back. Shauna gives me the up-down as she passes.
“Is this really your first time playing hockey?” he asks.
“Yeah,” I say. “I mean, I played camogie when I was younger so…”
“It’s a shame we didn’t get our hands on you earlier,” he says, packing the bibs and balls into a large sports bag. “Do you swim?”
I’ve been asked this question at every step of the enrollment process. The answer is no, I don’t even float.
“Well, if you make half the progress you’ve made in one hockey lesson, we’ll have you on a team in no time.”
“I can’t swim,” I say. “I have a perforated eardrum, I’m not allowed in the water.”
He fixes his brown eyes on mine, and I can’t look away.
“Let’s see if we can get that looked at for you.”
* * *
WHEN I GET HOME, I can hear the Countdown clock galloping to a climax from the hall.
“Lou?” says Mam from the living room.
She’s lying on the sofa, lights off, curtains closed, the glow from the telly just enough to catch the flush in her cheeks. With her bleached hair and lace top, she looks more like a brittle Debbie Harry than a thirty-six-year-old council-estate single mother.
“Well?” she says, pushing herself upright.
“Well what?” I’m too tired to play along.
“Ah come on, Lou. How was it?”
“Barter,” I say, looking at the letters on the screen.
“What?”
“No, Rebater. Yes, seven!”
“Very good,” says Mam.
The quiz obsession is her way of holding on to her past self. Even with a few drinks, she can blitz the mental-agility round on The Krypton Factor.
“But tell me, how was school?”
She pats the cushion beside her, but I stay where I am.
“It was fine, I suppose.”
“Is that it?” she says. Her shoulders slump and the guilt slices through me.
“OK, it was great,” I say, sitting beside her. Her breath has a sharp, chemical tang and I know to tread gently. “I played hockey, made some friends and the work was a piece of piss. And I finally met the famous Mr. McQueen.”
“Oh yeah, he called,” she says.
“What do you mean?”
“Mr. McQueen, he phoned.”
“Why?”
“He wanted to talk about your ear, to see if you’d be able to start swimming. A very nice man. You seem to have made some sort of impression on him.”
“I told him I didn’t want to join his stupid club.”
Even if it was just the ear and not the crippling fear of water that came with it, I’d still be surprised at the audacity of him.
“For god’s sake, Lou. After everything you’ve been through…”
“Here we go.”
“You’ve got a fresh start now and opportunities most people don’t even dream of. Mr. McQueen is a very influential man. If anyone can help you get back in the water, it’s him. Will you not think about it?”
I say nothing and Mam pushes on, mistaking my angry silence for consideration.
“You know, Tina would be so proud of you.”
But she’s wrong. Even if she wasn’t dead, pride is the very last thing Tina would feel for me.
7
The rain continues into my second week at Highfield, a leaden beat that fills every corner of the city with its perpetual monotony. I arrive at school each morning in various dank states after a thirty-five-minute cycle across South Dublin from Ballybrack to Sandyford. Mam doesn’t drive and the city’s radial bus service means there’s no other way of traveling the seven miles without going into town and back out again.
I love it, the freedom of the bike. That in-between time that’s not concerned with the past or the future, only an infinite present that stretches ahead like those days of summer that merge into night. When the tape in my Walkman decides my persona and I’m taken so far away from myself I don’t care if it’s grief or joy that surges my heart. Today it’s The Cure’s The Head on the Door, and I’m an eagle, soaring along the Leopardstown Road to the piano riff of “Six Different Ways,” reveling in the burn of “Push” as I make the final ascent to Highfield, sweat pooling in the small of my back. It’s the challenge of pain with a purpose that drives me, even with the earth damp and the tarmac wet and the sticky-sweet hair gel melting onto my forehead.
Most days I head straight to the locker room to change from my tracksuit to my uniform before assembly, but I’m late today and make it to the hall just in time for roll call. The whole school meets here every morning, all six years with four classes in each, almost five hundred day students in total. The last of the boarders graduated two years ago so they remain only in legend, stories that have already been elevated to mythological status. Melissa’s told me all the gory details, the sixth-year who had two boys climbing the drainpipe to her dorm on alternating nights. The daughter of a government minister who gave the Christmas address in the chapel while high on her da’s cocaine. The fourth-year who seduced a teacher and was promptly expelled. These myths are not about academic or sporting achievement—Highfield has plenty of that already. They’re a dangerous dip into the thrills of the outside world, the one that isn’t supposed to exist within these protective stone walls.
I slip into the back of the 6A line as Sister Shannon’s footsteps creak up the wooden steps at the side of the stage. Rain blurs the windows, all the blues turned gray, dulling even the heavy maroon curtains behind her, the ornate plasterwork overhead. Silence falls across the hall as she leads us in prayer, our reverence as mechanical as our refrain. It’s an illusion of control, the power the Church has over our lives. No matter how much they try to threaten and shame us, you can’t stop teenagers being themselves. Sometimes the more you have to rebel against, the harder you push.
As Sister Shannon starts her announcements—sick teachers, classroom changes—I take off my soaking school gabardine, hang it over my arm and lean forward to ruffle the rain out of my hair. The air is still warm and heavy, despite the damp, and I get a whiff of the sweat festering in my armpits.
Eva O’Brien, a prefect with windswept hair and red cheeks, makes her way along the line with a clipboard, marking off those present. When she gets to Carol Sheridan, a few places ahead of me, Carol leans into her, sniffing the air.
“What’s that smell?” she says.
I catch a sideways glance from Eva as I flick my head upright, and at least she has the remorse to look away, but Carol’s face is scrunched with intent as she looks down the line.
“Oh my god,” she says to Eva, “whatever about personal hygiene, it’s just good manners to shower in the mornings.”
A couple of girls turn around and back again when they see the state of me. Melissa is in front of them, either oblivious or indifferent. I’m about to explain to Carol, of course I washed, I just haven’t had time to change, but I know it’s not about that.
“I think somebody needs to have a quiet word with B. O. Baracus there,” says Carol to Eva, and I see the acne on the back of her neck shake with suppressed laughter.
You could pass it off as a few bitches but there are three fifth-years sniggering in the line beside us and nobody is telling Carol to shut up. Maybe it’s not even Carol at all, maybe she’s just a catalyst for the exclusion that is inevitable for people like me. I want to tell them all to fuck themselves and storm out, back to my natural habitat, where drugs and sex are not considered some high achievement. But nobody listens to the girl from Ballybrack, that much is clear. I have to take their crap, play their game and blend in as much as possible. It’s only from the inside that I have any hope of exposing the truth about Tina.
* * *
AFTER ASSEMBLY, I SLINK OFF to the locker room to banish my offending clothes and douse my bare skin in deodorant. My brain rattles with the need to show Carol I’m not the vermin she thinks I am while also trying to think of a killer comeback that will show her up as the ignorant snob she definitely is. I’m mouthing my way through an imaginary encounter with Carol when Shauna arrives at the door, blonde hair dark and wet around her shoulders. She doesn’t see me and she’s muttering too, as if practicing a speech.
