Page 2 of Boy Friends
I nod, but then I think, Mum’s missing so many other things. She tries to keep up and makes me tell her everything that’s going on in my honestly not that exciting life. But it means she only hears about things after they’ve happened, rather than being a part of them. I don’t think she regrets moving away, but I can tell that she misses Lombard – and Dad and me – more than she lets on.
‘School’s calling,’ I tell Miss M, then let go of her hand.
‘Ah, a new year. Are you excited, Luca?’
I shrug. ‘Just like every other year, isn’t it?’ Change means chaos, and I like the way things are.
‘We’ll see,’ says Miss M with the authority of someone decades older than me. ‘Don’t forget to send me today’s message on the noticeboard!’ she calls in lieu of a goodbye.
‘I’d never forget!’ I shout back, the familiar words rolling off my tongue before the door to her flat falls shut behind me.
We do this every Monday morning; I bring her coffeeand updates from the cafe, and she gets to inquire about my life and give me advice that I generally ignore. In my defence, Miss M gives awful advice for someone so old. I’m not going to start eating liquorice because it allegedly ‘makes ashy elbows moist again’. Body lotion exists for a reason, and besides, liquorice is rank.
I descend the stairs to the first floor, where I’ve lived all my life. I change into more sensible footwear, grab my school bag from my room and make my way down to the cafe on the ground floor. There’s chatter in the air and the smell of freshly ground coffee.
‘Miss M all good?’ Dad asks from behind the counter, busily filling pots of tea with steaming hot water.
‘Chirpy as ever,’ I respond. I grab a sourdough sandwich and a chocolate cookie, the latter earning me a stern look. Dad disapproves of sweets for breakfast but doesn’t get the chance to tell me off. A group of half a dozen tourists enter the already crammed place, and so I use the opportunity to escape.
Out on the street, I’m hit by a wave of salty air and the familiar cries of seagulls as they circle the town from above. A quick jog takes me to the promenade. The ocean glimmers silver in the sunlight, as I go to greet Paul in his kiosk. Instead of waving back, Paul turns towards the radio and frantically begins working its buttons. I don’t think much of his strange behaviour, until a pack of primary-school kids walking the other way spots me and instantly stops chatting. They giggle as I pass, and I make sure that I’m zipped up. I go to check if there’s something on my face with my phone camera and see several missed callsfrom Simo. I hit the call button.
The boulevard begins to slope up, taking me above sea level. If you pluck Piccadilly Circus out of London, then swap the mega-screens for a big slab of wood fixed between two poles and stick the whole thing bang on the coast of our little town, you basically get Lombard town square. It’s way cuter though, I think as I step on to the cobbled square from one side, with the town hall and a lighthouse offering shelter from the sea wind and rowan trees dotted all around, their branches loaded with red berries.
‘Have you seen it?’ Simo says, picking up after just one ring.
‘Seen what?’
‘You haven’t seen it.’ His voice is oddly toneless. ‘Where are you?’
‘Almost at the noticeboard,’ I reply, rounding the square so I can read the announcement.
The thing about the noticeboard is that its message changes weekly. Most of the time, it’ll be birthday wishes for residents reaching a significant age, or a massive storm warning, or holiday greetings. But now and then we get something hilarious or unexpectedly raunchy, like the time when Linda, the mailwoman, announced a split from her husband after she caught him cheating with the pet-shop owner. For a week, all of Lombard saw the wordsHARRY HICKS SLEEPS WITH FLEASblasted across the town square. Suffice it to say that nobody’s seen Harry since, and the pet shop shut down a few weeks later.
Heloise, the mayor’s right hand, is watering the plants in front of the lighthouse, but freezes when she sees me, as ifI caught her in the middle of committing a crime. ‘Why is everyone acting so weird today?’
‘Luca, I need you to—’
‘Wait,’ I interrupt Simo. ‘Let me take a picture of the message and send it to Miss M.’
I open my phone’s camera, stride towards the noticeboard – and stop short. My heart drops out of my chest and my phone clatters to the ground. I don’t hear it fall, don’t hear Simo calling my name. Paralysed, I stare up at the board, each letter the size of a loaf of bread.
The words are absolutely, terrifyingly impossible to miss.
There in black and white, my best-hidden feelings turned inside out for all the world to see.
SIMO AND LUCA ARE
IN LOVE
‘I ship it!’
‘Congrats, you guys!’
‘This is so cute I could die!’
Students I’ve never even spoken to shout at me from across the school hallway. Others pat my back, and a group of guys holler and clap in a weirdly non-offensive way. One girl shrieks so loudly I almost run into a locker to escape her, and I swear there are tears in her eyes.
I walked to school in a state of shock, skipped registrationby hiding behind the bike shed in a state of shock, then sat through design and technology in a state of shock. So far, I’ve successfully avoided Simo; avoided thinking about what this means for him, for me, for us. But as I’m headed to English, I know he’ll be there. We’ll be sharing a table for the next two hours. I’ve never been so scared to face him. Usually his presence fills me with a sense of calm that no other person can induce, but today just the thought of him has the opposite effect. I want to run.
