A Quiet Kind of Thunder(82)

Ebla hesitates and my heart gives an almighty lurch. I am as welcome in this house as I am in both of my own. Tem and I are Steftember. There is no hesitation when it comes to us.

‘I don’t think . . .’ Ebla pauses again. I see her bite her lip. ‘I don’t think Tem really wants to see you.’

My voice comes out in a high-pitched, garbled mess. ‘Oh God, it’s not – I’m here to – I tried to – I got the bus here and I need to see her and she does want to see me.’

Ebla blinks.

I swallow. ‘Please can I see her,’ I say. ‘Please.’

She lets me in, of course. When I get upstairs, Tem’s door is closed and for a moment I actually stand outside it, trying to figure out what to do. I can’t remember ever seeing Tem’s door closed. At least, not without me on the right side of it.

So I do the thing that simultaneously makes sense and no sense at all. I knock.

I’m greeted with this: a pyjama-clad September, hair wild and free, face scowling. She stares at me for a moment, saying nothing.

‘Hi,’ I squeak.

She doesn’t reply. Her eyes flicker from my face to my shoes and back again.

‘Can we . . . can I come in? Can we talk?’

Tem’s eyes narrow further. She doesn’t reply but steps aside so I can walk into her bedroom. It’s messier than usual, the bedcovers crumpled and strewn, clothes scattered over the floor.

‘Are you sorting?’ I ask inanely.

Silence. Oh God. Is this what it’s like for other people, when they try to talk to me?

‘I like this top,’ I say, poking a long-sleeved dragonfly shirt with my foot. ‘Don’t get rid of this one.’

‘I’m not sorting my clothes,’ Tem says, her voice low, more like a growl than anything else.

‘OK,’ I say. ‘Do you want me to help you tidy up?’ When she says nothing, I start picking up clothes. ‘Is this knitted thing machine-washable?’

‘For God’s sake!’ Tem explodes. ‘Just say you’re sorry!’

I freeze, an inside-out T-shirt that I’d been about to pull the right way around dangling from my fingertips.

‘Say, I’m sorry, September,’ Tem continues, her eyes fierce and blazing. She advances on me. ‘Say, I’m so sorry I ignored you, Tem. So sorry I waited ten freaking hours before replying to your very frantic messages. So sorry I wasn’t there when you needed me. So sorry I turned into the most boring cliché ever and chose my boyfriend over you at the first opportunity.’

She is standing right in front of me now, her face inches from mine. Tem is utterly fearless, and it’s one of the things I love most about her, but now it’s turned on me I’m cowed rather than impressed. And very guilty.

‘So?’ she prompts.

‘I’m sorry,’ I mumble.

‘What?’

‘I’m sorry!’ It comes out like a shout.

‘Good!’ she shouts back. ‘You should be sorry! Ten hours, Stef. I was waiting for you.’

‘Rhys had an –’

‘Accident, yeah. I read your messages. A couple of broken bones, right? That sucks, but it doesn’t take ten hours, and it’s not a reason to ignore me. And that’s not even starting on you being in freaking Edinburgh and not telling me. Why wouldn’t you tell me that? Why?’ Her expression has moved from anger to bafflement. On balance, it’s preferable, but it doesn’t make me feel any less guilty.

‘I don’t have to tell you everything,’ I say, and immediately regret it. Her face crumples, right in on itself, tissuelike and surprisingly fragile.

‘But you do tell me everything,’ she says, and her voice is all crackly, and my heart is pounding guiltily and anxiously, and my head is still going RhysRhysRhysRhys, and I just don’t know what to say.

‘I’m sorry,’ I say again, because what else can I say? ‘You know I would have been here if I could. I’m always there for you. Always.’

She lets out a noise that is half snort, half laugh. ‘Sure, Stef. Always. Always, because you don’t have anywhere else to be.’

Her words sock me right in the stomach. I’m almost winded. ‘That’s . . .’ My voice dies. That’s not fair, I want to say. That’s not true.

‘I know you think I take you for granted, because I’m the sociable one or whatever, but I don’t. It’s you – you take me for granted. And I don’t like it.’

I lick my lips, then swallow, playing for time. Speak, Steffi. Speak, speak, speak. Defend yourself. ‘I . . .’ I begin, and my voice is shaky, but it’s there. ‘I let you down once.’ I squeeze my hands into fists at my sides, trying to anchor myself. ‘Once.’

Tem looks at me for a long moment, the silence stretching between us, then seems to make a decision. ‘Oh yeah?’ she says, finally. ‘How are things with me and Karam?’

The question throws me. ‘Uh,’ I say. This must be a trick question, right? This is clearly linked to whatever she was upset about. ‘Not . . . good?’

Her eyes blaze. ‘No. Not good.’

I wait for more. When she offers nothing, I say, tentatively, ‘I thought things were going so great for you both.’