Page 11

I was on the point of braving the crush again, this time to go and talk to Kit, when a puff of exotic-fruit vape smoke made me glance around.

I hadn’t looked properly at any of the students out here, I guess partly because I figured I’d seen most of my targets inside.

So it caught me a little by surprise to recognise the undeniably handsome face and long, floppy fringe of James Sedgewick from his social media photos.

I couldn’t help taking a longer look. He was very much on his own, and seemed profoundly closed off to everyone else. He had the look of someone who’d been on the verge of leaving for some while. There was a ‘done with this’ vibe to him.

I sensed a possible rift to exploit, and so I moved in. And, Reid, please don’t try to pretend you wouldn’t have talked to him, too. I know you, and you would have been in there as determinedly as I was.

‘Jesus, it’s hot in there,’ I said to him after a second or two to gather my thoughts. ‘I still don’t understand why air conditioning can’t be a thing around here.’

James gave a little snorting laugh and then said, ‘It would ruin the authentic Cambridge experience. Remember, if it was good enough in 1760, it’s good enough for us now.’

‘True– why change?’ I agreed. ‘In fact, I’m shocked Kit doesn’t have a live lute band. Kind of killing the vibe with his sound system.’

‘Oh, but that’s the thing,’ James said, glancing over at me, and then away.

‘Some of us still have to be the nobility, and some of us still have to be the plebs. Kit is the nobility. So he has towers made in Sweden from three-hundred-year-old oaks and…’ He waved his hand, searching for an appropriate addition to this.

‘Speakers crafted from moose gut?’ I suggested. ‘With electronic circuits put together by elves?’

James gave a smile. ‘That kind of thing.’

The whole conversation gave me a deep feeling of satisfaction. It was clear that James felt disillusioned by his friend, and in that disillusionment there lay the chance of driving a wedge between them.

But as I was working out how to continue the conversation another male figure appeared through the window.

In sharp contrast with the awkward way I’d clambered out, he slid out through the opening athletically, all while holding what looked like a Tom Collins.

It was Kit Frankland. He probably jumped out of that window most days. Home advantage.

I was hoping he’d move off towards the other couple of people standing on the lawn, but he looked over towards us and then moved in.

‘You OK, Jamie?’ Kit asked as he closed in, but somehow I could tell his attention was actually on me.

Up close, I became aware of exactly how big he was.

He might not have been a wide front-row rugby player like Ryan, but he was taller than I’d realised– probably six three– and clearly powerful.

Despite the good-natured smile he was now gracing us with, I found myself thinking that I would go a long way to avoid getting in trouble with him.

‘I’m good,’ James told him, with what sounded like slight defensiveness. ‘Just having a vape.’

Kit turned to me. ‘Sorry, I don’t know… Did you come with Luca?’ I was sure Kit knew the answer to this already. I felt instinctively that what he’d really come to do was give me the third degree. I was an outsider, and that was, I guessed, dangerous.

I gave him a brilliant smile, and said, ‘I did. I got talked into crashing. For some reason he thought it was a good idea for me to try an undergrad party.’

Kit shook his head slightly. ‘Not just an undergrad party. This is my undergrad party,’ he said. ‘It’s going to spoil all the other ones for you.’

‘Oh, sorry,’ I said. ‘I should have realised. Is that what all the candles were for? Like, offerings for us to be grateful for your generosity?’

I said it with a grin, and Kit had the good grace to laugh. ‘Exactly. We’ll take whisky or blood sacrifices, depending.’

‘Shit, I forgot the whisky.’ I glanced towards the window. ‘Given that… is there anyone you wouldn’t miss? If I offed them?’

‘Ha. Several people, actually.’

There was a sound from James at that: a short, impatient sigh.

‘I’m heading off,’ he said.

I turned towards him with a strange feeling of looking away from a bright light.

‘Really? Already?’ I asked. That was my plans busted. He seemed closed off now, and I realised that bantering with Kit had probably lost me ground.

That said, there is always power in making people feel like they have to compete for your attention. And again, Reid, I know you do this too. So quiet with the moral judgements.

‘I should be revising,’ James said. ‘Nice to meet you…?’

‘Aria,’ I supplied. ‘Nice to meet you, too.’

James glanced towards his friend, and then said with his eyes still on him, ‘Don’t let Kit talk you into anything stupid.’

Despite the slight smile, I felt like there was more to that statement than light-hearted fun. I thought inevitably of Holly, and I couldn’t help a slight shiver as Kit said, ‘But that’s my one real skill.’

James didn’t bother to go back into the party. He just drifted off across the lawn, heading for the front gates. His hands were in his jacket pockets and his head was down, a picture of sadness.

‘I’m usually the one who leaves first,’ I commented as I watched him go.

‘Why’s that?’ Kit asked me.

‘Early training,’ I told him, looking back at him and secretly trying to assess whether this young man was really capable of murdering his friend.

I saw the way his interest picked up. ‘Rower?’ he asked.

‘Good call,’ I said. ‘Exactly.’

‘So… CUWBC?’

That, Reid, is the university women’s boat club. And by the way, a lot of those young women go on to have professional rowing careers, so he wasn’t undervaluing me.

‘More national,’ I told him. ‘I’m on the high-performance programme.’

‘Wow, nice.’ Kit looked genuinely impressed by this. ‘That’s basically my dream. Only with rugby.’

‘Oh, national stuff?’

Kit nodded. ‘Five-year plan is to graduate then get a pupillage in some well-paying law firm while training so I have a backup. Probably get fired for not working enough hours…’

‘Aren’t you too pretty for professional rugby?’ I asked him, grinning.

Kit laughed. ‘I play at number seven. I don’t have to get my face involved too often.’

‘You could try using it as a distraction technique,’ I suggested. ‘I’m pretty sure that’s how I’ve won several races. I get my game face on, it makes them laugh, they can’t concentrate… I win.’

‘OK, I need to see your game face now.’

‘I can’t just do it off the cuff,’ I told him indignantly. ‘I’d have to be competing at something.’

Kit looked around. ‘We could do competitive jumping.’

‘Oh, game on,’ I said. ‘Are we doing distance? From a standing start?’

‘I think so,’ he said. ‘Given there’s no bar to jump over.’

You will be able to predict entirely that at the prospect of a game to play I was totally all in and almost forgot what I was really there to do.

Within seconds I was practising my crouching posture, planning how to get the best forward momentum, and working out whether I could sabotage Kit’s chances.

‘OK, I’m going to need some of your drink,’ I told him, straightening up after a few moments.

Kit handed it to me without complaint, and I sank at least half of it before saying, ‘Ready.’

Obviously, the game was enormous fun. I did, indeed, do my game face, which Kit found hilarious, and I beat him a couple of times, and got beaten a couple of times. We both fell over through overreaching and ended up laughing hard enough to not be able to breathe.

And of course, equally obviously, by the time we’d ended up laughing too hard to continue I’d passed whatever test he’d set for me. As I excused myself to go home, he said, ‘Thanks for crashing. See you soon.’

And I knew, at that point, that I was in.