Penny
"Can you come over tonight?"
"I..."
"Come on, we have no homework."
"I don't want to."
"What? What the fuck, Penny? Don't you remember what I said?"
It's then that Mickey grabs my phone.
"If you don't leave her the fuck alone and stop feeding her lies, I will personally snap your neck. Choke on a dick, asshole."
He ends the call, and I blink. Lucy pats his shoulder.
I blink again.
"But now I have to like girls! I can't!" I feel something hot trickle down my face. I don't like crying. Mum doesn't like crying.
I try to stop, and it doesn't work. I start hearing everything mum said, all over again again.
"That's disgusting, Penelope! My own daughter! Don't you realise that this is a disease? You're a parasite! You cannot be with women, it's wrong!"
I remember the girls my brother used to bring into his room.
I realise I've started mumbling 'you're a parasite' repeatedly. It tumbles out of my mouth, and I can't cut it out.
I can't cut it out.
I shouldn't have told her.
Suddenly I'm at the door of her apartment and I'm running down the stairs and the bubbles are all dead and Greg is angry and I shouldn't have told her.
I'm running through the street and people are looking at me and I left my shoes behind.
The concrete hurts my feet but I don't notice it.
I don't know what to do.
I shouldn't have told her.
I trip.
I'm in an alleyway and there's grit in my knees. My palms are scuffed and the tears won't stop and I shouldn't have told her.
But here she is.
She's running towards me and telling me to try to get up.
My head is clouding.
I'm thirteen years old. Johnny and I are at the park. He's eating a sandwich even though his hands are all shaky. We're laughing at bad jokes and watching an old man feed the ducks. Mum and Dad are out for dinner.
The sun is setting. Johnny said he'd take me to the cinema at seven.
Then his chin juts upwards, and he looks behind me. His eyes get all wide and he shakes worse. I'd never seen my big brother so panicked.
He pats my cheek, and he says: "Run away, Pen. Go to your friend's house and don't come back home until tomorrow. They'll be searching the house."
Then he's up, he's left his sandwich and he's sprinting away from me.
Three policemen are following him.
I don't see Johnny again.
YOU ARE READING
Bubbles
RomanceI like bubbles in the air - I like watching them meander upwards, into the clouds. She likes bubbles in her alcohol - she likes them searing down her throat, and settling in her stomach. (A.N. - this was written long ago and is cringeworthy)
