“Righto,” I said. “Call you later.”
Buck shook his head. “Leave the kid alone,” he said. “Jesus, Trent, you can’t check up on her every bloody hour.”
“Yes I fucking can,” I said. “She’s twelve.”
“Nearly a teenager,” he said. “You’ll be cramping her style, man.”
“Too damn right I’ll be cramping her fucking style,” I said. “That’s my fucking job.”
I slapped him on the back as I passed, and he rolled his pissing eyes at me.
I’d been wary of letting Mia off on her own this school holiday, even if she was joined at the hip to Daisy and a load of other kids whose names I’d never pissing heard before. Jodie said it was to be expected, that all her friends were doing it, that we had to trust her to live a little for herself. I can’t say I liked the idea, though.
She may have looked older than her years, but she was still only twelve. Thirteen, Jodie kept saying. Almost thirteen, Darren. She should be playing tea parties with Mr Fluff and watching cartoons, not traipsing round the village without anyone to keep an eye on her.
Relax, Jodie kept saying. It’s only the village, Darren, she’ll be fine.
I was calling her on the hour, every hour, and I’d keep bloody doing it, too.
My phone pinged again. It was Lorraine a-fucking-gain.
Darren?! I wasn’t joking. I need to talk to you.
I sent Ruby over to help Hugh, and lit up a cigarette.
I’m busy, I replied.
Busy fucking Jodie? Chasing her around like a sappy little spaniel? I get it, Trent. More fool you.
Another message. You’ll want to hear me out.
I thought about deleting her number, sending her one final fuck off message and leaving it at that, but another message pinged before I could.
It’s about Jodie.
I replied quickly. Probably too quickly. What about Jodie?
She stalled for a couple of minutes that felt like fucking hours.
In person only, Darren. This isn’t for text.
Bitch.
A blot on an otherwise perfect fucking landscape.
A few days from the rally weekend and things were looking good. It was always hectic when the kids were off school, but Jodie had managed to slip out twice to mine already this week.
It was becoming a regular thing.
So regular that this play it by ear shit needed to come to a head one way or another. But I was nervous, like a stupid teenager, scared of blowing my chances by handling things too hard too soon.
I had a habit of doing that.
All I pissing needed was for Lorraine to put a spanner in the works. Rather she come to me than try to screw things up Jodie’s end. Fuck knows what the bitch wanted from me.
Although I had an inkling.
Tonight, I said. Come to mine. You’d best not be shitting me, Lorraine.
I got back to work and didn’t give the cow the courtesy of another fucking thought.
I swung the door open without any niceties, ignoring the fact that Lorraine was dressed in her finest with a bottle of wine in her hand. Like I ever fucking drank the stuff.
“What do you want?” I grunted.
She tutted, brushed past me and went to the kitchen like she owned the place. She took out two glasses and uncorked the bottle, pouring two hefty fucking measures. She held hers up.
“It’s been a while, Darren. Cheers.”
I pushed the second glass away from me, shunted it across the counter.
“What’s this about?”
She smiled, pretended this was a regular thing. Like fuck it was. “It’s about you. Me. Us…”
I couldn’t hide my disgust. “There is no us, Lorraine. There’s never been an us…”
“No,” she said. “Because there’s always been a Jodie, and I’m sick of it Darren, I’m sick of watching you chase after her like she’s Mother fucking Mary, like she can do no fucking wrong.”
I laughed. “Mother fucking Mary? I think she’d surprise you.”
“No,” she snapped. “I think she’d surprise you.”
Her eyes twinkled, that smug grin plastered on her face as she sipped at her wine. She was a know it all, but I was done. I’d had enough of this shit.
I pulled my cigarettes from my jeans. “I’m gonna have a smoke. You’ve got a couple of minutes to either drink your wine and get out of my face, or tell me what the fuck you’re really doing here.”
“Don’t be like that…”
I walked straight down the hall, practically launched the front door from its hinges. I was halfway through my cigarette when I heard her heels behind me. I didn’t bother turning around.
“You want her, don’t you?” she said, and there was that tone again, that condescending fucking tone she’s always used around me. “You want to move back home, and get her to play little wifey, cooking and cleaning and looking pretty around the house while you go and bang half the fucking village and play a dirty bit of rough for anyone who’s willing to pay for it.”