Michael Robotham - The Night Ferry

“Why’s that?”

“Because that’s what my boys call me: ‘Yo man, can I have some money?’ ‘Yo man, can I borrow the car?’”

His laugh sounded like nuts falling on a roof.

In the kitchen I pour myself a large glass of water and drink it greedily. Then I stretch my quads, balancing one leg on the back of a chair.

The mouse living under my fridge chooses that moment to appear. It is a very ambivalent mouse, scarcely bothering to lift its head to acknowledge me. And it doesn’t seem to mind that my youngest brother, Hari, keeps setting mousetraps. Perhaps it knows that I disarm them, taking off the cheese when Hari isn’t around.

The mouse finally looks up at me, as though about to complain about the lack of crumbs. Then it sniffs the air and scampers away.

Hari appears in the doorway, bare-chested and barefooted. Opening the fridge, he takes out a carton of orange juice and unscrews the plastic lid. He looks at me, considers his options, and gets a glass from the cupboard. Sometimes I think he is prettier than I am. He has longer lashes and thicker hair.

“Are you going to the reunion tonight?” I ask.

“Nope.”

“Why not?”

“Don’t tell me you’re going! You said you wouldn’t be caught dead.”

“I changed my mind.”

There is a voice from upstairs. “Hey, have you seen my knickers?”

Hari looks at me sheepishly.

“I know I had a pair. They’re not on the floor.”

Hari whispers, “I thought you’d gone out.”

“I went for a run. Who is she?”

“An old friend.”

“So you must know her name.”

“Cheryl.”

“Cheryl Taylor!” (She’s a bottle blonde who works behind the bar at the White Horse). “She’s older than I am.”

“No, she’s not.”

“What on earth do you see in her?”

“What difference does that make?”

“I’m interested.”

“Well, she has assets.”

“Assets?”

“The best.”

“You think so?”

“Absolutely.”

“What about Phoebe Griggs?”

“Too small.”

“Emma Shipley?”

“Saggy.”

“Mine?”

“Very funny.”

Cheryl is coming down the stairs. I can hear her rummaging in the sitting room. “Found them,” she shouts.

She arrives in the kitchen still adjusting the elastic beneath her skirt.

“Oh, hello,” she squeaks.

“Cheryl, this is my sister, Alisha.”

“Nice to see you again,” she says, not meaning it.

The silence seems to stretch out. I might never talk again. Finally I excuse myself and go upstairs for a shower. With any luck Cheryl will be gone by the time I come down.

Hari has been living with me for the past two months because it’s closer to university. He is supposed to be safeguarding my virtue and helping pay the mortgage but he’s four weeks behind in his rent and using my spare room as a knocking shop.

My legs are tingling. I love the feeling of lactic acid leaking away. I look in the mirror and pull back my hair. Yellow flecks spark in my irises like goldfish in a pond. There are no wrinkles. Black don’t crack.

My “assets” aren’t so bad. When I was running competitively I was always pleased they were on the small side and could be tightly bound in a sports bra. Now I wouldn’t mind being a size bigger so I could have a cleavage.

Hari yells up the stairs. “Hey, sis, I’m taking twenty from your purse.”

“Why?”

“Because when I take it from strangers they get angry.”

Very droll . “You still owe me rent.”

“Tomorrow.”

“You said that yesterday.” And the day before.

The front door closes. The house is quiet.

Downstairs, I pick up Cate’s note again, resting it between my fingertips. Then I prop it on the table against the salt and pepper shakers, staring at it for a while.

Cate Elliot. Her name still makes me smile. One of the strange things about friendship is that time together isn’t canceled out by time apart. One doesn’t erase the other or balance it on some invisible scale. You can spend a few hours with someone and they will change your life, or you can spend a lifetime with a person and remain unchanged.

We were born at the same hospital and raised in Bethnal Green in London’s East End although we managed to more or less avoid each other for the first thirteen years. Fate brought us together, if you believe in such things.

We became inseparable. Almost telepathic. We were partners in crime, stealing beer from her father’s fridge, window shopping on the Kings Road, eating chips with vinegar on our way home from school, sneaking out to see bands at the Hammersmith Odeon and movie stars on the red carpet at Leicester Square.

In our gap year we went to France. I crashed a moped, got cautioned for having a fake ID and tried hash for the first time. Cate lost the key to our hostel during a midnight swim and we had to climb a trellis at 2:00 a.m.

There is no breakup worse than that of best friends. Broken love affairs are painful. Broken marriages are messy. Broken homes are sometimes an improvement. Our breakup was the worst.

Now, after eight years, she wants to see me. The thrill of compliance spreads across my skin. Then comes a nagging, unshakable dread. She’s in trouble.

My car keys are in the sitting room. As I pick them up, I notice marks on the glass-topped coffee table. Looking closer, I can make out two neat buttock prints and what I imagine to be elbow smudges. I could kill my brother!

Someone has spilled a Bloody Mary mix on my shoes. I wouldn’t mind so much, but they’re not mine. I borrowed them, just like I borrowed this top, which is too big for me. At least my underwear is my own. “Never borrow money or underwear,” my mother always says, in an addendum to her clean-underwear speech which involves graphic descriptions of road accidents and ambulance officers cutting off my tights. No wonder I have nightmares.

Cate isn’t here yet. I’ve been trying to watch the door and avoid talking to anyone.

There should be a law against school reunions. They should come with warning stickers on the invitations. There is never a right time for them. You’re either too young or too old or too fat.

This isn’t even a proper school reunion. Somebody burned down the science classrooms at Oaklands. A vandal with a can of petrol rather than a rogue Bunsen burner. Now they’re opening a brand-new block, with a junior minister of something-or-other doing the honors.

The new building is functional and sturdy, with none of the charm of the Victorian original. The cathedral ceilings and arched windows have been replaced by fibrous cement panels, strip lighting and aluminum frames.

The school hall has been decorated with streamers and balloons hang from the rafters. A school banner is draped across the front of the stage.

There is a queue for the mirror in the girls’ toilets. Lindsay Saunders leans past me over the sink and rubs lipstick from her teeth. Satisfied, she turns and appraises me.

“Will you stop acting like a Punjabi princess and loosen up. Have fun.”

“Is that what this is?”

I’m wearing Lindsay’s top, the bronze one with shoestring straps, which I don’t have the bust to carry off. A strap falls off my shoulder. I tug it up again.

“I know you’re acting like you don’t care. You’re just nervous about Cate. Where is she?”

“I don’t know.”

Lindsay reapplies her lipstick and adjusts her dress. She’s been looking forward to the reunion for weeks because of Rocco Man-spiezer. She fancied him for six years at school but didn’t have the courage to tell him.

“What makes you so sure you’ll get him this time?”