Chapter 7
KIKI
As the temperature rose in the bus, Kiki wished she’d been able drive to the boutique for today’s half-shift, but her car was currently parked outside the high rise, and if she had to diagnose its condition, she’d say it was end of life.
The last twice she’d driven it, it had clapped out – once on the motorway, when a passing traffic cop had stopped and got it started again, and once at a busy junction in the city centre.
If she closed her eyes, she could still hear the irate horns of the cars that queued up behind her for what felt like a week and a half, until two kind blokes jumped out of their transit van and pushed her up onto the pavement.
She’d then had to spend over a hundred quid to get a repair service out to tow her home.
One of the teachers at work had a husband who was a car mechanic, and he’d given it a look over and said it was something to do with the spark plugs.
Or was it the alternator? He’d managed to do a temporary fix, but that had only lasted a couple of days, and then it had refused to start again.
Thankfully, the boutique was only fifteen minutes away on the bus, and that would give them plenty of time to get home, and changed before they headed to the screening at the drama academy.
Just thinking about that place, and about going there tonight, about seeing him, confronting him, demanding that he acknowledge her, made her stomach churn, so she diverted her thoughts, nudging Ava, who was shoulder to shoulder with her in the double seat.
‘Any word from your dad?’ she asked, trying to sound breezy, as if this wasn’t one of the pressing issues they were dealing with today. She’d had a quick glimpse at her phone when she’d first got on the bus and saw that Kev hadn’t even opened her message.
Ava’s huge brown eyes lifted from her phone and met hers. ‘Nothing. He must have got held on the rig, Mum. It’s the only explanation.’
Kiki didn’t want to counter that she could think of a few other explanations.
Maybe that Kev had bailed on them yet again.
Or that he didn’t want to spend the money it would take to come down here.
Or to buy the new outfit that he’d promised Ava.
It was a belated birthday present, supposedly to make up for the fact that on her actual birthday last month, she’d received a card and a two-minute phone call full of promises.
She fanned her face, not sure if the sudden heat rising up her neck was caused by the temperature on the bus or the fact that she was about to tell a whopping big porkie to the person she’d always taught never to lie.
‘I’m sure you’re right, honey. He wouldn’t miss this.
Let’s just keep our fingers crossed that he gets here. ’
‘I’m manifesting it,’ Ava told her.
The corners of Kiki’s lips raised in amusement. ‘Manifesting it?’
‘Yep, I forgot to tell you that it’s my new thing.
There’s an influencer on TikTok called Bryony Browne – she’s really famous, Mum – has a million followers.
Anyway, she came to the Academy to teach us all about manifesting.
You just have to put the energy out there, imagine it happening and you’ll attract whatever it is you want to bring into your life.
All the students at the Academy do it and some of them swear it works.
When Casey Lowen came to the Academy to star in our last show, she said she manifested a part on The Clydeside, and she got it, and now she’s a huge star. ’
‘In that case, can you get to work on a lottery win and a car with four legal tyres, a working engine and less than 90,000 miles on the clock?’
Kiki remembered the moment Ava had burst in and excitedly told her that an actual real-life TV star was coming to work with them.
Casey Lowen was one of the many celebrities who had done shows or workshops at the Academy.
Clearly, Ollie Chiles could pull in favours in high places.
That thought made her stomach begin to churn, so it was a relief when the sound of Ava’s giggle distracted her and made her laugh.
She didn’t hear it often enough these days.
The last year had been such a stress for her girl, with her schoolwork, exams and then moving full-time to the Academy.
Much as she loved it there, there had been a ferociously competitive audition process for a starring role in the next Academy theatre production, a Christmas show that would take place in December.
There had been months of auditions – dancing, singing and acting – which, according to Ava, had all been filmed by the documentary crew for the three-part series that was being screened tonight.
However, the cast of the festive production was going to be announced tonight after the screening, which was all very well if a second series was going to be commissioned, but if not, the audience would never learn who got the parts.
Of course, if it was Ava, then Kiki wanted the world to know.
But if it was one of the kids whose parents had stumped up for extra lessons and coaching…
well, that would just add another injustice to the large pile of them that Kiki was holding up at the moment.
She had to make this better. Had to protect Ava’s heart.
She wasn’t one of those parents who thought her daughter was entitled to win everything, but a level playing field was the least she could hope for.
Besides, what mum didn’t want her child’s dreams to come true?
Ava had gone back to enlisting the help of Bryony Browne on TikTok to manifest solutions to her worries, so Kiki left her to it.
The movement of the bus was so rhythmic, and the temperature so warm, that she closed her eyes and let her mind be still.
But only for a second. Because, as always, the memories replayed in her head.
For years, this was how she’d dealt with the fact that she could only be with the man she loved in snatched moments.
She’d just close her eyes, and pick out one of her favourite memories.
She’d replay it in her mind, and she’d savour every single moment, every glance, every word, every touch.
Today, perhaps because she was contemplating the abrupt end of her relationship with him, her mind took her right back to the beginning.
To the first day they met, in school, as two sixteen-year-old kids.
It all played out like a movie in her head.
‘Anyone sitting here?’ he’d asked, gesturing to the empty stool next to her in chemistry.
Kiki took a moment to process what he was asking her.
There was no one in this whole class, actually no one in this whole year group, who thought for a second that anyone would be sitting there.
Of course it was empty. It had been that way for four months since her pregnancy had begun to show.
Once upon a time, Kev had sat there, but now he was over at the long table at the front with all his mates.
She still hadn’t worked that one out. Everyone knew he was her baby’s dad – they’d been going out together since the third year Christmas dance two years ago – and yet, he wasn’t scorned or treated with disdain for knocking up his girlfriend.
In fact, sometimes it seemed like his pals had put him on a pedestal, like he was this big man in school now.
So big, he’d distanced himself from her, dumped her, and she’d heard rumours that his parents were considering moving him to a new school.
Meanwhile, it felt like she’d become a social outcast. Although, she was aware that she had to take some responsibility for that.
For the last couple of years, she’d let her friendships drift, because she’d spent every spare moment with Kev, or looking after her mum, who had lost herself in a bottle since her dad died.
Ironic. He’d passed from cirrhosis of the liver two years ago, and now her mum was coping by going down the same path.
Her former friends just didn’t get it. They were worried about make-up or getting tickets to a concert, while Kiki’s biggest concerns every day were keeping her mum and vodka in separate rooms, and finding time to be with Kev when her mum had crashed out somewhere.
Her mum hadn’t cared that Kev would sleep over.
In fact, Kiki wasn’t even sure that she noticed.
And, of course, Kev loved the freedom of hanging out at her place.
He would lie to his parents, tell them he was having sleepovers with his mates, and instead, they had the flat to themselves right up until closing time at the pub her mum worked in.
Or, rather, used to work in. She’d been fired a few weeks ago for drinking the profits.
At first, it had been pretty innocent. Sleeping in the same bed. Watching TV. Cuddling. Talking half the night. But then there had been that one time they’d gone so much further and now the evidence of that was straining her back as she sat alone in class.
Some of her old mates still spoke to her, but it was polite. Cursory. And none of them were in this class, so for the last four months, she’d sat at the back, at a table designed for four, with three empty chairs next to her.
Now this guy was asking if the seat was taken.
And not just any guy. The best-looking one in the school, the bloke that almost every girl would give up their entire Rihanna and Katy Perry collections for if it meant he’d sit next to them.
He usually sat on the other side of the room with his mate, but now he was standing there waiting for her answer.
‘N… n… no. No one is sitting there.’
Was this a joke? Or a dare? Oh shit, that was it. All the guys at Kev’s table at the front had now turned around and were watching them. They’d obviously organised this to take the piss out of her and add just another layer of humiliation to her already decidedly crap life.