Popping the Cherry (31 page)

So much for not leaving me on my own.

I was surprised she even waited for my reply before buggering off. Frantic whispering started up, just outside earshot, but then they moved onto the landing. The vicelike grip on my head intensified as I tried to eavesdrop—a proper vom-worthy headache to the highest degree—but I had to know what they were saying.

‘So there really isn’t anything going on between you two?’ Gemma asked, still not convinced.

‘No.’

‘But do you want there to be?’

My ears pricked up and I held my breath.

‘No,’ Jake repeated. ‘I’m not interested. Not now. Not ever,’ he said, killing off the last of my hopes.

‘I’ve got ears, you know,’ I yelled.

And feelings—unfortunately.

Talk about a major headfuck! Jake’s words and his actions didn’t match up, so it was no wonder I’d messed up so spectacularly. Tears welled in my eyes as I remembered the way he’d held onto me, the tender kiss he’d planted on my forehead. I gulped for air as pain lanced my chest, my heart shattering into a thousand tiny fragments. The acid built in my stomach and threatened to blow again, so I scooped my hair back off my face, gathering it into a ponytail, then wrapping it around my hand.

All of my dreams had come true when I’d woken up in Jake’s bed, safe and warm in his arms. Last night, he’d heard me calling for him somehow, as though our souls were connected, and he’d swooped in to save me just when I’d become resigned to my fate. My feelings for him had only grown stronger over time. I trusted him more than any other person, and I wanted to give myself to him physically, as well as emotionally.

Jake was the one—but he didn’t feel the same.

Gemma returned to the bathroom in time to watch my next bout of hurling. ‘You do know the sympathy thing doesn’t usually work when it’s self-inflicted, right?’

‘Thanks. I do now.’

Her quietness wasn’t fooling me for a second. I knew for sure it was just the calm before the storm. No way was she going to let this morning go. This was no prank gone wrong, or me ignoring her calls: she’d caught me trying to cop off with her brother and that was a crime worthy of a major freakout. Apparently. Jake popped his head into the bathroom when I’d finished being sick again.

‘I’m off,’ he said. ‘Just call me when the police get here and I’ll come straight back.’

I didn’t have it in me to respond.

His footsteps thumped down the stairs, triggering flashes of pain in my temples. The front door rattled open, before being slammed shut again, and the sound of a diesel engine fired up moments later, petering out as he drove away. After all his promises, Jake had upped and gone. And he’d left me with his seriously ticked-off sister.

‘I know you’ve had a shitty night,’ she said, her voice bordering a whisper and eerily calm. ‘I get that, I really do, and I’m sorry.’
But?
There just had to be a ‘but’ coming. ‘But I don’t buy Jake’s theory. Not at all.’
Uh-oh
. ‘I’m not going to ask you why you were trying to have sex with my brother. I don’t need to know—hell, I don’t even
want
to know—but you need to know you can’t have both of us.’

I spluttered. ‘Pardon?’

‘It’s me or him. Your choice.’

‘Why?’

‘I need to know I can confide in you as my best friend, but I can’t do that if there’s even a chance of it getting back to Jake.’

I rested my burning forehead against the cool white porcelain. ‘That’s bullshit, Gemma, and you know it.’

‘Well, I didn’t want to have to say anything, but you’ve forced my hand.’

‘Just spit it out, Gem.’

‘I’ve had my suspicions about you and Jake for months, but then you hooked up with Zac, and Jake started going out with Danielle.’

‘Danielle?’ My stomach lurched again, prompting another heave. It had totally slipped my mind that Jake had a girlfriend.

‘Yeah, she was at my party. I’d have introduced you if you’d stuck around.’

‘Do we really have to do this now, Gemma? When I’m chucking my guts up?’

‘Very well.’ She let out an exaggerated sigh, then got up and left.

Several minutes passed but then she reappeared on the landing with an armful of bedding—Jake’s bedding—having stripped his bed. Getting rid of the evidence, most likely. She disappeared again, presumably to do the same to hers, which she confirmed when she stuffed the next bundle onto the floor ready to take downstairs.

‘Can you drive me home, please?’ I asked.

Gemma’s cold front faltered. ‘But Jake said I had to stay with you.’

‘I don’t really give a damn about what Jake said,’ I snapped. ‘I want to go home. Right now. So are you going to take me or do I have to call a taxi?’

‘No, I’ll take you.’

‘Great. Let’s go.’ My legs were reluctant to bear my weight but they didn’t buckle beneath me. I survived the stairs and made it all the way to Gemma’s car.

We rode in silence but I could see Gemma gnawing on her bottom lip, shooting glances at me. Each time she looked my way, I stared ahead. She turned into my road and pulled up behind my car on the driveway. I had the passenger door open before she’d cut the engine.

‘Lena, I’m—’

‘Thanks for the lift.’ I didn’t want to hear whatever it was she had to say. It was time to get inside and lick my wounds. Alone. I climbed out of her car and shut the door behind me, then walked into my house as proudly as I could in a dressing gown, without looking back once.

Once I’d finally stopped being sick again, I ran a bath with lots of bubbles and had a go at scrubbing away the layer of filth that ran several layers deep. My phone went off a few times but I ignored it, getting out of the bath only when the water had gone cold. I’d been in too many beds over the last twenty-four hours, so I settled for a blanket and cushion on the sofa instead and spent the rest of the morning dozing on and off, with the television on low in the background.

The police showed up at around two o’clock to take my statement, but they must have called Jake too, because he arrived before I’d got the front door closed. His right eye was swollen and he had a nasty purple bruise spreading across his cheekbone. He refused to meet my gaze but followed me into the front room and sat next to me on the sofa, right up close, then took hold of my hand with his; whether that was for my benefit, or his, or purely for appearances’ sake was anyone’s guess.

Regardless of his motives, I accepted the support it offered and closed my grip around his fingers. He tried not to wince, so I tilted his hand over and gasped. His knuckles were grazed and the middle one appeared to be nearly twice its normal size. Meeting my eye for no more than a heartbeat, he gave a tiny shrug that clearly said, ‘It’s nothing,’ as if he were a telepath and had put the words directly into my head.

As I gave my statement, I withdrew deeper into my shell, forced to put up emotional barriers and pretend I was describing something I’d seen on the telly. Listening to Jake give his statement, I realised just how lucky I’d been. Naturally I was a bit shaken, but something had actually gone my way for once. Jake hung back when I saw the police out. I knew he wanted to interrogate me himself, and it was obvious he was unhappy with me staying on my own, so I decided to get in first.

‘I guess you’d better get back to work,’ I said, holding the front door wide open. ‘Thank you for everything.’

‘You shouldn’t be on your own, Tink.’ His tender use of my nickname stabbed me in the chest.

‘I’m fine,’ I lied.

‘We need to talk.’ Jake gazed at me with sad eyes, the corner of his lips turning down.

I very nearly caved in. Nearly, but not quite.

‘I think you’ve said quite enough for one day, don’t you?’ I said, trying to sound aloof, even though I wanted to scream and beg him to hold me just one more time.

His eyes widened. ‘You heard that?’

‘Yes I did.’

He stiffened. ‘So that’s it?’

‘Yeah, I guess so.’ A stone took up residence where my heart had once been.

He swallowed. ‘But—’

‘But if I’m ever in the market for a big brother you’ll be the first to know.’

Jake looked shell-shocked as he walked out through the open doorway. He stopped on the top step and turned back to face me. A transformation had come over him and he no longer looked invincible. If anything, I’d say he was at breaking point. He opened his mouth to say something else but no words came.

‘Goodbye, Jake.’

I closed the door on him before I could change my mind, then sank to the floor. He stayed there for what felt like for ever, shuffling and scuffing his feet, before finally getting back in his van and driving away. Time to call in the cavalry. Flick would never forgive me if I didn’t fill her in, and Nathan would probably crash the car if I told him on the way to work, so I sent them both a text to see if they were free.

Flick was the first to arrive, still dressed in her leotard. I started to tell her what had happened but then Nathan showed up, coming straight from the building site, so he was caked in dirt, but he was also bearing enough dinner to feed another half a dozen of us, so I let him off. They took the news pretty badly. It was kind of ironic, really. My actual so-called best friend—as Jake had so poignantly put it—had practically shunned me, she’d distanced herself totally, whereas Flick threw her arms around me and fought back tears, and Nathan immediately offered to stay over until Mum and Dad came home.

I gladly took him up on his offer, knowing that nighttimes would always be the hardest part for me. He dashed off to pack a bag with the proviso that Flick delay her plans until he returned. Sure enough, the nightmares came. It got to the point where Nathan was spending more time in my room than in the spare room, with neither of us getting much sleep, so he dragged back the quilt and climbed in with me. I didn’t wake up again until my alarm went off. My head was on Nathan’s chest and his arm was draped over me, weighing a ton. He knew better than trying to talk me out of going to work, so off we went.

Normality was good. Nathan didn’t even bother with the spare room that night. He was my living, breathing teddy bear. Mum and Dad arrived home midafternoon, alarmed to find Nathan and his overnight bag in my bedroom until I told them what had happened. They seemed to struggle with the concept of a guy and a girl being best friends but managed to keep their thoughts to themselves. The police came over with an update and to let me know that Ryan wasn’t pressing charges against Jake. Finally some good news.

Nathan went home after dinner, and, although my sleep wasn’t great, the nightmares were bearable. I could either let the whole sorry experience define me, turn me inward and make me bitter and resentful, or I could rally against it and try to put it behind me.

I choose life
.

My life may well have hit rock bottom, but that just meant the only way was up. I was done feeling like a victim. It was going to happen overnight, but I had to start somewhere. Little steps—most likely two steps forward and one step back—but the key was to just keep on trying. To keep moving.

Never give up
.

And the first thing I could take back control of was me. It was my turn to call an intervention, and I had an ultimatum of my own.

As I rode the bus into college on what turned out to be a sunny Monday morning, I texted the others and asked them to meet me at the oak tree right after the lunch bell rang. I’d refused Gemma’s calls all weekend and hadn’t even bothered opening her texts so I was wasn’t sure what kind of turnout I’d get. The last to arrive, I barely recognised Gemma as I walked up behind her. She wore a basic t-shirt over jeans and trainers—Gemma didn’t do trainers unless it was to go to the gym—and her hair was tied back in a ponytail.

Judging from the way people kept darting glances in her direction, I wasn’t the only one struggling with the sudden change in her appearance, but, when she turned to look at me, my jaw dropped. Anyone would think
she’d
been on the receiving end of Ryan’s attention instead of me. She certainly looked worse. Her eyes were huge and puffy, and she hadn’t even bothered with makeup to try to cover it up. I’d made an effort to put on makeup and style my hair, and, although I wore my usual jeans and Converse, I’d put on a nice top and a chunky leather belt.

No matter how much Gemma was freaking me out, I’d brought them all together for a reason, so I’d best get it over with.

‘Thank you for coming. I’ll keep this brief.’ I sucked in a deep breath. ‘I’m not here to talk about Hallowe’en: I want to talk about Operation: Popping the Cherry and how much it’s upset me.’ I held up my hand when Chloe tried to speak. ‘Although your intentions were good, I never once felt comfortable with it, and I didn’t appreciate having it forced on me. You’re supposed to my friends, but if you can’t accept me for who I am, for what I believe in and the choices I make, then it looks like we’re done here.’

Piper stared at her feet, Chloe her nails, and Gemma stared down at the floor. Flick was the only one to meet my eye. She smiled and gave me the thumbs-up, which gave me the strength to say the next part—the part I’d been dreading.

‘And Gemma?’ She tensed at the mention of her name. ‘I’ve made my choice.’ I waited until she met my gaze, her eyes brimming with tears. ‘I choose neither.’

Gemma flinched but nodded her head, dislodging a tear, and I watched as it trickled down her cheek.

A part of me ached inside. I didn’t want to hurt her, and it wasn’t in my nature to be a bitch, but she’d gone too far this time. Gemma knew it, too. She didn’t even try to argue or defend herself.

‘Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to grab some lunch,’ I said, forcing the words past the lump in my throat. ‘If nobody wants to join me, I’ll understand.’ I turned and made my retreat. Gemma started sobbing behind me but I held my head up high and carried on walking. Flick was the only one to catch up with me.

‘It’s about bloody time,’ she said, putting her arm around my shoulder and giving me a squeeze.

‘Thanks.’

Piper and Chloe showed up halfway through lunch, but Gemma wasn’t with them.