Читать книгу Brave: How I rebuilt my life after love turned to hate - Adele Bellis, Adele Bellis - Страница 6

‘Mum, can I borrow a tenner?’

She glanced at me quickly and then back at Coronation Street.

‘Pass me my bag, Adele,’ she said.

I hovered beside her as she fished around in her handbag for her purse, the scent of my Calvin Klein perfume filling our small living room. But just as she pulled her black leather purse from her bag, just as she was about to flip it open, she looked up at me.

‘Where are you going?’

‘Bowling.’

I tried to sound casual, looking straight ahead at the TV, but I still saw her give me a quick scan up and down: thick mascara, pink glossy lips, long dark hair falling down my back, stringy top, jeans …

‘In heels?’ she asked.

I shot a quick glance at my dad then, but luckily his eyes were fixed on the TV. When I turned back to Mum, I saw that her eyebrows were raised, awaiting an answer, the hint of a smile curling at the corner of her lips.

‘Yeah, I’ll hire bowling shoes when I get there.’

She looked at me for a second before shaking her head, turning back to her purse and pulling out a crisp £10 note.

‘There. Have fun,’ she said, putting it in my hand. ‘… And be careful!’ she called after me.

As I picked up my overnight bag by the front door, I couldn’t resist a smile because, of course, I had no intention at all of going to the bowling alley; that was the kind of thing I did when I was 14. Now I was 16, and me and my friends had already figured out which pubs we could get served at.

Seconds later I’d left our red-brick terraced home, the blueish light from the television flickering behind our bay window as I hurried down the front path towards the bus stop.

I felt my phone buzz in my pocket.

Just got on the bus. C u soon x

My friend Laura Woodcock. I was staying at hers tonight and we lived on the same bus route into town. She always texted me when she got on the bus so we could travel into town together.

The bus stop was a short walk from our house – a route I’d taken so many times in my life because this house was the only home I’d ever known. I’d first toddled this route when I was tiny, my hand in Mum’s, my older brothers Adam and Scott trailing alongside us, but these days I’d hurry along to it in my heels and whatever outfit I’d planned for my night out.

I felt the fresh crunch of the £10 note inside my palm and smiled to myself again. As the youngest, and the only girl in a family of two boys, I was used to getting my own way. For as far back as I could remember I’d always been a daddy’s girl. My dad worked long hours as a self-employed painter and decorator, but he always had time for me. He’d spoil me rotten too: whenever we went shopping and I snuck some chocolate into the trolley, Mum would always tell me to put it back on the shelf, but I only had to whinge to Dad and it would be mine.

‘Kevin!’ Mum would moan at him.

‘Oh come on, Colleen, it’s just a bar of chocolate.’

And I’d grin to myself.

My brothers have tormented me my entire life, as older brothers do, from practising their WWE moves on me when I was eight or nine, in my knee-high white socks and hairbands, to throwing my dolly out of the pram onto the floor just to tease me. But all I had to do was shout ‘Mum!’ and they’d get told off.

‘Leave your sister alone!’ Mum would shout through from the kitchen.

I’d quickly realised that being the little sister made me almost invincible. But it wasn’t always me that got the better of them. With all male cousins too, I’d often get left out of their games growing up. I’d run behind them, hoping they’d let me climb trees alongside them on sunny days when we’d have a picnic down at Toby Walk, but often they’d run too fast for my little legs to keep up. It had made me try harder, develop a tougher skin, be feisty when I needed to be. But that wasn’t a bad thing.

The bus rounded the corner as I noticed that the sky had deepened to a deep blue since I’d left the house, and illuminated by the lights inside the bus I saw Laura waving to me. I got on and took a seat next to her.

‘All right?’

She’d put her jeans and a strappy top on too but I wasn’t sure why either of us had dressed up. We didn’t really fancy a big night tonight.

‘I’m knackered,’ Laura yawned.

‘Me too,’ I said, catching her tiredness. ‘I can’t be bothered to drink tonight.’

‘Me neither,’ she said. ‘Let’s just pop to the pub for a couple of hours, though. It’s something to do.’

The last few weeks had been full of new starts for me. School had finished in the summer, and I’d got my GCSE results. They were OK, enough to get me on the beauty course at Lowestoft College. I hadn’t been a swot at school, I’d done enough to get by, but for me it was all about my social life. I’d made some great friends there – Jade, Remi, Paige, Becca, Madison and Jessie – while Laura was an old friend from middle school.

We were a pretty tight-knit group: we’d grown up together, hanging around in the local park each night after school, pooling our money and convincing strangers to buy us a bottle of vodka from the corner shop or a packet of Mayfair Superkings. We’d hang out there until 10 or 11 when we all had to be home, but on a Friday night – once my parents had gone out – I’d usually sneak back out to a friend’s house. There we’d spend the rest of the evening texting boys, or giggling about who’d been snogging who in the park while the boys practised their wheelies around us.

It was all so innocent then, but now life had changed, we were all growing up. Over the summer I’d lost my virginity to a boy. It wasn’t anything serious, just kids messing about. I’d met a couple of other girls too, Rachel and Amie, along with another girl, Lauren – who was doing the same beauty course at college as me. I had wanted to be a nurse at one point, but somehow the beauty course had seemed like an easier option. I loved it too, especially the anatomy and physiology, learning all about the skin, the muscles and bones, blood vessels and capillaries.

I was only a few weeks into the course so we were still covering the basics like how to cleanse, tone and moisturise – it wasn’t like I wasn’t used to doing that each night anyway, the same for painting nails, but it was interesting to learn about cuticles and how to treat them. I really felt different since leaving school, older, more grown up, so it seemed funny that just like any other 16-year-old girl I still borrowed money off my mum and fibbed to her about where I was going. Anyway, it was amazing what I could get out of a tenner – drinks in the pub, a takeaway, a packet of cigarettes and a taxi home. I was never quite sure how I managed it.

This would be a low-key night, though. Me and Laura weren’t looking for a big one. We got to the pub, went in and found Amie and our other friends. We actually ended up having a laugh: there was always some gossip to giggle over. I sank one vodka and coke after another, the ice clinking against my teeth as I finished each one, and I always left the bar with that little buzz just because I’d been served. I loved hearing who was snogging who, or who’d broken up that week. It was still like being at school, only better because we could buy our own booze now.

It got to about 11.30 and the atmosphere in the pub changed as people started to talk about moving on and collected their coats and bags to step out into the dark September night.

‘Shall we just go home?’ I asked Laura, swaying a little as I did. I hadn’t noticed just how the drink had gone to my head.

She nodded. But when I opened my purse to see how much I’d got for the taxi home, it was empty and there was nothing in Laura’s purse either.

‘How did that happen?’ I said.

We stared at each other.

I sighed and said, ‘We’ll just have to go around and ask anyone if they’ve got a pound to spare for a taxi. We could easily collect a fiver that way.’

So we split up, Laura going one way, me the other. I saw her out of the corner of my eye over on the other side of the pub, strangers shaking their heads and looking at us bemused as we went from one of them to another. Not that we cared, we were high on vodka and cokes, we didn’t mind if they thought we were two silly girls who’d spent our cab fare home.

Eventually, though, after so many refusals to help, I got bored. I wandered out the front doors of the pub and into the street where the chill in the air made my head spin with alcohol and reminded me I should have brought a jacket. I decided to warm myself up with a cigarette and fished into my handbag for one, and that was the exact moment that I first laid eyes on Anthony Riley. Not that I noticed him then; I wouldn’t have picked him out of a crowd, and of course I didn’t know his name either. There was a group of lads standing just a few feet away from me. I recognised them as mates of my brother Scott.

‘That’s Scott’s sister,’ I heard one or two of them say, and that’s when he looked up.

‘All right?’ he said, lighting his own cigarette beside me. ‘How you doing?’

I noticed him at that moment because his accent was like nothing from round where I lived: there was no Suffolk lilt, he didn’t drop his consonants in the same way as we did, didn’t stretch his vowels. He spoke with a Scottish accent, and, if nothing else, it piqued my interest.

‘I like your accent,’ I said, as I took another drag on my fag and with it lungs full of confidence.

He laughed. ‘Thanks,’ he said, nodding to me with a smile. ‘I’m Riley.’

‘I’m Adele,’ I said. ‘You’re not from round here.’

‘Well done,’ he grinned, as I giggled into my cigarette. ‘I’m from Glasgow, moved here when I was 15.’

I could see he was older than me by a few years. I’d put him at 19 because of the other lads he was with, the ones who were the same age as my brother.

‘Where you off to tonight?’ he asked. ‘Are you coming with us?’

‘Nah, we’re just going home now, but we’ve spent all our taxi money on vodka.’

He laughed again, his green eyes twinkling as he did. His hair was short at the sides, longer on top, spiky, like most of the guys wore it, and he had one tiny hoop earring in his left ear. He was dressed nicely, a blue and red checked shirt, jeans, shoes instead of trainers which meant he was going on to the club. He reminded me of someone famous too, someone from EastEnders, but I couldn’t think who at the time.

He took another drag on his cigarette and I watched the blue smoke curl up into the air around us, and as he did he reached into his back pocket and pulled out his wallet. He opened it and pulled out a fiver, then handed it to me.

‘Here you go,’ he said. ‘That should get you home.’

‘Oh God, really?’ I said. ‘Are you sure?’

‘Aye,’ he said. ‘Can’t have you walking home, can we?’

‘Oh thanks so much!’

Laura appeared at my side then, just in time to see me fold the note up and put it into my pocket.

‘I can pay you back if you –’

He tutted and shook his head.

‘Don’t be silly,’ he said. ‘But you can take my number.’

I smiled then and felt something other than the cigarette go to my head and my heart quicken a little inside my chest.

‘OK,’ I said, pulling my phone out of my bag.

His mates looked over at us as I started punching his number in.

‘Come on, Trevor, we’re leaving now,’ one called.

He looked up briefly. ‘Hang on a sec,’ he called to them.

‘Trevor?’

‘Aye, that’s what they call me,’ he said with a smile as if I should know why. ‘From EastEnders? Trevor Morgan. Little Mo’s fella?’

‘Oh, the crazy Scottish guy!’ I said.

‘Yeah, original eh?’

‘Actually, you do look a bit like him.’

He laughed. ‘So are you going to take my number?’

‘Oh yeah,’ I said, quickly, glancing at his friends over his shoulder waiting to leave with him.

He finished giving me it and I saved it under Riley.

‘Thanks again for the fiver,’ I said.

‘Ach, no problem,’ he replied. ‘See you again.’

And then he was gone.

Wait, did he say ‘again’? Or was it ‘around’? And if he said ‘again’, was it like again? Or just something you say. I turned back to Laura. She stood there, eyes wide.

‘He was all right, wasn’t he?’

‘Yeah!’ I laughed, and then I remembered the £5 note in my back pocket that this Scottish knight in shining armour had given us. I whipped it out. ‘Ta dah!’

‘Come on, let’s get a taxi,’ Laura said.

We followed the lads down the road. They were on the other side, and I couldn’t resist watching Riley. They were larking about, bantering with each other, laughing, giving each other the odd playful push off the path, and there was a part of me that wished we were going into the club too. But soon enough we reached the taxi rank, and Laura had given the driver her address. She got in the car, and left the door open for me.

‘Well, come on then!’ she said.

And I tore my eyes away from that Scottish stranger, just in time to see him disappear into the nightclub. Did he say ‘again’, or had he said ‘around’? I already knew which one I preferred.

If only I had known …

When we got back to Laura’s parents, we went through the whole thing again.

‘So I was just standing there having a fag and then he came over …’

‘And then what happened?’ Laura said.

I told her everything, all the little details, how he looked, how he said it, how he smiled as he did.

‘Do you think it’s too soon to text him?’ I said. ‘I mean, I could just say thanks for the fiver.’

Laura checked the time on her phone. ‘It’s 12.30,’ she said.

‘You don’t think I’d look desperate?’

‘No, I think it’s OK.’

So I tried various different messages, some with questions, but that did seem too desperate, others with kisses – too forward – before finally settling on this:

Hope you had a good night, thanks for the fiver. Adele

Friendly, not too keen. And now I just had to wait. Laura and I sat up for a bit longer, both of us taking it in turns to stare at my phone. I picked it up, turned it over, waiting for it to bleep a reply into my hands, but nothing. Eventually we went to bed.

There wasn’t a reply the next day either, or the next.

‘Do you think he gave me the right number?’ I said to Amie and Lauren during lunch break at college on Monday.

‘Why wouldn’t he?’

‘So why hasn’t he replied?’

I felt like I wasn’t that bothered on Friday night, I kind of liked him, but I wasn’t that keen. But a weekend spent staring at my phone had left me with more questions than answers. I’d tried switching it off and on again, but texts from my other friends were still coming through.

‘Do you think I should text him again?’ I asked the girls.

‘No!’ they replied in unison.

And so I waited. And waited. And waited.

And just as I’d managed to distract myself on Tuesday, and while we learnt that there are 27 bones in the human hand, my phone beeped in class. Amie shot a look over in my direction and when I saw the name Riley I nodded back to her and felt heat rush to my cheeks.

Sorry, been on a bender all weekend. How are you?

And there it started, right there in my college classroom. I didn’t leave it days or even hours to reply to him, not now I had his attention. I wanted to keep up the momentum.

I texted him back, I can’t remember what exactly now, I must have made a joke about him being on a bender because he replied straight away, and then I replied back, and it went back and forth like that for days.

I sent the girls a group message on MSN Messenger.

We’re texting all the time!

I felt different even then, perhaps because I knew he was friends with my brother, perhaps it gave it that added element of excitement, that bit of rebellion, and mostly because this guy was new. He wasn’t like the other scruffy 16-year-old boys that we hung around with, who were only just getting to grips with shaving. Anthony was 19, he was a man, he didn’t hang around parks convincing people to buy him a bottle of booze, he was old enough to buy it himself. He didn’t live at home with his mum, he lived with his friend, Scott Tarrant, ‘Scotty’. OK, he lived with Scotty’s mum, but it wasn’t the same as being stuck at home with your parents. He had a job too – or at least he’d had one before: he told me during one of our text messages that he’d been made redundant from his scaffolding job. And he could drive, well, he couldn’t at the moment because he’d got a ban for speeding, but he was different, he was interesting, even a speeding ban only made him more exciting and dangerous.

And with that accent Anthony felt exotic compared to the lads around here, not just because of his age, but because it felt to me like he’d just appeared out of nowhere. In a town where I pretty much knew most people my age, or certainly knew of them, Anthony had never been anywhere on my radar before – or that of any of my friends – and I liked him for that reason if nothing else. I didn’t know where he’d appeared from, I just knew that I liked him, and over the days as we texted and bantered and he made me laugh, I liked him more. And then finally …

Fancy coming round tomorrow night?

OK.

I told the girls that he’d asked me round to Scotty’s place, and as Remi knew Scotty she decided to come too. Not in a double-date way, because this was going to be my date and Remi didn’t fancy Scotty, but just so I could get to know Anthony.

The next night I told Mum I was off out with Remi, and then I heard a beep outside the house.

‘Take care, Adele,’ Mum called after me as I slammed the front door shut behind me.

Scotty had arrived in his green Punto to pick me up, and there in the passenger seat beside him was Anthony.

‘All right?’ the boys said when I got in the back.

We went from mine to pick up Remi, and then when we got to Scotty’s house Jade texted saying she wanted to come over too.

‘We’ll go and get Jade,’ Scotty said, gesturing towards Remi. Did I see a look pass between him and Anthony?

The next moment Anthony and I were alone in the house and all at once the space in the living room between us felt like a mile.

‘So … er …’

‘Yeah,’ Anthony replied.

We’d been texting for days and yet suddenly neither of us knew what to say. We were glued inside an awkward silence, made worse by the fact that I realised in those moments just how much I fancied him, and seeing this soft side – this shy side – made him seem even more attractive.

And I think, after a while like that, we both just looked up and fell about laughing at the ridiculousness of it all. And that just made me like him more.

Anthony got me a vodka and coke and I gulped it down to take the edge off my nerves, and so by the time Scotty came back with Remi and Jade we were laughing and messing about. We put some music on, I remember Kings of Leon’s ‘Sex On Fire’ and feeling slightly drunk and very excited just to be in the same room with this older guy with his Scottish accent and his charm and those eyes.

‘Shall we watch a film?’ one of the boys suggested after a while, and they put something on – not that any of us really watched it as we sat there drinking and laughing across the sofas at each other. At some point, I felt Anthony slip his arm around my shoulders, and my skin prickled under his touch. And later, when the others had gone into the kitchen to get another round of drinks, I looked up at him, and he looked down at me, and suddenly I was lost inside his kiss and we broke off, laughing, just in time for the others to catch us.

And that was it, my first date with Anthony Riley, if you can call it a date because it all felt pretty casual right from the start.

Scotty wasn’t drinking so he offered to drop us girls home that night, and back in my bedroom, as I took my make-up off before bed, I got a text message from Anthony.

Really nice seeing you, we should do it again some time.

I texted Remi and Jade.

But why didn’t he suggest when?! xx

Adele!! Stop worrying! xxx

A few days later, Amie and I finished college and headed back to mine together. She’d been texting Scotty for the last few days, and we had a plan to see the boys.

We did our make-up together at my house and I packed an overnight bag.

‘I’m staying at Amie’s tonight,’ I told Mum. ‘Would you give us a lift?’

Amie lived just a short walk from the big Tesco’s in town, so Mum always dropped us there and did a bit of shopping while we headed down the alleyway that linked Amie’s road with the supermarket. There, Amie changed her clothes and packed an overnight bag.

‘I’m staying at Adele’s tonight,’ she told her mum. ‘Her mum’s waiting for us at Tesco’s.’

‘OK, girls,’ she said.

But of course, by the time we’d headed back through the alleyway, congratulating ourselves on how well our plan had worked, it wasn’t my mum who was waiting for us in her car, it was Scotty and Anthony in the green Punto.

‘All right girls!’ they said, grinning as they spotted our overnight bags.

The texts between me and Anthony had got cheekier and naughtier over the last few days and it was obvious we were going to have sex that night. We had a laugh that evening, sitting in Scotty’s living room, drinking and joking together. His mum came home while we were watching I’m a Celebrity … Get Me Out of Here!

‘All right Scotty,’ she said, poking her head around the door. ‘I’m going to bed. Don’t make too much noise.’

‘OK, Mum,’ he said, and the night was ours.

We stayed up until the early hours, listening to music, and then finally it was time to go to bed. Amie went upstairs to Scotty’s room, while I followed Anthony up to the spare room where he was sleeping.

‘Sshh,’ I giggled as he took off my top, and kissed me. That was the first night we slept together, and it was everything I hoped it would be. But it was, after all, just sex. Anthony made that clear from the start, and I liked him so much that I wasn’t going to disagree. Like many girls, I guess, I thought that if we slept together long enough, if he got to know me, then it might change some day. For now, I was just happy that he was mine, even if it was just for a few hours a couple of times a week.

And that’s how it started. Perhaps you could call us friends with benefits, and it was fun, especially as Amie was hooking up with Scotty too. It was the four of us together. Amie and I would go off to college together in the morning, and then we’d take our homework round to the boys’ house and lie on the bed in Scotty’s bedroom as we pored through our books and drank and joked and the boys played Call of Duty on the Xbox. Then, when it was time for bed, me and Anthony would go to his room and Amie would stay with Scotty. And outside of our little foursome, nobody knew what was happening, and that gave everything an added frisson. Sometimes I’d be laying in bed with Anthony in the morning and my brother Scott would text or call him.

‘Why don’t you tell him you’re with his sister?’ I’d whisper, and he’d shake his head.

‘No way,’ he said. ‘It’s not like it’s anything serious. Why should anyone know?’

And I’d try to swallow down the disappointment that collected in my throat each time he said something like that. Instead I’d laugh and say ‘I know’ or anything else that might convince him that I wasn’t taking it seriously either.

But then once a week became twice a week, and twice a week became Anthony texting and asking if we could see each other alone. Sometimes it wasn’t even about the sex, we’d just cuddle up with a DVD. It was more like a relationship, and yet at the same time Anthony was always keen to let me know he was sleeping with other girls.

‘I got in such a mess at the weekend, I woke up next to this ginger girl on Sunday morning,’ he told me once, and I tried to laugh it off, or hit him playfully, or act like it didn’t matter, but deep down, it did. Deep down maybe I wondered why I wasn’t enough for him to stop seeing other girls, and it didn’t matter how much fun we had together, he always left me wanting more, because come the weekend, when he was out clubbing and I knew I’d never get in at 16, I had no idea what he was doing. And then again, he wasn’t shy to tell me who he’d got off with, or who he’d woken up with. But even if I didn’t know it then, it was eating away at me.

Yet, at the same time, he was getting closer to me. He started staying at his dad’s more, which was on my side of town so it was easier to see each other. I’d go in the house and straight upstairs, never saying hello to his dad or his stepmum, who was eight months pregnant at the time. We’d watch DVDs up in his room and when we were hungry he’d leave me there and go and get us a KFC. But we still were only friends with benefits.

We’d been like this for a couple of months when I started going to the same clubs as him. I’d be there with the girls, he’d be there with the lads – sometimes my brother among them – but we’d never speak. All of my friends knew what was going on, of course, but none of his did. Instead I’d watch from across the bar as he chatted to other girls in front of me.

‘Doesn’t it bother you?’ my friends asked.

‘But I’m the one who’s going home with him,’ I said.

Because when he was ready to leave I’d feel my phone buzz in my pocket and it would be a message from him.

I’m going, you coming?

I’d look up and he’d be watching me, and I’d nod and meet him out the front of the club. There was a bit of a buzz about our secrecy, something about it that made my tummy flip in excitement when my brother watched me leave the club without any idea that I was going home with his friend. But there was also something else swelling inside my belly, a dark feeling that felt like jealousy, and I was trying very hard to keep it inside and not let it come spilling out.

As much as I enjoyed the thrill of Anthony being mine and no one knowing, I was starting to wonder why he refused to tell anyone. Was he ashamed of me? Why was I his dirty little secret when he was texting me all the time, asking to see me and staying at his dad’s just so we could see each other more? What was it about me that wasn’t good enough for him to want to make me his girfriend? Although I tried to be casual, to go along with the rules that he’d set for our relationship, it was starting to bite deep inside. I wanted Anthony and I wanted him to want me.

And then on Christmas Eve it finally came to a head. We were out in a club, and as usual I watched from the other side of the dance floor as he danced with other girls in front of me, and then – right there, while I was watching – he started kissing one. My friends looked at me, and there was nothing I could do to keep my feelings from spilling out. Perhaps it was the vodka sloshing around in my belly, or maybe I’d just had enough. But when we bumped into each other in the club’s toilets, I went mad. I was pushing him and kicking him, and although all he had to do was keep me at arm’s length and I couldn’t even feel my body impact with his, he must have seen how upset I was.

‘How could you do this to me?’ I shouted at him, losing every ounce of cool I’d worked so hard to maintain.

And then I left. Angry, humiliated, mascara running down my cheeks. The clock had already struck midnight, but it was anything but a Happy Christmas.

We didn’t see each other on Christmas Day, and he hadn’t bought me a present either. We texted throughout the day, and I think I realised then just how much I really liked him. But I felt like a fool too because, while I’d silently been falling for him, he’d been taking the mickey out of me by sleeping with other girls behind my back, and then, of course, flaunting it in front of my face. It was impossible to not feel completely hurt, and totally humiliated.

On Boxing Day Mum and Dad went out for the night, and Amie came round. It was Christmas and we were bored, I wanted to drown my sorrows and there was a bottle of Jägermeister in the fridge. Somehow between the first shot and the sixth we’d started messaging Scott’s friends on MSN, and before we knew it, high on Jägermeister, we’d invited two of them over.

One of them was Bruce, who was dark, handsome and really fit, the one that all my friends fancied, and when he showed me attention that day, perhaps it was just what I needed. So when he tried to kiss me I pushed all thoughts of Anthony from my mind. I let myself fall into him, telling myself that this after all is what Anthony does, that he’s not thinking of me when he’s with other women, that perhaps I should try and behave like he does, that I should sleep with another guy. After all, like Anthony told me a dozen times, it was only a bit of fun.

And so I did, buoyed up by alcohol and immediately afterwards came down with a heavy shot of regret.

‘Let’s go out,’ the boys said.

And because it was Christmas, and because I was drunk and because I didn’t care any more, I decided to do just that, and guess who we bumped into – Anthony.

Not that he spoke to me. He did his usual thing of pretending I wasn’t there, which mixed and curdled with the Jägermeister in my stomach and made me feel worthless. So maybe when he texted me asking if I was ready to go, I wanted him to feel just a little of what I did. We started arguing on the way home, I can’t even remember what about, something and nothing, and so when we got back to his and we were still arguing, that’s when I decided to say it, to tell him, just like he’d told me.

‘We don’t have to have sex anyway,’ I said. ‘Because I’ve already had some tonight.’

His face darkened, right there in front of me a shadow passed across his eyes, an unmistakable look of anger furrowed his brow. He was speechless. Gone was the petty irritation of whatever it was that we were arguing about, and in its place was a blackness I’d never seen in him before.

‘What’s wrong?’ I said. ‘You do it openly, you tell me.’

I sat down on the bed and stared at him.

‘You’re treating me like a dickhead,’ I said. ‘You’ve done the same and now I’ve done it, you’re going to kick –’

But I didn’t get chance to finish my sentence because he grabbed me by my hand and pulled me from the bed.

When he finally spoke it wasn’t in his usual tone, it was in a hard, cold voice that I hadn’t heard before, and made my insides turn icy cold. And those green eyes, they weren’t twinkling any more. They were hard; they were frightening.

‘I’ve got feelings for you and you’ve ruined it all,’ he spat.

It was the first time he’d ever acknowledged he felt anything for me, and any other time I would have felt so happy, but he was dragging me from his room, pushing me down the stairs, trying to get me out of his house.

‘What the hell are you doing?’ I shouted. ‘I’m going home!’

I opened the front door and felt a blast of freezing cold air whoosh into the house from the street. I ran out, leaving the door open behind me, but I hadn’t got many steps down the road when I felt someone’s arm on mine. It was his stepmum. She was standing there in her nightie, her huge, swollen, pregnant belly wrapped in her arms.

‘It’s five o’clock in the morning, Adele. What’s going on?’

It was the first time I’d ever spoken to her, and I felt terrible that we’d woken his parents up by arguing, but she insisted I couldn’t walk home. She led me back into the house and upstairs to Anthony’s room. He was sitting on his bed, his head in his hands. In this room there were two double beds, one by the window, one by the wall.

‘You sleep in this one,’ she said, indicating the one by the wall. ‘And Anthony can sleep over by the window, and you can sort this out tomorrow when you’ve both calmed down.’

I must have fallen into a drunken sleep because the following morning I woke up to feel Anthony’s arms around me.

‘I was too cold over by the window,’ he said when I stirred.

In the light of a new day, I felt absolutely terrible for what I’d done. I buried my face in my hands and wondered how on earth I could salvage whatever it was that we had. I knew I’d hurt Anthony, and I didn’t want to do that, I just didn’t want him to keep on hurting me.

‘It wasn’t true, Anthony,’ I tried. ‘I didn’t do it. It’s you that I want. I only said it because I was drunk.’

Yes, I was lying, but I just kept thinking back to what he’d said the night before, about having feelings for me, about how I’d ruined everything. I’d had no idea.

‘You saying that made me realise that I don’t want anyone else to have you,’ he said. ‘It made me realise I want you to be my girlfriend.’

And despite everything that had happened – the argument, his pulling me from the bed, practically throwing me out of the house – just hearing that from him meant everything. After all these months, after telling me that it was just a bit of fun, he did want me and I was so happy.

I snuggled down further inside his arms then, wrapped up safe in a place that I never wanted to leave.

‘I won’t sleep with anyone else and I don’t want you to either,’ he said. ‘I don’t want you texting boys any more.’

I did wonder why he’d said that bit. I didn’t feel the need to say the same to him because I trusted him. It didn’t bother me if he was texting girls because he was mine. But I nodded and agreed because right then, right at that moment, I didn’t want anything to spoil what we now had. Anthony was finally my boyfriend and I’d never felt so happy.

We spent the next few days together, and would get the train to Norwich to go to the cinema, or for a meal.

‘Why don’t we just go out in Lowestoft?’ I asked.

‘It’s better in Norwich,’ he said. ‘No one knows us there.’

‘But we don’t need to hide our relationship from anyone now,’ I told him. ‘You’ve got to tell my brother. It’s New Year’s Eve in a few days. The new year is a new start for us. You need to tell him by then, Anthony.’

He nodded, although he seemed unsure. But I was adamant.

‘New year, new start,’ I reminded him.

I got ready for New Year’s Eve at home, slipping on a new blue dress I’d bought from New Look with a matching blue hairband to put in my backcombed hair. I painted my fingernails and toenails black to match my shoes.

‘You look nice,’ Mum said when I went downstairs.

‘Can I have a lift to Amie’s, Mum?’ I asked. ‘She’s having a party.’

‘Yes, of course,’ she said.

And then Scott appeared. ‘Can I have a lift too?’ he said.

We got into the car and Mum asked us both where we were going. Scott answered first.

‘I’m off out with your boyfriend,’ he said.

It felt odd hearing it from him, but in a good way because I knew then Anthony had done it.

‘What boyfriend?’ Mum said.

‘His name’s Anthony,’ I said. ‘He’s 19, the same as Scott.’

‘Oh, I need to meet him,’ Mum replied.

Just seconds after Scott got out of the car, a text came through on my phone from Anthony.

I’ve told your brother, he seems ok. xx

I smiled. So that was it now, no more sneaking around, we were a proper couple.

We had a few drinks at Amie’s that night before heading to a pub to meet all the boys. Anthony was there, and this time I didn’t need to worry about going over and saying hello. In fact, he came over to me. And then before we knew it the countdown to the new year had begun.

‘Five … four … three … two … one … Happy New Year!’ everyone cried.

But in among the poppers going off and people hugging and kissing and singing ‘Auld Lang Syne’, Anthony pulled me out of the back of the pub. There he held my hands and looked at me so seriously.

‘Please promise me something,’ he said. ‘Promise me you’ll always be there for me. You’re the only girl I’ve ever felt like this about, but you’ve got to promise you’ll always be there for me because I’m not the person you think I am.’

I stared deep into his green eyes; he was serious. But I was drunk and fireworks were shooting into the black sky around me, so I just wrapped him up in a hug and told him what he wanted me to say.

‘Of course I’ll always be there for you, Anthony,’ I said. And then we hugged and kissed because it was New Year’s Eve and what else do you do?

It kept coming back to me though, every few days, what Anthony had said, those eight words: I’m not the person you think I am. What did he mean? Not that I asked him, I assumed that he, like me, was just drunk and emotional. So I tried to push it to the back of my mind, told myself it didn’t mean anything.

Anyway, after New Year’s Eve we were pretty much inseparable, or at least that’s how Anthony seemed to want it to be, we both did. Once everybody knew about us there was no reason to hide or sneak around, or pretend we didn’t want to see each other. So we saw as much of each other as we could, and I was so happy.

I started back at college a few days into the new year and Anthony would text me through my classes.

‘Is that him again?’ my friends would say. ‘He must really like you.’

He’d even come and meet me on my breaks, and at lunch he’d take me out to lunch, or back to Scotty’s where he rustled up beans on toast or sausage and chips. The girls were always so impressed, after all, having an older boyfriend to take you out for lunch seemed so much more grown up than any of the boys they were seeing. And that made me feel special, important.

At the end of the day, as me and Amie filtered from class, he’d be there to walk me home.

Wednesday was my day off and the two of us loved nothing better than just enjoying a lazy morning in bed together. One day, as we lay there, I traced my fingers along his tattoos.

‘What’s this one?’ I asked, stroking one on the top of his right arm. It was a cross with a name written underneath it: ‘Margaret’.

‘It’s my mum,’ he said gently, tracing his own finger across the name. ‘She died when I was 15.’

His words hung in the air between us as my mind scrambled for something to say. But what can you say to that? Instead I wrapped my arms around his waist and snuggled into his chest. Perhaps sometimes you don’t need any words.

We’d have fun on those Wednesdays too. Mum had bought me a wax pot for Christmas as she knew it would come in handy for my beauty course, but I decided to try it out on Anthony first.

‘Ooh!’ he said, wriggling as I smeared the warm wax onto his chest with a spatula.

‘Hold still,’ I replied. ‘Otherwise it’s going to really hurt.’

‘I still can’t believe you convinced me to do this,’ he said. ‘Why can’t you practise another massage on me?’

‘No pain, no gain,’ I laughed. ‘Ready?’

He nodded, and with one big pull I pulled his hair off his chest with the cloth.

‘Ouch!’ he cried. And I laughed and laughed, and finally after rubbing his chest he did too.

The Anthony who let me paint face masks on his cheeks and dab cream under his eyes was a world away from the man everyone else knew, and that made our relationship feel all the more special. He didn’t care when his mates were moaning that he spent too much time with me, instead he sent their calls to voicemail and snuggled up on his dad’s sofa with me watching another DVD.

He looked after me too. I only had to mention that I fancied a Ribena and he’d be down the shop getting me one. Or he’d be up and down the stairs to his bedroom, making me a cup of tea or a slice of toast, and it felt nice to be looked after. I felt safe with Anthony. But it wasn’t like I hadn’t seen that he had an edge, with other people, of course, not me. When he got drunk he would get a bit angry: it was almost like he was looking for a fight with people at the bar. But I’d pull on his arm, and whisper to him to go home, and he was fine. Because under that hard exterior, I knew Anthony was a softie. I liked the fact that people referred to me as ‘Anthony’s girlfriend’. While I was with him I’d never have any boys hassling me, that was for sure.

We went from 0 to 60 in a matter of days. There was rarely a morning when I wouldn’t wake up to a text message from him. He’d take me on the train to Norwich to go to the cinema, or for a meal, and he always picked up the bill.

‘You’re so lucky,’ Amie would tell me. And I knew I was. Having Anthony to myself was all I’d ever wanted, and he was the perfect boyfriend, so charming, so wonderful. I could feel myself falling for him. Not that Mum thought he was as wonderful as me. She met him a few days into the new year when some of Scott’s friends were over at my house drinking. Anthony came over to meet them and it seemed like the best time to introduce him to my parents.

He shook their hands and said all the right things, and as I went to leave to go out with them, Mum called to him: ‘Make sure you look after her.’

‘Don’t worry, I will,’ he said.

But the next day when I asked her what she thought of him, she pulled a face.

‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘There’s just something about him.’

But she didn’t know Anthony like I did. No one did.

In mid-January he’d planned a Thursday night out with the lads. I decided not to go because I had college the next day, but I texted him while he was out.

Have a good night xx

Thanks babe xx

But the next morning I didn’t wake up to a message from him like I usually did. Instead there was one from his friend Chris saying: Call me.

First I tried Anthony’s phone, but it just went to voicemail, and then I assumed maybe he was using Chris’s phone, so I called. But when Chris answered and I asked for Anthony, I was unprepared for his reply.

‘He got arrested last night,’ he said.

‘Arrested!’

‘Yeah, he had a fight. They’ve remanded him in custody.’

‘Remanded him? What? Why?’

‘Well, he’s only been out of prison a few months, hasn’t he?’

I let the words settle a moment. Prison? Anthony? This was the first I’d heard. And in that second, with those few words, everything came crashing down. My happiness plummeted through the roof, landing in a pile at my feet. I’d never even known anyone who’d been arrested, let alone gone to prison. And now I was being told that person was my boyfriend.

‘He’s not in court until Monday …’ Chris was saying. ‘We’ll know more then …’

But when I put the phone down I couldn’t stop the tears. Monday? So I had to spend the whole weekend without him.

I staggered downstairs to Mum, my tears already streaking long salty trails down my cheeks.

‘Oh Adele,’ she said, wrapping me in a hug as I cried to her. ‘You’re too young for all this, you don’t need to get involved with a lad like this.’

‘But I really like him, Mum,’ I sobbed. ‘I really really like him. It’s such a downer to start the new year like this.’

I was absolutely devastated, but then my phone rang. It was Anthony.

‘Babe, I’m so so sorry,’ he said. ‘I’m only allowed one phone call but I had to ring you.’

‘What happened?’ I sobbed.

‘I was in this club and someone slagged my mum off and I beat him up.’

‘Oh Anthony,’ I said.

I felt torn then because instantly I could imagine how he might have felt. I remembered how quiet he’d been when he told me about his mum dying, how all I could do was wrap him up in my arms. I knew too how angry he got when he was drunk and I hated myself for not being there, because I would have been able to stop him and then we wouldn’t have been in this mess.

‘I know, I know, I’m sorry, but you promised me you’d wait for me.’

‘Of course but why –’

‘Just keep your promise,’ he said. And then he was gone.

Without Anthony’s arms to comfort me, I fell into my mum’s.

‘You can understand why he did it,’ I said.

‘It’s terrible,’ she said. ‘But he should have thought of you, he should have walked away. Don’t get mixed up in all this, Adele, you’re too young.’

But didn’t she see? I already was.