The Things I Should Have Told You. Carmel Harrington

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       Chapter Seven

       EVIE

      AnnMurphy: Heard about your granddad. Soz. Hope you are ok and not too sad.

      My first reaction is, yeah, right, like you care, Ann Murphy.

      I re-read the instant message on Facebook for the third time, puzzled and suspicious. Genuine or fake? She’s never really spoken to me before, so why, all of a sudden, get in touch?

      She’s not part of the whole bitch-parade in school. But she stood by and watched Martina and Deirdre make my life hell for the past year and did nothing. I decide to ignore it. Just like I’ve been ignoring all of the bullshit that’s been shared on Facebook about ‘E’ from so-called friends.

      I rub my temples. I still have a nagging headache. I might have been given a clean bill of health from the doctors, but I don’t feel back to normal yet. It’s all a bit fuzzy still.

      Pathetic. Nerd. Weirdo. Loser. That’s the usual tone of the messages I get on Facebook.

      I shouldn’t care what they think. For the longest time I didn’t. Then all of a sudden it mattered what everyone thought. I suppose everyone has their limit and I reached mine.

      I suppose I could just delete my accounts. But everyone is on Facebook, Snapchat and Instagram. The stubborn part of me thinks that it’s not fair that I should stop using them, when I’ve done nothing wrong. And if I do, surely that means they’ve won.

      Maybe they have already won. Maybe when I let them talk me into that stupid dare I made myself into the very thing they called me – a loser. I feel so stupid and shamed whenever I think about that. I can’t tell Mam and Dad what really happened, they’d only freak. And they wouldn’t understand anyhow. Better that they think I was experimenting with alcohol and made a mistake. I’ve not told them about the bullying, I can’t just land all of this on them now too.

      I wish Pops were here. I could talk to him, tell him about the message. I try to imagine what he’d say, but I can’t come up with anything. He’s only been gone a few days, but already it’s like his face and his voice is beginning to fade at the edges. I’m not ready to lose him. I just don’t know what to do.

      Jamie peeps in the door. I’ve no privacy since Dad banned me from closing my door. It’s a joke, this house. My whole life is a freaking sideshow.

      ‘Get lost, Jamie,’ I shout and he backs away, but he looks relieved. I know what he’s doing. He keeps checking up on me to make sure I’m alive. He thought I was dead when he found me. And now he’s worried that I’ll die too – like Pops. I hope he knows I’m sorry. I hate that I’ve upset him. He’s just a kid.

      He might run around like a Duracell bunny all day and I suppose you could be fooled into thinking he was fine. But at night I know he’s scared. That’s why he’s wetting the bed again. That’s when I get scared too. That’s when I can’t switch off. That’s when I think that my brain is about to explode.

      I wish I could cry. But I just feel numb most of the time. Is that normal? Everyone else seems to be crying on and off every day since Pops died. But the tears won’t come for me.

      Mam keeps asking me how I’m doing. But she doesn’t really want to know the answer. She just wants me to say, fine, then she can sigh with relief and move on. I wonder sometimes what she’d say if I answered her truthfully. What if I just said, hey Mam, there’s this pressure in my brain, in my stomach, in my hands and fingers that is building up so much that I think I’m going to explode. It hurts so much. Any minute now, boom, I’m gonna blow like a grenade.

      I can feel their eyes on me all the time, watching me. I know they are worried. But I can’t cope. I just want to pretend it never happened. Problem is, I can’t get away from it. My mind has it all on loop and keeps going back over and over it all. That moment when I realised I was in hospital, I’ll never forget.

       They think I’m asleep. I’m afraid to speak, afraid of what they will say to me. I’ve been so stupid. The doctor has a clipboard in his hand, all official-like. He looks tired. Like he’s not slept in days. I sympathise because I feel exhausted too. And I’m sore all over. What’s that about?

       They all look super-serious standing side by side, facing the doctor. I know I must be sick, because I’m in hospital, I certainly feel crap, but their faces, all kind of grey and pinched, scare me. At least Jamie is asleep on a chair in the corner. I don’t want him to see me like this.

       The doc sounds really cross, it makes the hairs on my arms stand upright. ‘Your daughter has more than five times the legal limit of alcohol in her system. Enough to kill a grown man. She’s lucky to be alive.’

       His words hang in the air like an accusation and nobody speaks for the longest time. I close my eyes tight and for a moment wish that I’d died earlier on. I don’t want to hear any more about the mess I’ve made of everything. But the urge to look is too strong and I peep out through my eyelashes at the drama that is unfolding. Drama that I caused. Shit, shit, shit. I’m in so much trouble. СКАЧАТЬ