Page 5 of Deep Blue Lies
I can’t answer at once, I feel the pressure of tears behind my eyes, but I don’t want to cry now. I glance back to see that Sam and Fraz are both looking over at us. Curious about what’s up. Under the table I tap at the floor with my foot.
“Not great,” I say in the end.
Kev makes a noise, halfway between supportive and dismissive. “They always make it sound worse than it is,” he tells me. “Not great’s probably a good outcome. They just want to scare you into doing more studying.” I sense him warming to the theme, so I shake my head.
“No.” I swallow. “They said I either leave, or they’ll kick me out. They gave me an hour to decide.”
Kevin puts a half grin on his face. He thinks I’m joking. “An hour? As in?—”
“As in sixty minutes, that’s right.” I realise I didn’t even take note of the time when Gavin gave me his ultimatum.
“Damn.” He pauses. “How long you got left?”
“I don’t fucking know,Kevin.” I look away. “It doesn’t matter either way. It’s just so they can spin it that they haven’t expelled me. Make it my decision to leave. I dunno. It’s better that way for their records or something.”
Kevin stares at me. It’s like I’ve suddenly become this exotic creature. Different from him, and everyone else here. An actualex-student.
“Can’t you, like – appeal it?”
I screw up my face, I hadn’t actually thought of this. I’m slightly annoyed that Kevin did before me.
“I don’t think so.” I think back. It didn’t exactly sound like it.
We’re both silent a while. Kevin looks at his sandwich, pink ham drooping out the side. He doesn’t pick it up.
“So what are you gonna do?”
After a few moments I shrug my shoulders. “I guess I’m gonna email my tutor and tell him I’ve decided to leave.”
“No I mean, what are you gonnado? Are you gonna stay here?”
Sunderland is seven hundred miles from where I live, south of London. Kevin lives in the city though. He’s a local boy. I try to think how this is going to work.
“I don’t really have a choice. My mum isn’t going to support me to stay here, she’s hardly supporting me anyway.” I feel that familiar creep of financial anxiety, but every student gets it. Most, at least.
“What about us?” Kevin eyes me nervously, and I can’t meet his gaze.
I shrug. “There’s the holidays. Summer and that.” I force myself to look at his handsome face. “Maybe you could come down south? Get a job for the summer?”
“Sure. Right.” He nods, as he considers this idea. “Where would I stay though? Like, with your family?”
The way he says this grates on me. It’s the wordfamily. I’ve told Kevin about a thousand times that it’s just Mum and me. But he’s the middle of three brothers, and he seems unable to conceive of a life without a big, boisterous family around him.
“Yeah. Maybe.” Not even I believe this. I tip my head back, staring at the ceiling. Taking stock of my life falling to pieces around me.
“It’s just…” Kevin goes on, “I’ve got that internship lined up here with the football club. Sports is like, really booming now, such a good area to get into.”
At that moment a girl walks past, carrying a tray towards another table, where two other girls are sitting deep in conversation. As she passes she smiles, waggling her fingers at Kevin. It seems to send a jolt of electricity into him, and he breaks into a sudden, wide-mouthed grin.
“Hey! How’s it going?” he says. It’s like I’m not here, that this conversation isn’t happening.
I almost say nothing, but I can’t stop myself.
“Who’s that?”
“Oh it’s no one,” – his voice is quiet now that she’s out of hearing – “just Anna.” He frowns as he thinks. “She’s in some of my lectures, and then I see her in the gym. But she’s no one.” He glances over to watch her slide her narrow backside into a chair. No question she knows he’s watching.
“Fuck, Kevin! You’re moving on already? We haven’t even broken up yet.”
