Until Harry(30)

My mother whimpered. “You are not. You’re beau—”

“Don’t,” I wailed. “Don’t lie to me. I ha-have braces, I have gl-glasses, I have acne, and I’m fat. I’m ev-everything they said I was. I’m an ugly cow. I want to die!”

“Lochlan!” my father’s voice shouted as my brother ran out of my room. “Where are you going?”

“To get those little bitches here to fix this!” Lochlan replied, his voice a bellow.

“Oh, shit. He’s going to the O’Leary house,” Layton hissed, then ran out of my bedroom after our brother.

“Goddammit. Take care of her – I’ll be back soon.” My father ran out of the room after my brothers.

When they were gone, I fully turned into my mother’s embrace and buried myself against her. I held onto her as my body trembled. I felt so bad about myself, and I didn’t know how to deal with it. I had never given my appearance much thought, but Anna was right: if I ever wanted a boyfriend, I would have to “look the part”. The only problem was, I had no idea what that meant.

“Why did Anna and Ally say those mean and untrue things to you?” my mother asked as she continued to rock us from side to side.

I sniffled. “Anna, she told me Kale was cu-cute, and she wanted him to be her b-b-boyfriend. I told her it wasn’t a good i-idea because he was older. I told her he was almost a man, and we w-were still girls. She didn’t care though, so I-I called her stupid,” I said, quickly adding, “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to call her that. It just sl-slipped out.”

“It’s okay, she is stupid for saying those things to you,” my mother assured me. “It’s all going to be okay.”

She continued to hold me, and before I knew it, I’d closed my eyes and slipped into an unsettled slumber. I awoke sometime later with my blanket pulled up over my body and my glasses removed. I reached out to my bedside table, picked up my glasses and slid them on. I was tired and wondered why I’d woken up, but when I heard voices downstairs, I realised I must have heard his voice in my sleep, and my body reacted by waking up.

I sat up and switched my lamp on. It was dark outside. One look at the clock on my wall and I groaned. It was after 8 p.m. I’d slept for hours, which meant I was going to be awake all night and be miserable in the morning when I got up for school.

The thought of school, and Anna and Ally in my class, made me feel ill. I decided then that I wasn’t going; I would persuade my parents to let me stay off since it was a Friday. I needed the entire weekend to figure out what I was going to do about my appearance.

I needed to think.

I looked at my door when I heard footsteps come up the stairs. I tilted my head to the side and focused on my door. It was closed and looked fine, but the panel that surrounded the lock was gone.

My father had kicked it off.

“Lane?” my mother’s voice called out softly as she knocked on my door. “Honey, Kale is here. He would like to see you.”

“Why?” I shouted at the closed door. “Why would he want to look at me?”

Seconds went by until his voice spoke. “Can I come in, Lane?”

Never.

“No, I don’t ever want to talk to you or see you again, Kale Hunt! You’re a liar!” I screamed, and lay back down on my bed, turning over to face my wall.

I was hurt, embarrassed and mad.

I was mad that Kale had never told me I was fat and ugly. He was supposed to be my best friend. We told each other everything. So why hadn’t he ever told me something so important?

Why did he lie to me? I thought hopelessly.

I sat on my bed and remained quiet until I heard their footsteps walk away from my bedroom and descend the stairs. I waited a further five minutes before I stood up from my bed.

I didn’t want to leave my room, but I needed to go to the toilet.

I walked over to my door slowly and carefully pulled the damaged wood open, wincing when the damaged hinges creaked. I hesitated, but then quickly pulled it open very fast, hoping the noise would be kept to a minimum. I was right: the door didn’t make much noise, but it didn’t matter if it did or not; he still would have heard. Sitting next to my room with his back against the hallway wall didn’t leave much room for him to miss anything.

“Go away, Kale,” I said, and stepped over his legs and walked down the hallway and into the bathroom.

He didn’t reply to me, didn’t make a single noise, and that irked me.

I relieved myself in the bathroom, and when I was cleaning myself up at the sink, I made a point not to look up into the mirror. I didn’t want to see what everyone else was forced to look at.