Page 59 of Vying Girls (Girls of Hazelhurst #2)

Tilda

I squint my eyes against the fierce wind, debating the wisdom of hosting hockey practice on the outdoor pitches tonight. Pin-like rain lashes me as I turn into the sports centre, taking a brief retrieve indoors before I’m spat back out into the squall.

I jog to the farthest pitch, the gathering of girls and sticks showing me I’m most likely the last to arrive.

Not my fault Elly decided to accost me whilst I was changing into my sports gear, cheekily pressing me up against my door with my hockey stick, refusing to let go until I’d practically snogged the lips off her.

I spot Nic’s tall head above the crowd, standing before Coach. It’s only when I reach the edge of the pitch that I see it’s the two of them the team are circling.

I frown, chucking my stuff on the bench. It’s rare for Nic to shout, even rarer for her to do so at Coach. Budging my teammates out the way, I come to stop near her, my ears primed.

‘I’m fucking fine!’ Nic bellows, tossing her arms up.

‘You’ve got five seconds,’ Coach replies, her voice deathly quiet yet somehow carrying over the wind, ‘to pick up your things and get out of here before I blacklist you for the rest of your time at university.’

For a moment, I think Nic’s going to continue arguing her point, whatever that is, when she suddenly slumps in defeat, stepping away from Coach.

My heart clenches when her eyes meet mine, the whites red and glittering with tears.

‘Hey.’ I reach out a hand. ‘What’s going on?’

Nic’s eyes flare, her jaw jumping with tension. ‘Get…the fuck …away from me.’

My hand freezes. It drops back to my side. ‘What? What’s happened?’

She shakes her head, one savage toss, before flying to the bench and swiping her water bottle and hockey stick bag. She doesn’t even sheath it before stalking back to the sports centre.

I take one look at my team before running after her, ignoring the sound of Coach calling me back.

‘Nic!’

She gets caught at the entrance waiting for some other students to enter. I grab her arm, not letting go this time.

‘What was that about?’

She gives a wet laugh, yanking her arm away. ‘Don’t play dumb, Tilda. Jesus.’

‘I’m not! What were you arguing about?’

‘Varsity, Tilda! She’s just kicked me off because someone told her about my heart flip-out.’ She looks at me with wet, wounded eyes. ‘You fucking promised.’

‘Yeah, I did. I did! I didn’t say anything, not to anyone.’

‘Right. So it was who? Skylar?’

‘Well—maybe.’

‘She doesn’t even know I play hockey, Tilda! Why would she bother?!’

I scrub damp hair out my face, shaking my head helplessly. ‘Nic—I don’t know.’

She looks past my shoulder into the trees, the tops of them bending in the wind, their howling mournful. There’s so much running through her eyes, a whorl of emotions scaring me with their intensity.

‘Nic, I swear—’

She tosses her stick at my feet and runs into the forest.

‘Nic! Fuck.’

I glance back in the direction of the pitch, knowing Coach will have my head if I don’t return. Guts writhing with a frantic kind of anxiety, I pick up Nic’s stick and make my way back.

Coach’s head is turned away as she bellows at the team. I slip onto the bench, quickly bringing up Nic’s number on my phone.

‘Tilda, you better get out here now!’

I nod rapidly, wiping raindrops off the screen with shaking fingers.

Please don’t let this mess things up, I type out.

I want to say more, a whole lot more, but Coach shouts for me again.

I shove open the door to the lodge, gasping from the force of the rain I’ve just jogged through. Haz glances at me from where she’s stirring something on the hob. The look in her eyes is just as accusing as Nic’s had been.

I wipe my face, shaking out water on the floor. ‘Have you seen Nic?’

‘No.’ She turns away, slamming a wooden spoon on the side of the saucepan as she crosses to the fridge. ‘Fucking good job I’ve not.’

I watch her warily, still catching my breath. ‘Why do you say that?’

‘Dunno. Why do I?’ Her voice is barely audible over the extractor fan. ‘I’ll leave that one to you.’

I step up to her, trying to look into her eyes. ‘Just tell me, please.’

She adds something to the pot and carries on stirring. ‘Is it true?’

‘What?’

‘That Nic had a heart crash out the other night. That you helped her, which meant you must have left the house at some point in the night. Snuck out, again.’

‘Which part are you mad at?’

‘Fucking all of it, Tilda! All me and Elly are trying to do is keep you safe, but it’s like you don’t want to be. And Nic—’ She stops, jaw clenched. ‘Tell me what happened.’

‘Tell me how you know first.’

‘Skylar.’

I nod, guessing as much. That fucking girl.

‘She messaged me asking how Nic is. Course, I didn’t have a fucking clue what she was going on about.’

I take in a breath. ‘I’m sorry. Nic made me promise. Haz, she was really freaked out. About her heart, about you finding out and killing her for it.’

Haz snorts. ‘I’m gonna kill her alright.’ The disappointment in her eyes almost cuts me down. ‘I told her you don’t fucking lie.’

It’s like a punch to the stomach.

A liar.

It’s what Nic accuses me of being. It’s what I can almost convince myself I am. What Mum wishes I’d been. It’s a knife twisting in the wound to hear it from Haz.

‘I just never know what to do for the fucking best!’ I grab at my arms, hurting the skin there, feeling like Nic as a sudden urge to run grips me.

‘Telling the truth to you means lying to her. And keeping her promise means lying to you. I just keep messing up everything.’ I breathe out some short breaths, that roaring from the other day back in my head. ‘Who told Coach?’

‘I did.’

‘Why?’

‘Why? Because I know she was given orders to rest. Because you weren’t there last year when I thought she was going to fucking die.

She needs to know there’s consequences to her actions, that she’s not fucking immortal.

’ Haz looks away. ‘And yeah, I was just mad at her and wanted a way to get back at her.’

‘Nice. Great. Well, I can tell you it’s me she’s punishing. It’s me she’s angry at yet again. We were actually doing alright, Haz. For fucking once, things were going good.’

‘She’s got no right to be mad at you. You didn’t say shit. That was all me.’ She tosses up a hand. ‘And Skylar, I guess.’

‘Yeah, but she doesn’t believe that, does she? And now she’s gone, thinking I betrayed her when I fucking promised.’ Hot tears flood my eyes. ‘Fuck’s sake, we were actually getting somewhere.’

‘What do you mean she’s gone?’

‘Just gone. To her tent, probably. She just ran off at practise just now. You know, after telling me to get the fuck away from her. A little warning would have been nice, Haz.’

Haz looks at the kitchen window, spoon poised in hand. The wind’s changed direction, hurling rain right at us.

‘Take over this.’ She drops the spoon into the pot. ‘Take it off after another twenty. I’ll go find her.’

I wipe my eyes. ‘Not if she doesn’t want to be found.’

‘I’ll find her. I don’t want you worrying about this.’ She captures my wrists, eyes lancing into mine. ‘Are you mad at me?’

‘A bit.’

She nods, letting me go. ‘Fine. I’ll sort it. Not the first time I’ve been here with her. I’ll deal.’

I watch her put on shoes and raise the hood of her tank hoodie. She needn’t bother. The thing’s going to be soaked through in seconds.

‘When you find her, Haz, just…make sure she knows I care about her.’

‘Yeah. Text me the coordinates of where her tent is. If I’m quick, I might get there before she moves it.’ She opens the door.

‘Wait! Does Elly know?’

‘No.’ She steps out into the wind. ‘You can tell her yourself.’

‘Does Elly know what?’

I glance over as Elly steps into the kitchen with an inquisitive smile. I gently shake off the spoon and turn off the hob. It’s nothing that can’t be taken care of later.

‘Just me fucking everything up as per.’

‘Heeeey.’ Her arms close around me from behind. ‘Tell Elly-Belly.’

‘You’ll hate me.’

She tuts. ‘Impossible.’

‘Okay, but you’ll be really bloody mad with me.’

‘I’ll be really bloody mad with you if you don’t hurry up and tell me.’ She turns me around and combs hair out my face. ‘Hm? Babe, you’re literally soaking. Let’s go get dry. Then you tell me whatever this big bad thing is.’

I let her pull me upstairs and into her room where she fetches me a towel, removes my clothes and dries me off. Then she does one of my favourite things ever and dresses me in her comfy, way-too-oversized pyjamas.

‘There. Cosy?’

I nod, closing my eyes as I bury my face into her fleecy top. It’s practically summer now but you’d never know it on Hazelhurst.

‘Good.’ She kisses my forehead, her warm breath making me tingle. ‘So, what’s up?’

‘I lied about something,’ I say quietly, leaning into her.

‘The other night I got a call from Skylar. You know that night Nic went to the Vaults? Well, she took shit, and her heart didn’t like it.

Not a heart attack or anything, but she thought that’s what it was.

But she was freaking out anyway and made Skylar ring me and go meet them. ’

‘You went out?’

‘Yeah,’ I mumble into her chest. ‘On my own in the middle of the night. I brought a knife, but…pretty stupid. Anyway, we ended up being airlifted to hospital for tests. Obviously Nic was fine in the end, and we managed to get the ferry back before you guys knew we were gone.’

‘What—and this all happened just the other night?’ She looks into my face with a frown.

‘Yeah. She didn’t want to tell you because she thought you’d be mad, and she didn’t want me to tell Coach because of Varsity.

I promised I wouldn’t say anything.’ I slump into Elly, soaking up her comfort.

‘But Haz found out, told Coach who kicked her off the team again, and obviously Nic thinks it was me.’

Elly’s quiet for a moment. It’s a lot to digest. ‘And where’s Nic now?’

‘Dunno. Legged it. Haz has gone to find her. Think she feels responsible.’

‘Maybe because she fucking is?’

I hum, keeping my eyes closed.