Chapter 3

by NC

“Excuse me!”

It was a lilting, gravelly sort of voice; the kind that would have belonged to the new girl at school, the one who was instantly both admired and feared, the one who offered you your first cigarette (she had been stealing them from her mother since she was twelve) while you lay side-by-side on the carpet, singing along to her Green Day and Alanis Morissette tapes. It was the voice of a girl who would make your high school math teacher sweat around the collar, who was constantly being mistaken for older than she actually was, whose hair you would have held back as she cried her eyes out on her seventeenth birthday. The kind of girl who always picked dares over truths, who your parents wished you would spend less time with, who copied your homework before class, and who would pick fights with anyone who said anything negative about you. A girl with an androgynous name, a name like Mika or Jordan, Cheyenne or Lex.

She felt a hand softly touch the back of her arm and spun around to meet the voice. As the woman’s features came together before her, she blinked. And then blinked again.

“Lex?”

The woman’s jaw dropped for a second. Then she started nodding vigorously, her hair falling forward into her eyes and her mouth spreading into a broad, beaming smile.

“Je savais que c’est toi. Oh my God.” Lex grabbed her shoulders, smacked kisses on either cheek and pulled her into a hug. “I knew it. I saw you from across the carriage.”

She was painfully aware of the crowd swirling around them, of the aggravated expressions of people trying to dodge them. Lex, of course, did not seem to care.

“Here, let’s just move to the side.”

Lex continued, undeterred. “When did you leave Switzerland? Et depuis quand habites-tu à Londres?”

“Well, I moved to the UK - to Manchester - for uni. And London, well, it’ll be a year tomorrow. I moved down here on my 25th birthday.” She tried edging sideways, hoping that Lex would follow her lead.

“Ah oui, it’s your birthday tomorrow! You know all these years...I’ve been meaning to call you. It’s just… I lost your number…your email address had changed… you know? I even thought about getting in touch with Sacré Coeur to see if they had contact information for you, and you know how much I hated that school! They hated me too, I suppose…” Lex took a breath. “I think this is fate bringing us back together. We have to celebrate! Do you have plans?”

She paused. How could she act as if nothing had happened? They hadn’t spoken since leaving Sacré Coeur, and the last time they did speak – she remembers, it was at Behati’s party, right after their school graduation – Lex had called her “a liar and a coward”, and she had called Lex “a selfish, cold-hearted bitch”. It was just too strange. All these figures from her past, reappearing, demanding her time and attention, and stirring up conflicted feelings. First there was that letter, and now here she was facing Alexa Martin-Kobayashi for the first time in almost a decade. A few minutes ago, she was invisible; now, suddenly, her anonymity had been ripped away from her, and she missed it.

“Lex, it’s great seeing you and I’d love to catch up… but I’m late for work. I’m sorry, I have to go.”

Lex held her eyes in a steady gaze, the corners of her mouth twitching, and very calmly said: “Call off. Call them, and tell them you're sick.”

It was a command that brought back a rush of adolescent half-memories and mixed feelings. She had to stop herself from reflexively reaching for her phone. She couldn't call off from work. Could she? Even if she could, why would she? Because Lex told her so?  They were no longer teenagers. They hardly knew each other any more. They hardly knew the person that they each had become.

“I’ll do it too,” Lex said, her eyes flashing, “and we can find somewhere cozy with good coffee and breakfast pastries!” She winked. “Go on, girl. Vas-y, attaque!”