You, Me & 'Charlie'

You, Me & 'Charlie' - chapter 3

Chapter 3

“And you forgave her? Are you kidding me?!” Paloma exclaimed, almost sending her juice flying.

A few kids turned around and gave us some funny looks. “Jog on losers!” said Paloma brushing them off.

I rolled my eyes, Paloma was so feisty, and she reminded me of a ratty Chihuahua.

“She’s m y best friend, I couldn’t just walk away.” I said quietly, trying not to draw anymore attention to us.

“Pfffft.” snorted Paloma, jabbing a fork at her chip violently. “This is why I gave up on her, she’s so two faced Tabby.”

Her saying this made me remember the time when we were all friends. And when she and Bree had the argument. Of course, it was about Jake, yet again. He seemed to be the common denominator in all of this.

“Look, I know you guys had this falling out, but I made a promise, to stay friends with you both.” 

“And you’re just going to let her walk all over you and sneak off every week to go see Mr Druggy? I think not. If I were you, I’d cut all ties and give that Jake a good kick in the…”

“No way!” I cut her off abruptly; I knew where she wanted me to kick him already.

“But Tab, what if Bree gets into drugs too? That could be the end of her. Around my estate, there was this kid and he took heroin once, and where is he now? Buried six feet underground.”

I knew Paloma was right, but Jake and his cronies only dealt with cannabis. For now, anyway.

The bell for lessons rang and Paloma sprang up, chucking the rest of her food in the bin as she went. I followed.

“I wish Bree was here today.” I sighed.

“Probably skiving. To snort some coke.” Paloma said darkly.

“Don’t be ridiculous, Bree isn’t that dumb.” I retorted, though a little voice in the back of my head was trying to tell me otherwise.

***

“Hello Mrs Turner, is Bree there?” I asked timidly.

It was five thirty, I hadn’t heard from Bree since Sunday, and that was four days ago. I was getting worried, Bree was hardly ever ill, so something must be up. She’d been off nearly all week.

“Sorry Tabby, but Bree has the flu and has been wrapped up in bed.” answered Mrs Turner, “she can’t have any visitors, as it’s catching, some bug from school I would think.” She sounded strained, as if it was an effort to do something simple like talk on the phone.

“Oh right.” I was stumped; I had really wanted to speak to her. Wanted to hear her voice, telling me she was actually skiving and faked it because she had to write an essay that was supposed to be due in last week.

“I’ll tell her you called shall I?” asked Mrs Turner, reading my thoughts.

“Umm, yeah, if you could thanks.”

“Well thank you for calling, good bye.” She hung up the phone abruptly.

I stood there for a moment, listening to the dead line tone. It was haunting in a weird kind of way, I hung up.

My other brother, Zachary had obviously been watching me. “Tabby, was your friend ok?” he asked curiously, tugging on my sleeve.

“Huh? Oh, no. Bree’s ill Zach, her mummy says she hasn’t been able to get out of bed.”

“That’s bad.” said Zach, looking up at me, eyes full of wonder.

“Yeah, I told her to get well soon though.” I smiled at him, it was hard not to.

Zach was Ethan’s twin brother. I remember when mum announced she was pregnant. It may have been ten years ago, but it’s still fresh in my mind today.

Mum desperately wanted another daughter, dad wanted a son. I wasn’t bothered, whatever the sex, I was going to have a brand new sibling to play with. Or two, as we found out at the twelve week scan. We waited to find out the sexes though.

Dad was even more over the moon to discover he wasn’t going to be the only man of the house anymore.

“It will be ok Tabby, Bree will get better and you will be friends again.” Zach hugged me, he was trying his best to comfort me, bless his heart.

“I know Zach, I know.”

He was trying his best to reassure me, but I think even he knew that it wasn’t going to be easy, nothing ever was with Bree.