Play Nice

“You know Dylan only got with you because your boobs are the biggest?”

The cafeteria was always busy at first break on Monday’s, full of students discussing their exploits from the previous Saturday. The boys would lean against the wall between the benches with one hand in a pocket and another around a babe. Girls would sit on the tables with crossed legs, twirling ringlets of hair, occasionally switching their legs with lethargic pace towards the wall. The door to the kitchen glowed despite the crowding and the smell of buttery garlic hung in the air.

“Maybe I like that” said Enid mouth still full with the brownie Jas’ mum made for the cake sale. “At least I have an inventory for my assets now. Let’s me know what’s serious and what’s not.”

“Do you ever do serious?” said Jas folding a crumby wrapper into an impossibly small square.

The day was dragging on. The only excitement so far was that they heard from Sarah Innes that Marie-Louise had thrown up watching her lab partner Zac Lewis snort a condom up his nose and pull it out his mouth.

“Yeah sure. Remember Dylan’s birthday when I told Zac I loved him and he said it back and then I did my first hand-job? That was very serious. I didn’t even have boobs then.”

“I don’t think you should talk about Zac and the other boys you get with when you have Dylan for a boyfriend.” Jas’ eyes were down at the square, teasing the corners into sharper edges.

“And I think you wouldn’t critique me if you finally lost your virginity you lil’ pap smear. Sexuality is fluid you know. We should have sex whenever we want to. Feminism and that”.

“You’re a virgin too remember.”

The cafeteria continued to swell as more uniforms entered carrying clear bags of sprinkled cupcakes, iced buns and Rizzlas. Most of the year 10s were sitting in the corner near Jas and Enid, occasionally looking at the pair as if they were a lion and a tiger in a cramped cage.

“We should move.” says Jas. The bell goes.

“Alright. I’ll probably see you at 3. My mum is picking us up”

The pair meet again. They’ve met in the prep school toilet blocks during chemistry to roll emergency fags. Jas sits on the toilet and places the papers on her knees whilst Enid cracks the stall window. There are bickering younger voices from the far side of the bathroom as Jas licks and smooths the paper.

“I reckon Marie-Louise is knocked up.” Enid says as she lights and sucks the cigarette Jas handed her. “It wasn’t that gross. She must have already been nauseous.”

“She could have been day-drinking again. Are the netball girl’s still doing initiation?” asks Jas as she rolls a new a paper.

“No that’s the best part! That ended two weeks ago. It’s four weeks now since Jack told everyone they did it for the first time. The timing is perfect.” Enid leans over to light Jas’ fag with her own.

“Maybe you’re just a little bit jealous somebody else beat you and Dylan to it” Jas giggles. Enid gives Jas a kick and ashes her knuckles in the process. The girls laugh in mutual pain.

“What’s my best feature Jas?”

“The best one? That’s hard I don’t know.” Jas fiddles with her silly band bracelet.

“Okay. Dylan said it had to be between my lips…” Enid searches. “And my boobs. Which One?”

“Lips. What about me?”

“What about you?”

“What’s my best feature Enid.”

“Probably your brain or your hair. Just your lovely head in general.”

The girls sit in catatonic silence as smoke curls above their heads and is sucked through the portal of the highlighter graffitied window. The haze of the tobacco was harmony for the pair. Rising snuffling noises could be heard from the other side of the bathroom. The girl’s finish their cigarettes and leave the stall to realise that some of the girls they had heard were crying.

“I’m not talking to you again you bitch” whines girl 1. Enid and Jas share a look at the young girl’s choice of language and walk towards the miniature group with eagerness.

“And what’s going on here?” says Enid, arms folded, singular eyebrow raised. She enjoys the words.

“Grace pointed at the wire sticking out of my shirt and said I had big boobs in front of the class. Everyone laughed” sniffles girl 1.

Enid stands stunned, assessing the girl's flower buds. “I can tell you now that it’s not a bad thing. Look at how big and pointy mine are. And guess what? I love them!”

Jas had already had enough. Her phone lights up, cutting through the whining with a redeeming ping.

“I’ll see you later Enid”.

“Whatever.” She doesn’t watch Jas go, instead fixing her interest to the pugilists in front of her.

“She stole my silly band” says Grace.

For Enid, smaller lives helped her realise how great she was. It’s why she loves waitressing at the hotel Belmont so much.

Whilst the girls continued to bicker, she reminded herself of last weekend’s wedding. There was a new waiter there she hadn’t seen before. He was young; standing behind the coffee table talking to the groom. About what she wasn’t sure but she thought the waiter was laughing too hard at the groom’s slurry jokes not to have already been tipped for the ambitious pleasantries.

Maybe it was a tenner for finding the last claret? The guests that evening had been particularly thirsty.

No, she thinks. He was overdoing the brown-nosing and considering the pizza face, she bet the groom snuck him a bottle of champagne. For that kind of generosity from a rich, uptight fucker you’d have to accept an invitation to the back room and show them an adolescent good time.

There was nothing naughtier than an alcohol-fuelled split second of intimacy she thought.

*

“God you’re amazing” says Dylan buttoning up his uniform.

Jas zones out into the school field, looking through the fresh cold of the late October light.

“Isn’t that something you can only say to a girlfriend?” Jas says expressionless, now fixing on a distant amber tree that’s kissing the last hour of sun.

“Maybe you should be my girlfriend” Dylan says.

“I can’t. I have Cello Monday through Friday and I can’t wear underwire bras. Besides you fucking stink".

“Yeah I stepped in Fox shit waiting for you. Underwire bras?”.

“The shit Enid wears”. Jas bats her hand away as she says Enid’s name.

“Yeah, I guess you’re right.” Dylan wipes the fox shit he stepped in on the art block wall. And just like that, he’s gone.

Jas lowers herself to the ground, hands sifting through the grass, searching for wet patches; not wet patches. She watches as Dylan goes.

Phone pings. It’s her mum.

Jas goes back to sifting her vision with speckles of amber light wishing she was back in the tobacco silence of the bathroom stall, not letting go.

She begins typing on her phone to Enid.

Mum says she’s taking us go-karting. Still up for it? <3