The Family Friend C. MacDonald (reading comprehension books .txt) 📖

of studio. Erin grits her teeth, they’re going to talk about this and she’s not going to lose it. ‘You OK?’ He still has his big coat on, woolly hat still in place. He looks expectant, tentative, as if he can sense she’s anything but ‘OK’.

‘Yeh, tired.’

‘Me too. He wasn’t up for ages last night but it was the frequency, you know?’ He crosses past her, goes into a drawer to get mats out for the table.

‘Done it,’ she says. He wheels round, sees the table set and smiles, a surprised smile. He surveys the room.

‘Place looks great.’

‘Thanks,’ she says. He doesn’t look out the window but she knows he’s thinking that Amanda must have cleaned today, but she didn’t. The moment lingers between them. He waits for her to ask about his day, to tell him something about hers, something about Bobby. But she doesn’t. She keeps her arms crossed so Raf can’t see her hands balled into such tight fists that she can feel her nails leaving dents in her palms. The oven beeps. Raf gets oven gloves out of the drawer and heads towards it.

‘I’ll do it,’ she says, ‘you sit down.’

‘It’s fine, I’m here now.’

‘I’ll do it, I said. I made dinner so I’ll do it.’ She thrusts her hand out for the gloves. Raf gives them to her before moving over to the other side of the room, expression split between a smirk and perturbed.

‘Was Bobby OK today? Are you OK? You didn’t text or anything. I hoped that meant you were managing with him but, but you seem a bit, I don’t know, stressed.’

‘“Managing with him”,’ Erin says, almost to herself as she gets the bubbling-hot dish out of the oven.

‘You haven’t told me anything about your day, Ez, was he all right? You know I like to know.’

‘Oh yeh,’ she says, through a bitter half-laugh, ‘you like to know exactly how my day’s going, don’t you? Haven’t you spoken to your old pal about it yet? Don’t you already know how great my day’s been?’

‘Erin –’

‘Don’t you already know that today, just today, I managed not to hurt my baby. But who knows, there’s always tomorrow. Better have a debrief with Earth Goddess out there about keeping close tabs on me tomorrow.’ Raf runs his thumbnail over his bottom teeth, starting to look annoyed. Annoyed is the least that Erin wants Raf to be. He had her followed. The temperature of the dish is getting through the gloves and she feels the heat flush through her body, the red wine swelling in the front of her head like a crashing wave.

‘Should I do that? You’ve let yourself get upset by something, so let’s sit down and have something to eat.’

‘What do you think I’ve “let myself get upset by”?’ she spits. He glances out to the garden. ‘Don’t look for her. Me, look at me. What do you think I’m upset about, Rafael?’

‘What aren’t you upset about, doesn’t take much, does it?’ He smiles, a Cheshire cat superior grin and she snaps. Erin launches the dish of boiling pasta bake at him. He sees it coming and manages to slam the corner of it down in front of him, sending the dish flying to the floor where it cracks into pieces, the contents splatting out like a Jackson Pollock. He shakes his head in disbelief, his lip curled in disgust as if she’s a drunk who’s just been sick. He closes his eyes, a long blink, then walks to the other side of the room. Erin stands, rictus hands inside the oven gloves still held out, miming the food, paralysed with the shock of what she’s just done.

‘No, you do not do that to me.’ His voice is steely but calm, like he’s talking to an aggressive dog. ‘You do not hit me. You do not throw things at me.’ He’s put the table between her and him and he paces by the bookshelf at the far end of the room like a captive jaguar. ‘What – what the hell do you think you’re doing?’

‘You had her follow me.’

‘What?’

‘Amanda, you had her follow me. The video’s made you think I’m going to hurt Bobby so you had her follow me.’

‘What the fuck are you talking about?’

‘I caught her. I thought she was the person trolling me, but she said you told her to “keep an eye on me”. You thought your son was in danger. With his own mother.’ The truth of that statement hits her all over again, bringing her back into the reality of their kitchen. She sees the mess of food all over the kitchen and it dawns on her what she’s just done. She’s just thrown food, scalding hot food, in a heavy ceramic dish at her fiancé, the person who’s worried that she has the capacity to hurt their child. So is he right? Is she dangerous?

Raf stops his pacing. Then he goes to the back door and goes out into the garden, leaving the door open so the cold rages into the room. He’s going to get her, Erin thinks. She begins to manically clear up the mess of pasta and vegetables on the white kitchen tiles. The dish has broken in five or six large chunks which she picks up and puts in a local newspaper and into the recycling. She tries to wipe up the mess but then they’re there, at the door. Raf and Amanda.

‘Oh my goodness, Erin, did you hurt yourself?’ Amanda rushes over to help but Erin stands up and walks out of the kitchen.

‘I dropped the dinner,’ he says. ‘But, Mand –’ Amanda perks herself up like a meerkat – ‘I was hoping you could clear up a bit of a misunderstanding. Erin thinks you’ve been following her? Around town.’

Amanda seems to be chewing something in the side of her mouth. She gives Erin a nervous side-eye.

‘What? No, no I haven’t been following her.’ Erin looks between them, speechless, she can’t