Chapter Thirty-Four

Hayden

Most Likely to Succeed

It isn t, really, anywhere near as much of a fuss as Bryony was making it all out to be. I set up the stepladder that s propped against the open cupboard; it s covered in flecks of paint and the metal groans before clicking into place, but it s sturdy enough when I climb up. The switches on the fuse box are all quite clearly labelled, even if the ink is a bit faded with time. I flip the master switch and lights flicker back on instantly. I hear them click and hum throughout the school; even the computer on the caretaker s desk whirs as it powers back up. I reset the fire alarm, too, finding the correct panel and switch.

It takes all of about two minutes, but when I climb down from the stepladder, I take a seat and sigh, burying my head in my hands, needing a moment.

I feel like this night has lasted for a thousand years. It feels like eons ago since I left the hall to follow Bryony. Even my phone call to say goodnight to Margot and Skye could have been whole decades ago.

I really don t know if I can go back to that party. If I can face it all again.

I am exhausted.

Exhaustion is an old, familiar friend, after night feeds and the girls kicking me awake as they crawl into bed after a nightmare or just run rampant around the park while I try to keep up on a Saturday afternoon. But this isn t just weary, bog-standard, need-a-good-night s-sleep tired. This is heavy enough to make me want to slide to the floor, sink down through it, close my eyes and not open them until the world has moved on around me, because I cannot even contemplate returning to it.

What it is, I think, is not really being fed up , so much as anxiety. The old, familiar kind that had a hold on me when I was a teenager and creeps back in occasionally now. It tells me they re right, I m wrong, everybody else knows something I do not and there is nothing I can do about that no matter how hard I try. They have it all figured out; I am the imposter, the fraud, and they all know it.

I suppose there is a chance that it s true - they re right; I m wrong. I gave it all up and I shouldn t have, and they can all see that, and I m the fool for burying my head in the sand.

Are they right?

Why do I care so badly if they are? These people I haven t even thought about for years, whose names I ve mostly forgotten, faces I don t recall Why do I suddenly value their opinions so highly, now?

I groan, the noise muffled against my palms, and wish I never came along tonight. It was a mistake.

Yes. That was the real mistake. Coming to the reunion, thinking it would be anything like fun or remotely a good idea. That was a fool s errand.

The rest of my life - and God, I felt so angry about the rest of my life until that fire alarm went off and we had to spring into action. Some of that rumbles through my body now, but it doesn t have the same ferocity as before, and when I concentrate on it, I just feel pissed off at everybody who gave me those sad, sorry looks instead of that blazing, harrowing fury at the entirety of my life in the last ten years.

I am still angry. A bit at myself, yes, and mostly at them, and maybe that isn t very fair, either. But the one thing I m certain of is that this anger isn t truly mine in the way I worried it would be. It s - a symptom. A side effect of the peer pressure and nostalgia. That will disappear with time, can be treated by distance, surely?

I wish I never came out tonight.

I wish they never instilled this doubt in me; I was happier living in ignorance.

School was draining enough when I had to be here. Why did I think it would be any different now? I owe these people nothing, and certainly no more of my emotional reserves or my time. I m tired . I m zapped. I want to sink into my hotel bed and treat this all like a bad dream, so I can leave it behind tomorrow and not take it with me.

Whatever everybody else thinks - whatever I started to think, earlier - I made the choices I made because they were what I wanted. Not just because they were best for the girls or for Lucy or even financially. I can regret not doing more for myself, but I can also contentedly stand by the choices I made in the last ten years. Those don t need to be mutually exclusive terms like everyone tonight seems so convinced they should be.

With the lights back on, I hear Bryony s playlist kick back on in the school hall, blaring through the speakers exactly where it left of, the final strains of the Macarena bleeding into Stacey s Mom , and I wince. With the power back up, she ll surely corral everybody back into the hall to finish the party; even if some people make a move, I bet most will stick around to salvage their night out.

I, however, won t be one of them. I can slip away with the other people who decide they ve had enough, disappear quietly, maybe message Bryony a thanks for organising or something after I m gone, which is only polite under the circumstances.

But I m done .

This reunion has taken enough from me already; I don t want to see what additional damage it can inflict in another hour or two. It s time to go home.

I clean my glasses on my shirt, scrub a hand through my hair and feel it sticking up on end, too unruly to bother tidying up now, and make my way back outside. I can hear shouting - no, cheering, and the volume of it only increases as I step through the entrance and some old classmates notice me.

The whoop! that cuts through the night is piercing, voracious enough to practically bowl me over. Someone - Shaun - lifts his fingers to his mouth to give a shrill whistle and the rugby lads start up a chant of my name, slicing it into two defined syllables in low bass notes.

Hay- den ! Hay- den ! HAY- DEN !

Other people join in the chant. People are applauding.

I m the hero of the night, the party saviour, which is rich when RJ once accused me of being a party-pooper and tried to disinvite me from prom before Ashleigh verbally cut his legs out from under him.

Bryony turns to me, her whole body sagging in relief and a smile lighting up her face. It s much simpler than her usual practised, swaggering grin, and makes her look years younger. She mouths, Thank you, to me. She might say it out loud, but I can t hear over the cacophony as everybody celebrates me.

So much for a quick getaway

I don t know what to do with all the attention so for a couple of seconds I just stare blankly, trying to wrap my head around it.

When I was fourteen, I had a recurring nightmare that I forgot my PE kit and had to go to class dressed in my boxers and one of those vests my mum made me wear when I was little and it was cold out, and everybody would be picking teams for whatever sport my dream decided we were playing that lesson, and they d start playing. And I d realise, it was all of them against me. They d all point and laugh and jeer and shout and inevitably, a ball of some description would come hurtling towards me and then I d wake up, gasping and sweating.

So the baying crowd before me isn t unfamiliar, exactly, but it still takes my brain a few seconds to catch up and make sense of it, and for the spike in my adrenaline to fade away.

I don t know what they want from me, so decide to treat it as if this was a game with Margot and Skye, and give them all my very best curtsey then a regal wave, calling, Thank you, thank you, so kind of you, thank you

Bryony steps up to me and grabs my arm in a frantic squeeze. All sorted?

Yup. Back up and running.

She squeals, fingers pinching my arm, and she smacks a noisy, wet kiss on my cheek. You re a star! Literally, the star of the show. We owe you! Alright, gang, she yells then, turning back to my adoring audience and making it her own once more. We are good to go! Party is back on!

Everybody begins to surge forward as one, chattering and back in high spirits. I notice that nobody makes a move to leave, which feels like a kick in the teeth. They can t all be enjoying this reunion that much, can they? Hasn t anybody else had enough by now?

Fuck it. I m still leaving. Might as well end on a high note, I suppose.

Hey, have you seen Ash anywhere? I ask Bryony. Only

She blanches, head jerking as if I had just slapped her, and she reels away from me to face the crowd once more.

WAIT! she bellows, making me wince, and she throws her arms out as if she can single-handedly stem the tidal wave of a hundred and fifty returning partygoers.

Which, unsurprisingly, she does. Bryony has always known how to keep people in the palm of her hand.

She cranes her neck, eyes scanning over our peers and their spouses. She consults her guestbook. She looks at everybody else again, and then swallows hard. Nobody moves, and people remain quiet, all curious and unsure.

And then Bryony asks, her voice carrying easily over everybody s heads, Where is Ashleigh? Ashleigh Easton? Has anybody seen her?

There are rumblings of no . Thea gets up on tiptoe and looks behind her like it s a game of Where s Wally . Roisin peers to her sides like Ashleigh might be there and she s only just noticing, and Josh gives a full-body shrug as he announces he hasn t seen her in a while.

I get my phone out of my pocket. There s no way Ashleigh would ve left me to the wolves and bailed on me, but maybe she didn t feel well? Maybe Ryan got under her skin a bit too much and she couldn t stick it anymore, or she felt embarrassed about having flirted with Freddie? But she hasn t texted me to say she wanted to leave or apologise for having left, and I know she would have done, so she must still be here somewhere.

Bryony looks at me, and I shrug.

With an exasperated sigh, she whips back to everyone else. You re telling me nobody has seen Ashleigh Easton for the last hour ? For God s sake, people, someone must know something! She can t have just vanished into thin air!

Er Someone clears their throat and Bryony s gaze zeroes in on them. A few people shuffle to reveal Hiro, a violin in one hand and his other raised awkwardly. He coughs again and then says, Uh, I don t think Ryan ever signed the guestbook, Bryony. I haven t seen him for a while either.

RJ whistles. Oh, shiiiiit

Priya squeals. Shut up.

Shaun s girlfriend, Aisha, looks around. What? What s going on? What s the matter?

Bryony throws her head back, hurls the guestbook to the floor and yells, Fuck!

And Freddie Loughton cracks up laughing. I m calling it now - those two have definitely murdered each other.