Non Pratt - Trouble

“My best friend,” I say, echoing something I know I’ve just said. “You’re my best friend.”

“You’re mine too. Why d’you think I came out here looking for you?” she says and starts working the bolt loose on the gate. “Who’s this Chris you keep going on about?”

Chris. Oh God, Chris. I’m so sorry. I miss you, mate. I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to… I should never have… I wasn’t…

I slump down on the floor, my head folding into my hands and the tears coming so fast and wet that they almost choke me on their way out. I’m nothing but grief. It doesn’t hurt. It’s a cold, deep emptiness inside me and I want it to end. I can’t face this again. I can’t…

Shit . I have no idea what’s just happened, but Aaron’s gone into total meltdown on the floor. He’s making the most awful sound — like a wail — and he’s sobbing so hard his whole body is shaking. When he looks up at me his face is like one of those theatre masks with the mouth turned upside down and there are tears streaming down his face. It’s like nothing I’ve ever seen before and it scares me.

But it’s not about me, is it?

This is about my best friend.

I wake up in a strange house, in a strange bed in the middle of the night, feeling sick. There’s a plastic bucket next to me on the bed and I vomit into it then put it on the floor. That’s when I find that someone’s put out a bottle of water and a glass. I drink half the bottle and lie back, feeling like I’m on the roundabout in the park with someone spinning it faster and faster…

I wake up again, and there’s light at the window. Someone’s cleared the bucket away and given me a new one, and there’s fresh water beside me along with a packet of crisps. I scoff the crisps and gulp the water, although sitting up kills me. I feel weak with exhaustion and I need a piss, but… I collapse back onto the bed and pull the duvet up and around me. I can smell myself, which is not a good sign, but I’m past caring. I guess that’s not a great sign either.

When I wake up the third time I’m feeling a lot better. A surge of gratitude washes over me — the high the body throws up in relief that it hasn’t been annihilated by alcohol. There’s noise beyond my bedroom door and I can hear Lola running along the landing. I stand up and stretch then shuffle over to the window and look out. It’s afternoon. There’s a gentle knock on the door and Hannah’s there in tracksuit bottoms and one of her old vests that only just covers the bump.

“Mum wants to know if you’re hungry.” Her expression is completely neutral. It worries me.

“I could go another packet of crisps?” I say with a smile that is only half returned, before she tells me that I seriously need to brush my teeth.

“Use the green brush. There’s a towel and clothes for you as well.”

I take the hint and shower. After I’ve dried off, I pull on the shorts and faded Nike T-shirt she’s left out. Jay’s, but for me.

Hannah is waiting on the bed next to a tray of food: crisps, biscuits, cold pizza, slices of apple, a Mars ice cream and two cans. One Diet Coke, one lemonade. I don’t need to ask who the ice cream’s for as I sit down. That baby she’s brewing is made of the stuff.

“I’m so sorry. About last week.” I apologize from the pit of my very empty stomach before taking a slice of pizza. “And about last night.”

“You said some pretty scary shit,” is all she says in reply.

I don’t remember exactly what I said. I don’t remember much at all, only bits here and there, pieces of a puzzle that don’t give any indication of the whole.

“Like what?” I say, because it’s going to be the only way to find out. Not that I want to.

“You said you had no one.” She swallows, concentrating hard on finishing her ice cream. “That you killed your best friend, Chris.”

There’s a pause. I told her about Chris? I look down at the duvet cover, desperately trying to remember when I said that, wondering if I told her everything or nothing, or something hashed up and halfway in between.

“You said you wished you were dead.”

Hannah’s voice breaks and I look up to see that she’s crying. Grown-up tears that just run down her face.

I’ve never seen her look so sad.

“I’m so sorry, Hannah,” I say, shuffling closer and putting my arms around her. “I don’t mean that.”

“You did,” she says into my shoulder.

I think about lying to her, but how can I?

She squeezes into me so tightly I think she’s trying to climb into my soul. And I feel it coming, the choice between shutting her out and letting her in…

“Who’s Chris?” she asks.

I hold my breath and close my eyes. I think about a part of my life I’ve tried to shut away. But I let it out when I told Neville and now it’s here in this room, waiting to be shared with the person I most want to hide it from. I can’t afford to lose Hannah any more than she can afford to lose me, but if I don’t tell her the truth, then it’s over.

What the hell. Here goes.

And so I learn who Chris is — and what happened to him. It is the hardest thing I’ve ever had to hear, but I know it was harder for him to tell me.

It changes nothing. Aaron is still my favourite person in the whole world.

He is still my hero, even if he can’t see why.

Of the seminal moments in my life, Careers Day in the Autumn of Year 5 is my favourite. Everyone had to dress as whatever they wanted to be when they grew up. I had gone in a tweed jacket and a bow tie and when Miss Weston asked me what I wanted to be I told her that I wanted to be the Doctor.

“Shouldn’t you be wearing a lab coat and stethoscope like Paul?” She pointed to Paul Black, who was trying to strangle everyone with the stethoscope in question.

Before I could answer, a boy I didn’t know from the other class spoke up.

“Paul’s a doctor,” he explained, giving me a look of approval. “He wants to be the Doctor.”

“Who?”

“Exactly,” we said at the same time, relieved that she understood.

She didn’t. We were sent to the quiet table to reflect on why cheeking teachers was wrong.

“I’m Aaron Tyler,” I whispered across the table.

“Chris Lam.” Chris checked Miss Weston wasn’t watching and stretched over to shake my hand, blinking behind over-sized glasses. “Nice to meet you, Aaron.”

I shook his hand and grinned. “My friends call me Ty.”

Geekiness formed a firm foundation for friendship and when we studied for the entrance exams for Bart’s — St Bartholomew’s — it was Chris I studied with, hoping we’d pass or fail together. The day we heard that we’d both got in, Chris came round to my house to celebrate with lemonade and a batch of my dad’s legendary brownies. We’d just rolled out our latest architectural plans for the Death Star, holding the corners down with half-full glasses and empty plates when there was a knock on the back door and someone rushed in, waving a sheet of paper.

“I got in!”

My other best friend. The one I’d kept hidden from Chris. The one who knew more about Star Wars than George Lucas, who’d helped me paint all my D&D figures, who I’d known since nursery. Only problem was… she was a girl. Chris didn’t like girls.

“Penny — Chris.” I turned to Chris, who was sweating so much that his glasses had slid down to the tip of his nose. “Chris, this is Penny.”

“Hi!” Penny stuck out her hand and shook Chris’s so hard it nearly dislocated his shoulder.