Five Hundred Miles

[The Delaney Twins]

“OK, so now you sound Jamaican.”
“Jamaican? Really?”
“Yes, really.”
“Oh.”
“I really don’t see what you’re finding so difficult about it. It’s one of the simplest accents there is!”
“…said the Scottish woman.”
“Ugh, you racist.”
Arihant laughed. “My inability to copy your accent makes me a racist?”
“Clearly.”
“Oh, OK then.”
There was a brief pause in which Lynn flicked an errant ladybird off her kneecap and Arihant leant back on his elbows, looking up at the clouded sky and sighing. “Lynn, you’ve lived here longer than I have. Tell me, does the sun ever shine?”
Lynn winced. “That’s a sore topic for us cloud-folk, Ari.”
“Surely we should all have rickets by now…” he continued vaguely, as if she hadn’t spoken.
“The sun gods don’t like us,” Lynn agreed solemnly. “We need to get back in their good books; sacrifice some lambs or something.”
“Or you could all just pack up shop and move to India.”
“Actually, there’s a point. How do the Indians do it? Do they sacrifice loads of lambs, is that what it is?”
He laughed again. “No, but we have a reputation for being pretty nice to cows. Maybe that’s it.”
“I’ll never eat beef again.”
“Good plan,” said Arihant, smiling widely.
Lynn still wasn’t fully used to this smiling-and-laughing-and-joking Arihant. Something had made him… she didn’t know. He’d mellowed over the summer, and the disturbing thing was that it hadn’t even been a gradual change. After that day that Kennedy had told her about – when he realised… certain things about a certain… Miss N – he had been so relaxed that it was unreal. Arihant the panicky, Arihant the shy, Arihant the scared with his big brown eyes wide in fear, and now…
Now, he was leaning back on the grass, and smiling, and laughing, and joking, and even after a couple of months it still felt surreal.
His old self hadn’t been completely forgotten, though. She and Kennedy had worried about him for a couple of days – or at least, they’d worried in their curious, prying way that had eventually forced the truth out of him. After a week of mellowness, they’d had enough, and the day before they went to Scotland for that hideously boring week with their parents they confronted him.
They’d come for him after he had finished walking Terry – Arihant had taken to Lynn’s dog marvellously, and so she was quick to take advantage of his free babysitting services. He’d come in through one of the side entrances, into a little corridor that didn’t tend to get all that many people, and Lynn and Kennedy were waiting for him. They’d considered many different approaches, but they decided that were they to actually get something out of him, they’d have to put him out of his depth a little bit.
They liked to think that they had looked intimidating, standing there without smiling or saying anything, but the new Arihant hadn’t been disturbed at all. He’d greeted them, handed the leash over to Lynn and looked at them as if they had gone mad when they didn’t answer him.
After a couple of moments of silence, he had asked them what was going on, and they had demanded their explanations (in varying tones of menace. Kennedy had thought that the best move would be to scare the news out of him, Lynn had thought that just their asking would be enough. She had been right.)
He’d told them that it felt like he’d had a weight taken off his chest. Like he had been denying something to himself, like he hadn’t even let himself acknowledge it.
Lynn decided then that Arihant really didn’t deal well with secrets.
And then he had said that now, now that he had worked out what was happening, it would be OK. That he could take it in control, and that he could stop it, and that he could sort everything out. He had said that the only thing to do now was to stop feeling that way, and he had said that he could do it, because after all, wasn’t admitting you had a problem the first step to recovery?
He didn’t say Kira’s name once throughout the entire conversation.
Lynn could see now that he was doing better, that he was happier, that he had changed, and in some ways she was glad about that, but she couldn’t help thinking that what he had decided to do was wrong. He was stopping himself from seeing her, talking about her, even mentioning her.
That couldn’t be healthy, could it?
The only time that they could see the old Arihant was when he failed to keep her from his mind. That was when his eyes grew wide with that familiar startled-deer look that he did so well, that was when he started fingering at his gloves again. You could even see in his posture that something had changed – he became a little less sure of himself, a little more stooped, a little more… scared.
He couldn’t have accepted how he felt if it was scaring him.
But for now, she’d ignore the misgivings that she had about the new Arihant, because unsettling though it was, he was still…
Well, fun.
“Here, look, you have to try again,” she said, sitting forward on her knees. They were out in the gardens again, despite the decidedly colder September weather. She and Arihant liked being outside. “Repeat after me, OK?”
“OK,” he said, leaning forward as she was.
“And I – ”
“And I,” he repeated.
“Would walk – ”
“Would walk.”
“Five hundred miles.”
“Five hundred miles.”
“Ach, Ari, Ari, Ari!” she said, shaking her head sadly. “What the hell was that?”
“I thought that was quite good,” he replied, a little defensively.
“That was not quite good,” she said. “That was dreadful!”
He shrugged. “It’s not an easy accent to get, Lynn. Couldn’t I just sing it in my own voice?”
She stared at him. “No, Arihant, you can’t just sing it in your voice! Chrissake, you think it still works if it’s not Scottish?”
“Is it so important that I’m able to sing… What was it again?”
She rolled her eyes. “Oh, just my heritage, no big deal.”
He laughed. “OK, fine, what do I do to fix it?”
“I don’t know, you need to… I don’t know. Dear me, Ari, you’d think that after - what? Six months of being friends with me and Kennedy? – Well, you’d think you’d get it by now.”
“It’s not six months.”
“That’s no excuse.”
“But I don’t have any particular desire to sound like Kennedy,” he pointed out. “I don’t know if my voice can even go that loud.”
“Fine. Fine. Right. What you need to do is, you need to… well, for a start, it’s not ‘I’, it’s ‘Ay.’”
“ ‘Ay.’”
“Aye, like that. And then ‘would’ – you have to make it a long ‘o’ sound, like you would if you were saying – hmm, what do you say that way. The way you would say ‘too’.”
“Woood.”
“Yes, like that. ‘Walk’ stays pretty much the same, I think, and so does ‘five’, but as for ‘hundred’ – Ari, dear, is it really so very hard for you to roll your ‘r’s?”
He raised his eyebrows. “Do what?”
She looked at him disparagingly. “Roll your ‘r’s. Y’know. Rrrrrrrrrrrrr,” she demonstrated.
“Oh, right. OK.”
“Whatever did you think I meant, Arihant?”
“Never mind. Is that all?”
She thought for a second. “I think so. Do you want to try again?”
“OK.”
“ ‘And I would walk five hundred miles.’”
“And Ay woood walk five hunderrrrrd miles.”
She burst out laughing. “Oh, Jesus, Arihant…”
“What? What did I do?”
“Nothing. Nothing. You just sound like a right wee Ulsterman.”
“A what?”
“You know. Someone from Northern Ireland.”
He looked at her sceptically. “What’s so funny about Northern Ireland?”
She laughed again. “Never you mind. Look, is that Kennedy?”
“If you’re trying to distract me, that’s a pretty feeble – ”
“Look, no, it is Kennedy. Oi!” she shouted at the black figure that she could just see coming over the horizon. “Kenny-face, we’re over here!”
Most people would be able to see them from where Kennedy was, but Lynn knew that her brother couldn’t. He was just far too stubborn to wear either the glasses or the contact lenses that he needed pretty desperately. Yet another reason, in Lynn’s mind, why he’d never have been able to be a halfway decent warrior.
‘Course, he’d never admit that he wasn’t able to see them. “I’m not blind, woman!” he yelled, and picked up his pace.
She turned back to Arihant as Kennedy approached. “See? No lying here. I’m a good girl, I am.” She smiled as widely as she was capable of.
“That’s debatable.”
She gasped. “Ari, I’m shocked.”
“I’m sure.”
“You bad friend.”
“I am dreadful, aren’t I?”
“I’d slap you if I could. ”
“ But you can’t,” he finished, leaning back on his elbows once more. “Sorry.”
“Ugh.” New Arihant could be irritating sometimes.
She looked back up at Kennedy’s approaching figure. “I wonder why he’s come out here,” she mused. The last time he had come outside with them had been sometime in August; he preferred, apparently, staying inside with Michael and the rest, even though ‘the rest’ included Jamie. She didn’t like to think of the sorts of arguments those two got into while Arihant and she were taking in a bit of fresh air.
“Maybe he’s come out for the exercise and the beautiful scenery,” Arihant suggested, his voice tinged with a hint of sarcasm. A hint being, of course, the maximum level of sarcasm that ever got into Arihant’s voice at all, so she could tell that he didn’t mean it.
“Actually, I think it’s probably because of that,” she said, gesturing at the square of white that she could see flapping around in his hand.
Arihant squinted his eyes. “What is it, a tissue?”
“A letter, I think.”
A couple of seconds later, Kennedy had reached them.
“Afternoon, Kenny,” Lynn said, squinting up at him. It was probably a bad sign, realising that the light from a clouded sky was making her squint. She might as well be nocturnal, living in this country. “Arihant’s joining the Orange Order, did he tell you?”
“The what?” Arihant asked, perturbed by the way that Kennedy immediately started laughing and saying, “Oh, God, do I want to know?”
She grinned over at Arihant. “Go on. Say it again.”
“You do realise, Lynn, that I don’t actually like being humilia-”
“Aw, go on. Please?” asked Kennedy, immediately curious.
Lynn decided to help him out. “You’d make us real happy, you know.”
“Really happy,” Kennedy concurred. “You have no idea.”
“What is the Orange Order?” Arihant asked, trying to change the subject.
“We’ll tell you when you say it!” said Lynn, although she had no intention of doing so. Somehow she had the idea that he wouldn’t be impressed.
She could see the heat waves emanating from his cheeks, and she was secretly kind of happy. This was how Arihant was supposed to be. “Fine.”
A brief silence. “Go on,” Kennedy encouraged.
His voice was barely audible as he tried again, “And Ay woood walk five hunderrrrd miles.”
And Kennedy started laughing again, a lot louder this time. Arihant’s cheeks were fully burning now. “Oh, Jesus,” he said, sitting down on the grass beside them. “Oh, Jesus, you’re right, Sall, that’s incredible. In a pathetic kind of way. We’ll ship you off to Belfast come daybreak, Ari.”
“What. Is. The. Orange. Order.”
He was getting annoyed.
Lynn ignored this fact, turned to Kennedy, and asked, “What brings you out here today, darling brother? The air, the sights, the conversation – ”
“Hell no,” he answered.
“What is – ”
“Shh, Ari, we’re trying to talk,” Lynn said, before turning back to her brother. “Fine, my unhealthy child, what was it, then?”
He rolled his eyes. “The Dutchman is haunting me from beyond the grave,” he said cryptically.
“What?” asked Arihant, but Lynn knew what he meant immediately.
“Cass? I got a letter?” she asked excitedly.
“I don’t take kindly to being your messenger boy, you know,” he said, which meant Yes. It also meant that he was winded within the next few seconds by the crushing force of one of Lynn’s hugs.
“Cass sent me a letter!”
“Oxygen, Sally, for the love of God!” he said, his voice sounding choked.
“And you brought it out for me!”
“Yes, yes I did, so as payment for this wonderful favour, could you maybe not crush my spine?”
“You’re an awesome brother, you know that?” she said, lessening the pressure just a little.
“I always know that,” he said gruffly – or as gruffly as his voice would allow, anyway – and took several over-exaggerated breaths. “I don’t know, however, why being such an awesome brother opens me to all this abuse.”
Lynn laughed. “This is how we roll,” she said, let go, and held out her hand. “So gimme gimme.”
He dropped the disappointingly light envelope in her hand and she ripped it open eagerly. She heard Arihant pestering Kennedy once more about just what the Orange Order was – and who Cass was, for that matter – but she wasn’t in any form to focus just now, with the letter that shared Cass’s apple scent sitting in her hands.
She unfolded it quickly, and started to decipher the spider-scrawl that covered the flimsy file paper she was holding.

Lynnie –
First off, you have to forgive me for taking so long with my letter. I didn’t mean to leave it so long, I swear, but everything’s been pretty hectic since I got back and – well, you of all people know how I am when it comes to multitasking. If it makes you feel better, I’ve been feeling terrible every night since I got your last letter that I haven’t replied to it. If that makes sense. My English has been going worse and worse since I got back home. You won’t even be able to understand me, next time I see you. Whenever that is.
Term started here at the academy a couple of days ago. It’s pretty different to Orchid – somehow, I don’t think you’d like it. No battles to be won in a blaze of glory, darling, it’d be very boring for you, hè? The people are pretty nice, and it’s nice to be speaking a language I understand properly, but, that being said, I haven’t been able to find any people as wonderfully mad as Kendra and yourself, so there’s definitely something missing there. Of course, that’s not to say that I don’t have any friends here – I’m not that sad just yet, don’t worry. I caught up again with Bep and Coby – I think I told you about them. Well, anyway, they’re together now, which I didn’t really expect, but I guess when you haven’t seen people for six years you can’t really expect to… expect much.
I hope my English is amusing you; it’s certainly amusing me. I’m actually sitting here laughing at the awfulness of it at one o’clock in the morning in my bedroom. It’s a little worrying.
Speaking of my bedroom, I’m boarding at the academy, I’m not back at Mammie’s house. Wouldn’t exactly be appropriate now, would it? This school doesn’t actually know about her… um, ‘profession’. I know you said I should tell them, but when it came to it, the words got all froze up in my mouth and it just… didn’t come out. Orchid’s much easier that way – they just know it all.
I got a gig playing Saturday nights in a little magical bar off of Dam Square, which is pretty cool. Well, it sounds cool when I tell you about it, anyway. Actually, the place is kind of a dive, and I have to share my performance time with a couple of other guys, but it’s good to be playing instead of letting my instruments go all rusty. The folks there aren’t exactly what you’d call classy, though, so they only really want to hear my guitar, which I’m OK with, obviously. The guitar’s the most important part, anyway.
Sure, it may be a dump, but anything that gets me closer to being a rockstar, right?
Haha, I sound so dorky. Sorry.
I shouldn’t be so nervous writing this; it’s just… it’s kind of weird, to be honest. I’m not really so much the letter-writing type, as my darling Lynnie should well know (insert pointed look), and when it comes to writing to you…
Ack, I’m sorry. I’ll try harder next time, I promise.
Listen, before I go, I was going to ask – do you and Ken want to come stay in Amsterdam with me for a few days at Christmas? I’d ask you for longer, but for one, I don’t think you’d take too kindly to sleeping on my sofa for more than a few days (or Kendra wouldn’t, anyway) and for another, I’m sure your parents want to see you, but then, so do I. I miss you guys, you know?
I miss you most of all.
Haven’t got a new girlfriend yet, just so you know. I tell you this because I certainly expect you to tell me when you get a new boyfriend – and I know what you’d be saying here, you’d be laughing and you’d be saying “That’s not when, Cass-face, it’s if,” but I maintain that it’s only a matter of time. Which is why I should be getting used to this ‘just friends’ thing.
Just… give me time. I’ll figure it out sooner or later.
Jesus, this letter is bad. This is what I get for writing while sleep-deprived. It’ll be better next time, promise. (That being said, I still don’t know what the issue is with phone-calling, but I won’t ask.)
I should probably sign off now before I say something really stupid, hè?
Love you Lynnie.

Cass xoxo

PS: Tell Kendra that I want my pants back.

She turned the pages over a couple of times, not wanting to believe that the letter had really ended, hoping that there would be some other message on the back.
But nope. That was it.
Oh, God.
She had been scared of this. She had been afraid that this would happen, this… this awkwardness.
Caspar Michaël van der Berg was, at this point, the most serious boyfriend that Lynn had ever had or ever hoped to have, for that matter. They had met about a year after the twins had first come to Orchid when Cass had been moved into Kennedy’s dorm, and after that, matters had progressed until one day Cass and Lynn had been sitting in the garden – near here, come to think of it, and he had said –
“Lynnie?”
That was the name he had always used for her. She had been lying on the grass beside him, looking out at the lights of the school switching on in the silhouette that was outlined against the setting sun, practically being sent to sleep by the quiet, brushing chords of Cass’s guitar. He was the best musician she’d ever heard – he’d developed a special playing technique with his super-speed, able to hit so many notes a second that it almost seemed like two or three guitars were serenading her instead of just one.
She’d been snapped out of her daze when the music stopped suddenly.
“Yes?” she had asked, thinking something had gone wrong.
“Will you be my girlfriend?”
And she had sat up, and looked at him, and his big blue eyes, and his mass of blond hair that never really seemed to be properly brushed, and it she hadn’t even had to think about her answer.
“All right.”
They had walked back to the school hand-in-hand.
But this May he’d had to leave, go back to Amsterdam. His mother was sick, they said, and she wanted him home.
And so Cass had had to leave, and there had been…bad times for her, for a while, and now…
Now, it was just awkward.
She’d never really thought it could be awkward with Cass. He’d always been one of the easiest people she knew – what was it Kennedy had called him?
‘So laid back he’s practically falling over’, that was it. That was Cass inside and out. It had never been difficult with him, never been hard, never angry, never wrong...
She had to stop thinking about him this way. They'd parted on good terms, yes, but the fact remained that they'd still parted. They were both supposed to find someone else. They were both supposed to move on.
But that was easier said than done. How did someone move on, in a place like Orchid? Everyone seemed to form some kind of eternal-and-forever bond with the first person of the opposite sex that they saw in this place - hell, even Arihant had done it, although, albeit, he and Kira were hardly bonded, and even if he hadn't, Ari wasn't exactly Lynn's type.
How did she find another Cass?
No, that was the wrong way to put it. She didn't want another Cass. She couldn't handle another Cass; that would just be... wrong. But how could she find someone else? How did that even work?
She should just resign herself to growing up and becoming some kind of cat-lady spinster with Kennedy, she thought. That seemed to be where it was going, anyway.
Fan-bloody-tastic.
"Sally, you done?" asked Kennedy, poking her. Made sense: she'd just been staring blankly at the page for a couple of minutes, after all.
She hid her sudden uncertainty behind a bright smile, meeting her brother's purple eyes. "Cass says he wants his pants back, Kenny. Do I really want to know what that means?"
A blush tinged his cheeks bright red as Arihant laughed confusedly.
"Well, see, the thing about that is..."