Never Tell Read Online Free PDF Page A

you’re lucky.’ James winked at me, dodging the bike-riders who sounded indignant bells. I didn’t need much persuading; I realised I was pleased to see him. So far, university wasn’t turning out to be the social whirlwind I’d imagined. As I followed James into the King’s Arms, the pub where all the cool kids drank that term, I felt a quickening in my step. For the first time since I’d arrived in the city, I felt like I might actually be part of something.
I spotted Dalziel as soon as I walked in; it was impossible not to. His reputation preceded him; I’d heard a couple of girls whispering and giggling about him a few times in the bar or over coffee in the rec. He was apparently infamous, a third year known for his flamboyance, his looks and his charm. Lounging against the bar with an indolent grace, seemingly born of the innate knowledge that the world was his, he idly saluted James and then turned back to his friends. James bought a round of cider whilst Moira and I found a table beside Dalziel’s friends.
I watched Dalziel hold court, laughing about something, blowing smoke-rings. After a while, I found I couldn’t look away. I heard him mention a group called The Assassins.
‘I’ve never heard of them,’ I muttered to James. ‘What do they sing?’
‘They don’t sing anything, petal,’ James laughed. ‘They’re a group of supposed student dissidents who mess around with gunpowder, amongst other things.’ He downed half his pint in one. ‘Bunch of stupid schoolboys, if you ask me.’
‘I got sick of blowing things up, to be honest,’ I heard Dalziel drawl, and I felt a quiver of something visceral; a leap in my belly that I couldn’t name. I stared at him. ‘Pretty bloody tame.’ He raised an eyebrow. ‘Not enough banging.’
What did I feel then? Did I see a chance to be lifted from my so-far dull suburban life? The chance for the parameters of my life to be widened? Or did I just sense pure unadulterated danger?
Dalziel’s group leaned together and began to whisper. A peroxided beauty, small and dark-skinned, lazed beside him, biting her nails in evident boredom and scowling at a taller girl with a funny angular chin, apparently called Lena. Lena was swaying at the table between the bar and us; talking very fast and with great animation to anyone who’d listen. I heard the words ‘X’ and ‘commandment’ and then she was told to keep her voice down.
‘Is that the society – the X one?’ I asked James. ‘That you were on about before?’
‘Shh,’ he said nervously, sliding his eyes towards Dalziel.
‘What?’ I frowned at him. Moira came back from the loo and sat heavily between us. James looked even more worried.
‘It’s – I’m not – I shouldn’t have mentioned it really.’
‘What?’ said Moira. James ignored her.
The peroxide girl sat at their table too now, very deliberately kissing a beautiful Asian boy who had just leaned over her chair, her lithe body snaking round and up towards him. The tall girl had stopped talking and was staring at them aghast. After a few minutes, she slammed her chair back and flung herself out of the pub.
‘Oh dear,’ said James with glee. ‘Lena’s not happy.’
The other girl winked at him and turned back to the boy, but her eyes were on Dalziel the whole time.
‘Why’s it a secret?’ I persisted, my second pint making me bold. ‘What’s the big deal?’
The boy slipped his hand into the peroxide girl’s top. I looked away, embarrassed and, if I was honest, a little envious. I hadn’t heard from Ralph again, which was rather mortifying as I’d spent the whole of August agonising over whether to give him my virginity. Finally I’d awarded him with it, sure it would be the start of something great. To my undying disappointment it had been painful and deeply unromantic, my head knocking against his mother’s coffee table, fluff from her sheepskin rug tickling my nose, a carpet burn on my calf: all that, and I was still