My phone jangles as Mum and I get back into the driveway. I look in my blazer pocket, catch sight of the caller ID, and sigh.
"Aren't you going to answer that?" Mum says, pulling into the driveway and yanking the handbrake upright, "It might be important."
"It's not," I mumble, "It's just Charlotte from school."
"Oh, one of your friends?" Mum says, smiling as she unbuckles her seatbelt and gets out.
My phone keeps on ringing, and I press my hand over the outline it makes in my pocket, as if that might silence it. And, of course, it doesn't. I cough. "Absolutely not," I reply. Not anymore, at least.
Mum frowns. "Are you coughing? You'd better not be catching a cold. You know what'll happen if you--"
I nod. "Yeah, of course. I'm fine. It's just a touch of hayfever." (The same reason we've spent all afternoon in North Tyneside. Same reason I got called out of school just after break started.)
"All right. Because you know your Dad won't be able to come home if..." She unlocks the door, and ushers me into the house, shutting it tightly behind us. "...If you're going to make him sick. You know he can't afford to catch a bug."
"I know, I know!" I say quickly, undoing my shoes and pulling them off, with a grunt and a wince. It's too hot for socks, and I go through tights like water. My feet--bare inside my shoes, sweaty and tired--shriek in pain as I flex them in the fresh air.
Well. The air. I don't think the stuff in our house really counts as "fresh". Damp and heavy, like the laundry Mum insists we hang up indoors. She takes the phrase, "Don't wash your dirty laundry in public," literally, not just figuratively. I guess, to her, the garden counts as "public," because... well... it kind of is. Everyone overlooks everyone else around here. Cheek by jowl. Not that that seems to bother anyone else. Summer days are full of bedsheets, flapping in the wind, and the smell of lavender drifting across the sky like clouds.
Finally my phone stops ringing. Ugh. Finally. I drag my bag up to my bedroom, and flop down on my bed, pressing my face into the pillow, and wondering if I might get some sleep in, this evening. Or tonight, maybe. I missed lunch today, and, since I got lunch yesterday, I'm feeling it now. Someone's sandpapered the inside of my stomach.
A wave of nausea rises up, and I clamp my hand over my mouth, pressing the other's fingers against the three silver nails that make up my cross pendant. Oh, God, don't let me be sick... Mum'll be so angry with me if I'm sick... whether or not she finds out why...
Before I can think anything else, my phone rings again, vibrations jabbing my ribcage, 8-bit music breaking through the air like a diver through the surface of a lake.
"For the love of Christ," I mutter, pulling the bloody thing out of my pocket, and snapping it open. I don't bother to look at who's calling. I don't care. "What?"
"Um, Ffion? Is that you? This is Char. Char Moreau."
"Oh," I say, "You called me a few minutes ago. What do you want?" I don't sit up. I just prop myself up on one elbow, and put my phone on my pillow. Put Charlotte on speakerphone.
"I wanted to be sure you were all right," Charlotte says, "Nobody saw you after break, and nobody knows where you went. Are you OK?"
"What do you care? You're not my friend," I mutter, getting off the bed and prodding the door with my foot, until it closes.
"I used to be," Charlotte says, "And I kind of wish I still were. You're nice. And... I kind of wonder about you. What's going on in your life, what you're up to. All of that. We never talk anymore."
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This Still Happens
Teen FictionWhen Chris, an old friend, assaults him for being gay, Gordon goes against the advice of his remaining companions, and takes violent revenge. Vengeance, though, is never as sweet as expected. Now Chris wants to kill Gordon and his friends, and he wo...
