Chapter Five

 Darrell Goes to the Football

Over the next two weeks, the four girls settled into a steady routine of tutorials and study sessions in the library, followed by walks on the beach and reading in the living room by the fire. One Sunday, after breakfast, Darrell, Sally, and Mildred went for a walk together on the beach and found that hidden cove. It had started to rain, but the girls had promised to each other that they would explore the cove another day. 

    It had been a drizzly start to the year; Darrell hadn’t had a chance to sit on her balcony with one of her books from the library or even take the long walks she was used to. 

    It was not unusual for Darrell to slump out of her bedroom in the morning to discover Sally and Mildred laughing in the living room, stretched out on the scratchy settee. They had taken to playing games for two, like chess or dominoes. Darrell did not realise it, but whenever she saw Sally and Mildred together, in their own bubble, it niggled her, so when she bumped into John walking from one of her tutorials, Darrell stopped to greet him. She played the part of a polite Malory Towers girl. 

    ‘You look nice.’ Darrell thanked him. ‘Have you had a good start to your year?’ 

    ‘I don’t know. I suppose it’s the same as last year. But now I know where all my classes are. And I know the people to avoid.’ 

    ‘Are there many people you avoid?’ 

    ‘Not many,’ John said. 

    ‘Where are you off to now?’ 

    ‘I was going home,’ Darrell said. 

    ‘No, you’re not,’ John said. ‘There’s a pint of bitter with your name on it. It’s sat in the pub now. Ever so lonely, Darrell, believe me.’ 

    Sally and Mildred would be practicing Mildred’s part in the winter play. Darrell could picture the pair reciting lines by the fireplace. It made her stomach turn. She would be forced to spend the night in her bedroom, avoiding the work she had to complete for Monday’s Classics tutorial, and avoiding Mildred and Sally. Darrell rarely spoke to Samantha. Samantha was irksome company. Her gentile coughs irritated Darrell. 

    So, a drink with John in their familiar corner in the Bucket and Moon seemed like the best option to Darrell. ‘It will only be one drink,’ Darrell told herself, as they walked from St. Andrews to the pub, where people went noisily about their business, but Darrell knew where she would be in an hour, as she could see the afternoon laid out before her. 

    Darrell was correct. 

    John leaned against his bedroom wall and lit a cigarette. 

    He told Darrell to open the window. 

    ‘But it’s cold,’ Darrell argued. John did not want his room to smell of smoke. ‘I don’t mind,’ Darrell said. John said that he minded. 

    Darrell opened the window. 

    She thought it jolly silly that John should smoke and not like the smell in his room. She was too tired to argue. Their second meeting had been more fruitful than the first for Darrell. She imagined John could say any number of cruel things to her now. She would do as she was told. She would listen with placid ears. She was comfortable. Her thighs gently ached. ‘Maybe those circles of damp have shrunk now,’ she thought, sighing quietly. John ran a hand through his hair. 

    ‘What’re you doing on Saturday?’ 

    ‘I was going to the football.’

    ‘Oh, let me come! I wouldn’t embarrass you. I’ve always liked football. We played lots of sports at Malory Towers, you know, and we wouldn’t need to talk much, as I’d be so focused on the game.’ 

    John considered her. 

    ‘Suppose you could come,’ he said. ‘But they’re a bit funny about girls. Almost an unwritten rule. You know how it is. But you have a small chest. Maybe, if you cut your hair short, then we could pass you off as a boy. Put yourself in something baggy. Get some trousers.’ 

    ‘It would be an adventure,’ Darrell thought. They agreed on a meeting place for Saturday. 

    Darrell dressed and left John to his own devices. 

    She needed to find something baggy to wear. This wouldn’t be too difficult. She had kept the jumper her mother had bought for her fifth form at Malory Towers. Darrell’s mother had been convinced that Darrell would have a growth spurt between her fourth and fifth year at school. She could buy trousers from one of the new charity shops. But Darrell needed someone to cut her hair. She couldn’t ask Sally. The Screw would disapprove. Mildred was out of the question. 

    Darrell slipped past Mildred and Sally in the living room and knocked on Samantha’s door. A weedy voice replied from inside the room. Darrell opened the door slowly. Samantha was sat in bed. There was a thin sheet draped over her. Rain hammered against her fragile windowpane. 

    ‘I need a favour,’ Darrell said, confidently. Samantha let out one of her gentile coughs. Darrell thought she was faking it for attention. Darrell had a pair of scissors in her right hand. ‘Can you cut hair?’ 

    Samantha removed the sheet and moved to the side of her bed. Darrell saw that she wore a white nightgown with an embroidered collar. 

    ‘I have cut Michael’s hair once before.’ 

    ‘I need mine cutting. I’m sick of it, in all honesty.’ 

    ‘Alright,’ Samantha said, as Darrell walked further into the room, having shut the bedroom door behind her. ‘It might be a challenge.’ 

    ‘It doesn’t have to be spectacular, just short,’ Darrell said. ‘I’ll sit here, on the bed, and you can turn around and cut from there.’ 

    Darrell got into position on the bed. She looked around Samantha’s room. She hadn’t unpacked everything yet. There were cardboard boxes filled with books in the corner of the room. Darrell noticed a hockey stick propped up against the wardrobe. ‘You play hockey,’ Darrell said. 

    ‘Used to,’ Samantha said, touching Darrell’s hair for the first time. ‘Before I took a turn for the worse.’ Darrell noticed the lilt of a Scottish accent in Samantha’s voice. 

    ‘Michael is your brother.’ 

    ‘He’s good to me. Collects my books from the library. Hands my essays to my masters. He lives in Fife. Works in one of the tea rooms by the Cathedral. But he won’t work there forever. He’s a musician really.’ Samantha made her first cut. There was no going back for Darrell now. Samantha explained that she’d spent her childhood in Edinburgh. Darrell hadn’t heard Samantha string two sentences together before now. The sickly girl stopped to cough, then continued to cut Darrell’s hair. ‘Michael is proficient in piano, but he can play most instruments.’ Darrell thought she should say something about her own sibling. 

    Samantha stopped when she noticed a pretty turtle shell clip in Darrell’s hair. Darrell removed it. It was the one she had bought in Polruan that summer. 

    ‘You can have it,’ Darrell said. ‘But you might give it back, when mine’s grown back, or you don’t need it anymore.’ 

    ‘Thanks, I will’ Samantha said, quite seriously. ‘Mildred told me you found a cove on the beach.’ 

    ‘You should walk with us more often. I rarely have anyone to talk to. Sally and Mildred get on like the closest friends. You won’t tell them I said that. I don’t want Sally to think I’m sad.’ 

Darrell waited for John for an hour before she realised that he wasn’t coming. Her neck felt cold without her long hair to protect it. She felt quite ridiculous standing there in her baggy jumper and boyish trousers. The lady in the charity shop had given Darrell a funny look when she had handed her the trousers to buy. Her embarrassment had been for nothing. 

    The worst thing about it was she couldn’t tell anyone. She imagined John laughing with his friends on the bus, on their way to the football. She wondered if John’s friends knew about her, or what they did together. Darrell Rivers walked to the beach. The sky was overcast. It didn’t feel like rain that day. Perhaps a jog along the coast would make her feel more sensible. It took all her courage to stop herself from crying right there on the beach. She walked to the tide and wetted her hands in the sea. Darrell found herself walking to the cove they had discovered last Sunday. She thought it might make a good thinking spot. ‘I have been a fool to carry on with John,’ she thought, as she neared the cove. Darrell looked to the cove and saw Sally and Mildred sitting on a slab of rock, their arms wrapped around one another.