Destination Anywhere Read online

  For what it’s worth, Kerry wrote me a letter after that incident, apologizing for sharing the message, insisting she didn’t know what would happen and saying that she was sorry. She stuck a smiley-face sticker on it and slipped it through the slats of my locker. But she didn’t try to be my friend, or tell people to stop when they laughed at me, and she never did tell me why no one liked me. I guess by that point she thought it was obvious.

  * * *

  Year nine. Mo Jafari figured out that P. King sounded like Peking, as in Peking duck. Suddenly, and for the rest of my time at Claridge, I was “Duck,” and any number of variants that included, but were not limited to: Duckie, Quack, Quackers, Goose (as in Duck, duck, goose), and Fucka (as in Fuck a duck). These may sound like affectionate nicknames, just a fun little joke we were all in on. Nope.

  * * *

  Year ten. By then I’d mostly rode the bullying storm and was just a loner no one talked to. It wasn’t a good life, but it was better than being hounded. And then the head of art, Mr. Clayton, chose a painting of mine to be framed and hung on the wall of the school cafeteria. This was a big deal; only year elevens usually got selected for that kind of honor, and it was mostly for their final art projects. Mine was a painting I’d been working on in the studio during my lunch breaks, which was my newer place of refuge from the rest of the school. It was sort of my own version of The Starry Night in that it was a painting of my town at night with the skyline rendered tiny (and gray and muted) under a huge, vibrant night sky. Mr. Clayton said it was “fantastic,” a word I’d never heard him use before. It got announced in assembly and the whole school clapped dutifully, and I was so proud and happy, even when Amber Monroe and her friends were way too enthusiastic, whistling between their teeth, waving at me and doing mock little bows.

  It had been hanging for three and a half days when I got called into the head teacher’s office, where I found Mr. Clayton waiting, a deep frown on his face. My painting had been desecrated—that’s the word he used. That morning before registration someone had Sharpied KING TWAT across the entire surface, complete with a crude attempt at a cock and balls beside it. (Even at the time, I thought that a vagina would have made far more sense, and it said so much about who’d done it that they were unable to draw one.) There was no saving the painting. My work was destroyed, and it broke my heart.

  My whole form got bollocked for it. Everyone knew I was a social pariah, even the teachers, and so it was obvious what had happened and why. Our head of year, Mr. Karousi, kept us all in at break time to find out who did it. It was Joe Hedge; we all knew that. Literally everyone knew, but no one said a word. And I sat there in that room, listening to the silence of everyone protecting him as if he was worth protecting, rage burning in my chest and my hands and my eyes. He was just going to get away with it. He’d done something so cruel—not just mean, but cruel—and they still didn’t care.

  So I said, just when Mr. Karousi was winding down, talking about how disappointed he was that no one was going to take responsibility, “Everyone knows it was Joe.”

  A tiny collective gasp swept across the room. Joe turned to me in shock. Amber’s eyes smoldered with fury. Mr. Karousi frowned at me, like I’d confessed to the crime myself. Mo Jafari muttered, “Shitting hell, King.”

  “Why won’t anyone say it?” I asked. I was full-on crying, my voice a choked shriek. “It was Joe.”

  Joe, who didn’t bother denying it, was suspended for four days and lost his place on the football team for two months. It was the first time anyone actually faced consequences for what they’d done to me, and I was glad, despite everything.

  Glad until the following week when we were long-distance running in PE. I was jogging along on my own, as per usual, lost in my own comfy thoughts, when someone knocked into me from behind. When I stumbled and fell, too startled to even cry out, hands grabbed at my arms, pulling me off the side of the track. The playing field must have been freshly mowed because there were small piles of grass dotted around the perimeter of the track, and it was into one of them that I was pushed down, face-first. Grass in my mouth and nose and eyes. My head held down. A male voice in my ear. “Eat the grass, grass. Fucking eat it.”

  They left me there, and I cried and coughed out grass and wished hell and herpes on all of them. When I finally got to my feet and staggered to the finish line, Mr. McGee told me off for “taking so long”—ignoring the grass stains on my PE kit, the grass in my hair, the grassy tears streaked across my dirty face—and sent me into the snake pit that was the changing rooms. There, I was completely ignored by Amber and her friends, which was merciful, but also all the other girls, who probably thought of themselves as good people and always hugged their friends when they cried. Which was agony.

  * * *

  I think that whole incident was when I started to get angry. Really angry. The kind of angry that gets called “rage” instead. The burning rage that settles in and stokes the fire of every emotion. I was angry at being shoved into a pile of grass, yes. But the rage came from the absolute fundamental unfairness of it. It wasn’t fair; it wasn’t right. Joe had done something wrong. Not questionable or on the line, but actually wrong. Destroying someone’s work is wrong; destroying someone’s art is wrong; hurting someone is wrong. Wrong, wrong, wrong. And yet he was protected by everyone I was meant to call a peer. And in their eyes, I was the one in the wrong for being a “grass,” essentially for simply pointing out that he was in the wrong. I was the one who was truly punished for the whole incident. He was even more of a hero; I was even more of an outcast. It made no sense at all.

  In school, cool is currency, and cool, apparently, is letting shitheads get away with being shitheads. It’s praising them for their shitheadery.

  Anyone who believes that the world operates on a basis of right and wrong has never been to secondary school.

  Anyway, I endured five years’ worth of the kind of thing I’ve just described. Five long, horrible years where the best I could hope for was being ignored. I hadn’t ever done anything wrong, not even anything particularly embarrassing; I was just the unlucky one.

  That was what I told myself when I was trying to be positive, anyway. Way back then, when I was first starting college, and I allowed myself to hope. There wasn’t something fundamental about me that my bullies had seen; it wasn’t going to be the pattern the rest of my life would follow. I could make friends just like anyone else, and then everything would be better.

  I was so sure of that second part, that’s the thing. That everything would be better. Did it even occur to me, then, that friends might not be the answer? That I might make friends and it could go wrong? (And I mean really wrong. Like, really wrong.) No. I just had all that stupid hope.

  So that was me, first day of sixth form college, hoping. For friends—any friends—to make everything better.

  Well, I got the friends. I even believed things really were better. For a while.

  NOW

  VANCOUVER

  But they weren’t better. Obviously.

  I look out the tiny window of the plane, trying to make out the solid ground so far below me it may as well be just a drawing. Greenland, apparently. A whole country full of people with their own full lives and problems. If I’d been born there, would I have had the same problems? Or is it all pure chance, the people you’re surrounded with, the school you go to, the friends you make or don’t make?

  Above my head, there’s a distinct but gentle ping and the seat belt sign turns red, just as the plane gives a lurch.

  “Oh no,” the woman in the green jumpsuit next to me murmurs, quiet but emphatic.

  I settle my head back against my seat, trying to ignore my sinking heart. Turbulence doesn’t much bother me, but still. As far as omens go when you’ve just left your entire life behind, it isn’t a great one, is it? My stomach twists and the plane jolts. Let’s be honest, I’d take this physical turbulence instead of life turbulence if it was a choice. At least I know this b
umping around thirty thousand feet in the air will end soon.

  My seatmate clearly doesn’t have this perspective, though. She has her eyes closed, fingers gripping the armrest. Every now and then, an involuntary whimper escapes her gritted teeth. I watch her for a while, wondering whether I should say something to reassure her.

  “It’s okay,” I say.

  She doesn’t move her head when she responds, as if she thinks extra movement will send the airplane into a tailspin. “What?”

  “It’s okay,” I say again. “Look.” I pick up my cup of water and move it to her tray table. “See how the water barely moves?”

  She frowns, her eyes traveling to watch the ripples on the water.

  “Something to focus on can help if you’re scared,” I say. The plane judders and I point at the cup. “See, it doesn’t even spill.”

  She looks at me, this time actually turning her head. “You’re very brave.”

  “Not really,” I say. “Turbulence isn’t dangerous. It just feels that way.”

  The plane gives another bone-shaking rattle and the woman lets out a tiny shriek, then closes her eyes again, breathing in slowly. She says, “What’s the difference?”

  I’m not sure she actually wants an answer, because it’s clear what the difference is. Instead, I say, “What are you going to Canada for?”

  “I live there,” she says, eyes still closed.

  “Oh, cool,” I say. “Are you Canadian?”

  “Yes,” she says. “Well, no.” She opens her eyes. “I’m actually American, but I’ve lived in Canada for nearly twenty years. It’s taken good care of me.”

  As off-the-cuff descriptions of countries you’re escaping to go, this is a nice one to hear. I pocket it for later, imagine myself saying it to someone in the future. I went to Canada It took good care of me.

  “How about you?” she asks, loud, like she’s trying to distract herself from whatever spiraling thoughts are happening in her head. “What’s in Canada for you?”

  “I don’t know yet,” I say. “I’m going to find out.”

  She looks at me again, startled. “What do you mean?”

  “I don’t have a plan,” I say. “I’m going on, like, an adventure.”

  “To Canada?”

  “Yeah.”

  There’s a pause. “Why?”

  “I just…” How to explain? “I had to get away. From my life. And Canada just seemed like… a good place to maybe do that. Does that make sense?”

  “Not really,” she says. “But also, yes.” The seat belt sign above us both pings off and she lets out a sigh of relief, closing her eyes again briefly, smiling. “God, I really hate flying.”

  “My dad says being on a plane at cruising altitude is the safest place you can be,” I say.

  “Really?” She looks hopefully at me. “Is that true? Is your dad a pilot?”

  “No,” I say. “He’s a banker.”

  She laughs, spontaneous and loud. “Well then, I’m convinced. Why did you have to get away from your life?”

  “Long story,” I say. It’s not really, is it? But I’m not going to try to explain it now. I’m not even sure I could.

  “Are you running away?” she asks, eyeing me with what might be concern or suspicion.

  “No,” I say. But maybe I am. Am I? Is escaping your life the same as running away? Probably. “It’s kind of… more complicated than that.”

  It’s not like I just left, anyway. I gave myself almost a whole day after I decided I was going to leave. I did some research, got my travel documents together, booked myself into a hostel in Vancouver. That’s not impulsive, is it? Almost twenty-four whole hours to change my mind, and I didn’t.

  This morning I went to college—making sure to time my arrival so it was in the middle of lessons and I wouldn’t run into anyone I didn’t want to see—and had a meeting with my head of year, telling him I’d decided to drop out. He said my parents would need to be involved, that they could all give me time to make a decision, that I shouldn’t do anything rash, let’s all meet again in a week. I nodded along.

  “Why do you want to leave?” Mr. Kirby asked.

  “This just isn’t the life I want,” I said.

  All the while, I waited anxiously to see if Dad would get sent some kind of alert that I’d bought my plane tickets using his credit card. Luckily, no alert came. I went home, packed my rucksack with my sketch pad and my most Canada-friendly travel clothes—dungarees, long-sleeved T-shirts, and a hoodie—and left the empty house as calmly as if I was just popping to the supermarket, my big winter coat slung carelessly over my arm.

  The whole time, it had seemed impossible that I would actually be able to do it, that I’d really make it onto the plane and up into the air without someone stopping me. But I did.

  Since then, I’ve been trying to figure it all out. How I got here, what I did wrong. And here’s what I’m thinking—maybe all these years I’ve been too fixated on other people. I’d thought that was what I needed to do, but it clearly hasn’t worked, has it? After putting everything I had into making friends, I’d ended up with nothing. Worse than before, even, because now I know that having no friends is better than having bad friends. And who wants to learn a lesson like that? If I’ve been chasing other people to find myself, maybe I need to stop and just… well, be. Get to know who I am without worrying about whether it’s good enough.

  That’s what I’ll do in Canada. I won’t be lonely; I’ll be independent. I’m going to travel across the entire country by myself, one end to the other. It’s going to be incredible; it’s going to be life-changing.

  And when I come back I’ll… well, maybe I won’t come back. I’ll be a nomad. Me, a pair of walking boots, my backpack, and my sketch pad. I’ll become one of those life coaches who gives inspirational talks about the power of being alone.

  This is my chance to be someone else, like I tried in college, but better. In a whole other country, I could be a whole different person. But… no, I don’t want to just be anyone. I want to try being Peyton, really Peyton, the Peyton I never got to be. What have I got to lose at this point? Nothing. It’s all already gone.

  * * *

  Considering so much can go wrong, I’m very calm going through border control. I think it’s because I know all the possible outcomes, and the worst scenario is that they just put me on the next plane home. If that happens, it would be gut-wrenchingly disappointing, but not exactly life-ruining. I’d have to go home and face the consequences a little earlier than I’d hoped, but I’d still have done it. My parents would have to listen to me. Things would have to change.

  So I answer the questions about why I’ve come to Canada with the bold-faced lie I’d prepared, explaining that my beloved grandad, who lives in Alberta, is due to have surgery, so I’ve come to take care of him. My grandad does exist, and he does live in Alberta, but as for beloved… well, let’s just say I’ve literally never met him. For all I know, the surgery thing could actually be true. I don’t feel guilty about using his existence for my own benefit, though; serves him right for walking out on my actually beloved grandma all those years ago and abandoning my dad. But anyway, his citizenship is a handy backup excuse for everything whenever I see a snag in my plan coming. Why have you come to Vancouver if he lives in Alberta? “We’re going to spend a few days in Vancouver because I’ve never been, then have a road trip.” What about the surgery? “That’s not until next week. It doesn’t affect his driving.” I have an answer for everything, which I would once have said was unlike me. I even make a joke about maple syrup, then apologize, saying he—Barry—must have heard it a hundred times already. He rolls his eyes, shaking his head, but there’s a small smile on his face when he stamps my passport. A huge smile on mine.

  I’d told Barry that Grandad was picking me up at the airport so we could spend a few days in Vancouver before a road trip to his place in Alberta, but of course there’s no one waiting in the arrivals hall, though I still do that
senseless thing people do when they come through arrivals, looking at everyone’s face as if somebody might have surprised me.

  Luckily, they haven’t. I’ve made it. I am in Canada. I find a row of seats in an information area and sit down, letting out a long breath. Now seems like a good enough time to take stock. It’s just after eight p.m. here, which means it’s… what time at home? I look up and see a display of clocks showing the times all over the world. London, 04:09. I promised my parents I’d phone them when I landed, but maybe they’ll be asleep? I connect to the airport Wi-Fi and watch as my phone all but explodes.

  There were replies to my email from both my parents, and WhatsApp messages saying, essentially, the same thing:

  Dad

  WHAT????

  Mum

  PEYTON!!!!

  The messages got gradually more articulate after that. I scroll through them, watching my parents realize in real time that I really am on the plane, that it’s taken off. They tell me that I have to come straight home. They remind me that I’m seventeen, that I’ve got college, that I can’t just run away. Reading the messages should probably panic me, but I’m weirdly calm. They finally ebb and then stop with a final instruction to call them THE MOMENT YOU ARE THROUGH SECURITY, regardless of WHAT BLOODY TIME IT IS, because they WILL BE AWAKE WAITING, and also that they’ll be WATCHING YOUR FLIGHT so they’ll KNOW EXACTLY WHAT TIME my plane will land, and if I don’t call them they will SEND THE MOUNTIES AFTER YOU.

  Mounties? I look up “mounties.” Canadian police. I roll my eyes, relaxing a little, because I know things are okay really, underneath the all caps, because they haven’t done what I was really worried they’d do, which is call the airport ahead of my arrival to tell them to put me on the first plane home. I have a chance here. Something in them, even subconsciously, has given me this chance.