‘That’s OK,’ I said immediately.
‘No, it’s not. Christmas was just a bit shit, but it’s over now, and it’s not your fault. I just want to be with my friends.’ She glanced at Rosie, reached out a hand and poked her shoulder. ‘That means you, bitch.’
Rosie grinned. To her credit, she let the conciliatory moment pass without comment. ‘Damn right it does.’ She poked back. ‘Takes one to know one.’
I felt the snake in my stomach uncoil and I let out a breath, relaxing. Suzanne flashed another tentative smile at me and I smiled back, trying to put all the friendly reassurance I had into it.
Rosie picked up one of the Wii remotes and waved it at us. ‘Multiplayer?’
We arranged ourselves over the bed so we could all face my TV as the simplest Mario Kart track loaded on screen. Suzanne shifted herself so she was partly leaning against both of us, her head almost in my lap, her feet resting on the backs of Rosie’s legs. We had the whole of my bedroom open to us but still that’s how we stayed for the rest of the afternoon, the three of us tumbled and wedged together, until Sarah came upstairs to take Suzanne home.
That year started slowly, the first few weeks unravelling with new coursework deadlines and the results of the mock exams from before Christmas. I had a comfortable mix of As and Bs, results which would have been considered good in any normal school but were signs of inadequacy in the eyes of both my school and my parents.
‘Maybe you should cut back on the time you’re spending with your friends,’ Mum said to me the evening I got my results.
‘Why?’ I asked, defensive immediately on their behalf. ‘What’s it got to do with them?’
‘Well, this is an important year,’ Mum said, as if I didn’t already know. ‘You can’t afford to be distracted in the run-up to your exams, Caddy. You’re capable of A grades. So we expect A grades. Whatever Suzanne has told you, your results do matter.’
It took me a second. ‘Wait – what? Suzanne told me what?’
‘I just hope she isn’t passing her clear disregard for education on to you,’ Mum said, either ignoring my question or choosing to interpret it to suit her own thought process. ‘After all these years at Esther’s, it would be tragic if you threw it all away in your final few months.’
Her words wound me up for two reasons. One, that she could be so preachily judgemental about a friend of mine that she basically knew nothing about, aside from whatever Sarah had chosen to tell her. Second, that she could think I was so impressionable that my just being friends with someone for whom school wasn’t the highest priority would be enough to ruin the private-school investment they’d made.
‘I guess it makes sense,’ Suzanne said diplomatically, when I complained to her and Rosie about my parents’ impossible standards, leaving out the fact that they partially blamed the two of them. ‘It must cost a lot for you to go to Esther’s, right?’
‘It’s thousands,’ Rosie said. ‘Like, literally thousands. Per term.’
I felt my face flush. ‘I never asked for it.’
‘So? You still got it,’ Rosie said bluntly. She’d never had much time for my private-school complex.
‘They must be expecting great things,’ Suzanne said. ‘Uni, right?’
‘Oh yeah.’ There had never even been a question. ‘Law or something.’
She made a face and looked at Rosie, as if expecting back-up. ‘Really? Law?’
‘Should I be offended that you look so surprised?’
‘You know that’s basically arguing for a living?’
I had to laugh. ‘Yeah, OK, it doesn’t scream Caddy Oliver.’
‘What do you want to do?’
It was such a simple question. ‘I don’t know. Law, I guess.’
‘You guess?’ she repeated, grinning. ‘It’s your life, Cads. What do you actually want?’
‘Most people our age don’t know what they want to do,’ I said defensively. ‘Do you know?’
‘No, but I’m a mess,’ Suzanne said matter-of-factly. ‘I need to sort myself out first. I’ll be lucky to make it to eighteen.’
‘Don’t be such a drama queen,’ Rosie put in, rolling her eyes. She’d stretched out on her back, her head hanging off her bed, dark curls touching the floor. ‘Any one of us could get hit by a bus tomorrow.’
‘When did we start talking about death?’ I asked. An image came to my mind of Sarah’s face before Christmas, when she’d said about Suzanne not coming home again. I’d honoured Suzanne’s request to never talk about it, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t in my head.
‘I’m going to be a businesswoman,’ Rosie said. ‘Caddy, you could be my PA. You’d be a great PA. Organized and anal.’
‘God, thanks,’ I said. ‘Organized and anal?’
‘I think you should be a therapist or something,’ Suzanne said, cutting in before Rosie could respond. ‘Or a counsellor. Someone who listens.’