A Pair Of Pears (Completed)

Chocolate-fed Zen Potato

I climb into the front of Willow’s van, there are crystals hanging from the inside mirror and a black cat with a purple collar asleep on the driver side. Willow opens the driver’s door.
‘Mystic! Again!’ She ushers the cat onto the seat in between us and climbs in. ‘This girl gets everywhere, she does.’  Willow strokes the cat's head. ‘She has a habit of sneaking into the van. I check each time now, but she still manages to sneak on. She ended up coming to Stonehenge with us for the Solstice.’
Willow puts her keys in and starts up the van. ‘I wouldn’t mind so much if she stayed close, she has a habit of disappearing for days at a time too.’ 
Willow reverses the van from its spot and drives out onto the road. It’s quite dark outside now, there are no streetlights in Cornwall. All we have are the headlights from the van, they reflect on the crystals that are now swinging from side to side as we drive down the bumpy country road. They look quite pretty. 
‘I see Laura hasn’t changed a bit.’ She says, nudging her head towards the back of the van. Mystic the cat cuddles into me as we go around a sharp bend. I know how she feels, I dig my fingers into the side of the seat, Willow isn’t great at driving in the dark. She reminds me of a mad man driving an ice cream van. 
I feel a bit puzzled about how Willow speaks about Mum, it’s as if she knows her.
 ‘Do you know my mum?’ I ask. 
Willow takes her eyes off the road and looks at me. I wish she wouldn’t, as unhappy as I am, I’d still like to get home in one piece. ‘I do, did she not say? Don’t get me wrong, we were never friends. But we go back a bit, Went to school together. A small town is Summermead, everyone knows everyone.’ 
Willow steers the van up my grandparent’s driveway. The lights are on, which means they are still up. Willow parks up, and opens the side door of the van, Mum is still half unconscious. Willow’s trying to wake mum up and get her steady on her feet. Gran comes out the front door. 
‘Charlie, do you have any idea what time it is?!?!?’ she calls out while hurrying down the front steps. Her hair is in rollers, and she’s wearing one of those old nightgowns that come down to your ankles, paired with a bright pink pair of fluffy slippers. 
‘You have school in the morning!’
Willow catches sight of her and struggles to keep a straight face. Gran’s eyes dart towards Mum being held up by Willow, gran looks at Mum her eyes filled with noticeable sadness, but she stays silent. Willow wraps mum’s right arm around her shoulder and proceeds to try and get her up the steps. I haven’t seen much of Mum recently, I notice how skinny she’s become. She has a history of swapping some meals in favour of alcohol so that she doesn’t go over her daily calorie intake, but now she looks like she’s barely been barely eating at all. I don’t know what to feel anymore, looking at her in this state, I feel sorry for her. She’s clearly not well. But when she’s sober, she’s still horrible. I’ve often hoped and imagined scenarios of something terrible happening to her one night when she’s out. I feel ashamed for having these thoughts about one of my own parents, but it’s true.
Grandad appears by the front door as Willow and Mum reach the top of the steps.
‘Take her upstairs.’ He says quietly, as they make their way through the door. 
I hear gran's slippers shuffling on the gravel behind me. ‘Right you!’ She says emotionless, as she walks past me and makes her way inside.
 ‘Bed.’ 
Willow drops Mum on her bed and heads back to Jacksons to pick up Lily. ‘I’ll give you a lift to school in the morning.’ She says, pulling me into a hug as she leaves. 
‘Be ready for eight.’
I wake up tired in the morning, having barely slept. The good news is that I’m not in as much pain as I was yesterday, with a bit of luck I’ll be in for a semi pain-free day. The marks on my neck have faded but are still noticeable, so I have to cover them up before I go downstairs. I have a knot of anxiety in the pit of my stomach, a mixture of attending a proper school for the first time and hearing mum’s voice as I make my way downstairs. I pause on the bottom step to listen, normally all conversations end as I walk into a room. 
‘I don’t know what happened.’ I hear Mum say to Gran. ‘The place was full of hippies, all I had was orange juice, I was probably drugged. You know what that lot are like, especially that Chocolate-fed Zen Potato, Willow. Have you seen the legs on her! Clearly, that meat-free diet isn’t helping her body fat.’ 
I feel the anger from the last few weeks rising in me like a bottle of fizz that had been vigorously shaken. Willow is by no means overweight, but all this is coming from a stick insect who spends all her spare time high on drugs or drinking herself into oblivion. I’m about to open the door when mum speaks again.  
‘I heard Charlie disappeared off with that Jackson lad, though. Should have seen the state of him, walking around without a shirt on and without any shoes on. The whole family are like that you know Mum. All the kids have messy haircuts and chocolate smeared faces.’ 
I hear the kettle click and the sound of water being poured. Mum carries on.
 ‘Oh, Mum! You know that Lily girl, the other one from the shop, Zen Potato’s daughter? Complete and utter dyke, all over some other girl.’ 
I can hear tea being stirred, and I have finally lost my temper. I walk to the kitchen door and open it with such force that it makes gran jump and she spills half her tea across the table. Mum stands there smirking with an eyebrow raised. That’s when I realise she must have heard me coming down the stairs, and deliberately set this up.