Lessons in Laughing Out Loud (9 page)

“I do feel like something has changed, like something’s . . .”

“About to happen,” Holly finished her sentence for her. “As long as it’s got nothing to do with that Daniel.”

Just as Willow was about to protest, the doorbell jangled loudly.

“Who’s that?” Holly asked.

“Don’t you know? Look, I’d better go.”

Willow’s doorbell never rang unexpectedly. It only ever rang if some sort of takeaway was expected or on the rare occasions that Daniel visited. Willow turned around and regarded her closed door suspiciously.

“Hello?” Willow spoke into the receiver, but all she could hear was the rush of traffic through puddles and static bristling in her ear.

“Hello?” she repeated, but there was no reply from the intercom. Perplexed, Willow replaced the phone and went to her window, pulling back the aged net curtain that she hated but had never mustered the energy to remove. She pressed her palms against the cool glass, slick with condensation, and peered down at the street below. Cold, tired people swarmed by, each huddled in a private cocoon, but there didn’t seem to be anyone waiting to come in.

The knock at the door spun her round. Whoever had been
ringing the bell had gotten into the building somehow. Maybe it was India, trying to hide from her adoring public. Or it could just have been Mrs. Kuresh from downstairs, thinking she’d forgotten her key again and then finding it in her hand. Telling herself that the curious tingle that crept up her spine was more the product of an overactive imagination than anything else, Willow went to answer the door.

There was no peephole in the door, so instead she slid the security chain on and opened the door a tiny crack. It was impossible to see anyone in the limited slice of hallway that the gap in the door afforded Willow, but as far as she could tell, the landing was empty.

“Hello?” she called, although she was fairly sure that any lurking villains or ax-wielding murderers would not issue a cheery reply. “Who’s there?”

Nothing. Willow thought for a moment, then pushed the door to release the chain, opened the door wide and stepped out into the hallway. The communal front door at the bottom of the stairs was open, the chill of the evening bowling toward her, raising goose bumps on her legs.

Sighing, Willow trotted down the stairs and out into the cold, fume-filled street. The fug of the day rose from the pavements, slimy with wet leaves and litter, the exhaust of the rush-hour traffic sitting thickly in the air, damp permeating everything. Willow folded her arms tightly around her and looked up and down the length of the street. There didn’t seem to be anyone around who looked suspicious, or more suspicious than usual, just the normal Wood Green crowd thronging the street, busy people desperate to be in their own homes, with their own people. The only person who appeared a little out of place was a teenage girl in a skirt that was far too short and skimpy for the cold weather, wearing a massive hooded top with the hood pulled low over her eyes, a scarf wrapped
around her nose and mouth. She was crouching against the railings, uncertainty framing every angle.

Probably lost, or a runaway, Willow guessed. Or another one of those skinny kids you see every now and then and you wonder why they aren’t at school or in bed but you don’t think about it too much because it makes you feel uncomfortable. There was something reminiscent about her, but unable to put her finger on exactly what, Willow shrugged and started to go back in. The girl sprang up, startling her.

“That’s it, walk away,” she said, in a faux street accent. Willow stopped, turned around, her heart racing unexpectedly. It couldn’t be . . . could it?

“Sorry, can I help you?” Willow said, shock and confirmation rippling through her in one fluid movement as her former stepdaughter, Chloe, pulled back her hood.

“Chloe!” Willow went toward her, more than ready to embrace her, but Chloe took two steps away, her flashing eyes a warning to back off. Willow halted, a confusion of emotion churning in her gut. In that first moment of recognition, Willow ached to hold her but quickly checked the impulse. The way they had parted meant she had no right to hug Chloe, who obviously didn’t feel the same way about seeing her; why would she?

“Hello, Willow.” Chloe stood there, caught between uncertainty and defiance.

“Chloe.” Willow repeated her name as a whisper, the roar and stink of the street around them receding to nothing in a moment. She hadn’t seen Chloe in five years, not since the day she had left Sam’s flat for good. Chloe had been ten then, and in Willow’s head she was still was ten. Not this hard-faced, beautiful, angry girl. “What are you doing here?”

“I’ve left home.” Chloe shrugged as if further explanation wasn’t necessary.

“Um . . .” Willow wavered, trying to process the statement at the same time as her brain tried to make a connection between the rosy-cheeked, black-eyed little girl she had once known and this gangly, long-legged creature with charcoal eyes and . . . and were those piercings? Things really had changed. Willow could never imagine Sam allowing piercings.

“Okay, well, left home?”

Willow glanced back at the open front door, the glow of artificial light glimmering on the wet stone steps. What was she supposed to say? How was she supposed to act? “Well, that’s um . . . is that good?”

“Good?” Chloe shook her head, her disgust confusing Will. “I’m fifteen, Willow, I’ve run away in the middle of London, in the freezing cold, and all you’ve got to say is ‘good’!”

“That’s not exactly what I said . . .”

“Then again, your mothering skills were never all that great, were they?”

Stung, Willow looked away briefly, trying to find some footing is this free fall she had stumbled into, waiting to hit familiar ground again. Of course Chloe felt that way. Five years ago Willow had left Sam’s flat knowing she was walking out on Chloe for good too. Chloe must hate her; God knows Willow hated herself enough. No amount of rationalization or resigning herself to the knowledge that she didn’t have a choice in the matter had ever salved the wound that leaving Chloe behind had opened up in her. Of course Chloe hated her, which begged the question—why was she here?

“So, if you know that it’s stupid and dangerous to run away, why have you?” The question came out as an accusation, and Willow bit her lips, desperate that Chloe should not disappear as quickly as she had appeared. Chloe shook her head contemptuously, clearly signaling exactly what she thought of Willow.

“Dad hates me.” Chloe pouted; her defiance was mannered, practiced. Almost like she’d been reading tips on how to be textbook rebellious. “And I hate his new girlfriend—if you can use the word
girl
for a saggy-titted old witch. I can’t stay there anymore. I can’t. It’s like, it’s like a violation of my human rights, right? He treats me like, like a slave. So that’s it. I’m outta there.”

“Out of,” Willow said, automatically irritating both herself and Chloe in one fell swoop. It wasn’t news to her that Sam had someone new in his life—an old colleague she’d bumped into about a year ago had taken great delight in telling her he was seeing someone—and yet Chloe mentioning another woman grated.

She was caught between indecision and uncertainty. Willow hadn’t been fully aware just how much she had missed Chloe until this moment. There was always the background hum of her absence, a constant undertone that Willow had grown used to, and its volume was suddenly amplified to deafening levels. But Will had no idea how to approach Chloe. Not only was the girl no longer ten, she was a stranger.

Try as she might, Willow could not forget the way Sam had looked at her the day she left, the contempt and disgust in his eyes as she’d packed her bags. She could almost have predicted that ending from the moment she’d stood at the altar—no, the moment she’d accepted his proposal, knowing that no matter how much she loved him she would never be able to keep him. Though she had had no idea, not even then, how much and how quickly she’d come to love Chloe, how close they would become. But Sam had wanted to cut Willow out of his life entirely, he wanted, needed a clean break—and that meant cutting her out of Chloe’s life too. Willow had taken her to school in the morning and had moved out before the afternoon bell had rung. She hadn’t even said good-bye. Over
the years Willow had told herself it was easier that way, easier than having to watch Chloe’s dismay and disappointment emerge at awkward, uncertain meetings in coffee shops and zoos until eventually they’d drift apart anyway. Willow didn’t want to witness the impact her failings had on Chloe, or see Chloe come to hate her. She had resigned herself to never seeing her again.

And yet here she was.

Willow caught her breath. How did Chloe even know where to find her?

“Will you . . . come up? Have a warm drink at least?” Willow offered.

“What, before I settle down for the night in a shop doorway? How magnanimous of you.” Despite her response, Chloe needed no further prompting, heading straight up the stairs, Willow following her.

“You’ve put weight on,” Chloe said as Willow joined her outside her front door.

“Yep.” Willow nodded. It was the truth, after all, a full dress size and a half since Sam told her he’d had enough.

“Cool shoes, though. They TopShop? Can I borrow ’em?”

“No and no,” Willow said firmly, opening the door and letting Chloe in first.

Chloe looked around the flat, the aged, open-plan kitchen tucked into one corner of the single living room, the dirty patterned carpet and woodchip on the walls.

“Well, this is a shithole. Dad wasn’t lying when he said you didn’t ask for anything in the divorce then.”

Willow shut the door and, for want of knowing what else to do, went to the sink and filled the kettle.

“I’m going to decorate, take up the carpet, refit the kitchen when I’ve got some time.”

“Oh, you’ve only just moved in?” Chloe asked her.

“Not exactly,” Willow hedged, wondering if Chloe knew this was the flat she’d moved into after the divorce. It wasn’t that she hadn’t had the time, or even the money, to make the place nicer, it was just that she had never had the inclination. It did just fine for her.

What had Sam told Chloe exactly? If he’d explained the whole truth about Willow’s abrupt departure, then Willow was almost certain Chloe would not be here. He must have said something, but what?

Willow turned back from the kitchen to find that Chloe had disappeared, and the bedroom door was ajar. She followed the younger girl into her room, where she surveyed the unmade bed, the assortment of unwashed clothes strewn over the floor, the half-finished packet of biscuits on the bedside table.

“Fuck, you live like a tramp!” Chloe exclaimed, her brow furrowing. “Funny, you always used to be so neat and tidy, always telling me to put my shoes together. . . .” Chloe turned around, plonking herself down on the bed and looking up at Willow. “You okay, you look like shit, yeah?”

“Chloe, what’s going on?” Willow crossed her arms. It felt appropriate.

“I told you, I’ve left home.” Chloe reached for the packet of biscuits and took one, cramming it into her mouth in one go.

“But why?” Willow asked. “Have you fallen out with your dad?”

“You could say that.” Chloe nodded thoughtfully as she munched. She swallowed and licked her thickly glossed lips. “Yes, that would be a fair assessment.” Her accent lurched from street-level slang to privately educated West London girls’ school like a well-oiled roller coaster.

“So you’ve run away to teach him a lesson?” Willow paced, dimly recognizing that she really needed to vacuum soon, before the carpet actually changed color.

“No, I haven’t run away to teach him a lesson.” Chloe did an irritatingly passable impression of Willow. “I’m not a twat. I know that a young girl on the streets of London is in danger of falling into drugs and child prostitution and worse, whatever is worse than that shit is. I’ve left home and . . . I’ve decided to move in with you.”

“Me?” Willow uncrossed her arms and then crossed them again, unable to take in what Chloe was saying. “You’ve come to
me
?”

“Yeah, right—I’ve been thinking about it and I think you owe me.” Chloe’s conviction was absolute. “And besides, there isn’t anyone else, and I can’t hide it from him anymore.” The girl’s voice wavered for a fraction on the last few words.

“Hide what?” Willow asked ever so slowly, because she somehow sensed that she would never be ready to hear the answer.

Chloe stood up and in one movement unzipped the tracksuit top, shrugged it off her shoulders, and let it fall to the floor.

“I’m up the duff,” Chloe said, putting her palms on her rounded belly. “About six months I think. And when Dad finds out he’s going to kill me, so I’m moving in with you, okay?”

It was Willow’s turn to sit down on her bed.

“Chloe . . . you’re fifteen.”

“Nearly sixteen . . . -ish,” Chloe said as if that made everything fine. Willow stared at her. “Okay, yes. I’m fifteen and pregnant, yes.
And
I knew about contraception, and I knew the risks of what might happen, but you know. I’m fifteen, how sensible do you expect me to be? Anyway, the UK has the highest incidence of underage pregnancy in Europe and like about fourth or fifth in the world, so, you know, are you really that surprised?”