Finn puts one hand on his heart. ‘I apologise for saying you would be scared of anything in the universe. You’re a fearless superhero who could kick my arse, or Wolverine’s arse, or a mad gorilla’s arse.’
‘Yeah, I am,’ Julia says. ‘You’re forgiven. That was beautiful.’
‘Good pic,’ Finn says, having another look. ‘Who took it? One of your mates, yeah?’
‘The ghost nun. Told you I was badass.’ Julia takes her phone back. ‘Tenner.’
‘Hold your horses,’ Finn says, pulling out his phone. ‘I’ve got a surprise for you, remember?’
If this is a photo of his dick, Julia thinks, I will kill the fucker. ‘Make my day,’ she says.
Finn hands her the phone and grins, that same straight-on wicked kid-grin, and Julia feels a rush of relief and guilt and warmth. She wants to touch him, hip-bump him off the breeze blocks or hook her elbow around his neck or something, to apologise for underestimating him all over again.
‘Great minds,’ Finn says, and nods at the phone.
Him, on the back lawn, in almost exactly the same spot. Black hoodie pulled up over the red hair – he played it smarter than she did – and one hand above his head, just like her, pointing up at the clock. Midnight.
The first thing Julia feels is outrage: Our place, at night that’s our place, can’t we even have— Then she realises.
‘Still want your tenner?’ Finn says. He’s grinning away, like a Labrador bringing home something rotten, looking for pats and praise. ‘Or will we call it evens?’
Julia says, ‘How’d you get out of school?’
Finn doesn’t notice the change in her voice; he’s too pleased with his big surprise. ‘Trade secret.’
Julia pulls it together. ‘Wow,’ she says. Big admiring eyes, sway in towards Finn. ‘I didn’t know you guys could do that.’
And this time she’s not underestimating. He’s delighted with himself, with how smart he is, dying to impress her even more. ‘I hotwired the fire-door alarm. Got the instructions online. It took me like five minutes. I can’t open it from outside, obviously, but I stuck a piece of wood in to keep it open while I was out.’
‘OhmyGod,’ Julia says, hand over her mouth. It’s so easy. ‘If someone had gone past and seen it, you’d have been in so much shit. You could’ve been expelled.’
Finn shrugs, all fake-casual, leaning back with one foot up and his hands in his jeans pockets. ‘Totally worth it.’
‘When’d you do it? We could’ve run into each other.’ She giggles.
‘Ages back. A couple of weeks after the dance.’
Plenty of time for Chris to set up a meeting with Selena, a dozen meetings; if he knew. ‘On your own? Was that a selfie? Jesus, you really aren’t scared of the nun, are you?’
‘Live nuns, God, yeah: terrified. Dead ones, nah.’
Julia laughs along. ‘So you went out there by yourself? Seriously?’
‘Brought a couple of mates, for the laugh. I’d go on my own, though.’ Finn rearranges his feet and examines whatever he was drawing on his runner, like it’s fascinating. ‘So,’ he says. ‘Seeing as we can both get out, and we’re both not scared. Want to meet, some night? Just to hang out. See if we can spot the ghost nun.’
This time Julia misses her chance to laugh along. A discreet distance away, among the ragwort and dandelions that are growing even taller and thicker this year, Selena and Holly and Becca are all trying to listen to something on Becca’s iPod at the same time; Selena and Holly are elbowing each other for the earbud, laughing, hair in each other’s face, like everything’s that simple still. They make Julia want to shoot off the breeze blocks and explode. Any second now some mate of Finn’s is going to show up and come bouncing over, and by then she needs to know. If Gemma wasn’t lying, just if, Julia needs the weekend to figure out what to do.
‘You’re friends with Chris Harper,’ she says. ‘Right?’
Finn’s face closes over. ‘Yeah,’ he says. He holds out a hand for his phone, shoves it back in his pocket. ‘So?’
‘Does he know you’ve cut off the alarm?’
His mouth is getting a cynical curl to it. ‘Yeah. It was his idea. He’s the one that took the photo.’
Gemma wasn’t lying.
‘And if he’s who you wanted to hook up with all along, you could’ve just said that to start with.’
Finn thinks he’s been played for a fool. Julia says, ‘He’s not.’
‘I should’ve fucking known.’
‘If Chris disappeared off the earth in a puff of sleazebaggy smoke, I’d be celebrating. Believe me.’
‘Yeah. Whatever.’ Finn has changed colours, eyes gone dark, a raw burned red high on his cheeks. If she were a guy, he would punch her. Since she isn’t, he’s left stinging and helpless. ‘You’re some piece of work, you know that?’
Julia understands that if she doesn’t fix this right now, the chance will be gone and he will never forgive her. If they run into each other on the street when they’re forty, Finn’s face will get that burned look and he’ll keep walking.
She doesn’t have room to work out how to mend this. The other thing is spreading white and blinding across her mind, pushing Finn to the edges.
‘Believe what you want,’ she says. ‘I have to go,’ and she slides off the breeze blocks and heads back to the others, feeling the Daleks’ eyes scratching at her skin like needles, wishing she was a guy so that Finn could punch her and get it over with and then she could find Chris Harper and smash his face in.
Holly’s eyes meet Julia’s for a second, but whatever she sees warns her or satisfies her, or both. Becca glances up and starts to ask something, but Selena touches her arm and they go back to the iPod. Some game is sending little orange darts zipping across the screen; white balloons explode in slow motion, silent fragments fluttering down. Julia sits in the weeds and watches Finn walk away.