Chocolate Box Girls: Sweet Honey (12 page)

The next thirty-six hours stretch out to
an eternity. I play it cool, but let’s face it, I’m not the patient
kind, and it’s way too long since I’ve had a date with a cute boy.

Tara and Bennie are fizzing with
excitement, like two boisterous puppy dogs.

‘I think I got this whole Riley
thing wrong,’ Bennie says. ‘He’s obviously mad about
you!’

‘Chemistry,’ Tara
breathes.

‘You’d know all about
that,’ Bennie cuts in. ‘There was a whole lot of
that
going on
this morning between you and Joshua McGee!’

‘You’d have been
proud,’ Tara says. ‘I didn’t blush crimson this time. More of a
deep cerise colour. Anyhow, Bennie, you’re just jealous!’

‘Possibly,’ she agrees.
‘Ask Riley if he’s got a friend for me, OK?’

‘I might just do that!’

‘Did he message again this
morning?’

‘Yep … says he
can’t wait,’ I report. ‘Nor can I. He’s so good-looking,
honestly!’

‘Bring him into town on
Saturday,’ Bennie suggests. ‘You can take him to that cafe where we went
the other week, and Tara and I will just happen to stroll in. If he’s as hot
as you say, it’d be rude to keep him all to yourself.’

‘I wish we could watch that film
with you,’ Tara says. ‘I’m going to watch it anyway, and see if I
can spot your sister, and listen out for Shay’s song in the
soundtrack …’

‘Text us the minute Riley’s
gone,’ Bennie adds. ‘We want to know
all
the details.
Don’t hold back!’

‘I won’t,’ I promise,
laughing.

I’m not laughing at four ’o
clock, though. I’m back home, peeling off the tent dress, jumping into the
shower, dressing quickly in a little print sundress and flip-flops. Emma lends me
her hairdryer and I do my make-up, my hand shaking slightly as I apply eyeliner.

‘You look fabulous,’ Emma
says. ‘I’ve got you some pizza and dips, and a bag of salted caramel
popcorn. Boys like that sort of thing. When he comes, I’ll say hello and then
pop across the road for a coffee with Josie. If you need me you know where I am.
Your dad’s working late again tonight, so that won’t be a
problem.’

‘Emma, thanks!’ I say, and I
mean it. Emma has been brilliant since I told her about Riley’s proposed visit
yesterday afternoon, genuinely pleased that I am settling in and making friends.
Last night we dragged the Christmas tree down from the loft, wrapped it in sparkly
pink lights and hung Emma’s designer glass ornaments on it – it looks like
something out of a style magazine, seriously. Back home we have a real tree,
lopsided, shedding needles, decorated with a million mismatched decorations made and
accumulated over the years; it would never win any prizes for style.

‘Your dad won’t be too keen
if he thinks this is a date,’ Emma reminds me. ‘He really does expect
you to swear off boys for the next ten years, but you and I both know that
isn’t very fair. You’re only human! I remember being
fifteen … I used to fall in love every other day!’

‘It’s nothing like
that,’ I tell her. ‘We hardly know each other. We’re
just … friends.’ I cross my fingers behind my back and hope for the
best.

‘If you say so,’ Emma says.
‘Still, it’s nice to see you having some fun. Greg has been a bit
stressed lately, with lots of big contracts on the line at work, but I know he
thinks the world of you. He’s just not used to having a teenager
around.’

I blink, speechless. I do not want
apologies and excuses from Emma for my dad’s angry outburst, no matter how
well-meaning.

‘When I told Greg you had a friend
coming over, I think he assumed it would be a girl,’ Emma goes on. ‘We
don’t need to tell him any different! You can watch the film in the living
room, so everything’s out in the open and above board.’

‘Oh … can’t we
just watch it in my room?’

Emma squeezes my arm. ‘It’s
not that I don’t trust you,’ she says. ‘I do, of course, but I
think it’s best to keep things light and friendly. As you said, you
don’t know each other well, and it might just give the wrong impression. Now,
when did you say he was due?’

‘He just said straight after
school,’ I say. ‘He didn’t give a specific time.’

Emma smiles and I set my laptop up on
the coffee table, checking the
Watch-Again
link. Once I’m happy
it’s all working properly, I plump up a few cushions on the cream leather sofa
and open the popcorn and pour it into a bowl. Where is he?

I flick open a window on SpiderWeb in
case Riley’s sent a message, but there’s nothing, so I flop down on to
the sofa and pick up a handful of popcorn.

‘He’s travelling from the
other side of the city,’ I tell Emma. ‘So, he could be a little bit
late …’

‘Where does he live
exactly?’ Emma asks.

‘I’m not sure.’

‘Is he coming by bus or by train?
Or is he getting a lift?’

‘I don’t know. Look, Emma,
why don’t you just go over to Josie’s? I’ll send you a text when
Riley gets here, if you like?’

‘No, no, I don’t mind
waiting,’ she insists. ‘No trouble.’

When Riley hasn’t shown up by half
six, I’m struggling to keep my cool and Emma’s expression has gone from
excited to embarrassed, pitying. She says something kind about a mix-up with the
times, and nips across the road to see her friend, leaving me alone with my shame.
He hasn’t messaged or texted, and stupidly, although I gave him my mobile
number, I didn’t think of asking for his. Why would he say he was coming over
and then not bother? Has he got the arrangements muddled? Or did something else come
up, something more interesting than me?

Why did I even ask him? I’ve only
met him once, for a couple of minutes; when I picture us together the images morph
into memories of me and Shay from long ago. The early morning SpiderWeb chats have
made me feel like I know him, but was any of that even real? Bennie was right – my
relationship with Riley was all fantasy, just a SpiderWeb flirtation. I wish
I’d left things that way; I wouldn’t be feeling so let down now.

I’m still hurt that Ash turned me
down too, although I’d never admit that to anyone.

I open my laptop and type.

Riley? What’s up? Did I get
the day wrong? Is everything OK?

I press Send, but there’s no reply,
no matter how many times I look.

When Emma comes back at half eight, I
pretend Riley messaged to cancel, and she puts an arm round my shoulders and tells
me no boy is worth getting upset over. My mobile buzzes with the first of many
messages from Tara and Bennie asking how things have gone; I switch it off and tell
Emma I’ve got a headache, retreating to my bedroom. I curl up on the bed and
stare blankly at the ceiling for hours, until I hear Dad’s car pull up and the
sound of the two of them talking.

He doesn’t come in to see me, so I
have no way of knowing what Emma has told him. My head is hurting and my heart aches
with self-pity. I imagine Riley, drinking beer at some wild student party; and Ash,
walking along a moonlit beach with some unknown girl.

What is it about me? What makes me so
unlovable, so easy to walk away from? I wish I knew. Dad used to tell me I was his
best girl, his princess, but that didn’t matter one bit when he decided
he’d stopped loving Mum. In the end, I wasn’t wanted. I was left behind,
thrown away like yesterday’s rubbish, and the hurt inside me slowly turned to
anger.

I’ve travelled halfway round the
world to be with Dad. I’ve worked my socks off at the dullest school in the
known universe, stayed in almost every night, washed dishes, been nice to Emma and
bitten my tongue every time I felt a snarky remark bubbling up to the surface. Well,
almost every time. I’ve tried my hardest, but guess what? Dad still
doesn’t have time for me, even now we are living under the same roof.

I push the thought away; sometimes the
truth hurts too much.

At midnight I eat cold pizza that tastes
of cardboard and watch
Scarlet Ribbons
on
Watch-Again
, remembering
the summer holidays at Tanglewood and the filming, when I still thought I could have
it all, before I messed up one time too many. Watching myself in the movie is like
watching a stranger – another version of me, brighter, braver, brimful of spiky,
sassy backchat. I am wearing long petticoats and a cotton dress the colour of
bluebells, my hair pinned up with fake plaits and a straw hat. It’s like
seeing some ghostly, past-life version of myself, someone long gone. When I look in
the mirror now I can’t see anything bright or brave or sassy. I just see a
lost girl, someone who has run out of options. Can a person unravel so fast?

I wish you could edit the past, delete
the bits you don’t want any more.

Kitnor looks beautiful in the movie, of
course, with its lush, moss-green fields and little, twisty trees, its pebbled
beaches stretching down to a silver sea. In the background, behind the real actors,
I catch sight of people I know: Coco, dressed in a red pinafore, pulling Humbug the
sheep on a lead; Finch, Skye’s holiday romance; there’s no Skye because
she was working on the costumes behind the scenes, and no Summer because this was
round about the time she started to get ill.

As the film ends, the credits go up and
Shay’s song ‘Bittersweet’, the song he wrote for Cherry, begins to
play. It fits the mood of the film perfectly, and my mood too, with its talk of lost
love and regrets.

Shay … he left me too, of
course. I thought he’d always be there for me, but my new stepsister came
along and stole him. ‘I tried to make you happy,’ Shay said when we
broke up. ‘I tried my hardest, but I can’t, Honey – only you can do
that. You’re beautiful on the outside, but inside you’re all eaten up
with hurt. It’s like some kind of poison. You have to stop being so angry, so
destructive, so … lost. I can’t cope with it any more.’

He walked away, and what was left of my
heart just crumbled.

Maybe Shay was right. Maybe inside I am
all eaten up with poison, and nobody will ever love me. I lie awake most of the
night, tossing and turning in the humid heat.