“Can’t leave this damn house?” she’d demanded, arms crossed and insinuating herself into my line of vision once again.
“No. Have fun.” I’d sounded pathetic— had been—and the one good thing about my poor-me demeanour had been the way Gemma’s face softened, sympathy crowding the bossiness from her eyes.
“Oh, Kit.” She’d uncrossed her arms and reached for me, and I’d shuddered at the thought of a girly hug, but she must have sensed the tension already building in my muscles, settling instead for a pat on my arm and a retreat to her own personal space again, leaving mine empty.
That quiet, sympathetic, excruciating, “Oh, Kit,” had been the straw that broke the camel’s back. I’d given in, agreed to come out with her and Gary that weekend but only for an hour. I couldn’t bear her pity, would have preferred Bossy Gemma to show herself again.
“Come on, let’s go get our coats on.” Gemma pushed her weight off the wall and led the way to the coat rack in the hallway.
“I am not a twat,” I whispered to Gary, obviously a little too loudly than I’d intended.
Gemma stopped, spun round on her heels and glared at us. Ah, now this I could handle.
I was used to this.
“Yes you are.”
“I bloody am—”
“You.” One single word from a five feet, six inches, slender blonde woman and two guys a good few inches taller, a couple of stones heavier, froze in their tracks. “Behave.”
“We are behaving,” Gary said, prodding me in the back.
“Would you get the fuck off me?” I elbowed him in the ribs, making him groan. “And he started it,” I added, but Gemma said nothing.
Her lips thinned out to a bleached line and she crossed her arms again. She meant business. The heavy sigh underscored this fact.
“I’m not angry,” she almost singsonged. “I’m—”
“—just disappointed,” Gary and I chorused. We’d heard it a thousand times before.
Plus ca change, plus c’est la meme chose.
“Get your coats,” she threw at us, spinning round again, grabbing her coat and making for the front door in one fluid movement that I thought made her appear to have demonic-level powers. Gemma Crawford knows all, Gemma Crawford sees all.
“Yes, Mum,” I muttered.
“I heard that.”
Gemma Crawford had supersonic fucking bat-hearing as well.
Some things definitely never changed.
* * * *
We grabbed a taxi from the rank near our local shops, not bothering to book one to pick us up at the door. “You do realise this little jaunt will give me time to back out?” I asked.
“You wouldn’t dare,” Gary told me.
“Oh?”
“Because I would kill you,” Gemma said, and I believed her. Couldn’t resist answering back, though.
“Wouldn’t that rather defeat the purpose of this Operation Cheer-Kit-Up thing you’ve got going on?”
She surprised me then by hooking her arm through mine, despite my—though it pained me to admit it— standoffish posture. Hands in jacket pockets, head slightly bowed, shoulders hunched.
“Bit hard to be happy, happy, joy, joy when you’re dead,” I pointed out.
“You’re almost funny when you’re grumpy.”
“Him? “ Gary’s voice was almost a squeal. “You’ve always said he was a bad-tempered bastard.”
“He is.” Gemma shrugged. “But when he’s like this, he’s almost entertaining. You know.” She smiled up at me as we walked. “Not really in the mood for doing something, but resigned to the fact I’m right and putting up a cursory protest.”
“You’re so bloody smug sometimes.”
“I may be smug,” she admitted, leaning her head against my arm in a gesture that from anyone else would have been adoring and submissive, “but I’m still right.”
“Fuck you.”
“I’m not your type.”
“And you’re supposed to be with me, remember?” Gary asked. “Instead of flirting with my gay housemate?”
“I wouldn’t have her anyway,” I muttered.
“Why the bloody hell not?” Gemma lifted her head off my arm and scowled.
“Are you kidding? You’d eat me for breakfast.”
“Yeah, I know.” Gary sniggered. “That’s one of the good things she—”
“Ugh. I do not want to know.”
“You can’t tell me you’ve never had a wake-up call like that.”
“Not with a woman, thank you.” I shuddered, playing it up for the cameras, or rather, Gemma’s benefit. There’d been a couple of times in my misspent youth when I’d tried to like women, but it just wasn’t happening.
A train of thought which led me inevitably to the last man I’d touched like that and I swore, if I concentrated hard enough and ran the tip of my tongue around my mouth just so, I could remember what he tasted like.
I loved to torture myself. I loved to think about things I shouldn’t think about, just to confirm that, yes, it did give me that funny feeling just below my ribcage that was somewhere between nauseated and breathless. Every morning kicked me in the solar plexus as I woke up but it took less and less time to get my breath back each day. Being the masochist I was, I liked to do it to myself sometimes, just to check.
Yep. It really did make me feel sick to consider I’d never touch Steven again. Taste him.
“Stop it,” Gemma growled.
“What? What?” One thing I wasn’t good at was feigning innocence in the face of her scrutiny.
“You know what.”
“I’m trying not to.”
“What the hell are you two whispering about?” Gary asked, walking backwards along the pavement in front of us. I saw at the end of the street, a few cabs waiting in the usual place for a taxi rank so we wouldn’t have to wait after all.
“Nothing important,” I said.
“Kit’s in grave danger of becoming human.” Gemma snorted, as if the chances of that seemed ridiculous to her.
“Ugh. I don’t know why I bothered coming out tonight,” I muttered, already planning my escape. One drink. One circuit of the house. Taxi home.
I definitely wasn’t going to stay the night.
* * * *
“What’s this party for, anyway?” I peered out of the rear passenger side window as Gary, in front, paid the driver. I hadn’t thought to ask before now, after Gemma had said a couple of
