Last Call
Page 1
Last Call
A. S. Kelly
Copyright © 2019 A. S. Kelly
Last Call
by
A. S. Kelly
English Edition
Translation by Abigail Prowse
Literary and artistic property reserved.
All rights reserved. Unauthorised reproduction prohibited.
This novel is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and storyline are the fruit of the author’s imagination or are used in a fictional sense. Any similarity to facts, places or people living or deceased is purely coincidental.
Photography by Lindee Robinson Photography
Contents
1. Niall
2. Niall
3. Niall
4. Niall
5. Jordan
6. Niall
7. Jordan
8. Jordan
9. Niall
10. Niall
11. Jordan
12. Niall
13. Niall
14. Jordan
15. Niall
16. Jordan
17. Jordan
18. Jordan
19. Niall
20. Niall
21. Jordan
22. Niall
23. Niall
24. Niall
25. Jordan
26. Niall
27. Niall
28. Jordan
29. Niall
30. Jordan
31. Niall
32. Niall
33. Jordan
34. Niall
35. Jordan
36. Niall
37. Jordan
38. Niall
39. Jordan
40. Niall
41. Niall
42. Niall
43. Jordan
44. Niall
45. Niall
46. Niall
47. Jordan
48. Niall
49. Niall
50. Niall
51. Niall
52. Niall
53. Niall
54. Niall
55. Niall
56. Jordan
57. Niall
58. Niall
59. Jordan
60. Niall
61. Jordan
62. Niall
63. Jordan
64. Jordan
65. Niall
66. Niall
67. Niall
68. Jordan
69. Niall
70. Niall
71. Jordan
72. Jordan
73. Niall
74. Jordan
75. Niall
76. Niall
77. Jordan
78. Niall
Epilogue
Epilogue
Follow A. S. Kelly
Also by A. S. Kelly
Niall
“Can you please get out of the car?”
Skylar crosses her arms and looks away.
“They’ve heard us. They already know we’re here.”
“Do you think I care?”
“At least give them a chance.”
“You told me it was a city!” she yells, glaring icily in my direction.
“It is a city.”
“We’re in the middle of fucking nowhere!”
“Don’t say that word.”
“Fine, we’re in the arse end…”
“Or that one. Please, not in front of your grandparents.”
She opens the passenger door suddenly, slamming it purposefully against my knee.
“Fuck!”
“Oh! So you’re allowed to say it?” She throws the door shut behind her, lifting her chin towards me, challengingly. “Good to know. It’s now my favourite fucking word.”
“I’m already losing my patience, and we haven’t even stepped through the doorway yet.”
“You should’ve thought of that before you dragged me here!” She stamps her feet onto the gravel of their driveway.
“And you should’ve thought before throwing yourself out!”
It would appear that our mental ages are roughly the same right now.
“You’re here!” The front door opens behind us. “We didn’t hear you pull in.”
“Seriously?”
Skylar rolls her eyes and stomps towards my parents’ house, dragging her heels deliberately through the stones.
“Honey, you’re… You’re…” My mother tries, but I don’t think she can find an appropriate adjective to describe her once-adorable granddaughter. “So colourful.”
Wow. I couldn’t have done better, myself.
My mother wraps her arms around her affectionately, but the gesture isn’t mutual. Skylar stands there, stock-still, with her arms clamped rigidly to her sides and her head turned away. She isn’t a huge fan of public displays of affection – or private ones, to be honest – and she especially hates hugs. They’re off-limits.
“Granddad is inside, waiting for you.” My mother loosens her grip and smiles at my daughter. “He’s in the living room. Do you still remember where it is?”
“Sure,” Skylar mumbles, without making eye contact, before stepping past her and into the house.
“It’ll take some time,” she says, looking at me. She stretches her arms out and approaches me. “It’ll all be fine, you’ll see. You’re home now.”
My mother hugs me, and I let myself sink into her arms. I don’t have the same problem as Skylar – lately, hugs haven’t seemed long enough.
“We’re so happy to have you both here,” she says once again, as if all her reassurances on the phone weren’t enough.
“Thanks, Mum.” I pull away from her with a heavy heart. “Just for a few weeks, until I can sort everything out.”
“Stay as long as you need.”
“I don’t want to take advantage of you.”
“Don’t be silly. This is your house, too. Both of yours.”
“I didn’t know where else to go. I’m so exhausted.”
“Come on, let’s go inside. Dinner’s almost ready, and your dad will have run out of jokes by now.”
I follow her inside, and the smell of burning wood wafts immediately into my nostrils, catapulting me back in time. I used to breathe in this smell every evening before I went to bed.
“Have you already got the fire on?” I ask, realising that autumn has only just begun, and that in the city, no one has turned on the heating yet.
“Have you forgotten how cold it gets here at night?”
She leads me into the living room, which is empty, apart from the crackling fire and the flickering TV.
“Where the hell are they?”
My mother shrugs, heading into the kitchen. She wanders around the island and steps towards the back door; as her gaze lands outside, she throws the door open suddenly.
“What do you think you’re doing?!” she yells into the garden.
I quickly catch up with her and freeze in the doorway at the sight of Skylar and my father smoking on the porch.
“Have you lost your mind?!” my mother screams at him.
“What?” he asks, innocently.
“Skylar, honey,” my mother says, trying unsuccessfully to soften her tone. “That stuff isn’t good for you.”
“He gave it to me.” She points to my father.
“Fionn.” My mother glares at him interrogatively, her arms crossed tightly.
“She asked me if I had any smokes and I said I only had cigars,” my father says naively.
“So you thought it would be a good idea to give a cigar to a little girl?”
My dad shrugs. I decide to intervene before my mother gets even more pissed off with him.
“Give me that thing.” I turn to Skylar.
“But I’m not finished,” she protests.
“Give it to me, right now, or I swear I’ll make you eat it.”
“Oh, yeah?” she asks, challenge etched onto her face. “How can I do that when it’s still lit? Or did you plan to put it out, first?”
“Don’t be cheeky with me,” I warn her.
“And you can fu—”
“Okay!” my mum jumps in. She snatches up the ashtray from the table and holds it under Skylar’s nose. She scoffs, but stubs out the cigar, muttering something we all pretend not to hear from between gritted teeth.
“You, too.” My mother moves the ashtray in my father’s direction.
“What have I got to do with this?”
“That stuff is bad for you.”
My father scoffs – in exactly the same manner as Skylar – then does as she says.
“Now I’d appreciate it if everyone would go and wash their hands before dinner.”
“Are she serious?” Skylar asks me, gesturing towards my mother.
“It’s best not to argue with your grandmother,” my dad advises her, wrapping his arm around her shoulders.
Skylar glances up at him, a look of disgust on her features, but she says nothing.
“Come with me. I’ll show you where the bathroom is.”
“I’m not senile, I remember where the bathroom is,” she snaps, making something burning and unpleasant explode in my stomach.
Skylar and my father step back into the house, as I patiently wait to hear my mother’s final sentence.
“You should’ve come here sooner.”
She isn’t accusing me. She seems more concerned than pissed off.
“The situation is worse than I’d feared.”
I can’t do anything but hang my head and agree with her.
Niall
Everything seems a little better once we’re sitting at the table; Dad eats, one eye occasionally darting over to the flickering TV in the living room; Mum talks, although no one is listening; Skylar scoffs, her mouth open as she noisily chews her food; and I’m enjoying the quiet, until the next storm breaks.
“So you still haven’t heard anything from school?” My mother turns to me. She must have realised that Dad has been sucked in by the second half of the match.
“I have a meeting with the head teacher on Monday.”
“And he hasn’t told you if…er…”
“If she got in? You can say it out loud, Mum.”
“Yeah, we have no secrets here. Especially not when it comes to blurting out everything that goes on in my life.”
“They’re your grandparents. They have a right to know what you’re up to.”
“Oh, really? Then where have they been, these past few years?” Her sharp, accusatory tone reaches my father’s ears, piquing his interest.
“We’ve always been here, honey,” my mother responds, calmly. “Ready to welcome you at any point.”
“So you’re telling me it’s his fault?” Obviously, she’s pointing at me.
“Your father works very hard…”
“He used to,” Skylar points out.
“You lived in Dublin, you both had your own lives…”
“Which we don’t have anymore,” she concludes darkly. “Because he,” she says, raising her voice, “practically handcuffed me and dragged me here, to a place I don’t know, with people I don’t know. I have no friends, I have no…” She stops herself, suddenly; she never wants to put her true emotions on display. She shakes her head for a few seconds as we all wait in silence, hoping that she’ll open up, say something that will let us help her. We want her to yell at us, tell us to go to hell, spit out my mother’s cooking. She needs to cry, to let it all out.
She jumps up, the chair screeching back behind her as she slams her palms down on the table.
“I’m not hungry,” she announces. “I’m going to bed.”
“Of course, honey. Your room is…”
“I can find it on my own,” she snaps, turning on her heels and storming upstairs. I sit there, waiting for the too-familiar sound of a door slamming. I let go of the breath I was holding.
“She hates me.” I let my fork clatter onto my plate.
“She’s angry, but not with you. She’s angry with the entire world right now.”
“Maybe, but I seem to have the starring role in this shitshow.”
My mother smiles gently, resting her hand on top of mine. “Just give her some time and space – especially space. She isn’t used to you.”
“I should’ve brought her here more often.”
“That’s true,” my father adds. “Last time she was here, your mother hadn’t even gone grey yet.”
Mum glares at him, and he shovels a generous forkful of mashed potatoes into his mouth.
“She was only five.” I lean my elbow on the table, rubbing at my forehead. “Or maybe six. It was Christmas: the first one we’d spent together. And the last,” I say, guilt washing over me immediately.
“Don’t do it.” My mother squeezes my wrist. “Don’t place all the blame on yourself. Don’t drag up the past. Now you have time to make things right.”
“She’s fifteen, Mum. She hates me.”
“All teenagers hate their parents.”
“I don’t remember ever hating you.”
“Not now,” she adds.
“I just really hope we can sort things out with the school.”
“What about work?” Dad reappears in the conversation. “What are you going to do?”
“I’ll work something out.”
“But you only know how to play.”
“I’ll find something. There are gyms, courses. People in this godforsaken town must play sport, right?”
“You could always help out around here,” Dad says. “We recently hired quite a few people, but I’m sure I could find you something.”
“I don’t want you to find me anything, Dad. I can find myself a job.”
“Don’t you remember what it’s like to work out in the countryside anymore?”
“Not really, but that’s not why I’m doing this. I’m doing it for me and Skylar. I want to show her that we can do it: that we can have a life together, that she can trust me.”
“I don’t think she thinks any differently.”
“I don’t know what she thinks, because she only opens her mouth to yell at me or insult me. Or to ask for money.”
“She’ll like it here. You’ll see. She’ll make friends quickly.”
“Only if they let her into that fucking school. Otherwise I’ll have to home-school her – and I don’t think that would help anything.”
“You can be quite persuasive when you want to be,” my father comments. “You’ll find a way.”
Until now, I’d never been able to persuade anyone of anything – and they were all women. I’d have no chance of convincing a guy, unless maybe he were gay. I guess if that were the case, I’d have no choice but to sacrifice my needs for Skylar’s sake…
“I’m sure you’ll manage. Even without your usual moves,” my mother says, suggestively.
“I’m sure you’ve got something up your sleeve.” My father waves his fork around in the air, before sliding it into his mouth.
I’m not sure I agree with him on that one – but it wouldn’t be the best idea to make them panic, too. My own sense of panic is definitely enough for us all.
“I’ll do my best.”
I take a sip of beer to drown the absolute crap that just came out of my mouth, and start to eat again, if only to avoid saying anything else. I’ve already fed Skylar enough bullshit – despite the fact that she wasn’t listening to almost any of it, with her ever-present headphones firmly stuffed into her ears. I don’t know if she’s ever actually listening to the deafening noises coming from those things, or whether she only does it to drown out the sound of my voice. Or, worst of all, whether she does it purely to piss me off.
I told her that we’d be coming to live in a beautiful little city in the north, by the sea,
with a school full of students for her to befriend, a huge shopping centre down the street, and a world of possibilities. I maybe failed to mention the fact that we’d have to live with her grandparents for a while, because I still don’t know if I’ll be able to find a job here, and I’m in desperate need of some help. But, hey – if I’d mentioned it, would she even have listened?
This is only a temporary measure. We moved quickly, with half our stuff still in a storage unit in Dublin, waiting to be shipped. Let’s just say that I didn’t exactly have time to sort everything out properly. We needed a change of scenery – she needed it – and this seemed like the best place for a broken teenage girl who needs a little peace. She needs to realise that she’s not alone in the world: that there are people who are ready to welcome her into their lives and love her.
Niall
I sink onto the stool by my parents’ kitchen counter as my father places a glass of whisky in front of me. I thank him with a curt nod and clasp my fingers around the glass, swirling the liquid. My father sits down next to me as my mother places an apple tart on the counter.