Read Online Almost English by Charlotte Mendelson - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Charlotte Mendelson
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but I haven’t . . . is it a, a smart restaurant? I mean—’
‘Just Capote’s.’
‘Oh. Thanks.’ She has already spent too much this term on inspiring postcards and impressive Penguin European Classics: Orlando Furioso , Oblomov , The Trial . She cannot ask her mother for more money. They pay probably hundreds every year for her fees, and then there are the train fares and the Old Combeian Society (motto: Floreat Combeiensis) , for which Rozsi signed her up for lifetime membership, together with OCS crested lapel badge and fountain pen, before Marina’s first day. Even the uniform, all those ties and tennis shoes, must cost quite a bit. I will order modestly, she thinks, and sits down, moved.
But they are cold and damp, and order hugely: onion rings, frutti di mare , lamb chops, steak. She eats her Margarita pizza and drinks enough house white to make the night seem glittery, the future not exactly golden, but not leaden either. She catches Guy’s eye and smiles. She can even stand sitting between Giles Yeo, who has slicked-back hair and Ray-Bans, and Bill Wallis, whose shirt has bow ties and champagne bottles on the sleeves.
‘Wop,’ they call each other, ‘flid’ and ‘spaz’ and ‘faggot’.
They lean across to talk about rugby, pretending to be very careful of her WSK but otherwise ignoring her. Bill’s three brothers all came here; next year he will be captain of the rowing team, so it would be unwise to annoy him. Nevertheless, Marina refuses to make conversation, on principle. She looks towards the salad bar with an enigmatic smile, thinking of being with Simon Flowers at Cambridge, crossing the quadrangles in lab coats on their way to making discoveries.
They walk back to school in formation: popular girls at the front like Amanda ‘Saddle’ Collindale, who hunts, and Michaela Buonasenda the nymphomaniac; Guy in the middle, Marina at the back. The streets of Combe are deserted.
‘Where are the peasants?’ bellows Bill, and Saddle snorts. Marina is almost too frightened to breathe. Her lips are dry. Townspeople really might attack them; I would, she thinks. Victoria Porritt, ‘Muffster’, a big-haired fat girl in Fitzgerald House, Fitz, with a Tory MP father, totters on the cobblestones and takes Marina’s arm.
‘You don’t want to be a doctor , though, surely?’ she says. ‘I mean, really.’
‘Well . . .’ If she explains that it’s not about wanting, Victoria Porritt might not understand. ‘I, I quite like the sciences,’ she says.
‘Ugh. Biology. Chemistry! How can you stand it?’
Marina swallows. ‘What do you want to be?’
‘Nothing. Married.’ She puts her wet mouth against Marina’s ear. ‘Did you know I was finger-fucked by Pete Galbraith at half-term?’
Through silent Garthgate, which usually she avoids despite the new lamp posts and illuminated night guard’s hut. Victoria Porritt does not care. She eulogizes her pony and Marina joins in, the little fraud. Above the spire and ancient towers, the Plough lies upended in the cold. Her heart is clanging. Only babies are afraid of the dark. They face the blackness at the end of the passage. Then, enormous in a strip of lamplight, out of the shadows looms Guy.
‘Piss off, virge,’ shout the boys at the back, head-locking him and ruffling his hair.
‘Oh, help!’ screams Victoria Porritt and hurries off to join the others.
Guy grins at Marina. ‘Bet you haven’t seen this,’ he says, and leads her back through the night to a little fence, easily climbed. Into the navy sky above them stretches another tower, a spray of stars, a single lit-up window. They are in a little walled garden hard up against the side of the ruins; there are flowerbeds, but no house close by.
‘Like it?’ he says, lowering his voice until it is just breath in the cold.
A branch of something is close to her ear; it smells sweet although it is winter. Rozsi would rip it off and take it home; she knows no shame. The bat roosts
‘Just Capote’s.’
‘Oh. Thanks.’ She has already spent too much this term on inspiring postcards and impressive Penguin European Classics: Orlando Furioso , Oblomov , The Trial . She cannot ask her mother for more money. They pay probably hundreds every year for her fees, and then there are the train fares and the Old Combeian Society (motto: Floreat Combeiensis) , for which Rozsi signed her up for lifetime membership, together with OCS crested lapel badge and fountain pen, before Marina’s first day. Even the uniform, all those ties and tennis shoes, must cost quite a bit. I will order modestly, she thinks, and sits down, moved.
But they are cold and damp, and order hugely: onion rings, frutti di mare , lamb chops, steak. She eats her Margarita pizza and drinks enough house white to make the night seem glittery, the future not exactly golden, but not leaden either. She catches Guy’s eye and smiles. She can even stand sitting between Giles Yeo, who has slicked-back hair and Ray-Bans, and Bill Wallis, whose shirt has bow ties and champagne bottles on the sleeves.
‘Wop,’ they call each other, ‘flid’ and ‘spaz’ and ‘faggot’.
They lean across to talk about rugby, pretending to be very careful of her WSK but otherwise ignoring her. Bill’s three brothers all came here; next year he will be captain of the rowing team, so it would be unwise to annoy him. Nevertheless, Marina refuses to make conversation, on principle. She looks towards the salad bar with an enigmatic smile, thinking of being with Simon Flowers at Cambridge, crossing the quadrangles in lab coats on their way to making discoveries.
They walk back to school in formation: popular girls at the front like Amanda ‘Saddle’ Collindale, who hunts, and Michaela Buonasenda the nymphomaniac; Guy in the middle, Marina at the back. The streets of Combe are deserted.
‘Where are the peasants?’ bellows Bill, and Saddle snorts. Marina is almost too frightened to breathe. Her lips are dry. Townspeople really might attack them; I would, she thinks. Victoria Porritt, ‘Muffster’, a big-haired fat girl in Fitzgerald House, Fitz, with a Tory MP father, totters on the cobblestones and takes Marina’s arm.
‘You don’t want to be a doctor , though, surely?’ she says. ‘I mean, really.’
‘Well . . .’ If she explains that it’s not about wanting, Victoria Porritt might not understand. ‘I, I quite like the sciences,’ she says.
‘Ugh. Biology. Chemistry! How can you stand it?’
Marina swallows. ‘What do you want to be?’
‘Nothing. Married.’ She puts her wet mouth against Marina’s ear. ‘Did you know I was finger-fucked by Pete Galbraith at half-term?’
Through silent Garthgate, which usually she avoids despite the new lamp posts and illuminated night guard’s hut. Victoria Porritt does not care. She eulogizes her pony and Marina joins in, the little fraud. Above the spire and ancient towers, the Plough lies upended in the cold. Her heart is clanging. Only babies are afraid of the dark. They face the blackness at the end of the passage. Then, enormous in a strip of lamplight, out of the shadows looms Guy.
‘Piss off, virge,’ shout the boys at the back, head-locking him and ruffling his hair.
‘Oh, help!’ screams Victoria Porritt and hurries off to join the others.
Guy grins at Marina. ‘Bet you haven’t seen this,’ he says, and leads her back through the night to a little fence, easily climbed. Into the navy sky above them stretches another tower, a spray of stars, a single lit-up window. They are in a little walled garden hard up against the side of the ruins; there are flowerbeds, but no house close by.
‘Like it?’ he says, lowering his voice until it is just breath in the cold.
A branch of something is close to her ear; it smells sweet although it is winter. Rozsi would rip it off and take it home; she knows no shame. The bat roosts
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