Some Boy (What's Love? #1) (12 page)

“Aren’t you meeting Steph anyway?”

“Yeah, in a minute. I’m just waiting till the coast is clear.”
 

I finished my lip gloss, touched up my mascara, and then stood back staring at myself appraisingly in the mirror.

“You look lush, Babe,” Izzy assured me. I just shrugged and twisted a little, assessing the effect of the simple top and jeans. I had some small dangly earrings in, in place of the studs that I’d thrown in the pool. It felt weird to have something else in my ears, and they tickled my neck as I turned. But it had felt even weirder having bare earlobes, so I kept them in.

“Besides, with your track record, you’re not going to be staying in your clothes for long, anyway,” Justin added. I shot him a glare, but my mouth betrayed me by turning up at the corners.
 

“We’re trying to actually get to know each other this time,” I said.

“Sure.”

“Whatever Justin. Be nice, or I’ll march you out there to face Damien’s wrath.”

“Fine, fine.”

I turned away from the mirror and picked up my coat and scarf, putting them near my handbag, then fiddling and rearranging them, and smoothing out my scarf, and then coat, and then scarf again.

“Kat?”

“Huh?” I looked up at my roommates and blinked.

“Feeling nervous?”

I
 
gave a short laugh. “What would give you that idea?”

“Don’t be. Brendan fancies you more than I’ve ever seen him fancy anyone. You’ve got nothing to worry about.”

I chewed on my lip, then quickly pressed them together instead, tasting lipgloss on my tongue.

“How long have you known him?”

“Since we started uni. Long enough to trust him to take out our Katherine,” Justin said, in a Yorkshire twang. He came up to me and put his arm around my neck, squeezing and ruffling my hair. I squawked in protest and wriggled out of his grip.

“But how well do you know him?” I turned to the mirror to rearrange my hair. “Like, where he lives, or have you met his family or anything?”

“Meeting the family? Getting a bit ahead of ourselves, aren’t we?” Justin perched himself on the edge of my bed and grinned. I just frowned at my reflection in the mirror.

“I didn’t mean I want to meet them. I just meant…I don’t know anything about him.”

“Isn’t that what tonight is for?”

“Yeah. It is. Forget it.”

“He is a bit of closed book. Doesn’t like sharing much about himself, so that he even suggested this is something. He obviously wants to tell you. Just go easy on him, okay?”

“Easy? What do you think I’m going to do, interrogate him?”

Justin shrugged. “I just mean, he’s had it tough. Don’t try and rush him or he might, I dunno, bite back.”

I turned squarely on Justin and folded my arms over my chest.
 

“What do you mean?”

“Yeah. This is sounding weird, Justin,” Izzy piped in, dropping down into the chair at my desk and tucking her knees up to her chest. She frowned at us from behind her blonde fringe.

“I shouldn’t have said anything.”

“Are you warning me about something? Should I not be doing this?”

“Shit. I didn’t say that. I didn’t say anything.” Justin waved his hand dismissively.

“That’s the problem.”

He stood up and paced across the room and back again, then dropped back down to the bed. “I was at his house yesterday—”

“Yesterday? When?”

“In the afternoon, after lunch when he got off work.”

“Why? Where does he live?”

“On Straight St, in Holbeck.” Justin kept his face a picture of nonchalance, but he was biting the inside of his lip.

“Holbeck’s not that bad. They’ve revamped it a lot,” I said unconvincingly.

“Yeah, and they’re ‘managing’ that red light district now,” he added.

“You two are such snobs. My brother’s in-laws live in Holbeck.” We both glanced at Izzy, who had pursed her lips indignantly.

“Depends where you go, I guess. Anyhoo,” Justin continued, turning back to me. “That wasn’t really my point. Who cares where he lives. I was just going to say that he asked me to meet him there, but never invited me inside. It just made me realise he’s never told me anything about his family. That was the first time he mentioned where he lived, let alone asked me to come there.”

“Why did he want you to meet him there yesterday then?”

“I don’t know if he’d like me telling you.”

I narrowed my eyes. “I won’t tell him you told. I’ll pretend I don’t know.”

“It’s not drugs is it?” Izzy asked, her eyes widening. I glanced at her and then back to Justin.

“Surely not…”

“No, it’s not drugs,” Justin said and rolled his eyes. “Do you think I’d be letting you go out with him tonight if he’d just asked me to help him get drugs?”

“What then?”

“I was just helping him carry a whole bunch of stuff to the pawn shop up the street.”

“Oh. So he, like, needs money?”

“I guess.” Then Justin stood up and pointed his finger at me. “Don’t even think about offering him any.”

“I wasn’t!” I raised my hands innocently. I had been. Then I chewed my lip again, ignoring the gloss. “He hasn’t got some silly idea of needing to pay for an expensive date or something has he?”

“I don’t know. He’s probably just, you know, regular old, garden-variety skint. He’s obviously paying his own way through uni and everything.”

“But he already works like three jobs or something—shit, is it because he lost his other job?”

“That was his own fault.”

I frowned and pulled on my lip. “Yeah, but—”

“Plus, it’s not like a few part time jobs really add up to much. Do you even know what those kinds of jobs pay?”

“Not really,” I admitted.
 

“Nah, me neither. But I bet it’s shite-all.”

“Fuck. And I gave him a hard time about not getting in touch, and it was just because he didn’t have credit. I knew he didn’t want to admit it when he told me.” I flopped down on the bed beside Jason and blew out a breath. “And he said he wasn’t at uni, so couldn’t use the internet. So he doesn’t even have internet at home.”

“Don’t start feeling sorry for him,” Izzy said. “Pity is the last thing he’ll want. I offered to split the bill on a date once with a guy
 
because he’d lost his job, and he flipped out on me about not needing my charity.”

“She’s right. Surprisingly,” Justin said, and Izzy poked her tongue out at him. “Seriously, Kat, just try and forget everything I’ve told you. I shouldn’t have brought it up. Just let him tell you in his own time.”

“Okay. As long as it’s not drugs.”

“It’s not.” But Justin’s eyes shifted and he looked down to pick at imaginary fluff on his shirt. Then noticed that we were both staring at him. “It’s not! Brendan is
not
on, or dealing, drugs — I know him well enough to know that.” He put an arm around me where I sat beside him on the bed. “I didn’t want to kill your buzz. Just go and have fun. Forget about it.”

“If he even comes at all,” I murmured, glancing at the clock as I reached for heeled boots to pull them on. He was five minutes late. But this was Brendan. I wasn’t really worried, not at that moment. I was still preoccupied with trying to forget everything Justin had just said, or at least push it to the back of my mind so it didn’t cloud my thoughts all night.

But half and hour later when there was still no sign of him, and no text message either, I was worried. And wound up. Justin was off on his own date, so not there to calm me down. Izzy had gone to watch a movie in her room, but when I went to the door I could her giggling and flirting down the phone to someone. Salsa guy, maybe.

It seemed like everyone had something moving in the right direction but me. My guy couldn’t even use a phone or show up when he said he would.

I sucked my cheeks in and bit down on them inside my mouth, trying to reign in my jealousy and frustration. I went to the kitchen and bent down to reach into the back of the cupboard for whatever bottle of alcohol I could find there.

“It was Justin wasn’t it.” I jerked my head up and whacked it on the edge of an open cupboard door above me.

“Ow, fuck.” I emerged, gripping the back of my head to find Damien glaring at me from the middle of the kitchen. “Don’t sneak up on me like that.” I’d thought Damien was hot when we’d first met, all dark hair and brooding. But it turned out his brooding was just a sour attitude, and I’d quickly gotten over it. I sighed. “It probably was Justin. You know him. Is it really that big a deal?”

“It is. Because you guys do this all the time. Can’t you just respect other people’s property?”

“It’s just food, Damien,” I said sharply. I normally tried to pacify him, or at least stay out of it, but I was in no mood to play nice right then. “Feel free to have anything out of our cupboards. We’re not that precious about it.”

“You never have anything
in
your cupboards. Besides piss.” He looked down pointedly at the bottle of vodka in my hand.

“And you’re welcome to it,” I said. “Maybe you’d benefit from taking the edge off,” I muttered, turning away to grab a glass. I knew I would.
 

“I don’t want your alcohol. I just want my food left where I put it.”

“Do you want money or something? I’ve got fifty quid in my room you can have. That should cover your corn chips.”

“Don’t try and throw money at me. You guys can’t just buy your way out of everything. It’s the principle.”

“It’s the principle,” I imitated under my breath, rolling my eyes. I was facing away from him, but I heard him exhale heavily.

I gritted my teeth and stopped pouring my drink. But when I turned to him, Damien was passing me on his way out of the kitchen with a wounded look on his face, and I felt guilty.

“Damien, sorry, I—”

“Fuck you, Kat.”
 

My eyes widened and I watched him stalk out of the room. That had gone too far. He’d never got that angry before — maybe we’d been prodding the bear too much lately. I thought about going after him to apologise properly, but I heard the front door to our flat slam and sighed. I’d fix that problem later. There were other things to worry about.

Like how it was almost quarter to nine, and Brendan had said he’d come pick me up at eight. All sorts of scenarios ran through my head. I started with excuses for him, about why he might have got caught up, like maybe he was at work and hadn’t been able to leave or something. But after three drinks, and as the clock ticked steadily towards 9.30, the mindless telly watching I’d resorted to wasn’t distracting me anymore and the scenarios grew wilder. Like maybe he’d nicked a car again to come and get me and was in jail for real this time.

I remembered what he’d said, about it being the twenty-first century, and why didn’t I call him? So I tried that, but his phone was off. It didn’t even ring, and I hung up without leaving a message. I was a bit tipsy and didn’t want to say anything crazy.

Instead I had the impulse to do something crazy.

And I’d grabbed my coat and handbag and was heading for the bus stop before I could really think it through.
 

Somehow it was only as I got off the second bus near the start of Straight St that the real idiocy of my plan dawned on me. I didn’t even know where his home was, other than the general street name. What was I going to do—wander up and down it until I found him? And who said he was even there? He could have been out, on his way to my place, with some perfectly reasonable explanation for his tardiness. Or something bad could have happened to him. Maybe it
was
drugs, and he had overdosed. Or he was selling them, and had got himself nicked. Or beaten up by a rival dealer.

My mind was whirling uncontrollably now. I stood indecisively beside the bus shelter where I had got off, and pulled out my phone, turning protectively away from a shifty looking guy passing by. Maybe the stupidest part of my plan was that I was standing on a street corner alone in the dark in the middle of Holbeck. Justin’s comment about the red light district played on my mind as a car approached where I was standing on the edge of the street. It was probably just my imagination that it slowed down as it got near. But I kept my face averted, being sure not to do anything that could be construed as suggestive. It passed.

I texted Justin. I probably should have texted him to come get me — I was drunk and paranoid. And I might have done so if I hadn’t known how annoyed he’d be at the interruption to his date. So instead I just asked him:

What number was Brendan’s house?

It was only a moment later that he replied.

Why? Is this a test?

Just tell me.

197. Why? You’re not quizzing him are you?

Not yet. I started walking, not replying to Justin, and checking the street numbers as I went. It seemed like an endless walk, though the street wasn’t even that long. I was regretting my shoe choice. And by the time I reached 197, it was starting to rain, and so I ducked up the steps and under the small portico over the front door before I could think about it, just to avoid getting wet.

There were lights on inside, so someone was home. But I was seriously questioning my sanity then. I couldn’t knock. This was the daftest thing I’d ever done. Whatever reason Brendan had for standing me up, I wasn’t going to make anything better by showing up at his house like this. I was turning away to go back down the steps to the street, rain and all, when I heard a crash and shout from inside the house. I hesitated and looked back to the door, my heart racing. I tried peering through the front window, but the blinds were drawn.

There was more unintelligible shouting from somewhere inside, and I felt scared now. And paralysed. Should I do something? Should I run away and pretend I was never here? I took a step backwards, still staring indecisively at the door, and my heel wobbled on the crumbly step. I slipped and squeaked in alarm as I fell backwards, lunging forward and grabbing at the low edge of the steps. It only slowed my descent, stopped me cracking my head on the concrete, but it didn’t stop me from landing squarely on my backside on the rain soaked ground.