Love My Crazy

by Rachel Medhurst

  Love My Crazy

  A Novella

  By Rachel Medhurst

  This book is dedicated to my mum, Wendy

  Copyright © 2016 by Rachel Medhurst

  CONTENTS

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Free Books

  Author Note

  Copyright

  Author

  Chapter One

  FREE BOOKS?

  I had to laugh at the look on their faces as I watched them through the window. Tommy and Jack tried so hard to look tough. We were only robbing a shop for some cigarettes and booze. It wasn’t like we were going to hurt anyone. Tiff squeezed my hand as the shout from inside signalled our cue.

  We rushed to the door. A dark haired boy held it open, so we pushed our way past him. I’d been so caught up in the drama, I hadn’t noticed him standing there. His gaze slammed into mine as I went to head towards the booze aisle.

  I froze before my attention was drawn back to the boys. Tommy held a knife towards the shaking shop keeper. The poor boy, who had just had the shock of his life, was about nineteen with major spotage on his face. His eyes were wide as Jack shoved cigarette packets into a carrier bag.

  “Come on, girls. Get the booze!” Tommy shouted, gesturing with the silver blade.

  Tiff started to shove bottles into a bin liner. I couldn’t move. When I looked back over to the dark haired boy, he just stood there, his tall frame beside the open door. His blue gaze stayed connected to mine as the corners of his lips lifted slightly.

  “Will you get a bloody move on?” Tommy yelled.

  I shook my head and blinked before spinning away to help my friends. Joining Tiff, I copied her movements with my own bag, all the time trying not to look towards the front of the shop. I’d never seen the boy before and wondered why he hadn’t run or tried to stop us.

  When my bag was full, I shouted to the others and turned to run out of the shop. As I went towards him, I couldn’t look at his face. I was about to walk past the weirdo, when he put a hand on my arm. Stopping, I looked up at him.

  “You have a choice,” he whispered.

  I opened my mouth to respond, but Tiff shoved me from behind and I ended up on the pavement outside. The spell was broken. I grabbed my friend’s hand and we ran as fast as we could away from the shop. Away from the intense boy.

  Chapter Two

  “What was wrong with you back there, Nat?” Tommy asked as he took a swig from a bottle of whiskey.

  “Nothing.”

  We sat on the swings in the local park. Tommy stood in front of me. It was gone ten. I should’ve been at home. Not that my mother would have noticed. Although, I was eighteen so it wasn’t like she could make me go home at a certain time.

  I shoved a cigarette into my mouth and looked away from the eldest member of our small group. We loved living in London, but sometimes it got boring as hell.

  “You kept looking at that boy.” His words started to slur.

  He’d almost downed the whole bottle in the space of ten minutes. He was going to be wrecked.

  “No, I didn’t, shut up and give me a bottle of something.” I reached out as he passed me a beer. Grabbing my sleeve, he pulled me off the swing. I landed on the floor at his feet.

  “Oi!” I shouted, jumping up.

  My head lowered and my breath started to huff. My hands reached towards his neck as I lunged, but he managed to get a hold of me and wrestle me to the ground.

  “Feisty, girl, I like it….It’s like she’s got something to hide, ain’t it, Jack?”

  He tried to get on top of me. I managed to get my leg up between us and kneed him exactly where no man should ever be kneed. He deserved it, though. Bastard kept trying to get off with me when he was off his head.

  “Get off her, Bruv, you don’t need to do that.” Jack stood up and started to sway.

  It didn’t matter, though; Tommy the dickhead, was crouched on the floor trying to get enough breath into his lungs to moan. I thought about feeling bad but decided against it.

  Getting up from the ground, I grabbed my beer and a pack of cigarettes before I headed out of the park. They shouted after me, but I was gone, running towards my favourite spot.

  My skin burned as I thought about the way Tommy always tried to grab me when he was drunk. He never bothered me when he was sober, proving he didn’t fancy me, anyway. He was such an idiot. I reached the rock that stood at the end of the small patch of woods. The park was a big area of grass with woods at the back of it. It was one of those tiny parts of London that had been allowed to stay natural.

  I reached up and tied my long blonde hair into a ponytail. My fringe always flopped into my eyes. It did my head in. My mother bugged me about getting it cut or growing it out, but I couldn’t be bothered with all that. I knew that I was pretty. My big eyes always attracted the creeps who walked around the shopping centre where I worked. I hated the attention. I’d be serving someone coffee, and all of a sudden, some idiot would grab my arse and wink at me. I’d almost been fired when I punched one of them in the face, but luckily my boss had been standing behind me. She was feminist, so I got away with a suspension. It was a nice couple of days off, considering I was the only one in our group that worked. The rest were lazy gits. I kept trying to make them get a job so we could go to the pub, but they weren’t having none of it.

  “Oh, stars up high in the sky, why are you so piss poor to me?”

  Why was life so crap? My mother had a rubbish boyfriend and my older brother had managed to get away by going travelling. Sneaky git had robbed a high tech shop and then sold everything. Told me it was the only way he’d get out of our crap-hole part of London.

  My bum grew cold as I sat staring at those mysterious flickers in the sky. Apparently they were gas from miles away that burnt millions of years ago. Yeah, alright mate.

  I stood up and threw my cigarette butt on the floor. I supposed I had better go back home and get some kip. I was thinking about going to sign up for college the next day, but would have to wait and see how I felt. If I couldn’t be bothered, I wouldn’t bother.

  Dragging my size five trainers, I walked home. I was hoping everyone would’ve gone to bed. I couldn’t take another hit today. I would end up hurting someone.

  The eyes of the weird boy in the shop popped into my head. I didn’t usually bother with lads much. They always wanted too much from me. I wasn’t prepared to give them what they wanted no more. My mother had tried to teach me to respect myself. I’d lost my way a bit, but I was no longer going to give myself to a random.

  “Hey, honey, come here, please,” Mother called as I crept in the back door.

  I went into the living room. My face screwed up at the sight of them sitting side by side. He had his arm around her shoulder. It wasn’t really inappropriate, but I didn’t need to see him touching my mother, thanks.

  “Whatttttsssssss upppppp?”

  “Natalie, stop it, will you? I need to tell you something.” Her voice was quiet. I detected a note of nervousness. Oh crap, it better not be what I thought it was.

  “We got engaged tonight, darling.”

  Much worse than I thought! Married? That was just disgusting. Did that mean they were serious? Like having sex and everything? Balls. It was definitely turning into the s
hittiest day of the century!

  “Mum, that’s…” I couldn’t go on.

  Her eyes were hopeful, you know, almost pleading. Sad, really. What was it with parents? They were so irritating. It wasn’t getting any better as I got older. First my dad buggered off when I was young and got married to the wicked witch of the South East. Now mother was marrying the dickest dick of Crapville.

  “Erm, well…today I went into town and Tommy was showing off. His mum came along and he started swearing at her, so she turned round and said…. ‘Tommy, don’t forget, son, my fanny was wrapped around your head once.’ We couldn’t stop laughing, how funny is that?”

  I laughed hard again, looking to see if they’d been impressed with my diversion tactic. Nope. My mum had tears hovering in her eyes and Richard…yes, he really was a Dick….didn’t look amused.

  “Whatever, Mum, as long as you’re happy, ain’t it?”

  I turned and walked out of the living room. I caught her look of relief. She knew me well enough to know it was as good as she would get from me. I wasn’t any good at much more.

  When I was younger, she would hug me, but since her breakdown, she wasn’t the hugger type no more. That was okay with me, though, I didn’t like it either.

  Up in my room, I got into bed with my clothes on and put my earphones in. My mates liked rap, but I was into rock music. I loved hearing the guitar riffs and pretended to strum along to them. Not that I would let anyone see me do it.

  A knock on my bedroom door caught my attention as I took an earphone out to have a drink. It was getting late and I was tired, but I knew I couldn’t ignore whoever stood in the hallway.

  “What?” I called, turning off my music.

  Richard opened the door. His face was white and his piggy eyes were wider than usual. I’d only been up there five minutes, what was up with him? Eww, I really hoped…

  “You need to come downstairs. It’s your mum: she’s having one of her funny turns.” His hands shook as he gestured behind him. I jumped up and followed him out of the room.

  “You’re joking? She’s not had one since you’ve known her. How can you know…?” My words trailed off as we entered the living room. My mum rocked back and forth, her eyes fixed on the blank television screen in front of her.

  “What happened?”

  I went over and sat next to her. It had been three years since I’d last seen her in such a state. She had seemed fine when I’d gone to bed.

  “I’m not sure. When you went up, she looked at me and smiled. She said that you meant that it would be okay. Then her eyes just glazed over and she started to do this…I don’t know…”

  “It’s the stress of getting engaged. You know she can’t deal with anything outside her normal routine. Although…she shouldn’t be this bad, unless…” I broke off and went into the kitchen. Opening one of the top drawers, I picked out her medication packets. Oh, shit! The stupid woman hadn’t taken them. I rushed back into the room.

  “Mum, why haven’t you been taking your meds?”

  Richard sat in the arm chair, away from her. He was as white as she was. Their faces looked like they had been painted as bloody ghosts at Halloween.

  “Oh, Nat, I’m so sorry,” she whispered, grabbing my hand and pulling me to sit next to her. Her gaze pleaded with me. The last time it had happened, I’d had to call the bloody ambulance, hadn’t I? My mates had hounded me, saying that I’d carted my mother off to the loony bin. Wasn’t the case though, was it? They didn’t have a bloody clue.

  I shook my head to clear the taunting words and looked at my mum. Her gaze had wandered back to the screen. She was obviously teetering on the edge of madness and I hadn’t noticed. Didn’t want to notice was probably more like it. Well, great…now she was gone…hit rock bottom…like a stone when it’s thrown into a lake.

  Okay, I had to turn into the detective. I had to turn my brain on and suss her out. How far gone was she? I was tempted not to bother. Tempted to tell Dick to stop being a dick and ring an ambulance. I wanted to hightail it out of there. Run away to my rock and take a nap on it. But I couldn’t, could I? What would that make me…? It would make me the daughter from hell and a bitch of a brat that didn’t help her mum when she was in need. I would also become the bastard of a bitch if I sent her to hospital again. What to do, what to do?

  “Dick, I mean Richard,” I started, standing up.

  My mum pulled me back down, her head starting to shake from side to side.

  “Yes?” He looked like he might run any minute.

  Silly git. Did he not realise that he’d have to deal with this situation if he married her?

  When she was on her meds, my mum was lovely. She was happy and confident. She was pretty and kind. It was her true nature. As soon as she was off them, though, she was a crazy woman. Like the ones you see in the scary films. Okay, not quite that bad, but it had felt like that as a kid.

  “Can you go and get the address book that’s on the kitchen table?”

  It was a simple task. I had a feeling that the bloke wasn’t going to be able to do much to help. Why did Darren have to bugger off abroad? How comes he got away with not dealing with our crazy mother? Life was such a bitch, and I was the bastard having to deal with it.

  “Here you are,” he said, handing me the floral book.

  It held all the important phone numbers. I thumbed through it, trying to decide who was best to call. It then dawned on me. What idiot mental health worker would be up at that time of night? It was gone midnight!

  “Will she be okay?” He spoke in a low tone.

  I looked up and nodded. I couldn’t babysit him as well. He would just have to grow a pair and get on with it. Actually, the sooner they got married, the better. Bye bye mental health duties…Hello freedom.

  “Are you going to call someone?”

  I rolled my eyes and took a deep breath. I could feel the shake of my mum’s body as it rattled the sofa underneath us. Why hadn’t I noticed? She wasn’t good. Which made me feel bad. The knot in my stomach got tighter as I tried to swallow. I needed to give myself a talking to: Stop worrying about it, and get on with it, woman.

  “I think we need to call an ambulance,” I muttered.

  “No, no, no, don’t do it…please…” Her fingers twisted around themselves as she snatched her hand from me and kneaded them together.

  Oops, I’d broken the cardinal rule. Don’t mention an ambulance until you’ve calmed her into the idea. Her trust in me balanced on a pin-head as she shot quick glances between us.

  “Mum,” I soothed, taking her hand again and stroking it. “You’re not well and you need some help.”

  “You can help me, Natalie. You can help me …. Please.” Her voice was quiet as her gaze swung towards the door. She expected the government, or something, to come in and take her away.

  “Mum, I can’t. You’ve got to get some professional help. Richard will come with you and look after you.”

  I heard him take a breath in, but he didn’t say a word. That was wise, or I might have bitten his head off and shit down his throat. The man had to cope with this. It was too late to back out now. Idiot. I looked at him, and give him his due, he nodded firmly at my mum when she glanced at him.

  “If Richard comes with you, will you go and get some help so you can get better?”

  I was the mother talking to the child. The child being condescending to the adult. I hated it. I hated it with every part of my, not so bad, a little bit curvy, but still slim, body. She looked at me and nodded. A tiny bit of her was still there with us. I only knew that cos she kept glancing at her fiancé. I was going to have a step dad. That just didn’t sound right.

  If she’d completely gone, she wouldn’t know who he was. Still, she was gone enough to go to hospital. If it hadn’t been the middle of the night, I would’ve called the emergency team…

  Oh, hold on. Stupid girl - emergency meant you could call them in an emergency. I sure as hell thought that our situation was
a bloody emergency. I could still call them. I jumped up to make the call. My mum flinched at the sudden movement.

  “Sorry. Listen, I’m going to go see if we can get the emergency team out to you, all right?”

  She nodded again, over, and over, and over. Her gaze went back to the TV and stayed there. Walking into the kitchen, I let the breath leave my lungs. I sure as hell wouldn’t miss this part of my life.

  Picking up the phone, I rang the team. I couldn’t believe it. They answered and told me that they’d be round within the hour. What had happened to the mental health system? They’d been the crappiest thing ever three years before. They must have had a brain transplant at the top and realised that people were still human, even if they were off their trolley.

  Going back into the living room, I stopped dead in the doorway. Not literally dead, obviously, or I would’ve dropped to the floor. There on the sofa, sat Dick. He sat close to her. She let him hold her hand. She wouldn’t look at him, and her body hadn’t stop vibrating like a washing machine, but she allowed him to be there. I’d never seen such a thing. Even when Darren had been here, she’d always pushed him away, saying that men were horrible and that her son was into dodgy things. Okay, so it may have been true, but to push your own son away…well…she was ill, ain’t it? That’s probably why he’d sodded off.

  “The emergency team are on their way. They’ll probably give her an injection, or make her take tablets, or something. Either way, they’ll deal with it.”

  I sat on the arm of the chair, trying not to look at the fear that etched itself on my mother’s face.

  “I can’t believe I didn’t notice that she wasn’t taking her meds,” Dick said, looking at me.

  “Well, I’m assuming that you ain’t ever had to deal with someone who’s a - who’s got a mental illness?”

  Stupid man. I didn’t know anyone else who had a mother who was crazy sometimes.

  “No, I haven’t,” he replied, smiling at me.

  It wasn’t a big smile, just one of those embarrassed- looking ones. I thought that he was a bit of a weirdo, but he seemed to be plucking up some courage from that small chest of his. He turned to my mum and started to stroke her hand. A few minutes later there was a knock at the door. I got up and let a tall lady into the house.