Chapter 6
‘You really don’t have to do this,’ I muttered to Jonah, having found him sitting in the living room in front of a coffee table covered in presents, balloons bobbing around his legs. To no one’s surprise, a longer-term foster carer hadn’t suddenly become available in the last few hours, and Jonah would be staying with us for another night. Foster carers were in short enough supply as it was. Foster carers with space for an older teenage boy were on the endangered-species list.
He shrugged, giving me a rueful glance from under the scraggly fringe that had escaped his hood. ‘It’s less awkward than hiding upstairs. But I can go if you want. Let you do your family thing.’
I tried to hide my surprise at this response. When Nicky referred to Jonah as a vampire, she didn’t mean the pleasant, Twilight kind. We were in the same class for only two subjects, history and science, and since joining our school he’d been slinking in late to a seat at the back and spending most lessons staring out of the window with his earphones in, reading books that only I knew he’d taken out on my library card or with his head on his desk, asleep. Anyone else would have been the recipient of our history teacher’s caustic tongue-lashing at the very least, if not kicked out. My best friend, Alicia, decided Mr Matthews was scared to confront such a blatant rebel.
‘That’s ridiculous. He isn’t scared of a student. He probably weighs twice as much as Jonah,’ my other friend in the class, Katie, said as we walked to our English lesson a couple of weeks ago.
‘Not even one who got kicked out his old school for shivving a teacher?’ Alicia shot back.
‘If he’d shivved someone, he’d be in youth detention, not at Bigley,’ I said, before pushing through the classroom door. ‘Those rumours are a load of rubbish.’
‘There must be some reason teachers pretend not to notice him being weird,’ Alicia said, trailing after me to our seats. ‘Don’t you think he’s creepy?’
Katie dumped her folder out on the table. ‘Kind of. But in a hot way, if you know what I mean?’
‘Hot creepy?’ Alicia, who had the biggest crush on Luke Hughes, the nicest boy in Year 11, screwed up her face. ‘That’s rank. Libby, back me up here.’
At that exact second I glanced out of the window and saw the person we were discussing trudging across the car park towards the exit. He had on the same jacket, sweatshirt and faded school trousers that he always wore, a rucksack on his shoulders. Head down, scrappy hair partially obscuring his blank face.
I knew all too well why teachers left certain kids with unwashed clothes and a defensive posture alone.
‘He’s probably got reasons for being how he is.’
‘What, hot or creepy?’
‘I don’t think he’s creepy! Just… finding it hard to fit in at a new school when everyone’s already decided he’s a serial killer.’
We turned to face the front of the room as our English teacher called for everyone’s attention.
‘I notice you didn’t deny finding him hot,’ Katie whispered, earning a glare from the teacher as she and Alicia burst into giggles.
Did I find Jonah King hot, now he was sitting hunched up on my sofa, while my parents fussed about in the kitchen?
Honestly? I found him… more intriguing than I was comfortable with. Mum had given us all a lift to and from school, rather than making Jonah walk as Nicky and I normally did. As always, Mum let the foster kid have the front passenger seat, inviting him to choose a radio station or a CD from the pile of random genres crammed into the glove box. I’d spent a lot of car journeys listening to kiddie pop or heavy metal, and braced myself for whatever depressing emo dirge Jonah might normally be blasting through his headphones.
Instead, he twisted around in the seat to where I huddled in the back, feeling guilty about how grumpy I felt.
The curve of brow above his amber eyes still made me think of a wolf.
I could feel my face turning red for no other reason than I was a socially awkward sixteen-year-old with a not-unattractive, broodingly mysterious boy looking right at me.
‘It’s your birthday. What do you want to listen to?’
If anything, that made me blush even harder. What did I want to listen to, or what did I want Jonah King to think I wanted to listen to?
‘It’s fine,’ I mumbled, shifting my gaze to a field of sheep outside the window. ‘You choose.’
A few seconds later the opening bars to an obscure local band filled the car. I glanced across in surprise, catching the tiniest hint of a smile from Jonah in the wing mirror. I wasn’t one to advertise my tastes on branded clothes or fan merch, but Katie, Alicia and I had been to their concert in Nottingham a few months ago. The bag I’d bought was my favourite shade of bright blue, so I’d starting using it for school. Quickly averting my gaze back to the sheep, I reminded myself for the millionth time that I really needed to stop letting wild rumours influence my opinion of people. Especially this person.
Now, in response to his question about hanging around while I opened my presents and did other birthday things, I found I not only didn’t mind him staying downstairs – after all, how awful would I have to be to banish him upstairs on his first proper evening here? – I sort-of wanted him to.
‘If you stay, it might help everyone try not to embarrass me quite so much.’
‘Okay.’ He attempted a smile, but mostly just looked tense.
‘My parents have been fostering since before Nicky was born. You being here honestly isn’t a big deal.’
He raised one eyebrow at me from under his hair.
‘Okay, I know for you it’s a huge deal. I just mean we’re used to different people being around. Birthdays, Christmas, whatever. It’s cool.’
‘The more the merrier?’
‘Are you describing yourself as merry?’
He laughed then. A deep rumble that, for a split second, produced the urge to put my hand against his chest to feel the vibrations. Fortunately, before I could feel any more embarrassed, Nicky walked in.
‘They’re fussing about the cake,’ she announced, flopping onto the other end of my sofa. ‘Neither of them remembered to buy more matches after the fire-starter kid moved on, and Dad’s trying to light fifteen candles using the stove.’
‘You mean sixteen.’
‘Nope.’ She grinned at me. ‘They could only find fifteen.’
I slumped back into the cushion, body in full post-sundae sugar crash. ‘Please tell them I don’t want any candles.’
‘Come on, Libby. They want candles, and that’s what matters here. Them proving what attentive, loving parents they are, despite having had no sleep last night.’ She looked at Jonah. ‘No offence.’
Before he could respond, the door flew open and Mum walked in carrying a cake topped with fifteen unlit candles and a wax crayon. Dad was right behind her, singing ‘Happy Birthday’ at full volume.
After a slightly cringey present opening, we ate Mum’s home-made chocolate cake followed by takeaway pizza, and, sticking to family tradition, Dad set up the karaoke machine.
‘You really don’t have to stay for this,’ I reminded Jonah, who threw me an amused look conveying that he wanted nothing more than to hear four weird people sing cheesy pop songs.
It wasn’t unusual for the teenagers we fostered to start off by spending a lot of time downstairs, rather than in their bedrooms. Being dropped off in a house with strangers meant there were countless unwritten rules that were often a world away from anything they were used to. Even a small thing like having a drink posed numerous questions: Can I help myself to a drink, or do I have to ask? Can I have the juice, or is that only for certain times? Do I have to drink it at the table, or can I take it into another room? What do I do with the glass when I’m finished?
Generally speaking, they figured this out by watching how we did it. Or at least doing it when one of us was there so we could tell them. They weren’t hanging out with us primarily because they liked us, but because they were working out whether they could begin to trust us, even the tiniest bit. For many of them, they’d already moved on before the answer to that question could become yes.
But, seriously, karaoke?
‘Maybe we should play a board game instead?’ I suggested.
The rest of the family looked at me askance.
‘But we always do karaoke on our birthdays!’ Nicky said, a wicked glint in her eyes.
‘We don’t usually make someone endure that torture on their first night with us.’ I didn’t add that this was because my parents never welcomed a new child around a birthday but hoped that my tone implied it.
‘Torture?’ Mum said, pretending to be offended before grinning idiotically at Jonah. ‘Speak for yourself.’
‘What do you reckon, Jonah?’ Dad asked, microphone in hand. ‘We’ve got a cupboard full of board games ranging from tiddlywinks to Risk.’
‘I reckon we should start with Bon Jovi,’ he replied, with a face so straight I knew he must be laughing on the inside.
‘Fine!’ I snapped, hating how huffy I sounded. ‘Fine.’
I grabbed the other microphone, stood to my feet and decided that if Jonah King wanted to hear me crucify ‘Livin’ on a Prayer’, then who was I to deny him that pleasure? It wasn’t as though he had a high opinion – make that any opinion – about a girl like me, anyway.
If we were going to do this, then I might as well enjoy myself.
At ten, Mum insisted we called it a night, sending us all up to bed while she and Dad cleared up the wrapping paper and leftover pizza.
‘I’m guessing that after tonight you might be relieved to move on to a long-term placement,’ Nicky said, pausing at the top of the stairs to grin at Jonah. ‘Maybe that was my parents’ plan all along. They are expert at this stuff by now.’
‘Nah.’ Jonah gave a small shake of his head. He’d taken off his hoodie at some point, and his hair, sweaty after his eventually being unable to resist joining in with our medley of rock classics, was pushed back, showing a smooth forehead and the full impact of his amber eyes. ‘Watching Tony impersonate Beyoncé was a perfect distraction from the craphole that is my life right now. I’m kind of hoping I have to stay a bit longer.’
Was it my imagination, or did his eyes flicker to where I was waiting behind Nicky on the stairs?
‘It’ll be September before we karaoke again.’ Nicky laughed. ‘That’s my nineteenth, by the way, in case you are still here and want to start planning my present early.’
‘Duly noted.’
It was a definite glance my way, that time. A ghost of a nod before he disappeared into his bedroom.
Nicky said nothing, but I knew her well enough to decipher the look on her face as we reached the tiny attic landing.
‘Seems like the vampire has a heart after all. Be interesting to see what happens if he does stay.’
I slipped through my door before she could interpret the look on mine.