Lies Like Love

LEO

The fact that he'd asked her to come inside, drink tea, eat cake, didn't actually mean he liked her any more than he liked anyone else. Leo walked back from seeing them home to the Grange, ready for Sue's teasing; he knew exactly what she was going to say. That he'd never brought a girl home before, that he'd fussed over her like she was a delicate flower. Leo stopped, turned, looked behind him. That place. The smell of it came to him again: damp, cold. Like something had recently died there. They must have got the rent cheap, that'd be what it was.

He would walk home with her. That would be fine. If he had to have a friend, well, why not her? And the fact that he liked watching her face and her eyes shift and change. Well. He couldn't help that, could he?

His mum called when he got in and Sue passed the phone, turning back to her crossword.

'Hey, Mum, how's it going?' Leo rested his legs on the table and Sue batted them with her paper.

'Leo. We're well. And you?'

'Fine, all good here.' He winked at Sue and she sighed: she'd berate him later, looking over the top of her half-moon specs, for being offhand. Then instantly forget it.

'Excellent. I was thinking about you today - we went to a wonderful concert and it made me miss you. Miss your playing.'

'Oh.' And then she was off on one about the piano concerto, one he'd played when he was thirteen and what a talent he had and how sad she was that it was going unused. All the money that had been spent on lessons, the hours of practice, blah blah blah. Leo could see it now. In his dinner jacket, bum fluff on his upper lip, his Adam's apple bobbing, stiff as a board, taking his applause, Mum in her black evening dress, elegant in the front row. Thank God he was out of it. Maybe he could interrupt, tell her about Audrey. See what she thought. But he stopped himself. He knew what she'd say. No. She could dismiss another human being in just one damning syllable, easy as that. Not our sort of people.

'So, I'll be back at half-term. And you'll come up to London. All right, darling?'

'Yeah, looking forward to it, Mum.'

'Yes, not yeah.' She spoke with a cut-glass accent. Used to swipe him one when he copied the children in the park near their London flat. Leo liked voices, sounds, the weirder the better and Audrey's voice was rustling leaves. It scratched at something in him, made him feel like sitting down to listen, although she'd said almost nothing, her eyes full stops. 'Yes, Mother,' Leo countered with a dramatic sigh. 'Good," she said. "Lots of love then, darling.'

'Love you too, Mum.' Why would you say that, aged seventeen? Leo did though, always.

'You too, darling. Now go and do something extremely useful. Right?'

'Sure.' Whatever, he thought when he put the phone down. His mum clearly hadn't been listening when Graham said no pressure.

Sue didn't have a piano and she didn't give a damn about his exams either, seemed to forget he had a whole raft of modules coming up in January. The word homework didn't even belong in her vocabulary. No doubt his mother would make up for that when he saw her next month. He'd have to take ear plugs.

Maybe tomorrow he'd tell Audrey about the fair and see if she was up for it. And if not that, then something else. Graham was right - he did need friends.