Chasing Butterflies (13 page)

“No,” I say, “I won’t tell them.

“You promise you won’t tell them?”

I swallow and rest my cheek against her head as she sobs into my chest. “I promise.”

“Yara, what happened to him? What did you do?”

“I don’t want to talk about it anymore,” she says through a sob. “I feel dirty and evil, and I just want to make it stop.” She grabs at my clothes again, and I can feel her shaking in my arms.

“Okay,” I say, feeling more confused now than I ever have. “It’s okay, Yara.”

Yara

That’s it. Granny is dead and buried, just like that. I stand beside Gabriel, not daring to look up at him as the congregation walks past us. None of them speak to me. Some of them shake hands with Gabriel, but none of them actually direct any of their sympathies toward me.

Gabriel tenses each time someone ignores me. I don’t know what he’s thinking and that scares me more than anything. I want to reach up and link my arm through his, but I daren’t.

I fell asleep in his arms last night, waking first thing this morning in a tangled heap of limbs on the sofa. We’d overslept and had to rush to get ready for the funeral, so we haven’t had a chance to speak to each other about what I told him last night.

When his mum approaches us, she gives me a small smile as she fans her face with one of the service booklets. “It was a beautiful service, Yara. I’m sure Joanna would have approved.”

I’m sure she’d have hated it.
But I take a deep breath and nod. “Thank you for all of your help.”

She gently squeezes my arm. “It’s been my pleasure. I’m sorry I haven’t been to see you for a few days.”

“That’s okay,” I say as Gabriel links his fingers through mine. “I’m sorry we argued.” I watch her gaze drop down to our hands, and then her eyes snap up to Gabriel’s face.

“Yes, well,” she mumbles, clearly flustered. “I’m sure Gabriel will help you out with anything else you might need.”

“I will,” he says gruffly.

She frowns at him and then walks out of the stifling hot church, leaving us alone. “What was all that about?” I ask.

“Nothing for you to worry about,” he says. “Shall I take you home now?”

I nod and let him lead me to his Jeep. I climb in and fasten the buckle while Gabriel jumps in and starts the engine. He waits until we’re clear of the church before I hear him take a deep breath. I turn to look at him, noticing how the morning sun lights up his face. Reaching over, I stroke his cheek with the back of my hand.

I really like Gabriel. There’s a part of me that thinks I could love him one day—like, really love him. The sort of love that would be so consuming, so fulfilling and demanding and wonderful, that it would need thousands and thousands of words to try and explain it to someone. But then I see the way he looks at me, and I know that if our love was a story, it wouldn’t end in a happily ever after.

“About last night,” he starts. I freeze and let my hand drop down to my lap.

“I want you to know that you did nothing wrong. You hear that, Yara? You did nothing wrong. I don’t think you did, and the police won’t think you did either.”

The police?
“No,” I say, shaking my head. “You promised.”

“Just hear me out,” he says, looking at me out of the corner of his eye. He drives the Jeep around a bend in the road and grips the wheel tightly. “You were too young to know that you’d done anything wrong, so why would it be so bad to tell the police?”

Panic grips my throat, constricting it to the point that I can’t speak or breathe. I feel my chest rising and falling, but I can’t feel any air being dragged into my lungs. The police will lock me up. They won’t understand like Gabriel did. They won’t listen to me. “No,” I wheeze. My heart thumps in my chest as I start to unbuckle my belt.

Gabriel’s hand flies across my chest, pinning me against the seat. “Stop it, Yara.”

I shake my head and try to pull his fingers away from me. I have to get out. I can’t be near him. I thought I could trust him.

I was wrong.

“Let me out,” I say quickly. “Let me out, Gabriel. And get away from me.”

He swerves to the other side of the road as I struggle against him. “Just stay still for a second,” he growls.

My legs tingle and my stomach feels like it’s doing somersaults. I can’t believe he’s doing this to me. To us.
Maybe he’s already told the police. Maybe he’s leading me straight into their trap.

“You called them?” I shriek.

“No, I haven’t called them!” he shouts. “And I won’t. But I think
you
should.”

I shake my head. “I won’t call them. I’ll never call them. You promised me!” I yell. “You promised, Gabriel. You made me feel like it was all going to be okay.”

“I know,” he says as he slams the Jeep into park outside of my house. “And it
will
be okay.”

“You don’t know it will,” I say. “You can’t predict how they’ll react.”

“Yara,” he says with a sigh. Killing the engine, he rubs his hands over his face. “I’m an adult. I know who’s to blame when I hear a story being told. I know the law. I know what’s right and wrong and who would be held accountable.”

“You don’t,” I tell him. “You fix people’s gardens, how do you know what the police will do?”

“Because I have half a fucking brain,” he snaps. “Joanna has brainwashed you! Can’t you see that?”

I feel my bottom lip tremble as I turn to look at him. He’s annoyed at what I’ve said, and I’m angry at him. We can’t be together right now. He needs to stay away from me, and I need to stay away from him until we’ve both calmed down. “I’m going in,” I finally say, nodding towards the house. “You should go back to your house, too, or to work or to the bar or to that other girl you were all over the other night.”

“Yara,” he breathes. “Please.”

I shake my head. “I need to be alone right now, Gabriel. I need some time to pull my thoughts together.”

He doesn’t say anything. I climb out of his Jeep, and then he starts the engine and reverses all the way down the lane.

I stride into my house and slam the front door shut behind me, hating how angry he’s made me. I swipe my hand across the shelf and knock all of the photo frames and ornaments onto the floor, and then I stamp all over them. Afterwards, I pull the big mirror off the wall that was hanging over the open fireplace and bring it up over my head before throwing it down on the ground, watching as bits of glass fly all around me.

Instead of realising that I’m acting like a loon, I carry on. I walk from room to room, smashing and breaking everything I can get my hands on. Everything that reminds me of Granny and Grandpa. Of my life. Of every bad thing that’s ever happened. Every awful Christmas. Every miserable birthday. I smash it all until I get to Granny’s room.

The late afternoon sun shines through her window, casting everything in a spooky orange glow. Granny never allowed me in her room. It was the only room that was banned, so naturally it was the only room I ever really wanted to go in.

I walk across the plush carpet, revelling in the softness under my feet. I open her wardrobe and see rails after rails of expensive-looking clothes, including long, flowing dresses that look like ball gowns.
When did Granny wear any of this stuff?
My fingers trail over them, loving the way they feel against my skin. I’m tempted to pull one out and try it on, but I don’t. Instead, my eye catches on a box that’s been wedged on the top shelf.

I reach up and pull it out, sitting down on the carpet with it nestled in my lap. I prise the lid off and find hundreds of photographs. My fingers flick through them until I come across one of Granny when she was much younger holding a little girl who’s wearing a frilly white frock and a floppy hat. I frown, wondering if it’s me, but then I see the date and realise with a gasp that it’s my mum. I’m so shocked I drop some of the photos on the floor. I’ve never seen a picture of my mum before.
Why did Granny keep these hidden from me? And if she hid these, what else was she hiding?

Tears drip down my cheeks as I shuffle through more photos. The sun suddenly disappears and the room plunges into darkness. I crawl around to the other side of the bed and pull the drawers of a small table open, looking for matches. I find a box and quickly light the big candles that Granny had by her bed. When I put the matchbox back in the drawer, my hand brushes against another box.

I pull it out and open it. My eyes struggle to see properly in the dim light, but I can see well enough to make out about forty handwritten letters, all addressed to me—all of them unopened. I stare at the writing in the flickering candlelight, not recognizing the penmanship at all.

My tears go cold on my cheeks as the night settles in around me, and I realise that I can’t read the letters now. It’s too dark and I’m too upset. I shove them back into the box and take it with me to my bedroom, where I dump it onto my bed.

I take off my black dress that I wore to the funeral and quickly pull on my favourite white nightie. I spy the book I’ve been reading for the last few days on my desk and look out of my window, noticing the big tree that sits at the end of my garden. Without another thought, I grab the book and run downstairs.

Gabriel

This time when I find Yara hanging upside down from the tree, I don’t hesitate for even a second. Walking up to her, I plant myself in exactly the same position that I did last time and then peel her nightie back over her head.

My eyes lock with her surprised ones before I sweep my gaze down to her lips. A ghost of a smile is starting to form. Instead of admiring them and thinking about how soft and plump they look, I crush my lips against her mouth.

Groaning into my mouth, her hands immediately snake around my neck and she pulls me in closer. Her hot tongue skims along the underside of my upper lip, and because she’s upside down and I’m not, our mouths move against each other in an unfamiliar way.

“I’m sorry,” she whispers between kisses. “I’m so sorry.”

She has nothing to be sorry for, and I open my mouth to try and tell her so but she deepens the kiss, forcing her tongue into my mouth until mine surrenders. I kiss her back just as passionately.

I already know that kissing Yara is never going to get boring. She surprises me. She makes me want things I know I can’t have. She makes me want to fight for things that I never imagined I’d fight for and seduces me without even knowing she’s doing it. I wake up every morning wondering what she’s going to do today…how she’s going to make me feel at the end of the day.

When I hear a sob leak out of her, I reach up with my hands and cup her bum, pulling her down from the branch and into my arms with one quick tug. She tears her mouth away from mine and buries her face in my neck.

“I’m so scared,” she whimpers against my skin.

“You have nothing to be scared about,” I tell her as I start to walk toward her house. “I’ve already told you—”

“Not about that,” she interrupts. “I’ll do whatever you think is best.”

I frown. “Well then, what are you scared of?”

“Of losing you,” she whispers. “Of not being able to take this any further when it’s the only thing I’ve ever really wanted. I feel like I’ve lost you before I’ve even really had you.” She grips my hoodie in her hands and snuggles against me. “I miss you when you’re not here. I can’t get you out of my head, and I’m terrified of how much it’s going to hurt when I
have
to get you out of my head.”

Her honesty shocks me for a minute. I guess I shouldn’t be shocked because Yara has always been blunt, but I wasn’t expecting any of
tha
t. I take a deep breath and rest my cheek against the top of her head as I carry her through her garden.

“I think about you a lot too,” I finally admit. Stepping inside her house, my eyes immediately trail over the broken shit littered across every surface of the floor. But I have other things to say to her before I ask her about that. “There are things I want to do to you that I can’t even bring myself to tell my best friend.” I walk through the darkened hallway, trying to remember my bearings, and carry her up the stairs. “You’re ridiculously beautiful and funny and clever, and you’re everything I ever thought I wanted in a girl and more. I want to be with you as more than a friend, but I can’t get my head around the fact that you’re only sixteen.”

I stop on the landing, looking around at all the doors. “Which one is your room?” I ask.

“Third door on the right,” she whispers.

I carry her into her room, placing her gently down onto a pale pink quilt. Then I pull away and brush the back of my fingers down her cheek, tucking a piece of her hair behind her ear.

“It keeps me awake at night…what people would think of you if they knew we’d been together like that,” I tell her quietly. “I don’t care what they think of me, but I don’t want anyone to think anything about you that isn’t right. I wouldn’t want anyone thinking that what we had, what we’d done, wasn’t special. Wasn’t meaningful.”

I see her swallow and then she nods. “I understand,” she says sadly. “But we could always move somewhere different and lie about my age?”

I shake my head. “No lies,” I tell her. “We’re not building anything on a pack of lies. Lies come out in the end anyway, and then the shit really hits the fan.”

She sniffs, and I see her face glistening in the moonlight. “Would you wait?”

“Yes.”

“But how old do I have to be?” she asks, nibbling on her bottom lip.