Let's Get Lost by Sarra Manning Page B

Besides, it’s best when there’s rain and wind and the sea comes lashing up at you. I bought a bag of fresh doughnuts from the stall at the pier entrance with the last of the money I stole from Dad and crossed over the road, listening to Broken Social Scene’s “Anthems for a Seventeen-Year-Old Girl” one last time. I was going to miss Smith’s

    iPod—there was some really good stuff on it and I hadn’t worked out how to transfer it on to my computer.
    Not like I could ask him to do it because that would really ruin my mean girl rep, I thought as I stood on his doorstep and tried to will my fingers to ring the bell. After a few moments they obliged, and then I had to stand there, quaking in my flip-flops while a pair of feet thundered down the stairs followed by swearing that was so fluent and graphic even I was shocked.
    The door opened and this pretty girl with a MRS. SETH COHEN T-shirt and an aggravated expression gave me a quizzical look.
    “Yeah?”
    I was planning on taking my sunglasses off but thought better of it. She was really cute and I wasn’t having a good hair or a good anything day. “Is Smith in?”
    She nodded and then stepped aside. “Come in and mind the bike. I just banged my hip on it.” She laughed. “Hence the bad language.”
    There was something really familiar about her. Like I knew her from somewhere, but maybe she’d been at the club the other night.
    I followed her up the stairs and into the living room. “Wait here and I’ll see if he’s up,” she said. “I’m Molly, by the way.”
    “Isabel,” I murmured, perching gingerly on the edge of a chair. Molly? So this was the paragon of perfection that Smith was hopelessly crushing on. She flicked her honey-blonde hair (which in no way was natural) back from her elfin face and, yup, she was definitely crush-worthy. Molly seemed to be waiting for me to say something else. I pulled the iPod out of my pocket. “I need to give this back to him.
    So, like, maybe you could do that and get mine?” I asked hopefully, but she was already out the door.
    “I’ll just go and get him,” she called over her shoulder.
    I looked cautiously around the room. Everything I’d heard about student accommodation was true. It was a complete hovel. There were magazines and newspapers obscuring the carpet. Dirty cups and saucers, most of them doubling up as ashtrays, littered every surface, and I shuffled my buttocks further along the seat to minimize contact. Just sitting there made my skin crawl.
    “Sorry, it’s a bit of a mess in here,” Molly said as she came back into the room. “We keep having people around and they keep making a mess and we keep not clearing it up. It’s a never-ending cycle of untidiness.”
    I smiled weakly and racked my brains for something to say to her. “It’s really not that bad,” I lied. “You could shove most of it into a bin bag and it would look better.”
    Hi, I’m Isabel and housework is my passion.
    “Yeah, we could,” she agreed, nudging a stack of magazines with her socked foot. “Anyway, Smith says you can go up if you like. Do you want some tea or something?”
    There was no way I was drinking out of any mug that lived in this flat. Not without getting dysentery or Legionnaires’ disease or something. “Oh no, that’s okay. I’m fine.”
    I stood up and tried not to look clueless. “So, where am I going?”
    “Up the stairs, last door you come to.” Molly was still poking at the debris on the floor. “He’s in a foul mood. He’s got a bitch of a hangover,” she added cheerfully.
    I was really careful going up the stairs so that I didn’t have to touch the banister or the walls, which were probably coated in years’ worth of dirt. Yeah, they looked freshly painted, but bacteria lurks everywhere.
    There was music leaking out from under Smith’s door as I tapped on it lightly. No reply. It wasn’t until I hammered on it with both fists that I heard a grunt and pushed the door