The Keeper

The First Day She Saw Him

Martha remembered the day she had first seen him. It was January 1990 and she was on the bus, staring out of the window on the bottom deck, listening to her Walkman. Janis Ian was singing from the seventies about not fitting in, not being popular, and being unloved. Martha wanted to reach out down the years to Janis, to offer her friendship. A new decade and a new school didn't hold the same appeal.

Moving house promised an opportunity to reinvent herself, become someone cool, maybe even someone everyone wanted to be with. Martha had told herself this before; it never worked. It's not worth being different when you're seventeen. Far better to dress the same way, listen to the same bands and do all the same boring things as everybody else. That's how you get to have friends. That's how you get to be popular. By selling out and sucking up. It was so stupid. Infantile. She wasn't any good at being a teenager, no matter how hard she tried.

Damn it.

What was the point of even trying? It was a stupid game with stupid rules, and winning meant cheating on herself by betraying her beliefs. Better this time not to make friends. Then there was no one to turn on you and bring you down. It was impossible to be like them, anyway. She had no interest in fashion, she didn't want to talk about the latest TV heartthrob, and she couldn't bear the music that was in the charts. Martha loved listening to singer-songwriters from the seventies; her hobbies were painting and gardening. Her dad laughed at her, saying that if she'd only listen to Radio 4, she would pass for a middle-aged woman. It was a compliment to Martha, who felt more comfortable at home than anywhere else. She had always found it easier to talk to her parents' generation than her own. It would be better to not talk to hers at all.

So that was the plan. Don't talk to anyone. Keep her head down and get through the rest of this school year and the next before she could leave. Nearly two years more. Ugh. This plan wouldn't work. She couldn't be invisible and besides, her life was boring enough as it was without drawing out the months at school into days, hours and minutes of endless clock-watching. Surely she could find one person like her. One person to connect with. One person who didn't think Jason Donovan and Hammer pants were the answer to life, the universe, and everything. A person like no one she had met before.

Maybe it was easier to stick to the plan.

The bus stopped to let the boys out at their school. Martha watched them larking around, swearing at each other, pushing and shoving and spitting out hormones. Boys her age were so immature; it was depressing. She looked around her. Most of the girls left on the lower deck were younger: thirteen- and fourteen-year-olds. Laughter tumbled down the steps from the older girls on the top deck. She turned up the volume on her Walkman and looked back out of the window, watching the terraced houses, corner-shops and pubs pass by. The driver turned into Kingswood Avenue, a straight road lined with horse chestnut trees knitted together overhead like a cathedral nave. Then they were at the gates and the girls spilled out of the bus, chatting and giggling, deep in their own worlds. Martha was invisible to them. Perfect. She waited until the last three bovver-booted girls clomped down the steps. Their hair was brushed straight and pony-tailed, but packet black. Martha followed them off the bus and passed them as they sat on the kerb to change into the uniform's grey, flat shoes. They slipped into the grounds as the prefects shut the large spiked wrought-iron gates before ushering the stragglers up the steps to the main entrance.

Martha wrinkled her nose. The pale green and grey corridors smelled of chemical disinfectant applied by the gallon. She looked at the sun streaming through the east-facing window and visualised where she was on the orientation map the school had sent her, confidently walking through the science block, rounding the corner by the windows that looked out onto the playing fields, then taking the stairs past the art room two at a time. Catching her breath, her memory failed her. She stopped and rifled through her satchel to sneak another look at the map.

"Are you lost?" A deep voice behind her.

Martha fumbled through the satchel and pulled out the welcome pack. "No, I'm – "

"What form are you?"

She turned around and looked up at the man. He struck her as more lumberjack than teacher; a checked flannel shirt was tucked into jeans and matched with a chunky belt and a pair of grunty, lace-up tan boots that seemed overkill for walking up and down concrete-floored corridors. He was tall and slim and his hair was slightly dishevelled, but not carefully; there wasn't a hint of product. It looked as if he hadn't shaved for a few days. His stubble was dotted with grey but his unlined face suggested he couldn't be much more than thirty.

He looked at her, waiting for her answer. And those eyes. Oh boy.

"6B," she said.

His eyes creased as he smiled. "Mrs Madison. History teacher. Stickler for being on time. She runs a tight ship at registration and you're now late. Follow me and I'll get you in."

As he loped away, Martha stuffed the welcome pack back into her satchel and hurried to catch up. He was up another flight of steps and had opened a door to the left to announce, "I found a straggler, Mrs Madison. I think she's new here. Don't let her get away." His hand on her back, guiding her into the classroom, and he was gone.

"Oh, you must be Martha Carson. Hurry up and sit down... Simone Fitzgibbons?"

"Here."

"Catherine Godley?"

"Here."