AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Shifting on the bed, I stole another pillow and pushed it under my neck. Mark moved with me as we both found comfort.
“Stay here for a bit?” He spoke into my jumper.
“Of course.”
I would. Because he was here, and I didn’t want to admit to myself how much I needed to lie here with him, where things were uncomplicated and there were no expectations or needs or wants or anything. I could be myself with him, and as he fell asleep, so did I.
Hugo
I’d almost made it through another week, but it felt like a month of cramming in as many double shifts as I could get my hands on, and my head was constantly swimming. One more shift to go…
You forgot to text again, asshat. FFS.
She isn’t wrong, I thought as I shot off another pathetic one-word apology text to my sister. She wasted no time biting my head offin response.
You know what Mum and Dad are like, and I don’t need the aggro. Text, OK? Just spent an hour on the phone trying to stop Dad from doing a midweek road trip to check on your sorry arse.
I needed a day off, but being off meant being at home and dealing with Lewis, risking his wrath and his anger. He’d been in a foul mood lately, and I knew far too well what that meant.
I needed proper sleep. My stomach was screaming for nutrition, which was something I was unwilling to give in to.
I wasn’t stupid. I knew perfectly well what I was doing to myself, but there were always those rules at the back of my mind, and they scared the living daylights out of me.
As long as I ate just enough to not bulk out my stomach, I would be safe. I drank plenty of water. I allowed myself a one-shot dose of sugar when needed, mostly through boiled sweets. I could make those last a long time, and they also took away that furry feeling in my mouth.
But the headaches had got worse, and I’d fainted in the shower this morning and woken up in a pile on the tiles. There was a broken one in the corner where the showerhead must have slammed into the wall.
Lewis would be so angry.
He was always angry.
There were too many rules. Too many restrictions on how I lived my life. I couldn’t help it. If I wanted things to go smoothly, I had to let fate take a hand. As long as I followed the rules, things would be fine. I needed to stay in control, not let my body trick me into doing things that could tip my life off its axis.
I’d doneeverythingright yesterday apart from forgetting to text Willa, and it pissed me off. That shouldn’t have happened. I’d drunk my black tea and swallowed down a spoonful of yoghurt before rinsing the pot and putting it in the recycling box on my way to bed.
I’d still banged my head and ended up on the floor.
The broken tile taunted me, cackling away at the back of my mind as I went through to the kitchen, and my heart almost stopped when I spotted the printout on the fridge door, placed meticulously on top of my sister’s wedding invite.
I knew what he was doing, and it made my chest flame.
Willa didn’t deserve this. She was my sister and had always been there for me. And there was nothing wrong with Lewis’s teeth. Well, apart from that, right now, I wanted to smash them down his throat with my fist. Or maybe a hammer.
The travel itinerary mocked me with its fancy font and bright colours screaming budget airline in my face.
I wasn’t going to Turkey. I was going to my sister’s wedding.
Trying to ignore the shivers down my spine, I grabbed the wedding invite from the fridge and shoved it into my pocket.
I would no doubt end up in bloody Turkey.
There was a new rule that had started a few weeks back, a simple one. Every time I left the flat, I had to remove one item. Something that was mine that I may one day need. Those items were then neatly stacked in my locker at work.
Small things. Stuff Lewis wouldn’t notice was missing.
I wanted my passport, but it was not where I’d last seen it. My birth certificate and school papers were already in my locker, but the passport? Lewis was a total bitch. I knew I shouldn’t say things like that, not even think them in my head, but this was very him. He would have taken it and hidden it somewhere, once again gone through my stuff and laughed at my patheticness.
Iwaspathetic. I owned very little. Not even the clothes on my back because they were all things Lewis had bought for me. He didn’t trust my fashion sense, said I dressed like a hobo, so he’d thrown out my old clothes and bought me more suitable clothes that I wore. I didn’t want to upset him when he was being nice to me for once.
