All the Little Things Sarah Lawton (red white royal blue TXT) 📖

and I have to avert my eyes from the expanse of skin while she grabs the towel I put out for her. ‘Do you think your mum will make pancakes?’

‘I don’t think she’s up. I didn’t hear her come home, did you?’

‘Yeah, I heard her come in. It was late though.’

‘Well, maybe, I don’t know…’

Molly sings in the shower, badly. She might be good at a lot of things but her singing could strip wallpaper. It wakes my mother up, which I suspect was her intention, and I hear her moving around in the kitchen in between verses.

By the time I am finished in the cold shower, which fails to cool me down but at least makes me feel cleaner, and slightly more alive, Molly has already disappeared. I get ready and slink down the stairs, soft feet, so I can snoop. They are laughing together, not talking, so I go in. Neither of them takes any notice of me standing in the doorway: I am invisible.

‘Wait, wait!’ says Molly, who has hold of the frying pan and is trying to flip the pancake. ‘Yay!’ It flips in the air, she catches it perfectly, and she puts the pan back down and catches my mother in a hug, which she reciprocates. This scene of domestic bliss makes me feel sick, so I cough, and they see me and step apart. I hate pancakes.

The school day drags as the remains of my Molly’s-fault headache rolls around in my skull, squashing and squeezing my brain. She is as perky as ever, laughing and joking, while I feel vile and moody. It’s harder to behave when I am not feeling straight. All of them tease me at lunch for being hungover.

‘You look as rough as a badger’s arse,’ giggles Tilly, covering her mouth like she always does when she laughs, ashamed of her teeth.

‘At least I don’t smell like one, like your disgusting brother!’ I snap, and enjoy the offended look on her face. I cannot stop myself. ‘Are you rancid on the inside, like he is?’

‘What’s that supposed to mean?’ she asks me, eyebrows gathering above her watery eyes in a frown. ‘He’s not that bad! That’s out of order, Vivian – I was only teasing you because you’re hungover for once, instead of us.’

‘Truth hurts, huh?’

‘Fuck off!’

‘Molly knows all about how rancid he is, don’t you, Molly?’ Her face is a picture, but I don’t really understand why: she knows what he did to me the other night, she was there! I open my mouth to say I don’t know what when she stands up and grabs me by the arm, pulling me out of my chair and hurting me. I swing my other arm and slap her, hard, on her bare bicep. The noise of it rings around the room. Serena and Tilly are aghast, stupid eyes wide.

‘Vivian Sanders! Molly Barnes!’ The strident voice of Mrs Barker shouts out across the canteen, making us cringe. ‘Come with me, right now!’

The walk is sullen. I didn’t mean to hit her, she was hurting me first. They always hurt me first – it’s not my fault if I lash out after, is it? I can feel imprints of hard fingers circling the thin muscle of my arm: little burning spots. My jaw hurts where I have been gritting my teeth. Molly hurt me. She is trying to steal my mother: every time she sees her I catch her all over her, in the studio, in the kitchen, and now she hurt me. I don’t like this Molly.

Mrs Barker takes us into Mrs Brondsbury’s little office next to reception. I don’t know where she is, but her stink lingers. Coffee and stale cigarette smoke. I can feel a slick of sweat start up on the back of my neck, and I have to tense to not heave up my lunch on the carpet.

‘It was my fault, miss,’ says Molly, stepping forward in front of me. ‘I was pulling her, it was my fault.’ I can see the welts my fingers have left on the silky skin of her upper arm, white blending to pink, strangely beautiful.

‘I saw her hit you, Molly. And not gently.’

‘It didn’t hurt, miss, it was my fault.’

Mrs Barker looks unconvinced. I just look at the floor, though I can feel her eyes on me, suspicious. She’s never liked me, not since Mum came in and had a meeting with her because she was worried about bullying, like at my old school. God knows what she blabbed on about. I am so cross at myself for not keeping it together. At least Molly is admitting that it’s all her fault, which makes me inclined to forgive her for yesterday’s transgressions. Maybe.

‘Both in detention tonight, please. I won’t have fighting on school grounds. I’m frankly disappointed in you, Molly.’

Why isn’t she disappointed in me? I’ve never had a detention in my life!

Rachel

I always enjoyed it when Molly stayed over, but it made me feel guilty too, because I would always catch a secret part of myself wishing Vivian could be more like her. I loved my daughter madly, but I longed for an easier, more tactile relationship. I missed human touch. Vivian hated it when I tried to hug her, or kiss her – anything at all really. She’d always been like that, even as a small child, pushing me away. She allowed it as she got older, sometimes reciprocated and did try to be affectionate – her friends were good for her like that – but I could always sense the tension it sparked in her. I didn’t know if it was just me, or if she was like that with everyone. The psychiatrists at the hospital told me that she had delayed empathy. One suggested that she had an attachment disorder, that I was not loving or caring enough, that perhaps bringing her up without any contact with her father and then working too much had scarred