32. Love it. Love you
Love it. Love you
Mike
“What the fuck?” I muttered as Ollie, Felix, and I walked into The Badger’s Sett.
“Thank Christ you’re here,” said Jimbo. “I can’t bloody well deal with this.
Look at the state of them! And there’s that bloody pony, in my pub !
The fat bastard’s done a shit by the bar.
I know we’re not classy like those posh joints you kids go to in London, but we don’t want actual horse shit on the floor. ”
“Bloody hell,” said Felix as he rubbed his hands down his face. “This escalated quickly.”
“My husband!” shouted my sister. “My big, beautiful soon-to-be-husband! He’s here!
” She stood up as if to go to him, but then swayed on her feet.
“Ooh, head rush.” She collapsed back down into her seat like a ragdoll.
“He’ll probably need to carry me,” she told the rest of the table of women.
“He does that sometimes, you know.” She lowered her voice to a stage whisper, which was almost louder than her speaking voice. “It’s very sexy.”
“I like it when they do that,” said Lottie, who was staring at Ollie with a dreamy expression on her face.
Lottie didn’t even have alcohol as an excuse, as she didn’t drink.
“I really, really like it too,” said Vicky, which was a surprise, seeing as she looked like she was asleep on Claire’s shoulder. Her eyes were closed, and there was a small smile on her face. “It feels warm and safe. It might be my favourite.”
“Ugh, barf,” snapped Claire, before grabbing a shot from in front of her. “You guys are gross. It should be a hard no on the carrying you around thing. You’re not bloody toddlers. Now, do your shots.”
“Yes, darlings,” slurred Margot, who had her arm around my mother. “You mustn’t let them carry you around. Bad form.”
“I wouldn’t mind it,” said Mum, who then, to my horror, gave Jimbo a slow wink.
“My little boy!” cried Bianca when she caught sight of Felix.
Felix was well over six foot; little, he was not. But then her smile dropped as she squinted up at us all. “But you’re naughty boys. This is only girls tonight. Only for hens. No cockerels.”
Lucy giggled into her shot glass. “Yeah, no cock erels, boys.” She then turned to Felix and winked sloppily. “Until later,” she said in another loud stage whisper.
“Barf again,” said Claire. “Right then, one, two, three…”
“Alla salute!” shouted Bianca. All three of us rushed forward as they lifted their full shot glasses—other than Lottie who lifted her can of coke instead—repeating Bianca’s words, but we were too late to stop them downing the lot, except thankfully for Vicky, who was still asleep on Claire’s shoulder.
“I think I’m gonna throw up,” Claire said after a moment, her face going an unnatural shade of green as she bolted away from the table.
Vicky started to topple over when her human pillow disappeared, but I shot into the booth to hold her up before she could face plant onto the chair beside her.
Then I had her soft weight in my arms; her lavender scent mixed with tequila around me. I heard her let out a small sigh as she snuggled further into my chest. Her small hand fell into my crotch, and I gritted my teeth. I did not want to be hard, sitting at a table with my mother and sister.
“I need to get you home, love,” I muttered into the hair at the top of her head.
“I love the cabin,” she whispered, and I froze.
The others were trying to get the rest of the women up.
Mum was arguing with Felix about what time it was.
“Hetty,” Felix said with extreme patience. “It’s three in the bloody morning. Jimbo wants you and that pony out of here. Why on earth did you bring Legolas anyway?”
“Weirdest hen party I’ve ever seen,” said Ollie as he and Lottie tried to extract Margot from her chair.
Lottie was giggling too hard to be of much use.
I knew I should probably help Felix, who was dealing with both my mum, his mum, and my sister, but I ignored them all to focus on what Vicky had just said.
“You like the cabin, love?” I asked in a soft voice.
“Love it,” she told me, her voice fading as she relaxed more into my side. “Love you.”
My heart felt like it was beating outside of my chest. I had to swallow against the lump in my throat before I could speak again. “I love you too, sweetheart.”
Then, to my horror, I felt wet through my shirt.
Vicky was crying.
“Hey,” I said, gathering her closer. “Why are you sad?”
“I miss you,” she whispered.
“Christ, I miss you too, love. So much.”
“Not for me.”
“What’s isn’t?”
“You’re not.”
“Mayweather,” snapped Ollie, who was dragging his mum out of her chair with Lottie still giggling too much to help. “We’re going, mate. Jimbo’s about to lose his shit.”
So I stood up with Vicky in my arms, dead asleep now. “Bullshit, I’m not for you,” I muttered in a firm voice.
When we made it outside the pub, the cold air hit us like a brick wall, and it was enough to wake Vicky up.
When her eyelids fluttered open, the cold must have sobered her up a little, and she stiffened.
“Put me down,” she said.
“Vicky, I?—”
“Put me down .” Her voice rose enough that the motley crew around us fell silent to look at us. “I mean it, Mike.”
I had no choice but to lower her to her feet.
She swayed for a moment, and I reached out for her elbow to steady her, but she flinched away.
“No,” she semi-shouted.
I put up both my hands in a gesture of surrender. “Okay, love. I won’t touch you.”
“It hurts too much,” she said in a broken voice, and I felt that chest tightness again. She shook her head.
“I’m hurting too, baby. I miss you too. If you’d just…”
“No!” she was nearly screaming now. She staggered back and nearly fell, but that small fat pony was behind her. Her hand went into his fur, and then she sank down, wrapping her arms around the pony’s neck and shoving her face into the deep fur.
Legolas snorted softly and nuzzled her with his nose.
“Mike,” Ollie said, stepping in front of me to block my view of Vicky wrapped around Legolas. “Leave it for tonight, mate. I’ll see her back to the Manor. She’s in no state for this now. And anyway, you need to help Felix.”
I glanced over at Felix, who was struggling to guide both his mother and mine to his car whilst Lucy happily hung off his neck. I sighed in frustration as I acknowledged the truth of his words.
Love it. Love you.
“Look.” Ollie cut into my thoughts. “I’m no stranger to a good grovel. But you’ve got to pick your moments. This is the first time Vicky’s ever been drunk in her life. Now is not the time to pick her up caveman style and take her home with you.”
“She’s miserable, Ollie,” I said in a pained voice. “She’s making herself miserable, and I know I can make her happy. I know I can. She’s lost weight again. I don’t think she’s sleeping. I’m worried.”
“She’s fine. We’ve?—”
“She’s not fine,” I snapped. “Look, I’ve been doing my research, and Autistic women are more likely to suffer from depression and…” I broke off as my eyes started to sting. I couldn’t bring myself to repeat the terrifying statistics I’d found. “If I lost her, I’d––”
“Mike,” Ollie said firmly, one of his hands going to the back of my neck, and the other, to my shoulder.
“We’re looking after her, I promise. When she’s not with Mum at the Manor, she’s under twenty-four-hour surveillance in London.
And we’re not letting her hide away when she’s hurt anymore.
We’ve let her down as a family, but that’s over now. So she’s not alone.”
“Okay,” I said in a broken voice.
“You’ll get your chance,” Ollie told me before he gave my back a slap and moved away. “But it won’t be tonight.”
I sniffed, took a deep breath in and out, and squared my shoulders. It took all I had to walk away from Vicky, letting Ollie untangle her from the pony.
“Come on, Jimbo,” I heard Mum slur at Jimbo as he emerged from the pub, glowering at her and everyone around her. “How’s about it, love?”
Then my mother threw her arms around the pub landlord and kissed him on the cheek.
What I could see of Jimbo’s face under his thick beard went bright pink, and his eyes flew wide.
“Er… Hetty,” he said, his arms going out to the side. “I think you might be a bit worse for wear. Maybe when you’re sober and ponyless, we could?—”
“I love your beard!” she shouted, and I decided that was enough.
I extracted my mum from a terrified Jimbo, and then Felix and I herded them all into our cars.
Ollie had picked Vicky up now and was striding over to his car where he’d already deposited his mum and Lottie. As they went past my windshield, Vicky looked straight at me, and I almost surged out of the car to get to her.
The sadness and longing in her eyes were painful to witness.
I gritted my teeth as I started the car and then shook my head to clear it, but I couldn’t get her voice out of my mind.
Love it. Love you.