Питер Мэй - I'll Keep You Safe

‘No.’

‘Good riddance, eh?’ She turned towards me. ‘So are there any decent pubs in Galashiels?’

I don’t know how much she was aware of it, but I spent the next few weeks doing my best to avoid her. I took up running so that I had an excuse to get out on my own. Or I would simply tell her that I was studying and couldn’t be disturbed, shutting myself away in my cell. Of course, I couldn’t avoid her in class, or in the canteen, when she would invariably come and sit beside me. In a crowd, when a bunch of us would go to the student union, I would involve myself in conversation with one of the other girls as a discouragement to Seonag, and happily chat to any of the young rugby players who would come into the bar after matches at weekends.

Seonag was, as usual, Miss Personality superplus. The best-looking girl on the course. There were very few boys at the college, but I noticed how their eyes always seemed drawn in her direction. And the Gala boys would fall over themselves to buy her drinks in the pub, in return for which she seemed happy to flirt outrageously.

More than all that, I noticed how popular she was with the other girls. There would always be gatherings of them congregating around her in the common room, laughing and whispering. Or walking together across campus in giggling groups. Squeezing into a booth at the pub. A sisterhood from which I felt excluded. It seemed then that she was the one avoiding me, rather than the other way around.

We were two months into the term before I got my first real insight into something I had never even suspected. And when I look back on it now, I realize how naive and innocent I must have been.

At the weekends, when a lot of the girls went home, those of us left would often go to a pub called The Salmon. There was a rumoured connection between the owner and Linshader Lodge, where it was said he had once worked as a ghillie. Whether or not that was true I couldn’t say, since I never met the man. But it was a comforting sort of link with the island.

It was one of those bright, cold November Saturdays, with a haze of frost on the grass and a mist on the hills. A group of us had gone to the pub after lunch and sat there drinking all afternoon. There was an international rugby match on the telly. Scotland versus someone or other. I didn’t know, or care. I had never been turned on by rugby, but wouldn’t have dared give voice to my indifference here, of all places. It would have been like denouncing God from the pulpit of the Free Church.

I remember that Seonag had been there when we arrived, but she was gone by the time we left. I hadn’t noticed her leaving. I had been feeling sorry for myself, with the prospect of another month before the Christmas break and the chance, finally, to go home. As a result of which I had drunk more than was good for me and was almost overcome by melancholy. The prospect of another Saturday night sitting reading alone in my cell was very nearly unbearable, and I decided that maybe it was time I gave Seonag another chance. In truth, although I was the one who had started out avoiding her, it was me who was now feeling excluded. Time to address all those things that had come between us. The misunderstandings and petty jealousies.

So it was with an alcohol-fuelled courage and determination that I climbed the stairs to the girls’ floor and walked along the hall to Seonag’s door. I hesitated, resolution deserting me only for a moment, before I knocked once and walked in.

At first, I didn’t really understand what I was seeing. And the moment passed so quickly I couldn’t be sure in the immediate aftermath that my eyes had not deceived me. An English girl called Jane, who had also been with us earlier in the pub, was lying naked on Seonag’s bed, dark hair splashed across the pillow. Seonag, too, was naked, lying on her belly between the other girl’s legs, Jane’s fists tightly clasped around bunches of Seonag’s burnished red hair. Milky white bodies impossibly conjoined.

They broke apart immediately, startled by my sudden appearance, and sat up, grasping at sheets to cover their nakedness. I was so taken aback I had no idea what to say. I felt the colour rising on my cheeks, and stammered something stupid like ‘Sorry. Didn’t mean to interrupt.’ And closed the door quickly as I stepped back into the corridor.

I stood breathing hard for a moment, trying to process what I had just seen. Then hurried back along the hall to the common room, and slipped inside, shutting the door behind me. The other girls had not yet returned, and I stood there trembling and dreading the thought of having to face Seonag alone. How naive had I been never even to suspect? And, yet, nothing in my God-fearing sheltered island upbringing had prepared me for such a moment. I had no idea how to deal with it. It seems ridiculous to me now, in the wake of all the years of experience I have clocked up since. But I was shaken to my core.

I heard a door opening and then closing further down the hall. A knock. And then silence. Before soft footsteps came hurrying along the linoleum. I stepped away from the door as it opened, and Seonag stood there with her dressing gown wrapped around her. Bare feet, tousled hair, bright spots of red high on her porcelain cheeks. She pushed the door shut behind her and her green eyes sought mine, imploring, filled with fear and longing. I found it impossible to maintain eye contact and looked away towards the floor. She reached out to grab both of my arms. ‘You really didn’t know?’

I forced myself to look at her. ‘No.’

She sighed heavily and seemed distraught. ‘My poor, innocent Niamh.’

‘It’s disgusting!’

She let me go and stepped back, almost recoiling, as if from a slap. ‘No, it’s not! It’s the most natural thing in the world if that’s how you feel.’ I could see the emotion bubbling up inside her. ‘All those times cuddling together in the bothag with the dollies, playing mums and dads. All those nights in the same bed, sharing the heat of our bodies, arms around each other for comfort.’

‘Like sisters!’ I was horrified that she could ever have seen it as anything else. ‘I never thought...’

‘I’ve had a crush on you, Niamh, ever since we were little. Just wanted to be with you. You and nobody else. I looked up to you. I loved you.’ She sighed. ‘As far back as I can remember, I was hoping that one day you would feel this way, too.’

‘Well, I don’t.’

It was as if she didn’t hear me. She stepped towards me again and took both of my hands. I was too distracted to resist. ‘It wasn’t until we were teenagers that I realized why. What it was I wanted from you. That no boy could give me. I can’t tell you how disappointed I was by your infatuation with Ruairidh. How much it hurt me.’ She turned her head back towards the door. ‘There’ve been other girls like Jane. But that was just physical. Satisfying a need. I don’t care about her. Or any of the others. Only you, Niamh. Just you.’

It took a moment for me to realize as she drew closer that she meant to kiss me. I jerked away, pulling my hands free. ‘Don’t!’ I was seething with anger and confusion. And uncertainty. I know now that our sexuality is just an extension of ourselves. We don’t choose to be, we just are. Somewhere deep inside, a part of me wanted to take her in my arms and tell her everything was going to be okay. She was my best friend. We had shared the better part of our lives together. But it was never going to be okay the way she wanted.

I saw her tears through mine before I brushed past her, out into the hall, and ran all the way along to my room. I closed the door behind me and locked it, before throwing myself on the bed and crying into my pillow, stifling my sobs in case anyone would hear me. I felt... and I can’t think of any other way to describe it... bereaved. I had just lost the part of me that was Seonag. A part of me that, clearly, I had never really understood. But loved all the same. I couldn’t see, then, how I would ever get over it.