Page 69 of Oleander

“Told you. I think you could have taken my chem one for me too. Oh, to be naturally brainy like you,” she sighed.

“I’m really not.”

“You are, though. You’re hotandsmart. I’m super lucky.”

I shifted, awkward under the praise. “Is your mum picking you up?”

“Dad. I think he’s outside now,” she groaned. “Only two weeks to go. I feel like a bloody prisoner.”

“Yeah, two weeks will fly.”

She leaned up on her tiptoes.

“I can’t wait to be alone with you.”

I knew Ellie wanted to have sex again. She’d mentioned as much in our text chats while she was in France – on Christmas morning, she’d even sent a topless photo.‘Merry Christmas, Jude x’it had said. It had done its job. I was a 16-year-old boy, and I quickly learned that I didn’t have much control over these things. No matter where my heart and mind lay.

The first time she’d asked for a photo back, I’d made an excuse about not being at home and then pretending to forget. The second time, though, I gave in. And though I’d been embarrassed and nervous, I’d still pulled it out and photographed my semi-hard cock and sent it to her. I’d felt it was the decent thing to do.

“Yeah, me too,” I muttered.

“How can you still be shy?” She gave me the face she did sometimes, like I was a small, adorable puppy. “God, you’re so cute.”

When she kissed me again, a little deeper this time, I tasted cherries and apples. A few people in the corridor whistled.

Every night that week, I cycled up to Deveraux, sat in Gideon’s library, and stared at the painting. Every night, I thought about calling him. Even if it was just to thank him. But the longing in my chest was a constant thing, the absence of him almost as all-consuming as his presence. I knew if I called him, I’d only embarrass myself again by begging him to come home.

He’d long ago begun to feel like a ghost, some figment I’d conjured out of loneliness. I’d have been convinced he wasn’t real if it wasn’t for Gideon.

Gideon would swoop into the library like a moth to remind me of him, as if I were in danger of forgetting.

“Gosh, it is a wonderful likeness,” he’d said about the painting that first night. He’d come in to offer me a cup of hot chocolate, which he’d made himself. After that, he would bring me one every night at the same time. “I think he captured your heart in every stroke.”

“He said you were quite angry with him that day,” he said the following night.

I’d been about to deny it because I only recalled the fervid, burning moments on the floor. The white exquisite pleasure after. But then I remembered how I’d arrived, how angry I’d been with him and his threats to tell Ellie everything.

The night before my English Lit mock, he set the hot chocolate down next toDracula;I’d chosen it for tomorrow’s exam. It was the same battered copy Caspien had taken to the beach that day. “I say, did you ever write him the letter we spoke of?” He sat down and gave me an encouraging smile.

I shook my head. “I tried. I just...I couldn’t think of anything I thought he’d like to hear about.” I remembered the letter I’d written and stuffed under my mattress. I’d forgotten all about it.

“I don’t think that is the purpose of letters, Jude.” He took a sip of his hot chocolate.

I frowned at this. “What’s the purpose of letters then?”

Another of his encouraging smiles. “Well, to say things we might not be brave enough to say face to face.”

I looked down at the page ofDraculain front of me. The passage that stood out was so apt that I felt a shiver run down my spine:I am all in a sea of wonders. I doubt; I fear;I think strange things, which I dare not confess to my own soul.

“I say this only as I’m going to see him tomorrow,” Gideon was saying. “I fly out early, and I could take it to him personally. If that’s something you’d want me to do.”

He was going to see him. Envy pulsed through me. Christ, what I’d have given to see him.

But I forced myself to think about the letter. Perhaps I could thank him for the painting and apologise for my drunken call. I could ask when he’d be home and make those promises I’d made in the letter under my mattress –I’ll do whatever you want me to, please just come back.

Perhaps I could even tell him about the strange things I dare not confess to my own soul.

Gideon let me use his desk in the corner of the blue sitting room. There was the Deveraux letterhead on rich white embossed paper, envelopes, and an array of pens in the small narrow drawer under the large desk. He patted me on the shoulder, gave me a proud smile, and went whistling out of the room.