CRAIG
CRAIG
“Are you almost finished with your reading?” Mum knocks on my open door even as she passes through it.
“Yeah.” I don’t bother to lift my head from the textbook. The words are starting to blur together on the page. “Why?”
“We’re going out. You have half an hour.”
My unauthorized excursion to the farm yesterday did not result in the upset I thought it might.
When I returned home, Mum was out for a stroll with Christopher, and Dad was shut away in his office. Honestly, it made me wonder whether I could have been setting the punishment for myself this whole time. Like all that I sacrificed for them this past week has been of no consequence whatsoever.
Is it weird that I think the bollocking I’d expected may have been preferable?
Probably.
Mum has already disappeared from my room by the time her statement jars some sense back into me.
I follow, and she’s halfway down the staircase when I catch her up. “By ‘we,’ you mean…?”
“Yes, Craig. You, too. We’re all going out, so get a move on.”
“Where to?”
“Have you finished that chapter?” She counters, arching a brow.
“Do I have to dress smart?”
“You have to hurry up.” Her tight-lippedness about this outing has me nervous.
I stand my ground. “Mum?”
When her eyes flick up and away, my worst fear is confirmed, and I don’t wait for her answer before shaking my head. “We’ve been invited over to the Tinwells,” she relents too late.
“No.”
“It’s not up for debate.”
“Absolutely not!” I turn and start back up the stairs.
“Kathryn’s making paella. Young Gary has an exciting announcement to make, and he wants us all there to hear it.”
My foot stops mid-step. “What?”
“Don’t,” she warns. “Don’t you dare start in with your nonsense! You need to let go of this grudge you’re clinging to, all over one silly mistake. Gary’s holding out an olive branch here. The two of you used to get on so well.”
Silly mistake? I drop my head.
There’s so much wrong with what Mum’s just said; I don’t know where to even start. Olive branch, my arse!
But, yeah, sure, a time did exist when Gary Tinwell and I ‘got along.’ It was a time he’d use me for money, and I let him so as not to cause friction between our families. Of all the people to betray me, though, I genuinely never thought it would be him.
I thought we had an understanding, and that was my silly mistake. Nothing remains between us that can now ever be repaired.
Especially in light of what I learned yesterday. “And attempting to rape a girl? That a silly mistake too, is it?”
A vicious slap to the bannister whips me around. “You weren’t there that night any more than I was, Craig. So, you can pull yourself back on that accusation!”
So, she knows. I’m shaking my head again. Shaking in general, actually. “It’s true, Mum. He—”
“There are two sides to every story, mister!”
“Except his is the only one you care about, right?”
For a single, awful millisecond, I brace for her next slap to be across my face. Instead, taking a deep breath, she closes the distance between us by two steps and fixes me with a harsh blue stare. “Let’s be honest here, Craig. That girl has nothing to do with this. Because what matters to you is only ever you .”
That hits me as hard as if she genuinely had slapped me. “Mum?”
“You just can’t stop blaming him, can you? Because it’s easier than taking responsibility for yourself. But the big thing you need to start seeing, son, is that it was your indiscretion — yours and that boy’s — that rocked the ground you stood on. Not Gary’s. And it’s way beyond damn time you stopped shooting the messenger!”
I can’t breathe. She doesn’t talk about that. We never talk about that.
Mum quickly realizes how dangerous a misstep she’s made, and in a blink, the anger drains from her face, crushing it. That’s when Dad intrudes on us, emerging from the nursery and pulling up at the top of the staircase.
“That kid will be reading himself stories before too long. You mark my words.” His gruff chuckle stops as abruptly as he does, sharp eyes taking in the scene. “Anything you want to share with me, Craig?”
“Go on and finish up, love, please.” Tone soft, Mum taps a single finger, featherlight, against my elbow.
I blanch away from the touch, her endearment stinging in the aftermath of what she’s just said. “I’m going out.”
“Excuse me?” Dad starts toward us before I manage to convince my body to move. “You’ll do no such thing. Listen to your mother. We have plans, and the clock’s ticking.”
“No.” I slip around Mum while Dad’s approach has her distracted. “Your plans aren’t mine.”
“You do not want to push us on this, Craig.”
Except…
Except, as I track the direct jab of his thumb over his shoulder and toward my room, I embrace the absolute certainty that I do. I do want to push them on this because the mere thought of sharing air with Gary this evening feels like poison to my blood. My eyes slide to the door.
He catches me on it. “That would be very stupid, boy!”
“Disagree.” I need to drive, clear my head. It’s not as if I’ll genuinely be missed anyway. “I won’t be late.”
Mum gasps as Dad thunders past her in pursuit of me. He catches up to me just as I step off the bottom stair, grabbing a fistful of my shirt and slamming me back against the wall. My head thuds off it, my teeth nip my tongue. But I barely register the pain as he leans in close, his icy glare — so much like Alex’s, so much more vicious — pinning me. “We’ve been exceptionally lenient with you these past few weeks, your mother and I.”
“Dad…”
“Loosened the reins. You’re almost a man now, son, and we thought to give you the chance to start acting like one. But there’s only so much I’m willing to let slide.”
“Dad, please. Let me go.”
His grip tightens. His breath hot on my face. “I’d think very carefully here, if I were you, about your next move.”
“Please.” I’m entirely willing to admit I’m scared. I squirm, trying to claim some space from him, and he responds with a warning shove that jolts my spine.
“Stop it!” I hear Mum’s feet quickstep down the stairs toward us, but I can’t turn enough to see her. “Enough,” she says, and a moment later, her hand appears on his arm. She doesn’t touch me. She doesn’t so much as look my way. “Ease off, Phillip. You’re hurting him.”
Dad clenches his jaw and flicks her a strained glance. He holds perfectly still for what feels like a whole eternity before his fingers uncurl from my chest and he takes a step back.
Then, without a beat of hesitation, I bolt.
“Phillip!” Mum screams at my back as I launch myself out the door. But I don’t need to look behind to know Dad’s not about to let me off so easy.
I retract my earlier consideration; the bollocking is absolutely not the better option.
The last I hear from him as I escape outside, sprinting for Roxy, is a threat. An explicit warning of the reception I can expect when I skulk back home. I flinch, but I don’t stop.
There’s a good reason I never shut my car away in the garage.
Roxy’s beautiful, and she’s powerful. But the thing about her I love the most is the freedom she gives me. The moment I’m sat in the driver’s seat, the steering wheel under my hands, I feel my whole body ease with a sense of control I’m granted in no other part of my life. Bolstered by her eager purr, no time is wasted in pitching it out the gates.
Not until I’m free of our estate, turning off the narrow country road, do I pull into a lay-by and give myself a minute to assess. And to calm my frantic heart. My eyes keep darting to the rearview mirror, expecting to see Dad’s 4x4 pulling in behind me any minute.
I call Alex first, but he doesn’t pick up. He didn’t pick up any of my calls yesterday, either, and he hasn’t called me back. He's too busy, I guess, or stubbornly set on payback. But then, Alex’s would be the first place I’ll be hunted down anyway.
I’ve left the house in only a T-shirt, and it is not a gentle evening. Thankfully, the clothes Ashleigh returned to me are still piled on the back seat.
Reaching over the middle console, I retrieve my parka and shirk it on. An errant smile teases my lips as I register the tidy patch-up on the shoulder tear. Then I start Roxy up again and head for the only other place I can be sure of an easy welcome.
An eight-mile drive beyond Yoverton, around the halfway point to college, on a route cutting through wild terrain, the pit is nothing more than a parking area situated within the unfathomable vastness of the moors. By day, hikers, dog walkers, and adventuring families use it. By night, young drivers with fast cars adopt it.
Tonight, the place is heaving. I quit counting the cars at thirty, their blazing headlights vanquishing the dark. Bodies weave and cluster in the spaces between, and the exhaust-fumed air thrums with bass from competing stereos. Despite my mood, the charged atmosphere quickens my pulse.
I immediately hunt out Roxy’s big blue sister—Naz’s six-year-old Skyline—and park in the nearest available space, blasting my horn sharply.
Shutting off the engine and opening the door, I spot Scotty’s short, stocky form and Naz’s hulking one meandering their way over.
“Hey Roxy, baby, I thought I’d lost you.” Naz runs his hand over the length of my car in a deliberate effort to provoke me. Scotty laughs an ear-offending bray.
I bite back a reaction as I climb out and face the pair. “Been busy.”
“Oh, dude, all work and no play…”
“Yeah, well.” A practised smirk crooks my lips. “That’s why I’m here now, right?” Naz, I know through college — we’re both studying A Level Law. Scotty, I know only through Naz. These guys are privy to nothing about my home life and close to nothing about me. It’s a significant part of the solace I find in coming here, and I fully intend to keep it that way. “Better late than never.”
“Thought we might have forgotten by now, did you?” Scotty narrows his eyes on me while Naz props his arse on Roxy’s bonnet, shaking his head and retrieving a hipflask from his coat pocket. “Like you eating my dust is something I’d ever let slip my mind. And getting what I’m owed will be all the sweeter for the wait, I’m sure.”
“You’re hilarious!” I grit my teeth, holding my face in check. That jacked-up fix of a race may feel like an entire lifetime ago, but damn, does it still smart. “I owe you diddly-squat.”
Naz sniggers and offers me the flask. He stumbles as my shove unseats him. “Whoa! Such a sore loser, Craigy-boy.” Unscrewing the lid, he takes a swig and then again invites me to drink. I fold my arms. “It’s most unbecoming.”
“Seriously, though.” Snatching the flask from Naz’s lips and grinning moronically, Scotty cranks up my annoyance with a wink. “I don’t want any hard feelings. A quickie with your fine lady here,” he pats Roxy, “and we’ll be all square.”
There’s no way in hell that’s happening. I never agreed to the wager—I wouldn’t ever put my car up for some stupid bet. I’ve invested way too much work and money into Roxy, and I’ve witnessed Scotty’s careless treatment of his own lady way too often.
“Or, hey, tell you what,” Scotty goes on when it becomes clear I have no intention of responding. “I’m feeling generous. Your pansy-ass up for losing to me again? Make it interesting this time, all or quits, Deadman’s Hook?”
The palm slam to his chest is reflexive.