Too Good Girl

by Eleanor Lloyd-Jones

  He wiped his mouth on the back of his sleeve and rose to his feet, holding his hand out for my plate. “You done with that?”

  I nodded. “I’ll heat it up later.” I held it up for him and he took it, walking out of the room, his voice floating in from the kitchen.

  “Stop worrying. I’ll be fine.”

  “Famous last words, Palmer.” I shouted my response through the open door and settled myself back into the corner of the sofa and scrolling through my electronic ‘black book’.

  ***

  The buzzing of my mobile had my eyes fluttering open in the pitch black of my bedroom, except I quickly remembered it wasn’t my bedroom.

  “Fuck.” I fumbled around with my hand to locate my phone as a heavy arm flung itself over my chest. A grunt and snort and the Gavin’s breathing evened out allowing me to twist myself out from under him. I slipped to the floor and onto my knees, leaning over to grab my jacket and pulling my phone out of the pocket. The bright screen had Jack’s name and picture flashing across it, and I sat back on my heels, closing my eyes and taking a deep breath before answering it. I whispered into the handset. “What are you ringing me for at this ungodly hour?”

  “Where the hell are you?”

  I sat and stretched my legs out in front of me, my head lolling back against the side of the bed, before closing my eyes and rubbing them with the heel of my hand. “Never mind. I fell asleep that’s all. I must have been ti—”

  “Do you need me to come get you?” I heard the sound of a door slamming closed and knew he was already out of the house.

  I glanced around the small room, my eyes adjusting to the dark, and shook my head. “Not in a stolen car, thanks. It’s fine. I’ll walk home. It’s only on Willerby Road.”

  “Like hell you will. What’s the house number?”

  “Jack, I’ll walk. It’s fine. I need to go.”

  “I’ll come meet you.”

  “I said no. It’s fine, Jack... Jack?” The phone went dead and I rolled my eyes, knowing he’d have set off already. Three years my senior, he was always trying to look after me. After finding me bedraggled and malnourished, he felt he had a never ending duty of care, and it was, at times, suffocating. If it weren’t for Jack, though, it was likely I would still be on the streets, or worse: in a gutter. So, I gritted my teeth and allowed him to fuss about me from time to time.

  Shimmying into my jeans, I shoved my jumper on, all the while attempting to be silent. Slinging the long strap of my bag over my head, I stood with my phone and my Vans in my hand and slunk out of the bedroom to navigate myself out of the house in the dark. I only made it a hundred yards down the road before I saw Jack striding in my direction. The dim light from the street lamps lit up his wavy, shoulder-length blonde hair, and I found myself stopping to watch him as he approached. He had become my whole life and the only person I really trusted, but I’d always held him at arm’s length. Yes, he knew some of my secrets, my past and all my internal struggles, but only the facts. I’d never poured my heart out to him. He’d never seen me cry. And that was the way it would stay.

  As I stood there, though, I didn’t want to go home and close my bedroom door on him. Something about the way he had gone out of his way to make sure I was safe had me smiling on the inside, and I wanted to sit with him and bullshit for a while.

  “You’re a dufus.”

  His brows knitted together as he forced back a smirk. “How am I a dufus?”

  I stepped towards him and adjusted my bag as he sidled up beside me, and I nudged his arm with my shoulder. “Coming out at this time to check I’m okay.”

  Jack squinted at me from the corners of his eyes. “Hmm. I see. Well, I didn’t fancy having to deal with any aftermath on my day off tomorrow.”

  I punched his arm.

  We both looked out across the road at the invisible horizon, our lips twitching.

  “Fancy a walk?” I gripped the strap of my bag that sat diagonally across my body and waited for him to respond.

  “Sure.”

  Nodding, I stepped out into the road, heading towards the jetty with him a step or two behind me. The sandy grass was cold and prickly under my bare feet, and I stopped to slip back into my shoes before standing up and dusting the sand from my arse. We walked a little further, hitting the small beachy cove within a few steps, and both climbed onto the jetty. A gust of cold wind whipped the hair around our faces, and I pulled a couple of dreads from the front, tying them at the back of my head in an attempt to keep it all out of my eyes.

  There was something about being by the sea that made me want to gasp for breath as if I were struggling to grapple to the surface, drowning in my grief, yet it filled me with intrigue and drew me close to it, almost calling to me at times. I watched he crests of the night-time waves glistened under the light of the moon, and I took a moment to listen to them crash. I wanted to be closer to the mystery of it, to fathom it, to ask it questions and for it to consume me with its answers, and standing watching the lapping of the waves with Jack by my side, my thoughts were calm. My lungs filled easily and my heart seemed to be beating in a regular rhythm.

  “I’d like to live there one day.” I nodded over to the candyfloss pink house sitting in the middle of a row of bright white houses that curved along the shoreline. In the darkness, the colour was dull, but in the bright light of the sun, the house took centre stage along the coastline of the fishing town of Faymere. “I think if I lived there, I would feel sunny every day. There’s something about the way it stands almost on its own, like a robin with its chest puffed out. Makes me feel like whoever sleeps in it wakes up without a care in the world every damn day.”

  Jack smiled and nodded his head towards the ocean. “I’d like to live out there, in one of the Maunsell Sea Forts.”

  I frowned and squinted. “The what?”

  He sat on top of the railing, still staring out into the huge expanse of nothingness. “The sea forts. They’re armed towers built during World War II to protect the UK—to deter the German air-raids. Obviously they’re not armed anymore. Pirate radio stations used them in the sixties and seventies but they’re abandoned now. They’re too far out to see in the dark, but maybe I’ll take you one day.” He pushed his hand through his blonde hair and held it on top of his head to keep the wind from blowing it around. “No one would fucking bother me out there. Doug wouldn’t want to get his brogues wet.”

  I snorted. “I think you might be onto something.” I hopped up next to him and listened again to the crashing of the waves. “I could visit you.”

  “Nah. It would drive you nuts being in there. Everything would be mismatched, and nothing would have a proper place. You wouldn't be able to bleach anythin—”

  I punched him again and he clasped his hand around his arm in mock horror, chuckling.

  “I don’t bleach everything.”

  “You do. Let’s be honest.”

  “Most things.”

  “Everything, Sy. You bleach everything.”

  I jumped down and yanked him with me. “I want to paddle. Come on.” Setting off at a light jog, I reached the water’s edge in no time, slipping back out of my shoes and dropping them to the sand next to my bag and my jacket. I bent down and rolled the bottoms of my skinny jeans up as far as they would go and turned around, grinning and slightly out of breath, to make sure Jack was following suit.

  He wasn’t.

  He was standing there, watching me.

  My breath caught in my throat as I looked in his eyes that sparkled in the moonlight, and my chest heaved as I swallowed down, no idea what was going on. “What?”

  He shook his head. “Nothing.”

  “Well why are you staring at me?”

  “Because you look happy. It’s good to see you smiling.”

  I swallowed again before rolling my eyes to cover my embarrassment and the feeling of blood rushing in my ears. “Come on.”

  Turning back
around, I took my first tentative steps into the freezing cold water, my heart pounding in my chest and an unknown feeling in my stomach.

  Syra

  Someone To Stay by Vancouver Sleep Clinic

  “HELLO?” I PEERED around the front door, stepping over the countless takeaway menus and other mail that was strewn across the doormat before crouching down to pick up what looked important. “Mum?” Piling the leaflets and junk mail on the mat ready to take out with me when I left, I made my way down the hallway, sifting through what looked like bills and other utility correspondence. “Mum, are you home?” I glanced through the glass-paneled door into the sitting room, shaking my head and closing my eyes to the rack and ruin. There were beer cans and food wrappers strewn across the expensive cream carpet that now had burns and stains all over it. The thick curtains were drawn closed, as they always were, and the dim light from a lava lamp in the corner gave the whole room an eerie glow. The silence from the house indicated that Mum was probably still at the pub where she worked, or high in a ditch somewhere. Either was just as feasible as the other, and it was far from the first time I’d been left wondering if I would ever see her alive again.

  “Mum?” I picked my way over piles of clothes into the dining room and kitchen area, bending down to pick up a tipped over bottle of milk and sniffing the contents before reeling at the stench. “Jesus Christ.” Moving to the sink, I emptied it down the drain and opened the bin to dispose of the carton. Another stale stink knocked me backwards, and I covered my mouth and nose with the crook of my arm.

  “Here she is.”

  Turning my head, I saw a shirtless Tony leaning against the door frame, a cigarette hanging from the corner of his mouth, his blood-shot eyes glaring at me. My lip curled up in disgust at the mere sight of him, and I let the lid of the dustbin fall back closed, wiping my hands on my jeans as I continued to look around the place. “Where’s Mum?”

  He shrugged and began to swagger my way.

  He was high.

  “Right, well, can you tell her I was here and that I’ll call round again in a few days.

  “Sure.” He stopped in front of me—so close I could smell his rancid breath—and reached around me to flick his ash into the sink. “You don’t want to stay? Have some fun?”

  “I’ll pass, thanks.” I twisted away from him and was about to leave when a noise from the back room caused me to stop and frown. I turned to face him and raised my eyebrows. “You said you didn’t know where she was.”

  “Did I?”

  Pushing past him, muttering obscenities under my breath, I flung the door to sitting room open, stopping short as my eyes took in the scene. Mum was on the sofa, propped up with cushions, a dressing gown cord tied around her arm and a needle in her hand. It wasn’t completely unfamiliar—I’d seen her fucked up and drugged up before—but I’d never caught her using.

  She lifted her eyes quickly once she realised I was there, and as her face contorted at the sight of me, she screamed. “Get out!” Her voice was a panicked screech. Her whole body was shaking, her eyes wild and desperate, almost pleading with me to leave her to her business.

  Regardless of the horror before me and the shrill command from my mother, I remained frozen on the spot, staring at her pale skin and unwashed hair.

  “Tony! Get her the fuck out of here.”

  The feel of his thin fingers wrapping around my upper arms from behind me, pulling me away, caused me to snap out of my trance, and I swallowed, blinking quickly to try to rid myself of the image. But as he roughly guided me backwards and out of the room, I didn’t look away once—not even when Mum gave in to her body’s need, jabbing the needle into her arm and pushing on the top of the syringe, and not when her eyes rolled back in their sockets as the opium entered her bloodstream. Tony spun us around as her head flopped backwards and her arms relaxed, the needle falling from her unclasped fingers, and he kicked the door shut. My heart was pounding, my mouth dry and empty of words. I pulled out of his grip, shrugging my jacket back onto my shoulders as my mind switched back on. “Let me back in.”

  He blocked me with his puffed out chest, his chin tipped slightly in the air in a haughty display of dominance as he looked down the length of his nose at me. But I wasn’t going to give up. I moved again in an attempt to get around him, but he was faster than me and skidded into place in front of the door. “She doesn’t want you, Syra. She only wants the junk.” He sneered and shoved his hands into his pockets.

  Screaming, I pushed at him, pummeling his scrawny body with my fists. “Mum! Please!”

  Tony’s facial expression changed in an instant. He was angry, like a threatened animal, and he grimaced, almost snarling as his hands gripped my arms again, shoving me hard so I stumbled backwards to the floor, hitting my head against the cupboard door.

  “Go home, little girl. This is grown up stuff. Your mum doesn’t want you anymore.” He stood over me, watching as I shuffled backwards across the floor before standing up and running out of the house.

  It was windy, and the relentless sheets of rain almost blinded me as I ran. Main Street was empty in the dimming light of day, the streetlights were flickering on, and the roads were quiet. I rounded the corner, my foot landing in a huge puddle, causing muddy water to splash up around my legs, and came to an abrupt stop outside the glass doors of Christine’s office block.

  A businessman was crouched down attaching a padlock to the bottom of the shutters. “Sorry love, I’m locking up for the night. Open again at eight-thirty.”

  I stared at the guy, tears and rain chasing each other down my cheeks, and he turned away from me to slide his keys into the lock before he stood and walked away. Scrubbing my hands up and down my face, I grabbed my phone from my back pocket and began scrolling through my contacts. I got back to the corner of the street and slumped against wall, hunched against the rain.

  The phone was answered after three rings, and I squeezed my eyes shut. “Hey, Gavin. Are you in?”

  He chuckled down the phone. “Sure am. I’ll leave the door unlocked. Let yourself in.”

  ***

  Opening the front door to see my mum on the other side of it a couple of days later, I folded my arms, leaving her standing on the street. She was thin and pale, her eyes darting all over the place, and the disappointment that warred through me had me shaking my head and huffing. “You’re a mess.”

  She swiped a finger under her nose and shoved her hands back in her pockets. “Can I come in?”

  I stood a little longer, staring at her, taking it all in and wondering where it had all gone so bloody wrong, before holding the door open a little wider in invitation. With a last skittish look behind her, Mum stepped inside and stood awkwardly in the hallway while I shut the door behind us.

  “Drink?” I walked in front of her down the hallway. “Or a line of coke?” She didn’t bite, so I continued. “Oh that’s right, you don’t do coke. You inject heroin into your blood now.” At this, I spun around, seething at her stupidity. “Jesus, Mum. Do you even know what you’re doing?” I rubbed the heel of my hand on my forehead and closed my eyes, almost defeated and knowing this wasn’t a battle I was going to win. “When was the last time you ate anything?”

  She shrugged. “I don’t know. Yesterday? The day before?”

  Sighing loudly, I led her into the kitchen and set about making her a sandwich, filling a glass with cold water and holding it out to her. “Here. Drink this.”

  Mum reached out a shaky hand and took it, cradling it and sipping from it. “I’m sorry about Tony. He doesn’t mean it. It’s—”

  “The drugs, Mum. It’s the drugs. Let’s not be naive. The drugs make him desperate, and desperation makes him act like an animal. He shoved me to the floor. You know that, right?”

  She bowed her head and took another sip of water. “I’m sorry.”

  I was sure she was in her own way, but sorry wouldn't fix this fucked up situation she was in. Sorry wou
ldn’t bring her back.

  “Eat.” I slid the plate across the counter and watched as she began to demolish the food. Dark circles made her eyes look sunken, her hair was still greasy and when I glanced down, I was drawn to what I knew to be track marks. She saw me looking and quickly pulled her sleeves down.

  “So are you addicted now?”

  Her silence spoke volumes, but I wasn’t done.

  “Are you even still employed?”

  She kicked her head up and her chewing slowed. “At the pub? Yeah.”

  “And it’s your wages that pay for the hard stuff?”

  “Sometimes. Can we not do this? Please?”

  “Sometimes? What do you mean sometimes?”

  Looking back down at her plate, she rested the heels of her hands on the edge of the counter. “Sy, please.”

  “What do you mean, Mum?”

  She put the last bit of her sandwich back on the plate and took a drink of water. “Tony scores for us somet—”

  “In exchange for what?”

  She gave a little shrug. “Me? The house?”

  “How mutually beneficial!” I was seething. How fucking dare he? Mum was fragile. Ever since Dad died, she’d lost her spark—lost her courage and her bravery. Tony was taking advantage in every way possible. This, however, did not stop me from directing my anger at her. She was a grown adult for Christ’s sake.

  I began to pace the kitchen floor, emotion almost tipping me over the edge. “One might think you’d have learned, might one?” I stopped and spun around. “Jesus. Dad wasn’t even hooked and it killed him. What the hell are you doing? Why are you ruining your life?”

  She slumped onto the chair at the table. “Your dad died of a lung infection.”

  I threw my arms in the air, my voice climbing an octave. “Caused by injecting heroin, which in turn caused Hepatitis! Don’t act so goddamned stupid.”