Chapter 11: Before

BEFORE

Four weeks into the first semester (or rather, Michaelmas term, as she had already learned to call it) and Hannah felt like she had been at Oxford forever—but also that she would never get used to this miracle.

It was so strange that it was possible to experience both states at the same time—both the wonder of waking up in a eighteenth-century room, in one of the world’s oldest centers of learning, hearing the chapel bells tolling and the high, ethereal voices of the Pelham College choirboys floating up to her windows—and yet at the same time to feel the reassuring rhythm of Meatloaf Mondays in the dining hall, Hugh’s regular grumbles about the smell of Pot Noodles stinking up his room from the Cloade kitchen, and the daily visits from the staircase scout, bossy, motherly Sue. The strangest thing of all was that she and April seemed to have become de facto best friends—in spite of the fact that back in Dodsworth Hannah was fairly sure she would have gone out of her way to avoid someone as intimidatingly beautiful and conspicuously wealthy as April.

Now, thrown together by the simple fact of sharing a room, they seemed to be taken for granted. April and Hannah. Hannah and April. Friends. Roommates. Conspirators.

“She’s such a cow,” April complained. It was Friday night, and she was sprawled across the sofa eating dry Coco Pops from a bowl, wearing a hand-painted dressing gown in Japanese silk. She was watching The Breakfast Club on her laptop and scrolling through the brand-new Instagram app on her iPhone. “I swear she waits until I’m either maximum hungover or got a massive deadline to come and hoover.”

“Who?” Hannah adjusted the hood of her gown in the mirror. It was formal hall tonight, which meant if you wanted a cooked dinner, you had to dress the part—academic gown and smart clothes, although in practice “smart” tended to mean “no ripped jeans.” She glanced over April’s shoulder to check the time on her laptop: 7:25. Emily had promised to call past on her way over to the hall, but they were cutting it fine if they wanted to find seats together.

“I told you—Sue. Were you not listening?”

“She’s got to get through the rooms,” Hannah said mildly.

“She hates me ever since I pranked her with that bowl of glitter on top of the wardrobe,” April said. She put a spoonful of Coco Pops in her mouth and crunched them noisily. “Bitch.”

April was, Hannah had discovered, an inveterate practical joker. It was one of the more unnerving things about sharing a room with her—though not sharing a room didn’t lessen the risk much. She had gotten Ryan with a fake call summoning him to see the Master—who was not pleased to be interrupted at ten thirty on a Sunday night. Hannah’s own “gotcha” had been coming up the stairs one night after dinner to hear panicked screams coming from April’s bedroom. She had rushed into the room to see two pale hands scrabbling helplessly at the edge of the open window frame.

It was only when she had raced across the room, her heart in her mouth, and grabbed one of the hands by the wrist that she had looked down to see April standing safely on the projecting bay window below, laughing like a hyena.

Of course, with hindsight it was completely stupid. Why would April be hanging outside her own window? There was no way she could have gotten in such a position by accident. And so Hannah had forced herself to laugh too, and had recounted the incident over breakfast as a joke against herself. In truth, though, she hadn’t found it particularly funny. It struck her as pointless and a little unkind—even dangerous, to the extent that April could easily have fallen and broken her neck for real. Climbing out of the window had been fairly easy, according to April, but getting back up proved a lot harder. After Hannah had made two fruitless attempts to pull April back into the room, April had given up and clambered perilously down a very rusty drainpipe, losing a chunk of skin in the process. It would, Hannah reflected bitterly, have been considerably less funny if April had actually fallen to her death. But you weren’t allowed to say things like that if you were the butt of a practical joke, or you looked sour and humorless.

“Who’s a bitch?” The voice came from the doorway to the hall, and Hannah and April both turned sharply.

“Emily!” April said. She put a hand over her heart. “Jesus, don’t do that to me! You gave me a heart attack.”

“Sorry. Are you coming, Han? I was calling your mobile, but you weren’t picking up.”

“Oh, shoot, sorry. It didn’t ring. I must have run out of credit again. Are you sure you’re not coming?” she said to April, but more to show willing than anything else. April never came to formal hall. She claimed it was because she thought it was stuffy and pretentious—both of which were true, though Hannah had a weakness for the ceremony of it all, the Hogwarts theatricality of the rows of black-gowned students, the polished oak benches, the glimmering little lamps dotted all around, the Latin grace. But Hannah suspected it was something else. Something to do with April’s odd relationship with food—the way she would eat six McDonald’s cheeseburgers in a row while out in Oxford on a Saturday night, but then skip lunch every day for a week.

In formal hall there was no escape from the full, waiter-serviced three courses of it all. No possibility of taking a side salad, or scooping your still-laden plate into an anonymous pile at the hatch. You had to order a full meal and then sit there, waiting while everyone else finished, until the staff came to clear.

“I’d rather drink bin juice,” April said now, but amiably, and Hannah shrugged.

“Okay, suit yourself,” she said, and followed Emily from the room.

Ryan was waiting for them at the foot of the stairs, and together they made their way across the quad in the gloaming. It was November already, and the nights were drawing in. All around them were the crisp autumn air and the lights shining out through the chapel’s stained glass.

“So who was the bitch?” Emily asked again, and Hannah rolled her eyes.

“Oh, Sue. April thinks she’s holding a grudge. You know—over the glitter.”

“God, I’m not surprised. If she tries any of that shit with me, I will end her,” Emily said. She looked surprisingly furious. “It’s not funny, it’s actually pathetic. I heard about it from my scout, you know. They talk to each other. Sue spent hours hoovering up glitter and getting it out of her hair. If I was her, I’d have reported April to the Master.”

“I think she did get a telling-off,” Hannah said cautiously. She hitched up her gown, which was sliding off one shoulder. She felt uncomfortable, as if she were bitching about April behind her back. “I’m not sure from who, but someone came to speak to her.”

“Yeah, but did anything happen? I’m willing to bet good money the answer is no.”

“I wasn’t there, but the impression I got was that there would be consequences if it happened again,” Hannah said. But she knew it sounded weak.

“I expect Daddy made a few calls and it magically got dropped,” Ryan said sarcastically. “Will’s a sound bloke, but I don’t know what he sees in her, I really don’t.”

Hannah bit her lip. She couldn’t blame Ryan for his annoyance—he was still smarting from the business with the phone call—but April’s family wealth had been a bone of contention even before that: the extent of the family holdings, the donation her father had made to the Pelham College gym. And it wasn’t just Ryan. April Clarke-Cliveden? Hannah had heard someone say as she passed them in the cloisters on her way to a tutorial. That It Girl? Oh, she’s thick as two short planks—she wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for her dad’s money. He’s like, one rung down from Warren Buffett or something.

The odd thing was that April herself did nothing to dispel the rumors; in fact she seemed to revel in them. Her Instagram feed was a slew of designer clothes, boys in tuxedos, and shots of herself drinking champagne from the bottle and pouting at the camera. She seemed to take a pride in the notion that she did little or no work and yet still got good marks, and Hannah had heard her mention her unconditional offer and poor exam results more than once, as if daring people to put two and two together.

But it wasn’t true, that was the thing. April wasn’t an airhead, not at all. She liked clothes and parties, that much was true, but what her carefully curated Instagram feed failed to show was the hard work behind the scenes. Hannah had lost count of the number of times April had staggered home at midnight, ripped off her heels, and then pulled an all-nighter on some assignment due the next day. Hannah had proofread a few of those essays over breakfast as a favor to April. She had gone in trepidatiously the first time, expecting a load of plagiarized points, ramblingly regurgitated, but to her astonishment the essay was good—even brilliant in parts. Hannah was no historian, but she could recognize good writing—and these papers were much better than anything completed after half a dozen Cosmopolitans had a right to be. They deserved the marks April was getting, maybe even more.

It wasn’t just the essays either. A couple of weeks ago Hannah had walked in on April rehearsing for her part in a play she was supposed to be performing with the drama club before Christmas, and she had stood in the doorway, completely transfixed, goose bumps running up and down her spine. April wasn’t just some wannabe starlet. Maybe It Girl was right, though. Whatever it was, she had it.

“You know,” she began to Ryan—but as she said the words, they passed the Porters’ Lodge, and Hannah remembered something. “Oh, I’m really sorry—I’m expecting a letter from my mum. Can you hang on for two ticks while I check?”

“Don’t be long!” Emily said, and Hannah nodded and ran up the steps.

Inside it was warm and stuffy, with a strong smell of something that might have been damp cloth or an oddly musty kind of BO. She made her way over to the rows of pigeonholes and peered inside her own. Nothing, apart from a library slip reminding her about an overdue loan. Which was really odd; her mother’s letter was a pretty regular Friday occurrence. Had it gotten misfiled? It wouldn’t be the first time.

She was just peering into the pigeonholes above and below her own when she heard a reedy voice behind her.

“Looking for something?”

She turned, with a jump, to see the porter standing there—the one she had met on her visit to Dr. Myers’s office. He had come out from behind the desk and was standing next to her, just slightly too close for Hannah’s comfort. She took a step back.

“No, I mean—I was expecting a letter. My mum writes to me every week. But I don’t know if it’s here.”

“Just arrived. I was about to put it in your pigeonhole.” He held it out towards her, between two fingers, and Hannah reached for it, but to her surprise he jerked his hand back, holding the letter just above her head, with what seemed to be meant as a jovial expression.

Hannah frowned, and he held it out to her again; and again, when she reached for it, he pulled his hand back.

This time Hannah folded her arms, looking at him, refusing to reach for the letter. Her heart was quickening in a very uncomfortable way. There was nothing she could put her finger on, but this whole interaction felt so deeply off-balance, so odd and unprofessional, that she just didn’t know how to proceed. It reminded her unsettlingly of that moment on the first day, when he had dangled the keys and then held on to them for just a beat too long.

“Can I have my letter?” she said at last, and was irritated to find that her voice wobbled a little on the final word. She glanced out the window. Emily was standing there, glaring at her. As Hannah met her eyes Emily held up her watch, pointing at the dial.

I know, Hannah mouthed through the glass, trying to convey her predicament. She couldn’t go out and get Emily or Ryan to back her up, that was too pathetic. But she did wish one of them would come in after her.

“Can I please have my letter?” she repeated, and this time her voice sounded stronger, more annoyed.

“Course,” Neville said. He gave a broad smile and held out the letter for a third time, and this time, when Hannah reached for it, her heart pounding, he did not snatch it away, but let her slide it slowly from his fingers. “All you needed to say was the magic word. I like polite little girls.”

For a minute Hannah wasn’t sure what to say. Polite little girls? Was it sexism? Was he coming on to her? Or was this just some weird paternalistic bullshit, like she reminded him of his own daughter?

Neville was grinning at her, as if waiting for a reply, but instead of giving him the satisfaction of a thank-you, Hannah turned on her heel, pushing back the door of the Porters’ Lodge so hard that it banged against the wall, and stumbled out into the cool night air, her cheeks still blazing with a mixture of anger and discomfort.

Afterwards, talking it over during formal hall with Emily and Ryan, she almost couldn’t believe her own memory of the exchange.

“And that’s really what he said?” Emily was incredulous. “That he likes polite little girls?”

“I mean—I’m pretty sure?” Hannah said. “It’s creepy, right? I’m not overreacting here?”

“Too fucking right it’s creepy. It’s gross! You should report him to someone!”

“Look, he’s got to be fifty if he’s a day, maybe even sixty,” Ryan said. “That’s my granddad’s age—and that’s just what they’re like, aren’t they? Old blokes. Different generation. You’ve got to make allowances. He probably didn’t mean any harm.”

“He probably didn’t, but the fact is, it’s really fucking patronizing! Please tell me you’re going to report this, Han?”

“What, she’s going to report him for being a bit old-fashioned? What’s next, me suing the scout for calling me ducky?”

“It’s not the same and you know it!” Emily shot back.

As she and Ryan continued their argument, the conversation drifted away, Emily ranting about sexism and the patriarchy, Ryan goading her by pretending to miss her point, but Hannah found herself preoccupied, thinking over Ryan’s words. Because the thing was, he was probably right. John Neville probably didn’t mean any harm. And she couldn’t see herself reporting the incident, as Emily had suggested. What would she say? He pretended not to give me my letter and I felt uncomfortable?

Because that was the bottom line. It wasn’t anything specific he’d said or done. And although the little girls remark was weird, there was not much else she could put her finger on. But he had made her feel uncomfortable. He had made her beg for a letter that was rightfully hers, and there was something about the power play underlying the whole exchange that made her skin crawl. She found herself surreptitiously wiping her mother’s letter on her knee, even though she knew it was ridiculous.

After dinner, Ryan and Emily disappeared to meet some friends of Emily’s from another college, and Hannah finished off the remains of the wine they had ordered with a group of girls from Cloade’s, who all knew each other. When they filtered away to the college bar next door, she realized she was more or less alone in the hall, apart from a group of tutors still chatting over coffee at high table and the staff clearing away plates.

At the door she found herself uneasily glancing at the golden light filtering out from the windows of the Porters’ Lodge, and wondering when the shifts changed for the night. Would John Neville still be there? Would he see her walking across the Old Quad? There was no other exit from the hall, and no way of getting back to New Quad that didn’t involve cutting across the line of sight from the lodge. It had been deliberately positioned to give the porters a clear view of visitors making their way across the college grounds.

She knew she was being slightly ridiculous, but at the same time, there was just something about the thought of him lying in wait, maybe even coming out to ambush her, that set her skin crawling with a mix of fear and revulsion. Had he really been shelving her letter at that exact moment? Surely the post came in the morning? Or had he held on to it, waiting for her to come and look for it so that he could play his strange little game?

She was still standing in the doorway to the hall, hesitating, when she heard a voice from behind her.

“Everything okay?”

Turning, she saw Will’s friend Hugh. He was wearing a bow tie and his academic gown, and his glasses were slightly askew in a way that made him look a little comical and perhaps a little drunk too.

“Oh, Hugh!” she said gratefully. “Yes, everything’s fine. I was—I was just thinking about turning in. Are you heading back to Cloade’s?”

“Actually I’m off to the library.” He straightened his glasses, blew his hair off his brow, and gave a slightly rueful grin. “Got to pull a late on an essay I was supposed to hand in today. I’ve got an extension until tomorrow—I told old Bates that it was written but the printer wasn’t working, when the truth is I’ve not written a word. Do you want me to walk you?”

Hannah hesitated. New Quad wasn’t really on the way to the library—at least, not without taking a considerable detour. But the thought of kindly, horn-rimmed Hugh’s reassuring company was very tempting.

“Would you mind?” she said at last, and then laughed. “Sorry, that’s such a stupid thing to say. You could hardly say no when I put it like that. Honestly, I’m fine either way, I promise.”

But maybe Hugh was less drunk than he looked, or more perceptive. Whichever it was, he shook his head.

“It’s fine. I’d like the fresh air—probably need sobering up, to be honest.” He took her arm. “Come on, old thing. Har fleag, har fleag, har fleag onwards! Toodoo, toodoo!”

He imitated a hunting horn, setting the crows that lived in the trees around the quad crying and wheeling in irritation.

Hannah laughed, and they set out into the night together.