Rajinder Ayyar

Gresham isn’t speaking to me. He found out that I had sex with Arianwen. I think she wanted him to find out, and I think I should care about that, but I don’t. I don’t care. I don’t know why I don’t care, either. I should care. We’ve been friends since I came to school. But lately…I don’t know. Maybe I’m tired of hearing how guilty he feels about the way his family won’t acknowledge his Anglo-Indian cousins. Maybe I’m tired of listening to him praise himself for seeing his cousins and Arianwen and me and Vieira and Mablin as human beings. While at the same time going on and on about how Forrester’s some kind of coolie because he’s part-mundane and he doesn’t stand up to every casual insult he hears in a day in the life in Avalon. Or how Arianwen’s the equal of any man, except when she feels like fucking around like one. I don’t know. The world could end tonight, I don’t want to die thinking about Andrew Gresham.

So people know about Arianwen and me and maybe she used me, but she never told me she didn’t and maybe she’ll do it again. She’s like Séverine ma belle putain in all those Armorican songs, well I could be doing a lot worse than the guy who’s watching the most beautiful girl in the world making love to somebody else, ‘cause at least I’m there with her, at least I got her at all. I just…I know I’m not really one of her friends. And her brother probably isn’t too happy about it, if he knows, but…why did Nerissa Trelawney volunteer me to watch Paul Pettigrew’s firsties and then drag the rest of them off? I know I’m not one of them. But I’d rather be one of them than one of Gresham’s idiot crowd. And Arianwen likes me, doesn’t that count for something? Nerissa is her brother’s friend, though…not hers. Arianwen’s friends are Goulston and Ducas and Saint Germain and Vieira. And they’re all friendly with me, I suppose. At least they still seem to be. And I do care what happens to the firsties.

I’m worried about Anjali. I don’t think the Lovelace girl or her cousin do blame her for what happened, but I can’t be sure. It’s not like I’m friends with Ambrose or anything, but…they seem to have something else on their minds. And doesn’t everyone, right now? We’ve all got a dozen things on our minds, knowing whatever we think about now might well be the last thing we ever think about…and it feels so weird that our fates are all in the hands of my cousin Viresh, his boyfriend (whom I want to like, despite the fact that he scares the shite out of me) and Juliana Leffoy…and her boyfriend, even if no-one admits it.

I don’t know if I want to live with Viresh and that guy. But I don’t know if I want to live with his sister and stepmother, either. Mostly? I just want to live.

I’m so dead if Gresham ever finds out where I was this morning. Or if Anjali does. And I have no idea what it means.

I don’t care if she doesn’t want to do it again. Although I think she does, not that we talked about that. I don’t care if she doesn’t want to walk out with me.

Well, not much. I mean, it’s not because she thinks there’s something wrong with me, or because I’m Indian; it’s because she doesn’t like being tied down, she made that quite clear. Tied down...is for other people. Not her!

I just wish I could tell someone. It’s still humiliating that people think Pettigrew has been laid and I haven’t. Even if it isn’t true, any more.

I hope they don’t write to my parents. Not that they’d understand. I shouldn’t have gone. I know that. It was stupid, and I didn’t even have fun. I only went because Madge asked me to, and she ended up dancing with somebody else. Anjali is furious with me, but she says she won’t even write down that I went in her diary. Well, I will. Because it was stupid. But maybe Viresh is right about British girls. (I almost hope so. It would be depressing, but less so than the other possibility about Viresh. I wonder what happened with his Japanese girlfriend? I hope she’s not imaginary, like I thought she was at the time.)

Meanwhile there was something here killing people, and I’m going to make Viresh explain that somehow, since he’s so sure there aren’t any demons or gods. Because I don’t want to go to hell. But I don’t want to be religious, either. Besides, if Allah or the hundreds of gods in the south were all real, would Pettigrew have had sex, and not me? (I know, I’m being ridiculous. Maybe Pettigrew had sex with the demon. That would restore my faith in...something like justice, or sense, in the world.)

I know sex lives in Avalon, but really, can’t it visit here occasionally? In company other than that of a demon? And not just Macmillan and Rosier (though Macmillan looks miserable, lately).

This is all very trivial and written down it’s all the more obviously so. On the other hand, I’d rather contemplate Viresh’s sex life than the amount of trouble I’m currently in. They haven’t even told us what our punishments are yet.

Claire Jeannot has died, but I can’t say I’m surprised; she’s always been mad. It’s awful, and Anjali’s upset—but I don’t think it has much to do with the other problems here at school People are getting a bit hysterical. Of course, you don’t dare say a thing like that out loud, or you’re accused of not caring. But I don’t. I always did feel sorry for her, but I never knew her; I hope she’s happier in her next life.

I need to talk to my cousin Viresh. I knew he’d almost got married once, but Colette Saint-Germain said it was to someone she knew. She was asking me if I had a problem with Vieira, because we’ve not been spending a lot of time together so far this year. I told her it was early in the year, and Mablin takes up all his time these days. I don’t have a problem with people like that—though I’m glad I am not one! but I get along fine with Macmillan and Rosier. (Pettigrew and Hawkwood had better watch their backs.) We just don’t have anyone like that at home, I said.

It was apparently the wrong thing to say.

Colette laughed out loud at me and used a few rude words. Once I figured out what she was getting at I realised that she was trying to imply that my cousin Viresh is one. Apparently there’s a story to this and it involves too much wine, her cousin Christophe, and a broom closet at Viresh’s engagement party to her other cousin. I can’t believe a word of this, myself—Colette and Dimity love to spread scandals—but Rey backs them up, it’s insane. But what bothers me most is I can’t decide what’s more unbelievable—that Viresh is like that, or that he almost married a girl, any girl, let alone Angelique Delacroix...