by RM Walker
“Ouch.”
“Could have been worse.” Drew looked over to the entrance. “Did you tell them what you’re doing?” He looked back at her.
“Yeah, they were fine about it.”
“Liar.”
“Well, not fine exactly, but they didn’t try to stop me.”
“Really?” He arched his eyebrow at her.
“No, they didn’t. They want me to keep in touch, let them know where I am, but it’s fine.”
“And did Lynda agree to camping?”
“Not at first. She wanted me to go to London with her, but I wouldn’t have gone anyway.”
“London?” He tilted his head. The wind picked up, ruffling his hair and sending the ends of his scarf fluttering.
“She’s staying with the owner of the gallery that shows her paintings for a week. He’s asked her to marry him, and she’s said yes. I don’t want to be up there and ruin their time together.”
“She’s marrying Gerry Pringle?” He snorted.
“You know him?”
“I know of him. I checked him out when she signed with him. He’s got family that are witches, does she know that?”
“I don’t know. Is he a witch?”
“No. Not at all. Don’t tell her either.”
“Why?”
“Because he might not know, and well, the devil in me laughs at the irony of it all. She’s going to marry into blood that she hates. Poetic if their children were magical.” He put his hands into his pockets and rocked back onto his heels.
“I won’t tell her. I haven’t told her I’m going with you yet.”
He raised an eyebrow at her, continuing to rock on his heels.
“She’s not back till Saturday. I think it’s safer to wait till she’s back and in a good mood,” she said.
“Is that wise? Don’t you think you should tell her before she goes?”
“No, she’d freak out. I’ll tell her when she gets back. I’m eighteen. Why can’t I go home with my dad for a day or two?”
He smiled at her and touched her cheek. “We’re going to have a good time.”
“Lily?”
She turned to see Matt jogging towards them.
“Hey, everything okay?” she asked as he stopped beside Drew.
“Yeah, they need to get something finished, so I’m going to drop you home and then come back for them.”
“Finish something? What?” Lily asked.
“Lines?” suggested Drew.
“I’m sorry, sir, was there something you wanted?” Matt’s words were polite, but his tone and stance were far from it.
Drew laughed loudly. “If you’re trying to impress the father of the girl you want to date you just failed miserably.”
“I don’t try to impress anyone.” Matt folded his arms across his chest.
“Oh, for god’s sake. Why must you always be at each other’s throats?” She picked up her bag and got out of the Land Rover. “There’s no point in making two trips. The bus is still here, I’ll go on that.”
“It’s not a problem.”
“I’ll drop you off.”
They spoke at the same time and Matt glared at Drew. “It’s fine. I’ll drop her and come back.”
“No point in wasting petrol and I’m going right past her place. Obviously,” drawled Drew.
“I’ve got plenty of—”
“I’m catching the bus.” Lily rose on her tiptoes and kissed Matt’s cheek. “I’ll see you later.”
“Lily, there’s—”
“It’s not up for debate.” She handed him the keys. “I’m not going to play tug-of-war with you two. It’s childish. I’ll see you all later.” She turned and ran across to the bus that would take her home.
The noise that greeted her was horrendous, every seat on the lower deck was taken and she was forced to climb the steps as the bus pulled out of the car park. She got to the top, hanging onto the bars as the bus turned onto the road. It was quieter up top, but there was still a lot of students and they were all looking at her. She recognised a few faces from different classes, but when she smiled at them, she got no smile in return. Her cheeks heated as she took the first empty seat she saw. There wasn’t a lot of room left as the boy already sitting there took up more than his side, but at least he gave her a friendly smile. She recognised him from one of her classes but couldn’t remember his name.
“Hey, Lily. Slumming it tonight.” He grinned, revealing a flash of metal braces. He held out a paper bag, offering her a sweet. She refused, but the disappointment on his face had her taking one with a quiet thanks.
“Oi! Porkie! Got yourself a girlfriend at last?”
Laughter broke out behind them and judging by how bright his cheeks went, they were shouting at him. “Ignore them. There isn’t a brain cell amongst them,” she advised him.
He laughed, offering her another sweet.
“These are nice, thanks.” She took one and popped it into her mouth. Someone brushed past her and Connie stopped by the seat in front.
“Hey, Lil. You want to come back and sit with us instead of Percy?” Connie’s red hair was brushed to a high sheen and her face was perfectly made up.
A boy she vaguely recognised came up beside Connie, slinging his arm around her neck. “Come on, offer us some sweets. Don’t be a greedy porker.” The boy snatched the sweets from Percy, took a handful and stuffed them into his mouth, before throwing the bag to someone behind them.
Percy remained quiet, staring at his hands and anger flashed through Lily.
“Come and sit back with us,” Connie repeated herself.
“I’m fine here, thanks.” She closed her bag and crossed her arms over it. Her phone began to ring inside the bag, but she didn’t want to take it out with them around.
“Ah, come on, Lil, we don’t bite, do we, Trev?” Connie laughed.
“Well, that depends on how much you beg me to bite you.” He made a snapping noise by her ear, and she swatted him away, laughing.
“You want me to bite you?” He leant down towards her, but Connie jerked him back.
“Leave her, Trev. This is Lily Adair.” Connie picked at a loose strand on the headrest she leant on.
“Lily? You the one with the freaky four?” Trev asked her, but she ignored him, repressing a sigh. Another college, another county, another set of idiots. Some things would never change.
“Matt says she’s his girlfriend,” Connie said.
“Does he know you’re fucking his cousins?” Trev laughed as if it was hysterical.
“Matt’s okay, a bit weird and secretive. His cousins are always around though. I mean, like always. Telling Matt what to do, especially Nate, he’s a bossy fucker, it was them that split us up. I’d kiss Matt and there they’d be, leering. Creepy as fuck, especially those twins, the way they talk.” She feigned a shudder. “Tell them to fuck off, or you’ll never get laid.”
“Unless they’re into kinky group sex,” Trev pointed out. “Are you? You could take Porkie with you, gang bang of six.”
“Seven, it’d be seven,” a girl called out.
“Seven?” Connie looked towards the back.
“That sexy history teacher, he’s taking her away for a dirty weekend. Ann heard her telling the freaky four outside the girls’ loos,” the girl replied.
Connie looked at her in surprise. “You’re fucking a teacher? Does Matt know?”
“Ann has an overactive imagination.” Lily kept her voice flat.
“You’re not fucking the teacher?” Connie pulled a face. “Why else would you be going away with him?”
“I know this is backwater country, and I’ve met the results of inbreeding.” She looked directly at Trev. “But where I come from sleeping with my dad is regarded as incest and pretty disgusting.”
“Dad?” Connie’s eyes widened. “Wenlock is your dad? But you don’t have the same last name.”
“And that’s why incest is illegal,” Percy mumbled.
Lily
snorted with laughter and raised her hand to fist bump him. He grinned and met her fist with his. Her phone buzzed again, but she didn’t take it out.
“Fuck you, moron.” Connie reached over and pushed Percy’s head into the window.
“Worth it,” he muttered, rubbing at the sore spot.
“Pack it in, Connie.” Lily met her eyes. “Leave him alone.”
Trev snatched her bag from her.
“Hey! Give that back.”
“Your phone keeps ringing, they’re going to worry if you don’t answer.” He smirked, dragging her phone out and dropping the bag onto her lap. “Jesus Christ, did Moses let you borrow his phone? Look at this thing. It should be in a museum.” He hooted with laughter and held up the phone for his friends to see.
She ignored the laughter and comments from behind and tried to take her phone from him, but he pulled away and answered it.
“I’m afraid Lily can’t get to the phone right now, she’s busy giving head and there’s still a queue. If you’d like to join the queue, leave your name and number after the tone and Lily will blow you as soon as she can.” He made a loud beeping noise and then dropped the phone onto the floor, stepped on it and went back to his friends.
Connie picked it up and dropped it on Lily’s bag. “Don’t fuck Matt up, or I’ll fuck you up.” She went back to her seat, the laughing getting louder.
Hot humiliation washed over her as she stared at the smashed screen of her phone. The display behind was impossible to see, even if it did still work, which it didn’t.
“Oh shit.” Percy’s strawberry-smelling breath washed over the side of her face as he leant over to have a look at the damage. Tears pricked her eyes, she didn’t even know who’d phoned her. If it was her mother, she’d be panicking. If it was one of the boys they’d go ballistic and murder Trev.
“They can sometimes fix the screen.” Percy took the phone from her numb fingers and poked at the buttons. “Or not. I think it died.”
“I think you’re right.” Her voice was thick with tears.
“Um.” He handed it to her and fished out his own phone. “Do you know who was ringing you? One of the twins?”
“I don’t know.” She fumbled the opening to her bag and stuffed the phone inside with shaky hands. She wanted to curl up in a corner and cry, but she’d be damned if she did it in front of everyone.
“Do you want to ring someone on my phone?” he whispered.
“I’m okay, thanks.” She gave him a watery smile.
“They’re not happy unless they’re making someone else unhappy.” He drew out another bag of sweets and offered it to her.
She took one, sighing. “Thanks, Percy.”
“My stop is coming up soon. There’s a few that get off, there’ll be seats downstairs then.”
“Thanks.” She tried to smile at him and failed.
“Is he really your dad?” He fiddled with his bag strap.
“Drew? Yeah, he’s my dad.”
“I suppose cause he’s a stand-in, no one made the connection between you.” He looked at her. “Doesn’t he mind?” He flushed and delved into the sweets. “Sorry, that’s not my business.”
She took another sweet from the pro-offered bag. “Mind what?”
“Well, y’know, Matt, and the others.”
“He knows. It’s my life.”
“Yeah, I guess.”
“Do others call them the freaky four?” She picked at her nails.
“Only the idiots like Trev and his mates. They’re just as bad even though their leader Johnston got kicked out.” He held the bag of sweets between them. “I’ve never had a problem with the twins, or Nate and Matt. Connie used to be Matt’s girlfriend till he found out she was cheating on him.”
The bus slowed, and Percy looked out the window. “This is my stop.”
She got up, and he followed her to the stairs.
“And Porkie scores! Oi, Pork, wrap it when you fuck skanks like her.”
Laughter rang in her ears and heat flooded her cheeks as she went down to the lower level. She got an empty seat near the door and waved to Percy as the bus pulled away. She knew she was talked about, that everyone was aware she was with the boys. She didn’t care about that, but it upset her that people called her boys the freaky four. They weren’t that different from her. Isolated, unable to socialise, regarded as likeable but odd. Even if the reasons were different, it brought out a protective instinct in her. It made her want to crowd them all behind her as she faced off anyone who would tease them.
She should have gone with Drew. Or let Matt take her back. But she was fed up with being the piggy in the middle with them. They would just have to accept that she wasn’t giving up any of them.
A scream of pain pierced the air, with more screams joining it. The bus stopped abruptly, and she grabbed the handle to keep her seat. The driver thundered up the stairs with a fire extinguisher, swearing loudly. There was a commotion above her and then the sound of feet and the driver shouting.
“You stupid little buggers! What’s the point in you going to school if you can’t read a simple sign. No Smoking! No smoking at all, you bleedin’ morons.”
“I don’t know how it happened.” Trev’s voice drifted down and then he appeared on the steps.
Lily covered her mouth to stop a laugh from escaping. From the neck down he was covered in foam from the fire extinguisher. The front of his hair and his eyebrows were singed, and his eyes were watering.
“Hey, Trev! Did you piss yourself?” Someone shouted, and laughter broke out. He gave them the finger as he stomped towards the door. Connie came down with a few others behind her. They’d all been doused in foam. Their faces looked like something exploded, the same singeing to their eyebrows and hair.
“I don’t get how a lighter could do that,” she snarled. She caught sight of Lily and narrowed her eyes at her.
Lily was enough of a bitch to smile and give her a small wave. It felt fantastic.
The driver pushed Connie’s shoulder to keep moving and then followed them from the bus, continuing to lay into them.
A couple of minutes later he got back onto the bus. “That lot will not be allowed back on these busses again. If I catch any of you miscreants lighting up, or even thinking of lighting up a cigarette on here you’ll be walking as well. Understand?” He sneered at them and muttering under his breath drove on.
Lily settled back in her seat, waving to Connie again as they drove past.
Karma was an awesome thing.
You’re mine
Lily jumped from the bus, calling a thank you to the driver. As the bus drove away a car behind pulled up next to her and she realised it was Drew.
The passenger window opened, and he leant across the seats. “Get in.”
She got in, aware from his tone he wasn’t happy. He was gripping the steering wheel, his jaw tight with anger as a small muscle ticked.
“You’re angry with me, but I won’t apologise for going on the bus.” Even if it had been a colossal mistake on her part.
“Show me your phone.”
“My phone?” Her stomach sank. Was it him who’d been ringing her?
“Yes, Lily, your phone. Now.” It wasn’t a request.
“Why do you want my phone?” she tried to stall.
He looked at her and she saw the banked fury burning in his eyes. “I rang you and it was answered by an asshole telling me you were busy going down on someone, and there was a queue for your services.”
Outraged, she shouted at him, “I would never do anything like that.”
“I know that,” he roared. “I stopped the car to use the Scrylapis, out of mind with worry about what I’d see them forcing you to do. And don’t even start to tell me they wouldn’t do that, because it wouldn’t be the first time someone was bullied that badly on a bus.”
She swallowed heavily, took out her phone and handed it to him
He didn’t look at it, just took it and threw it onto the back
seat. “Get your belt on.”
“Where are we going?” She did up her belt.
“To get you another phone.”
“You can’t do that.”
“I’m your dad, I can get you whatever the hell I want to get you.”
“I told them.” She stared at her bag, bracing herself for him to really explode.
“What?” He looked at her briefly as they pulled out of the village and towards the town.
“Well, everyone knows I’m with the boys.”
“That’s common knowledge, I’m afraid.”
“I don’t care about that. But you’ve been added into the mix as well.”
“What?” Spit flew from his mouth onto the steering wheel.
“Gross!”
“Yeah? Well at least I didn’t puke all over you.” His voice had softened, the anger not so cold.
“Point.” She fiddled with her bag handle. “Thing is, someone heard me telling the boys I was going away with you.”
“And it was mentioned on the bus?”
“Yeah, apparently we’re going on a dirty weekend.” She winced, expecting the anger to return.
“What did you tell them?” He gave nothing away in his voice, but she could see his dark scowl.
“I was a bit mouthy.”
“How?”
“I told her that I’ve seen the results of inbreeding and where I come from incest is illegal.”
It went silent for a few seconds and then he barked out a laugh. “Bet that didn’t go down well?”
“Connie was confused because we don’t share the same last name, and Percy may have suggested that’s why incest is illegal.”
He snorted with laughter and then went serious. “You’re not going on the bus again, even if those other kids aren’t allowed back on. If you can’t get a ride home with Matt, you come home with me.”
“I won’t be pulled between you.”
“I told Matt straight I wasn’t going anywhere, and they had to get used to it. He doesn’t want to upset you any more than I do. Besides, when they hear about this they won’t argue with me.”