Among Others

do, too, only maybe not green. What I’d really like would be a panelled study like Daniel’s.
    “It’s nice to be able to shut the door and keep people out,” Janine said.
    “It must be,” I said.
    “Do you sleep in a dormitory?” she asked.
    “Yes I do, but no we don’t have midnight feasts or anything fun you may have read about,” I said.
    “I share a room with my brother,” Hugh said.
    “What does he do?”
    “He’s mad about Manchester United. So his half of the room is all football, and mine is all books.” Hugh looked uncomfortable saying this.
    Janine bounced up and found me The Dark Is Rising , and she and Hugh started squabbling about whether I should read the whole series or whether it would put me off to start with the first one because it was kind of childish. Hugh didn’t seem to think I’d have time to read five books between now and Tuesday night.
    “I will,” I explained. “I don’t have much to do except lessons and reading. At Arlinghurst the emphasis is on sport, and I can’t do sport of course. So I spend all my time in the library reading. I have hours every day, normally. I didn’t this week because of the exams, but they’re over now, so it’ll be back to normal.”
    “Pretty dim of your family to send you to Arlinghurst in the circumstances,” Hugh said.
    “Yes, wasn’t it,” I said.
    “What is wrong with your leg anyway?” he asked.
    Normally I hate that question, but the way he asked—just as it had come up in conversation, and as if he was mildly interested, in the same way Janine wanted to know if I slept in a dorm—I didn’t mind at all. “It was a car accident,” I said. “My hip got all mashed up, and my pelvis. It’s not so bad now. It doesn’t hurt all the time.”
    “Is it getting better?” Hugh asked.
    I should have just said no, it’s not, either that or that I hoped it would, but burning tears came out of my eyes for no real reason and I hid my face in a tissue. Janine fussed around and changed the subject and then it was time for me to go.
    Hugh came with me to the bus stop, still carrying my library books. I had my shopping and also the Susan Cooper books I’d borrowed from Janine.
    “About Wim,” he said, as we were turning the corner by KwikSave.
    I looked at him enquiringly. My leg was hurting—Janine’s bed was too low for me to sit on comfortably, and getting up again had jolted it.
    “We don’t know what happened. Wim has never talked about it. Wim has refused point blank to talk about it. And I see people condemning him and—this is a small place. Reputations are strange things. It’s a case of giving a dog a bad name and you might as well hang him. He dropped out of school, you know.”
    “I know. He’s doing his A levels part time. Janine told me.”
    “Janine. Janine thinks the feminist thing to do is to believe the woman all the time. But I think it means treating everyone the same as much as you can. I don’t know what happened. But I know I don’t know. I do know Wim’s making his life much harder because of it.” Hugh looked terribly serious. He’s shorter than I am and a tiny bit plump, and he has that freckle-face, so it’s easy to think of him as a little boy and a clown, but he isn’t like that at all.
    “Why do you care?” I asked. We were nearly at the bus stop, but the bus wasn’t there yet. A whole scrum of Arlinghurst girls were milling about waiting for it. Hugh sat down on a wall, and I lowered myself onto it next to him.
    “Wim saved my life,” he said, quietly. “Well, my sanity. He stopped a group of boys beating me up and instead of walking away afterwards he stayed and talked to me. He lent me Citizen of the Galaxy . I was twelve and he was fifteen, but he treated me like a human being and not like a snot rag. I think he deserves the benefit of the doubt?”
    “Whatever he did to Ruthie?”
    “No, not whatever he did, but until we know what it was he did.” Hugh shrugged, and blushed again. “For what it’s worth, I think they probably, well, did it, by mutual agreement. They were careless with contraception and Ruthie had a scare and panicked. That’s not something to condemn someone to the outer circles of Hell for.”
    I didn’t know what to say. My father had been made to marry my mother because she got pregnant, and look how well that worked out. Fortunately the bus came around the corner and saved me from saying anything. I took my bag from Hugh and moved towards