Non Pratt - Trouble

That was when he took out his wallet and handed me all the cash he had — which was loads . That was exactly what he did for Mum and he thinks it’s the best way to fix a hormonal outburst. I agree.

“Where are the boys?” I say, since Aaron and Gideon skived off the moment we got here. So much for getting a male opinion on my new clothes.

“There.” Anj points at a comic shop called Otherworlds. Nerd nirvana — not a shop I’ve ever paid much attention to. “Gideon drags me in there every time we come here.”

“Why?” I ask.

“Look behind the counter.” Anj nudges me. I peer into the window at the guy serving. If I’m honest, he’s a bit weaselly for my tastes, but still. Cute enough. As I’m looking, Gideon explodes out of the door, followed by Aaron. Gideon covers the ground between us in three bounds and links his arms through ours, singing, “He totally has my email address.”

But a group of girls blocks our path and I hang back before we get tangled up, which is when I notice that Aaron’s missing. I look round to see him standing halfway between here and the comic shop. At first I think he’s staring right at me — but then I realize Aaron’s looking at the girls walking this way.

When Gideon suggested going into Otherworlds, I agreed. I’d be safe — only one other person from my past knew the place existed and he wouldn’t be there. Walking in was surreal. Different posters, different layout — I didn’t go often enough to get friendly with the staff and I didn’t recognize the lad Gideon was lusting over. I walked over to the graphic novels, picked up one I already owned and opened it at my favourite part. It’s about dreams. Odd given the strained relationship I have with mine.

When I finished it, I turned and walked over to the counter. Gideon took the hint and we left.

I’d been safe there.

Now I’m outside and I am not safe at all.

The other two haven’t noticed that Aaron’s stopped in the middle of the walkway, so I’m the only one that sees his expression as the girls part to go around me, their bags bumping mine before they clump together as they approach him.

Aaron is terrified.

Four of them. All painfully familiar. One so much more so than the others. I turn for the side and consider flinging myself over the railing to the level below just to get away. But there’s no need — they’ve passed me by, too busy talking to notice me.

“Aaron?” It’s the second time I’ve said his name, and I rest my fingers on his jaw, turning his attention to me. I want to ask what just happened, but I stop myself. Aaron never asks me too much — I should do the same for him.

I look past him and see one of the girls look back at us. Pretty, blonde, kind of rock chick. Our eyes meet for a second, then she frowns, eyes darting to the back of Aaron’s head as if he’s someone she might recognize… but the crowd shifts and she’s lost amongst the other shoppers.

Only then do I realize that Aaron is no longer leaning on the railing, he’s leaning on me.

There’s a box in my wardrobe, one of those plastic ones with the cheap lids that never clip on properly. It’s covered in stickers: faded superheroes; blindingly shiny holographic discs; papery white patches where I’ve peeled off stickers that I tired of and doodled my own picture in biro; newer, bigger, cooler skateboard stickers and band logos. On the lid, I’ve stuck on some paper and written in massive caps “IDENTIFY YOURSELF CITIZEN” and drawn an intricate image of a thumbprint. The punctuation-phile in me finds a black pen and draws in a comma before CITIZEN. Childishly satisfied, I take the box over to my bed and sit with it for a moment, wondering whether this is really a good idea.

It isn’t, but I’m going in anyway.

The box is filled to the brim with envelopes, cards, notebooks, thin cardboard folders and many, many fictional blueprints for the Death Star. I pull out almost everything, turning over some of the less familiar pieces, trying to remember why I kept them. I find a project from Juniors and a note stapled to the front of it where the teacher made a joke about me being the next Roald Dahl. I smile at it. I’m not looking for memories this old.

At the bottom of the box are year photos — too big to fit comfortably, they’re slightly bowed inside their cardboard frames. I only take out the top one, from the end of Year 9. It’s a smaller photo than those up in the corridors of Kingsway, maybe only 450 of us, but I’m only looking for the girl I saw two hours ago: Penny Fraser. She’s turning a little towards the girl next to her, a huge smile about to blossom, strands of hair swooshing across her face. I peer closely at her, the crooked nose and the very pierced ear. She looks so young . Not as young as in some of the photos of me and her together, the ones tucked away in photo albums that my mother has very carefully left packed up in the loft.

I’m standing one row back, looking suitably ashamed of the God-awful haircut that Mum had inflicted on me the day before. If I squint closely enough I swear I can see the line where my tan stops and my fringe should have been… although maybe I’m just imagining it because I remember being so painfully aware of it at the time. My eyes skip over half-familiar faces to the end of the row.

Chris.

Grief isn’t always a knife-sharp twist in your heart or a dull bludgeon in your stomach, sometimes it’s a net, cast suddenly and silently over your soul so that you feel trapped and suffocated by its grasp. I feel the loss in the deepest recesses of myself, hidden parts of my mind and my matter, united in missing someone I will never see again.

I turn the photograph over and spend a long, long time looking out of the window.

I tell Neville about seeing Penny at Clearwater. I give him just enough context to stop him from asking questions.

“Why are you telling me this?”

Obviously not enough context.

“I’m not your therapist and this isn’t Jeremy Springer.” I don’t correct him. “You don’t just get to offload and leave.”

“I wasn’t—”

“You were. I’m old and I’m wise and I’ve had enough of this bullshit,” he says. “You’re just taking bits of the jigsaw out of the box. You don’t have to put the whole picture together, but you’ve got to understand it’s frustrating, only knowing bits here and there.”

I don’t say anything, remembering him telling me I needed a friend.

“People who only give away bits of themselves are hiding something.”

“You do it too,” I say quietly.

“Well, you’re not the only one hiding things.”

I look up at him, studying his expression, taking in the seriousness of his gaze and noticing the “tch” of his teeth as he works his jaw slightly — something he only does when he’s about to wipe the floor with me at cards.

“You know I’m going to ask what things, don’t you?” I say and he nods. “And you’re going to tell me that I’ve got to tell you something about me in return.” Again, he nods, closing his eyes briefly as he dips his head ever-so slightly.

I like Neville. I have no idea why. He smells of alcohol and stale sweat. He’s a bad loser and a terrible winner. He hasn’t a kind word to say about anyone and every other thought he has is lewd. Yet he makes me laugh — at him, at the world and at myself. There’s a lot to be said for learning not to take yourself too seriously. Neville is more than the sum of his old wrinkled parts. He’s my friend.