Читать книгу Sweetpea: The most unique and gripping thriller of 2017 - C.J. Skuse, C. J. Skuse, C.J. Skuse - Страница 10

1. Derek Scudd

2. Derek Scudd’s lawyer

3. Wesley Parsons

4. Our local whack job, Creepy Ed Sheeran, who hangs around Lidl car park, tearing the leaves off the bushes, sniffing them and chuckling

5. Anyone who buys, sells or creates Star Wars merchandise. I can’t even buy a Snickers without seeing a token for a sodding light sabre

Dreamed about Dad again last night. I asked him who his favourite child was, and he smiled and told me, ‘You, of course.’

I could talk to my dad about anything. There’s no one now. Craig’s pathetic – he’s always got one eye on the TV and, even if it’s turned off, I figure he’s mentally rerunning an old episode of Game of Thrones. I can’t talk to Seren, of course. She hasn’t been back to England since Dad’s funeral and, every time we talk on the phone, I get the impression she can’t wait to hang up.

And as for the PICSOs, when I want derogatory comments about my lack of kids or non-selling novel or my low-grade job, maybe their opinions will matter.

I don’t know what Mum or Dad would tell me to do if they were still around.

I didn’t grieve for them like an ordinary person would. Seren said it was ‘very unsettling’ seeing the way I grieved about Dad. She said it was like ‘looking through a window when it’s raining’ – the rain trickling down it and cold as ice. I didn’t know how to feel. I was just numb. I googled it once – WebMD said ‘bereavement numbness for the first few days is very common as your brain tries to process what has happened’. I couldn’t find anything about numbness that went on for years. Apparently, that wasn’t a thing.

The two seniors, Claudia and Linus, came back from court at lunch, to say that the paedophile Derek Scudd, sixty-eight, had got off with a three-year suspended sentence, a two-month rehab order and a place on the Sex Offenders’ Register. We’ve all been following the case for over a year. Un-fucking-believable! The man needs to be skinned alive and fried while he was still screaming.