You Never Knew Me (Never 1)

Maybe I’ll get my little girl back, I love you Hen, hope to hear from you soon.

Dad

X

Hmm, more emails from those addresses, spam folder it is. I’m not opening from an unknown sender, it will probably give me a virus knowing my luck.

I send them all to spam until I see one from a sender called PastFinder, strange name and the heading is nothing more than I know.

It has to be a virus, I mean I shouldn’t open it, should I? I’ll leave it for now but maybe I should keep an eye out for any more emails from that sender, what could they know?

I shake my head as I pull on my red dress with black roses, my thick black leggings and red pumps. I’m doing my hair up in a French braid when a knock sounds at my door.

I’m surprised to see Amias standing there and I’m not even going to try and hold back my eye roll. I leave the door open and go back over to my chest of drawers and try to see if I have any of my satin scarves with me.

“He likes Anime, all things Marvel and Star Wars and chocolate brownies. Noah is happy for you to have his number but he asked if I could give him yours and he’ll ring you when he’s free.” He’s so matter of fact about it all but he doesn’t meet my eyes. The door must be utterly fascinating right now.

“Sure, and thanks. It’s too late to buy anything now, but I think I have something I can give him. Did you need something else?” I ask, and yeah I’m being off, but I’m done with it all.

This is why I shouldn’t date or kiss friends, it all ends badly.

“Do you know how many girls I’ve gone out with since I came here in year eight. Why I’m here over Christmas when everyone else left and why I said even though this could just be fun I still went and messed it up anyway?” His tone is heating up with every word he says and it’s only piquing my curiosity.

“Honestly, no I have no idea,” I say, as I run my hand down my face, no makeup today and I’m liking it.

“Do you want to know?”

“If you want to tell me then I’m happy to listen but if not… then I have to get ready.” He sighs in frustration before sitting down on my sofa and with an answering sigh I sit on the chair opposite him.

“I come from South Africa same as my dad, both my parents are doctors and aside from their private practices they have over here they also travel to countries that don’t have a strong health system.” Pity is entirely lacking in his voice, I guess he’s become desensitised. “I guess they thought if I was born whilst they were there working, I could grow up that way.” He sounds so mocking, I guess he doesn’t agree. “Whenever we were in England, they would enrol me in school and then when they travelled, they would take me out, hire a private tutor and drag me with them. I saw the third world countries, the slums and the dark sides that the travel agents don’t want you to see.” His voice matches the darkness he’s describing and I’m getting a better understanding of the darkness that lives in his eyes.

He looks ragged and I never noticed it before, but it’s like he hasn’t slept in days.

“It was a lot to grow up with and then I started hanging around with the kids, bare knuckle fighting, stealing food, they needed to and I didn’t. I got into some other trouble too. My parents claimed to be concerned about the person I was turning into, so we came back here.” He laughs mirthlessly as he shakes his head in a deprecating way. “They lasted two months before they decided to go back out and sent me here. I’ve spent one Christmas with them since I was enrolled, and our relationship is built around voicemail and emails. When they are back it’s always conveniently during term time so I don’t get to see them.” His fists are clenched, and his jaw and shoulders are tight.

“I’m an angry bastard who does whatever I can to get back at them, I’ve had tons of girls that I’ve ‘seen’, always refused to put a label to it, and I got rid of them the moment they started to get clingy. You were like a dream come true because you wanted the same thing.” His stare is so intense, and he sounds as though he’s annoyed with himself. “The only issue is, you’re so damn perfectly imperfect that you’ve got me wanting to change my own rules. You don’t want that and it’s messing with my head, you don’t just like me but my mates as well and I want to keep you to myself without losing them or you in the process. Two weeks of fun was a terrible idea, because I’ve realised two weeks isn’t enough for me and it was easier to act like a dick and ignore you than have you turn me away instead.” He’s getting worked up and frustrated and I don’t know how to fix it.

He stands up, looking down at me before heading to my door, but he puts something on my chest of drawers on his way out.

We’ve all converged in the hall waiting for the film to start. Declan has collected all the presents addressed to us from under the tree and we’ve gathered a nice little pile between the six of us. Mattias hasn’t joined us yet and I don’t know if Amias will either, we have their presents amongst ours but if they don’t show I’ll leave them outside their doors later.

“Can we get to opening them now?” asks Mikaela, who has actually put her book down for the event – we all had fun teasing her about that.

“Ten more minutes and if the spoilsports don’t show, then they can go screw themselves or each other,” says Roxie with a smirk and we all moan at her crassness.

“Finley is on his own,” says Declan, looking over to where he’s sitting.

I almost tell him to invite him over, until a group of girls drop down beside him and he’s definitely not alone now.

“Problem solved,” comes from Leah looking relieved and I won’t pretend that I’m not relieved as well.

Ten minutes turns into twenty and I call it a day, they’re not going to show up so we may as well get on with it.

I pass Leah hers and she shakes the box trying to figure out what it is.

“Just open it already,” I say on a laugh and she needs no more encouragement as she rips the paper off.

She squeals before throwing her arms around me, and I pat her awkwardly on her back.