To: Suzanne Watts {[email protected]}; Caddy Oliver {[email protected]}
Don’t be like that, I’m just worrying about you.
Wednesday 13.39
From: Suzanne Watts {[email protected]}
To: Rosie Caron {[email protected]}; Caddy Oliver {[email protected]}
Well don’t.
Wednesday 13.40
From: Rosie Caron {[email protected]}
To: Suzanne Watts {[email protected]}; Caddy Oliver {[email protected]}
Oh fine, forget it.
Wednesday 13.41
From: Suzanne Watts {[email protected]}
To: Rosie Caron {[email protected]}; Caddy Oliver {[email protected]}
Fine.
Wednesday 16.04
From: Caddy Oliver {[email protected]}
To: Suzanne Watts {[email protected]}; Rosie Caron {[email protected]}
Um. So . . . are we still on for Saturday?
Wednesday 16.17
From: Suzanne Watts {[email protected]}
To: Caddy Oliver {[email protected]}; Rosie Caron {[email protected]}
Yeah. You two can be my chaperones.
Wednesday 16.41
From: Rosie Caron {[email protected]}
To: Caddy Oliver {[email protected]}
Argh I can’t talk to her any more. You deal with her. Tell her to come to mine for 6 on Saturday, if she stops acting like such a petty bitch.
Wednesday 16.53
From: Caddy Oliver {[email protected]}
To: Rosie Caron {[email protected]}
Give her a break, she was suspended yesterday.
I’ll tell her, but I’m sure you’ll speak to her before then anyway!
xx
Wednesday 16.55
From: Rosie Caron {[email protected]}
To: Caddy Oliver {[email protected]}
Hmmm.
Wednesday 17.01
From: Caddy Oliver {[email protected]}
To: Suzanne Watts {[email protected]}
Shall we go together to Rosie’s on Sat? We should get there for 6.
xx
Wednesday 17.12
From: Suzanne Watts {[email protected]}
To: Caddy Oliver {[email protected] OK, Sarah can pick you up? Would that be OK with your parents?
xx
Wednesday 17.15
From: Caddy Oliver {[email protected]}
To: Suzanne Watts {[email protected]}
Yeah, it’ll be fine.
Any joy with your head of year?
xx
Wednesday 17.19
From: Suzanne Watts {[email protected]}
To: Caddy Oliver {[email protected]}
Nope. So I’ll be at the cafe tomorrow. Hey, if you’re free after school you should stop by for cake :) Wednesday 17.22
From: Caddy Oliver {[email protected]}
To: Suzanne Watts {[email protected]}
Amazing! I will if I can. I’ll bring Roz, yeah?
Wednesday 17.23
From: Suzanne Watts {[email protected]}
To: Caddy Oliver {[email protected]}
OK.
xx
In less than twenty-four hours, Suzanne and Rosie seemed to have got over their snippiness and were back to their usual selves. I came home late on Thursday evening, after a Sixth Form information evening at Esther’s, to find they’d both spammed my Facebook page with forty-eight photos and videos of Elton John.
If anything, Suzanne seemed to enjoy her three days off school and her time in the cafe. When Rosie and I visited on Friday afternoon she was behind the till, concentrating so hard on taking an order that she didn’t realize immediately that we were there. She brought us millefeuille and chocolate milkshakes and we sat at the corner table together, people-watching and talking.
On Saturday, Suzanne texted me to let me know she was outside with Sarah and I went out to meet her. She was dressed in the most casual of Saturday clothes, the picture of a teenage girl on her way to a friend’s house for a sleepover.
‘Just a quiet night for you girls then?’ Sarah asked as she drove.
‘Yeah,’ Suzanne said before I could try to lie. ‘It’s been such a weird week I couldn’t face anything else.’
It was almost scary really. I knew she was lying, and even I was momentarily convinced. It wasn’t just what she’d said or even the placid expression on her face, it was the relaxed way she was sitting in the front seat, her overnight bag containing her going-out clothes right there on her lap, her fingers tapping her leg to the beat of the music. She lied with her whole body and it seemed effortless.
I thought about asking her about it later, but I couldn’t think of a way of doing it that wouldn’t come out confrontational. The last thing I wanted after everything that had happened that week was an argument.
Levina’s house lived up to its billing. It turned out to be much closer to my own house than Rosie’s, near to the seafront and huge. Her older sister and brother – twins in the Upper Sixth – had invited their own friends, so even by the time we arrived you could barely move for people.
‘Come and get a drink!’ Levina squealed when we arrived, already giggly with alcohol. She was wearing a too-tight dress and a large hat in the shape of a birthday cake. ‘Oh my God, Suze, I can’t believe you came!’