Page 133 - What Is Not Yours Is Not Yours

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DAY WAITED to hear about Flor and Hercules. She felt a bit sick but that was just
obstructed emotion, a sensation the Dayang Sharifs of this world know all too
well. Spring was definitely in the air, even as early as February. Everyone except
Day was in some sort of romantic relationship—Marie with a townie who rode a
motorbike, Willa with a curator at the Fitzwilliam, Theo with a guide who led
tours of Dickensian London, Ed and Grainne with each other, and now

Flordeliza with her Bettencourt boy. Day’s only hope was that Hercules
Demetriou would come out of this story sounding so greasy that Day’s physical
response to his proximity would be mercifully dulled forever.
(The other day she’d passed him and a few other boys she suspected were
Bettencourters on King’s Parade, apparently conducting a survey that involved

soliciting the opinions of women. “More like ranking them,” she muttered, and
Hercules had smiled at her and said: “Sorry, what was that?”
“Nothing. Hello.”
“Hi. Listen, do you want to—”
“Sorry, I can’t. Bye!”)
Flor wasn’t talking about Hercules, but about a third-year at her college
named Barney Chaskel, a boy she hadn’t pegged for a Bettencourter because,

“Well, he’s sort of low-key and makes fun of his own obsession with conspiracy
theories and . . . he’s sweet.”
“Sweet?!” came at her from every corner of the room. Day asked it loudest,
more with curiosity than incredulity. Hilde said: “Flor, aren’t you going too far?”
“Look . . . on the way over I actually thought about presenting all this as if I’d
seduced him on purpose to get info, but the truth is I didn’t know Chaskel was a

Bettencourter until this morning! I said I had to run to a Wench meeting, and he
was like . . . surely not the Homely Wenches? And I was like, yeah, the very
same, and then he went, ‘How funny, I’m a Bettencourter . . .’”
“‘How funny’ . . . ? This ‘Barney Chaskel’ thinks our decades of enmity are
just a bit of fun . . . ?” Theo wondered aloud.
“Flor,” Marie said, in sepulchral tones. “So far this is the tale of our enemies
evolving into ever more superficially pleasing forms. You mentioned that this

was also a tale of possibility?”
“Flordeliza, if there’s a twist introduce it now or there might be beats in store
for you . . .” Ed added.