Undone(76)
I bite back the snarky comment that would have no doubt completely ruined family night and somehow manage to focus on the TV through my tears. Lucky for me, there are some tarry-looking seabirds flapping around helplessly on a beach somewhere. Not lucky for them, obviously. ‘Those poor birds!’
Dad pats my knee in a vaguely reassuring way, and I can tell Mum’s still looking at me – not remotely convinced. Why is it that fathers are so much easier to fool than mothers?
We sit through a plane crash, a civil war in some country I’ve never even heard of and a house fire that killed a family of five. By the time Dad switches off the telly and grabs his keys I’ve kind of lost my appetite.
We sit at our usual table at Mr Chow’s and everyone orders the same thing they usually do and Noah pretends his veggie spring roll is a cigar and Mum gets annoyed and tells him not to play with his food. Mum flirts a little bit with the waiter, just like she always does. Dad puts up with it and says nothing, just like he always does. Everyone plays their roles perfectly. Everything is unbearably normal.
I’m quieter than usual, watching, listening, taking it all in. Absorbing the little things they do and say, trying to etch them permanently into my brain. Because it’s only just occurred to me that this will be the last time we’re all together like this. And I’ve only just realized that maybe I should have been spending time with Mum and Dad and Noah instead of wasting my time on this stupid revenge thing. It all suddenly seems a bit ridiculous. Like my priorities have been horribly, obviously wrong, but there hasn’t been anyone around to tell me. That’s a cop-out really. Kai’s been telling me, but I haven’t been listening. And it’s too late now.
Mum and Dad have coffee after dinner, and Noah has a hot chocolate. I have nothing. No one noticed that I barely ate any of my food. Mum’s a little bit drunk and is now focusing her flirting energies on Dad. Normally this kind of behaviour makes me want to throw up a little bit, but tonight it’s OK. Tonight I’m glad to see it, because you can tell they really love each other. And I think this means they’re going to be OK when I’m gone. They’re strong enough to get through it, so I don’t need to worry.
Who am I kidding?
chapter forty-seven
Sasha wanted to get ready at my house. I tried to put her off, but she was having none of it. When I finally agreed, she clapped her hands together and said, ‘Our very first sleepover!’ I said nothing. I was too busy wondering how someone coming over to get ready for a party automatically gave them an invite to sleep there. It must be another secret girl code no one bothered to tell me about. Anyway, I’m not going to sweat it, since there’s no way she’ll end up coming back to my place tonight.
No school today because of an Inset day (which never fails to make Mum go off on one about teachers being lazy). I spend most of the day sleeping. I can’t help feeling like this is a bit of a waste of my last day as a member of Team Popular, but I don’t want to see any of them before tonight. An hour or so before Sasha arrives I sit cross-legged on my bedroom floor and get to work. It makes me think of Christmas Eve and a giggle bubbles up from nowhere. I think I am losing the plot entirely.
Sasha arrives bang on time and her eyes practically pop out of her head when she sees my hair. She doesn’t have a chance to say anything though, because Mum’s right there asking her how she’s been and blah blah blah. So Sasha spends a good twenty minutes chatting to Mum in the kitchen. She’s so bloody comfortable with people. Mum loves her – that’s obvious as anything. She laughs at everything Sasha says, which is stupid because Sasha is not a particularly hilarious person. Even Dad decides to get in on the action by wandering into the kitchen and chipping in to the conversation every now and then. I get the feeling that if I could disappear through the wall I’m leaning on, my parents would be perfectly satisfied with Sasha as a replacement daughter.
The one redeeming thing is that I’m pretty sure Noah would prefer me as a sister, because I’m not sure Sasha would be up for beating the crap out of him in the various video games he makes me play. Correction: made me play. Thinking about it, I can’t remember the last time he asked me to play a game with him. I always used to pretend I had better things to do, but I never did. I loved it, if I’m honest. It was the perfect opportunity to teach him some pretty choice swear words to impress his friends with.
I think it’s probably for the best that I haven’t been spending heaps of time with Noah and Mum and Dad recently. If I tell myself this enough times, it might start to come true.
Mum and Dad and Sasha are all staring at me. I’m clearly supposed to say something. I suppose I could risk a ‘yes’ or ‘no’ or ‘maybe’, but I go for a confused-sounding ‘hmm?’ instead.
Dad shakes his head and laughs in that incredibly irritating What is she like? way. At least he doesn’t start singing the old David Bowie song he normally warbles when I’m not listening to him. That would be too embarrassing for words. ‘Sasha was just saying her parents have invited you to their house in Scotland for the weekend … ?’
Um. What? House in where? This is news to me. Why is Sasha doing this to me?!
Sasha sees my look of utter bafflement and laughs. ‘Yeah, sometimes my folks take pity on me having to hang out with them in the middle of the Highlands, so they let me invite a friend along … and I thought you … might like to? It’s not for a month or something, so you don’t need to decide now.’ She seems almost shy all of a sudden, as though she genuinely gives a toss whether I go to bloody Scotland or not. I mean, who even has an extra house in Scotland?! A house in France would be acceptable, Italy would be even better.