Chapter Ten #2
“Tell him to leave!” Adam interrupted, his tone irritable. “It’s your birthday in like an hour. Why do you want him here causing trouble?”
Sam still hadn’t said anything. I couldn’t read him. I looked at Freddie. “Maybe you could take this outside?”
Freddie’s shoulders drooped. He gave Adam another hard glance. “You know what, I’ll just go.”
“Wait,” Sam muttered, his voice thick with emotion.
Freddie paused. “Hattie’s boyfriend is making a scene. It’s better if I go.”
“You hit a wall! And I’m the one making a scene?” Adam spluttered.
“Adam!” I reprimanded. Besides, no one had witnessed what or where the bang had come from. “Just leave it, please.”
“No. It’s fine. I’ll call. I should’ve called,” Freddie said. He stepped towards me, handing me the bag he’d had with him since he’d arrived. “Give this to Sam when he’s ready, yeah? And look after him.”
He didn’t pay any attention to Adam, who tried to move between us. Then he grabbed his coat again and was out the door, slamming it behind him.
Adam laughed and muttered something unhelpful before turning back into the kitchen. I frowned after him.
I felt like something much bigger just happened than a brotherly disagreement. I put the bag on the stairs to look at later.
Sam was dead still, staring at the wall, his features blank. I tried to wave him back to me. He startled like he’d forgotten I was there.
“Are you ok?” I asked.
He held up his hand and frowned at his bloody knuckles. I knew Freddie was too calm to have hit a wall. But it was so unlike my best friend to react with any kind of thuggery, it made my heart hurt. What had Freddie told him?
I blew out a breath. “Maybe don’t tell Adam it was you. He’ll kick you out of your own party.”
Sam snorted. “Sorry. I shouldn’t’ve done that.”
“What happened?”
“Freddie told me something… But don’t worry. I’m ok. It just upset me, that’s all.”
“I’ve never seen you do anything like punch a wall.”
He shrugged. “I surprised myself, to be honest.”
I looked back to the kitchen where all our guests were now mingling again, clinking glasses and picking at splayed-open packets of crisps. Checking the time, we had thirty minutes before we counted in the New Year.
“Hey, want to do something stupid?” I asked.
Sam shrugged. “Fuck, yes. Get me out of my head, Hatter.”
“I have fireworks in my room.”
“I don’t know if you should keep them in your room…”
“Let’s go let them off at the park,” I said.
“Ugh. People will be so mad.”
I laughed. “Exactly. Then we’ll run away. It’ll be funny.”
He nodded towards the kitchen. “Do we bring that lot?”
“Absolutely! The more the merrier.”
The park was only a few hundred metres from our house. We bundled ourselves up in coats and strolled down together. It turned out nobody even cared about us letting off fireworks in the dark public spaces as loads went off all around us, filling the sky with bright colours.
I hugged Sam. I kissed Adam. But I couldn’t stop thinking about Freddie and what he’d told Sam to rile him up so much. Every now and again, I’d turn and half-expect him to appear in his dark coat and brooding gaze.
A few people sang ‘Happy Birthday’ to me as we walked arm in arm back to Butt Lane. Some kind of event was going on down by the seafront; we could see the lights and hear the rumble of music drifting up the hill on the calm, coastal winds.
Once we were back, I finally snuck off to grab the bag Freddie left. I took it upstairs to my room and pulled out two presents. So, he had bought me something.
I checked the tags. Yes, he had. One was addressed to me.
I frowned, wondering why he’d handed me the bag and not Sam. Was I meant to tell Sam he’d given this to me? Or was he trying to be sly about it?
It was a small, wrapped box. I opened it quickly, tearing at the paper to find a delicate bracelet with a storm-cloud charm attached to it.
All I could think about was how he’d watched me sing ‘Thunderstruck’ last New Year’s Eve. But it couldn’t be that…
There were loud footsteps on the stairs, so I quickly crammed the paper and bracelet under my pillow. Sam knocked, then poked his head round the door. “You ok, birthday girl?”
“Yes!” I squeaked, then proceeded to distract him with his present from Freddie: a Lynx deodorant giftbox. He put it aside straight away.
“Shall we exchange gifts now?” he asked, a pleased grin on his face.
Considering we’d been spending our birthdays together since we were turning fourteen, it was remarkable that this was the first year we’d decided to exchange presents.
I leant across to my bedside table and took out Sam’s present from the bottom drawer.
I’d wrapped it in Christmas paper because that was all I had.
“Really?” he said. “Are you not sick of Christmas yet?”
“I am. But I also didn’t have time to buy birthday paper and gift wrapping is stupid anyway.”
“How is wrapping stupid?”
“It’s a waste of paper. And most of the time, adults already know what they’re getting anyway. Why wrap it?”
Sam shrugged. “It looks nice? It makes it more fun?”
“Does it though? Really?”
“Shut up and open your present,” he said, handing me the gift he’d been hiding behind his back.
“See. This proves my point, entirely. This is clearly a weapon of some sort.”
“It’s not a fucking weapon,” he sputtered, his eyes bright with humour.
It turns out to be worse than a weapon. The moron thinks he’s funny and has wrapped a rounders bat.
“I’m well glad I got you something shit too,” I said.
“How is that shit? You said last summer that you wanted to play rounders.”
“No, I never!”
“You so did.”
I scoffed. “Ok, so let’s pretend that did happen… Last summer, Sam?”
“You’re so ungrateful. And what do you mean you got me a shit present?” He ripped the paper and snorted as he took out the shittest socks I could find in Brighton Mall. They looked like meat.
“Now you have meat socks,” I said with a grin.
“You know, I’m not even disappointed. This would’ve taken you time to find.”
“It did. It was between them and the sharks that make it look like they’re eating your ankles.”
“Sexy.”
I smiled, chewing on my bottom lip. I slapped the end of the bat into my hand a few times. “Thanks for the weapon.”
“Again, it’s for rounders.”